Bones shivered and jumped, rising up on their ends to roll around each other as the altar broke apart. Every eye socket in every skull glowed with a dim orange light. The body lying atop it slipped through bone, falling to the stone below as the altar reshaped itself into something else.
The long bones and skulls adhered to each other in the shape of a tall, narrow column that resembled a mortar if one squinted hard enough. The bones shifted and spun until they settled into their final shape, supporting a shadowy figure that slowly coalesced into an old, haggard crone who took her place on top of the floating mortar.
Shadows played across her heavily wrinkled face, mouth and large nose both misshapen to a monstrous degree, but her eyes were clear and sharp in the light from the skulls. Her long white hair fell around her face in a tangled mess, knees pressed to her chest, dirt-stained fingers gripping the knobby ends of thigh bones beneath her.
The crone smiled, revealing iron teeth that reminded him of Ashanti. “Perhaps I should give you task,da?”
She gripped the air in front of her, and a wooden pestle appeared between her crooked fingers. The crone whacked the pestle against the mortar, and her strange mode of transportation floated closer. The drekavacs skittered over the bodies and bones surrounding Patrick, keeping their distance from the crone.
The spark of ozone in the air was familiar, if dulled. The crone was immortal, but not a god. Still a myth prayed to life through stories though.
Still a problem.
“Pattycakes here already has a task, Baba Yaga,” a gratingly familiar voice said from behind Patrick. “Persephone won’t appreciate you trying to give him another.”
“Bah.” Baba Yaga floated toward the drekavacs, keen eyes riveted on her prey. “What else mortals good for?”
The drekavacs screamed a warning Baba Yaga didn’t heed. Patrick looked over his shoulder in time to see her wield her pestle with brutally precise strikes at the walking dead. Each hit broke bone and split dead flesh, leaving the drekavacs writhing on the stone floor. Several retreated through the low entrance and back into the dark.
Baba Yaga speared one of the drekavacs with her pestle and lifted the body. She cackled softly before ripping out chunks of flesh with her teeth, swallowing the bites whole.
Patrick blinked, and when he opened his eyes again, Hermes was leaning over him, staring at him through his shields.
“You know, if you wanted to lie in a grave so badly, you could’ve done it back in New York,” Hermes said around a smirk.
“Fuck you,” Patrick said, the words making his skull vibrate. He swallowed against the bile creeping up his throat.
Hermes laughed. “Think your wolf might not like that.”
The god still reached through Patrick’s shields like they didn’t exist, framing his face with warm hands. Patrick tried to jerk away, but Hermes’ grip was like a vise, even if the brush of his lips across Patrick’s forehead was cool.
Magic washed through him, electrically sharp, stealing the pain away in his head. It felt less like a benediction and more like a grudgingly given gift. Patrick batted Hermes’ hands away and got to his feet once his head stopped spinning. His shields sank back beneath his skin, an afterthought of protection he no longer needed to fuel with a ley line.
The soulbond thrummed between him and Jono. Patrick separated himself from the ley line below, magic running out of him and through Jono’s soul, draining away. He stared over Hermes’ shoulder as Baba Yaga turned to face them, the skulls in her bone mortar still glowing.
“Shall we depart?” Hermes asked her.
Baba Yaga snorted, tapping her gore-covered pestle against a row of skulls in her mortar. She had dead flesh stuck between her teeth. “My way is not your way.”
“It is tonight.”
Baba Yaga floated closer, bringing with her the scent of death that permeated the bones which once formed Peklabog’s altar. She tapped the mortar again. “Hold fast.”
Hermes grabbed onto the mortar, and Patrick could only do the same. The bones ground together as they rose to the ceiling, his feet lifting off the ground. Layers of the mortar broke off to slide over Patrick’s body. He flinched against the bloodied bones, tilting his head back to watch as they formed a circle on the ceiling. The stone crumbled, and he quickly leaned his head forward again, squeezing his eyes shut as dust and stone rained down around them.
They floated higher. Patrick cracked open one eye, watching the floor of the Salle du Drapeau fall away from his feet. Then the bones that had carved their way through stone and earth and the bare edges of the veil filled in the hole. When Patrick let go of the mortar, he landed on the dark hardwood floor of a shop.
Lights flickered on in dozens of small lanterns hanging from the ceiling, revealing shelves filled with candles, soaps, and bottles of neatly labeled potions. The windows were made of frosted glass, with no name written across it. The register on the counter was an electronic tablet setup with a wireless card reader. It looked weirdly out of place.
It smelled like herbs and oils, medicinal beneath a layer of perfume that made Patrick want to sneeze. Patrick rubbed his nose before yanking at the belt attached to his waders, stripping out of the disgusting things. He kicked them underneath the nearest table.
Baba Yaga’s mortar shrank to fit the space, but she still didn’t leave it. Her mortar settled to the ground, the bones of it grinding together. Something long and thin whipped through the air from the other side of the room. The broom smacked into her free hand, and she busied herself with sweeping up the dust of their passage.
Hermes bent over a table and poked at some of the items there. “I see you are still in business.”
“Potion selling always good.” Baba Yaga spun her broom lightning-quick to smack it across the back of Hermes’ hands. “Is not for touch.”
Hermes yanked his hands away from the table and glared at her as she floated past. “What drew you down to the Catacombs?”
