“Careful there,” Jake warned. “Don’t want to be touching that.”

He dropped the stone back into his pack and got a better look at the little beast, noting the smaller wings near its sharp tail, the featherlike spines of its cowl. It looked strangely familiar—which had to be impossible.

Then he remembered.

Hadn’t he seen such a creature drawn on the metal plate back at the royal pyramid: a winged serpent biting its own tail? What had Shaduf called it?

A wisling.

The beast panted, its tiny forked tongue flickering. Clearly the wisling was exhausted by its wild flight. Tiny eyes, like black crystals, studied Jake’s face. Its head cocked to one side; its body twisted into a question mark.

“I have just as many questions about you,” Jake said softly, lifting a hand carefully.

With a hiss, the wisling lunged and bit him, stabbing its fangs deep into the meat of Jake’s thumb. Then it vanished. Literally. One second it was there, the next it was gone.

“What the—?”

Jake searched, shaking his hand, sprinkling drops of blood. Was the snake poisonous? He squeezed out more drops, but he felt no burning, no telltale sting of a toxin.

“I’m sorry!” he called out.

Then something strangled him. Appearing out of nowhere, it slithered around his neck. Jake came close to ripping the beast away with his nails, but then a familiar buzz of wings tickled his left ear. A small face rose in front of him, close enough for its tiny tongue to brush his eyelashes.

Jake kept dead still, afraid to move.

The head brushed against his cheek, then the body curled more snugly around his neck. The wings folded and tucked smoothly away.

“Okay …” Jake whispered. “Guess you’re staying with me.”

With great care, Jake collected his pack and his torch. He headed to the far tunnel and climbed its steep path. The fresh breeze drew him forward, but along the way, a few crossroads confounded him. Still, whenever he took the wrong path, the coils around his neck tightened. That was warning enough. Jake knew to take heed.

After another quarter hour of hiking, Jake stumbled out of the darkness into a bright early evening. The sun had set, but the skies to the west were still rosy.

“Jake!”

He turned to see Marika rushing toward him. Pindor and Bach’uuk followed her. He backed away, fearful of how the wisling would respond. It uncurled from his neck, hissing, then shot straight up. Jake craned, searching for the creature; but it was gone, lost in the dark. He touched his throat, feeling oddly naked—and oddly disappointed.

Then friends crashed into him.

“You made it out alive!” Pindor shouted.

Jake kept staring up. “Did you see …?” He made a wiggling motion with his arm, shooting it up in the air.

“What?” Marika asked.

Bach’uuk gave him a worried look, as if Jake had lost his mind.