Christopher Moore - Coyote Blue

"No," Adeline said, following him. "I don't want any."

He went to the crucifix on the wall, tore it off, and threw it in the bag. "Quiets coughs, promotes regularity, increases energy…"

"No!" Adeline said.

Lloyd took the 3-D picture of Jesus off the television and threw it in the bag.

"Calms nerves."

"No!"

"Cures acne."

"No!"

"Cures crabs, spiritual indecision, poison sumac, rabies, and-"

"No!"

"Gets rid of unwanted owls."

"How much is it?" Adeline said.

"Cash or check?" Lloyd said. He sat back down on the couch.

Adeline heard the bedroom door open. She turned and saw Milo coming into the living room, wearing sunglasses. He couldn't tolerate bright light for a day or two after a peyote ceremony. "What in the hell is going on out here?"

"I was just talking to this salesman," Adeline said.

"What salesman?"

Adeline turned around. The salesman, his sample case, and the garbage bag full of over-the-counter icons were gone. The brown bottle of Miracle Medicine sat on the table.

"Here honey, take some of this," she said. "You'll feel better."

She felt better already.

Sam felt as if he were passing out, then the vertigo of falling. The sounds around him faded; Pokey's voice became distant, then silent. He felt his stomach lurch, as if he had just gone into the big drop of a roller coaster, then an impact that flattened him on the ground. He looked up, expecting to see the others around him in the sweat lodge. The lodge, and everyone in it, was gone. There was nothing but blackness and the sound of his own breathing.

A thousand questions raced through his brain, but he realized that each one led to another and the best strategy was to maintain a state of automatic action and remember why he was here. He stood and squinted into the darkness. Two golden eyes were floating in front of him. He heard the sound of an animal breathing.

Suddenly a stone platform started to glow. On it stood a figure: a man's body with a dog's head, wearing an Egyptian kilt. Except for the golden eyes, he was black, so black he appeared to absorb light. He carried a golden staff tipped with the effigy of a falcon. Beside him on the platform was the source of the breathing sounds: a beast the size of a hippo, with the jaws of a crocodile on the body of a lion. It snorted and snapped at the air, flicking foam from its jaws. Behind them both stood a giant balance scale.

Despite all he had been through, Sam felt a wave of mind-blanking terror pass through him. He wanted to run, but couldn't move. With the light coming off the pedestal he could see human bones scattered around him. He realized that he was standing on his toes, every muscle in his body rigid.

The black dog man snapped his staff on the platform. "Okay, up on the scale," he said. Then he narrowed his gaze and stepped down from the platform. "Wait a minute, you're alive. Go away. We only do the dead. Out, out, out."

Of all the strange things Sam had seen in the last week, watching the dog mouth forming human speech was the strangest. It looked like the creature was trying to yak up a chicken bone. Suddenly the fear was gone. This was too goofy, like an Alpo commercial filmed in Hell.

"Are you the one I'm supposed to talk to about — about getting some help?"

"Look, I tried to warn you that my brother was going to cause you problems. I sent my agent to help you."

"Your brother?"

"Coyote is my brother. He didn't tell you?"

"No, he never mentioned a brother. He said I had to find the one that weighs the souls."

The dog man scoffed. "Well there's the scale. And here I am. Take a wild guess. Go ahead, Einstein, figure it out. I can't believe he didn't mention me." He sat down, hung his head and began scratching himself behind the ears. "He's an ingrate."

The monster growled and Sam jumped back.

"That's Ammut," the dog man said. "He wants to eat you."

Sam shuddered. "Maybe later. I'm here to ask a favor."

"You don't even know who I am, do you? That hurts. You think I don't have feelings?"

"I'm sorry," Sam said. "I'm a little preoccupied. I didn't mean to be rude." Preoccupied? Naked, in a supernatural world, talking to the dog-food god, trying to get back the woman he loved. Excuse my manners , he thought. "I'm Sam Hunter, and you are?"

"Anubis, son of Osiris. God of the Underworld." He scratched behind his ears harder and his leg began to bounce with pleasure.

"Osiris? You're Egyptian?"

"My people lived in the Nile Valley, yes."

"But you said that you were Coyote's brother."

"He didn't tell you that story either?" Anubis was irritated.

"No, sorry," Sam said. How could Calliope's life be in the hands of this neurotic canine? He decided to try to placate the god. "But I'd love to hear it."

Anubis pricked up his long ears. "It was long ago," he began. "And the god Osiris brought to the people of the Nile Valley the knowledge to plant grain, and he brought great floods to nourish the grains. With his queen, Isis, he ruled all of civilization, until his brother Set, the dark one, became jealous and killed Osiris, tearing his body into fourteen pieces and scattering them over the valley.

"But Osiris had consorted with Set's wife, Nephthys, and she gave birth to two dog-headed sons, Anubis and Aputet. When Set found the boys he put them into baskets and set them afloat in the Nile. Later, Isis found Anubis and adopted him. But Aputet floated out to sea and across the ocean to another land in the West."

Here the dog-headed god puffed himself up with pride. "Anubis was always the one bound to duty, the faithful. He found the pieces of our father and bound them together so that Osiris lived again. For that he was given the job of weighing human souls against truth, and taking people to the Underworld.

"And my brother," Anubis said, "grew up in a wild land, with the powers of a god and no sense of duty or justice. All he cares about is the stories people tell about him. And he never remembers his brother, who has saved him so many times. He never visits. You're sure Coyote never told you this?"

Sam didn't know what to say. He thought of the Coyote tales he had heard as a child, and how this seemed to fit.

"No, I was told he brought my people the buffalo and taught us how to live off the land."

"He did those things to serve himself. Without a way to live, how could they tell stories about him? He has used me for years to make his stories. Now he has returned to Earth and used you."

It all fit. "He fucked up my life and got Calliope killed for the stories." Sam was trying to control his anger. "I'm here because he wants people to tell stories about him?"

"He had to or he would end up like me." Anubis lowered his voice. "Your people don't have a word in their language for «computer» or «VCR» or "television." The children are losing the old stories, the stories of hunting buffalo and counting coup. That's not their world. Coyote was afraid he would be forgotten, like me. With the new stories he's real again. You lived the stories that will bring him back. He doesn't care about the people, only that they are talking about him. I tried. I sent my agent to help you."

Sam looked at Anubis. "The big black guy, Minty? You sent him?"

"He's mine, a dutiful son, but he doesn't know it," Anubis said. "I can no longer walk in your world because I am a dead god. I died of change. So I sent the black one to help you. He is mine like you are Aputet's."

"I'm his? What does that mean?"

"You were born for his stories. To live them, to carry them on."

"He wants little kids to hear stories about killing innocent women? That's supposed to be good for a people?"

"He doesn't care. As long as the stories are told they will hold his people together. He says people need a good bad example. It gives them pride in doing the right thing. I have always done the right thing and my people are gone because of it, swallowed up by the Christian god."