The Bones of the Earth- The Complete Collection

by Scott Hale

  “Come with me,” she said, leaving the helm of their boat, going deeper into the Garden.

  Aeson and Bjørn both looked down. No matter where they planted their feet, the life-stealing plant that was Death’s Dilemma would be crushed. Their attentions focused on them, the flowers ducked their heads even farther beneath their stalks, as if embarrassed.

  Death went sideways. Her mouth opened, but didn’t move, as she said, “You’re as far away from living as possible. Those flowers won’t hurt you.” She paused, added, “They’re not for you. They never were for anyone,” and kept walking towards the center of the Garden.

  Aeson looked at Bjørn, and Bjørn looked at Aeson. They didn’t need to take off their masks to know the expression on each other’s faces.

  “She’s right,” Bjørn said. “There’s nothing to lose.”

  “Right now, she has everything,” Aeson said.

  “Death always did.”

  Bjørn took a deep breath, even though there was no air to breathe here, and stepped out of the boat. Carefully at first, and then brutishly, he crushed a patch of Death’s Dilemma with both his feet. The flowers melted like ice underneath Bjørn, but he did not die.

  Okay, Aeson told himself. You can do this. And so he stepped out of the boat, into the Garden, and onto a patch of Death’s Dilemma so thick he should’ve died ten times over.

  Bjørn laughed.

  Aeson couldn’t help but do the same.

  “They were the first,” Death said. “I wouldn’t call them daughters, but they are mine.”

  She was referring to the shepherds that kept appearing and disappearing at random intervals around the Garden of Sleep. They didn’t seem to be alive or dead; rather, merely being; creatures of focus and a singular purpose. The shepherds were nearly identical to one another; the only discrepancy was the color of their nail polish. It was as if Death had decided they had to be human, and female, and because Death was neither, superficiality was the only tool at her disposal she was competent enough with to use.

  “The entropy of existence can be difficult to manage. Things, on occasion, do slip through my fingers.”

  Death flexed her hands; Aeson could hear the sharpness of her claws. They looked like scissors, but were far more delicate in shape and curve. Scalpels, maybe, meant to cut out the dead tissue of the World.

  Death continued through the Garden, her footsteps leaving no impression, no destruction. She was there, and yet, she wasn’t.

  “My shepherds maintain those who resist the Abyss, and those who have been called from it.” Death stopped at the center, where her namesake flowers were at their thickest, looked at Aeson and Bjørn, and said, “You have already taken the first step. A few more will not kill you.”

  At the same time, Aeson and Bjørn moved forward, side-by-side, like two friends approaching oblivion. The Garden of Sleep withered and died in every place that their feet touched it. If they had some life in them, then this was no place for it.

  “Are… are Pain and Joy shepherds?” Aeson asked.

  “I cannot give life,” Death said. “I can only give a part of myself. The shepherds are simply extensions of my purpose. But Pain and Joy were pieces I tore from myself and molded into something new. They began as me, and then, over time, became something else.

  “After watching the living for so long, I realized how lonely I was in the Abyss. The lights below us—”

  Aeson looked down, through the groundless Garden, at the countless stars that filled the fathomless dimensions of the Abyss.

  “—are those that have died. I used to snuff souls out of existence, but over time, I started to collect them. Once I did this, things began to weave spells to steal from my collection. I did not mind this. I liked the challenge, and the idea of a second chance. I did not know such things.

  “So, I collected souls to keep me company, but the dead are poor companions. They do not speak, and they are far from me. Those who were resurrected were eager to go, so I formed my shepherds to return them to the flock. But the shepherds are mirrors, and already myself was not enough. For all that I created and coveted, I was still alone.

  “I reached inside myself and tore out of a piece of my heart. I gave it my blood and breath, and because my loneliness had grown so painful, Pain is what I grew.”

  Aeson and Bjørn had reached the center of the Garden. Behind them, their treacherous trek had left a path of ruin. He didn’t know if the plants would grow again, and because they appeared to be all Death had, he felt guilty; more so than for courting a mother to help kill her daughters.

  The skulls and eyes on Death’s wings rotated and blinked. Her stomach, colored in accordance to her Dilemmas, shimmered. She continued: “Humans interest me. There are better, more evolved creatures, but I am fascinated by their flaws. I modeled the shepherds after them, and in time, Pain began to take on their appearance, too. Even when she was nothing more than tissue and fluids, she was beautiful. I had one daughter. I needed another.

  “I reached into my heart and tore another piece from it. I gave it my blood and breath, and because I was overjoyed with what I had done, Joy is what I grew.”

  Watching Death retell her tale, Aeson began to worry. He noticed the way her antennae moved, and the way parts of her bulbous eyes swelled. She stiffened, too, as if on the defense. And she kept twitching her fingers, striking blade against blade. If she managed to finish her story without finishing them first, would she still help them? Was it making it better? Or making it worse?

  Aeson took off his mask and held it at his side. “What happened next?” he asked Death, all his flaws on display.

  “Children are observers,” Death said, cocking her head, fascinated by his appearance. She looked at Bjørn.

  And Bjørn quickly took off his mask and held it at his side. His face was flushed, and sagging; he looked two times older than what he claimed. All the years he had dodged Death were finally caching up with him.

  “I wanted them to observe something other than the Abyss.” Death sounded pleased; her iridescent jaw quivered. “They were not much then, so I carried them like dust upon my wings. We flew the Membrane, even the worlds no one will ever know, but because a child is, in part, their parent, it was humans and the places they had colonized to which my daughters were drawn.”

  Bjørn cleared his throat. “Were they… always… always the way they are now?”

  “No,” Death said, turning to the gray Void clinging like mold to the rim of the Abyss. “I made them much, much worse.

  “They grew up too quickly. Pain and Joy had bodies of their own before I knew it. Thoughts, too, and beliefs that I had not put there. They were me, this is true, but I had left most of them empty, so that they could be filled and made something else. Different kinds of Death, if you will; two that had taken different paths from their mother, and yet would still arrive at the same place. That is, here, in the Abyss, with me.

  “I was never a child. I was never anything but what I am now. I did not know childhood. Pain and Joy were difficult children. They were cruel, and covetous. They teased and tortured my shepherds—”

  Aeson glanced over at the creatures. Though they had been arriving and leaving the Garden of Sleep in silence, each with bandages in their hands, their gaze was always fixed on Death. It wasn’t that they didn’t know the story she was telling. It was almost as if, and this was a guess, because their long, blonde hair blocked their faces, they wanted to hear how she was telling it. If it would reach the end they all clearly wanted.

  “—and when I left them with the humans, mostly on Earth, they would sow mischief and misery. Parents lie to themselves about the quality of their children. I did not.”

  Aeson’s throat tightened. Because of Death’s words, he remembered something Adelyn had said: To love Vrana, no matter what she had become.

  “For a long time, I did lie to myself about Pain and Joy. They were cruel and mischievous, and mean-spirited, but darkness breeds darkness,
and darkness is what we had here at the edge of everything. Difficult as it may be to imagine now, Pain and Joy did develop kindness and consideration. They showed affection in kisses, and even played with the shepherds. Joy grew the Garden, to make me happy and to gather friends, while Pain tended to the souls below, to study them and quantify the deeds that led to their deaths.

  “No, it was not their quality about which I lied to myself, but their necessity.

  “In my daughters, I saw my own doubt, and perhaps, my own downfall. Death does not have a lineage, and yet I formed successors. Pain and Joy were killers, while I merely collected those that needed to be killed. In my daughters, I saw competition, and perhaps, my own obsolescence.”

  The shepherds stopped coming to the Garden. Above, the red ring that let out to the fleshy tunnel beyond seared itself shut. Below, the stars of souls grew smaller and smaller, while the gray Void appeared to be expanding. Death was steering them closer to her daughters’ domain.

  “I know the end of all things. Not how it will happen, or when, but only that it will. I know when you will die Aeson—”

  Aeson swallowed hard and stared at Death’s wings.

  “—and when you will die, Bjørn.”

  Bjørn nodded, whispered, “Is it soon?”

  Death ignored him. “I knew that my daughters would die, too. But death does not know her own death, and never had I worried about my place until those two girls were standing in my shadow. By creating Pain and Joy, I had violated something sacred and profound. I loved them. I love them dearly. But in the end, as it had always been, I loved myself more.”

  Again, Death’s torso shimmered blue and white. She bent down and plucked a Death’s Dilemma from the ground and held it outwards. The melancholic petals caught the gray Void’s light and glowed like a grave at dusk.

  “Pain and Joy had lived for a very long time, but if you had seen them at the moment I decided to kill them, you would have thought they were five years old.”

  Death dropped the flower, and her Dilemma was dust before it could hit the ground.

  “I brought them to Earth with a lie. I told them we were going to live amongst the humans for a while—something which they had greatly enjoyed in the past. We settled on a small town in the mountains that has since been renamed Angheuawl.”

  That’s where the Cult of the Worm is gathering, Aeson realized, heart thudding in his chest.

  “There are many beautiful lakes in the area. Hot springs, too, from the volcanic activity of Kistvaen. Pain and Joy played with the children during the day, and their parents at night, while I debated and debased myself away from a decision. I think my daughters knew something was wrong, but among the living, they were, in their own way, gods. The Abyss never had satisfied their cravings. How could it? They were creatures born of my curiosity in humanity. They wanted power, and companionship.

  “I knew they could no longer be, so I woke them early one morning, packed food for a picnic, and took them to Angheuawl’s most secluded lake. While they were laying out the blanket and setting out the food, I took a rock and bashed their heads in. They did not die. I knew that it would not be that easy, but I could not bring myself to destroy them so brutally. While they were unconscious, I dragged them to the lake. I held them under the water for hours, until the sun had risen and fallen and risen once more. They were full of water, and they were no longer moving. When I looked upon their bloated corpses, I, for the first time in my existence, wept.

  “And then I left them there, because despite all my strength, I was not and could never be strong enough to carry what I had done back to the Abyss with me.”

  Death sighed, clicked her claws against one another. The Garden of Sleep slowed to a halt. The gray Void wasn’t close enough to touch, but it was near enough that Aeson could see shapes inside it. Pillars, and walls, and landscapes of its own pock-marked by black, roaming clouds.

  She’s in there, Aeson thought. Vrana’s in there. She’s right there. If only I could just…

  “Why didn’t they die?” Bjørn asked.

  “I do not know,” Death said. “They had a part of me, and so perhaps that gave them an immunity to me. They were curious creatures, like myself, and I know they had spent much time in the Membrane, exploring the worlds it ran between.

  “Some time passed before I realized Pain and Joy had not perished. Souls began to join the Abyss that had died by their hands. My daughters were alive, and they were an unstoppable force, moving through the world, building their own myth, constructing their own lore. They gave themselves strengths and limitations, and simple goals to achieve. The humans they terrorized and tortured were instrumental in providing my daughters a purpose. Pain and Joy could have murdered the world in those days, but they preferred to make it suffer, instead.

  “I could not kill them again. I could have, but I had failed once, and I knew, in part, their slaughtering was an attempt to spite me. I could not face them; that is the truth of it.”

  “The Void,” Aeson said, nodding towards it. “What is it?”

  “I gave half my heart to have my daughters, and half my heart to kill them. The void that was left behind is my weakness, and the Void made of it is their power.

  “I do not know if it was I who made it, or them, but when I realized they had not died, I then realized the Void was there. It is where they live; they cannot be harmed there. In the shadow of Death, one is immortal.”

  Death bent over once more and plucked another Dilemma. In a whisper, she said, “Humans are terrible storytellers. In a matter of seconds, a tale can change. Tell me, Bear, what is this flower’s story?”

  “It’s, uh, meant to represent… represent someone you loved,” Bjørn said, sweating. “And someone who loved you. An… impossible union.”

  “No,” Death said, shaking her head. “I formed these flowers after I learned my daughters were still alive. Death’s Dilemma is not a weapon, but an invitation. I could not kill them by my own hand, but if they would take one of these flowers, they would be accepting death on their own terms.

  “I planted Death’s Dilemma across the Earth, and every place my daughters were known to go. Everything they do is to hurt me; I wanted them to know that I was watching, listening, and that the Abyss would have them, if they would have it.”

  “The flowers are said to snip your soul if you pick it,” Aeson whispered.

  Death flicked her fingers, like scissor blades.

  “Even if it’s not your daughters picking them, you kill the person?”

  “The flowers, like the shepherds, are extensions of myself. They do, and if they do not, they are nothing.”

  Death crumbled the flower. “It interests me that a few years ago, Joy was having a similar conversation to ours now with King Edgar in the Nameless Forest.”

  Aeson and Bjørn exchanged glances.

  “Pain and Joy have been together as much as they have been apart. They loathe each other’s company as much as they love it. After the Trauma, they went their separate ways. Pain retreated to the Void, while Joy settled in the Nameless Forest.

  “She had a family. Joy had always wanted a family, or at least, playthings. Throughout history, she has formed families, only to destroy them or cause them to destroy themselves. But for the first time, in the Nameless Forest, she had a family of four boys that just so happened to be descendants of King Edgar. So many had tried to kill them in the past, to claim the Forest, and every time, Joy stopped them, even though she had wanted to do the same herself. But when King Edgar arrived, she finally lost all interest in her sons, and she promised him the Forest and its secrets if he did. And he did.

  “And so here we are now, you beseeching me to destroy my daughters—my daughters, who I cannot kill, and yet think of killing every day. At any other moment in time, I would have collected you for the dark, but in this moment, I will help you.

  “Because, you see, children truly are their parents. I tortured and mutilated myself to create torture
d and mutilated companions—my shepherds, my Pain and Joy. What does Pain do if not torture and mutilate in the pursuit of companionship and power? I leave Death’s Dilemma, and my daughter leaves traps. She is me, and I am her.

  “I formed beings because I was lonely. Despite the terrible existences they have lived, I formed them, regardless. I have done it before, and I will do it again, and again. I collect. I am covetous. I need nothing, and yet I want. What does Joy do if not collect and covet in the pursuit of happiness and higher purpose? I form extensions of myself, and my daughter does the same. She is me, and I am her.

  “Today, I want them dead. Tomorrow, I may not. I do not see the future. I do not know if this was meant to be. You seek a Red Death weapon? I would have to forge one anew.”

  “Will it take long?” Aeson asked.

  And Bjørn followed with: “How does it work?”

  Death lightly flapped her wings and lifted slightly off the ground. “I created the Red Death weapons for creatures to combat threats beyond their capabilities. Humans have created replicas through the use of spellweaving, but a true Red Death weapon holds the power of myself and the Abyss.”

  “It can kill anything?” Aeson asked.

  Death nodded.

  “Even a Worm?”

  “Worms do not answer to this Death,” she said.

  “But it will kill the Witches?” Bjørn asked.

  “No,” Death said, “but it will be strong enough to sever their connection to this place, to me. It will close them off from the Void, and they will be as human and weak as they’ve told themselves they would be without it.”

  Aeson said, “But they have to be out of the Void.”

  “They will be,” Death said. “Abandoned children crave attention. The Cult of the Worm will reach the end of its pilgrimage soon. You can be sure they will be there, in attendance.”

  Aeson didn’t want to ask it. He didn’t want to ask anything, anymore. He wanted to be on his way, out of here, with what they had, and nothing else. But he had to ask it, and so he did. “Will it take long to make a new weapon?”