“Centaurs,” Jake said, summoning fire to his fingertips. I pulled out one of my throwing knives and edged closer to him. Maybe my knife wouldn’t be much protection against centaurs I could see through, but I felt better having it in my hand.
Their bare chests were grey, just like everything else on this dismal plain. Through the grass stems I caught flashes of their powerful, stocky horse bodies. They were shaggier than I’d expected from my memories of classical centaurs in books and paintings. Maybe the ancient artists hadn’t gotten them quite right. Plus, these ones were clearly dead. Perhaps that made a difference.
For shades, or souls, or whatever they were, they still managed to make a mess of the grass, trampling it down in a wide circle around us. No one was actually pointing a spear at us, but they didn’t look all that friendly. I doubted an invitation to afternoon tea was on the cards.
They spread out, surrounding us, which gave me the heebie jeebies. I did not like standing with my back to an armed man. Armed centaur. Whatever. I turned slowly on the spot, trying to give them all the death stare at once. Jake merely waited, the orange flames flickering up and down his arms the only spot of colour in this grim place.
“Do you reckon a spear you can see through would still hurt?” I muttered to Jake.
“Let’s not find out, shall we?”
One of the centaurs grounded his spear butt and glared at us. He wasn’t the biggest, but his beard was the longest, and plaited into intricate braids threaded with beads and little glints of metal that could have been anything but looked silver in the unchanging grey light.
“The living are not welcome in the lands of the dead,” he growled.
“We’re friends of Hades,” I said.
“We’re looking for Lord Hephaistos,” Jake added. “Do you know where we can find him?”
At a signal from Fancy Beard, the centaurs began to move again, trotting around us in a slow circle. Damn, I’d get dizzy if they kept that up. I felt like a penguin on an ice floe, watching the killer whales closing in.
“Why do you seek Hephaistos the Smith in the lands of the dead? He is a god, foolish mortal.”
“You should keep up with the news,” I said. “He’s now a dead god.”
Fancy Beard bared his teeth at me, and the circling horde shook their spears. Jake flashed me a look that said, plain as day, Please leave the talking to me. I shrugged. The horse boys looked to be spoiling for a fight. Probably anything was better than trotting through the same boring grey grass for all eternity. Diplomacy didn’t stand much of a chance compared to the excitement of battle. I doubted anything I said would change their intentions.
Those teeth were wicked sharp. Maybe Fancy Beard was related to Styx. What was with everyone around here having the same vicious shark teeth? Did they collect their Evil Teeth on arrival at the gates? Step right up, folks. Free Evil Teeth in every show bag. Start your afterlife in bad-ass style. I rolled my shoulders, ready for anything. Let’s see how evil he felt with my knife buried in his neck.
“Is this Elysium?” Jake asked. You had to give him points for persistence. He stood, apparently relaxed, with his hands on his hips. But the tongues of fire that licked up and down his arms had grown bigger, and his shoulders looked tight. Maybe he was having that same itch between his shoulder blades that I was. “Lord Hades said he had prepared a place in Elysium for Lord Hephaistos.”
I reached out with my mind, trying to find a way in. Centaurs were half animal—that gave me a fifty per cent chance of being able to connect with them, right? But I found nothing. Either fifty per cent wasn’t enough, or the whole being dead thing caused a problem. It was like trying to grasp the wind.
Fancy Beard scowled, and the stomp of hooves grew louder as the circling centaurs picked up speed. The wind that stirred the grasses around our little circle carried the distant sound of Cerberus’s deep bark. “Chase horses”, indeed. He hadn’t thought to mention that these horses were armed and dangerous.
*Cerberus!* I called, reaching out with my mind for the deep red spark of his. It wasn’t that I didn’t have faith in Jake’s pyrotechnics, but he’d never tried them before against the dead. Maybe the centaurs would go up in flames, and maybe they’d just plough right on through. I clutched my knife a little tighter. *Stop chasing horses and get back here.*
I felt his reluctance, and pushed harder, forcing my will on him. This was no time for our guardian to get distracted. Another distant bark reached me, and then he headed back our way. *Plenty of horses to chase here,* I told him, which got him moving with more enthusiasm.
The centaurs were moving faster now, too, circling us at a canter, except for Fancy Beard, who continued to scowl menacingly from the same spot. With a wild yell, one of them broke from the circle and feinted at us with his spear. He bared his teeth in a savage grin at my flinch, and several of his companions laughed.
Jake stepped in front of me and flung his arms out wide. Flames shot skyward from his upturned palms. “Try that again and I’ll roast your pony butt like a marshmallow.”
I doubt the centaur even heard him over the drumming of hoof beats, but he understood a challenge when he saw one. He flung the spear in the space between one heartbeat and the next, so fast that I didn’t even have time to scream before Jake scorched it out of the air with a bolt of fire.
As if that was the signal, the dark sky was suddenly raining ghost spears. Jake sent his fire whooshing out in a widening circle as I felt something strike my leg. A few centaurs disintegrated into writhing smoke, but most of them fell back from the flames, unhurt.
I couldn’t say the same. A cold numbness was spreading up my leg. A spear had gone straight through it and now lay smoking on the ground within our circle. There was no blood, not even a tear in my jeans, but I could no longer feel my left leg below mid-thigh.
“Jake, I’m hit,” I said as the leg buckled beneath me and I sagged awkwardly against his back.
More spears arched through the wall of flame around us, and Jake zapped them all into smoke and ruin. Then he made a pushing motion with his hands, and the wall of flame sprung outwards, herding the centaurs before it, crackling and snapping through the dry grasses.
“This whole place is going to go up,” I protested.
He caught me and hoisted me into his arms. “And I should care why, exactly?” Soot had joined the mud on his face, and both mixed with sweat from the heat of the flames. Little fires danced in his eyes as his gaze swept over me. “They can all burn. Where are you hurt?”
“My leg. It’s gone completely numb.”
Centaurs still roved beyond the wall of fire, but no more spears passed through the flames. Jake stared out anxiously. “Where is that damn dog?”
I’d forgotten him in the excitement, but I didn’t have to cast my mind out to find him. He appeared on the other side of the flames, snapping at centaurs the way a lesser dog lunges at flies. The teeth of one great head closed around the torso of a centaur, lifting him off his feet, but the creature dissolved into mist a moment later. Each one that he caught dissipated like smoke on the wind. As Jake strode through the flames with me in his arms, the rest of the band took to their heels. I stopped Cerberus with a word when he would have chased after them.
“We need to get you to help,” Jake said, anxiety replacing the flames in his eyes, and his arms tightened around me.
I coughed; the air was thick with smoke. I couldn’t tell how far the centaurs had gone—or when they might come back. The spreading numbness had reached my hip now and I knew Jake was right. Clearly, I needed help, but it was just as obvious that I couldn’t walk in this state.
Which only left one option.
“Cerberus, could you carry us?” I asked.
Three big heads turned to stare at me. I wouldn’t have thought a dog could look affronted, but he did. *NOT HORSE.*
*I know, I know, and I’m sorry,* I said, switching to inner speech. *I wouldn’t ask, but …* I swallowed hard, letting him se
e my fear. *I’m scared. We need help. Fast.*
A giant, pink tongue licked me gently. *HORSE FOR BOSSY GIRL.*
Bossy Girl? In other circumstances, I might have taken exception to that, but I was too grateful for the ride to quibble about it now. He could call me whatever he liked.
It was a little difficult to manage, but Cerberus laid down and eventually we got ourselves arranged on his back, me at the front, with Jake’s arms encircling me from behind. Giant dog-back riding proved to be every bit as uncomfortable as I’d imagined, and if it hadn’t been for Jake, I probably would have slipped off at the first bump, but Cerberus soon settled into a ground-eating stride.
“Take us to Hammer Man,” I whispered. One huge black ear flicked toward the sound of my voice. “Hurry.”
I didn’t want to think about what might happen when the creeping numbness reached my heart.
5
After a while, I began to shiver, even with my back pressed up against the warmth of Jake’s chest. The cold had spread its creeping fingers across my belly, and little tendrils of icy numbness lanced into my right leg, too. It was like standing in a freezing river up to the waist—the whole lower half of my body was so cold it burned.
Jake’s arms tightened around me. “Hang on. I’m sure we’ll be there soon. Let me warm you.”
His arms glowed orange where they touched my body, and tiny tongues of flame crept from him to me. I’d seen him do this once before, when we’d found two lost boys soaking wet in the cold night bush. I hadn’t realised, then, how much it tickled. The little flames didn’t hurt at all, but they felt like ants marching across my skin. Very warm ants. Gradually, my shivering subsided, though the warmth didn’t reach down into my legs. It felt as though I’d just snuggled into a thick woollen jumper, and I sighed with pleasure.
We’d finally left the grassy plains. Cerberus was loping through fields of tumbled rocks towards a range of stony mountains that rose forbiddingly over the blasted landscape. A strong smell of sulphur hung in the air. Cerberus picked his way through the rocks with ease, never slowing. Our weight on his back seemed to make no difference to him.
The path began to climb, winding its way past ever-larger boulders up towards a cleft between two peaks. Jake cursed as we slipped backwards. He had his legs clenched tight against Cerberus’s sides, but he had to hold on for both of us. My legs didn’t even feel like they were attached to me anymore, so I was a dead weight in his arms.
“Lean forward,” Jake said, as the angle of the incline grew steeper. “See if you can get your arms around his neck.”
I pitched forward, laying my chest against the great dog’s warm back, and got my arms as far as I could around his middle neck. Jake huddled protectively over the top of me, his breath stirring my hair. Between his warmth and Cerberus’s, my top half felt deliciously cosy. I couldn’t feel my bottom half at all.
Black rocks rolled away down the slope behind us as Cerberus climbed, dislodged by his massive paws. I didn’t want to choke him, but I had to hang on pretty tight. It wasn’t exactly a smooth ride. Jake’s breath was warm in my ear as he curled around me, helping me to hold on. We must have looked ridiculous, like a couple of baby monkeys clinging to their three-headed mother.
Up ahead, light glowed in the cleft between the two peaks, like a beacon amongst all the grey. “What do you think that is?”
“Hopefully our destination.” Jake’s voice showed the strain of keeping us both on our precarious mount. Cerberus’s back was much wider than a horse’s, which made me almost glad my legs were numb. It was a very unnatural sitting position. Would Jake even be able to walk once we reached Hephaistos?
Finally, Cerberus crested the rise, and I realised we were in a pass between the peaks. Below us, a soft, green land spread out, lit with a golden light that was richer than daylight. Sunlight on steroids. Houses nestled on the sides of gentle slopes, some grouped together, others on their own, all scattered across the green fields. Gracefully drooping willows marked the position of several small streams that crisscrossed the wide-open land. It was like a pastoral dream, only apparently without the backbreaking labour and the animals stinking the place up. At least, I couldn’t see any cultivated fields or animals grazing. It looked too good to be true.
“Elysium?” I guessed. It certainly looked like a pleasant place to spend the afterlife, though I couldn’t help wondering if the average hero might find it just a teensy bit quiet after a while. Smoke rose from the chimneys of the nearest cottages, though nothing else moved. Maybe there were drinking halls, too, and places to joust or whatever heroes did for fun. Whacked each other with swords, probably, or took bets on mud-wrestling matches.
On this side of the range, an easy path, bordered by tiny white flowers like stars, switched back and forth in a gentle incline down the mountainside. At the bottom, Cerberus turned left and loped along beside the foothills. His every step released a scent like jasmine and, behind us, the grass sprang back as if he’d never passed through.
Jake’s flames, which still flickered and tickled across my skin, seemed to have halted the advance of the creeping coldness. Now that we were back on the flat, I released my death grip around Cerberus’s neck and Jake helped me sit up, though he continued to cradle me in his arms as if I were more precious than gold. I could get used to this kind of solicitousness—it was just a shame I had to get shot by a dead centaur’s freaky arrow to bring it out. Losing the feeling in the bottom half of my body was a steep price to pay for a cuddle, however nice it was to relax into his strong arms and feel taken care of for once.
Cerberus followed a small stream that chattered over smooth pebbles away from the mountain’s flank until we arrived at a stone cottage. No smoke rose from this one’s chimney, but the big dog stopped as if we’d reached our destination.
“Is this it?” I asked. “Is this where Hammer Man lives?”
*HAMMER MAN,* Cerberus agreed.
“We’re here,” I said to Jake.
He slid down from Cerberus’s back, staggering a bit as he landed. Ouch. Just as I’d thought, he was going to be stiff after that ride. Maybe I should offer to rub the affected parts for him. I had to grab my right leg and haul it over Cerberus’s back before I could slide down to join him. He caught me when I would have collapsed in a heap and swung me into his arms. I nestled my head against his shoulder with a sigh. I could get used to this.
“Lord Hephaistos!” Jake strode toward the cottage. “Are you home?”
No one answered, so Jake kicked the door open and carried me inside.
“Shouldn’t we have knocked?” I protested. I mean, what was the point of being all polite and calling him Lord if he was just going to kick the door in?
Jake rolled his eyes. “You’re a thief. Do you usually knock on the doors of the houses you break into?”
“The difference being that I’m not robbing this house,” I pointed out.
“Do you argue this much with everyone, or is it just me?” he asked.
I opened my mouth to say, “Just you,” and then paused. I did argue with Syl a lot, after all. “Maybe you’re too used to your underlings saying ‘yes, sir, no, sir, three bags full, sir’. Think of it as a public service to keep your ego in check.”
The cottage was just as small as it had looked from outside. The main room had a large fireplace, in which a fire was neatly laid, ready to be lit, with a lounge and two armchairs placed invitingly in front of it. To one side was a rudimentary kitchen, not much more than a sink and a couple of cupboards along the wall.
“Remind me to thank you one day,” Jake said.
“No problem. Happy to help.”
Through an open door was a bedroom featuring a bed covered in animal skins. Clearly, Hephaistos was into the minimalist lifestyle. Deathstyle? Whatever this was called. There didn’t seem to be a bathroom, even though there was a kitchen. Did that mean that being dead meant you could eat without ever having to go to the toilet? Or that you didn’t swea
t and need a shower? Maybe I’d ask Hades one day. It didn’t seem like the kind of conversation I could have with Hephaistos, when we hadn’t even met yet. First impressions were so important, particularly when you were trying to get a grumpy dead god to help you.
Jake deposited me gently on the lounge, which was brown leather and simply enormous, like something you’d find in a hunting lodge—or a swish hotel that was pretending to be one. I was glad he didn’t put me on the god’s bed—that seemed too presumptuous.
“How do you feel?” he asked, stroking a stray lock of hair back from my face with more gentleness than his testy tone indicated.
“I feel fine,” I said, trying to sound calm and fearless. “The parts of me I can still feel, anyway. Everything from the waist down is numb with cold. It’s like someone’s just chopped the bottom half of me off.”
I laid my hand on my own leg, and I couldn’t even feel it. It was as if my legs belonged to someone else. There was nothing to see where the arrow had pierced me—not a drop of blood, not even a tear in my jeans. How could it have done such damage?
Jake perched on the lounge next to me and ran his hands over my legs, all the way down to my feet. Little flames followed the path of his fingers.
“Can you feel that?”
“No.” What a waste. I’d imagined him running his hands over my body before, but somehow, I’d never pictured the scene quite like this. I leaned back against the cushions and shut my eyes. So far, the quest to find Hephaistos was an epic failure. I’d come all this way, got injured in the process, and the god wasn’t even here. Maybe I should have stayed put and waited for Hades after all. “What are we going to do now?”
“I’ll go out and look for Hephaistos,” he said, rising from the lounge.
“No, wait!” I caught at his hand. “Don’t leave me here.”
I wouldn’t admit it, but I was afraid. What if the bitter cold continued its march up my body while he was gone? Without his warmth, I might be cold and dead by the time he got back. And what a shitty way to go that would be, lying here, waiting for the cold to snuff me out, knowing what was coming but being unable to move or do anything to stop it.
Rivers of Hell (Shadows of the Immortals Book 3) Page 5
