Chapter 16
She materialised in the same place in the Underworld, the long path stretching before her. Around her, she sensed demons stirring, as if called by her presence. She glanced around but found herself the only soul, so with a deep breath, she stepped off the path and set off into the forest. The forest that consumed wandering souls, made minds crumble and souls shatter. Normal humans, anyway. She was different. The forest seemed almost obedient to her, the trees almost parting for her as she went, and shifting their thick foliage to allow bands of reddish light to guide her. Once she felt she was deep enough within, sufficiently hidden by the energy of the forest, she simply waited. The demons wouldn’t touch the path but the forest was fair game.
From a distance she heard their hooves and claws scraping and thumping against the forest floor, their matted fur and scales and horns catching on foliage. She wasn’t afraid. They weren’t, after all, coming to kill her and the human fear of monsters had long been abandoned. Of the ones in the Underworld, anyway.
It was a Harpy that came out first, which surprised Fay. Few lived in the Underworld but by chance – or fate – one had felt her and come to her silent call. She looked almost human, at a glance; taller than Fay, with oily black hair loose down one shoulder, and dark olive skin to match. Obsidian wings were folded neatly at her back, the tips peaking just over her shoulder. Her tail flicked out, swishing back and forth like a bored cat surveying its prey. She had her arms crossed, her talons curling around her tattooed arms.
“You summoned me,” she said with a curl of disdain.
The name of the harpy came to Fay, as if conjured from memory. “I need you to deliver a message for me Aello.”
Aello stiffened at the call of her name but she inclined her head obediently. “The message?”
“To Nebiru, the leader of the Hellhounds here in the Underworld. To him, I want you to say exactly this: there is one amongst you whom you cannot trust, and a rogue hellhound that must be found. Meet me as soon as you get this where you promised we’d talk again”
Aello repeated the message perfectly but she seemed venomous to be reduced to a messenger. It was something beneath her. Fay didn’t care. She watched Aello vanish into a plume of smoke, feeling more demons close in. Not in the mood to deal with more she closed her eyes and willed herself away, appearing back at the back of the cabin.
She wandered inside but everything was quiet and dark, the air thick and stale. By her guess she’d been gone most of the day, given that the sun was slowly sinking beneath the horizon, and the air didn’t taste like it’d been contained for more than a day. She glanced through the front window. There wasn’t a car but it was faster to shadow travel anyway. Outside, she shed her clothes quickly, found a small bag for them, wrapped them up tightly and then shifted. Once the last bone clicked into place she scooped the bag into her mouth and set off.
Fay took care to drown the bond in energy as she reached the outskirts of the school. It was midday and school was in session. She shifted back and carefully unwrapped the parcel, donning her clothes quickly. It’d be awkward if she ran into anyone, naked. Once she tagged her shirt into place she sat down by the tree, stretched out beneath the tree and tried to relax. A sudden quiver of anxiety pulsed through her at the prospect of another vision. They were happening more and more, clearer each time, and they seemed to linger in her mind. The past and present were slowly blurring into one and she felt adrift, uneasy. With the tether to Abe essentially severed she didn’t know who to turn to. Mel was too new, Ben with too much past, and everyone else was a stranger.
“So, you summon demons?” Nebiru’s voice rumbled from the trees and a second later he materialised from the shadows. “Full of surprises, aren’t you?”
“They’re drawn to me and they obey me. I don’t know why, guess I figured it was part of being a hellhound,” said Fay, climbing up. “Is it?”
Nebiru studied her closely. “No.”
“About my message-“
“The mole?”
Fay nodded, slowly. She didn’t like taking a leap of faith, especially when there was every chance he was the mole. Though she wasn’t about to admit she was only confiding because of the visions; in them, he seemed genuinely concerned, a kind sort of person. It was a thin straw but Fay was in the mood to grasp at anything. So, she quietly confessed about Amanda, and the Poltergeists; how, in her mind, it was connected. The timing was too close; her abduction, the sightings of poltergeists, the Immortal wolves. Her theory that someone from the Underworld had aided in the smuggling of souls for a spell seemed to disturb him deeply.
“We knew about the other hellhound,” he confessed. “We’ve kept it quiet for our own reasons. Thanatos came back one day, angry over how everything went down with you, and the fact that the second hellhound he went to he couldn’t find.”
Fay frowned. “The God of Death couldn’t find a creature of death?”
Scepticism danced in Nebiru’s dark gaze. “Indeed. After that, she was sensed only sporadically. I suspected as such her master – or mistress – might’ve used magic to hide her.”
“Powerful magic to hide someone from Thanatos. Has Hades said anything?”
He stiffened and looked away suddenly, as if Fay had stumbled onto dangerous ground. Loyalty had him torn, though Fay still struggled to grasp anyone having any real loyalty for Hades. When he looked back he seemed intensely reluctant.
“Hades has been distracted, lately. There have been problems in Tartarus. I can’t go into it but because of it Hades has been distracted. We’ve been trying to control the issue of the hellhound girl. Unfortunately, when she has come up in recent months, it’s been in the Underworld and only briefly, like flashes of her presence. It’s bright, like she’s purposefully being loud, pushing through whatever barriers are hiding her. It feels like she’s trying to be noticed,” said Nebiru and fell silent, realising he’d probably said too much.
“So, she’s being going to the Underworld, stealing souls. I saw the place where they did the spell to summon them all and to anchor them to the town. They drove them mad and-“ Fay stopped herself and looked intensely up at Nebiru. “You were there, at the lake.”
He stared back, eyes stony, resolute. “I was. I had my hounds search the lake for the source as I took you away. Those that remain at the beach were attacked. They survived but were badly injured and retreated to the Underworld. When we returned the dust had already been collected.”
“And those Immortal Wolves were born,” said Fay, troubled. “How does Zeus not know about this?”
“My guess is he’s either being blinded by this – and if that’s the case, there’s a bigger player in this right now. Otherwise, he doesn’t see this as a problem. I don’t pretend to know his mind,” said Nebiru with a curl of disdain. “I can’t decide which is more troubling.”
Fay pondered the matter of Zeus’s mind for a moment or so. Since she’d turned she’d never really felt him, never worried about his hand in things. He seemed like a distant thought, some abstract presence lurking at the fringe of consciousness. She turned her mind to Amanda.
“Any ideas on who Amanda’s master might be?”
Nebiru’s shuttered eyes flickered away for a moment. “Evidence suggests a witch, a very powerful witch.”
“God-touched?”
Nebiru’s stony eyes glanced at Fay, betraying nothing. After a moment, he shrugged but remained silent, as though Fay had unwittingly touched an uneasy subject. What if a God had blessed a young witch, granting her power but, seeing how dangerous she’d become, withdrew? Or simply grew bored? Fay had heard and seen how someone spurned by the Gods could react.
“You intend to continue with this case, don’t you?” He asked finally, levelling a guarded look at her.
Fay stared back, unflinching. “Yes.”
“Which is why you avoid Abe.”
At that, she swore he smiled as he dissolved into a plume of smoke, his dark laughter ringing in her ears.
Fay didn’t want to return to the empty cabin, so she found a small park at the edge of town, a little off the main road. It was hidden at the bottom of a small slope, edged by an array of low trees and well-pruned hedges. Fay sat down beneath a large oak, the ancient limbs stretching out far, casting a thick shadow over her. She dissolved herself into the shadow and sat, unseen, watching the whole world.
On a little slide in the kid’s park a black bird perched, feathers ruffled. It wasn’t a special kind of bird, nor did it sing. It simply sat there, perhaps resting but maybe it watched the park too, just as Fay did. Its own simple thoughts spiralling around in that tiny brain, whilst Fay’s complex web tightened and unravelled, spiralled into darkness before springing up into blinding light.
The dull roar of a motorbike split the air. The bird fluttered away, vanishing. Fay glanced over as she sat the rider climbed off the bike they parked at the top of the hill. They looked down at the park, searching, then slowly removed the helmet. It was Tash. She looked different; from afar she seemed pensive, gloomy as she walked down the slope. She walked straight over to the swing and sat down. For a minute she just stared into thin air, then sighed and dug out her phone from her bag. She looked at it briefly then put it in the pocket of her jacket.
Before Fay knew it she stood and stepped out of the shadows. Tash didn’t even look at her until Fay sat down in the swing beside her.
“So, you’re AWOL now?”
“Routine bores me,” said Fay conversationally. “I came here to get away from people. Why are you here?”
Tash laughed. “Same reason. People suck, you know? There’s rumours going around about you.”
Fay smiled wickedly. “What salacious rumours are they?”
“You’re pregnant with your half-brother’s baby, running off because he won’t deal with the scandal. Some say you’re high in some drug house. Others say you ran away to Europe. I like the one where they say you married a rich guy in secret and flew away to somewhere exotic,” said Tash wistfully. “To get away from all of this. I will someday, you know? There’s a castle on a hill with my name on it.”
“Not the worst thing to dream for.”
Tash shrugged. “Anyway, what are you going?”
“Trying to figure on some stuff rattling around in my head. It’s a mess up there, trust me.”
The two of them felt silent and Fay felt an odd kinship with her, as if they’d known each other for years. With anyone she’d felt like an outcast, a spy peering into a foreign world. There had been something detached about it. Yet with Tash she felt normal, if such a thing were possible.
“I like you,” declared Fay. “I don’t like a lot of people but I like you.”
Tash snorted. “I’m glad.”
“No, you don’t get it. I’ve always been an outcast. The weird one. I never quite fit anywhere and very few people seemed to like me. Probably because I avoided people like the plague.” She was silent for a moment before she continued on. “Ben was my only friend. He tried to help me make a few others but I’m pretty sure they only hung around me because of him.”
“I didn’t know Ben for long at school before he left but seemed nice, genuine. Rare at our school,” she remarked. “His problem was, however, he tried to help everyone. Everyone thought he was a saint for it.”
Fay glanced at Tash, whose face was hard to read, the shape of her mouth hard and unyielding.
“You didn’t?”
“Honestly? It was like he was trying to atone, like he was ashamed of something. There was about six months of that, then he left school. That was as far as he got in running from this town,” she said scornfully, as if Ben had failed to live up to her expectations. “He could’ve run, made something for himself but didn’t. He stayed.”
Tash’s mouth tightened, as if holding in words. She rested her cheek on the chain and exhaled, deeply. Tension still lingered in her shoulders.
“Why don’t you leave if you hate it so much?”
“I am,” said Tash, without missing a beat. “What about you? Are you sticking around?”
“A little longer, then I’m gone.”
“Where?”
Fay stilled. Where would she go? Back to Abe’s side, a faithful partner? The thought twisted like a knife in her gut. No reply came and Tash and she sat in their own silence, seemingly companions against the world, haunted.
There was a small river running through the forest barely a hundred yards from the cabin, hidden by thick forest and dense foliage. Fay sat by it as she sipped a cup of coffee, her knees brought up to her chest, and her back to the hardened bark of an ancient tree. Sunlight streamed in through slits in the canopies, slicing through bands of shadow. She brought the cup to her mouth, downing the bitter coffee. As she brought the mug back down, savouring the drink snaking down her chest, she closed her eyes – just for a moment.
A gasp split the air. Fay’s eyes flew open, her drink going flying as the mug fell away. A figure dragged itself from the water, blood streaming in the water behind them, a trail of watery red. The figure – no, a girl – collapsed. Fay rushed forward, rolling her over.
“Mel?”
The Siren looked half dead, covered in a myriad of gashes and bite marks, bruised from head to toe, her clothes shredded. She was breathing hard, her eyes staring up but unfocused. Her lips began to move, blood spluttering from them, and she started to sing. Entranced, Fay couldn’t move, couldn’t think, as Mel sang – her ethereal voice filling the air as her body began to glow, the cuts healing before her eyes; then, without warning, she stopped and groaned, sitting up, still covered in wounds but a little better.
“Mel, what the hell happened?”
Mel’s eyes flew to Fay. “Ben!”
She tried to stand but swayed, weak. Fay clamped her hand around Mel’s arm, stopping her. “Where is he?”
“I’ll help. I have to. I-I left him! He threw me in the water, said to run but…I blacked out. I should’ve stayed.”
Fay gripped Mel. “Where is he? I’ll go. I’ll find him but you have to tell me.”
Mel blinked and pointed shakily to the water. “Follow the river…You’ll smell the blood. God, there was so much blood.”
Fay didn’t hear anything else as she took off running, leaping, shifting midstride. She became one with the darkness and in that moment, something inside her awoke and it was out for blood.
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