Page 95 of The Deer and the Dragon
I looked beyond the lake to the hill and balked at the sheer size of it. This would not be a few hours of digging through a hedge. This would be a month of unbroken excavation. Not only would I have to dig longer, farther, and deeper than I could have possibly fathomed, but I’d need to find a place in the town where I wouldn’t be jailed for a very perplexing crime of vandalism. I wondered what stories residents told themselves about the emerald bluffs, or what the police thought of the interesting landscaping that carved through their little city. I couldn’t imagine any excuse making sense once they found me elbow deep in a mountain of destroyed property.
He sat down on the edge of the lake but didn’t touch the water.
“All right,” he said. “Make your little altar.”
I didn’t have to be a practitioner to understand what he meant. I’d done enough and seen enough to understand the rough configuration of my offering. In addition to the food, crystal decanter of liquor, and the roll of bills, I arranged a few candles and procured a matchbook withBellfield Innemblazoned on the side.
“I don’t know what a merman is gonna need cash for,” I mumbled as I lit the candles.
“It’s not about the money; it’s about the sacrifice. And please, for the love of the gods: if Dagon shows up, don’t call him a merman.”
I didn’t want to snap back at Azrames that I wasn’t stupid, because the truth is, I was. However, I was an idiot with a literature degree and an international reputation for fictional works in mythology. Perhaps I didn’t know anything about the ancient Canaanite religion of what would be modern-day Lebanon, but I understood that gods weren’t djinn. I wasn’t summoning a lake genie to grant a wish; I was compiling an offering of gratitude to thank him for intercession on my behalf. In this instance, hopefully Dagon and I would share a common goal.
The candles burned, and we waited.
And waited.
And waited.
“Az, what if—”
He lifted a finger to his lips to shush me, then pointed to the clouds. Just on the edge of the horizon, the calm sky broke into cumulonimbus towers. The enormous clouds moved forward on a gust of wind, blowing out what little remained of the candles. I lurched to grab the offerings, but Azrames snatched my wrist to stop me before I touched the items, allowing the fruits and bundle of cash to blow into the water. I looked to him with growing concern as theclouds crawled through the air with incredible speed, snuffing out the midmorning sunlight to a day so dark it might have been dusk.
Wind whipped across the lake, stirring up tiny whitecaps. As the air turned harbor-gray with the churning weather, the waters dropped into a menacing shade of charcoal. For the first time, I smelled fish and seaweed and the silty soil of lake bottoms rather than the manicured gardens. I squinted as the wind whipped my hair into my eyes, wincing as the world abandoned logic and reason for the sort of meteorological anomaly that one could only describe as an act of God.
Don’t be scared, you coward, I begged myself.Azrames isn’t afraid, and he’s sitting right next to you. You’re fine, you’re fine.
But it was a lie. Chills raced across my back, my arms, my neck, pebbling every inch of my flesh with fear and adrenaline. My mouth dried out as the water began to ripple, stirring from the center of the lake. I was one crack of lightning away from wetting my pants. I jolted halfway to my feet at the shock of movement as a thick, white mist crept in on either side, but once again, I was yanked to the ground and urged to remain still. Azrames kept a tight hand around my forearm this time.
“Be reverent,” he hissed.
Reverent. Right.I nodded, swallowing. I’d spent years on my knees in church. I knew how to prostrate myself before a god. Only, my god had never answered my crystal decanter of liquor with mist and thunder. My heart raced as the fog thickened until I could barely see Azrames.
Then just as soon as it began, the wind died, giving way to utter silence. The thunderheads, the mist, the tangible feelings of dread remained.
I heard it then. At first it sounded like a fish jumping out of water. The sloshing noises of steps filled the air, and then, we were not alone.
Chapter Thirty-One
Dagon.
My heart stopped at the sight of the man beside me.
I forgot to breathe as I looked at him through the mist. From the straight, black beard to the rainbow scales of his robe, I knew beyond the shadow of a doubt that this deeply ancient deity took no pleasure in modernity. He would not be the TV-watching, candy-eating goblin who waited in my living room, nor the demon with a luxury sports car.
He was history and culture and language. He was the Epic of Gilgamesh, the sands of time, the tectonic plates shifting as Pangea broke apart. He was deeply and terrifyingly eternal.
He stood in front of us, feet planted in the lake. He did not possess the fishtail of a merman but thick, muscled legs. I understood the storm and mist the moment I looked at him. Even if someone else had possessed my sigil or the ability to pierce the veil, they couldn’t have seen through the impenetrable curtain of fog that concealed him.
Azrames rolled from his sitting position onto a kneel. He didn’t bow his head but dipped his chin once in respectful acknowledgment as he propped his elbow against his knee. “Dagon, Your Excellence, I’m Azrames of Hell. I think I speak on behalf of all of us when I apologize for your hands.”
I was still in the process of copying Az’s posture, steadingmyself on one knee, when my eyes shot to the fish lord in the lake. Each wrist bore a thick, terrible scar, as if his hands had once been severed.
At long last, he returned the acknowledging dip. With a terrifying and unfamiliar accent that screamed of his agelessness among eternity, he responded, “The enemy of my enemy is my friend.”
I waited for Azrames to have me speak, but he did not.
“How long have you been kept here?” he asked.
