The Three Furies (Erec Rex) (55 page)

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"It's the end of everything now, looks like," Erec said. "If it had been me, I would have figured out a way to keep her little brother really safe. Not whiling my time away playing with a scepter. Or you could have at least used the scepter to do something good, like keeping Bethany
and
her brother safe."

"Erec, June is right. It's complicated. When you come here we'll talk, and I'll see if I can help you understand--"

"I'm not coming." Erec crossed his arms.

The king looked distraught. "Of course you are. All of you. We'll spend our last days together. Bethany too. And I hope you'll forgive me, and try to understand what I was thinking."

"I will never forgive you. Let's start there. And I will not be spending my last days there. I'm going to get my quest. And, if these are our last days, I'll be spending my time actually trying to do something about that." He switched off the e-mail and walked out of the room.

After a while of sitting alone in bed, trying to calm himself, Bethany walked in and sat next to him. Erec expected her to defend his father, like she had so many times in the past, and he didn't want to hear it. But instead she sat silently, staring at her feet.

"I can't believe he did that to you."

When he raised his eyes, he was surprised to see tears rolling down her face. She nodded. "I know."

Erec dropped his head onto his knees. Of course, this news would be even harder on her than on him. She had thought of Piter as her own father. He was all she had, with both of her parents dead. And he had sold her down the river. Erec's fists clenched. How
dare
he do this to Bethany? What must she feel like now? She had lived with Earl Evirly for all of those years--him not loving her, just taking advantage of her. And now King Piter proved to be no better.

Erec put his arm around her shoulders, which made her cry

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harder. He wished he knew the right thing to say. "I'm sorry, Bethany."

She laughed through her tears. "Stop it. You sound like Jam."

They both cracked up for a minute, then Bethany hugged her knees. Erec smiled at her. "You know what really matters, Bethany? You do have a real family. Pi loves you, and your new brother will too, once we find him. And we will find him, okay? I'll make sure of that. And you also have me. I mean, I know I'm not your family or anything. But I'll do anything for you. Who cares about what King Piter thinks? He's my real father--and I don't even want him. I'm officially giving him up. So neither of us have parents now. We're even."

Bethany looked at him out of the corner of her eye, a smile forming on her cheeks. "You have June, still."

"Yeah." Erec pondered that. "I guess the jury's still out on her. Not sure if I'm forgiving her for this one."

"I have. It wasn't her fault, really. Think of all the other things King Piter told her not to talk about, like who you really were, and Danny and Sammy. Those were all for good reasons. So she thought she had to listen." Bethany shrugged.

"I guess so. It'll take me a little time to get used to that, but you're probably right. I still have another mother to find too--my birth mother. She's around somewhere, I just know it."

"We'll find her, too. Your birth mother, my younger brother, and your missing triplet siblings. Guess we have our work cut out." She laughed.

It was good to see Bethany smile again. "Yeah. But you know the first thing I have to do, don't you?"

Bethany looked like she didn't want to hear the answer.

"I'm getting the next quest," Erec said firmly. "I have to find out what it is. Maybe there is an easy thing I can do that would make all of the difference with the Furies. I'm going to pull the quest out and see what it says, that's all. Then I'll decide what to do."

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She was troubled, but she understood. "That sounds reasonable. Except it is so hard to get your quests now. Didn't you say you had to have a dragon fly you there last time?"

"Yup. Little Erec," Erec said, cracking a smile. "You've got to meet him. He's gotten so big since we saved him."

"Since
you
saved him. You always share all the credit with everyone."

"No, I don't."

She winked at him. "That's what I like about you."

"Okay, then. Maybe I do." A grin spread over his face.

"So, are you going to call Patchouli and Little Erec to help you get to Al's Well again?"

"I don't know. It was really dangerous last time. I don't want little Erec to get shot. There has to be another way."

He racked his brain. How else could he get into the Labor Society? Guards were posted everywhere, waiting for him. Even if he slipped through the front door, he couldn't get into Al's Well that way. Only the side door, where Janus was, gave him access to where he needed to go. And that door was crowded with armed guards.

Last time he had dropped from the sky on a dragon's back. Too bad he couldn't bring a cloudy thought on and sprout wings. Even if he did, how would he get back again? Turn on another cloudy thought and fly home?

"Wait a minute," Bethany said. "Remember that time you got flushed out of Al's Well into those water tunnels, and you ended up in the castle pool table?"

Erec sat up straight. That was the answer!

"Too bad that pool table is gone," Bethany said.

"But the water tunnel that led to it is still there. It's outside my father's house, in the gardens. He made it into a pool. That's perfect! I'll go in and try to find my way back to Al's Well." As he said that,

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he remembered how easy it was to get lost inside those tunnels.

"I'll go with you! That will be fun."

He was glad she volunteered to come. "All right. We're the only two who can do it, with our Instagills. Why not?"

"First thing in the morning, then?"

"We're on."

June didn't say much when they left, but her eyes were teary. Erec decided that he had forgiven her and gave her a hug. "We're just going to draw the sixth quest from the well and see what it is. It doesn't mean I'm going to do it."

"Be careful."

Erec was relieved to find nobody in his father's house. It occurred to him that Mrs. Smith would no longer be hounding them, now that her king and queen were restored to power. So, she really was a clown. That explained her strange looks a lot.

They weren't planning to go outside Alypium, so no coats were in order. Erec pointed out the window. "That's the pool. You ready?"

Bethany nodded. The two of them raced outside and jumped in. As soon as he submerged, Erec felt the Instagills open in his wrists. After a moment to adjust, he was breathing underwater like a fish. It felt great to be swimming. The water streamed around him, warm and comfortable.

"Here's the hole." He pointed at an opening at the bottom a few feet wide.

"Let's go!" Erec could hear Bethany almost as well as when they were on land. She was watching the little gills opening and closing in her palms with amazement. Then she dove toward the hole in the bottom. Erec followed her. It had been a while since he had been in these water passages, but it all came right back to him. Even though they were underground, an unseen light source filled the tunnels.

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Openings branched off in several directions, leading to more tunnels and more openings. He remembered that a few led up into lakes, or even puddles or swamps. But no markings showed which way to go, so they just looked into a few as they passed by. Nothing looked like it led up into a well.

Regardless, it was fun swimming together. After a few kicks to send him in one direction a current took over, pushing him along that way, and then all he had to do was float while it carried him. For fun, Bethany kicked herself upward, down, then backward, just to make the current around her change and send her different ways.

"We can't go too far away," she said. "Al's Well is in Alypium. If we swim too long in any one direction, we should turn back again."

"That makes sense. The only problem is that this current is carrying us faster than you'd think. Remember how quickly we got out near an ocean last time?"

"Ooh--you're right." Bethany stopped going forward and swam in circles. "It is hard to judge how far we're going."

A few fish swam by, making Erec wonder if they were near a lake. They turned and plunged into a tunnel that led up and into a stream in the wilderness. He popped his head above water and gasped for breath as his body adjusted to the air.

"Look!" Overhead, two dragons soared through the air. One was a reddish purple, and the smaller one a deeper green.

Bethany choked slightly on the water. "Next time I'm staying under until I know where we are." She coughed until her breathing was clear. "We must be in Otherness somewhere. Oh, Erec. We're completely lost. I should have known this would happen in these tunnels."

"I wish there was a map." Erec shivered. "Let's go back down. It feels warmer and a lot better when my Instagills are out."

It was clear that they were well lost. Erec wished he had brought

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his backpack with the Serving Tray. It would have been nice to get a snack. And that way there was no pressure to find a place to stay. Sleeping underwater sounded strange, but it would probably be comfortable.

They meandered a while, starting to feel hopeless, and then Bethany pointed toward a flutter of activity. "Look! Something is going on over there." They swam close enough to see fish flurrying around something that looked like a treasure chest. Erec spied a flash of greenish hair and an arm. As they drifted closer, however, something huge rushed at them, teeth bared.

"Eek!" Bethany and Erec kicked hard and darted away from whatever it was. Luckily, the creature did not chase them. After they were far enough away, it went back to whatever dark corner it lived in.

"I'm about ready to call it a day," Erec said as they floated farther in an unknown direction. "What do you think?"

Bethany frowned. "I don't know. Look over there."

Erec turned to an odd sight. A very tall, thin man, with large gills waving from both sides of his neck, stood completely still in a wide alcove. Gray hair fluttered around his head in the water, and he watched them with a grave look on his face. His clothing, a blue camouflage one-piece suit, looked odd--not that Erec would expect to see any certain style of clothing on someone who lived underwater. Nonetheless, Erec was quite relieved to see someone who might help them find their way around.

They swam over to the man. "Hello," Erec said. "I'm afraid we're lost. Can you point us in the direction of Alypium, please?"

The man cleared his throat. His voice was goofy, and he extended all of his vowels a great deal and screeched sharply. "Excuse me? Are you just barging in here? Can't you see that we're having some important festivities right now? If you don't mind coming back in

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an hour or so, I think we'd be more inclined to help you then."

Erec and Bethany looked at each other. Nobody else was around that they could see.

"Sir," Bethany said gently. "We would love to come back later, but we're very tired and need to get home soon. Is there a way you could tell us now, if you know where Alypium is from here?"

"Oh, very well." He rolled his eyes. "I may deign to help you two gentlemen. But first I must confer with my fellow villagers. Do you mind waiting a moment?"

"Of course," she said.

The man turned so that he was facing away from them and continued to remain stock still. In a few moments he turned back. "We decided that you must pass a test, if you want help to find your way back. I know how to get all over the place. But I'm going to ask you each two very difficult questions. If you answer correctly, then I will take you wherever you want to go in the tunnels in Alypium. But if you
don't
. . ." He leaned forward, leering menacingly.

"Yes?" Erec said. "If we don't, then what?"

"
Then
. . . I will drown you in massive quantities of water!"

Erec looked at the water all around them, deciding that the guy was certifiably crazy. But they had nothing to lose. "Okay. Can we help each other with the answers?"

The man nodded. "You will have to. The questions are extremely difficult."

"Okay." Erec nodded. "Go ahead, then."

"You first." He pointed at Erec. "Your first question: What . . . is my favorite supper?"

Erec looked around, dumbfounded. "Um . . . fish?"

"Correct. You may live for question number two."

"Phew!" Erec shot Bethany a bewildered look. "Okay."

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"Your second question is: If
e
to the
i
-
x
equals the cosine of
x
plus
i
times the sine of
x
,
i
being the imaginary unit, then how can you represent a point,
z
, in the complex plane?"

Erec froze, but Bethany chuckled as if the man had asked what two plus two was. Erec rolled his hand out toward her, hoping she would take over.

Which she happily did. "Euler's formula--so basic it's beautiful. Simple, really.
i
is the square root of negative one, of course. That used to be my favorite number! And it's kind of a trick question, so shame on you. Because if you want to express
z
in Cartesian coordinates it could be done simply, say as
z
equals
x
plus
i
-
y
, or
z
equals
x
minus
i
-
y
. But integrating Euler's formula you can express
z
in polar coordinates. Which then would be the absolute value of
z
times the sum of the cosine of theta plus
i
times the sine of theta, which equals the absolute value of
z
times
e
to the
i
-theta. And so on."

The man nodded at her, entirely unimpressed. "Correct." He rolled his
r
s for a long time. Erec wondered if the man actually knew the correct answer or not. Bethany's response was so enthusiastic that it was hard to doubt her.

"Now your turn, sir." The man turned to Bethany, who looked slightly annoyed at being called "sir." "Your first question is: What . . . is your name?"

Bethany laughed with relief. "Bethany Cleary."

"And second . . . how do you spell it?"

She started to say, "
B
. . .
E
. . .
T
--"

But Erec shouted over her, "No!" They both looked at him--Bethany's eyes wide with surprise--as he said, "
I
. . .
T
!"

The man pointed at Erec. "Correct again! You have passed your test. So now I will guide you. Where did you say you wanted to go again? Directly under the famous geyser of Granitsia? Well, follow me,