Page 92 of Blacktail

“As long as you might have lived in the physical world,” Uriel said. “Perhaps a bit longer. But in time you will die, as all creatures do, and then you and your clan go on together to what comes next. They needn’t even remember that they are—Well, they needn’t know.”

“And what would you have of me in return?”

“Nothing at all,” Uriel said. Blacktail’s nostrils flared—searching, Chester thought, for a lie. “Your wrath is a terrible thing, Blacktail, perhaps the worst thing. All who hear it must tremble. The god of man would ransom your peace. That is the truth, and all of it, I swear.”

Uriel knelt down, stretched out his hand. The ghost-dog, Renren, walked over to it, sniffed the paw a moment, and licked it. The angel scratched her ears. She grinned up at him. It was a happy, servile smile, a slave’s smile.

“What do you say, little one?” Uriel asked Renren. “Would you be with your love again?”

Renren looked first to Blacktail, then to the angel, then with longing to the snowy hill behind her.

“My…my…my lord,” she said haltingly. It was as if she had forgotten the trick of speech during her long stay in the dark. “My Lord Hunter.”

“Yes,” Blacktail said, “it is me.”

“My lord, you know that I loved you.”

“Yes.”

“Know also that I love you still.”

“Yes. And I you.”

“And know that had we—had I lived, I would—”

“Yes,” Blacktail said, his voice thick with emotion. “I do know.”

“Then kill them,” she barked, spitting the words out with such venomous rage that even Blacktail drew back a step. “Kill for me, who was faithful and loved them without reservation. Kill for my puppies, who harmed no one, but were murdered in my womb, murdered in my body, dead forever without seeing the light. Heed the pleas of your night-dreams. Reign forever in your fury. Devour them all.”

Blacktail sipped at the air for a moment, tasting the scent of his mate. Chester thought for a moment that Blacktail might speak, but he didn’t. Perhaps there was nothing more to say. Renren dipped her head, looked up at him one final time…then turned and walked back into the dark from which she had come.

Blacktail turned from her to face the fire. His countenance had grown so terrible that even the angel now hid his eyes from the sight. The bare sliver that Chester could see from behind left him frozen with terror.

“Come out,” Blacktail said. “I have a message for your Lord of Hosts that I would send back with you.”

Uriel, who was the Fire of God, hid his face in his hands. He made no answer.

“Come out,” Blacktail said again.

Still the angel held his silence, but now he trembled within the flame. Chester thought he struggled against some mighty force that bound him.

“Come out,” Blacktail said a third time, “or I shall come in after you.”

When again there was no answer, Blacktail fixed his gaze and strode down the hill. When he reached the fire, he paused for a moment.

Chester scrambled to his feet, screaming. “Blacktail! No!”

Blacktail did not hear, or did not care if he did. He walked into the fire. He did not disappear, but receded, as if walking slowly down a long path. Chester thought at first it was some illusion of the flame. The fire they had built was only a few paces across at its widest, but Blacktail looked to be much, much farther away than that, now small, now tiny, now only a speck in the distance.

Chester lifted his gaze and saw that the angel was gone. He whined again, very softly. A moment later he crept out of the circle of light and moved away from the fire, his tail tucked between his legs. The fur on the back of his neck was high and prickly.

Despite his fear, Chester was not willing to abandon Blacktail. He stopped behind a large rock and hunkered down, much farther away than he had been but still close enough to see. Something is coming, he thought. Some terrible thing.

The pack of holy men sensed it as well. They glanced back and forth at one another, then began to stand. Two of them simply ran, their courage broken. A third followed moments later. The last one hesitated, terrified but still screaming for the old one in the black cloth to join them. He is their pack lord, Chester thought. That one didn’t respond. He seemed to have fallen asleep or died. The last one, a burly fellow, slung the limp body over his own shoulders and hobbled away as best he could.

They didn’t quite make it.

The great circle of fire swelled once, growing perhaps a half pace, fell back, then swelled again. Seeing it, Chester felt a fresh terror bubble up from the boiling spasms of his mind.