WARNING! SPOILERS FOR JOHN CONSTANTINE: HELLBLAZER #9 BELOW!
Being a magician, exorcist, master, petty dabbler of the dark arts, as well as a member of the Justice League Dark has made John Constantine's tolerance for the strange and usual about as strong as whatever he's drinking any night. However, John is human and isn't afraid to say when he does or does not like something. In the latest John Constantine: Hellblazer issue, we learn that there is one thing that John Constantine despises, possibly more than Heaven or Hell, and that is....horses?!?
In John Constantine: Hellblazer #9 by Simon Spurrier, Matias Bergara, and Jordie Bellaire, the Black Label series has the fan-favorite chain-smoking magician get his drink interrupted by a curious reporter who brings up an old case involving the Royal Family. Spurrier and his collaborators tell a story that would have fit in his John's Vertigo Comics days about the Royal Family's obsession with horses and how a disgraced Royal Family member with a penchant for barely-legal girls takes up an offer from a mysterious old man regarding superior horse breeds. Not understanding the bargain he's made, the old man gives the jolly faced royal John's name to call in case anything goes awry. A few months later, John's attempt to stay under the radar is nixed as he is picked up and taken via government agents to private stables. An annoyed and perplexed John discovers that one of the Royal mares' is pregnant but inexplicably with the child of what appears to be a mythological unicorn.
After admitting to putting on a show complete with fake magical incantations because John was unprepared and out of his depth to deal with this situation, he interrupts his story about covert mystical animal births and smarmy royals taking advantage of their power to state that the only thing he knows is how much he hates horses. According to John Constantine, " You've got your herbivorous herding mammal that's been so traumatized it'll permit an actual fucking predator to sit on its back shrieking "Giddyup" without so much as a cardiac arrest."
Constantine believes that is the sign of a truly mental creature but it doesn't stop him from doing his research and consulting with others how to handle the situation when things will go wrong, as John knows they eventually will. Unfortunately when John's right, he's right and the unicorn's arrival is a vicious and bloody affair in front of everyone who witnesses it and makes it out alive. Creators Simon Spurrier and Matias Bergara take the entire situation and make it a memory of corruption, power, greed, uncertainty, life, and death wrapped around bargaining with forces that normal people shouldn't or couldn't understand. Although John Constantine handled the situation as well as he could, this job didn't help ease his dislike of horses or those who enjoy the equestrian lifestyle or gambling on it. In the end, God saves the Constantine.