Hell's Pawn

by Jay Bell

  C ernunnos stood, towering over them. “Well? W hat words did you bring? W hat tricks did you think would turn us from our path?”

  J ohn struggled to find his voice as they regained their feet. The animal instincts had fled from him, but his mind hadn’t yet recovered.

  C ernunnos sniffed, his wide nostrils flaring as he sampled each of them before settling on Dante.

  “W hat is that smell on you? An ox? A goat? S omething with horns. S omething close to me, but you aren’t one of mine.”

  J ohn waited for R immon to appear, but the demon stayed hidden. C ernunnos stomped a circle around Dante, guttural animal noises rising from his chest.

  “You don’t look like a demon.” He took another deep whiff. “B ut there’s no mistaking that smell. Your kind stole their scent from me.”

  “Don’t go blaming me,” Dante said. “S ome friends you can’t choose. Associations that you didn’t ask for, if you catch my drift.”

  C ernunnos huffed, took a step back, and howled. The sound was terrifying, an immensely deep chord that made them shudder. M ovement came from the trees. The first to step into the clearing was a bear, followed by a leopard and a boar. Then the stags came, at least a dozen of them. They were brawny creatures, their coats and hooves glossy with health, but it was the impressive racks that intimidated as they were lowered meaningfully.

  A low growl began in Bolo’s chest, confirming the intended threat.

  John swallowed. He needed a distraction. “These animals are yours,” he said, “but is this where all animals go when they die?”

  “Words,” Cernunnos hissed as his beasts began to advance.

  “How many stags did we see trapped in Purgatory?” John asked.

  “O h, I don’t know,” Dante answered smoothly, having caught on. “Ten? Twenty?

  Enough that it was hard to count.”

  “Empty and hollow words!” Cernunnos snarled. “Pots sculpted from liar’s clay.” B olo’s growl broke into a whimper. They were done for. The dog could sense what humans couldn’t and must have known no hope was left. C ernunnos meant to kill them, or whatever horrible condition he could inflict on them, except that the woodland god’s complete a ention was now focused on the dog. He growled at the dog and dipped his head in a feigned a ack, but B olo didn’t back down. I nstead he barked, dodging back and forth as if C ernunnos were a sheep he could herd.

  C ernunnos growled back, but B olo continued to be a moving target. Then they both ceased this odd game.

  “This hound vouches for you,” C ernunnos said. “You freed him, but there were many more.”

  “That’s why we want to go back and fight.” J ohn hesitated, wanting to say more but realizing that C ernunnos had li le patience for words. The horned god thought. As he did so, the surrounding beasts relaxed and dispersed, disappearing back into the forest.

  “Those before you had nothing to say about the animals,” Cernunnos said.

  “M aybe they didn’t know,” J ohn said. “This is about freeing trapped souls, animals included. That’s all you need agree to.”

  C ernunnos’s eyes narrowed in suspicion. “I will free the animals, but no more than that.”

  J ohn breathed a sigh of relief. “That’s more than enough, but we’ll need help reaching them. There’s a barrier—”

  “Come,” Cernunnos beckoned them forward. “Save your words for the other gods.” O ne moment they were on trial, the next they had gained a new ally. J ohn couldn’t remember the last time he’d had so much fun! M aybe being an architectural engineer hadn’t been the right job for him, when he could have sought his thrills as a hostage negotiator or something similar.

  The woods C ernunnos led them through were full of life. Two foxes cut across their path, absorbed in chasing each other. B irds fli ed from tree to tree, and the underbrush rustled with unseen activity. S quirrels cha ered and deer grazed fearlessly, as if they were in the Garden of Eden.

  “So, is this where animals go when they die?” John asked again.

  “The animals go where they please,” C ernunnos said. “They are not pulled to one place, as human souls are. Unburdened by religion, they are free.”

  “I’ve noticed Bolo does whatever he likes,” Dante muttered.

  Cernunnos nodded. “Dogs have no dogma.”

  “B ut what about atheists?” J ohn asked. “Plenty of people aren’t religious. W hat happens to them?”

  The horned god shrugged. “They do not interest me. I tire of speaking. L et us run again.”

  John was all too glad to comply.

  * * * * *

  The sun was se ing when they reached the edge of the woods and, soon after, the end of the island. Humps of grassy hills rolled along until they were interrupted by ocean-ba ered cliffs. The world was quiet here, the call of seagulls notably absent.

  Cernunnos led them toward a long, mounded hill broken by a dark opening.

  A woman appeared out of the shadows. S he was wrapped in a cloak of dark feathers, her slick, black hair a scarf around her neck. Her skin was the ivory of a moon set against the night sky, for that was what she was. C erridwen, goddess of the moon, knowledge, magic, and transformation.

  “G reetings, Horned O ne.” Her voice was the breeze at midnight. “That you bring company suggests business instead of pleasure.”

  “I always seek your pleasure,” C ernunnos answered. “Dispose of these visitors, and these silent cliffs shall be filled with our howls.”

  “Then I shall not let them delay me long.” The goddess smiled. “C ome gentlemen, come away with me.”

  They didn’t need to move. The darkness from the hill’s entrance spilled out and enveloped the world. C ernunnos and his woods, the sky above and crashing waves below, all were gone. J ohn was barely able to see Dante and B olo, their faces pale in the glowing light of C erridwen’s skin. The goddess glided away from them, and if they didn’t follow, they would have no light left to see by. They chased after the goddess, who appeared to progress by a casual stroll, but they couldn’t quite reach her. The glow of C erridwen’s skin intensified as they moved through the darkness, illuminating their surroundings.

  The path they were walking twisted downward through a cave. The time-smoothed walls were covered in writing, strange chopstick le ers from a language J ohn didn’t recognize. He tried to decipher words, to find meaning in the symbols, until the walls fell away. They had entered a large cavern, the echoes from their footsteps distant.

  S oon the goddess ahead of them was all they could see, their surroundings lost again to darkness. S he was much further ahead than she had been before. The idea of losing her panicked them. W ithout her they would be lost in a void, deprived of their most precious sense.

  “Hurry,” J ohn hissed, but there was no response from his friends. Desperately he cast his arms out to either side, but found no one there. Nor was there a reply when he called their names. Even Rimmon’s name failed to provoke a response.

  C erridwen was li le more than a slowly ascending ball of light in the distance.

  J ohn’s head spun with disorientation. Did the path ahead gain height? Was the goddess climbing? S he continued to rise until she was far above his head. J ohn stopped and stared. He could not follow. There was no possibility of reaching her.

  C erridwen had become the moon, a solitary light in the endless night surrounding him.

  The ghostly remnants of a song echoed in the distance, a multitude of voices harmonized into one that sounded familiar, although J ohn couldn’t quite remember where he had heard it before. P ressure on his shoulder caused him to gasp. He turned, expecting to find Dante, but found instead the goddess next to him, even though the moon was still shining from above. Cerridwen looked different now, older, but age had made her more dignified, more mysterious.

  “C ernunnos brings out the girl in me,” she explained, unprompted. “The moon revolves around the earth, and such is my a raction to him, for he is very much a part of the lan
d. I n the same way the ocean waters strain to reach me, the tides rushing back and forth in the hopes of entrancing me, M anannan’s eyes burn bright for me.

  We are balanced, you see? Earth, sky, and water, but it will not always be so.” John stared, fixed by her words and unable to find any of his own as she continued.

  “The war you propose has already begun, triggered by your actions. The M inisters of O rder felt the death of their own in Asgard. Already they move to silence the other pantheons. They mean to break us down like pieces of a stone, dividing and separating us until we are gravel, sand, dust. You must bring us together. S eek out the other dark gods, those who understand the depths of the underworld. P repare them to move, to slither beneath the roots of the world tree and into the warmth of the fiery pits.

  Whether they agree to fight or not, they must come.”

  The goddess placed her pale hands on his forehead, and J ohn’s mind filled with names, dozens of them. They se led there where he could always find them, even though he wasn’t sure what purpose they held. He turned to ask, but C erridwen was gone.

  J ohn looked at the moon, now sallow and heavy on the horizon. He took a few steps forward, encouraged when it did not move away from him. The moon was stationary as he continued to walk, although he noticed that its shape wasn’t right, too rough around the edges and flat at the bottom.

  S ounds came to him, conversation, chairs skidding on the floor, and the crackle of a fire. J ohn rushed forward, recognizing that what he mistook as the moon was a doorway. He burst into a cavern, warm with heat and the scent of food. S eated around a large round table were dozens of gods. J ohn focused on them only momentarily, feeling overwhelmed by so many powerful auras in such a small space.

  “Where’d you get to?” Dante asked, approaching with Bolo.

  “I was—” John hesitated, unsure of how to explain it. “Well, how did you get here?”

  “We followed her.” Dante nodded toward the table.

  C erridwen was seated there. Her eyes met his momentarily and were filled with meaning before she turned back to the proceedings. C ernunnos was to her right.

  Further down the table, Manannan was deep in thought.

  “I think they’re going to join,” Dante whispered. “Assuming she doesn’t up and slaughter us in her excitement.”

  There was no question of who he was referring to. The M orrigan was standing now, vehemently outlining the reasons they should go to war and occasionally striking the table with her fist. The war goddess had the a ention of everyone in a endance. S he radiated authority and power, and yet somehow J ohn knew she was not the leader of this pantheon.

  J ohn searched the table, trying to determine who the leaders were in order to gage their reaction. L ugh was nearest to the M orrigan, a capable warrior in his own right.

  Next to him was B righid, threefold goddess of poetry, smithcraft, and healing. Her face, framed by fiery red hair, wasn’t as convinced as some of the others. The Dagda was the next in line, and for a moment J ohn thought he was the leader. The older god watched the proceedings with confident experience. Perhaps he had once led his people or was often looked to for guidance, but he wasn’t an exact match. The next chair was empty.

  J ohn stared at it, a name calling out to him but too muddled for him to understand.

  W hoever sat there, the one person missing, was their leader. B ut who was that person, and why were they absent? He strode over to the chair in a dream state. Nothing had felt quite real since he walked through the night, chasing after C erridwen. J ohn reached the chair and placed his hand on its back, pulling it back slightly as if to sit.

  W hoever had sat there was divine, and their aura still clung to it. He could almost feel the missing god’s warmth. J ohn moved his hands along the chair, exploring the surface and earning himself a splinter in the process, but the pain was just enough to send him over the edge.

  A goddess, mother to most of the deities here. The wife of the Dagda, she was a goddess of fertility and wise leader of her people. And then it came to him, the name on the tip of his tongue.

  “Danu!” he said out loud.

  The room was suddenly quiet. All eyes were turned on him, some questioning, others accusatory until someone cleared his throat. It was Manannan.

  “We have decided to go to war,” he said.

  * * * * *

  M anannan’s ship was waiting for them when they exited into daylight again. The tides had risen high enough to swallow up the once-steep cliffs, and J ohn knew be er than to wonder at this improbability. I nstead he considered how M anannan could have dropped them off here in the first place, rather than making them chase through the woods with Cernunnos. Just more evidence of the gods and their games.

  M uch to J ohn’s surprise, he found a private moment with M anannan. Dante was making himself scarce as possible, no doubt because of the golden goblet he had pilfered from the feast table, and R immon was stuck with him. Another of the C eltic deities had decided to see them off: B righid stood at the ship’s stern, her freckled face upturned to the sun. E ven though the C elts had agreed to join with Hell, revealing now that a demon had been hiding in their midst would appear dishonest.

  This was the perfect opportunity to find out what everyone conspired to keep from him. J ohn decided to approach the issue with tact, even though he feared his privacy with the sea god might not last, and asked instead another question that had been troubling him.

  “Cernunnos mentioned that religion determines where we go when we die.”

  “Belief more than religion,” Manannan corrected.

  “So what happens to people who don’t believe in anything?”

  “Any number of things. An atheist, for instance, might cease to exist if determined enough. That is, the soul will revert to the ether that we are all created from. Not necessarily, though. Faced with new information, an atheist might become agnostic and find himself wandering, trying to understand the situation be er or find the realm best suited to him. Visits such as yours weren’t so rare at one time.”

  “But now they are?”

  M anannan nodded. “We thought there was some form of campaigning, another afterlife venturing out and recruiting these souls to their own cause, but now we know that P urgatory is to blame. Any lost soul is now drawn to P urgatory and imprisoned there, but for what purpose?”

  “I don’t know,” J ohn murmured. “Do you think my condition is what drew me there?”

  M anannan was silent for a moment. “Your friends seem to think that you aren’t aware of your unique properties.”

  J ohn tensed. Dante, maybe even R immon, had go en to M anannan first. “I t doesn’t seem fair that they know something about me that I don’t.”

  “They have your best interests at heart, or at least they feel they do.”

  “And you?”

  “I think you are stronger than any of them realize.”

  B olo began barking, his front legs against the starboard bow so he could see over the edge. The E nglish S hepherd had been watching the water the whole trip, but now a school of dolphins had noticed him and were pu ing on a show. B righid laughed and Dante’s caution was forgo en as he approached to see what all the commotion was about.

  “Tell me what it is,” John pleaded. “Quickly.”

  “I ’m afraid I promised not to,” M anannan said, “but perhaps if you took a seat and gave it all a good think, you might find yourself drawn to the answer. O h, look! Your coach!”

  J ohn stared blankly at the li le island and their ride home before it clicked. W hat if he took the driver’s seat? The steam coach was supposed to take any soul to where it belonged. He wasn’t sure how this would answer his question, but it was the biggest lead he had.

  “Thank you,” John said.

  “There’s nothing to thank me for,” M anannan replied. “We all deserve to know where we belong, but be warned, some journeys are more difficult to return from than others.”

 
; Chapter Eight

  J ohn waited in the coach, absentmindedly pe ing B olo while R immon strapped Dante in the driver’s seat. W ith M anannan’s boat having set sail, R immon could show himself again, and J ohn was eager for the chance to talk to him alone before they reached Hell.

  S o much was happening so quickly. B eing trapped in P urgatory seemed a distant event of weeks or months ago. J ohn still didn’t understand how time functioned in the afterlife, but he knew that if he were alive, he would be desperate to crawl into bed about now. As it was, John felt great, especially since he had more to do than ever.

  The tip M anannan had given him, the key to the secret that was being kept from him, was far from his most immediate concern. I nstead he kept thinking of what he had said to the other gods, how Heaven wasn’t their target. P urgatory was. S tanding up for his convictions had been easy at the time, but soon Asmoday would hear a full report. John could only imagine that the Archduke’s reaction wouldn’t be pretty.

  The coach door opened and R immon climbed inside. He gave J ohn the sort of look reserved for meeting a date. Not a first date, but a few later when the sex was really gearing up and getting exciting.

  “We have to stop meeting like this,” John teased.

  “O h, I don’t know.” R immon ran his fingers over the brass-tipped lever before grasping it and giving it a healthy jerk. “A li le alone time could be just what the doctor ordered.”

  J ohn braced himself as the coach lurched forward, barely managing to get an arm around B olo to prevent him from sliding off the bench. “Then again,” he said, “this van is rocking enough as it is.”

  R immon stretched himself wide on the bench, arms and legs splayed open in a very clear invitation. “Maybe we can counteract that motion.”

  “S ounds good. J ust show me wri en permission from your boyfriend and we’ll get started.” J ohn meant it as a joke, but R immon looked pained, if only for a second. J ohn wondered, not for the first time, what the true story behind their relationship was.