I kept my eyes on the retreating flanks of the sheep ahead of me and kept pumping my legs up the hill. Incredibly, I seemed to be gaining ground on them, and I felt so triumphant about it that I let loose with a few barks to scare them stupid. But they were built to negotiate those hills with ease, and I was not, and eventually I lost some ground as I had to scramble for footholds and find better places to jump up. When they disappeared over the peak and were headed down the other side, I started barking again to make sure they knew I was close behind and there was no time to stop. I wanted them to head straight for Oberon.
I had no way of knowing precisely where he was waiting, of course, but hopefully my barking would give him an idea of where we were headed.
Going down was much more treacherous than going up. The way the shadows fell, it was difficult to tell if the next step was a foot down or a fathom. But the pale flanks bobbing up and down ahead of me in soft, night-blue streaks gave me a good idea of what to expect. They were headed almost due south, and I heard nothing beyond their hooves clattering amongst the rocks and my own panting and barking. If Oberon and Flidais were waiting ahead, they were being careful not to reveal their positions.
I kept barking, though it was more to drown out any small noises Oberon might make than any enthusiasm I had for closing the gap between us. I fetched up at a precipice and saw that I would have to travel around to the west a bit before I could find a way down, and with every second the sheep got farther away. So I remained where I was and watched, and sure enough, Oberon was hidden behind a creosote bush not far from where the sheep finally came down off the hill. There was a gap of fifty yards or so before the next hill reared up out of the earth, with nothing but sparse desert plants in the way. Oberon cut off their approach to the next hill, and I was barking behind them, so the sheep turned east up the pass between the hills. Once they silhouetted themselves against the sky, an arrow knocked one off its feet and sent it tumbling, bleating to its doom as its fellows fled.
Oberon closed on it to finish it off, but there was no need. Flidais’s arrow had found its heart, and she would doubtless appear momentarily to claim her kill. I began to work my way down the hill, wondering if she would be satisfied. The hunt had not lasted long; we had flushed them too perfectly, owing perhaps to our recent visits and familiarity with the terrain.
But it seemed those recent visits had not gone unnoticed, unfortunately: As I reached the site of the kill, where Flidais was already gutting the animal and Oberon was standing nearby, a park ranger suddenly appeared, holding a flashlight and a gun. He demanded loudly that we freeze as he blinded us with a halogen glare.
We couldn’t have been more startled. He should not have been able to sneak up on any of us, much less all three. But it is not wise to surprise one of the Tuatha Dé Danann. Flidais whipped her knife out of its sheath and threw it to the left of the flashlight before I had even finished turning my head toward the ranger. She had not aimed, or even looked, so the knife didn’t kill him; it sank into his left shoulder and caused him to cry out and drop his flashlight, which would make it harder for him to aim that gun if he felt like shooting. It turned out he did; a few shots thundered in the night, and I felt one bullet whip over my spine and heard another smack into a barrel cactus to my left. Flidais grunted as she took a slug in the arm, then roared in outrage as she realized what had happened.
“Kill him!” she shrieked, and I unthinkingly leapt to obey, as did Oberon. But unlike Oberon, I managed an independent thought after the first couple of steps, and that stopped me. Killing a ranger would bring the law down upon us, perhaps forcing us to flee, and I did not want to leave Arizona. I changed back to my human form, and immediately the fog lifted from my mind. Flidais had been controlling me as a hound, just as she was controlling Oberon—just as she could control all animals. Unable to resist without the protection of cold iron, Oberon had not stopped, and now he had the man flat on his back, screaming. I tried to call him off, but it was no use with Flidais binding him to her will; I could not even feel his mental presence as I normally could.
“Flidais! Release my hound now!” I snapped, and the man’s screams stopped. But it was already too late. Without ceremony, without any dramatic growls or shivering violins, my hound had torn out the poor man’s throat.
Oberon’s thoughts returned and a flood of questions filled my mind.
Step away from him and I’ll explain in a moment, I said. When one has seen as much death as Flidais and I have, there are no expressions of disbelief at a person’s sudden end. There is no gibbering, no wailing, no tearing of hair. There is only a cool assessment of the consequences. But if the consequences are dire, then a display of emotion is allowed.
“That was not necessary!” I shouted, but carefully kept my eyes on the corpse. “We could have disarmed him. His death will cause me and my hound much trouble.”
“I do not see how,” Flidais replied. “We can simply dispose of the body.”
“That is not so simple as it used to be. They will find it eventually, and when they do, they will find canine DNA in the wounds.”
“You speak of the mortals?” the huntress asked.
What does one do when one needs to pray to the gods for patience but a god is causing the need for patience? “Yes, the mortals!” I spat.
“What is this DNA you speak of?”
I ground my teeth and heard the short yips of Coyote on the thin desert air. He was laughing at me.
“Never mind.”
“I think it well he is dead, Druid. He shot me and tried to shoot you. And he also surprised me, which should not have been possible.”
I had to admit that piqued my curiosity. I stepped closer to the body and warned Oberon off.
he practically whined.
No, Oberon, I said. You didn’t do this. Flidais did. She used your teeth as a weapon, just as she would use a knife or her bow.
He whined in earnest. He coughed and hacked, vomiting onto the dry, rocky soil.
I crouched down to take a closer look at the ranger. He was a young Latino with a wispy mustache and a pair of thick lips. His aura was already gone, his soul traveling elsewhere, but when I used one of my charms to check out the magical spectrum, I saw traces of Druidry in a diamond stud in his left ear. That set off alarms.
I rose and gestured at the man. “Flidais, his earring is magical. Can you determine its purpose, or perhaps its origin?” Its origin was clear to me, but the knots in these particular bindings were unfamiliar. My query was a sort of test: If Flidais confirmed their Druidic origin and even recognized their purpose, she was not playing double. If she tried to tell me it was Voudoun, however, or something else completely different, then she was on some other side than mine. Flidais’s boots crunched toward me, her trophy ram and wounded arm forgotten. She squatted next to the ranger’s head and examined the earring. “Ah, yes, I recognize these bindings. It’s not the sort of thing the lesser Fae can do. This man was under the control of the Tuatha Dé.”
“That is enough for me,” I said, satisfied she was telling the truth. “I’m sure it was Aenghus Óg himself. He gave the man a cloaking spell and then broke it abruptly as he was about to speak, ensuring our surprise and the man’s death. It is the sort of puppetry Aenghus enjoys.” I did not mention that Flidais seemed to enjoy it too. I felt like joining Oberon in a nice, cathartic vomit, utterly repulsed by these beings who robbed creatures of their own free will.
I had looked up Aenghus Óg on the Internet once to see if the mortals had a clue about his true nature. They describe him as a god of love and beauty, with four birds following him about, representing his kisses or some such nonsense. Who would tolerate four birds flapping about his head, constantly letting loose their bowels and screeching? Not the Aenghus I know. But some ac
counts provide a better picture of his character by also telling of his deeds, such as taking his father’s house from him by trickery and slaying both his stepfather and his foster mother. Or the time he left a girl who was hopelessly in love with him and who died of grief a few weeks later. That’s more the kind of man we are talking about.
No, the Celtic god of love isn’t a cherub with cute little wings, nor is he a siren born of the sea in a giant clamshell. He is not benevolent or merciful or even inclined to be nice on a regular basis. Though it pains me to think of it because of what it says about my people, our god of love is a ruthless seeker of conquest, wholly self-serving, and more than a little vindictive.
As if to punctuate that thought, emergency sirens began to wail in the night.
“That noise is used by mortal law enforcement, is it not?” Flidais asked.
“Aye, it is.”
“Do you think it probable that they are headed here?”
“Of course. Aenghus sent this man to die,” I said, waving at the ranger, “and he wants us to be inconvenienced as much as possible.” The chance that the police would not know precisely where in the park to look for us was as close to zero as I could imagine.
“And I suppose,” she said with asperity, “that you would not want me to kill the mortal authorities so that I can take time to harvest my trophy.”
She was not joking. She really would have killed them without compunction. From her tone, it was clear that I should be grateful to her for recognizing that I might have a different set of priorities.
“You suppose correctly, Flidais. Living as I do amongst the mortals, I am subject to their laws and do not wish to draw undue attention to myself.”
The huntress sighed in exasperation. “Then we must hurry. The best I can do is to have the earth swallow him,” she said, yanking her knife out of the dead man’s shoulder.
I shook my head. “The police will have him out of the ground again as soon as we leave. But go ahead, since it is the best we can do. It may contaminate the evidence somewhat.”
Flidais spoke some of the old tongue, and the skin around her tattoos whitened briefly as she drew power from the land. She frowned a bit: There was not as much to be had out here as in the Old World, and it cost her more effort than it should have. But she waved her fingers, said, “Oscail,” and the dirt beneath the ranger obeyed. First the surface gravel began to skitter away from him, then the crust began to cave and ripple beneath him, and he sank. Once he was only a couple of feet below the surface, Flidais waved her fingers in the opposite direction, muttered, “Dún,” and the earth closed over him. It was magic I could have performed myself, albeit not so quickly. There was nothing subtle about it though. The earth looked churned up and disturbed, and the police would have little trouble deciding where to look for a freshly killed body. The sirens were close now.
“Back to the chariot,” she said, and I nodded and set off at a ground-eating pace, calling Oberon to follow. Flidais paused only to collect her bow and pull her arrow out of the ram, then she caught up and ran with us.
The sirens stopped, and we heard the dull whump of car doors slamming to the south as we reached her chariot. If they had a guide, and I had no doubt they did, the police would reach the body in minutes.
one of the stags said.
the other chimed in.
Before I could, Flidais told them to shut up and thankfully Oberon bit back any response he would have given. Flidais cast invisibility on us—a wonderful trick, that—and we hoofed it out of there without delay.
The goddess of the hunt was seething. “My first new hunt in an age of man,” she said through gritted teeth, “and it was ruined by Aenghus Óg. Well, I will be avenged. The huntress can be patient.”
“You’re better adjusted than I am,” I said, though I thought her a dangerous sociopath. “I’m about out of patience.”
Chapter 7
With much apologizing and simultaneous thanks for the gift of her company, I suggested to Flidais once I returned home that if I were to be attacked shortly by a party of Fir Bolgs, I had much to do in the way of preparation. She was only too happy to take the hint, and her leave.
“If you prevail, Druid, perhaps we can hunt at leisure in the near future. You have my blessing.” She gave Oberon an affectionate pat on the head—from which he tried to recoil—bade us both farewell, then winked out of sight and returned to her chariot. We may have had her blessing, but we wouldn’t have her bow at our back. She could not afford to be seen taking my side against the Tuatha Dé Danann.
I expelled a deep breath, releasing some of the tension her mere presence had caused, and sank into a chair by my kitchen table. Oberon approached me, head down, tail between his legs.
he said.
It was not your fault, I reminded him. She used you like a weapon, and Aenghus Óg wanted that man to be killed. But now you and I must face the consequences.
Oberon said.
Flidais made you kill him. Nevertheless, that means that you will be killed in turn, if the police figure out you’re the one who did it.
I know. And that is why we will never hunt with her again. She had a strong influence on me as well, and I did not like being under her control, even a little bit.
Never in animal form. I hunted with her for a good while in the Ukraine once. She helped me out with my archery on horseback. It’s bloody tough, I’ll tell you, but Genghis Khan’s hordes could do it, so of course I had to learn.
Never mind. Listen, we have to get you cleaned up. Into the bath.
No, we need to get you superclean. Any blood found on you will automatically get you killed at this point.
Not if I can help it, Oberon. Come on, let’s go.
I rose from my chair, and Oberon began to trot in front of me down the hall to the bathroom, his tail wagging again.
Hordes, not whores. He had both, though, now that you mention it.
You have no idea.
We had a good time with the suds and the short version of Khan’s empire, after which I had to see to my preparations for the Fir Bolgs—the full extent of which was nothing more than a good night’s sleep. They would not attack me in my home, figuring it would be too well protected—and it was. They would wait for me to set foot off my property, and then they would gang up on me like a bunch of schoolyard bullies. So I relaxed and got my beauty rest.
In the morning, I calmly made myself an omelet with cheese and chives, poured some Tabasco on it, and nibbled on a piece of whole wheat toast. I cooked up some sausages too, but most of them went to Oberon. I made us a pot of coffee to wash it down, some freshly ground organic stuff from Central America (I usually take mine black, but Oberon likes it with Irish Crème Coffee-mate and cooled down with a few ice cubes).
Oberon asked me. After my bathtime story, he wanted to be the Genghis Khan of dogs. He wanted a harem full of French poodles, all of whom were named either Fifi or Bambi. It was an amusing habit of his: Oberon had, in the past, wanted to be Vlad the Impaler, Joan of Arc, Bertrand Russell, and any other historical figure I had recently told him about while he was getting a thorough cleansing. His Liberace period had been particularly good for my soul: You haven’t lived until you’ve seen an Irish wolfhound parading around in rhinestone-studded gold lamé.
He didn’t drink coffee, I replied. Genghis Khan was more of a tea man. Or yak milk. Coffee really wasn’t around in his time.
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Of course. I will ice it for you after it brews so you won’t burn your tongue.
After I cleared away the dishes and Oberon Khan had enjoyed his tea, it was time to make myself a target.
I strode out to my backyard, barefoot, and told Oberon to go into sentinel mode. I watered my herb garden from right to left, talking to the plants and encouraging them. The herbs grew in planter boxes around the circumference of my yard, all of which rested on shelves attached to my fence. Underneath these I grew some vegetables in the actual earth of my backyard, leaving some real estate for Oberon to roll around on. The medicinal herbs took up most of the boxes, but I spared a few for culinary varieties.
While this mundane chore was going on, I was using my connection to the earth to review my domestic defenses. Sending my awareness down through my tattoos, I looked for holes in my bindings, anything the least bit out of the ordinary, to make sure that I was alone and unwatched. There was a cactus wren checking me out from high up in my neighbor’s palo verde tree, but he flew off when I made a throwing motion with my arm, thereby showing that he was a normal bird and not someone’s familiar. When I came to the last planter box on the left, I put down the watering can and shook my head.
“There’s never enough thyme,” I said, and pulled the box of herbs off the shelf and upended it on the lawn. The smell of rich loam and compost wafted into my nostrils, and the sight of a long, narrow package wrapped tightly in oilskin greeted my eyes. “Oh, look!” I said in mock surprise. Oberon recognized my tone and didn’t bother to turn his head. “Somebody has hidden an ancient magical sword underneath my herbs. That’s so silly.”
This was my most vulnerable time, because while the sword’s location was now revealed, there were three bindings and a cloak on the sword to prevent anyone—including me—from using it. The bindings were my own work, and it’s pretty much all a Druid can do. We bind elements together or unbind them: When I shape-shift, I am binding my spirit to an animal’s form. Summoning mist or wind—that’s a form of binding too, as is camouflaging myself or allowing Oberon to hear my thoughts. It is all possible because we are already bound with the natural world by living in it. We could not bind anything if the strings connecting us to all of nature were not already there. And because we see these connections and know that seemingly disparate elements can in fact be closely related, Druids have a better grasp of divination than most other magical practitioners. Our knowledge of nature makes us superior brewers of medicines, poisons, and even potables. We’re able to run tirelessly by drawing on the power of the earth, and we heal fairly quickly. We’re useful to have around. But we don’t shoot balls of fire out of our hands, or fly upon brooms, or make people’s heads explode. That sort of magic is only possible through a radically different view of the world—and by binding one’s spirit to extremely unsavory beings.