Begin
The final frontier of sentient-kind is death. Nothing else exists that we have not yet explored.
Godwin, Tempest Seer
The inside of the circular building is what I imagine an old colosseum looked like in ancient Rome. Along the walls are hundreds of seats carved directly out of the stone walls. Fifteen feet separates the first row from the pit itself which is a bare field of sand.
And in the center stands the Red Mage.
“Finally,” they say, unfolding their arms. “Did you get lost?”
“You didn’t tell me where to go,” I say, closing the space between us. “A nice lady in a panther mask found me wandering around the stalls like a lost puppy.”
“And how is Bast this morning?” Azazel asks, and something in the monotone makes me wonder if the mage has a soft spot for the woman.
“Chatty. She said you’re a cryptic ass,” I say stopping a few feet from them.
“Are you always like this?” Azazel asks, tilting their head.
“I’m a veritable source of whimsy,” I say nodding. “So where do we start?”
Azazel waves a hand and the colosseum darkens to almost pitch black. The only source of light emanates from Azazel. Almost like the robes themselves are glow-in-the-dark.
“Oh—” I huff out, feeling the spirits already waking.
“Resist them,” they say and I feel the color drain from my face.
“How?” I hiss, watching the first ghastly form appear from behind Azazel.
“Their power is only what you give them. Do you see one?”
I nod, not really caring if Azazel can see me or not.
“Where?” they ask, and maybe I imagine it, but they sound more kind now.
“Behind you,” I whisper, watching the nearest one peak around Azazel like this is a fucking game. They look absolutely horrific. Apparently this one decided to keep the form they had when they died, rather than do me the service of looking moderately less terrifying.
“Fascinating,” Azazel says. “Recall your rage and hatred. Do not let it take that from you.”
I don’t really hear Azazel, though. The whispers have started and, God, they’re loud.
“They don’t want you,” the spirit hisses. The familiar words like stinging nettles in an already raw soul.
“Hiraeth,” Azazel’s voice sounds far away.
A tendril of darkness lashes out from the void, piercing directly at my heart.
I hit the sandy floor, the tendril whipping like the tail of a fantastical beast. Each movement shoots spikes of white-hot fire through my body.
My labored breathing sounds like a death rattle as I tear at the tendril with swiftly weakening fingers.
A red flash explodes from nearby and the tendril evaporates. As does the ghoul.
I gasp out in panicked breaths. My fingers scrabble at the quickly knitting whole in my chest as sand crunches nearby.
“I see the issue,” Azazel’s voice, while monotone, is quieter now.
Words don’t form as I let out a choked sob. Embarrassment and shame flash through me like a torrent of awfulness. My chest rises and falls as anxiety threatens to turn visceral.
“What are you so afraid of?”
I finally meet the blank eyes of the mask, knowing it’s foolish to try and discern anything from the expressionless face.
“You are the only Death Afflicted being to walk this plane. The only, the first, and I expect, the last. You are the link between life and death. What is it that stops you from accepting this power you have been gifted?”
“Because what if they’re right,” I spit out, voice watery with tears that have become far too frequent.
“That you are some freak? A monster?” Azazel’s voice almost sounds angry. Or impassioned, it’s fucking hard to tell.
I only nod. There’s nothing to say.
“Good,” they hiss, and this time there’s only anger in their voice. “This world no longer deserves mercy. It deserves to be remade in our image.”
I stare wide-eyed at the figure who, until now, had seemed so level-headed.
“They chose subjugation and technofascism. They chose corporate dictatorship and the quiet extinction of our kind. You need to be their monster, Arya. Be their annihilation. We will not win our equality if we continue to live in the shadow of their judgement.”
They’re silent for a long time before letting out a slow breath.
“Are you ready to try again?”
Azazel’s strong hand reaches down and encapsulates mine. This close, I realize they’re stockier than me, but definitely shorter.
“How bad is it out there?” I ask, feeling at my chest to ensure I’ve still got all my parts.
“Bad,” Azazel says without hesitation. “We are fighting a war for our kind against an enemy we can neither identify nor slow.”
“And you need me to get it together,” I groan, squeezing my eyes tight against the thrumming pain at the base of my skull.
Azazel pins me with what I now decide is their “serious” head tilt.
“I know you do not care for your own life—but you care for the lives of others. You chose to involve yourself in the struggle of others. You did the right thing, even if it cost you what little humanity you clung to. I am only asking that you do the same now.”
Azazel’s words ring loudly in the vacant colosseum. They tug at a shredded heart that I so often want to pull out. So often wish would just stop beating.
“I’m not a hero,” I say breathlessly. “I just couldn’t stand by while—”
“While you had the power to stop the bad things,” Azazel says, sounding as if they understand the sentiment intimately.
I nod, not sure what else to say. We stand there for a moment as Azazel’s uncanny stillness returns.
“Are we ready to try again?” They ask after the silence had drawn out almost uncomfortably.
“Fuck it,” I say, grunting.
And the lights go out.
The spirits gather faster—like they were expecting the rematch.
One materializes before the others do. It’s not the same one as before. And it’s not one I recognize, though they hardly ever are.
He’s large. Not taller than me, but thickly muscled. Or, rather, he probably had been in life. Now, though, most of his guts seem to have been pulled out by a bigger fish.
“Can I see my family again?” he whispers, voice softer than I would have expected.
I frown as I approach, watching the way he sort of “exists.” He doesn’t seem to be angry. He’s not even really looking at me.
“I don’t have the ability to control that,” I say, nearing enough to see the way his body glistens with blood shed who knows how long ago.
He meets my eyes then, and there’s a sadness there that I’ve never seen in the spirits.
“That’s why they’re angry,” he says, nodding behind him as if the entire afterlife occupies the colosseum seating. “They need control. They need regulation.”
“How?” I ask softly, tilting my head to catch his eyes again.
“Can you feel me?” he asks, and I glance down the length of his ghostly form. “My presence.”
I suck at my teeth and nod.
Duh.
Closing my eyes, I let my senses spread with the shadows. In the past I’d only ever used the incorporeal bands to find the living. I’d never needed, or wanted, to find the dead.
But there he is. It’s a flicker of something. Not the same energy put off by Azazel who watches quietly from the side.
This is different. This is familiar.
Slowly, I wrap a tendril around it and the man lets out a shuddering gasp. At first fear rockets through the connection, but then it dulls quickly into utter jubilation.
That’s the only word for it. Ecstasy. Freedom.
Release.
Opening my eyes again, I find the man. His own eyes are closed, head tilted back in reverence.
“This is all they want,” he says, voice hushed like in a place of worship. “This is what they need from you.”
And then he disappears. The fragment of energy feels as though it transcends the connection between us as his form evaporates.
But I can still sense it. Unlike the other spirits who’d tormented me, I can feel him like it’s just one of my other thousands of thoughts and feelings. Not overwhelming. Not even really noticeable unless I want to.
It’s just there.
“What happened?” Azazel’s voice breaks through my reverie.
I turn to him with what’s probably a stupid grin.
“I had a nice one this time. I think I get it. At least a little bit,” I say, grinning wider with a renewed sense of direction.
“Are there more?” Azazel asks, not exactly pushing for an explanation.
Which is good because I don’t really know what I just did, either.
“A lot,” I say, grunting as several more less-than-friendly faces appear in the sheer darkness around Azazel’s glow.
“Then do it again. You are the master of death, Hiraeth. Rebuild the throne of your kingdom.”
The hours pass as I wrangle spirits like a goddamn cattle rancher. The whole situation is almost comedic if you ignore the screams of the damned.
Some of the spirits act like the first man. They’re sad and tired. For whatever reason, they never passed on.
And that raised the next excellent question of “what the fuck do you mean pass on?”
When I ask several of the kinder ones, they simply shrug. It’s like the instinct is there, but something is preventing them from going… somewhere.
The nebulous “afterlife” isn’t something any of them really get. They just know it exists.
Others though are angry that they’re stuck.
Or, worse, angry that they’re dead at all.
Those ones fight back. Though once they calm down enough that I can do whatever it is I’m doing, they relax.
That small piece of them seems calmer and more compliant as it sits somewhere in the vast emptiness of my brain.
Or my soul, maybe. It’s really unclear.
After some time, I no longer see spirits clouding my vision. My periphery no longer houses anguished faces. I no longer hear their whispers.
“Shit,” I cough out, sweat drenching at my back. The sand between my fingers grounds me as I kneel in it.
“Excellent,” Azazel says, sounding not even remotely different or impassioned. But I accept the praise, nonetheless.
It seems like something they don’t give out very often.
“So, you’ll want me to keep practicing this until I master it, then?” I ask, tilting my head up to them.
“No,” Azazel says immediately. “We will be moving on to using your shadows as weapons. I know you can do it, but I want to see the extent. I want to see you push yourself.”
I nod, grateful for the silence. For the first time there hasn’t been another occupying force.
“That I can do. Same time tomorrow?” I ask, pushing to my feet. The aches in my joints seem incongruous since I hardly moved from this spot.
“Yes, but you will join us for the nightly briefing,” Azazel says, lights in the colosseum flickering to life again. “It would be prudent for you to truly see what we are up against.”