Derrek was awakened by a loud yell, his eyes met with intense darkness. His lungs and throat ached, but he could breathe again, although his stomach growled and he could feel his lips were chapped from dehydration. He scrambled and felt around, finding his surroundings to be cool to the touch, and hard as rock.
“Wakey wakey!”
A familiar voice echoed around him. He couldn’t tell where the source of it was, but he could tell it was Discord speaking. He felt a rush of anger but got the feeling it wouldn’t do him any good, so he put those feelings aside and called back out to him.
“Where am I, Discord?”
It took a moment for him to respond, likely due to the echoing nature of their conversation.
“Some cave—not sure what it’s called.”
Derrek put his face in his hands, exasperated and beyond annoyed.
“Why am I here?”
Discord’s hearty laughter echoed through the cave, gradually growing louder and louder, to the point where it was nearly deafening.
“Cause that’s where I put you, silly!”
Derrek groaned and concluded that Discord would be no help. He felt his way to his feet, which, due to the damp, uneven ground, was harder than it should have been. It was pitch black, and he couldn’t see past his nose.
He could see a faint outline of the cavern surrounding him, growing clearer by the second. Soon enough, he saw the cavern clearly. He found an exit standing before him, although the green tint to it all was unusual. He waved his hand in front of his face, finding a light source coming from his left eye.
This had not happened before, even in his room at the Schadenfreude with the curtains closed, so he assumed it was his body’s response to needing a light source. He took note of his newfound ability and trudged forward through the rocky opening before him, heading into a hallway-like tunnel, leading on as far as he could see.
“It’s kinda funny,” Discord’s voice echoed. “Reapers are pretty much immune to poison, venom, bullets, knives, even nukes, but a little bit of sage in their lungs, and they’re practically dead for half a day.”
Derrek did his best to ignore him and pushed onward, and he found himself in a larger cavern with another door-like opening fifty feet away. He walked toward it, but after a few feet, he found the ground underneath him to be absent suddenly, and he began to fall.
He managed to catch himself on the ledge he just slipped off of, and he pulled himself back up. He was shaken but quickly got over it and peered over the edge. Saw that the light from his eye could not show the bottom, and as the light reached from one end of the chamber to the other, he decided that falling was out of the question. The crevice stretched over the majority of the cavern—thirty feet, by his estimate—and he was certain he couldn’t jump it.
“You alive in there?” Discord called out. “Thought I heard some slipping and falling.”
“I’m fine—asshole.”
“OK, good. Thought you fell down that pit for a second there. The bottom is just riddled with stalactites.”
“Stalagmites. When they rise from the ground, they’re stalagmites.”
“Oh, yeah. Thanks, buddy!”
Derrek groaned again and looked around, trying to find a way across. There were no materials to work with on his end aside from a pair of wood posts with scraps of rotten rope tied to them, telling him there was once a bridge spanning the gap. He brushed it off as useless, as he was fairly sure he couldn’t travel back in time to the point when the bridge once swung and continued to scan the room, looking for anything useful.
He saw a small stretch across the gap along the wall left to him. It was maybe a foot wide, but it bridged the gap completely, and it was crossable as long as he stayed close to the wall. He spread his body out against the wall, making himself as flat as possible, and inched his way across the seemingly bottomless pit beneath him. He was almost ten feet across when he heard Discord’s voice again.
“I always get those confused, you know, like conscience and conscious? Always trips me up.”
With those words, Derrek’s foot slipped, giving him only a split second to regain his balance. He stayed in place for a few seconds, allowing him to steady his hands and calm his pulse. After regaining his composure, he kept moving along, making it almost halfway across.
“What do you think about hitting up that Italian place in the village when we’re done? I could go for some Alfredo right about now.”
Derrek continued to ignore him and finally came to the end of the ledge. He carefully stepped onto the solid ground, getting down on his knees for a moment, in appreciation of the ground he always took for granted. He got back on his feet and continued through the tunnel.
“This actually reminds me of Orpheus and Eurydice. You ever heard that one? Real sad story.”
After walking for several minutes, Derrek began to wonder just how far the tunnel went. At some point, he picked up a foul stench coming from ahead, smelling of rotting meat with faint traces of roses. He wasn’t sure he wanted to continue and looked behind him, contemplating turning back. He couldn’t be sure, but he could have sworn he saw something at the limit of his vision retreat, swallowed by the endless darkness. He turned back around and continued on his way, picking up his pace.
“It’s all about these two lovers, and like any good love story, it starts with death. Eurydice got bit by a snake, and she bit the big one, but Orpheus, son of Apollo, the other half of this couple, wasn’t gonna let her go without a fight.”
After some time, Derrek found himself in a smaller cavern, and the stench nearly overwhelmed him. He coughed and dry heaved, and for a brief moment, he was glad his stomach was empty. After acclimating to the smell, he took a look around and found the source in the center of the room.
There was a mutilated corpse in the middle of the room in an advanced stage of decay. It lacked any identifying features, such as a head or skin, but based on the scraps of clothing and the partially intact backpack alongside the vaguely torso-shaped mess of bone and dried blood, he could only assume it was human.
“So, what he did was he went to the underworld, a big no-no for mortals and an even bigger one for demigods. He just played his lyre all the way through, putting Cerberus to sleep, and even swaying Hades’s heart on his strict no-exceptions policy with letting souls escape.”
Derrek did not want to stay in this room, and he hurried along, staying close to the wall to avoid the smell. As he passed through the next tunnel, he thought he heard scratching along the floor behind him, and he quickened his stride. He continued for a few minutes, eventually outrunning the smell and only keeping pace ahead of whatever was following him. As he continued through, he felt around his person, trying to see if his knives were still on his belt just in case the sounds behind him weren’t just his imagination, but it seemed Discord had disarmed him.
“He let Orpheus leave with his love, but on one condition: he could not look at her until they were back in the mortal world, or else she would eternally be the property of the underworld.”
He felt a slight breeze blow across his face, and he was filled with hope as he thought this was a sign he was close to escaping this subterranean hell. Before he could finish that thought, however, he found himself in yet another cavern. The first thing that caught his eye was a massive stalagmite, stretching over a hundred feet into the air. Surrounding it were countless smaller ones, covering the entire floor, save for a path that had been cleared along the large stalagmite, which he started to follow.
“And to his credit, he made it pretty far—way farther than anyone else could have. But at the last stretch, he stole a glance and saw her beautiful face one last time. Of course, she wasn’t so beautiful after her skin fell off.”
Derrek stopped dead in his tracks halfway around the stalagmite. He didn’t know what it was, but he suddenly felt a deep feeling of dread. He knew he could not go forward; nor could he turn back. He had no idea what, but he knew something was watching him, and this time, he knew it wasn’t his imagination.
“A lot of people see the moral of that story as If you love someone, you have to have patience with them, but personally, I always saw it differently.”
Derrek’s heart raced. He knew something was close.
“Never … look … back.”
He turned his head slightly and caught a brief glimpse of the emaciated figure behind him, sparing him only enough time to start running along the path. The creature, whatever it was, began to screech in a high-pitched tone, hurting Derrek’s ears and preventing him from keeping track of it as it jumped around the cavern. He managed to get to the next tunnel and ran through as fast as he could, trying to outrun the thing chasing him, which was clawing on his back, catching his shirt a few times, prodding him to go faster.
The tunnel suddenly opened into a wall of trees surrounding a small clearing, the moon hanging low in the sky, and a brief wave of relief washed over Derrek, which was soon replaced with the sensation of claws digging into his back. He was thrown to the ground, and he only had time to flip himself right side up before he was met with a withered figure.
It was humanoid, but its limbs were long and slender, and its hands ended in four knife-like appendages. Its skin was pale and pulled taught across its skeleton. Its eyes, or rather, where eyes should have been, were grown over with skin, apparently an adjustment to life without light. Its teeth were long and jagged, and its jaw stretched further than it should as it screamed in Derrek’s face.
Without thinking, Derrek swung his fist at the creature’s face, making contact with its jaw, even breaking off a tooth, which unfortunately got stuck in the meat of his right hand. He scrambled back to his feet and looked around for anything he could use as a weapon, quickly settling on a heavy-looking branch right next to him. He gripped it with both hands, gushing blood from his wound, and getting ready as the creature recovered and jumped at him.
He swung the branch, shattering it in a shower of splinters over its head, leaving nothing but a short chunk of wood in his hands. He threw the splintered piece at the creature, annoying it but having no other effect. He tried to find another makeshift weapon and set his eyes on a large rock nearby but was tackled by the creature before he could reach it.
It scratched and clawed at Derrek’s chest as he tried to fight it off, punching and kicking wildly, breaking bones that never seemed to stay broken and shattering teeth that seemed to keep growing. He was losing the struggle, and the creature continued to tear chunks from his flesh, trying to bite into him, just out of reach but quickly getting closer. He knew he couldn’t hold it off forever. It was just a matter of time before he became this thing’s next meal.
Suddenly, he felt a surge of strength from deep within him. He had felt an adrenaline rush before and knew that wasn’t what this was. He grabbed the thing by the throat and managed to flip it, pinning it to the ground as it continued to claw into him, slowing as its airflow was cut off.
When it stopped clawing, Derrek suddenly felt a deep, intense heat, as if his insides were on fire. His mind became foggy, and he could not think of anything save for the creature before him. He placed his hands on both sides of its head and stared into where its eyes would have been. He opened his mouth, letting out an orange beam of light, followed by one from each of his eyes, burning into the creature’s face. It began burning from the inside out, visibly deflating its form as its body burned an outline into the barren earth beneath it.
Once nothing was left but a charred skeleton in a misshapen form, Derrek closed his mouth and eyes, stopping the flow of light. He reopened his eyes, which were back to their usual, heterochromous state. He pulled himself to his feet and stared out into the woods, where Discord slowly emerged.
“I was never a fan of the ending. If I had my way, I’d have it end a bit more like this.”
Derrek glared at him. “So, did I pass your fucking test?”
“I wouldn’t call it a test. Tests have answers. This was more of a challenge, and you passed it with flying colors!” Discord said, smiling widely.
“What was that thing?”
Discord walked over to the charred remains and picked up the skull, then began clearing the soot from it. “It’s got a stupid name: ‘cave monster.’ They’re like wendigos, except they live in caves, but because of semantics and cultural differences, they’re considered different things.”
Discord now held a clean skull filled with jagged teeth. He tucked it into his jacket and his hand came out holding a bottle of water and a protein bar, both of which he handed to Derrek. He accepted and quickly downed the water and tore into the bar.
“I’m sure you guessed it,” Discord said as Derrek took another large bite from his protein bar. “But what you just did was devouring. That’s what you did to Boyd.”
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Derrek took a break from eating and took his first breath since he started. He then said, “You could have just—I don’t know—asked me to come down here. I don’t see why you had to poison me for this.”
“I needed you weak, confused, and angry—that’s always the best combination for something caused by pure desperation. And do you have any idea how dramatic that shit was? Had a whole parallels thing going, not to mention some OG Greek tales.”
“And what if that thing killed me? What then?”
“But you didn’t die, did you?”
“That is not an excuse.”
“I get that a lot.”
Derrek finished his protein bar and stared at the burnt earth where the creature once lay. He couldn’t remember devouring Boyd, but he knew it meant his body had changed in some way. And if he somehow became like that creature …
“You won’t turn into one of them.”
“Huh?” Derrek asked.
“The devourer integrates only positive physical traits, like sharper senses or tougher skin.”
“What about my sage allergy then?”
“Weaknesses don’t count as physical traits, but they’re nowhere near as potent. That puff of sage you took would have sent a full reaper into a coma for a month. This thing probably gave you better hearing or something like that, maybe its regenerative abilities—I don’t know. I never had the chance to study how it chooses, just how its hosts fight.”
Derrek took a seat on a nearby rock, exhausted as his adrenaline wore off. He examined the wound on his hand, which was already swollen and was starting to turn purple around the tooth. Hesitantly, he grabbed it as far up as he could and jerked it out, causing blood to spurt from the hole in his hand. It hurt more than he thought it would, but he kept his cool. Discord approached him and gently grabbed his wrist, assessing the damage.
“Getting bit by a wendigo, or cave monster, is like getting bit by a dozen corpses. The amount of bacteria that builds up on those teeth is just straight bonkers,” he said, pointing to the tooth Derrek was holding.
Discord put his hands around the wound and closed his eyes, concentrating deeply. A warm light began to glow within his palms, and the pain slowly began to fade. Within seconds, the pain was gone, and Discord removed his hands, revealing that the wound had healed perfectly, leaving little more than a circular scar halfway between the base of his pinky and wrist.
Derrek was stunned, and after several seconds of looking at his newly-healed hand, he asked, “How did you do that?”
“I didn’t really do much. Most of that was all you. It’s like jumping a car.”
“What?”
“I used a bit of my spiritual energy to draw yours out, allowing your body to take it from there. You’ve got a shitload, especially after eating that thing,” Discord said, throwing his thumb over his shoulder at the burnt remains.
Derrek looked at his hands again. He didn’t know just how strong he was. Nor did he have any idea what he was capable of, but at that moment, he felt strong. He had fought for his life, and he had survived. He wasn’t sure how long it would be until he could call upon his ability to devour at will, but he could control it, and that meant progress. He was still mad at Discord, but he decided a beer on him would be enough for him to set it aside.
Discord set his hand on Derrek’s shoulder, and before he could look up from his own hands, he was back in his room. He looked around, confused, and rightfully so.
“So, was this all some weird dream, or did you drug me again?” he asked, exasperated.
Discord laughed. “Neither, I just figured you’d rather get here quick than make the whole walk.”
“But how did you do that? Did we just teleport?”
“Nah, I just kicked it into eighteenth gear and dragged you across a few dozen miles.”
Derrek stared at him for a few seconds. “Huh. All right.”
He sat on his bed and immediately lay back, sprawling onto the mattress, allowing the comfort to wash over him. Discord saw the look of exhaustion on his face. “Your phone and knives are in your nightstand. Rest up. We’re taking the day off, but we’re going back to it on Sunday.”
He walked toward the door. Derrek grunted in the affirmative, then closed his eyes and fell right asleep. Discord looked back at him and decided to drape his blanket over him and take off his shoes, as he knew just how much he had gone through. After getting him in order, he left the room and went to the neighboring one, using his key to open the lock.
He had rented the room, as per his agreement with Mila, but he had barely spent any time in it. He did as he usually did for hotels when he showed up—draped the curtains, installed an extra lock, and put up whatever maps or charts he needed at the time. He had one map that was on the wall which marked the cave he dropped Derrek in. He no longer needed it, so he folded it up and stuck it into his coat.
He had a white cloth laid over the bed, atop of which were no less than seven guns he had been working on, cleaning the ones he collected, carving runes on the ones ready to go. The pistol he took during the pub scuffle the week before was among them, now unrecognizable, as it was finally given the attention it needed. Nothing irked him quite like poor weapon-maintenance habits.
He stood in front of the wall and scanned the maps, looking to see which lead he should follow next. There were reports of Skinwalkers in Washington state, which wasn’t unusual, but the numbers were worrying. There was an online listing for a statue made of solid platinum, possibly a primordial relic. He made sure to keep placing bids, but tracked down the IP address of the seller just in case he was outbid at the last second. It was what was happening in France, however, that worried him the most.
Several known poachers were seen congregating at a cabin in the French countryside. Discord hadn’t had the chance to check it out, but he worried they may have caught Derrek’s scent, or worse—they were targeting the Schadenfreude.
It’s always something, he said to himself as he pulled an open beer from his coat and took a sip. Still cold.
He heard a knock on his door. He didn’t bother with the peephole since he already knew who it was. He undid the locks and opened the door and was met by a man with a bald head, a bushy beard, and a gun in his hand.
“How’s it hanging, Jeffy?” Discord asked nonchalantly.
Jeffrey’s face was serious, and his hand was steady as he rested his finger on the trigger. He didn’t say a word, just gestured with the gun for Discord to go inside his room.
“All right then, won’t you come in?” he asked, bowing and gesturing for Jeffrey to enter, which he did, closing the door behind him. He went to his minifridge and pulled out a Brewski, which he handed toward Jeffrey. Continuing his silent streak, he just stared at Discord, who eventually set it down on the dresser next to him.
“Nice piece. Looks like you clean it regularly. Oh damn, you even put a coat of polish over it? Classy.”
“Shut up,” Jeffrey said, pointing his gun in Discord’s face. “Something about you has been bugging me all week, so here’s what’s gonna happen. I’m gonna ask some questions, you’re gonna answer, and if I don’t like your answer, I’m gonna shoot you in the mouth.”
“Could you do me a favor and aim for my forehead? I was planning on getting some Italian this weekend, and I’d rather have it taste right.”
“Shut up.”
Discord put his hands up and mimed zipping his mouth closed, then locking it and throwing the key over his shoulder.
“Who are you?” Jeffrey asked. Discord began to pretend to talk, keeping his lips pursed and mumbling with a muffled voice in incomprehensible words. Jeffrey rolled his eyes. “I’m not in the mood for this, open your damn mouth and tell me what I want to know!”
Discord laughed. “Sorry, couldn’t resist.”
Jeffrey groaned. “I’ll ask again: Who are you?”
“How long you got?”
“All the time in the world.”
“Won’t be enough. I’ll keep it simple: I’m Discord.”
“Elaborate,” Jeffrey said, pushing the gun in Discord’s face.
“Odds are more will come out with the other answers. Asking me who I am is like asking a historian about the social impact of the Ottoman Empire: there’s a lot more to it than you’d expect.”
“Fine. Who sent you?”
“Nobody, I’m here of my own volition.”
Jeffrey didn’t believe him, but nothing about him pointed to him lying, so he opted to continue.
“What’s with all the guns and maps? Are you some kind of fucking terrorist or something?”
“First off, I doubt anybody would admit to being a terrorist. As for the rest, I collect guns, and the maps are leads on some real weird stuff.”
“What kind of ‘weird stuff’?”
“Monsters, artifacts, magic boots—you know, stuff like your book.”
“How do you know about that book?”
“What, you think you’re the first to ever carry it? I’ve met probably a dozen people who carried it, and the end result is always the same.”
“And just what might that be?”
“A fiery death.”
Jeffrey’s face went from anger to dejection, and he lowered his gun. He walked over to Discord’s chair, which was left empty, and slumped into it, leaving his gun in his lap and burying his face in his hands. He continuously cursed under his breath, slowly shaking his head back and forth.
“Could be worse,” Discord said, “You could’ve been fated to freeze to death—that’s, like, ten times worse.”
Jeffrey jumped out of the chair and pressed the muzzle of his gun under Discord’s chin, to which he responded by maintaining eye contact and taking another sip from his beer.
“Here’s a question for you,” Jeffrey said through his teeth. “What on God’s green earth did you do to Derrek?”
“Well, I didn’t kill him, for starters.”
“What, were you going to? Are you going to?”
“I was supposed to, but I decided not to. I thought it’d be more fun to keep him alive.”
“What the fuck are you planning with him?” Jeffrey yelled as quietly as he could.
“Nothing. His fate is his own, and I’m just sticking around for the ride.” Jeffrey pushed the gun further under his chin, causing him to choke for a brief second. “Could you put the gun down? It really isn’t doing you any favors.”
“You’re talking, aren’t you?”
“Just back up a few feet and let me demonstrate, will you?”
Jeffrey wasn’t sure what he was doing, but aside from the several guns on the bed, he seemed to be unarmed. He gave Discord some space, still pointing his gun between his eyes.
Without saying a word, Discord produced a knife from his coat, almost prompting Jeffrey to shoot until he buried the blade into his own neck. He pulled the knife forward, chopping out his Adam’s apple and pouring blood onto the floor, splattering some onto Jeffrey’s shoes and much more onto his pants.
All the while, Discord stood, not reacting to the immense pain he must have been in. He took another sip from his beer, which flowed through the hole, onto the carpet. He set the beer down on the dresser and maintained eye contact with Jeffrey as the hole quickly began to close over, completely healing within seconds.
As soon as he could talk, Discord said, “See? You can put the gun away. It won’t do you any good.”
Jeffrey stood before him, absolutely dumbfounded, staring slack-jawed at him, and dropped his gun to the ground, raising his hands in a surrendering manner, shaking like a leaf the entire time.
Discord, in an annoyed tone, said, “Oh, come on. You were talking that good shit just a second ago. Put your hands down and just talk to me.”
Jeffrey slowly lowered his hands and was now very aware he was at a severe disadvantage.
“Do … you mind if I sit?” Jeffrey sheepishly asked.
“If it makes you more comfortable, have at it.”
Jeffrey slowly made his way back to the chair, doing his best not to step in any more blood, and lowered himself into the chair. He was avoiding looking at Discord and was caught off guard when a towel was thrown over his head. He flailed around, thinking a sack was being pulled over his head but calmed down once he saw it was just a towel.
“Sorry about the mess. I would’ve shot myself, but even with a suppressor, odds are the bullet would’ve gone into the next room, which is some attention I just cannot afford bringing.”
Jeffrey was still for a moment. Realizing there was blood all over his boots, he started to clean them off.
“There’s a lot you don’t understand, Major, and that’s not me ripping on you. There’s way more than a book that won’t stay damaged, and there’s way more than me.”
“How deep does this go?”
“I just had this conversation, like, sixty or so pages ago. It goes real deep, man, and Havok is real deep into it. He didn’t choose to be as he is, but fate has chosen him. I have no intention of really hurting him. I just want to be sure he can handle himself.”
Jeffrey was still terrified. He had been through the hell that is war and went back and asked for more, but this man who stood before him was beyond anything he had ever seen. He considered bolting, running through the door as fast as he could, but then he spoke again.
“He talks very highly of you and thinks even higher. You matter to him, and he matters to me, so killing you was never an option, if that’s what you’re worried about. You can relax. If you want to leave, you’re free to do so.”
Jeffrey looked up to meet his gaze and saw sincerity in his eyes. He felt relieved but wasn’t sure from what. He took a deep breath. “I guess we’re on the same page then.”
Discord smiled and tried to hand him the Brewski once more. He considered turning it down, but as a show of good faith, he accepted but didn’t open it.
“Glad to hear,” Discord said. “Anything else you wanna know?”
Jeffrey considered all the questions he could ask, but he quickly realized he wasn’t sure he wanted to hear the answer.
“I think I’m good,” Jeffrey said, standing up from his chair. “Thanks for the beer. I think I should go.”
Discord nodded. “It is pretty late—or early—at this point. Take care, Major.”
Jeffrey nodded back at him and walked toward the door. He had his hand on the handle when he was grabbed by the shoulder. He turned around, terrified that Discord had changed his mind, and seeing him holding a gun didn’t help.
“Wouldn’t want you to forget this,” Discord said, handing back Jeffrey’s gun.
Jeffrey had completely forgotten. He took his gun back, quickly rolled up his pant leg, and stored it back in his prosthetic.
“Thanks,” he said as he left. “Take it easy.”
He closed the door behind him, leaving Discord alone in his room, fresh blood on the carpet mixed with a good amount of beer. He looked at the puddle and decided to leave it for room service. He was paying extra, after all.
He went back to his wall of maps and examined the one in the center. There was a suicide doomsday cult in Idaho—thirty-four dead and two in critical condition. He had been keeping up with them, believing them to be a blood cult, but once he was sure they weren’t, he took them off his radar, thinking they were just another group of fanatics. Looking further into it, however, he found they had grown not only in numbers since he stopped paying attention but in their extremism. They had performed ritual sacrifice of animals, carved into the flesh of their members, leaving deep, intricate markings, and had even sacrificed members among them who had doubts. He was still sure they weren’t at any time a blood cult, but something about them just wouldn’t sit right with Discord even though they practically wiped themselves out. Maybe it was their name.
The Children of Ragnarok.