OF THE MANY strange encounters I have observed in the course of my long life,” said Proteus, now suddenly at my shoulder, “that is surely one of the strangest.”
Of course, I could smell him long before I saw him. “Honestly, you don’t smell that?” I asked.
He raised his sparse eyebrows and shook his head.
I grunted and unrolled Chiron’s map.
“Oh, don’t be sour. Surely you did not expect me to help you fight a giant.”
I grunted again, but now because I was thinking.
“What is it?” he asked, matching my mood.
“There’s something wrong with the map,” I said. “It says here that we are standing in the Lake of Cocytus.”
Proteus looked at his feet. “We are not.”
I looked up at him. “No, Proteus, you’re quite right. We are not standing in the Lake of Cocytus. And might I commend you on the ripping genius of that insight.”
“Really, now?” sneered Proteus, mimicking my sarcasm. “Which of us blindly jumped into this lake without looking?”
“Neither,” said I. “We jumped onto it—and it’s not a lake.”
“And a good thing too, because you did not think to consult your map first, did you?”
“Yeah, well, I handled the fall better than you did.”
Proteus frowned. “I would have been fine if your map had been correct. Pelicans are excellent swimmers.”
“Not so good on land, though, it would seem.”
Proteus shook his head and took several steps into the mist. Then both feet slid out from under him. He landed flat on his back with a crunch.
“Oh,” he groaned from where he lay, “I think I know where we are.”
“So you do now?”
“Yes,” he said. I heard bones popping back into place. “This is Lake Cocytus.”
I scratched my head for a moment, and then it hit me. “Ah! Of course! The lake is frozen. Why didn’t I think of that?”
“You don’t have my ‘ripping genius’.”
“Whatever the case,” said I, rolling up the map, “one thing is clear: we have arrived at our destination.”
“Strange, though,” continued Proteus, still flat on his back. “I am finding it hard to congratulate myself.”
“We have arrived,” I continued, “at the ninth—and last—circle of Hell. This is where the most abhorrent members of the human race are sent when they die.”
“Such as?”
“Well . . . traitors, I expect. Really despicable sorts. Though it doesn’t look so bad to me.”
“Bad enough,” answered Proteus, still supine.
I stood up carefully and shouldered my shield. I shuffled over to Proteus. “Good or bad, we’ve no time for naps.” I poked him with my toe. “Get up. We have a long march ahead of us.” Proteus snarled, rolled over, slowly assumed the form of a great white bear, and plodded past me into the mist.
I turned to follow, but my sandals proved no match for the ice. I hadn’t advanced a step before I was on my rump again. Then I slipped getting to my feet and dropped my shield. When I stooped to retrieve it, I noticed odd shapes beneath the surface of the ice—blurry patchworks of brown and gray. I looked more closely, spat, and rubbed a little window into the frost with the edge of my tunic. And there, just below the surface, an ashen face glared up at me.
Corpses. The ice was littered with corpses. Everywhere, just beneath the surface, frozen into contortions of agony. Human bodies. Here and there a twitching hand, a foot, a face occasionally broke the surface like stones in a pond.
I gasped, leapt backward, fell down, scrambled to my feet again, panting.
“Proteus!” I shouted. “Come back!”
I slipped again and this time rose slowly, closing my eyes to focus on swallowing the panic. “Miserable man,” I moaned. “Miserable! Nothing but misery.” I walked carefully back to my shield and plucked it from the ice, trying not to look at the shapes beneath.
I called for Proteus again, and he appeared, plodding toward me through the mist. Despite myself, I was relieved to see him.
“Are you coming?” he said.
“There’s a . . . there are people in the ice.”
“Yes,” he said, lowering his great bear’s head and sniffing. “I noticed that.”
I swallowed hard and did my best to adopt a casual demeanor. “Regardless, my feet don’t adapt to ice quite as well as yours. You’ll have to slow down if you expect me to keep up.”
He growled. “Oh, just climb on.”
I frowned at him.
“Do it. We will get there faster if you let me do the walking. I will not cross you—not yet. I am not ready. Besides, I owe you for sparing my life—you know . . . earlier . . . when I was a pelican.”
I accepted his offer but kept a wary hand on my sword, and in this manner, we began our slow trek across the ice, Proteus sniffing and growling at the thick fog, I watching him for any hint that he might turn on me.
Despite my fears, an odd sense of well-being crept over me, inspired perhaps by the cool air and mist, the plodding of Proteus’ furry feet, and the ubiquitous monochrome of white on white. Before long, I settled into an agreeable sort of stupor. For his part, though, Proteus seemed to want to talk.
“Mmm,” he sighed. “Mm hmm hmm.” Then a little louder, “Oh, hmm.” And a little louder still, “I wonder . . .”
“Oh, by the immortal gods, what is it?” I snapped.
He swung his head around and eyed me over his shoulder. “Goodness! I thought perhaps you had fallen asleep up there.”
“Right. Right. What do you want?”
“Me? Why, nothing. Never have. Certainly you, of all people, have nothing to offer me.”
“Fine, then.”
“And yet . . .”
I growled. “Have out with it, will you?”
“Goodness! You would think I’d be the one to act like a bear.”
I growled again.
“Well, I was wondering—just wondering, you know—why in fact you did not kill me back there when you had the chance.”
“A better question is why I’m not killing you now,” I snapped.
He chuckled. “No, really. Tell me—one liar to another—why did you not kill me when I was trying to un-pelican myself? You know how to hurt me now.”
“It is not the way of a Greek to strike a man when he is helpless.”
“Did that ever stop you before?”
“Careful, old man. I’ll kill you now.”
He laughed. “Well, you cannot kill me now. I would snap into an eagle and flit away.”
“Except that we’re on ice.”
He swung his head back around again to look at me over the other shoulder. “You are a sharp one,” he said. “But the fog has thickened. Still, if I knew not better, I should say you felt pity for me.”
“Mercy must triumph over justice,” I said.
He looked away. “Many have feared me. Envied me. Hated me. A few found me curious. I think . . . I think the witch loved me. But I cannot remember anyone ever pitying me.”
I started to laugh but caught myself. There was something truly melancholy about the way he held his head.
“Say, Proteus?”
“Hm?”
“Why did you leave her?”
“Who?”
“The witch.”
He walked in silence for so long, I thought he had decided not to answer the question, but at last he spoke. “She wanted to change me,” he said, and I thought I sensed real grief in his voice.
Yet I had to laugh. “Isn’t that what you wanted from her to begin with?”
He stopped and stared ahead into the fog. “No,” he said. “I wanted to shift. Not change.”
Proteus and I pushed slowly deeper and deeper into the mist, and although I felt certain he was plotting my destruction even then, I also felt—and for the first time—a certain affection for the old rascal. After all, he hadn’t actually succeeded in doing me any harm, and he was such a frail thing—despite all outward appearances—that it was hard to imagine him ever really hurting anyone. In fact, when it came to lies and betrayal, wasn’t I as guilty as he? Hadn’t lying and treachery brought me to Hell in the first place? I was still thinking along these lines when Proteus suddenly stopped.
I made a desperate grab for the fur on his shoulders and only narrowly avoided tumbling forward over his head. I cursed. “What is it now?”
Proteus lifted his great bear’s snout and poked it around in the air. “He is with us.”
“With us?” I said. “Who?”
“Hades.” He sniffed at the air again. “He is here. Get off.”
I climbed down from his back and stood unsteadily on the ice, wondering if the risk of drawing my sword outweighed the risk of falling on it. “How do you know he’s here?” I said, straining my eyes in the fog.
But Proteus was no longer listening. He rose on his hind legs and dropped his forepaws to his sides. Then he lifted his head higher and roared. “Hades,” he bellowed, “Lord of the Underworld. Light Bearer. First of the Fallen Angeloi. It is I, your servant, Proteus. I have come to you.” He raised his claws in a greeting, and I watched them dissolve into hands. “I, Proteus. Old Man of the Sea.” As he spoke, the white fur sank into his flesh, and bones snapped into place.
As though stirred to life by his pain, the fog began to swirl about us. A cold wind blew, and the ice split into a million tiny cracks beneath our feet. Then a long, low, thunderous growl rang out from somewhere overhead. I peered into the fog, but still only mist and ice met my gaze. As the fog began to thin, I thought I saw a vague shape in the distance. But no, it was not in the distance. It was much closer. Towering over us, even. A mountain.
“Hades,” Proteus again cried, “Light Bearer, I come with gifts.”
And then, all at once, I beheld the Lord of the Underworld.