Chapter 1
Candles flickered on the altar. Anticipation and apprehension coiled in my stomach as I held a stick of incense to a flame.
It caught quickly and I blew it out, the sweet-smelling smoke curling up towards the chapel ceiling as the incense started to smolder and crumble.
Its length had been carefully calculated for the Ritual and would be gone by the time my heart stopped beating.
My hands trembled as I placed it in the ceramic holder.
One of three. Aside from the candles and a wide metal dish, they were the only things on the marble surface.
The other two incense sticks were already lit.
The day had finally come for me to journey to the In Between. To die for a chance to atone. For my family. For my transgressions in a previous life. I clasped my hands together to stop them from shaking.
Seven years, I’d waited. Seven years of offerings to Death—scourging of flesh, fasting, bloodletting. My knees throbbed and my back ached in memory of what I’d endured.
The Ritual was conducted once each winter. I had volunteered for it every time since the day I arrived. Six times they’d told me no and selected others. I was beginning to think I’d never be allowed to go, that the Guardian of Death had recognized my unworthiness, but it was finally time.
“Your offering,” the sister behind me prompted me, the whip at her waist creaking as she shifted.
My heart clenched as I reached into my pocket and withdrew my mother’s necklace. A small gold pomegranate at the end of a chain, its red jeweled seeds winking in the firelight. The last tangible thing I had of my family. I didn’t want to part with it, but I couldn’t take it with me.
Before I could think too hard about it, I dropped it in the dish.
It clinked against the offerings the other initiates had made, a hollow sound that reverberated through my body.
My eyes burned with unshed tears, but I didn’t deserve to cry.
I’d vowed to endure anything to atone. Parting with an object was nothing.
“And now your blood.” The sister handed me an ornate dagger.
The silver salamanders on the handle dug into my palm.
I allowed myself one breath before I drew it along my skin, the blade cutting deep.
Blood welled as I curled my hand into a fist and held it over the candles on the altar, two drops of blood for each one.
The throbbing burn of pain echoed through me and my pulse pounded in my throat.
There were twelve candles, each one the length of my forearm and twice as round.
Designs had been carved into the surface, along with the name of a soul lost in the transfer during the Ritual.
Twelve souls in nine years. No one knew why they hadn’t made it, or where they’d ended up, just that they hadn’t.
I knew I might join them, my soul ceasing to exist, lost forever, but it was a risk I was willing to take.
I couldn’t face the alternative—that my family’s death meant nothing.
At least, that’s what I told myself. In truth, I was a coward.
I forced air into my lungs as I accepted a cloth bandage to wrap around my hand and let the sister lead me out into the cloisters.
The air was crisp in the twilight, making me shiver in my thin shift and overdress. I breathed in the smells of winter—cold air, damp earth, moldering leaves and wood smoke.
The massive pomegranate tree in the center of the grass made stark shapes against the purple sky.
Only a few leaves clung to its branches, clustered in groups where fruit hung ripe and heavy.
It was unnatural to have fruit at the height of winter, but this was no normal tree.
It was ancient and sacred, connecting the World of the Living to the In Between with roots that were said to reach across the realms.
My stomach knotted as I realized: this was my last glimpse of sky. I wasn’t sure if the In Between had anything like it. I’d find out soon enough. If I made it there. My chest tightened and I forced myself to turn away.
We entered the church through a side door, and the smell of candle wax and dust filled the air.
The vaulted ceiling soared above the rows of stone benches in the nave.
Our footsteps on the flagstone floor echoed the pounding of my heart as we walked down the central aisle.
I kept my gaze on the altar, avoiding the faces of the people praying or waiting to make offerings for the smooth passage of the souls of their loved ones.
To ask Death and her Judges to be merciful when determining their next life.
Most of them clutched candles in one hand and totems of the people they’d lost in the other—jewelry, clothing, toys.
My entire body tensed, the way it always did in large groups of people, and I mentally scanned myself for any inklings of pain that might not be my own.
I’d managed to hide my curse from the sisters and my fellow novices, though there had been a few close calls over the years.
I’d gotten better at sensing when someone in my vicinity was near death so I could remove myself, but it required constant hypervigilance, something I hoped I could give up soon.
Since everyone in the In Between was already dead, there should be no deaths to see or feel.
And if I disappeared along the way, then the world would be free of my curse.
The Burial Chamber was reached through a door behind the altar.
It was flanked by familiar, full-size marble statues.
On one side, Death in a flowing dress with salamanders at her feet, holding her pomegranate-shaped Orb in one hand and reaching out with the other to pass judgment.
On the other side, the Devil sat on a throne wearing a crown of horns.
Beneath his feet lay three bodies writhing in pain, despair carved on their faces.
While Death weighed and judged souls, deciding the circumstances of their next lives, the Devil taught and punished through manipulation of their fears, desires, and past misdeeds.
A soul could be sentenced to time with the Devil before being reincarnated, a path I no doubt would have taken if I’d been punished like I deserved.
My gaze lingered on his form. What did he look like in the flesh?
Was he anything like the statue, a paragon of masculinity?
The sculptor had given the Devil an expression both forbidding and leering, like he could see right through you.
What would it be like to have his attention focused on you?
Warmth bloomed low in my belly and my breath hitched.
I averted my gaze, shame overtaking arousal.
There was something wrong with me. I didn’t deserve to want like this, and even without that, wanting the Devil was madness, no matter what he looked like.
Whispers said that the strength of his power was responsible for the overflow of cruelty and injustice in our world.
Through the door, a stone staircase lit with torches spiraled down several floors until it let out into the Burial Chamber. The tight space was filled with sisters and novices.
I forced myself to breathe. It felt suffocating to be so far underground without any natural light.
The air was cold despite the two massive iron chandeliers and standing candelabras giving off light and heat, and the large fireplace in the middle of one wall with a crackling blaze within.
Sacred salamanders scampered along the logs, chasing one another as they ran through the flames.
They were said to be able to travel across realms. I wondered if any of them ever became lost, or if it was just souls.
In the center of the room lay three marble platforms and the other initiates—a doll-like girl and a man with a weak chin. I recognized them, though I didn’t know either well.
Both were already down to their shifts and shaking.
A tremor moved through me, though whether from fear or excitement I couldn’t tell.
Maybe an equal measure of both. Part of me wanted to turn around and run as far away as I could but I had vowed to endure.
To atone. I’d made my choice. I wouldn’t turn back now.
It’s a calling. Not a choice. In my head, I repeated the words the judge had said to me at my sentencing, just as I’d done every time I doubted myself since.
They settled me enough to let two sisters lead me to the remaining platform and roughly strip off my overdress and boots.
The stone floor was gritty beneath my bare feet, and my body shook as my hair was yanked back into a braid and tied off at the middle of my back.
A hush fell over the crowd. All eyes turned to the podium standing next to the altar and the large stack of paper that sat atop it. We didn’t have to wait long before words blossomed on the page in large looping letters. A message from the In Between.
It is time.
My heart started to race as a sister stepped towards me.
“Do you embark on this journey of your own free will?” she asked.
“I do.” I fought to keep the tremble from my voice.
She held out a silver tray.
A blood-red pomegranate seed, glistening like a small ruby, sat in the middle. It almost looked normal, but I knew it wasn’t. Each year the tree in the cloisters produced one fruit for this Ritual. The seed was as hard as glass and warm to the touch as I brought it to my lips and swallowed.
I heard the other initiates whimper, moan, and gag as they did the same.
The seed burned as it went down, and I couldn’t suppress a wince. I felt it come to rest in my stomach like a piece of hot coal. For a moment I doubted I could go through with it. This was only the beginning, a taste of what was to come. But I shoved my doubts away. I had to atone.
I resisted the urge to vomit. The seed was the anchor.
A marker. Without it the Ritual wouldn’t be successful.
Instead of entering the In Between as a resident, we’d just die and continue the cycle of reincarnation.
I grabbed the jeweled cup being offered and chugged the contents, slapping a hand over my mouth as I struggled to swallow the poison.
My knees buckled and two sets of hands held me up.
They helped me onto the platform and laid me down.
A tremor worked its way through my limbs as the poison clawed through my veins.
My throat closed and I fought for every breath.
Spots appeared in my vision, and the room closed in.
I felt my eyelids close and open, but saw nothing.
Panic drowned me.
The poison spread and an animal instinct took over my limbs, fighting, resisting. I couldn’t stop myself from screaming and clawing at my skin, trying to make it stop. It only made it worse. Hands held me down so that all I could do was convulse.
Breathing was near impossible. I had to force the heavy muscles in my chest to expand and contract.
I clutched the sliver of me that remembered why I was doing this.
Where I was going. The In Between awaited me.
Death’s castle, where I would train to be a Judge and atone for my family’s death, and for my previous transgressions.
All I had to do was stop fighting. And pray I ended up where I was supposed to.
I felt the thread of my life unraveling, but I couldn’t let go. No matter how much I wanted to. All I could do was wait for death to take me. The pain paused. For a moment everything was suspended. My life slipped through my fingers, and there was nothing except the cold black void.
I didn’t know how much time passed, could have been minutes, could have been years.
One moment there was nothing, the next nothing but pain.
It went on and on, setting every nerve aflame.
The darkness surrounding me was tinged red, and my heart seized as if someone was squeezing it.
Something hooked deep into my heart and tried to pull it from my chest, yanking my entire being forward.
I thrashed, trying to free myself, but whatever had snared me only sank deeper.
A scream built in my throat, but I couldn’t voice it.
My body didn’t respond, only my mind, which flailed about, wondering if this was what happened to souls lost during the transfer.
Panic clutched me tight as I considered this might be my fate, trapped somewhere in the void, a prisoner in my own body.
Just as I decided I was lost, a vision unfurled in the darkness—a man hunched over a desk, large hands clenched on the wooden surface.
His head rose, his eyes screwed shut, and he let out a strangled moan that turned into a roar.
Fury radiated from him, so intense I almost flinched.
Then, his shoulders slumped and his face relaxed, as if whatever he’d been struggling with had passed.
Relief poured off of him as his hands shook.
I took in his dark curly hair, short, scruffy beard framing a strong jaw, and the way his sleeveless tunic stretched over his torso and showed off his muscled arms. Gods, he was handsome.
I couldn’t look away. Especially when he opened his eyes and looked straight at me.
Shock ran through me. His eyes were brown, with gold flecks that swirled like wheeling stars in his irises, mesmerizing. I thought I saw a hint of recognition. Then he was gone. The vision winked out as if it had never happened, replaced by darkness, and all I was left with was the pain.
Slowly, it began to subside. Like the tide going out, it receded a bit at a time until it finally released its grip. I gasped and sat up. All sensation returned at once and I blinked against the bright light.