Meg - Summons Cab

“What now?” I asked, really hoping Meg had an answer.

From her belt pouches, Meg fished out the item Lu had given her: a shiny golden Roman coin. Despite everything we’d just been through, I detected a gleam of excitement in my young friend’s eyes.

“Now I summon a ride,” she said.

With a cold flush of dread, I understood what she was talking about. I realized why Luguselwa had given her that coin, and part of me wished I had thrown the Gaul a few more blocks.

“Oh, no,” I pleaded. “You can’t mean them. Not them!”

“They’re great,” Meg insisted.

“No, they are not great! They’re awful!”

“Maybe don’t tell them that,” Meg said, then she threw the coin into the street and yelled in Latin, “Stop, O Chariot of Damnation!”

***

The Tower of Nero, Chapter 6

***

CALL ME SUPERSTITIOUS. IF YOU’RE GOING to hail a chariot, you should at least try for one that doesn’t have damnation right there in the name.

Meg’s coin hit the pavement and disappeared in a flash. Instantly, a car-size section of asphalt liquefied into a boiling pool of blood and tar. (At least that’s what it looked like. I did not test the ingredients.)

A taxi erupted from the goo like a submarine breaking the surface. It was similar to a standard New York cab, but gray instead of yellow: the color of dust, or tombstones, or probably my face at that moment. Painted across the door were the words GRAY SISTERS. Inside, sitting shoulder to shoulder across the driver’s bench, were the three old hags (excuse me, the three mature female siblings) themselves.

The passenger-side window rolled down. The sister riding shotgun stuck out her head and croaked, “Passage? Passage?”

She was just as lovely as I remembered: a face like a rubber Halloween mask, sunken craters where her eyes should have been, and a cobweb-and-linen shawl over her bristly white hair.

“Hello, Tempest.” I sighed. “It’s been a while.”

***

The Tower of Nero, Chapter 7