Christopher Golden - Tears of the Furies

"You don’t mean that," Conan Doyle said, as he started down the slope toward the enormous corpse. "What about Eve? Do you want to leave her here?"

"Eve can handle herself," Danny replied, but Conan Doyle could hear little conviction in his tone.

He stopped his descent and turned to look at Danny and Ceridwen, who were still standing on the crest of the hill of bones. "But she will not have to, for we are going to assist her."

Danny shook his horned head. "No way. I can’t do it anymore, it’s just too much." He gestured toward the body of Hades in the black soil valley below. "Do you see that?" he asked, his voice growing higher with panic. "It’s a giant fucking dead guy!"

The boy turned, and for a moment Conan Doyle thought he was about to walk away, but he spun around to reiterate his point. "It’s been one thing after another since coming here — since hooking up with you."

"And you’ve become a welcome part of our motley tribe," Ceridwen said, as she calmly stroked the back of his head.

Danny quickly stepped away from her touch. "I’m sorry, I just can’t."

There was a tremble in the boy’s voice and Conan Doyle was certain that he was about to cry. This will not do, not at all.

"You asked for this, boy," he said coldly. "You begged to be a part of it."

The boy squatted and buried his face in his hands. "I know, I know, and there’s a part of me that’s starting to get used to it." Danny laughed, raising his head. There were tears in his yellow eyes. "Can you believe that? I’m sixteen years old and I’m starting to get used to this shit. When we’re in the middle of it, the blood and monsters and shit, there’s a part of me that even likes it. Do you have any idea how much that scares me?"

"Get hold of yourself, Daniel," Conan Doyle snapped. "Are you not part of my team, of my Menagerie?"

Danny wiped his nose with the back of his hand. "It’s just that.. I was inside the belly of a fucking sea monster… and now this." He again gestured to the corpse that filled the valley below, the remains of a god. "I just don’t know if…"

"Damn you, boy! Answer the question!" Conan Doyle bellowed. "Are you not a part of my Menagerie?"

The young demon looked as though he’d been struck, rocking back slightly on his haunches, and then his expression began to change. Conan Doyle recognized the anger, which was exactly the response he was hoping to get.

"Did you hear me, Daniel Ferrick?" he continued. "Or was my question lost in the sound of your pathetic blubbering?"

The youth rose to his feet and Conan Doyle could have sworn he saw a flicker of crimson flame erupt from his eyes.

"No, I heard you just fine," Danny growled. "And, yes, I am part of your fucking Menagerie."

"Excellent," Conan Doyle said, reaching up to casually stroke his mustache. "Now follow. We’ll see this through. Eve would sacrifice immortal life for any of us. You’ve never served in the military, Daniel, but still you should understand. We don’t leave one of our own behind. Not ever." The mage turned and continued down the hill, off of the bone-strewn hill and onto the fine black soil of the valley.

Danny pushed past him, quickening his step. "What’re we waiting for?" he growled. "The sooner we find Eve, the faster we can get out of here."

Ceridwen fell into stride beside Conan Doyle, one hand raised, stirring the wind so that the air, thick with the stench of decay, was more breathable. He had noticed that after the shattering of her elemental staff, she had not attempted to repair it using the dark, corrupt wood of the Underworld. She had summoned the roots and made the trees do her bidding in building a raft for them to cross the Styx, but had not made herself a new staff. It was clear she had established a rapport with the elements of this place, but it seemed she did not want that connection to be any more intimate than was necessary.

"Are you two coming?" the demon boy called.

"We’re right behind you," Conan Doyle said, taking Ceridwen’s arm. "Every step of the way."

Ceridwen stood before the body of the fallen god and marveled at its enormity. From inside the great, decaying corpse there came faint sounds of life. Her gaze traveled over the incredible sight of the dead giant, rotting remains whose breadth was greater than all but the largest villages of Faerie.

Conan Doyle stood on her left, Danny on her right, all of them awed into silence until the demon boy shook his head, swore under his breath, and began to utter a mad little laugh.

"What do you think happened to him?" Danny asked. "By the looks of his throat, I’m guessing shaving accident."

She ought to have been reassured that the boy’s twisted sense of humor had returned, but there was that lunatic edge to it that only made Ceridwen more concerned for him. She gazed down at the dark, powdery earth beneath her feet, then knelt and pushed the tips of her fingers into the tainted soil, gasping at the images flooding her mind. Conan Doyle joined her and she took hold of his proffered hand as she tried to sort through the tainted memories of earth.

"Hades took his own life," she said, withdrawing her hand from the soil. She wiped her fingers on the hem of her cloak. "He knew it was only a matter of time before they were forgotten, and without the memory of the mortal world, they would cease to be." The very ground was saturated with the melancholy of the gods, and it threatened to overwhelm her. "The constant thought of it drove Hades mad, and he slit his own throat with a dagger that was a gift to him from his beloved Persephone."

"I’d slit my throat if I had to live here, too," Danny muttered to himself, still gazing in disbelief at the remains of the god.

Conan Doyle still held Ceridwen’s hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. "And Eve? Can you sense anything of her?"

Ceridwen nodded, dredging up that particular piece of imagery from the countless others shown to her. She saw the hideous Gull and his followers, and she saw Eve, kneeling before the vengeful Furies. "Yes, they were here," she gasped. "As were the Erinyes. They’ve all gone inside."

She turned her gaze to one of the many ragged, rotting holes in the corpse of Hades, where strange, mournful sounds continued to waft out from within. They live there, she thought. Not only the Furies, but others as well. The dead. The damned. The gigantic corpse was like a city of death.

Danny only laughed. "We’re going in there? Of course we are!"

The rotting flesh of the god was stiff with rigor, but tore with enough pressure, releasing the nauseating stink of decay. Conan Doyle was surprised to find how simple it was to climb Hades’ corpse. Only the stench was a deterrent. They scaled the mountainous corpse to one of the larger gashes at the rib cage and slipped inside, walking on wounded flesh that seemed to have moved from putrefaction to petrification. Inside, the corpse was so dry it seemed almost mummified.

Conan Doyle led them within and found that pathways had been constructed of repurposed flesh and bone. There were chambers and tunnels, and quickly enough they found a makeshift bridge fashioned out of a rib bone. Conan Doyle crossed that bridge and the others quickly followed. It was like they had entered another world. Within the corpse it was dark, but what looked to be stars twinkled from the ceiling above, suspended in a velvety black sky, illuminating the strange landscape with the faint hint of twilight.

"They can’t be stars," Danny said, squinting up at the ceiling. "We’re inside a body…"

The demon boy’s voice trailed off, arousing Conan Doyle’s curiosity. "What is it, Danny?" he asked, looking up as well, but unable to penetrate the inky black.

Ceridwen raised her hand, blue-green light springing to life at her fingers as she attempted to illuminate the darkness above, but it was impenetrable.