Chapter 1 Ruh
Ruh
Ruhyan Veturius was dead. He knew this because a monster of hunger and shadows had ripped his heart out.
For a few moments, his spirit drifted above his body and he saw the horror of what the monster had done. Of what Ilar—whom he thought was his friend—allowed the monster to do.
Ilar had come to his Tribe months ago. Asked for help finding a story. Listened to Ruh, laughed with him, made him feel special, like they were friends. And after Ruh aided her, she repaid him by allying with the demon that ate Ruh’s heart.
Suddenly, he’d found himself in a forest with thick old-growth trees as wide as a Tribal wagon was long.
He knew where he was based on his mother’s stories, from his family’s history.
This was the Waiting Place, where lost spirits were soothed by the Ban al-Mauth—the Soul Catchers—who took the spirits’ pain and eased them into a peaceful afterlife.
Wrath suffused Ruh at the injustice of it, the kind he sometimes felt but never showed. Anger, his ama had advised him, eats at your soul.
Ruh was never sure about that. He’d seen anger in the eyes of his big sister Karinna, particularly when someone had insulted their family or doubted her skill.
Sufiyan, his oldest brother, and Zuriya, his other sister, rolled their eyes at Kari’s overreactions.
Ama would sigh and worry. His father would shrug. That’s how she is.
And Ruh—well, Ruh never thought Kari overreacted. And he didn’t think he was overreacting now. He’d just been murdered, and his anger grew like the chick of a Karka vulture, sprouting claws and beak and a need to rend. He would hurt Ilar, take his vengeance—
All this passed through his mind in a second as a familiar white-haired, scar-faced figure appeared.
Nan. His grandmother was the Bani al-Mauth, one of the Soul Catchers of the Waiting Place.
“Welcome to the Waiting Place, the realm of ghosts,” she said in her low rasp. “I am the Soul Catcher, and I—” She peered at him as she got closer and gasped. “Ruh?”
“My heart got eaten, Nan.” Ruh’s voice was small. “I—I—Aba and Ama will be so sad—”
“Oh no—no—” Nan glanced around, impatient, as if waiting for someone to speak. “This isn’t right, is it?”
No, a low voice responded, sounding like a storm that had decided it had something to communicate to an inconsequential human. Go, Bani al-Mauth.
Ruh had never heard that voice before, but again, he knew who it was because of Ama’s stories.
Mauth, the power that lay at the heart of the Waiting Place, the source of all magic in this world.
Ruh stared at Nan, gape-mouthed, the storyteller in him marveling that he’d heard Mauth, Mauth, who spoke to so few.
“Your spirit chose a good spot to arrive, lad,” Nan said. “Stay here. Don’t move. Don’t talk to any other Soul Catchers, though I doubt they’ll come this way. They’re all jinn, and jinn can’t stand this place. I’ll be back.”
She moved in a blur, her magic lending her speed, and was gone. But Ruh didn’t understand what she thought she could do. He was dead.
He glanced around the forest. He’d come to the Waiting Place before, though he always stayed at Nan’s cabin. He liked it there. She had lots of fat-knitted blankets and hot cups of sweet pink tea.
The forest around him, on the other hand, felt cold and heavy with the stain of some old memory. “H-hello?” he called out.
He was met with silence at first. Briefly, he thought he heard voices. Children, like him, whispering, crying. Then the sounds quieted.
He wasn’t sure how long he waited for Nan. Time warped, like thread pulled too tight on a loom. Ruh couldn’t see if it was early in the day or late. The light never seemed to change.
When Nan did return, it had been hours but also no time at all. Her golden-brown face looked paler than normal. She’d changed her clothes.
“Well, lad, seems you’ve gone and got your heart ripped out by a creature calling itself Div. Though I don’t think that’s her real name.” Nan’s hand settled on the dagger at her waist, as if she’d like to use it. “It shouldn’t be me passing you to the other side, and it won’t be.”
“Why not?”
“It’s not your time.”
“Death is death, you taught us. Even if we don’t want it to be,” Ruh reminded her. “Will you let me say goodbye to my parents? Aba will be angry. He’ll want vengeance.” Ruh paused, his anger seeming to burn his insides, even though he was a ghost. “I want vengeance too.”
“You and me both, lad. But no, I won’t be letting your parents say goodbye. Your mother is the reason we’re in this mess.”
Ruh bristled. “Don’t you go blaming Ama!”
“Why not?” Nan snapped. “It’s her fault. She was the one who released the monster that killed you.”
“That’s not true. Ilar did,” Ruh said, but he wasn’t quite sure. Nan sighed.
“Ilar only picked up a book your mother wrote,” Nan said.
“After she became a Kehanni, Laia was out in the desert looking for stories. Div spoke to her, for she is a corrupt and ancient magic and had been waiting for a sympathetic audience. Your mother, pure soul that she is, swallowed the creature’s sad tale. Set it down in books.”
“What was the story?”
“Ha! I’m not fool enough to tell it. As it is, the books corrupted any tale-spinner who read them. Duranis, they called themselves. Chaos storytellers. In a way, your ama was the first.”
“But—but Ama doesn’t eat children,” Ruh said, horrified, and then considered. “Does she?”
“Don’t be stupid, boy, of course she doesn’t,” Nan said.
“Your ama was safe from the corruption of Div’s tale because Mauth protects her bloodline.
A little gift from him for all she sacrificed to save our world when she battled the Nightbringer twenty years ago.
But no one else who read the tale was safe.
Eventually, Tribe Saif’s old Kehanni had the books destroyed. But one must have escaped.”
“The one Ilar had.”
“Yes. Div manipulated that girl through the last book. Got Ilar to bring her blood. I suspect it was blood that sealed Div in, so blood allowed her to escape. Yours, in this case.”
“Why didn’t you stop Ama telling the story in the first place?” Ruh crossed his arms, glaring at Nan.
“Because I can’t interfere unless Mauth tells me to,” Nan said.
“Which he hasn’t done in the twenty years I’ve been the Bani al-Mauth.
Until now.” Nan looked at Ruh like he was a particularly irritating puzzle box.
“Sometimes, lad, something happens that is so terrible it twists the world in a way it shouldn’t be twisted.
Your death—it shouldn’t have happened. Mauth had other plans for you. ”
The boy must fix this, Bani al-Mauth, that deep, earth-rumbling voice came again.
“He’s ten, you great brute. And dead. How is he supposed to fix it?”
He sees what will come. He dreams. But he does not understand this, yet. I will teach him—though there will be a cost. He must come to the Owa Khel.
Ruh cringed; he did not want to go there. The Owa Khel was where the Soul Catchers threw all the pain and suffering from lost spirits. It was Mauth’s domain. He ruled it and kept every horrid feeling there from bleeding into the human realm.
“That’s a wretched place to send a child, even if he is dead,” Nan said. “Teach him here. You’ve taught me, and skies know I’m a terrible student. The boy will learn quickly.”
He is not yet meant for death. But if he remains, the jinn will sense him. They will insist he be passed on.
“Tell them you don’t want him passed on. You’re always bossing me around.”
And what will I say to them of their own children, Bani al-Mauth? Those who were so cruelly murdered on the very ground you stand upon? What will I say when they ask why I did not bring those children back?
Nan sighed in defeat. “What do I do with the, ah—” She shot a quick look at Ruh. “With his—”
“You can say body, Nan,” Ruh said. “I’m not a baby.”
Bring it here. The jinn do not come here. I will nourish it. When it is time to retrieve it, I will tell you.
“Why don’t the jinn come here?” Ruh said.
Nan frowned. “Weren’t you listening? This is where their children were slaughtered. All of them. A thousand little flames quenched, all at once. Murdered by humans who were jealous of their power.”
Ruh nodded, for the story of the jinn was the first one his mother told as a Kehanni, and the first story her children ever heard. The jinn children had been escaping the great war between humans and jinn. But humans had betrayed them and killed them all in one horrible night.
“Enough old tales,” Nan said. “Mauth says you’re to go to the Owa Khel.
That is where I must take you.” She paused, and her blue eyes softened as they did only for her grandchildren.
“I think you can say no, if you wish, child. I—I can pass you on. He cannot make you stay. You may be a spirit, but you still have a choice. You can rest if you wish.”
It would be nice to rest, for Ruh was weary without his heart.
But he thought of Ilar. Of how he had cared for her and helped her, treated her like family. He thought of how he had trusted her, how foolish he was for doing so. And of how badly she’d betrayed him.
He thought of how his parents and siblings would mourn him. How Karinna and Sufiyan would blame themselves.
“I want vengeance more than rest, Nan,” he whispered.
“Well, if I wasn’t sure you were my grandson,” she said, “I certainly am now. Come on, then, lad.” She offered her hand, sadness flashing across her face. “Walk with me into the dark.”