by Amy Sumida
“Nice trick,” Thor noted.
“Some tribes believe owls to be death omens,” Mr. T said solemnly, his obsidian eyes glittering. “Some think they're the spirits of the dead. But other tribes consider them to be protectors and bearers of ancient knowledge. Shamans petition the Itakupe for help achieving mystical wisdom.”
“They're also believed to be healers,” Teharon added. “That is how I know of them—by myths of their great ability to heal.”
“They are all of those things,” Mrs. E said. “Death, protection, wisdom, and healing. They are elusive, even to other gods, but when they decide to reveal themselves, it is indeed a bad omen.”
“Why? They seemed okay.” I shrugged.
“Because the Itakupe only emerge when the need is great,” Teharon declared. “The saying goes that if the Itakupe fly above, evil crawls below.”
“But they aren't evil?” I asked, just to be sure.
“They are as honorable as gods can be,” Mr. T vowed. “You will find no fault in them.”
“Can you contact them?” I asked him.
Mr. T made a face and shifted his stare toward Teharon. The two men grimaced at each other, looking very alike. But I suppose that comes with being related. Teharon is Tsohanoai's grandson.
“I'll take that as a no,” I muttered.
“All right, let's forget about the Itakupe for now. So far, they've been helpful so we don't need to concern ourselves with them yet,” Thor pointed out. “Torrent, did you find any snake gods?”
“Oh, yes!” Torrent leaned forward in his seat eagerly. “There are quite a few Egyptian ones.”
“They're not Egyptian,” Re stopped him before he could go on.
“Oh.” Torrent deflated a little.
“Re got a good look at one of them,” I explained.
“Tell them about the others,” Artemis urged Torr.
“Oh, yes!” Torrent perked up again. “There are the Mahoraga. They are connected to the Buddhist and Hindu Pantheons.”
“It's not the Mahoraga,” Brahma stated firmly. “There are very few of them left and they never leave the God Realm.”
“Okay,” Torrent muttered. “There's also Damballa and Dan Wedo, both are Vodou lwas.”
“Oh, please don't let them be Vodou,” I whined.
“Neither of those gods has a family of snake-shifters,” Trevor pointed out. “And this god called the snakes his family. We're looking for a large group.”
“What else did the snake god say?” Torrent asked. “Maybe you could help me shorten the list before I go through every name.”
“Sorry, Torr, we should have done that first,” I admitted. “The snake god told me not to interfere and he called me Godhunter. Oh, and he also said it would only be a little longer. So, he has a goal and he's almost achieved it.”
“What did he look like?” Torrent asked as his gaze went distant and then started to flick back and forth.
“Black. Big and black,” Trevor said.
“That sounds like a Cards Against Humanity answer,” Finn whispered to Morpheus, who chuckled.
“I caught a glimpse of him before he shifted,” I added, ignoring Finn and Morph. “He was black then too. I only caught an outline and the gleam of an eye. At first, I thought it was because he was in the shadows, but he was darker than the shadows.”
“Oh! That helps!” Torrent exclaimed. “Black as sin. That narrows it down to—”
“It's Adro,” Odin declared as he strode into the room.
“Son of a cocker spaniel!” Torrent cursed. “I was just about to say that! You utterly ruined my big reveal, Odin.”
“My apologies,” Odin said absently to Torrent as he made his way to our end of the room. He leaned his fists on the table to triumphantly add, “I finally found the story I was looking for—the one about snakes and not looking back. It's the Adroanzi, the children of Adro.”
“Who's Adro?” Karni Mata asked.
“Adro is the God of the Lugbara of Central Africa,” Torrent rushed to explain before Odin could beat him to it. “He's half good and half bad.”
“Aren't we all?” Re drawled with a wicked grin.
“Yes, but this is literal,” Torrent said crisply. “The myths say that the god Adroa split himself in two to separate the evil in him from the good. His good half is called Adroa and lives in the sky.”
“The God Realm,” I translated.
“Yes, likely,” Torrent agreed. “Adroa is described as tall and white. His bad half is called Adro. He is short and black—as in sin-black—and he is bound to the Earth.”
“Bound to the Earth?” I sat up, an idea tingling to life.
“That's what I was going to tell you next,” Odin took over. “Adro can't trace. Human belief has split him in two: one half bound to the God Realm and the other half to Earth. Neither can leave their realm.”
“You said that every god can trace,” I reminded him.
“I didn't know that Adroa couldn't trace,” he said defensively. “I'd read about him being separated into two—not as brutal as it sounds, if the accounts are to be trusted—but I didn't realize that it hobbled him as far as tracing went.”
“Talk about a split personality,” I noted. “But he's not literally half a person, is he?”
“I've never met him but according to the first-hand accounts I've read, he is,” Odin said as he finally sat down. “The only time he's whole is when he's in snake form. It's also the only time when he can copulate, which is how the Adroanzi line began.”
“He had sex with snakes?” Re asked in horror. “I'm Egyptian and the kinkiest person I know, and I would never have sex with snakes.”
“Even if you were a snake?” I asked with a lifted brow.
Re considered this. “Well, obviously if I were a snake, I'd be having sex with other snakes. Which might not be so bad—some snakes have two penises after all.”
“What?” Viper nearly shrieked.
“Yes, they're called hemipenes,” Re delighted in notifying us. “The females—”
“That's more than enough information on snake genitalia, thank you, Re,” Thor cut him off.
“I'll tell you later,” Re whispered to Viper.
But Viper wasn't as interested in female snakes as he was the anatomy of males. He looked at me accusingly and announced, “I don't have two dicks, Vervain.”
I lifted my brows and blinked at the vehemence in his voice. “I know that, Viper. Nearly everyone who lives here can attest to that.”
“But why don't I have two dicks?” He demanded.
Every eye watched us.
My face flushed. “Probably because I already have enough of them to deal with. The last thing I need is a man with two.”
“You weren't with the others when you made me.”
“Yes, but, as I told you, I was not the one who—”
“Okay! Okay!” Viper held up a hand before I could divulge the fact that I hadn't made his body so his lack of an extra penis wasn't my fault. “Fine. I get it. I'll deal with the deficit.”
“Honey, there is no part of you that could possibly be considered deficient.” I grinned lasciviously at him.
“If we could get back to the snake god?” Thor asked with his I'm-tired-of-your-crap-Vervain look.
I gave him my I-didn't-start-it look.
“As I was saying,” Odin began again. “Adro can only procreate in snake form and he did so. A lot. The Adroanzi are his family. Since they're demigods dependent on his magic, they, like him, are bound to the Earth and cannot trace.”
“That's why they had to tunnel everywhere,” Trevor concluded. “And why they didn't simply trace away to escape us.”
“Bound to the Earth,” I repeated Odin's words. “We were right, he's an earth god.”
“Yes,” Odin confirmed. “Adroa is the God of Heaven and Adro is the God of Earth. Besides his shapeshifting trick, he can also move soil and stone.”
“I don't remember him being only half
a man,” I murmured. Then I reviewed my memory. “On second thought, I did only see half a man. I thought he was hidden behind the trunk of a tree but maybe he wasn't. Maybe he was simply standing beside the tree.”
“How does he get around with only one foot?” Hades frowned pensively.
“He probably hops like the Fachan do,” I hypothesized.
Morpheus snorted. “Hopping faeries.”
“She's right,” Odin vindicated me. “That's evidently how he gets around.”
“How humiliating,” Blue murmured.
“Do the halves share thoughts? Or do they each have half a brain?” I lifted an eyebrow at my husband.
“I don't know if they can communicate with each other, but Adro seems to have no problem with his brain,” Odin said. “You heard him, he sounded rational.”
“Magic can be so crazy,” I whispered in wonder.
“You were going to tell us about the Adroanzi,” Karni Mata reminded Odin.
“Yes, the Adroanzi.” Odin smacked the table with his palm. “They follow people home at night. If their targets don't look back, the Adroanzi will protect them and see them home safely. However, if they do look back, the Adroanzi kill them.”
“That explains why that snake-shifter didn't kill the woman,” Trevor noted.
“The Lugbara believe that when they die, they'll be turned into Adroanzi unless they sacrifice a child to Adro,” Torrent said brightly.
“What?” I growled. “I thought Adro fathered the Adroanzi?”
“He did,” Odin assured me. “Adro used the threat to encourage sacrifices.”
“Of children?” I growled again.
“Oh, they don't do it anymore,” Torrent assured me. “Nowadays, they kill a ram instead.”
“People still worship him?” I asked in surprise.
“Yes, but they don't give him human sacrifice anymore,” Odin said pointedly. “Whatever he's trying to do, it requires more power than he's been given. So, he brought his snakes here and set them loose.”
“All the way from Africa,” I murmured. “Why?”
“Maybe he didn't want to kill his own people,” Hekate said. “Or maybe he killed some there and moved on.”
“Just enough so that the humans didn't get spooked.” Hades nodded in agreement. “Torrent, can you—”
“I'm on it,” Torrent cut off Hades. Then his expression hardened. “There is a distinct trail of snake-related deaths leading from Uganda, across Africa, and then Brazil. From there, they moved upward until they hit Texas.”
“And we're only now becoming aware of it,” I whispered in horror. “How many people are dead because we didn't catch on quickly enough? And it wasn't even us who caught it, it was Austin.”
“We can't watch every god all of the time, Carus,” Azrael said gently.
“I know,” I muttered. “I just... damn.”
“But why?” Blue asked.
We looked at him askance.
“How many deaths have there been, Torrent?” Blue posed another question instead of answering our unspoken one.
“Thousands,” Torrent said grimly.
“What would one god do with that much energy?” Blue countered with yet another question. “What would this god want badly enough to slaughter that many people?”
“It's humiliating,” I murmured, then met Blue's gaze. “That's what you said: that it would be humiliating to hop around like that. And that's just one of the issues he has to live with. So, what would an earthbound god who only has half a body want? He'd want to be whole and free.”
“But to do that, he'd have to break the magic of human belief,” Sarasvati, Brahma's wife pointed out disdainfully. “No god is stupid enough to attempt that.”
“Why not?” I asked. “I mean, I know you can't change certain things because of human belief but if you had enough magic and did the impossible—if you managed to bypass human belief—what would happen?”
“It's unprecedented,” Thor muttered. “There's no way to know.”
“If I had to guess.”—Odin shared a heavy look with his son—“I'd say it would, at the very least, destroy the god.”
“And at the very most?” I asked.
“It would destroy all of the Gods.”
Chapter Thirty
“So, how do we find this guy?” I asked the Squad after the outburst that Odin's statement prompted had died down.
“He can't be too far from where you last saw him,” Torrent pointed out. “He's limited to traveling by human means or hopping.”
“Or slithering,” Finn reminded us. “That's the way I'd go if I were him.”
“The tunnels.” Odin nodded. “They're probably his fastest means of travel.”
“But most of us can't go into the tunnels,” Thor pointed out. “And if we can't do that, how do we track him? Vervain, Trevor, and Kirill are our best hunters and none of them can access the tunnels.”
“I tracked the snakes,” Viper reminded us.
“Yes, but can you track a particular snake?” Thor shot back. “How good is your sense of smell? Or is it taste?” Thor smirked.
“Oh, look at you. You made a joke,” I teased Thor. “Good for you.”
Thor's smirk softened into a smile.
“Seriously, though, how good is your sense of smell when you're in snake form?” I asked Viper.
“Not as good as your dragon nose,” he admitted. “I don't think I'd be able to find an individual scent but I can smell where the most snakes have gone and how fresh their trail is.”
“And you're limited by whatever form you choose so it will be the same for you,” Thor said to his father.
Odin nodded grudgingly.
“There must be a better way to find him,” Brahma grumbled. “We're gods and we're able to trace; that's one up on him. So, how do we use that advantage to find Adro?”
“What if we don't have to find Adro?” Artemis asked.
Everyone turned toward the Greek goddess—the Greek huntress goddess.
Artie grinned. “This guy is in two places at once, right? So, do we know where his other half is?”
Our stares went from Artemis to Odin. Odin started to smile.
“I'll take that as a yes,” I concluded. “But do we know anyone who knows Adroa? I'd rather not go barging into this guy's territory unannounced.”
“He's killing people, Vervain,” Morpheus snorted. “Do we really need to wait for an invite?”
“Actually—” Odin started.
“Actually, he's not killing people,” I cut Odin off. “Adroa's separated from his bad half. I think that gets him off the hook, doesn't it?”
“It depends,” Teharon mused. “If Adroa knows what his other half is doing and hasn't tried to stop him, then that makes him responsible.”
“Yes, but—” Odin tried again, but I was on a roll.
“Sure,” I agreed with Teharon. “Even if he couldn't go after Adro, he could at least tell someone in his pantheon and they could attempt it. But maybe he's done that. Maybe they failed. We don't know anything beyond what Adro has done.”
“And we aren't going to know unless we talk to Adroa,” Sarasvati pointed out. “I vote for going in.”
Several of the others nodded in agreement.
“We're not even going to try to contact him first? Maybe we could reach out to the other gods in his pantheon,” I suggested.
“Vervain, he is the other gods in his pantheon,” Odin said dryly.
“Huh?”
“The Lugbara believe in Adroa, who split himself in two. After he was divided, Adro created the Adroanzi. That's it for their entire pantheon,” Odin explained.
“Wow. Okay. I was about to say that it's a small pantheon but then I remembered how many snakes we saw the other night.”
“Like the Angels with my father and Jerry,” Azrael noted.
“Snake angels.” I nodded. “Sure. Why not?”
“They're barred from the God Realm so I think that would make them
snake demons,” Morpheus argued.
“Demons are a type of angel,” I shot back. “And Hell is in the God Realm.”
