Hexed

“What kind o’ sausages?” I asked.

Coyote chuckled. “Old paranoid Druid. You never change. Normal sausages, perfectly safe. Chicken–apple flavor. I didn’t want your hound to go hungry while we talk.”

“That was right nice o’ ya, Coyote. My hound and I both thank ya for it.” If he knew Oberon wanted chicken–apple sausages tonight, that meant he was close by when we first ran into that demon—close enough to help, but he clearly chose not to. It also meant he could hear Oberon’s thoughts. I took the bag from him and opened it up to find eight perfect chicken–apple sausages the size of bratwurst, still warm and smelling delicious. I tore open the bag and laid it down on the porch in front of Oberon so he could get at them easily. He wasted no time inhaling them.

“Good,” Coyote nodded, taking another swig of beer. He seemed unaware that he had replied before I had repeated Oberon’s words. “So, seen any demons ’round here?”

Oberon stopped chewing and raised his head, ears perked, and I studied Coyote carefully for any signs of suddenly sprouting horns or the stench of brimstone. He threw his head back and laughed at us. His canine teeth shone in the pale yellow light of the streetlamps.

“Hoo-ee, you oughtta see your faces! I bet ya seen a demon, all right! Lemme guess, a big black bug?”

“Yeah. But I reckon ya didn’t have to guess, didja?” I asked.

“Naw, I saw him comin’ this way afore I got here. But he ain’t the only one out there, ya know.”

“Yeah, I figured,” I said.

“I ’spect you did, Mr. Druid. And you’re the reason they’re runnin’ ’round here, eatin’ people.”

“What do you care if a demon makes mischief in town?” I asked.

“What do I care? If a demon went ’round eatin’ white men like you, you’re right, I wouldn’t care. But I said they’re eatin’ people, an’ by that I mean they’re eatin’ my people, Mr. Druid. My people are feedin’ a demon that’s here because of you. So we have somethin’ to talk about, you an’ I.”

“I see.” I nodded, and Oberon took this as a signal that it was okay for him to finish off his repast. “Where and when did your people die?”

“A maiden at Skyline High School was eaten yesterday, when all t’other kids were eatin’ lunch inside.”

“What, at the school? Where ever’one could see?”

“Nobody seen it happen but me. She was by herself, eatin’ flatbread outside. An’, besides, humans can’t see this one. You coulda seen it, though. An’ I seen it for sure.”

“What did it look like?”

“Huge black thing with wings.” Oberon belched and I felt a bit of indigestion as well. I knew the demon Coyote meant. It was one of the first creatures out of hell when Aenghus Óg opened the portal and the first demon to disregard the binding. It was very strong, and since it flew, there was no way I could kill it with Cold Fire, which required the demon to be in contact with the earth. “So what’re ya gonna do?” Coyote asked.

“I’m gonna wait,” I said. “Eventually it’ll come after me here, and when it does, I’ll be ready.”

“Lemme suggest a different plan,” Coyote said, his half smile still playing about his face. He pointed the mouth of his beer bottle at me. “You’ll go out to that school tomorrow an’ kill that demon afore it kills again. There are more of my people at that school, an’ I don’t wanna lose another one ’cause you wanna wait.”

“Why don’t you just kill it, Coyote?”

“ ’Cause I ain’t responsible for it bein’ here, paleface. You are. An’ it’s a demon from the white man’s religion, anyways, so my medicine won’t be as strong against it as yours. But I’ll help ya if I can.”

“Well, my medicine might not be any stronger. I may be a white man, but this thing don’t figure into my religion neither. Besides, I’m awful busy with problems of my own.”

Coyote’s perpetual smirk vanished, and he glared at me from underneath his hat brim. “This is your problem, Mr. Druid. Or didn’t I make that clear? You’ll fix this situation or you’ll answer to me. An’ to Pima Coyote. An’ Tohono O’odham Coyote, an’ Apache Coyote too. An’ while ever’ single one of us might die in the first fight, an’ maybe the second an’ third fights too, you know we’ll keep comin’ back. How many times can you come back from the dead, Mr. Druid? Me an’ my brothers can come back all we want, but I reckon we only have to kill you once.”

My hound flattened his ears and showed his teeth, but didn’t quite growl at our guest.

It’s okay, Oberon. He can hear you, so don’t give anything away. I’ll let you know if I need you. He subsided but kept watching Coyote warily.

I nodded for Coyote’s benefit. I didn’t tell him I was awfully tough to kill, since the Morrigan had promised never to take me. Still, Coyote could do a lot of damage I might never recover from, as my mangled right ear testified. I just wanted to know how serious he was about this, and now I had my answer.

“Think ya can give me a ride out there?” I asked. “I ain’t got a car.” Skyline High School was on the east side of Mesa, near the borderline with Apache Junction—which, of course, was the city right outside the Superstition Mountains where the demon had escaped from hell. It would be a twenty-mile bike ride for me one way, which would be less than comfortable.

“I ain’t got a car neither.” Coyote grinned as he took another slug of beer, threats forgotten. “But that shouldn’t stop me from gettin’ one by tomorrow.”

“All right, pick me up here at ten in the mornin’,” I said. “And bring a bow. We’re gonna shoot us a demon out o’ the sky.”

“With regular ol’ arrows?” Coyote’s eyebrows rose so high they got lost underneath his hat.

“No, we’ll get ourselves some special arrows,” I said. “I think I know where we can get us some holy ones, some demon-slayin’ arrows.”

“You do? I ain’t never seen any for sale in any of those Cath’lick churches,” Coyote said.

“When were you ever in a Cath’lick church?” I asked incredulously, and Coyote started to laugh. It was infectious laughter, the kind you cannot help but smile at. “I mean, how would you know, right? They could be passin’ out holy arrows with their Jesus crackers and you’d never know any different.”

Coyote hooted and hollered and howled his laughter, and it wasn’t long before I was doing the same. He doubled over; he slapped his thighs; he laughed silently for a while because he was out of breath; he laughed until he had tears streaming from his eyes. “I bet it was just like that, Mr. Druid!” Coyote finally managed to gasp. “Them priests would come on up to the soldiers and say, ‘In the name of the Father and the Son, here’s a cracker, now go kill some fuckin’ Indians!’ ” And abruptly the laughter died in our throats, and our smiles fell quietly like death shrouds on the fallen. It was simply too close to the truth to be funny. We spent some small while staring down at the flower bed in front of my porch. I cannot speak for what Coyote was thinking, but personally I was haunted by the ghosts of those who had trespassed against me; I was the only survivor of the Holy Roman Church’s war against Druidry.

Coyote eventually wiped at his cheeks, finished off his Stella, and said, “Thanks for the beer an’ the laugh, Mr. Druid.” He stood up and put the empty on my porch rail, then held out his hand to shake, a huge grin on his face again. “You’d be a good guy if ya wasn’t so damn white.”

I shook his hand firmly, grinned back, and said, “An’ you’d be a good guy if ya wasn’t a damn dog.” That set Coyote off to laughing again, but this time it seemed not entirely human. He let go of my hand and then I saw what was happening. He fell to all fours, and in another heartbeat he was bounding off my porch in his animal form, yipping his amusement into the cool November night.

He didn’t even leave any clothes behind; they just sort of melted away somehow. Oberon noticed too. he said.

“Right.” I looked down at Oberon and clapped my hands together as Coyote disappeared from view. “Now we can go see the Polish witches.”

Oberon observed.