Chapter 159: Cerebus

Mason came from the darkness screaming, Claws out and ready to kill, ready to die. He had gone from a ‘cave’ and a meeting with Blake, to a rotting forest filled with monsters. For a good long minute it was like watching a horror flick on acid, then it pulled him away.

“Well you look fun.”

Mason blinked until he saw a huge wooden totem in the center of spherical wooden room. A mutant goat-snake lay curled around it, staring at Mason before it yawned. Apparently it was also a

talking

mutant snake.

“Give me my wolf,” Mason snarled, looking at the snake’s body for any possible wolf-shaped bumps.

“Your wolf?” The snake body extended itself, ram’s head jutting forward to bleed green light from its eyes as it stared. “Mmm. No. I think not. What have they done to you, my beautiful white ape? You have been…trained and civilized.”

Mason clenched the grips on his Claws, quickly losing patience, anger covering any feeling of fear.

“No one did anything to me. Now stop stalling and…”

The snake-ram laughed, sound drowning out Mason’s voice easily before it spoke again.

“Oh but they did. Your eyes were just hooded as they broke you to their fist. You are meant to be wild and free. Oh what a beautiful creature you could be, with your cunning and your strength. The greatest predator of the great forest—patient and terrifying, eating both beast and leaf, taking whatever mates you wish. You should rule that forest like a king.”

Mason felt his anger cool, thrown off by the creature’s words and manner.

“What are you?” he said.

“Nothing,” said the creature, “if not Cerebus. If not the god of wild and dangerous things.”

Mason unsummoned his Claws and lifted his bow.

“Well, Cerebus. Are you going to give me my friend? Or am I going to put an arrow in your eye?”

The goat-head smiled, revealing snake-like fangs and two rows of teeth that belonged in a dinosaur museum.

“I’m not going to give you anything.”

Mason’s Power Shot streaked straight through the creature, slamming into the totem behind with a loud crack. The creature laughed.

“There he is! There is the beautiful beast who does what he wishes,

when

he wishes! But you cannot hurt me,

Mason.

I am but a spirit in this holy place. You could destroy my totem, if you wished, and I would trouble you no more. I couldn’t stop you.”

Mason looked at the large, but basically wooden edifice and seriously considered it. “Why shouldn’t I?”

“You should!” Again the creature smiled. “If that is what you wish.

Mason took a long, suffering breath, knowing he was again talking to something like the crone, or the nymphs. This was all part of the game, he knew, and try as he might he knew he had to play.

“I guess I don’t.” He put away his bow and took several calming breaths. “Why do you know me? Why are you here?”

“I know all the beasts of the wild,” said the creature, curling lazily around its totem home. “Even the domesticated descendants of the great hunting apes. I wonder, do the trees call you still? Do you feel the branches as if gripped in your smooth, pink palms?”

“Not so smooth.” Mason held up his increasingly rough, callused hands, and the creature chuckled almost amiably. Mason took a breath and tried to stay calm. “What have you done with my wolf?”

“Nothing.” Apparently a snake-goat could shrug. “It looked upon me, and remembered what it was.” When Mason just stared it grinned and went on. “You’re his master. And a clever one. But you’re not his kin, clever ape.”

“His kin would have abandoned him, maybe killed him. I saved him from that fate,” Mason said.

“Would you rather die or live as a slave?” ‘Cerebus’ snapped.

Mason frowned, taken slightly aback. “He’s not my slave. I look after him, and he looks after me.”

“Then

bond

him, ranger. Until you do he is nothing but a pet.”

“I…” Mason shrugged, feeling suddenly ignorant. “I don’t know what you mean, or how…”

“Of course you don’t.” Cerebus rolled his eyes. “Gaia did not teach you. And why would she? What does that ignorant harlot know of such things? Touch the totem, clever ape. And you will see. I will teach you.”

“What’s going to happen if I do?”

“Who can say?” The goat-snake yawned and curled around the totem. “Wildness is your birthright. Reclaim it. Or let Gaia fatten and tame you with honey and softness. The choice is yours.”

Mason ground his teeth, hesitating. Whatever nonsense this thing was speaking, it wasn’t

all

bullshit. Mason understood. He

felt

the call. He heard drums and saw fire and a ring of men and beasts screaming their challenge into the night.

He felt..having no other proper word…

freedom,

radiating from the totem like heat waves.

He had felt it first with the gnolls in his tutorial, when he thought of nothing but survival and killing the next creature that wanted his life. Then again with Haley when he took her in the trees. When he ran through the woods with Streak at his side, away from the others with no laws or opinions or

rules

.

When he was younger the same feeling had come from violence and competition—beating those who stood against him, or hurting those he felt deserved it. It had always kept him sane.

Now Blake and Nassau kept him…civilized, in the creature’s words, that was true. So did Rebecca and Haley. But he understood what it was saying. Oh yes, he understood. What might he become if left alone? If he had nothing left to lose?

“Patron? Are you alright?

Mason blinked and looked back to find Phuong and the others emerging from the nearby tunnel. Apparently Mason had walked all the way to the totem, and his hand was mere inches from the symbols on the wood. Phuong looked at the totem, and his hand, and the creature staring from above.

“Do you…think that’s wise?”

Mason practically laughed at the tone.

No

, he thought,

I do not at all think it

’s wise.

But he thought about Duality of Life and what it did to him, the loss of control, the almost alien feeling that overtook him. The nymphs, too, stripped him of control. It seemed something of a theme with Gaia, and Mason wasn’t at all sure he approved.

And apparently there was more than one ‘god’ of nature. Mason had been given a path before he understood, before he’d felt he had any choice. And even then, the system picked his prestige class too.

He was getting a little tired of being forced into things. Whatever this Cerebus was, he felt brutally, dangerously straight forward. He didn’t care and didn’t pretend otherwise. He offered a path, and you took it or not. That was the kind of god Mason could respect.

“I have to help Streak,” he said, knowing it wasn’t the full answer. But he decided if he hesitated here, if he refused to face whatever this was, he would always regret it.

He would always be frightened of his own power, of being controlled by forces beyond him, of becoming lost and resentful.

He reached for the totem, and looked back as the snake stared with no pleasure, no surprise, no judgment in its strange, slit eyes.

[Hidden feature activated: Essence Test. Discover and master your inner nature to modify your affinity with a unique feature! This is a mortal test and it cannot be exited. Would you still like to proceed?]

Mason looked at his hand and found it didn’t shake. He wasn’t afraid of death, not anymore. He thought of what the challenge might be, and found he was almost…excited.

He clicked yes, and the snake unfurled in the blink of an eye, wrapping around him without really touching him. He thought maybe he heard the others cry out in warning, then everything was green, ghostly coils.