Faith of the Divine Inferno - Leslie Thompson (best short novels of all time TXT) 📗

but he had gone to that village with a purpose. The Dark Man did not take holidays. Whatever had been his goal, he had failed to achieve it when the last villager succumbed to his fate.
Far Dorocha abruptly stood with the grace of a pouncing cat that and offered a folded bit of notebook paper to Finvarra. The King is a creature too proud to come down off of his platform so a guard plucked it from the Dark Man’s long fingers and offered it up where it could be reached. Finvarra scanned the letter and let out a curse.
“Is the Morrigans sure of this?” he snapped. “They have verified this information with their own eyes?”
Still Far Dorocha said nothing. He merely gave another eloquent shrug.
“Go to your mistress and tell her to return to the Sidhe as soon as she is able. There is much to do before Beltane.” Finvarra crooked a finger at Shaw and me. The guards pushed us forward so that he could speak to us without shouting over the anxious noise of the court. “Do you wish to ever leave Sidhe Knockma?”
“It would be nice,” Shaw growled.
“Then you must pledge to assist us in this new battle against the Faith of the Divine Inferno.”
How many crazy-assed cults did Atlanta have functioning inside its borders? “I’m sorry, but I’m already busy destroying one psychotic cult right now, so maybe your people can take care of this one,” I replied.
“They call themselves the Immortal Church of God to keep the masses complacent and blind to what they are.” Finvarra spoke as if I hadn’t just told him no. “When their leader is alone with his inner circle and draining their life force to maintain his power on the mortal plain, they are the Faith of the Divine Inferno, a group devoted to the task of bringing the Damned to the Earth and set their master, the demon Stolas, as the king of men.”
This just proves that paranoid mortals who huddle together in secret societies aren’t the only ones who believe in convoluted conspiracy theories. Apparently the things that go bump in the night believe in them too. “Let’s assume for a moment that you’re right,” I began, giving the King a look of disbelief so that he knew that I wasn’t buying the bullshit he was trying to sell. “Do you have any idea how they are going to bring demons to Earth? Because you must realize that in order to bust anything out of the Underworld, a person or creature has to have enormous power and extensive knowledge of quantum physics. What makes you think either of us can do a damn thing about it?” I jerked my thumb at Shaw as I spoke to include him in the statement without saying his name. Odds are pretty good that the Bridget chic knows Shaw’s name, after all they did have a fling way back when that had resulted in an elaborate tattoo. Still no one in the Mound had called Shaw by name, and I wasn’t about to give him away if these people were clueless. If the faeries wanted to use his name to screw with him, they were going to have to do it the old fashioned way and trick it out of him.
“You will do what we tell you to do,” Finvarra snapped.
“Like hell you will,” I retorted.
“Your immortality makes you arrogant,” the King snarled, angry because I wasn’t bowing to his whim like a goofy lackey.
“The condition does come with irritating side effects,” I retorted. “One of them is being able to tell you to kiss my ass and doing what I want anyway.” I stepped up to challenge Finvarra by invading his personal space, but the effect was spoiled by Shaw jerking me right back.
“Stop the bravado,” he hissed in my ear. “You’re going to get us killed.”
“You think that you can make your own way out? By all means, you are welcome to try.” Finvarra stepped aside and made a sweeping gesture. “Let me know if you come across the corpse of Finn Mac Cool. We haven’t been able to find him in eons.”
I looked past Finvarra and into the darkness that huddled at the end of the hall. I lied to myself and said that if I walked long enough, I would eventually find my way out of this insane place. After all, I had all the time in the world and no real need for resources. Then I caught a glimpse of Far Dorocha out of the corner of my eye. He had edged closer during the conversation, and his eyes held an eager and chilling gleam that left my blood cold. I could all but hear him anticipate my defiance of the King, hopeful that if I choose to wander the Mound on my own. Once I was good and lost, he could find me at his leisure and pick up where we had left off a thousand years ago. I’d rather go toe to toe with Stolas and all of his minions in Hell, thank you very much.
“Fine, I’ll help you. But in return you have to remove the geas that Bres put on me.” I sighed in resignation.
“Indeed?” At first I thought that the King was angry that I had not agreed without conditions, but then he turned on Bres. The man had managed to untangle himself from Bridget and the two of them were standing quietly by to watch the proceedings. “Eochu Breas, did you place this geas upon this immortal human?”
Bres was nervous enough that he had to clear his throat several times before he could speak. Bridget noticed his fear and she gloated at it. “Yes my lord. I placed taboos upon her to keep her from speaking of our activities to human authorities.”
“Did the woman agree to this?”
“No.” I snapped before Bres could lie. Bridget’s eyes glittered with glee and she had to hug her arms to keep from jumping up and down in her joy.
“It is forbidden to force such things on these modern peoples. They have machines that can detect the magic and lead them to bring war upon us. We no longer have the power to stand against the humans if they choose to destroy us.” Finvarra was really pissed off. For a moment I thought the King would solve all my problems and blast Bres into a greasy stain right then and there. But I was not so lucky. Finvarra repressed his rage and let out a heavy sigh as he turned back to me. “I’m afraid that the geas will have to remain in place for the time being. Removing such things takes energy, and we will need all the strength we can muster in the coming weeks.” He looked to Shaw and addressed him. “What say you, mortal? Will you make the same agreement as your lover?”
“Whatever gets me the hell out of here,” he replied, not bothering to tell Finvarra that we were not sleeping together. I didn’t correct the mistake either. I hoped that if Far Dorocha believed that I was spoken for, then he would stop giving me the knowing looks that made my skin crawl.
“Take the humans out of here,” Finvarra said to no one in particular. With that he turned on his heel and walked off. One of the guards approached me with a smile playing on his full lips and a lecherous look in his dark eyes.
“This won’t hurt a bit,” he told me and cupped my cheek in his palm. I felt a warm tingle spread across my face and scalp and then my eyelids drooped and my knees buckled. I had the sensation of being caught and slowly lowered to the floor as the world went dark around me.

Chapter 17

I need a vacation. I’ve been back in the world for two years now, and already I was sick and tired of the bullshit happening to me. Typically, it takes me two or three decades before I want to abandon everything I’d accumulated and go underground to rebuild my tolerance for mortal nonsense. What I was enduring now was so far beyond the pale that I was willing to do almost anything to make it go away.
Those freaking faeries left us sprawled out on the ground outside the Mound entrance for the Children of Orpheus to find. I came to at the sight one of the blonde clones whose ear I had bitten off leaning over me and I lashed out. I took the poor bastard with a fast punch to the face that broke his nose and left him laid out on the ground. I didn’t think it was too bad a shot considering that I had been in a laying position when I did it, but One Ear had been more enraged than impressed. Two of his identical brothers had to pile on top of him to keep him from shooting me again.
Shaw had come to in a gentler manner. He had sat bolt upright and gawked at the Children surrounding him and then he tried to scramble away. When it became clear that they weren’t going to let him go, he became very quiet and still. He listened intently while they explained to him who they were, and what they were doing, but I don’t think he was convinced. He stared at the men around him like he was trying to memorize their faces in case he had to describe them in detail to a sketch artist later.
True to their usual habit, the Children remained polite and cheerful in the face of my rude behavior as they herded us to a waiting car and drove us back to my apartment. Well, all of them but One Ear. He glared and growled at me from a safe distance while he held a Kleenex to his bleeding nose. His eyes had already gone a startling black and purple that made the rage burning in his sky blue eyes almost pretty. I realized then that One Ear and I were never going to be friends, so I gave him a haughty smirk that nearly drove him over the edge of coherency. He actually pulled his gun on me and had to be wrestled to the ground again. That guy has some serious anger management issues.
We were driven out of the Holcomb Bridge Road exit of the Chattahoochee National Recreation Area and then went south toward Buckhead and my apartment. At first I thought that they were going to take us to our separate homes, but then one of the big blondes, a cheery fellow calling himself Arnold, insisted that Shaw get out when they stopped at my place. No one had to tell him twice. The man had been through events that would make anyone question their sanity, and he wanted to get someplace reasonably normal. Though why he thought that I could provide that was well beyond me.
Mrs. Atwater all but launched herself from her apartment the second she heard my keys jingle in the lock and tried to hug me to death. “My God!” she gasped as she squeezed my shoulders with her arms so that