I carefully nosed forward one of the flash cards from United States History that read ‘This US President could write two letters at once in separate languages.’
My Maggie was already dressed for bed in one of her father’s t-shirts that read ‘Don’t Make Me Put You In The Trunk. It’s Already Crowded In There.’ She was a tiny child with dark hair and dark eyes.
She crinkled up her nose, frowning at the card and guessed, “Benjamin Franklin?”
I made a grumbling sound.
“I can’t help it, I like him best,” Maggie said. “Maybe John Adams?”
I lay down on my side and moaned.
Maggie giggled at me. “Ronald McDonald?”
I rolled on my back and made an exasperated noise. Terrifying Hamburger Clowns had nothing to do with the American Revolution—and there was a quiz tomorrow.
“You take class way too seriously, Mouse,” Maggie told me. “It’s Jefferson, everyone knows that one.”
I sat up and said, “Woof,” in my most approving tone, so that My Maggie would know she had gotten the answer right. My Maggie was a very intelligent student, but she sometimes wanted to do other things more than she wanted to do school.
I loved school! I learned so many things! Like Reading! And Math! And Science! I got to go to class with all the other kids and everyone petted me!
I think if more dogs realized how much fun school was, they would all want to go.
My Maggie and I worked on the American Revolution quiz until lights out, and then My Maggie got into bed, seized her flashlight and her comic books, and got under the covers with them. I lay down in front of the door, dutifully ready to snort a warning if one of the nuns came down the hall. My Maggie loved her comics, and even though she was breaking the rules, she always fell asleep in a few minutes, and she did so again tonight.
I dozed off, trusting my nose and ears to tell me if any trouble came.
It did.
At midnight.
One moment, all was quiet. The next, the very air quivered with subtle power. By the time I opened my eyes, a seam had opened in the air, flush against the floor of My Maggie’s dorm room. Within seconds, it had widened into a ragged oval of sullen red light and something huge began to haul its way through.
My Maggie was a heavy sleeper, and lay motionless in bed, her cheeks pink.
I got up and prowled to stand between her and the opening gateway. Power radiated from it—but no menace, and I decided to wait and see what was happening.
Slowly, almost impossibly, a great beast emerged from the gateway. Three huge canine heads arose from the red light, and enormous paws thrust forth to drag the great beast into the dorm room. There was barely room for it to fit, and I found myself nose to nose-nose-nose with an absolute monster of a dog, one that radiated sheer metaphysical mass and strength.
I leaned forward carefully, sniffing at the central head. Three heads sniffed back, taking in my scent before they focused on me, and then a deep, resonant voice sounded clearly in my mind.
“Please excuse my intrusion. I am here looking for Mouse Dresden,” the beast said, politely enough.
“That is me,” I said back, the same way. “I am Mouse Dresden.”
“My name,” the beast said, “is Cerberus.”
“You are famous,” I said.
“Yes,” the three-headed dog replied. “I need your help.”
“I am a Service Dog,” I said. “But I think that means I mostly help My Maggie.”
One of Cerberus’s heads sniffed curiously toward the little girl. “She is in danger.”
My ears came forward at that, very seriously. “Why?”
Two of Cerberus’s heads looked ashamed and hung low. “I failed in my duty. A prisoner has escaped Lord Hades’ custody. I must track down the fugitive. But I require your help.”
“Lord Hades and My Friend know one another,” I noted.
“Yes,” Cerberus replied seriously. “My Lord believes the fugitive was removed from Hades to harm Your Friend and his offspring. My Lord likes Your Friend, so he sent me to help.”
I let out a low growl. “Who would do such a thing?”
“When we find them,” Cerberus said, “I will tell you.”
I growled again, more thoughtfully. “I cannot go with you. I cannot leave My Maggie unprotected. I am her Service Dog.”
Cerberus sat down and pondered this thoughtfully. “What if My Lord provided security for her?” he offered.
“I do not know him,” I said. “Or you.”
“I swear to you by my noses and tail,” Cerberus said, “Your Maggie will be safe.”
“Oh!” I said, “that is a different matter, of course.”
“Thank you,” Cerberus said gravely. All three of his heads turned toward the still-glowing gateway.
After a moment, a cloaked and hooded form arose from the ruddy light, human in shape more or less, but smelling of dark and damp and of slithering scaly things. The figure emanated calm and power, its hooded head looking around the room for a moment before she settled calmly down in My Maggie’s chair at her desk and folded feminine hands over one knee. The hood over her head seemed to stir gently from time to time.
“This is a friend,” Cerberus said. “She is very protective of women. She will keep Your Maggie safe until dawn.”
“Then I must return by sunrise,” I said.
“Agreed,” Cerberus said. “Let us waste no time finding the trail.”
I rose and shook myself, going over to sniff the figure guarding Maggie, marking the scent. She smelled partly like a human, and partly like a snake, and I felt amusement coming from her as I snuffled.
Should anything happen to the little girl, Hell itself could not hide this creature’s trail from me.
“What are we tracking?” I asked Cerberus.
The three heads growled from three throats and one chest.
“A monster of the old world,” Cerberus rumbled. “The Nemean Lion.”
Cerberus turned one wall of the building into red light for a moment and we walked through it, which I thought much more practical than a doggy door. Once through, the Hades-hound shook his massive form and blurred with shadow. When he was finished, he had only one visible head and was the size of a very, very large but very normal dog like me, a black fighting breed, heavy and thick with muscle.
“That is a very good illusion,” I said, with a certain amount of insight. My Friend was a wizard, after all.
“Thank you,” Cerberus said gravely and began to run. I kept pace with him, which was difficult. I have been doing lots and lots of school, but there is not enough room on the grounds to exercise properly and I had become professionally soft and squishy as Maggie’s primary bodyguard and snuggle companion.
“I do not understand,” I said. “You can do so much. Why do you need my help?”
Cerberus let out a little growl. “When it escaped Hades, the Lion had help from the outside. And now there is a force at work against me. Not mortal magic, nor divine in the way I have come to know it.”
His eyes glanced aside at me. “Something like what you use.”
That made my hackles rise. “Oh.”
“You know of what I speak?”
I growled in the affirmative. “My Shadow. He is also a temple dog. But he is a Bad Dog.”
Both of us shivered at the mere words.
Cerberus flicked his ears. “My claim on the Lion is preeminent. But this creature prevents me from tracking the Lion somehow. I thought you might help balance the scales.”
“I like doing that,” I confirmed. “But I cannot simply tell you where the Lion is.”
My mythic companion slowed his pace as we rounded one last corner, and there before us was the Castle, the blocky stone house My Friend had taken away from Criminal Bad Man. At this time of night, the Castle should have been locked and dim, but instead there were half a dozen men outside with lights, mostly gathered around the large wooden front door, where the sidewalk was lit by a row of several overturned and burning automobiles.