Must Love Hellhounds

year is it? I left in 1937.”
    “The year here wouldn’t be the same as the year it was when you left,” Clovache said. “We are Britlingens.”
    The woman’s face stayed blank.
    Batanya said, “You seem to have been caught up in some event, or some magic, unknown to us.”
    The woman took a deep, shuddering breath. “What year was it when you were last on Earth?” she asked, as if not quite certain she wanted to know the answer.
    “Ah . . . well past your time,” Clovache said. She glanced across Narcissus’s cell to Batanya. “After 2000, anyway, though I’m not sure I ever noticed what year it was.” She shrugged. “We knew we weren’t going to be there long.”
    “It was in the 2000s,” Batanya agreed.
    “I can’t understand this,” the woman said quietly. “I must be insane.”
    “What’s your name?” Batanya asked. Maybe a change of topic would break the woman’s black mood.
    “Amelia Earhart.” She glanced from Batanya to Clovache as if, despite everything, she thought they might recognize her name. She and Narcissus had that in common, anyway.
    When Amelia saw that the two Britlingens hadn’t heard of her, she shrugged. Then her whole posture stiffened as the prisoners all heard a sound approaching the big door that was supposed to seal off the cells, though the guards had left it open. It was a sort of scratchy, snuffly sound. “Ah, the dogs,” Amelia said. “It must be almost dinnertime.”
    “Dogs?” Batanya said hoarsely, at almost the same moment that Clovache said, “What kind of dogs?”
    “They’re large,” Narcissus said. He was taking a break from staring at his reflection. He was polishing his mirror with the hem of his tunic.
    “Large!” Amelia laughed, the first normal sound they’d heard in this place. “They’re giants!”
    Two huge black hounds came through the doorway and began sniffing down the corridor. They had short, shining fur, pointed ears, and long, thin tails. Their mouths were open and their long pink tongues were lolling out, providing a sharp color contrast to their sharp white fangs and their glowing red eyes.
    Batanya pressed herself as far back in her cell as she could go, unless she could gouge a niche in the stone wall. She managed to say, “Do they let the dogs come into the cells?” Dogs! It would be dogs! Why couldn’t the prison level be guarded by hydras, or gargoyles? Anything besides dogs.
    “No,” Narcissus said. The dogs swung their heads toward him and took a tentative step closer to the bars of his cell. With a complete disregard for the long, sharp teeth and the demonic eyes, Narcissus moved to the front of the cell and stretched his hand between the bars. The fearsome beasts took a big sniff, and the one nearer Narcissus let the young man scratch his head.
    The three women stared at this, and Narcissus smiled. “Even dogs are attracted to me,” he said happily. “But you know, I love them, too.”
    Batanya shuddered when she thought of some of the things she’d seen in her travels. She hoped the bars remained in place, for Narcissus’s sake. “Attracted” could translate in many ways.
    After a moment, the hounds seemed to lose interest in Narcissus and resumed their prowl down the corridor. The red eyes fixed on each prisoner in turn, and a growl began rumbling through their chests as they came to Batanya’s cell. Her face was set in the clenched expression of someone completely determined not to show what she was feeling, but she was pale and sweating.
    “Just stay back from the bars,” Clovache said, keeping her voice smooth and calm with a huge effort. “They can’t get you. They’re just reacting to your . . .” Clovache couldn’t bring herself to say the word in connection to her senior.
    Batanya understood her, though, and she said it herself. “Yes, they smell my fear.” She hated this, hated herself for feeling it. Hated having a weakness. You’re a warrior, she told herself. That was years ago. You’re too old to feel this, now.
    Both the hounds thrust their heads against the bars of her cell, and they began to bay. It was like nothing she’d ever heard. It took every ounce of grit she had to keep her knees stiff. Two human guards came rushing down the corridor to check out the hounds’ agitation. The hounds were by now so excited that they wheeled and leaped toward the guards, who were completely taken by surprise. Both men were armed with a form of gun, but before the stocky man on