“Ammit,” Hannah whispered as the creature retreated to the shadows. “But where is Anubis?”
“Heel, my hound,” a loud voice commanded.
Wycliff emitted a grunt, and his body turned involuntarily to the right. He ground his jaws and snapped as his paws slid over the stone floor. His long nails grated on the smooth stone, trying to find purchase.
“Wycliff!” Hannah cried, and rushed to his side.
“My master calls.” He growled and snarled as though someone reeled in a chain attached to his ornate collar.
Seraphina cast a glowing orb and flung it into the air. It spun for a moment, then flew to one side of the raised platform.
Hannah nearly tripped when her mother’s light revealed who had called Wycliff to his side. Only her hand on Wycliff’s fur allowed her to keep her balance.
Before them stood a towering man with the head of a jackal. Some eight feet tall, he possessed a chiselled torso of ebony skin stretched over tight muscle. Around his hips hung a cream linen kilt edged in gold. Golden bracers inset with blue and green gems encased his forearms and were matched by a collar around his neck.
Anubis.
“You dare to cast magic in my realm?” Anubis roared at Seraphina. He snapped out one arm that held a staff and a narrow beam of red shot toward the mage.
Seraphina crossed her wrists and then gestured with one hand. The beam crumpled like an autumn leaf into a hundred tiny pieces that floated to the floor. “This is my realm, too.”
Anubis laughed. “So it would seem. At last, my hound brings me the missing shadow mage. It has been too long since one served at my side.”
A woman stood beside Anubis. Hair like a raven’s wing fell down her back to her waist. A Horus eye was drawn in heavy black around her eyes and her lids were painted with gold. She wore a gown similar to the clothing of Hannah and her mother, but the gold cord made an intricate pattern as it criss-crossed her torso. She regarded them with the hint of a smile on her full lips.
Anput, wife of Anubis.
Wycliff sat on his haunches before the god of the underworld. “Why was I created?”
Anubis leaned toward Wycliff and inhaled, his large nostrils flaring. “You are familiar. I once granted his life to a man who smelled like you, at my shadow mage’s behest, but there is also a whiff of Kemsit about you.”
“He is the descendant of de Cliffe. Is that why your hounds did this to him?” Hannah stepped forward, but one hand still gripped Wycliff’s fur.
The fearsome god swung his head to Hannah and narrowed his eyes. “Who are you?”
“My daughter.”
“My wife.” Seraphina and Wycliff answered simultaneously.
A scream halted Hannah’s response, as another soul tipped the scales. She glanced over as Ammit lunged and snapped the heart between her jaws. A shudder ran down Hannah’s spine. She understood why some chose to stay in the Duat, rather than present themselves for judgement only to be found unworthy.
“I journeyed here beside my husband and mother,” Hannah replied, steeling her spine to meet Anubis’s inky gaze.
A smile tugged at Anput’s lips. “It appears your hound married the daughter of your shadow mage. Kemsit would be pleased.”
Anubis frowned, and his grip shifted on the staff.
“Why did your hounds create Wycliff? And after you answer that question, I want to know what being a shadow mage entails.” Seraphina walked to the base of the dais. Sparks rippled over her skin as magic coursed through her.
Anubis pinched the bridge of his jackal nose and walked backward to his throne. He dropped onto the curved seat. Reclining sphinx created the arms and each spread a winged arm to form the back of the chair. The god of the underworld tapped long fingers on a sphinx head as he glared at them. “De Cliffe promised me his heir to replace a hound, in exchange for his life. Kemsit journeyed with him to that cold and wet isle to ensure he kept his promise.”
“One of mine for one of yours, a bargain struck, the tower endures,” Hannah whispered. She ran her fingers through Wycliff’s silken fur. “It wasn’t an exchange, but a promise. De Cliffe gave his descendant to become a hellhound.”
Wycliff snarled and jumped to his feet. He snapped at his master. “Where is my choice in this?”
Hannah stroked the fur rising along his spine. She understood his anger, but events that day had shaped her life, too. “If you could undo that day, Wycliff, would we ever have crossed paths? We are chess pieces upon the board of life, are we not, Mother?”
The pony-sized hellhound heaved a sigh and sat back down. “You are right, Hannah. I would change nothing, if to do so would mean we never met.”
Anput grinned and stood next to her husband. “Your fate, hound, was sealed long ago. But I think the outcome is satisfactory, is it not?”
“Why were your hellhounds prowling the living realm? One has never been seen since, except for Wycliff here.” Seraphina crafted her own curved seat from the air and sat at last. Then she crossed her legs and uncrossed them, before placing her feet flat on the ground.
“The hounds were called forth when the shadow mage ritual was invoked. They were sent to find her and escort her here, but they returned alone. It took de Cliffe’s heir to bring you here.” Anubis gestured with his hand.
“Like my husband before the hellhounds, my mother did not consent to becoming a shadow mage. Her life was snuffed out by another, a man called Dupré, who perverted the ritual to create a shadow mage.” Hannah borrowed bravery from the presence of her mother and husband. The longer she spent in the temple before Anubis, the more her curiosity emerged.
“Is this true?” Anubis barked at Seraphina.
“Yes. This living mage brewed a most heinous poison. First, he tested it on me, then he unleashed it on England—our country, where Kemsit’s remains rest. Three hundred innocents lost their lives. But he used spells he found in Egypt without understanding their effect. We rot upon our feet. Only consuming the brain of another keeps the decay from consuming us.” Seraphina pushed off from her chair and paced before Anubis, something she had not been able to do for two years. The linen of her gown flowed around her legs like water. “I cannot imagine that you intended your shadow mage to exist in such a perilous state.”
Anubis rolled his shoulders and tossed his staff to the ground. “My shadow mage does not decay. Your ka should give your physical form the sustenance it requires from the Duat, to keep that form intact. Your body must remain well preserved to serve me in the living realm.”
Seraphina paused and faced the god with a faint smile. “Yet that is our predicament. Those struck down by this curse should be relieved of that horror, if we cannot restart their hearts and restore them to life. We believe something stops the ka from returning to the khat each night, and that it is tied to the evil magic Dupré cast.”
Pride flowed through Hannah at how her mother tackled the god of the underworld without flinching.
The dead mage continued, “We seek his soul, which may hide here. His hands are covered in the blood of innocents and if we know how he cast this curse, we may be able to undo it. Or free the ka so our bodies no longer deteriorate.”
“You stand before me and speak of bloody hands? Yours are dripping with it, shadow mage.” Anubis swiped the air and blood fell from Seraphina’s hands and dripped to the stones at her feet.
She shook her hands, and the blood vanished. Then Seraphina straightened her spine and stared at the god. No easy feat when he stood eight feet tall and upon a dais. “I stood on a battlefield and defended my soldiers against a charging enemy. Dupré sneaked into the bedchambers of women and snuffed out their lives in a cowardly manner. We are nothing alike. If you expect me to serve you, you first need to stop my body from rotting.”
Then her mother turned and walked back to her seat. There, she inspected her fingernails. Hannah glanced from shadow mage to god. As Anubis went to rise, his wife placed a hand on his shoulder.
“Your
mage’s request is reasonable,” Anput said. “Let them find this soul. He should answer to you, husband, for twisting our sacred rituals to his own ends.”
Anubis nodded. “Very well. You may hunt him and drag him before me.”
“How do we find one among so many?” Seraphina stood and gestured to her chair, which winked out of existence. A handy skill, Hannah thought. She was growing tired of all the walking and standing.
Anubis barked a laugh, and it echoed around the temple until it seemed a hundred jackals laughed in response. “This is our realm, and our hellhound is before you. His purpose is to seek out the foul souls who conceal themselves. Place your hand on his head and give him the name of the one you would have brought before you.”
Seraphina did as instructed and rested her hand between Wycliff’s large ears. Then she whispered, “Dupré.”
22
The name echoed through Wycliff’s skull and reached a crescendo, as though he had stuck his head between a pair of cymbals at the exact moment they crashed together. He shook his head to disperse the ringing in his ears, and the noise faded to a single faint note. He turned. The sound shifted and now came from outside his head.
He brushed himself against Hannah in a farewell caress, inclined his head to the mage, and then took off at a run. People scattered out of his way, and he bounded down the steps in a single stride. Hitting the sand, he closed his eyes and drew a deep breath. He filtered through the noise of startled souls, circling birds, and vendors selling their wares.
The clear note pulled him in one direction, toward the bustling city. He set off at a lope; the sand disappearing under his paws as he ran. A breeze ruffled along his back and cooled his fur. The gold ankh on his collar swung back and forth, splashing bright light over his feet.
The city reminded him of those he’d seen during his time in the army. Red-tinged mud-brick houses were crammed close to one another and dotted the rise of the land. Many had flat roofs where the occupants slept at night to take advantage of the cooler air. Washed clothing in sunny yellows, fiery reds, and vibrant blues was strung between buildings and created flapping flags. As he slowed his pace to accommodate the press of people, Wycliff pondered the ordinariness of an afterlife where you still needed to do laundry.
Pausing at a crossroads, he lifted his head to find the tone. The steady pitch came from his right and the rolling hills behind the city. Trotting along the busy roads, Wycliff observed that he generated two different reactions in people. Some reached out to stroke his fur as he passed and murmured greetings, others shrank and hid.
A group of children ran along the packed-dirt street, kicking a ball between them. That made him pause. For some reason, he hadn’t expected to see children in the Duat. But then, death did not discriminate on the basis of age or status. Death took everyone, whether you were prepared or not.
Onward, the ringing tone pulled him. The houses lay farther apart on the outskirts of the city, and soon he made his way through scrub and scraggly plants. The hill loomed before him and a dim shadow at the bottom indicated a depression or cave. The noise between his ears pinged every time he stared at the dark spot.
Wycliff shook his head as the tone increased in pitch with each stride he took toward the entrance. He sniffed, catching a ripe, unwashed aroma. Then silence fell in his skull as the sound vanished.
“Found you,” he whispered as he stood on the line between light and dark.
The cave ran back into the hill for several feet and created a space similar in size to a large parlour. A lantern burned near the back and highlighted the room. Shelves and a table were pushed to one side. Everything seemed constructed of crooked and misaligned wood, as though built from sticks and branches rather than milled timber. Or made by someone unused to using his hands.
A man sat on a roughly constructed bed. He appeared to be somewhere in his sixties, with silver hair and a bushy beard laced with silver. He was dressed in simple linen trousers and an overshirt, both stained with sweat and grime, the original cream now a dingy brown. Neither man nor clothing had been washed in some time. Wycliff had found the source of the sweaty stench.
Books and scrolls were scattered around the man’s feet, and an open one rested across his lap. He held his hands over the pages and muttered under his breath. Over and over he rubbed his hands. The incantation became louder, and then he slapped his hands together.
Nothing happened.
The man swore and tossed the book to the dirt floor to join the pile of others. At which point he noticed Wycliff and jumped to his feet.
“Magic not working?” Wycliff asked as he stalked closer.
“I am the strongest mage in all of France and Europe. I commanded powerful forces when I last stood in Egypt at my emperor’s side. My magic should work in this hellhole, too.” Dupré’s attention darted to the exit behind Wycliff.
“You were a powerful mage. Now you are dead and your power passed to another.” He took a step closer to the mage who had crafted the curse that took Hannah’s life. In his mind, Wycliff imagined setting fire to the man and watching him burn. But that wouldn’t drag the cure from his lips. Despite his gut reaction at the prospect of seeing the creator of the Affliction suffer, he had to bide his time. Wycliff expected his rage to turn his vision red, but this close to the man, his veins chilled instead.
Some people didn’t realise that ice burned. Most lads got their tongues stuck at some point in their youth, or laughed as another boy licked cold metal or a chunk of ice. The ground under Wycliff’s paws cracked as the earth froze. White slivers raced away from his pads. His fur tinkled with the music of frosted leaves.
“Why are you here, dog? Go away and leave me to my work.” The mage waved a hand at him, as though shooing a chicken out of the way.
What Wycliff wanted was to hear the man scream in agony and beg for his life, but when he reached out for the void, it didn’t appear. He wondered if it only worked as a conduit between the living realm and the Duat. That seemed inefficient to him. How was he supposed to dispatch an evil soul he had ferreted out of its hiding place?
“You are summoned to the temple. I am to fetch you.” Wycliff’s words turned to snow and drifted to the floor.
“I am not interested. I am staying here with my books. Somewhere in here is the spell I need to transport me back to France.” Dupré shuffled sideways, edging toward the opening of the cave.
“This is not a request.” Wycliff padded closer and bared his canines. Saliva froze and turned into stalactites hanging from his jaws.
Dupré lunged and snatched up a chair at the end of the bed. He swung it and wood smashed into Wycliff’s head.
Fool. The flimsy chair broke apart as though it were made of twigs. All it did was annoy him. Wycliff snapped and latched on to the mage’s arm.
The man screamed as his flesh iced over. He jerked and struck out with his other hand, but his warm palm stuck to Wycliff’s frozen side. Wycliff took a step toward the light and dragged the mage with him. The mage’s sandals scuffed over the dirt as he tried to dig in his heels, and he threw his weight backward. The flailing man was no impediment at all to the pony-sized hellhound, rather like a child trying to stop a determined horse. Part of Wycliff was disappointed; he wanted more of a fight. Perhaps Lady Miles would invoke a stronger reaction in Dupré.
He blinked as he emerged into the daylight with his prisoner and heaved a sigh. It would be a slow trip back with the man’s arm wedged in his jaws. At that point, Wycliff discovered Dupré didn’t appreciate the value of silence. The mage ranted, raved, swore, and then pleaded nonstop.
Wycliff pondered turning his cold fury into blazing rage and seeing how the mage who had created the Afflicted enjoyed a good inferno. But that might not go down well with his wife, her powerful mother-in-law, or the god of the underworld, who all waited for him. That led him to contemplate Anubis’s employment terms. There weren’t enough hours in the day already to satisfy the demands of Mireworth and his rol
e as investigator, without having to sniff out recalcitrant souls for Anubis.
Hannah watched the massive hellhound run from the temple and wished her husband a safe mission.
Anubis stepped down from the dais and gestured to Seraphina. “Come, shadow mage, there are spells I need you to reinforce around my temple.”
A coy smile flitted across Seraphina’s face. “I haven’t decided if I want the position yet. What happened to Kemsit?”
Anubis frowned and glanced back to his wife, as though expecting her to deal with this troublesome member of her sex. “She grew weary and journeyed to the Aaru.”
“What happened with de Cliffe in Egypt that he struck a bargain to give up his descendant to be your hellhound?” Hannah asked. Since they had the attention of Anubis, who better to ask about the secrets hiding at Mireworth?
The god of the underworld emitted his barking laugh. “I will only tell my shadow mage that tale, once she takes up her position.”
Well, that wasn’t fair. Hannah shot her mother a pleading look—the one that usually allowed her an extra book at the store, or an hour longer to read before bed.
“Since you have opened negotiations…I will become your shadow mage when you restore my daughter to life,” Seraphina threw out to the imposing god.
Hannah nearly called out and yourself, but bit her lip. Logically, if her mother’s heart beat once more, she would no longer be a shadow mage. The implications stuck in her throat—a child’s innocent life would be cut short. The boy who inherited her mother’s powers on her passing could not exist if Seraphina lived. He would die to restore her power.
Anubis crossed his muscled arms, and his ears twitched. “Come. I have a ward that holds back the void that is cracked. Fix it and I will consider the fate of your child.”
Hessians and Hellhounds Page 20
