If the River Styx hated Arthur, and she could touch the river, commune with it . . .
Ceridwen stopped fighting the current, let herself be swept by it. The water was all around her and now her body shimmered with a dusky light. The river hated Arthur, which meant it was aware of his presence . . . she touched the water, and she searched for him.
There. At the riverbank, but deep beneath the surface, dragged along the edge and dashed against rock and black earth. Arthur.
The fire that glowed within the icy sphere atop her staff flared once. Ceridwen had hesitated to connect too fully with this world, but now she mustered all of her elemental magick. The current changed direction around her, the water grasping her and propelling her toward the riverbank. She rose to the surface and she burst up into the air to take several deep breaths, caught a glimpse of the strange sky, the cavern ceiling so high it could not be seen in the gloom.
Then she willed the river to drag her under again. It curled around her, swept her to where Arthur drifted. She saw him kick feebly, trying to swim to the surface. Weak, but he was alive. His hands reached upward and she grabbed his wrists and though the river hated him, she forced the water to propel them both upward.
The Styx erupted in a spout of water that tossed them onto the riverbank. Ceridwen struck the ground hard and for a moment she could only lay there, catching her breath. Her chest hurt as if there was something broken inside, and she prayed it was only her need for air. She heard Arthur coughing beside her with a wheezy rasp, but he was alive.
She turned her head, forced herself onto her hands and knees and crawled to him. Finally she knelt and put a hand on his back as he caught his breath, and then he fell into her arms and she held him, simply held him, the way they had done so very long ago, when it hadn’t taken the threat of death to make them see what they were to each other.
"Ceri . . ." he began.
"Sssh, no, Arthur." She pushed damp locks of hair away from his forehead so that she could kiss him there.
Then she stiffened and turned toward the River Styx. Her people were known for their passions in love and war, but not for their sense of family. Nevertheless, they were fiercely loyal, and she had been ingrained with that loyalty all of her life.
Arthur saw her alarm and then his eyes mirrored her own concern. He sat up painfully, and they rose side by side.
"Danny?" he said.
Ceridwen shook her head. "I . . . I didn’t see him. I could only think of you, and . . . the river let me find you. Gull did something, but . . . I’m not even sure if I could —"
Then she was moving, running toward the water’s edge. She had to try at least to locate Danny Ferrick. The boy had sacrificed himself trying to save them. Ceridwen could do no less if there was a chance he might still be alive.
"Ceri, wait!" Arthur shouted. She turned to see him pointing back up the river. "Look!"
Out on the rushing river a section of the water was white with the undulations beneath. She had no time to act before the Styx erupted and the sea monster, Scylla, shot up from its flow, letting loose with a shriek that caused her to clap her hands over her ears and stagger backward. It swayed and rocked in the air, shaking and continuing to shriek as its heads swung about.
Then it spotted Ceridwen and Arthur on the bank. It reared up, whipping back and forth in a frenzy, maddened with rage.
Arthur came up beside her and raised his hands. Ceridwen lifted her staff, but she knew that they were both depleted. She wondered if they would be able to summon enough energy to destroy the monstrosity.
One final time Scylla shrieked.
Its belly swelled, inflating quickly. The thing’s jaws opened but this time its scream was of silent agony. Scylla’s flesh tore, ripped open from within, and a gore-covered figure emerged from its viscera.
Danny Ferrick leaped into the river and hit the water with a splash only seconds before Scylla toppled in after him. Unmoving, the giant beast floated half above and half below the water, and the current began to drag it away.
When Danny climbed from the water, Ceridwen and Arthur ran to him. He was hunched over, unsmiling, horns gleaming wet, and his eyes glowed a perilous red. The boy had never looked more like a demon. There was so much of Hell in his eyes that they stopped a few steps away, regarding him warily.
"Oh, man," Danny said, shaking his head and then reaching up to cover his face. "That just totally sucked."
Ceridwen smiled and went to him, pulling him into her embrace.
"Thank you," she said.
Danny shrugged, wildness in his eyes. "Any time. This is why we’re here, right? All in all, I’d rather be watching TV. But if we don’t do the dirty work, there won’t be any TV. So, I figure, we do what we’ve gotta do."
Arthur clapped a hand on the boy’s shoulder, a bemused smile on his face. "So, you’re fighting monsters and traversing the netherworld to make the world safe for television?"
"Pretty much."
"Well," Conan Doyle said, "as long as you have your priorities straight."
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Their time in the Underworld had been a parade of the astonishing, a mind-boggling series of sights and experiences unlike any they had previously experienced. Conan Doyle had come to believe he had grown numb to it, that there was nothing left that could surprise him. Now, standing on a hill of bones, gazing down on the sprawling corpse of Hades, the mage realized how wrong he had been.
"Y’know what?" Danny asked beside him, breathing through his mouth to avoid the horrendous stench of decay that permeated the air. "I’ve had enough. I’m going home."
Ceridwen moved up next to the boy and placed a comforting arm about his shoulders. Conan Doyle knew the Fey were sensitive to the emotional states of others. She could feel Danny’s turmoil and was attempting to calm him. That was good, for he himself had no time for such mollycoddling. One of his Menagerie was in grave danger, and he would move Heaven, Earth and the Underworld itself to get her back.
"You don’t mean that," Conan Doyle said, as he started down the slope toward the enormous corpse. "What about Eve? Do you want to leave her here?"
"Eve can handle herself," Danny replied, but Conan Doyle could hear little conviction in his tone.
He stopped his descent and turned to look at Danny and Ceridwen, who were still standing on the crest of the hill of bones. "But she will not have to, for we are going to assist her."
Danny shook his horned head. "No way. I can’t do it anymore, it’s just too much." He gestured toward the body of Hades in the black soil valley below. "Do you see that?" he asked, his voice growing higher with panic. "It’s a giant fucking dead guy!"
The boy turned, and for a moment Conan Doyle thought he was about to walk away, but he spun around to reiterate his point. "It’s been one thing after another since coming here — since hooking up with you."
"And you’ve become a welcome part of our motley tribe," Ceridwen said, as she calmly stroked the back of his head.
Danny quickly stepped away from her touch. "I’m sorry, I just can’t."
There was a tremble in the boy’s voice and Conan Doyle was certain that he was about to cry. This will not do, not at all.
"You asked for this, boy," he said coldly. "You begged to be a part of it."
The boy squatted and buried his face in his hands. "I know, I know, and there’s a part of me that’s starting to get used to it." Danny laughed, raising his head. There were tears in his yellow eyes. "Can you believe that? I’m sixteen years old and I’m starting to get used to this shit. When we’re in the middle of it, the blood and monsters and shit, there’s a part of me that even likes it. Do you have any idea how much that scares me?"
"Get hold of yourself, Daniel," Conan Doyle snapped. "Are you not part of my team, of my Menagerie?"
Danny wiped his nose with the back of his hand. "It’s just that . . . I was inside the belly of a fucking sea monster . . .and now this." He again gestured to the corpse that filled the
valley below, the remains of a god. "I just don’t know if . . ."
"Damn you, boy! Answer the question!" Conan Doyle bellowed. "Are you not a part of my Menagerie?"
The young demon looked as though he’d been struck, rocking back slightly on his haunches, and then his expression began to change. Conan Doyle recognized the anger, which was exactly the response he was hoping to get.
"Did you hear me, Daniel Ferrick?" he continued. "Or was my question lost in the sound of your pathetic blubbering?"
The youth rose to his feet and Conan Doyle could have sworn he saw a flicker of crimson flame erupt from his eyes.
"No, I heard you just fine," Danny growled. "And, yes, I am part of your fucking Menagerie."
"Excellent," Conan Doyle said, reaching up to casually stroke his mustache. "Now follow. We’ll see this through. Eve would sacrifice immortal life for any of us. You’ve never served in the military, Daniel, but still you should understand. We don’t leave one of our own behind. Not ever." The mage turned and continued down the hill, off of the bone-strewn hill and onto the fine black soil of the valley.
Danny pushed past him, quickening his step. "What’re we waiting for?" he growled. "The sooner we find Eve, the faster we can get out of here."
Ceridwen fell into stride beside Conan Doyle, one hand raised, stirring the wind so that the air, thick with the stench of decay, was more breathable. He had noticed that after the shattering of her elemental staff, she had not attempted to repair it using the dark, corrupt wood of the Underworld. She had summoned the roots and made the trees do her bidding in building a raft for them to cross the Styx, but had not made herself a new staff. It was clear she had established a rapport with the elements of this place, but it seemed she did not want that connection to be any more intimate than was necessary.
"Are you two coming?" the demon boy called.
"We’re right behind you," Conan Doyle said, taking Ceridwen’s arm. "Every step of the way."
Ceridwen stood before the body of the fallen god and marveled at its enormity. From inside the great, decaying corpse there came faint sounds of life. Her gaze traveled over the incredible sight of the dead giant, rotting remains whose breadth was greater than all but the largest villages of Faerie.
Conan Doyle stood on her left, Danny on her right, all of them awed into silence until the demon boy shook his head, swore under his breath, and began to utter a mad little laugh.
"What do you think happened to him?" Danny asked. "By the looks of his throat, I’m guessing shaving accident."
She ought to have been reassured that the boy’s twisted sense of humor had returned, but there was that lunatic edge to it that only made Ceridwen more concerned for him. She gazed down at the dark, powdery earth beneath her feet, then knelt and pushed the tips of her fingers into the tainted soil, gasping at the images flooding her mind. Conan Doyle joined her and she took hold of his proffered hand as she tried to sort through the tainted memories of earth.
"Hades took his own life," she said, withdrawing her hand from the soil. She wiped her fingers on the hem of her cloak. "He knew it was only a matter of time before they were forgotten, and without the memory of the mortal world, they would cease to be." The very ground was saturated with the melancholy of the gods, and it threatened to overwhelm her. "The constant thought of it drove Hades mad, and he slit his own throat with a dagger that was a gift to him from his beloved Persephone."
"I’d slit my throat if I had to live here, too," Danny muttered to himself, still gazing in disbelief at the remains of the god.
Conan Doyle still held Ceridwen’s hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. "And Eve? Can you sense anything of her?"
Ceridwen nodded, dredging up that particular piece of imagery from the countless others shown to her. She saw the hideous Gull and his followers, and she saw Eve, kneeling before the vengeful Furies. "Yes, they were here," she gasped. "As were the Erinyes. They’ve all gone inside."
She turned her gaze to one of the many ragged, rotting holes in the corpse of Hades, where strange, mournful sounds continued to waft out from within. They live there, she thought. Not only the Furies, but others as well. The dead. The damned. The gigantic corpse was like a city of death.
Danny only laughed. "We’re going in there? Of course we are!"
The rotting flesh of the god was stiff with rigor, but tore with enough pressure, releasing the nauseating stink of decay. Conan Doyle was surprised to find how simple it was to climb Hades’ corpse. Only the stench was a deterrent. They scaled the mountainous corpse to one of the larger gashes at the rib cage and slipped inside, walking on wounded flesh that seemed to have moved from putrefaction to petrification. Inside, the corpse was so dry it seemed almost mummified.
Conan Doyle led them within and found that pathways had been constructed of repurposed flesh and bone. There were chambers and tunnels, and quickly enough they found a makeshift bridge fashioned out of a rib bone. Conan Doyle crossed that bridge and the others quickly followed. It was like they had entered another world. Within the corpse it was dark, but what looked to be stars twinkled from the ceiling above, suspended in a velvety black sky, illuminating the strange landscape with the faint hint of twilight.
"They can’t be stars," Danny said, squinting up at the ceiling. "We’re inside a body. . ."
The demon boy’s voice trailed off, arousing Conan Doyle’s curiosity. "What is it, Danny?" he asked, looking up as well, but unable to penetrate the inky black.
Ceridwen raised her hand, blue-green light springing to life at her fingers as she attempted to illuminate the darkness above, but it was impenetrable.
"Those aren’t stars," Danny said with a slow shake of his head. "They’re eyes."
Conan Doyle squinted, but it was obvious that the youth’s recent demonic metamorphosis had enhanced his night vision, for as much as he wanted to, he could still see nothing.
"The entire roof, or whatever it is . . . it’s covered in bodies, thousands of bodies, and they’re watching us." Danny shuddered, looking quickly away.
"The spirits of those being punished by the Furies," Ceridwen said thoughtfully. "I saw it when I was tethered to the soil. The Erinyes built their lair here, transformed Hades’ remains into a palace of suffering for those condemned to their ministrations."
Danny looked up at the ceiling again, unable to take his eyes from it. "It’s . . . it’s horrible," he whispered. "Their mouths are all moving — they’re reaching out for somebody to help them." He sounded very young.
Conan Doyle put a hand on the boy’s shoulder. "There’s nothing we can do for those poor souls now. They’re the ghosts of another age. But we can prevent Eve from sharing their fate."
This seemed to rally the boy’s resolve, and they forged ahead, deeper into the body of the fallen god, the eyes of the damned lighting their way. There were strange formations of what first appeared to be rock on either side of the path they traveled. Upon closer examination, Conan Doyle discovered that it was not rock at all, but the ossified remains of what could only have once been other gods. They were huddled close, wearing masks of sadness and misery, draped over one another as if they had been commiserating when the end finally arrived. Minor deities and demigods, dressed in tarnished armor and wielding pitted swords and axes. They had inhabited the corpse of Hades at some point, who knew how many millennia before, and had died there, forgotten. Dozens of them. Hundreds.
The Children of Olympus.
And yet Conan Doyle could not help wondering what had happened to the others. Where were Zeus and Athena and Poseidon and their kin, the key figures of Greek mythology? Surely they were not these withered corpses whose remains had merged with the bones and dead flesh of Hades.
"This is where they fled," Ceridwen said, interrupting his musing as she reached out to brush her fingers across the remains of a dead god. She gasped, pulling her hand quickly away. "How horrible," she whispered, clutching the hand to her breast. "They are still alive — a spark of life
still exists within these petrified shells."
"Come away," Conan Doyle said, taking her by the arm and leading her back onto the path. "They are echoes of the distant past. Relics. Their fate cannot be undone."
The demon boy hushed them, then, and Conan Doyle turned to see that he had moved ahead several yards. He was crouched with his head cocked, listening. When the mage and Ceridwen went to stand with him, they heard faint voices chanting in ritual, the words indistinguishable but growing louder.
They began to follow the voices. As they walked, the ground beneath their feet became soft and yielding but not from rot, like the outer flesh of the corpse. It was as though they were walking across a carpet of thick moss. Conan Doyle wondered about it, but his musings were cut short as they reached a new passage. The sounds of voices were louder now, and he could distinguish that of Nigel Gull from the others. The sorcerer was pleading, begging in song that his petition be granted. The other voices, women’s voices, made the hair at the back of Doyle’s neck stand on end, and an icy chill run up and down his spine.
The fleshy passage opened up onto a ledge that looked out over an enormous chamber of dark, thickly muscled walls.
"The heart of Hades," Conan Doyle whispered to his companions, marveling at the sight.
The three knelt and carefully peered over the edge.
Below them Nigel Gull stood before three terrible creatures that could only have been the Furies. Hawkins and Jezebel knelt behind him in reverence to the sisters, their heads bowed, as if to look upon the Erinyes was to somehow incite their wrath. Eve stood obediently at Gull’s side, the lash of one of the Erinyes wrapped around her throat like a leash. The twisted mage was using the voice he had stolen, the voice of Orpheus, to entice the sisters of night.
Tears of the Furies (A Novel of the Menagerie) Page 28
