Page 34 of Inferno

But before he could get any closer, a loud thudding sound came echoing out of the forest, and Nerik froze as a group of five warriors came bursting out of the undergrowth. No surprises there; he’d known the warriors wouldn’t be far behind the fire-dog. Thankfully, they were close enough to Nerik’s house that he could just say he was out collecting firewood, if any of them thought there was anything odd about him skulking about in the ferns.

“Nerik!” one of the warriors called to him. “Watch yourself out here! There’s a hellhound on the loose.”

Nerik nodded, eyes wide, feigning terror. “I just saw it,” he said, pointing back the way he’d come. “Damn thing scared the living daylights out of me! It ran off into the forest, heading north. About two hundred metres west when I saw it.”

“After it, boys!” the warrior shouted, the group crashing through the undergrowth in the direction Nerik had pointed. He waited until the sounds faded away, then turned back to check whether the dog was still there.

It was, frozen and wide-eyed amidst the tree branches. Smart creature, knowing when to stay put.

“Hey, sweetie,” Nerik called, firstly to make sure the dog knew he was there, and secondly to try and reassure it a little. “It’s okay. I’m a friend. I’m here to help you.” He stepped carefully closer, moving slowly and making sure he stayed within the dog’s line of sight. Poor thing was probably terrified. “It’s okay. Do you want to come over here? Are you hurt? Oh, you’re probably hungry, right? My house is just over there.” He pointed in the general direction of it. “I can get you something nice to eat.” For a fire-dog, ‘something nice’ meant a pile of hot coals, half-burned so that they were nugget-sized and crunchy. While infernals were perfectly happy burning fresh wood, fire-dogs much preferred their food ‘pre-cooked’, as it were.

Nerik got halfway towards the dog before it lost its nerve. It whined and backed out of the branches, heading away from Nerik, while keeping a firm eye on him.

Nerik stopped, knowing that if he tried to get any closer, the dog would likely turn tail and run, and that would only end up getting it killed. “It’s okay, sweetie,” he said again. “I’m not going to hurt you. See, look, no weapons.” He held up his hands, knowing that the fire-dog understood him. “If you run away, you’re going to get killed. I just want to help you.” He crouched down, trying to make himself appear less threatening. But the fire-dog backed up a couple of steps, prancing nervously. And Nerik could hardly blame him – for it was a ‘him’, he could now see. He would have been given copious warnings about humans before he’d crossed the gate, then been chased through the forest by them, and now here was one – or at least, someone who looked very much like one – trying to lure him into what the fire-dog most likely saw as a trap.

Nerik opened his mind to the fire-dog, letting down barriers that he’d worked hard to erect over years of practice… but the dog was making no effort at all to communicate with him. And unfortunately, infernals had no innate telepathic powers. Nerik could easily communicate with a unicorn or a fire-dog that initiated the connection, but he had no ability to forge a connection of his own.

Shit. It was imperative that he convince the dog that he was a friend. Too many of them were still being killed by the warriors, and it was currently unfairly difficult for the poor creatures to meet up with other Chalandrians, given that they had no regular meeting place or designated refuge location. It would be a harsh tragedy for the dog to have made it all this way, to have crossed the gate itself, only to die because it couldn’t tell the difference between friend and foe.

With a deep apprehension and a sharp knowledge of how badly this could go if he got it wrong, Nerik looked around the forest. He was close to his own home, and people rarely ventured this way. And if they did, they stuck to the laneway, not wandering off into the undergrowth. And the warriors had already passed, so chances of them coming back in the next few minutes were slim.

But at the same time, if they did circle back, realising they’d lost the trail, they’d be just as willing to kill Nerik, if they knew what he was.

But the dog was backing away now, tail down, eyes darting about uncertainly.

Okay, that did it. Nerik ripped his shirt over his head, dumping it on top of a pile of wood. His boots were next, then his socks. Being naked as a human was so damned inconvenient, but if he changed forms with his clothes on, they’d just catch fire.

“Easy, boy,” Nerik said to the dog, moving as fast as he dared as he undressed. “I’m a friend. I’ll show you, okay. I know you’re scared, but I’m here to help you. Look, I’ve got a necklace, just like the witches make for everyone else.” He held it up, even as he undid his belt and the buttons on his trousers with his other hand. He slid them off, tossing them carelessly into a pile of leaves, and then he undid the necklace, barely removing it from his body before he redid the clasp. His body reverted to its native form in an instant… and in that instant, two entirely different things happened. With his eyes fixed on the dog, Nerik saw the creature visibly relax, a look of profound relief on its canine face… and from over to the left, he heard a startled gasp.

Nerik’s head snapped around, feeling a surge of dread hit him like a boulder. Yorin was standing there, stiff as a post, camouflaged by a large blackberry bush and not thirty metres from where Nerik stood.

A rush of ice shot through his belly as his fire faltered at the shock of this revelation. Oh gods, no. Not Yorin. Not like this. He’d wanted to tell him what he really was, but slowly, gently, with time to explain it. With time to let him get over his fears.

But the look on Yorin’s face said it was far, far too late for such well-intentioned notions.

◊ ◊ ◊

Yorin had known it was a foolish thing to do, to go tramping through the ferns when he’d heard the warriors coming past again. If they were close by, then it meant the hellhound most likely was as well.

But on the other hand, he’d never seen a hellhound in person. He’d heard plenty of descriptions, seen drawings of them, but to see one in the flesh…

Hellhounds were black all over, according to the accounts from the warriors. They were tall and lanky, with eyes that glowed red, like fire. There was plenty of conjecture about what they were made of, whether it was flesh and blood, or smoke and flame. They were able to conjure fire at will, vomiting great plumes of it to burn the warriors who tried to kill them, and that was what made them so dangerous.

So, foolishly, but aware of his own folly, Yorin followed the sounds of the warriors, thinking that he would just stand at a distance and maybe get a glimpse of a real hellhound himself. It was the safest way he would ever get to see one, he told himself, since with five armed and ready warriors around, there was a minimal chance he’d be in any real danger.

So off he went, prepared to run away if things went sideways, but with a deep curiosity gnawing at him. Nerik had been so convinced that nothing dangerous came this far from the gate, and the warriors had an excellent reputation for dealing with anything that came through the portal. So how much trouble could he really get into?

Yorin’s assessment of the whole situation changed abruptly when he stepped over a fallen log – quite a few of those around, after the storm – and there, huddled under some branches attached to another log twenty metres up ahead, was the black form of a hellhound.

Yorin froze in terror, aware that the warriors were coming – he could still hear them thumping through the forest – but they weren’t quite here yet. In hindsight, that made sense; they were doing a thorough search, while Yorin was just wandering about in the undergrowth.

But then his heart lurched, and Yorin’s terror increased a dozen fold. Nerik was wandering in from the opposite side, heading straight for the hellhound. Yorin tried to find words to shout a warning to him, horrified by the thought of Nerik being attacked. They’d only just managed to admit that they meant something to each other, and first, Nerik had nearly died in a storm, and now he was about to be killed by a demon. Couldn’t the gods just give them a break for a couple of days?

But still frozen in terror, Yorin could only watch as Nerik sent the warriors away. At first, he thought maybe there was a second hellhound in the forest that Nerik had already crossed paths with, or perhaps this one had circled around and hidden itself, cunning as well as dangerous.

But then Nerik started trying to coax it out of hiding. Yorin’s mind was working overtime to try and process what he was seeing. Did Nerik know something the rest of them didn’t? Did he know a secret way to kill a hellhound? Or maybe, like the men who tamed the dragons, he believed that hellhounds could be tamed and trained like domestic dogs? Nerik was showing no fear at all, and Yorin watched, his fear fading in the face of Nerik’s calm confidence. The man stood still, able to see the hellhound’s nervousness and not wanting to spook it at all. It was just like the descriptions he’d heard, lean and black, though perhaps a little stockier than he’d expected. And when it turned its head, he could see that its eyes were indeed glowing red, like there were flames dancing behind those devilish eyes.

Gods above, he hoped Nerik knew what he was doing.