Hexed_ The Iron Druid Chronicles - Kevin Hearne [30]
“And the Fifth Circle,” I said, “if I remember my Dante, is where the wrathful and the sullen are punished.”
“That’s correct, my child,” Mary affirmed.
“Gods Below, how did Aenghus Óg manage to summon something that powerful?”
Mary beamed patiently at me, ignoring my invocation of a different pantheon. “I do not think he summoned it so much as provided an avenue for its escape. Still, the binding placed on it as a condition of its egress is still in effect, and that is the only thing keeping it in this area.”
“Meaning that it won’t leave the East Valley until I’m dead,” I said.
“Whoa, it sucks to be you, Mr. Druid.” Coyote chuckled and clapped me a couple of times on the shoulder. “Here, gimme those arrows.” He took them from my arms and placed them back in the quiver. “I’ll be waitin’ in the hot vehicle. This white lady’s a bit too shiny for me.”
“You have an interesting assortment of friends,” Mary observed as Coyote’s boots crunched away on the gravel. “A Native Amercian deity, a pack of lycanthropes, a vampire, and a coven of Zorya worshippers.”
“I wouldn’t call them all my friends,” I said. “More like acquaintances. Mrs. MacDonagh and my dog, Oberon, are my friends.”
“Then you have chosen your friends wisely,” Mary said kindly. “My work here is finished. Yours is just beginning, I fear. You will most likely need to pierce Basasael more than once before he is undone.”
“Basasael?”
“That is his name. He was mighty before he fell with Lucifer.”
“Christ,” I whispered without thinking.
“My son is confident of your victory,” Mary said.
“No kidding? Tell Jesus I said hi, and we should have a beer next time he’s in the neighborhood.”
“I will relay your greetings. Now go, child. You have my blessing upon you.”
“Peace be with you,” I said, and as I turned to resume my journey with Coyote, I added under my breath, “and asskicking be with me.”
Chapter 9
“I gotta admit, Mr. Druid, I didn’t think we’d be seein’ anythin’ like that. You kinda surprised me. How’d you know that shiny white lady’d be there?”
Coyote was dressed the same way as I had seen him the night before, except now he was wearing dark sunglasses. His expressions tended to run to either amused or inscrutable, and right now he was showing me the latter. Perhaps he mistrusted me. I shrugged my shoulders as I steered the SUV south to U.S. 60. “I just had faith, I guess.”
“Pfffft. You don’ have any more faith’n I do for the Christian folks.”
I felt myself slipping automatically back into the rhythms of Coyote’s speech. “Yeah, but I had faith in a Cath’lick friend o’ mine. She did the prayin’ for me.”
“Well then, why didn’ she just pray for Jesus to come down and smite the demon or somethin’? We coulda slept in.”
“ ’Cause Jesus don’ like to come down very much. People keep thinkin’ of him bein’ nailed to a cross or wearin’ a crown of thorns, or else he’s got huge bloody holes in his hands an’ feet, an’ that’s just gotta be damn uncomfortable. Plus they think he was a white guy with straight brown hair, but he was dark-skinned. Shucks, I bet you know what that’s like, when people think o’ you like one o’ them stylized sandpaintings or a fetish animal. You don’t wanna go prancin’ around lookin’ like that, do ya?”
“Hell, no.” Coyote grinned. “I tried appearin’ as one o’ those sandpaintings once. My body was so stretched out I completely lost track o’ where my ass was.”
We shared a laugh over that as we turned east onto U.S. 60 and the clouds that had been threatening to dump on us all morning finally let loose. Big fat drops splattered noisily on our vehicle, and it reminded me of those drumrolls you hear before a circus acrobat does something remarkably stupid without a net. I had difficulty figuring out how to turn on the windshield wipers, and Coyote sniggered at me until I got them on.