Christopher Golden - Tears of the Furies

They had to find another way. For now, following the train was the only solution. Their greatest concern was that she might throw herself from the train and disappear into the countryside or some village along the Aegean. There was also the possibility that they might actually overtake the train and manage to be waiting for it when it pulled into Corinth.

But with Clay behind the wheel, that seemed a distant hope. He drove like an old lady. Back home Squire had rigged Conan Doyle’s limo with foot blocks on the brake and accelerator so his short legs could reach. He loved to drive… and he loved to drive fast. It was torture for him to sit in the passenger seat.

They had driven through Megara a while back. Now the road had swung far enough south that the blue-green shimmer of the Aegean was visible, like some ancient paradise beckoning them to abandon the modern world.

"It’s beautiful, isn’t it?" Clay said, glancing out his window.

"Absolutely. So nice that we have time to appreciate the wonders of the Mediterranean. For Christ’s sake, just drive the fucking car! If you stop sightseeing, we might actually catch up to her."

He wanted something fried to eat. Onion rings, yeah, that would be perfect.

Clay gave him a sidelong glance, accelerating to a speed at which the car began to shudder. The shapeshifter grunted in amusement, but he wore a fond smile.

"Don’t take it out on me because you’re too short to drive."

The ghost of Dr. Graves drifted forward from the back seat, moving his head between them and glancing at Squire. "Need I remind you, my friend, that you have the advantage of being solid?"

"Oh, so now we’re trying to top each other’s miseries? Next Captain Quint’s gonna show us his shark bite."

But Graves was right. He liked being solid, and not just because it meant he could drive a car. There were a few other of his favorite things he needed flesh and bone to do. Eating was up there, but it wasn’t number one. Much as he hated to admit it to himself, the ghost had given him some perspective.

Squire glanced at Clay again and grumbled. "Just drive."

The engine whined loudly, as though under the hood was not an ordinary car engine but something swapped out from a Honda motorcycle. Traffic was sparse and for all of Squire’s complaints, Clay was driving fast. The road hummed under the tires.

The hobgoblin reached out and clicked on the radio. He scanned the stations, finding a lot of static and too many voices speaking Greek. At one point he paused on a familiar song, Bruce Springsteen’s "Born to Run," but the reception was for crap, fading in and out, sounding muffled and tinny, and he gave up, cursing.

"Greek radio," he muttered.

"Yeah," Clay agreed. "You don’t get a lot of international pop stars out of Greece."

Squire snorted. "Exactly."

The hobgoblin punched the radio off with a stubby, leathery finger.

"Well, gentlemen," said the ghost in the back seat, "as much as I hate to miss a moment of this scintillating conversation, I think I ought to check on the train’s progress again."

Squire sighed and crossed his arms. "Yeah, well, I don’t see you jumping in with the funny anecdotes, Doc. I need to get one of them Game Boys. Or, hey, either of you guys know Mad-Libs? What I wouldn’t give for a Mad-Libs right now. I’m a riot with those things."

There was silence from the back seat. After a moment Squire frowned and twisted around to glance behind him, expecting to see the familiar features of Dr. Graves. Squire had to hand it to the guy, the 1940s adventurer look really worked for him. Tall, dark, and handsome, all that shit. Only problem was, he was too serious.

He was also gone.

"Son of a bitch," Squire muttered, shooting a glance at Clay behind the wheel. "Now that’s just downright rude. Here I am talking and he just… poof!"

Clay nodded. "Ghosts do that."

"Fucking ghosts."

"Sometimes Leonard just needs to be on his own," Clay added. He reached up a hand and brushed back his brown hair, fingers pushing through the single, odd patch of white. It wasn’t his real hair, or his real face for that matter, just the one he used the most often. Squire was not completely sure Clay had a real face, unless it was the formidable shape he often took in battle, the hairless, dried-earth creature that seemed made of actual clay.

"Still, he could have said something," Squire replied.

Graves had gone to check on the progress of the train eight or ten times already. They had agreed at the outset that he would not try to locate Medusa on the train, or to engage her. Clay could have shapeshifted into a falcon or something even faster on the wing and caught up with the train as well. If Squire knew where he was going along the shadow paths he probably could have found the train — saving them all the trouble of traveling in this crappy car and the uncertainty of their pursuit of the Gorgon — but he’d never been aboard the train, and it was in motion, and it might have taken him ages to find the right shadow. Never mind that he’d have to carry along all of the nets and weapons he’d gathered to catch Medusa. And they had agreed it was wiser if they were together when they located her again.

It soured Squire’s outlook considerably, knowing he was holding them back.

The road curved northward and soon they lost their view of the Aegean. Only then did Squire realize how much he had appreciated it. The sea was the only thing worth looking at from the road. Sure, they had seen little villages sprawled on either side of the highway, but there was not much chance to appreciate them while whipping past them at eighty miles per hour. The isthmus that connected Athens and its surroundings with the Peloponnese was a part of Greece that deserved a more casual approach. Squire would much rather have been meandering through seaside villages, sampling the local cuisine at each stop. At that moment a piece of spinach pie would have gone down very nicely.

But from the highway, and without the gleaming Aegean to remind them of their location, the landscape could have been a hundred other places.

Squire glanced at Clay. He was intent on the road, hands at ten o’clock and two o’clock like the poster boy for auto school. But the shapeshifter’s eyes kept moving, checking the rearview mirror. Every couple of minutes he would lean to one side and try to get a view of the sky out of his window. He wasn’t looking for the ghost of Dr. Graves.

"He can’t fly," Squire told him.

"Who?" Clay asked.

"Who? The guy who’s got you so antsy. The reason none of us had been that talkative. Got you spooked, didn’t he, with his dirt from the Doc’s grave and whatever that thing was he did to you. Not only is he watching out for Medusa, protecting her, but he was expecting us."

For a long moment, Clay said nothing. Squire realized that he must really be a little spooked. That didn’t sit well with the hobgoblin after all. Clay was… he didn’t like to think about what and who Clay was. And if he was nervous -

"Hey, I killed the idiot once," Squire added. "We can do it again."

A car whipped by them on the highway doing nearly a hundred miles an hour, judging by how quickly it passed them. Neither of them bothered to comment. Clay gave Squire a sidelong glance.

"Over time I’ve learned that anybody who comes back to life after you kill them is usually much harder to finish off the second time around."

Squire rolled his eyes. "Yeah, yeah. You’re a font of wisdom. I’m just saying he’s maybe hard to kill, but that doesn’t make him special."

"All right, then tell me about him. Tassarian. How did you kill him the first time?"

The hobgoblin grinned. He leaned back in his seat and put his boots up on the dashboard. "Now that’s a memory I cherish."