Hunted

Chapter 28

The Romans acted surprised when the god of madness would not be reasoned with. Bacchus threw Jupiter at Mercury—or tried to, anyway—because Jupiter was off balance and holding on too tightly to his arm. Jupiter didn’t let go, however, and pulled Bacchus down with him as Mercury scrambled out of the way. I closed the portal while they tumbled in the mist, Bacchus continuing to bellow his primal vocalizations over Jupiter’s loud demands that he calm down, until Jupiter managed to pin him on the ground.

But that was just the beginning, because then Bacchus twisted his head and saw me. His face began to cycle through several colors—pink, green, brown, purple—as he bared his teeth and let go with more decibels than I thought vocal cords could manage. The helicopters had turned away but could still be heard until Bacchus drowned them out.

My amulet thunked against my chest, and I wondered what he’d just tried to cast on me. One by one, the heads of Artemis, Mercury, Hermes, and Zeus all jerked as if someone had punched them in the face, but they didn’t look any different afterward, except perhaps a bit annoyed. Jupiter head-butted the back of Bacchus’s skull, driving Bacchus’s chin into the dirt, and bellowed at him to stop. He didn’t stop, though. He turned his head the other way and saw Flidais and Perun standing there without any magical wards except for fulgurites protecting them from lightning, and he flung at them the same spell of madness he had hurled at the rest of us. For that’s what happened: Flidais and Perun went mad and tried to kill everyone—including each other. Perun called down lightning, striking down both Hermes and Faunus, and Flidais drew knives that she had recovered from the assault on Diana and started laying about her, beginning with Perun. Had she been at 100 percent she might have ended him, but, damaged as she was, she got one knife into him before he batted her away to land nearby. She rose, saw Zeus, and charged him in a manner that wasn’t simply batshit but rather a whole cave full of batshit, eyes crazed and drool leaking out of her mouth. She’d already forgotten that she’d been fighting Perun; she would now attack whatever she saw first.

“I told you Bacchus was a dick!” I shouted. Jupiter made no sign that he had heard because he was still struggling to keep Bacchus contained. The demented eyes found me again and then fell off to my right side.

I wondered for the briefest moment what he was looking at, and then realized with horror what he intended. I spun around to my right, where my hound was waiting only three steps away to shift to Tír na nÓg, his paw on the tree as I’d instructed.

Oh, no. Oberon, stay with me—

My hound flinched and stepped back from the tree, and I couldn’t shift him away without that contact. Something changed in his eyes as his lips curled back from his teeth, his ears flattened, and he growled at me.

Oberon? Oberon, answer me. It’s Atticus.

He didn’t reply. I was getting nothing from him. The iron talisman around his neck hadn’t been powerful enough to stop the frenzy of Bacchus; if I wanted him truly protected I’d have to bind his aura to it like I had mine. The muscles bunched in his hind legs and my heart sank.

Oberon, no!

He leapt at my throat. I was able to sidestep, and we collided broadside as he passed. I scrambled for the tree in the few seconds I would have while he landed and turned to attack again.

Damn it, Oberon! I began to mentally shout his favorite words to him in hopes that it would shake him loose from the thrall of Bacchus. Sausage! Poodles! Snacks! Treats! Barbecue!

None of it helped. He bounded after me and I put the tree between us, which would slow him down a little bit but wouldn’t keep me free of his teeth for more than an extra second or two. Zeus must have thrown Flidais our way, because she landed behind me with a shriek and crunch of leaves. When she got to her feet she’d probably come after me, being the nearest thing she could kill, or else she’d attack Oberon and wouldn’t restrain herself. Bacchus had made a bollocks of everything, and Jupiter still hadn’t been able to get him to shut up.

Taking what I considered an acceptable risk, I squatted down next to the tree so that my right side was protected against the trunk, and held up my left forearm crosswise just below my chin. I didn’t have long to wait before Oberon barreled into me, taking my arm into his mouth in the instinctive strike at the throat and laying me out flat. His teeth sank deep, and he tore into it, shaking his head in an attempt to move the arm out of the way. In a moment he’d let go and dive in for the kill. I numbed the pain in my arm to keep my head clear.

I put my right hand on the trunk of the tree and found the tether to Tír na nÓg. Tearing my own forearm in the process, I yanked Oberon’s head toward the trunk so that he’d have contact with it—he certainly had contact with me already. I heard Flidais approaching, so far gone that she was not merely letting loose with a battle cry but actually ululating.

When Oberon’s muzzle hit the tree I shifted us to Tír na nÓg, leaving Flidais and Perun to the dubious mercy of the Olympians. I noticed the quiet first—the Fae plane lacked screaming gods. I resumed talking to Oberon on the theory that his thrall to Bacchus would be severed with the plane shift. When I’d kicked Bacchus into the portal that sent him to the Time Islands, all of his Bacchants came back to themselves after I closed it.

Oberon, stop! It’s Atticus! Oberon, no!

His eyes cleared and he went still.

I smiled in relief. Yeah, it’s me. You can let go now.

He unlocked his jaws and my bloody arm flopped down.

Yes, but it’s okay, it’s not your fault. Bacchus drove you mad.

Don’t worry, buddy, I’ll be fine. I’m already healing.

Oberon began to hack and spit as best as he could.