Free City of the Dead by Rosemary Jones Page B

lost inside the City of the Dead,” she told him.
    Skirting around a large and rather foreboding marble tomb, the roof overhung with grim gargoyles carved from dark red granite, they came upon a memorial statue of a woman in full armor, weeping into her hands. Sophraea stared into the little basin of clear water at the statue’s feet. An old memory stirred. “I know this place,” she said.
    The long-legged wizard twisted around. “I swear that bush over there moved,” he said.
    “Don’t be ridiculous.”
    “No, it moved, it changed position.”
    “What?”
    Gustin cocked his head to one side. “Interesting. See, it was all bunched up there. Now it’s longer, with a pointy bit at the very end over there. Sophraea?”
    “Hmm?” She knew, in that strange way that she’d always known exactly where she was in the City of the Dead, that they were too far south of the place where she had first seen the light. That was more north and west of their present location, near that small tomb where she first met Lord Adarbrent. “Brick and mortar,” said Sophraea out loud, fixing the location in her mind. “With a bronze door.”
    “Sophraea,” Gustin sounded much more insistent. “Do you see shapes in bushes?”
    “What are you talking about?
    “Shapes in bushes, like you see shapes in clouds?”
    “I don’t know. Sometimes you see faces in the shrubbery here, shadows of things that have gone. Ignore it.”
    “No, I mean that bush really looks like a tail, a big long twitching tail and that bit… that round big bit… that looks like a hind leg ending in a large clawed foot.”
    Sophraea glanced over her shoulder at the dark green hedge surrounding a round memorial, a simple pillar polished and carved to look like a storm-blasted tree. The hedge obscured the carving, but Sophraea pushed aside the leaves to look at details, she could see the stone cut in the shape of bark and broken branches protruding from the trunk.
    “This is really old, probably one of Fidelity’s, for somebody famous, I just don’t remember the name,” she said to Gustin, circling the hedge to find an opening. When she came to an open place, she crossed the winter-browned lawn to examine the stone tree more closely. A druid, she thought, the family used to carve tombstones like this for druids but there weren’t many inside the graveyard walls.
    “Sophraea, I think the bush is moving again,” said Gustin.
    “It’s just a hedge, they used to plant hedges like this around certain gravesites, mostly to keep people from getting too close,”
    said Sophraea, moving closer to take a better look. Moss covered a metal plaque set halfway up the trunk of the stone tree.
    “I swear that bit looks like a snout, a dragons snout,” said Gustin.
    “Where?”
    “That bit hanging over your head.”
    Sophraea looked up. The wizard was right. The long leafy branches overhanging her head looked amazingly like a long nose. Whiffs of mist clung to the branches, giving the impression of smoke curling up from a dragon’s nostrils. Smooth, curved thorns resembled fangs. The longer she stared, the more teeth seemed to appear, rather as if a large mouth was opening wide above her head.
    “Sophraea!” Gustin yelled. The wizard rushed forward, only to be swatted aside by the twiggy spikes of the creature’s tail.
    Sophraea leaped away from the hedge as the giant jaw snapped closed above her. As she stumbled .backward, a leafy paw sprang out and caught the edge of her cloak. She tripped.and fell. The shrubbery pounced on her like a large cat on a very small mouse.

SEVEN
    Sophraea squirmed under the leafy paw holding her effortlessly down. The pressure was firm on her back but not painful. She pushed her hands into the muddy ground and shoved back. Twigs and branches curled around her, flipping her over effortlessly.
    Sophraea blinked at the long and definitely draconic face looming above her. “Let me up!” she commanded.
    The creature curled up its