Mad Lizard Mambo by Rhys Ford

Author:Rhys Ford [Ford, Rhys]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: fantasy
ISBN: 978-1-63477-744-5
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press
Published: 2016-09-13T04:00:00+00:00

Twelve

THE DOGS were ugly, flat black shapes dappled with uneven mottles of muddy gray. They weren’t the largest I’d seen but were plenty large enough to cause damage, heavyset and squat with hulking shoulders and broad, horned, triangular heads and stubby spikes running down their slimy, sloping backs. They smelled worse than death, more like the spoiled grime of rotten skin and fat left to rot in a moist, dark crevice. Saliva dribbled from their uneven mouths, long trails of acidic spittle pocking the walk with tiny craters where the drops hit the cold cement. These dogs were nearly toad shaped; short, powerful back legs bent and tucked under them with longer limbs in front, paws bristling with uneven claws.

They were definitely ugly, but then all ainmhi dubh—the black dogs of the Wild Hunt—were ugly, foul-wrought creatures formed of blood, hate, and magic. There’s no beauty in hate, no elegance or delicacy. Even the brutish stamp of harsh planes and hard lines held an attraction in its sternness, but the ainmhi dubh were in a world of ugly all their own.

The magic in a black dog’s creation was at best unstable, at its worst, chaotic. It showed in their bodies, misshapen and twisted forms forged by their creator’s imagination. It took power to shape an ainmhi dubh and even more power to infuse it with life. Most took on canine or avian forms, their bodies changing as they aged and their unsidhe Master fed them more of his or her power throughout their lifetime.

A Wild Hunt meant status and power at a Dusk Court, shadows sent to slaughter anyone who crossed their Master. With the Merge, more and more unsidhe attempted to create their own Hunts. Very few unsidhe succeeded, and even fewer were strong enough to hold their creations in check.

And when a Master lost control of their Hunt, the ainmhi dubh consumed them first before going rogue and hunting whatever flesh was nearby.

I made good money bringing ainmhi dubh pelts in. They were a Stalker’s bread and butter. A powerful ainmhi dubh bitch could throw a litter within two years of her creation, but each subsequent generation grew weaker, spreading the caster’s magic thinner and thinner until it couldn’t sustain any more creatures.

There was no outcry from animal lovers to protect the ainmhi dubh. A black dog pack would sooner take down a toddler than feed from a tied-up goat. They fed on fear, thrived on the extinguishing of intelligent life, and preferred human or elfin for food over an animal any day.

And Robbie Crickets Malone sure as hell looked like food to the three dogs circling him in the middle of the Changa’s parking lot.

“Don’t move, Robbie.” I kept my voice low and steady, a calming strand for Malone to grab onto. His piss-soaked pants tainted the rain-dewed breeze with the smell of urine, a sharp scent woven through the rank stench of wet black dog, and Malone quivered, his arms shaking hard enough the plastic bags sounded like rattlesnakes.

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