by Jamie Wyman
I rolled my eyes. The whiskey haze was burning away beneath the heat of my anger. I stared out the window, watching the lights flicker by and trying to will my mind back into its drunken cocoon.
Marius called me out of it. “Do you know how many souls Eris currently owns?”
I shook my head.
“One. And that, my dear, would be you. Not many mortals actually wager with their souls these days.”
He danced near an old wound. Through my teeth I said, “What’s your point?”
“My point is that if you cared so much about who held the deed to your soul, you shouldn’t have been playing with it in the first place.”
I whipped my head around to glare at him. “What the hell do you know about it?” I snarled. “My debt with Eris was not my choice.”
“That’s what they all say.” He smirked. “So tell me, then, how did you come to belong to our mistress?”
He’d asked the question, and I was drunk enough to give a half answer. “I fell in love with the wrong person.”
“Love?!” Marius made a retching sound. “Oh, for fuck’s sake, don’t tell me it had to do with love!”
“You’ve never been in love?”
“Of course not! Why should I? It’s a narcotic, love. A poison. Nothing more than a diversion from the real pleasures in life. You lot use love as some grand excuse to hide from your real desires. Forget religion. Love? Now that’s the real opiate of the masses.”
“Could you just stop being a dick for like five minutes? I’ve got a problem here.”
Marius shifted in his seat. “Yes, it would seem you do. Eris won’t be pleased that you’ve left the party.”
“She bet my soul in a goddamn game of poker!”
“And Coyote may already have won. Better news, you just walked out on him. Not exactly the best way to greet your potential new boss.”
“And there’s the matter of these other tokens I have to find.”
“And the other players,” Marius added helpfully. “You don’t have any idea who they are, do you?”
My forehead hit the window with a thud. I closed my eyes and moaned, “No.” I was so out of my league. “I have no clue what I’m supposed to do.”
The car purred along the asphalt making its way northwest toward my place.
When Marius spoke again, his voice was quiet. “Might I offer a suggestion?”
I flopped a hand in response. “If you insist.”
“Hide,” he said somberly. “Hide at a friend’s house until it all blows over. See how things play out. Hope you don’t get shipped off to Asgard. Or worse, Cleveland.”
Hide? If that worked, I would never have answered my phone when the goddess called. “I don’t much like that option.”
“Cleveland is wretched, Catherine. Trust me.”
“I meant hiding!”
“You must have friends. Someone willing to let you crash on a sofa for a few days.”
That was part of the problem with my life, wasn’t it? Ever since Eris took possession of my soul, I hadn’t trusted anyone. Shit like that happens when your heart is broken and your whole world changes in the blink of an eye.
I supposed I could call Flynn but getting him involved in my drama was a last resort.
“Not exactly,” I sighed to Marius. “I don’t have many friends.”
“What about me?”
I laughed until I snorted. “Is that what we are?”
“All right. If not a friend, how about a friendly guide? Does that sound more appropriate?”
My head rolled lazily on my neck, and I gave the satyr an incredulous look. “Huh?”
Marius gave me one of his cocksure grins. “You, my dear, happen to be on speaking terms with the personal assistant of a deity. I am rather well-connected, you know.”
“You?” I asked, dumbfounded. “You’re actually offering to help?”
“Nothing so sweet as that. No, I offer a business arrangement. An exchange of my skills and services for your payment.”
“And just what sort of payment are you expecting for these skills?”
For a time he only had eyes for the road. The longer he waited to speak, the deeper the pit in my stomach became. I could imagine all the things a satyr would want, and I just didn’t think I was that limber. Not to mention I didn’t like the idea of yet another choice being taken away from me.
“If I help you,” he said finally, “you owe me a date.”
“A date? Didn’t we just do that?”
“You said yourself that wasn’t a date. I’m talking about you and me. Alone. Dinner. Perhaps more, but no less.”
“Just a date?”
“Just a date.”
I blinked in confusion. “You’re serious? You’ll help me, and all I have to do is go out with you? There’s got to be a catch.”
“No catch. Except for me, that is,” he confirmed, a smile playing in his voice.
A date with Marius. Hell, hadn’t I just proven that I could spend a night in his company without killing him? I didn’t get why he would even want a date with me, but I wasn’t about to bite the only hand that offered me his help.
“All right,” I said. “It’s a deal. You help me figure out who is in the game and where these tokens are, and I’ll go out with you.”
“Excellent,” he sang. “Where shall we begin, then?”
“My apartment. I can’t think in this dress.”
His lopsided smirk made his eyes twinkle. “That’s convenient. I can’t think with you in that dress either.”
***
The Mercedes pulled into the gravel lot of my apartment complex. As he put the car in park, he said, “This could work out to your advantage—this poker game. You might find a better employer than Eris.”
I rifled through my bag, looking for my keys. “Well, it can’t be all bad working for her. Pretty expensive car you’ve got here. She certainly pays you far better than she pays me.”
“Not remotely,” he chuffed.
I stopped and regarded him dubiously. “I’ve never seen you wear anything less than Armani. If she doesn’t pay you, how can you afford it?”
“Let’s just say I have other investments to meet my needs.”
“Whatever, Mr. Cryptic,” I slurred with a roll of my eyes.
Leading the way to my apartment, I didn’t quite stagger but I wobbled in my stilettos. Whiskey sang to my brain, encouraging a blissful whimsy. I looked up to the sky and traced a line between stars.
My apartment complex isn’t much more than twenty units stacked two-high in a few small letter-shaped structures that remind me of Tetris blocks. My place squats in the bend of a U facing the parking lot and a courtyard. If it can even be called that—the yard in question is a six-foot square of crabgrass. To get to my door, I had to cross this patch of earth and its garden of bottle caps, pull-tabs, and cigarette butts. I also had to pass my landlady’s apartment.
“Miss Sharp, is that you?” she called from her window.
“Yes, Mrs. McIntyre.”
“Oh, good. I need to talk to you.”
I stopped and waited as she disengaged three locks and two chains. She shuffled out, looking very much like a tiny Fraggle with her fuzzy slippers and pink terrycloth robe. She hadn’t bothered with her walker, but instead braced herself on the doorframe. Wisps of her thinning hair stuck out of her nightcap like tufts of cotton candy. She took one look at me and her eyes lit up like a Christmas tree.
She gasped, her toothless mouth falling open into an amused smile. “Dear, you look magnificent!”
“Thank you, Mrs. M,” I said. “You needed to talk to me?”
“Yes,” she said, drawing out the word with a bit of a phlegmy rumble. “You know, those water heaters in units six and seven are on the fritz again.”
Mrs. M couldn’t afford contractors to come out all the time or hire a regular maintenance staff. But she had a tenant with a knack for fixing all things mechanical.
I smiled, n
odding to my landlady. “Of course. I’m on call this weekend, so I may not have a chance to get to them right away, but I’ll definitely be able to knock those out by the end of the week.”
“Oh, thank you, dear. You are a peach. How much do you think?”
I waved off the comment. “Mrs. M, don’t worry about it.”
“No, dear, I insist. Tell you what. I’ll take fifty off your rent this month if you can get another six months out of those heaters.”
“It’s a deal,” I said.
Her watery eyes focused on the night behind me. Immediately, her pale, paper-thin skin flushed pink, and her jaw fell open. She’d finally noticed Marius.
“Oh, Cathy, honey, why didn’t you tell me you had a date? I’m so sorry. I won’t keep you any longer.”
I cringed at the shortened form of my name. “It’s nothing,” I said. I glanced over my shoulder at Marius, still looking handsome in his suit and golden tie. “Trust me.”
He must have taken this as a challenge. Slinking up to me, he draped one arm around my shoulders. When he spoke, his voice was rich as chocolate and full of promises. “Come along, darling. Our evening is just beginning.”
Mrs. McIntyre’s eyes filled with memories of younger days, and she shooed me away. She padded back into her home and began doing up the locks.
The satyr gave me a grin and a waggle of his eyebrows. I rolled my eyes. “Good night, Mrs. McIntyre,” I called as I lurched toward my door.
“Yes, good night, dear lady,” Marius sang.
I shrugged out of his embrace and unlocked my apartment. Like the complex itself, my place wasn’t much. I rented a few rooms of brick walls painted with an ever-yellowing eggshell gloss. The sandy carpet was worn in a few places but not stained. I tried to keep the place tidy, aside from the stack of dead laptops in the corner I sometimes use for spare parts.
Marius stood in my living room and turned in a circle, examining my over-stuffed bookshelves and secondhand furniture.
“This is the first time I’ve ever seen the inside of your home,” he mused.
“It’s not much, but it’s mine,” I said. My keys jangled as I tossed them onto the countertop that also served as my dining room table.
His gaze dropped to the floor where a mass of fur and muscle I call Linux curled around his legs. The tuxedo tomcat turned hopeful eyes up to the satyr.
“You shed on my suit, and I will serve you with egg rolls,” he said.
With a flash from his golden eyes, Linux turned up both tail and nose before strutting over to greet me properly as the personal deity of his food bowl. Purring, he rammed into me. On a normal day, his hello was almost enough to send me back against the door. In heels and slightly drunk, I was lucky I didn’t break my neck.
I reached down to pet him and began working the straps on my shoes.
“It’s a quaint little place,” Marius said, adding, “Cathy.”
I snarled. “Do not call me that.”
Barefoot, I plodded into my bedroom to get out of the glitzy dress before Linux decided it would look better with his own personal accessories.
“Do you need any help in there?” Marius said loudly. “I’m quite good with zippers and underthings.”
“No, thanks.”
“You know you want me to come in there right this second and rip off your dress with my teeth.”
A quick jolt of pleasure hit me in the pink parts as an image flashed across my mind. Marius behind me, his hands gliding up my arms. Gently, he pushes my hair off of my neck and over one shoulder. I gasp as he places the lightest, most tantalizing of kisses on my throat. My head rocks back against him, inviting him to continue. His fingers slide beneath the straps of my dress and inch them down.
With another gasp, I lurched forward, jostling the contents of my dresser. What the hell?
I was alone in my bedroom. I poked my head out to find Marius sitting on my couch with both arms sprawled over the back cushions. Linux stretched his tuxedo form at the satyr’s feet, begging for a tummy rub.
“What was that?” I asked.
Marius’s smile gleamed in his wicked eyes. “Something wrong?”
“You just…what the hell did you do?”
“Am I really the only satyr you’ve met, Catherine?”
“Marius,” I growled in warning.
“It’s a gift of my race: providing inspiration.”
“So you put that in my mind?”
“Consider it a teaser,” he said silkily. “The coming attractions, as it were.”
“Stay out of my head,” I warned.
Sliding the door shut, but not latching it, I stepped out of the sheath and rummaged in my drawers for a suitable change of clothes. As it was nighttime, my house, and I was more than buzzed, I opted for the blue plaid pajama pants and a black T-shirt printed with the power symbol. It even glowed in the dark.
“I think,” Marius called from the living room, “you enjoyed that.”
“Not interested, satyr. Your charms won’t work on me.”
“Oh, no? I believe they just did.”
I winced at that particularly uncomfortable truth. Ignoring it, I asked, “How is it that I’m just now finding out about this little power of yours?”
“Professional courtesy,” he said flatly. “I’ve got a block on you.”
I may have snorted. “Right. A block. Good one.”
“If I didn’t, you’d be soaking your panties and flinging yourself at me. I wouldn’t be able to go home because you’d be stalking me. So much would your need consume you that you’d spend every waking minute shagging me. This wouldn’t be productive at all, would it? Then the goddess would get mad at me for interfering in her business and add more years to my debt. Not to mention the risk of dehydration from the hours and hours of athletic sex.”
“The world may never know,” I said as I plopped on the sofa beside him. “All right. You and I need to talk. Tell me what you know about Eris and this poker game.”
“Who says I know anything?”
“You do.” As I spouted off his earlier comments, I mocked his posh accent, “I am the personal assistant to a deity. I’m well-connected. Come on,” I said in my own voice. “There’s no way you didn’t know about this.”
“I do not sound like that.”
I didn’t respond with words. I gave him my most insistent, intense glare.
Relenting, he sighed. “The game was last night. Now, I’m not invited to the game, but this”—Marius took the poker chip out of his pocket and flipped it like a coin—“along with what you heard from the Faery, our mistress, and Coyote makes it damn obvious that you are in the pot.”
“Who are the other players?”
“Well, the Lady is rather chaotic, so it’s anyone’s guess. But if your soul is in play that says it’s likely to be one of her more exclusive games. And there are only five other beings that could possibly be at that table.”
“Coyote and Puck,” I offered. “Who else?”
“Maui, Anansi, and the bastard son of Asgard himself.”
Anansi. Maui. I’d worked around Eris enough to recognize the names of her African and Hawaiian colleagues. Anansi, the Spider, came up on my radar often. Those emails from scammers posing as Nigerian princes or something? Yeah, that’s the Spider’s gig.
Maui I’d only heard rumors about, but if the lore holds true, he is the one you need to thank for those luscious islands. Myth says he cast his hook into the sea, snagged the islands, and pulled them to the surface behind him.
In the company of such avatars of mayhem, Asgard’s son must be Loki. I didn’t know much about the actual Norse god of mischief, but something told me he wouldn’t be anything like the movie villain. The more I pondered it, I wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not.
Eris, Anansi, Maui, Puck, Coyote, and Loki. Tricksters and thieves, these six gods were among the most notorious deities in mythology. Architects of chaos and disorder, creators and destroyers, the tricksters
are both revered and reviled. And they were poker buddies? I tried to fathom just how twisted a game among these bullshit artists would be.
Twisted enough that my soul was up for grabs to the winner.
I tried to imagine them all hunched around a green felt table. And there, in the center of the table with all the chips was my soul.
The idea filled my stomach with nausea and a fair amount of angst.
“Does this happen often? Betting with souls, I mean?”
Marius swung his head in a gesture of indecision. “Not precisely. Souls are a valuable commodity, but it’s not as if there’s a stock market with trading and such. No, souls are pulled out for big bets only. Or bluffs.”
Great. She might be bluffing. If she loses, I still get screwed.
“So what does this mean?” I asked, plucking the black poker chip from Marius’s hand. “Coyote had this. So, he won?”
“Not likely,” Marius said. “He’s a terrible player from what I hear.”
“But, he had it. So…?”
Marius shrugged and tossed a stray lock of hair out of his face. “I’ve never been to one of her games, I’m afraid. I can’t tell you the significance other than it is a token of promise. Sort of an I.O.U.”
All the new information swirled around in my head. “Wait… You just mentioned five gods, but Eris said I had to get four tokens.”
“Someone may not have come to the game,” he offered. “I wasn’t there.”
“Great.”
“Even if you knew for sure, getting the chips won’t be easy,” Marius added.
“No shit,” I sneered. “Not that anything with Eris is ever easy, but what made you say that?”
Marius squirmed in his seat and loosened his tie. “You have to understand that you’re not dealing with mortals, Catherine. These beings are ancient and take endless pleasure from causing strife. The only thing more enjoyable to them than wreaking havoc in human lives is fucking with one another.”
I raked my hand through my hair. “So, in order to screw with Eris and make her life miserable, someone else might take a poke at me now that I’m on the table?”
He nodded.
“Shit,” I hissed. “So where should we start? Anansi? Loki? How do I find these gods anyway?”