The sun is hot, brilliant, and Juvelyn stands beside me in a pair of shorts and a t-shirt, both of which are soaking wet. She's wearing a swimsuit under her clothes, but Philippine modesty dictates that she remain covered, so she's wearing shorts and a shirt over the new bikini I bought her. We're at a house in Barangay Valladolid, in one of the Philippines' central islands. It's a nice house, owned by a Filipino couple who work overseas and rent out their nice pool to visitors during the day, like Juvy and I, during their absence. I'm in my swimsuit, dripping wet, and I realize I need to get out of the sun because although I'm Italian, my family is from Naples, and I don't tan.

Juvy and I are standing on a concrete platform with a view of the luxurious swim pool, and a nice house with a tiled roof, surrounded by huts with tin roofs, or thatch roofs, with undernourished dogs roaming muddy streets, a highway at the end of the neighborhood, and mangrove trees on a mud flat beside us, leading to the ocean.

Juvy's hair is wet, yet still wavy, and falls down her caramel-colored shoulders. I see beads of water shine on her back like glass bits in a kaleidoscope, and her dark eyes are beautiful.

I lock eyes with a lizard the size of a dog, with a long tail and a narrow snout. I've never seen a lizard that large in my life. The lizard goes rigid for a moment, then races toward the water at full speed. The lizard throws forward one front leg and one rear leg, then switches, running with a swinging gait that is surprisingly fast as it dashes across the mud flat. The huge lizard winds its way between the spindly black roots of the mangroves resembling sticks thrust into the mud, and splashes into the ocean.

“What was that?” I ask Juvelyn.

“We call it halo.” She pronounces it like “hah-low.” “You can eat it. It taste like a chicken.”

Some time later I found out a water monitor lizard doesn't taste like chicken—it's much better than that.

* * *

The day watch are running toward me with upraised pole weapons, including the odd long sandbag, which is an unusual weapon, but a highly effective one, resulting in the English phrase, “got sandbagged.” Like the halo I saw in the Philippines, I turn and race for the ocean. I scramble madly on all fours, trailing blood over the streets, dashing past the bars with obese hookers and wannabe snake people, winding around a drunk who's staggered outside to vomit.

I don't let up until I hit the sand, and even then I'm pushing with all I've got. I figure if I black out I can at least float.

I hit the water with a splash, My exultation at leaving the day watch far behind and reaching the safety of the ocean is suddenly replaced by the agony of every cut on my body screaming in pain as the salt water stings. I lock my jaw and force my head underwater for a moment, swimming beneath the surface and moving down the beach, trying to escape the eyes of the city guard. I trail blood in the water like an old car belching diesel smoke, but I want a shark to attack me because I feel like killing something. The burning sensation makes me painfully aware of the cuts all over my body, some of them from the projectiles, a good gash in the lower belly from a broken excrement bottle, and maybe a few from knives or swords that couldn't quite land solidly, but it's all a blur.

Dammit, it stings like crazy, so I console myself with the thought that the salt water is an antiseptic cleansing my wounds. Still, I'd rather not have a dozen cuts that need to be cleansed.

My leg is sore, I think from a couple of stones hurled by the red mob. Colorful fish hang suspended in the clear water, hovering over the corals, but the water has grown dimmer as the sun descends on the horizon, sending spikes of light into the sea at an angle. I pop up behind a rock and rest, gathering my strength, or so I tell myself.

As the sun sets I slither forward, snaking through the water with the low profile of an alligator. I hit the beach on all fours and figure I can't worry about getting sand into my cuts, because Taur and Liana are in the city somewhere. I crawl low over the sand until I reach the street, where I climb up the wall and slide over the roof. I feel safer on the rooftop, high above potential mobs.

I make my way parallel to the first street where we entered the city, leaping from one rooftop to another rooftop, or landing on the side of a building, and return to the house where Taur and Liana took shelter. The owner is outside, an old woman with wrinkled skin chewing something and spitting onto the sidewalk as she picks up her belongings.

I scan the building carefully, then crawl down from the roof and approach the old woman from a round the corner.

“Excuse me, ma'am...”

“Baal's bollocks!” the woman shouts as she jumps back, dropping the broken chair she holds in her hands. “You scared the crap out of me.”

“The bull man and the albino girl, where are they?”

“I thought they killed you,” she says without looking up from the chair that she's trying to reassemble.

“They tried.” I am down on all fours, wary of being seen. “Where are the bull man and the albino girl?”

“In the hoosegow. Where else would they be?” She turns and spits, then moves the mass she's chewing on to the other cheek. “You can't just slander the followers of the snake goddess and wander the city like visiting royalty.”

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“Where is the jail?”

The woman looks at me and brushes her white hair away from her heavily wrinkled face. “You want to know so you can avoid it? That mob nearly killed the three of you.”

I look at her with unblinking eyes, which are larger than a human's, with vertical irises.

“If you're crazy and you want to die, the dungeon is down the street three blocks, then over one block, beside the temple. Can't miss it—just follow the wails of people being tortured.” She shakes her head and tosses the fragments of her chair to the side.

I raise the manacle on my wrist so she can see it. “I've been in a dungeon before. Thanks.”

I scamper down an alley behind the house, moving parallel to the street, climbing up to the rooftops where I am safe from anyone on the street and can spot trouble long before it reaches me. I follow the spire of the temple, another temple of God the Healer that has been taken over by the worshipers of the temptress and flies the banner of the snake.

Watching from the rooftop, I see the prison, which is obvious from the iron bars on the windows set into the stone walls. There is just a crescent moon, so there isn't much light, but fortunately for me, geckos have excellent night vision. I scan the windows, moving around the building, until I spot a shred of fabric tied to one of the bars.

I climb down the wall, then scamper across the street, staying low on my belly. I climb the side of the prison up to the third floor. When I peek through the bars, I am thrilled to see Taur and Liana in the cell. Liana has already alerted the bull man to my approach, so they are expecting me.

“Back away from the window,” I tell them in a whisper.

Opening my snout, I spray a mist of acid, focusing on the top edge of the central bar, which smokes. The odor is acrid and strong enough that I am forced to creep back from the window. I return to spray a light mist over the rest of the bar, followed by smoke rising.

“Taur,” I signal him.

The bull man puts his back to the window and seizes the central bar with both hands, just below a very narrow, but visible gap. He strains, bending forward and pulling down with all his might, causing the muscles in his scarred back to ripple as he strains. Slowly the bar bends forward and downward.

“Back!” I spray another mist over the spot where the bar has bent at its base, followed by smoke curling up from the weakened iron. I don't have a limitless supply of acid and feel that I am “dry” at this point.

Taur grasps the curled bar again, groaning as he strains, pulling the bar downward.

The problem becomes obvious to all three of us at once. The gap in the barred window is large enough for Liana to squeeze through, but there's no way the giant man can get through that gap.

“Go ahead, Vic, you take Liana and go.” Taur kneels as though he's about to give the albino girl a boost to reach the window.

“No. Nobody gets left behind.” There's only one thing to do: I slink through the gap in the window, so that now I have joined Taur and Liana in the cell, which is dark, because it's not designed for comfort.

“So now we're all locked up.” Taur doesn't sound very pleased.

I realize that Liana is wearing just a sack. “Where's your dress?”

“They took it.” She shrugs her pale shoulders, which look ghostly in the dark cell.

“And my cape and club, too,” Taur adds.

“Rat bastards.” I move to the door, and notice there's no lock.

“It's barred from the outside,” Liana explains.

There's just a narrow window with two bars in the shape of a cross to allow jailers to peer inside the cell. I could reach the wooden beam barring the door if I could get to it with my tongue, but I can't get my snout through the window. I climb up the door, then up onto the stone above the threshold, and try to thread my tail through the small window, when Taur gets an idea of what I'm intending, and helps guide my tail through. I grope blindly, flicking my tail over the door, until I finally manage to wrap my tail over the wooden bar and lift, at which point Taur pushes on the door.

My tail loses its grip, and the beam falls with a clack, but Taur and Liana are already out, and down the hall. I drop down and follow.

When we reach the end of a long row of cells on both sides of the hallway we are faced with a locked door. A guard is sitting on a chair with his back to the door, asleep and snoring loudly. We quickly discuss Liana's plan in whispers.

Liana knocks on the door. She must knock repeatedly until the guard is roused from his sleep, probably deepened by copious amounts of grog. Curious, the jailer realizes the knocking is coming from the door right behind him. When he gets up, he knocks the chair aside to peep through the small window, and sees an albino girl standing in the corridor.

“Get back in yer cell! Bloody wench!” He curses, but then realizes, “How did she get out of her cell?”

She's just a girl, so he goes through several keys on his ring before he finds the right one and opens the door. Drawing his truncheon from his belt, he approaches the girl, whose eyes grow wide in fear.

“Don' worry, we're just gonna have a bit of fun and it's back to the cage...”

That's as far as he gets, because I am clinging to the stone above the threshold. Taur drops off of my back and is on the jailer as he spins around. The guard tries to shout the alarm, but the bull man's fingers have locked onto his throat and crush his trachea as Taur shakes him violently. If the guy weren't already dead, he'd have a fatal case of Shaken Baby Syndrome.

I drop down from the wall while Liana has already seized the jailer's key ring.

“Wait a minute,” I tell her. “We're not leaving anybody behind.”

Taur gives me a puzzled look. “What kind of criminals do you plan on turning loose?”

“Criminals like you and Liana,” I shoot back. “How many people are in here because they slandered some weak-ass snake poser, or didn't worship the goddess fervently enough? If it's just the three of us they can focus on us, but the more people running loose, the more they are distracted.”

Taur looks at me skeptically.

I quietly sing the psalm...

By the power of Your death

and the might of Your resurrection into eternal life

Suffuse me with Your presence,

Grant me power that I may deliver

the oppressed and free the captives.

The bull man shrugs his broad shoulders. “I guess that settles it.”

Liana has already begun opening cell doors. Taur and I join her, lifting the bars and motioning the men to be silent. One of the prisoners has to be helped out, an old, toothless man who is emaciated and weak.

Liana lifts her finger to her lips to signal them to be silent, but I can see them pacing, eager to leave. The prisoners are now jammed into the hallway, eager to get out, but they are also eager to dish out punishment.

So am I. With a nod, we rush down the stairs.