Reaper of Souls

by Rena Barron

  “You’re too powerful with the chieftains’ magic, and you’ll use it to hurt Daho if given a chance,” Dimma says. “I can’t allow that.”

  “What are you saying?” I look up at her, seeing the girl who helped the Demon King bring the gods to their knees. Dimma: god, girl, wife, mother, traitor, monster.

  “Your magic in exchange for his life,” she says as if it’s a simple matter. “If you agree, I will save your ama and return to my slumber until your death. Daho can wait for me a little longer. All you have to do is release the chieftains’ kas.”

  I can hardly process what she’s asking, no, not asking—what she is demanding. I can’t give up my magic with the demons threatening our world. How can I protect the tribal people—how can I protect myself? The chieftains’ memories have become a comfort—their magic my savior and my curse. I tell myself that I’ve used their gift to do more good than bad, but I can’t forget the awful things that I’ve done, too. I’ve killed so many, and given the chance, I will kill Daho to save Rudjek. Dimma knows my mind better than I know hers.

  “You would leave me helpless against the demons?” I ask, my voice small.

  She would have me give up my only connection left to the tribal people—my magic.

  “Daho would never hurt you,” Dimma says without doubt.

  “Daho would never hurt me?” I shake my head. “He knows that I must die to free you.”

  “While you decide, Rudjek grows closer to death,” Dimma says, ignoring my words. “Soon I will not be able to stop his soul from ascending. If he reaches the Supreme Cataclysm, he will be unmade.”

  In the end, she and I are more alike than we are different. She’s counting on that. She knew that I could never say no. She’s risked everything to save Daho, and I’d do the same for Rudjek.

  “I’ll do it,” I whisper through choked tears.

  I call up the chieftains’ memories one last time. Grandmother, Beka, and the others bid me a silent farewell. I speak the words to unbind them, and the chieftains’ kas shake loose from my soul. It feels like I’m shattering into a million pieces, and I can’t help but wonder if Dimma felt the same way when she split her soul to make the demons immortal.

  When it’s done, I am left with an immense sense of emptiness. I am a ben’ik again—almost magicless—but Rudjek will live.

  Forty-One

  Arrah

  Rudjek and I stand on the ridge where the crossroads starts. The refugees from the camp have settled in Tribe Zu’s lands for now, but we must keep going. Last night we held a funeral for Sukar, Majka, and Raëke. Jahla was stone-faced as she stared into the fire. Rudjek told me that she and Majka had become more than friends. Essnai and I hummed a burial song for Sukar. We’ve mourned him twice, and I know that I will mourn him for the rest of my life.

  Rudjek pulls me into his arms. I inhale him, savoring his scent of woodsmoke and lilac. I can still sense his anti-magic. It moves across his skin like invisible ants marching to the beat of their own drum. Now that I’m back to my old self—the almost magicless girl—his anti-magic doesn’t act against me. It is only an impression of warmth and awareness that pricks down my back.

  “Are you sure you’re up for this?” Rudjek asks, cocking one crooked eyebrow. He’s healed from his injuries except for a few tender spots. “We could wait a few more days.”

  “We’re already on borrowed time,” I say, running my fingers along his jaw. I’ve become obsessed with the feel of his stubble. The way it bristles against my skin, how it pricks and teases and tickles my face when we kiss. It won’t be long before Daho learns how to control the reapers and comes for his enemies—before he comes for me.

  “I can think of several ways to make good use of that borrowed time.” Rudjek’s voice is heavy as he brushes a finger across my lips. I want more of him, but that must wait for now.

  “Watch yourself with that one.” Re’Mec shimmers out of thin air in front of us. He is in white robes trimmed in gold—the Almighty One’s colors. It’s a not-so-subtle reminder of Rudjek’s place in the war to come. “She is truly a viper in disguise. She’ll poison your heart if you let her.”

  Rudjek rests his hands on his shotels. “Why are you here, Re’Mec?”

  “Oh, you know, waiting for the Demon King to open Iben’s gate and destroy this world.” Re’Mec flourishes his hand like it’s no consequence to him, but I know him better than that. “Or maybe he won’t bother to come himself and just send the reapers.”

  I shudder, remembering the sense of dread and sadness that had overcome me when Daho killed Fram. Dimma had shared a kinship with them—closer than she had with any of her other siblings. Through her, I understand the reapers’ hunger, their need to destroy. She had passed along a similar craving to the demons when she made them immortal. “I can’t believe Fram is really gone.”

  “I don’t know about that.” Re’Mec shrugs. “Only time will tell.”

  I inhale a sharp breath. “What are you saying?”

  “Dimma’s still alive within you, so Fram may yet resurface,” Re’Mec answers.

  “What about the reapers?” Rudjek asks. “Can you stop them?”

  “No.” Re’Mec grimaces. “The Demon King is the only one who can control them now.”

  Rudjek frowns like he’s in deep thought. “What is he waiting for?”

  “That’s a good question,” Koré drawls, appearing next to her brother. She wears red, the color of the Blood Moon. It takes a little getting used to, seeing her without her box, and she doesn’t seem to know what to do with her idle hands.

  “Perhaps he’s waiting for Dimma to call to him?” Re’Mec says, raising an eyebrow.

  Rudjek shifts uncomfortably beside me, and I glance at the ground, my cheeks burning with shame. Dimma kept her end of our bargain. She manipulated the chieftains’ magic to draw Rudjek back from the brink of death. All this time, I thought my magic and his anti-magic would keep us apart, but Dimma had found a way around it.

  “Dimma is asleep.” I swallow hard. I remember every moment she spent with Daho, the child growing in her belly, the day she made the demons immortal. It’s all there. But since I let go of the chieftains’ kas, I can only glean faint impressions of them. They did leave me with one parting gift. I know hundreds, if not thousands, of rituals by heart now. Little good it does me without magic of my own. To use any of the rituals, I would have to go back to trading my years in exchange for magic.

  “She won’t always be asleep,” Koré warns. “You know that.”

  I don’t take her words lightly, or what’s left unsaid. Dimma won’t always be asleep, and when she wakes, she’ll side with the Demon King against her brethren. When she wakes, it will mean my death. “We’ll worry about that day when it comes,” I say. “For now, I’d like to see the tribal people one last time.”

  I don’t know why Daho hasn’t come through the gate to Zöran, but I won’t squander what time I have left. I interlace my fingers with Rudjek’s and lean into him. I will never get used to the feel of his skin against mine.

  Essnai, Kira, and Fadyi join us at the head of the crossroads as the sun and moon orishas quietly disappear. I’ve grown used to their impromptu visits and idle conversation. Though they’ll never admit to it, they want to be close to Dimma. They miss her. Maybe they even regret the choices that they’ve made. She misses them, too.

  Without the chieftains, the outline of the crossroads isn’t as bright, but I can still see the sparks clinging to the path. A white cat saunters past me, and then jumps into Fadyi’s arms. Jahla hasn’t taken human form since we left the North. We’re all grieving in our own way. Fadyi smiles down at her, stroking her back, then he cradles her against his chest. She lets out a gentle purr and closes her eyes.

  As I step onto the crossroads, I don’t know what tomorrow holds. Dimma may have taken away my magic to fight against Daho, but I don’t need magic when I have her as leverage. Whether she knows it or not, she is my hostage, my unwilling a
ccomplice, my coconspirator. When the time comes, I will wield her memories like a newly forged blade and put an end to the Demon King.

  The Unnamed Orisha: Dimma

  Of my brethren’s creations, time has always been the most difficult for me to accept. All these years, it’s been slippery on my fingertips. Now time is running out for me. It ticks down to the moment of my first death and the day the war between my brethren and Daho began in earnest.

  The palace rings with the clash of swords, the sizzle of magic, the taste of blood. The battle is growing closer now—it echoes in the halls. I sit upon a throne of polished bone inlaid with gold and jewels that is at once grotesque and beautiful. I am high above the floor, at the top of the stairs that Daho built for me to watch the heavens. At this hour, when my brother Re’Mec rules, I am bathed in his sunlight through the amethyst sky dome above.

  “You must leave this place, my son,” I say, cradling my belly. “Do not return or visit any of the continuum of worlds that my brethren have created, and they will not seek you out. Stay hidden, and one day, you will find your purpose.” I smile as tears wet my cheeks, listening to his protests. “I know that none of this makes sense, and I am sorry that we will not watch you grow up. My son, you are the beginning of the end. I know that now. That is why my brethren are afraid.” I stroke my belly as the child makes a single declaration. He wants to save us. “You already have. We will live through you.”

  I reach into my vessel, my hand passing through my flesh like a phantom, and take the child. He is a tiny beam of light. He has my true form and Daho’s kind heart. I sense it pulsing in him—he is stronger than my brethren, stronger than Daho or me. He is more like the Supreme Cataclysm than I could’ve ever imagined. I don’t know how this is possible, and I would like to understand if there was time. But my brethren are moments from breaking through my shield around the throne. “Go, Heka,” I say. “You must live.”

  He floats up from my hand and hovers in front of my face, right between my eyes. His presence is warm against my skin as he pulses with love. He touches my nose in an embrace and then rises through the sky dome. Fram is almost through my defenses, but I have time for one final act. I collect my memories from this moment, like catching fireflies in a jar; I crush them in my hand. The only way to protect my son is not to remember that I sent him away. I squeeze my eyes shut, shuddering.

  A cloak of darkness bleeds into the chamber, swallowing the sunshine and the sounds of the battle. One of my siblings has slipped past Daho and his army and broken through my defenses. I let out a deep, tired sigh.

  So many will die because of my decisions. My sister Koré once told me that a god’s love is a dangerous thing. I know that now. I don’t want to die, but I deserve my fate.

  “Oh, Dimma.” Fram’s anguished dual voices cut through me. “What have you done?”

  When I open my eyes, Fram stands before me in their two forms, twins of light and dark, life and death, chaos and calm. I realize almost immediately that I have lost a slice of time—there is a hole in my memories, a piece cut out. I look down at my clenched fist, the hand that only a moment ago held my child. My fingers tremble as they unfold, one by one, and reveal an empty palm.

  The amethyst ceiling cracks with my rage and rains down in shards that tear into my flesh. The walls weep my tears. “Where is he?” I demand. “Where is my son?”

  “I am sorry, sister,” Fram says as their shadows cup my face. They brush away my tears, and I am flooded with relief that it is Fram who came to steal my life, not Koré or Re’Mec. Of all my siblings, Fram understands me best. “You shouldn’t have been the one to do it. That is cruelty that I do not wish upon anyone.”

  “I killed him?” I ask, drawing the only possible conclusion. I shrink against the throne, gutted and hollow. I’ve done something unforgivable. “I killed my son.”

  I remember every single moment of my first life, except this one. I’d cradled my child in my hands and then . . . he was gone. Some acts are too horrible to remember—some deeds too painful to keep.

  Tears spill from Fram’s eyes, too. “Re’Mec and Koré will end the war only when both you and the child are dead. They will spare Daho and his people if you agree to our terms.”

  I stare down at my hands again. I can’t live with what I’ve done—I can’t face Daho. I cannot tell him that I’ve killed our son. “Do it,” I say. “Before I change my mind.”

  Fram strikes me with ribbons of light. They cut into my chest and rip out the part of me connected to the Supreme Cataclysm—my immortality. My soul withers as their shadows brush away the last of the tears on my empty vessel’s face. Even I cannot free myself from the clutches of the god of life and death. But as I’ve said, this is not the end of my story.

  It is also the beginning.

  Epilogue: Daho

  I rake my fingers through the soil. It’s lifeless. Nothing grows in Ilora. Imagine spending five thousand years on a world with no trees, no grass, no flowers. The gods turned our world into purgatory and trapped my people here. They’ve been in a box of their own—and some of them are shell-shocked and combative.

  My mission in life is to destroy the gods, and now that I have Fram’s children, it will be easy. I can feel them seeping into the edges of my mind—their hunger, their yearning to devour.

  I glance up at the wasteland around me. There are so many faces in the gloomy half light of our dying sun. I know that we can’t stay here, not forever, but it will do for now. My people have been separated for so long. They need a moment of rest, and I need to collect my thoughts.

  This is only a minor setback. I won’t give up. Dimma is so close to being whole again. I thought that Arrah would understand—that once Dimma woke, everything would be like before. That was only a fantasy born out of a lethal cocktail of hope and desperation. There is no way to reclaim the past. It’s time to look to the future—to what will be.

  Fram did more damage than I thought possible. I will find a way to release Dimma from her prison, but it means nothing with the boy still alive. Rudjek. His name sends a wave of ice down my spine. I can’t kill him myself. That would be another mistake. It would only push Dimma farther away, which leaves me in a very difficult predicament.

  There’s laughter among the people scattered around me, and celebration. Some are getting used to having bodies again for the first time in five thousand years. Some are finding long-lost friends and family from before the gods closed the gate.

  “When do you plan to release my daughter?” Shezmu asks from behind me. He has a sharp edge to his voice, like when he’s preparing to argue his point. It’s been so long since I debated him over strategy of war and, before that, over a game board after evening meals. “Haven’t you punished her enough?”

  He’s reshaped his human vessel to look like his old self. Silver skin, sea-green eyes, and long hair as white as snow pulled back over his shoulders. In his posture, I see his wariness, his strength, his hunger for revenge. I see his sadness for Ta’la, the daughter he lost so long ago. I remember that day in the courtyard after Eluua and the endoyans attacked.

  That was the day that Dimma gave our people her gift of immortality, but it came with a curse. None of them can bear children of their own anymore. Efiya was the first child in over five thousand years, and it took Heka’s power to make it possible. He keeps himself separate from the orishas, but I shall pay him a visit soon. He is the key. Once I consume his soul and possess his power, along with that of the reapers, I will finally end this war and get Dimma back.

  “Efiya went against my orders and attacked the tribal people.” I come to my feet. I sympathize with Shezmu, but he must understand why I have left Efiya imprisoned for months. “She’s proved herself time and time again to be unpredictable and untrustworthy.”

  “If there are character flaws in my daughter, then I am the one to blame.” Shezmu’s wings quake against his back like they always do when he’s worried. “I poured everything that is me into
her soul—good and bad. Punish me for her mistakes, for she did not have her parents to guide her in the way that a child should have. Let me make up for that now.”

  “What will you do if she steps out of line again?” I ask after a deep sigh. “What happens the next time she doesn’t obey my orders?”

  “If it’s all the same to you, I’d like my daughter to stay out of your war with the gods.” Shezmu crosses his arms and takes a wide stance like he’s been thinking about this for some time. “There’s no reason for her to fight. She’s done enough by freeing you.”

  “You have a point there, although I did not miss how you avoided answering my questions.” I brush the dirt from my hands and remove the dagger from the sheath at my waist. “Try to keep her out of trouble, will you?”

  “Of course, my king.” Shezmu gives me a sarcastic bow. We haven’t been formal since before Koré imprisoned me in her box. It’s good that he has his sense of humor back.

  His face is full of hope and anticipation, like I’d been the day I found out that Dimma was with child. I so enjoyed listening to the sounds our son made growing in her belly. She always said that he was talking to her, but theirs was a language only knowable through their bond. Fram told me that Dimma killed our child before they reaped her soul. I don’t believe that—I know my wife, and she could never do something so unspeakable. Only she knows what happened to our son, and I must find out the truth.

  I run my finger across the blade with the intent of drawing Efiya to the surface. I can sense her almost immediately. Her soul feels like trying to hold water and watching it slip between my fingers. When she emerges from the blade, she is mist that settles into the shape of a girl. She looks the same. Human. Green eyes like her father’s, wild hair, her mother’s beauty. Shezmu weeps at the sight of her and pulls her into an embrace.