Cosmic fishing, much like Earth fishing (whether for food or compliments) seemed to consist of a lot of sitting around, trying to make boredom look like concentration.

Or, at least, I thought so. Like the angels of the Third Sphere I had once seen in a bestiary of pops', Vyrt's features differed from a statue's only by colour. He didn't blink, didn't breathe, despite the perfectly healthy organs in his body. His immense heart, for example, didn't beat. If it did, it would have probably drowned out the thousands of others in the Roundhouse-between the London Chapter and the auxiliary staff, I could hear thousands of hearts, spread over the spatially-warped equivalent of kilometres beating in eerie unison, like an army marching. I'd heard rumours of how the Knights drilled in order to match each other's movement as much as different physiologies allowed, but this was...

Huh. They actually breathed and blinked at the same time, too.

One had to wonder how much the telepathy their armour enabled was really necessary, with such cohesion.

'You do not have to stay here, David,' Vyrt spoke eventually, mouth unmoving, no air entering or leaving his lungs. He was so concentrated, he'd forgotten to fake human mannerisms. 'Unless, of course, you wish to. Mimir's sight could be helpful with spotting things mine might miss. He always saw things clearer than most...' The Nephilim sighed. 'Ironic, isn't it? He could see the future, but not his own death in time to warn the Aesir.'

I nodded along while Darth Vyrtgueis talked, only watching him with one eye, the other moving from portrait to portrait. C'mon, stare back. The paintings' eyes always move in the cool places...I'm looking at you, look back. Eye for an eye...

'That is, of course, assuming Mimir didn't simply accept his death, or even helped bring it along. After all, we still do not know how Chernobog managed to steal him away from Borson. Perhaps he left himself, using his knowledge to hide until he reached the Black God's grasp.'

I turned to give Vyrt my full attention, staring up at him incredulously. He sounded like he knew more than he had been letting on-would inquiring cause him to spill more? I wouldn't even have to fake interest. 'Those are certainly possibilities, Master.'

'Thank you for using my rank, David. Be careful not to roll your eyes any harder, they might fall out.'

'I did not-'

'Metaphorically. I see you are still feeling called out, though.'

'Mimir?' I asked gruffly. 'Chernobog?'

'They are both gods associated with the Northern Hemisphere...oh, you meant what I was talking about. Yes, that is interesting too. Mimir could have chosen to die, knowing the chaos it would cause. Perhaps, tired of being used as a glorified search engine by a knowledge-monger, he chose to make sure as many gods as possible died.' Vyrt shrugged. 'I have seen less productive suicides.'

'That would mean the Headhunt was all a sham,' I said warily. 'That...'

'Would it not be heartbreaking to learn you ate people while your mind was raped, because an old man was feeling spiteful?' The Nephilim smiled. 'I'm certain Odin would be devastated if it turned out everything he built was almost torn down out of pettiness. Such rage would take him...I have not seen him truly mad in millennia, you know.'

'Unless you want to, I would argue not telling him about these theories.'

'But of course.' Vyrt raised a grey eyebrow. 'Odin hates having his ideas repeated to him. It makes him livid, truly. Why, the only thing worse would be if he learned the responsible were still at large.'

I will not lie: the moment I saw Vyrt's smile and the gleam in his eyes, an image, of white teeth in a black, otherwise featureless face flashed into my mind, and I stumbled.

'Stop talking,' I whispered. 'You are trying to scare me.'

And then I left, jumping off the desk and-I will not lie-running out of Vyrt's office. His chuckles followed me for a long, long time.

***

I didn't know the Roundhouse's layout, let alone where the others' rooms were, and I didn't trust myself to open Mimir's sight. As luck would have it, after minutes of walking around corridors lined with the armours of dead Knights, standing eternal watch under their late owners's portraits, I found my wall into a chamber of worship.

It was an interesting change of pace after the countless dead ends and the staring, mournful eyes of Knights fallen in the line of duty. Few of the human ones had been old. None had died peacefully; I knew, for their portraits showed the moments of their deaths.

They all looked like they were judging me. Their eyes had followed me, too.

The chamber I was in now could not be called a chapel, for it was larger than most churches I had see, and Christianity wasn't the only religion represented. I saw Jesus and Buddha, Amaterasu and the Trimurti, Odin and Zeus and Cernunnos. I saw gods of war and peace and death, and even a group of humble-looking deities deities I didn't recognise, before seeing the 'we will never forget you' plaques left by said Knights' descendants.

Ancestor worship? Or just attachment?

'At what point does one become the other, strigoi?' a voice like hailstones on wood drew my attention.

I turned to look into Cernunnos' shaggy, green-eyed visage. After everything, I was less surprised at the god manifesting, and more at the fact he'd pulled the cliché of stepping off his statue's plinth.

'I suppose it depends, as so many things do, on faith, and how it is shown,' I replied, adjusting the cross that had started stinging more than usual, for some reason.

'Indeed it does. Answer me this, then: do you believe in me, David?'

I blinked at the odd question. But, judging by the Celtic god's warm, earnest smile, he was being serious. 'Do I believe...?'

'In me. Do you?'

'Well, yes. In the sense I know you are real.'

'That is the correct answer, David. I  am real.'

A black blur, claws around my throat, and Chernobog was pressing me up against a wall. I gaped at him for half a microsecond, then glanced frantically about the room. Cernunnos' plinth was empty-what the fuck?! This wasn't an illusion?

Had the Black God come back,  and somehow snuck into the Roundhouse? Why? How? Or were the Knights in league with him? Vyrt's talk of hidden alliances, bargains struck to watch the world burn, came back to me. But why would the Nephilim point my thoughts in that direction, if he was in cahoots with Chernobog?

Fucking dammit. I was doing half his job, driving myself insane like this.

'You are already mad, David,' Chernobog said, voice just as warm as it had been in his disguise as Cernunnos. 'Who would worship the thing that hurts them, but a madman-'

I spat in his blank, ebony face. 'Szabo already rambled about that,' I sneered. 'And he was worse than you could ever be.'

'Is that a challenge?' Chernobog sounded delighted at the prospect. 'I'll be sure to take you up on it. But first, let me show you the face of your saviour.'

Another blur, and my back smashed through the thick cross that bore Jesus' statue. The Messiah's cracked image fell on me, robes falling apart like they were cloth rather than stone, showing a rotten spear wound in his side. His features had gone from serene to a silent scream, mouth parted in a grimace that revealed rotten teeth. The crown of thorns on his head pulsed in rhythm to Chernobog's shaking shoulders, pressing into his forehead, but drawing only a thick pus, rather than blood.

'He was afraid, in the end,' the Black God said softly, squatting down and nudging the statue with one finger. 'Of death. Can you  imagine that? An aspect of the thing that called itself God, like it was the only one! Live enough among humans, and-'

'What? You'll become scared, like them? You must've lived an awfully long time among humans, what with how Nacht killed you.' I tried to smirk, and move the statue, which felt heavier than the world, off of me, and managed neither.

Chernobog snickered. 'Says the one too scared to stop hiding behind jokes. But...I should not be surprised. It is a sign of deceiving oneself, and you  are Christian, after all. You have all convinced yourselves your god is not a bloated tyrant, toying with you out of boredom, then devouring your souls. But observe...'

With a deep, rattling breath, the Jesus statue shuddered to a mockery of life. Bloodshot eyes were wide with horror that almost eclipsed the horror blazing feverishly within them.

'I have seen the truth,' it said in a broken voice that was all the uglier for how beautiful it must have been once. 'D-Death...is only the beginning. But there is no  life after it. There is no Heaven. Hell is a lie. They...t-they all are...' it gibbered to itself, sludge-like tears slowly trailing down gaunt cheeks; I realised, to my disgust, that they were worms, transparent and bloated with eggs that pulsed within them, even as they crawled out of the statue's hollow eye sockets and through its flesh, eating it.

'I must partake of you,' the statue and the worms spoke in unison. 'Give me your body and your blood, so I may stave off death.'

Before I could do anything, the worms rushed forward, dashing down my throat. One wrapped around my lungs and dead heart, growing as it fed, filling my throat so I couldn't talk. The other moved lower, into my stomach, devouring its lining as it grew and grew, until my abdomen burst. Then, they began laying their eggs.

All the while, Chernobog and the statue looked down, beaming; then, the latter unhinged its jaw, and bit down on my chest, shattering my cross.

I didn't scream. I couldn't.

***

When I came to, it was in a small, dingy room, a bare lightbulb hanging from the dirty grey ceiling. And yet, even the meager light hurt my eyes, like I had lived my whole life underground.

'He's awake.'

The cold, detached voice drew my gaze to the man in the chair. My father had never smiled so darkly, in all the decades I had known him. His clothes were shabby and torn, showing patches of pale flesh covered in blotches. Where had his muscle gone? Where were the scars?

'You gave us one fuck of a scare, there,' the man said, leaning forward, rubbing his bearded chin. I gaped at the swear word-Constantin would never talk like this-, then saw my mouth was hanging open my itself. My lower jaw dangled from a series of thin metal strings bolted into my skull, and my teeth and tongue were gone.

Constantin grinned-my expression must have been hilarious-, and turned to speak over his shoulder at someone I couldn't see, someone in the hall beyond the room. 'Did you record that? That juice really feeds your imagination. Though I guess I shouldn't be too surprised. Ever since I adopted the little fuck, he came up with some shit even  I wouldn't have thought of. Guess he thought if he contributed himself, it'd hurt less.'

Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.

'Won't you ever get tired of him? It's been decades,' the person in the hall spoke, in a flat voice that held only the barest flicker of curiosity.

Constantin laughed, the folds of his belly jiggling. 'You fucking kidding me? The meat might not be fresh any more, but he's still good to go until he dies. And-why not?-a lil' bit after.' His eyes narrowed with malicious amusement. 'Turn off the painkillers.'

Instantly, tubes I hadn't even seen ripped free of my flesh with wet pops, flooding me with pain. I screamed until my throat was raw, but couldn't move, couldn't even thrash in place: my limbs were gone, and the phantom pain was killing me.

'Enough of that!' Constantin parked, clamping a thick collar around my neck and attaching a chain to it. 'They wanna use my toy to test their shit? Fine, long as I get paid. But that's over and done now! C'mon, David. We're going home.'

Whistling, he dragged me out of the nightmare hospital bed by the chain, not even slowing down when I fell to the floor with a wet thud, tears mingling with the blood from my stumps. As he dragged me out into the hall and towards the exit, the last thing I saw was a woman, who looked exactly like Andrei had described my mother, except decades older than when she had died, her curly brown hair almost grey.

'Why didn't you die, too?' the corpse asked, trailing a skeletal hand down its distended, stretched belly.

***

Darkness.

'Can you believe he lasted this long?' Mihai asked, sounding far, far away, yet deafening.

'Fucking putz had an epiphany; finally caught on to how sad he was making everyone's lives by being in them,' Lucian rumbled.

'Any of you curious what I could do in his body?' Alex suggested. 'Not like anyone'll miss it...'

'Oh, I would  love that,' Bianca breathed. 'He never even realised I was eyeing him. It would've been a pity fuck, but he was funny. In a sad away.'

'Throwing that rat away was the best idea I ever had,' Andrei chuckled, before taking a swig of something. 'Too bad he didn't die of frostbite before you came home, Constantin.'

'Alas. I would have rather burned that little body than raised such a disappointing man. All those hollow prayers, and for what? He couldn't even faithcraft. And killing himself? Even if I had ever considered David my son, this would have been the end of it.' I heard him clasp his hands and kneel on my grave, two metres above me. 'God, forgive me for keeping this wretch within my home. May You smite his place of rest, so the world may forget him, as we shall...'

***

'So many nightmares...some of them quite nonsensical,' Chernobog said, striding around me as I tried to stay on all fours and not drop to the floor again, dragging the tip of one claw around my neck. My blood pooled around the edges, oozing down slowly, like tree sap.

 Drip.

'And you call  me afraid, David? I should kill you, spare the world your existence.'

Drip. Drip.

'Do it, bastard,' I rasped. 'You can only hurt me with my own fears-you think I give a fuck if you break my body? Go ahead and kill me. Admit you can't win.' I smiled, showing my mangled mouth. 'At least I knew some love on this Earth, unlike you ever will.'

Chernobog didn't reply for a while. When he did, his voice was as empty and cold as the razed Siberian village where he had manifested before the Headhunt. 'I regret I could not make you give up your grinning mask, David. But do not worry. One day, I will show you, and everyone else, what you are.'

'Sounds fancy,' I said, not looking at him. He didn't deserve it. 'I only regret that Nacht didn't keep you alive as its toy. We could use some jokes in ARC...and I've yet to see one bigger than you.'

'I never died, David. Nor will you. I will keep you alive, forever, until you forget how to beg for death.' He stomped down on my head, pressing it into the floor. 'And then, I will teach you true suffering.'

'Experience is always useful,' I said, releasing the bundle of will I had gathered in my eyes, which snapped open, showing me the room's aetheric incarnation. 'Begone!'

The black shape wavered like smoke in the wind, before dispersing with an agonised scream, briefly filling the room, then disappearing.

My mundane sight returned, and I chuckled breathlessly to see Cernunnos' statue was back on its plinth. The samsara wheel-shaped clock mounted on one wall showed no time had passed since my arrival.

A hallucination. Nothing more. Vyrt's words had stirred up old fears, and my mind had spun horror out of them. I was sure that, once I took a trip to the centre of my mind, my strigoi side would bark a cold laugh at how it had fooled me.

'Um...look. I get that you want to show reverence to Christ. I respect that. But this place is not for private worship, so, uh...would you mind  not telling me to leave?'

I tried to turn in surprise, but ended up crab walking-I was on all fours before the Messiah's statue, and the sight of it whole and unblemished brought tears to my eyes. I wasn't Protestant, I was used to icons, but...

'Hey...you alright there? Silva, right? The strigoi with god eyes?'

Now that my wits were back, I could tell the newcomer was female, with a voice used to being obeyed. Armoured boots briefly filled my vision, then the Knight squatted down to look into my eyes, tilting my chin up with one hand.

Her nose had been broken several times, and her left cheek was dominated by a fist-sized gouge that showed glistening bone under pale-green skin, but she was still beautiful. Jesus, Mary and Joseph-anyone would have been beautiful after...after...

Emerald almond eyes regarded me with concern, brown furrowing beneath a shock of copper hair. 'I am Lady Theo, Castellan of the Roundhouse,' she said in a calming voice, like I was a startled animal. 'I lead when the Grandmaster and Master are away on business, and maintain the castle the rest of the time. Are you alright? Do you need medical attention?'

I tried to speak, but ended up with something between a hiccup and a cough. The demifae wasn't reassured when I shook my head, either. 'You look like shit, agent. You didn't even hear me when I entered, and didn't respond when I nudged you. What...what were you even doing?'

'What do you mean?' I finally managed to ask in a thin voice.

'You were prostrating yourself before the statue, but...you weren't praying. You...I had half a mind to throw you out of the room for blasphemy. We weren't told you would be like this,' the broad-shouldered woman said, before reaching into the metal of her armour and pulling my cross out through it. 'Took this away. You could have killed yourself with it-'

'Thank you,' I hissed, wrapping my arms around her knees, not caring how pathetic I looked. 'I...I don't want to die again. Not yet.'

The Castellan briefly froze, hands in the air, then awkwardly patted my back.

'Dust yourself off. The colonials sent some bumbling twats to trip us all up, and I think you could use a laugh,' Theo said with forced levity, gently prying my arms off of her, pulling me to my feet, and gesturing for me to follow.

'And a psychiatrist...' I didn't hear her say it. But my eyes showed me it was what she thought. No matter. The hallucination was gone.

Drip. Drip. Drip.

***

'Brother! You were praying all night, you pious little bastard, weren't you?' Szabo taunted, slapping a meaty hand on my shoulder when I arrived in one of the courtyards. It was indeed morning. We had arrived before eight...yesterday, but I hadn't felt time pass.

I was so fucking grateful for what passed for normalcy in my unlife that I wrapped my arms around the older strigoi, lifting him off the ground in a tight hug. Judging by the Fivefold's parted mouth and Sam's uncomprehending expression, they were half as surprised at me, put together.

Szabo didn't speak for several moments, remaining still. 'David?' he finally asked. 'If you've decided to embrace me as your brother in death, I am flattered. If not, and this is a bizarre attempt to kill me, know it will not work.'

Laughing, I put Szabo down, then put my hands on his shoulders and kissed him on both cheeks. His expression grew more stumped with each moment, but I didn't care. He was  real. They all were!

I moved to Sam and the Fivefold, but neither was feeling sentimental.

'Watch it, Silva,' Shiftskin grumbled. 'There's only one dead mouth I let touch me, and it ain't yours. Europeans...' the wendigo muttered, glancing aside.

'Let us imagine you did it, and move on,' the Fivefold said with a sheepish smile that begged me not to make things weird in front of the Knights.

I nodded, grinning at them, and looked around the courtyard. A tiny old man, wearing nothing besides loose white pants and the white, black-striped sash of the Karma Delivered around his narrow waist, floated in the lotus position amidst a group of Knights, manipulating a distortion in space like a touchscreen. He was trying to view the Unseelie realm, or rather hunting grounds.

'Awwww, dun' harsh his mellow, Shiftyyyyy~' a voice thick with drink slurred. Its owner was wore a three-piece suit and pair of heart-shaped sunglasses in all the colours of the rainbow, which shimmered like fireworks when he bobbed his head. His diamond-bright teeth were a stark contrast to the mop of raven hair, but not as much as the man he was standing next to was a contrast to him.

He was over two metres tall, but not whipcord-lean, like some humans his height were. Instead, he was covered in slabs of muscle, visible even under his brown leather longcoat and dark blue button-up shirt. His pants, boots and hat were of the same make as his jacket, and older than some countries.

'Shut yer yap,' Dust Devil mumbled, adjusting his Stetson, during which I caught a glimpse of old, old steel-grey eyes. 'No one wants yer opinion in the rare instances yer sober, let alone now.'

'Awww, but Clyyyyde~' Randy-name and description-whined. 'The dude's in a bad place! He's hit a snag and it 'it 'im back, can't ya teell?!' Randy burped, gesturing in my direction with an exasperated grimace. Dust Devil scoffed, fingering his holstered revolvers. Neither of them was ever at peace, though for very, very different reasons.

'Ooooh...' Vykt's voice filled the courtyard, as the cambion's presence did soon after. 'What a shame~. Now Vyrt will never blow that gasket...I was hoping FREAKSHOW would send either or both of the raging meatheads, not the dumb one and his minder...'

'Ha!' Randy barked, crossing his arms so triumphantly he almost fell forward. 'See!? E'en Jabba over there knows you're angry 'cause you're stupid!'

'Mephistopheles was right,' Dust Devil said, struggling to glare at both simultaneously. 'Hell  is other people.'