Ana The seventh soul
Ana
The seventh soul
“This one will be difficult,” Tiberius said, his voice gruffer than usual.
I was still getting used to calling him by his birth name. From time to time, the ethereal name would slip from my lips, earning a mischievous gaze from him.
The month of Brum?rel was passing by, the rain getting colder, the trees were losing their green crowns, giving way to voidness.
“Why?” I asked, watching as drops of water fell from our scythes.
“Because he doesn’t think he is evil…”
I turned my head to him, a question in my eyes.
“He thinks that what he is doing is righteous, that he is saving the people who work for him. But in fact, he enslaves them.”
“Eugen’s mother thought she was doing the right thing by killing him,” I argued, not fully understanding where he wanted to go with that idea.
“True, the difference here is that the mother of Eugen knew what she was doing was bad, like all the other five souls you took, and against the law. But this one sends the people to slow murder.”
A factory lay in front of us, horns and pipes surrounding the building.
As shown in the Mirror, people of every age, from young children to older men, worked day and night between brick walls.
Tubes and packages were daily delivered by large trucks and burly men, all of them looking angry, frowns darkening their faces.
Some of those depicted worry, many hours of work under precarious conditions so they could have food on the table. Others were filled with fear that they were not doing enough for their families.
And some were, by nature, angry.
Scrawny men came to unload the shipment, unable to hold the pipes properly. Another man, taller than all the others, towering over them, barked orders left and right.
“He reminds me of you,” I mocked, hinting with my head towards the man in question.
“That joke of yours almost made me smile, my lady,” he said flatly.
The corners of my mouth lifted, remembering his arms around me. How he kept me under his protection on the day of the baptism, how slowly he became a better person.
Even with Eugen, he behaved properly. The boy was curious about all the morbid stories Tiberius had to tell. And as a goader, the man loved to voice his experiences.
The sound of the trucks leaving drew my attention.
“Ready, Stag Woman?” he asked, his tone amused.
I nodded and transported myself to the main office I had seen before in the Mirror.
I left my skull at home. How odd it was to call his lair ‘my home’ after all these months?
Smiling to myself, I realised that the skull did nothing for me or for Tiberius anymore. Once I was over this damned contract, and if we found a way from this curse, I would break that wretched mass of bones and burn it with a laugh on my lips.
The lingering smell of tobacco was making my stomach sick.
“Who are you?” the man sitting at a desk asked, his eyebrows raised.
He was not fazed by the fact that I was carrying a scythe in one of my hands, not even my eyes frightened him.
He saw this before.
“I am here to collect your soul,” I stated, my head held high.
The office he stood in was not large by any means.
In the middle of the room was a desk with a wooden chair on which his filthy body was slumped.
It was filled to the brim with papers left unattended.
A small cupboard stood in the faraway corner of the room.
And a window overlooked the morning shift at the plant.
He chuckled, his beard jumping. “Someone else tried this joke before. I am not doing anything evil here.”
“What about all these people suffering from the work in the factory?”
He stood up, his round glasses falling from the bridge of his nose. “These people have a paid job, food on the table and shelter. What more can they want?”
“You truly believe that having food on the table would suffice from the meagre wages you give them?”
“What else would?” He stomped his cigarette on the floor.
“Happiness,” I answered, my hand becoming numb on the scythe.
He started laughing, his hands grabbing his stomach.
When he finally stopped, he eyed me with a frown before his eyebrows. “Happiness does not exist. It is an illusion. Money... money is real.”
“Do you really believe that?”
I stepped closer to him, seeing clearly that he would step over bodies to get his purpose.
“And making that money on the back of hard-working people brings you happiness?” I leaned my head on my shoulder, eyeing his big belly. “Do you think that they are healthy while fulfilling their duties?”
I leaned my palms on the desk, my eyes brighter from the lamp.
Snatching my scythe and pressing it on his neck and drawing blood, fear intruded into the man’s eyes. “I am not just a Soul Ripper. I still have my soul intact, despite the swirls in my eyes.” Cutting deep into his vein, crimson stained his collar.
I left his limp body fallen on the chair, my mind conjuring money to rain in the shop floor. As much money as the people working in the factory needed.
“A worthy price to pay,” Tiberius said when I joined him.
The rain finally stopped, the sun barely scraping the sky.
Nodding, I turned to him. “Who was the Ripper who visited the first time?”
“I was.”
“And you let him live?” My eyebrows shot up.
“Yes, I had an appointment on the G?ina Hill,” he winked at me, a smirk appearing on his lips.
I couldn’t stop smiling, even though I just came from taking my seventh soul.
For the last few days, we spent searching for a way out of the contract, and we concluded that there was none. I had to take all of the souls in the short span of two months. Or else, who knew what the Elk had in store for us.
Biting my cheek, I held in the words that kept me up last night. Feeling my inner turmoil, Tiberius stepped closer to me. His scent soothed the thoughts I had. I took a deep breath and turned to him. There were questions in his eyes that needed answers. That only I possessed.
“You showed me the places you hold dear to your heart,” I said, and he answered with a nod. “I want to show you mine.”
I took his hand, its warmth giving me the courage to move further. For the first time since I gained powers, I travelled us to my favourite place in this small world.
The cold air pushed my lungs, and in the next second, my feet touched the grass of the hill that overlooked my village.
I was with my sister the last time I climbed this hill and watched the sunrise.
Right in front of us stood the church of the village.
The holy place where my parents got married and where Angelica and I were baptised.
It was over three hundred years old and was built when we knew of no king.
Priest Neagu organised a restoration ten years ago.
He hired painters to depict St Mihail and Gavril as they were the patrons of the church.
“Do you come here often?” he asked, releasing my hand.
I looked at him, sending daggers with my eyes.
“Oh, right. I am sorry about that!” He dipped his chin, watching me through his lashes.
“I brought you here to see the place I felt most comfortable in my entire life,” I said, taking a seat on the wet grass.
My eyes travelled briefly to my house, but shaking my head, I returned my attention to the church.
“There I ran either alone or with Angelica, to hide.” I swallowed, not moving my gaze.
“When she was little, I used to take her away to this same field. But soon, she understood why we were running.”
Tiberius sat next to me, his eyes on my cheek, his fingers brushing mine.
“Priest Neagu tried talking to my father, but he never listened. After all this time, I realised that my father would let all of us go to church, because the sermon was at the same time as he had to meet with his drunk fellows.” I pulled my knees to my chest. “The thing is that the love of God not only gave me hope, but it also gave me comfort. I had something of mine, where I could hide.”
I blinked, freeing some of the tears gathered in my eyes. “My mum, of course, was mine and Angelica’s support during those times, but she was alone in doing so. I tended to her wounds multiple times. She blamed herself every time Angelica or I was hit. In the end, we were too afraid to leave.”
Swallowing, I wiped my tears. “You have to understand, Tiberius, the love for God kept me afloat.”
We stood, listening to the bells of the church ringing, as if they were calling for me. I dreamt of spending the most important events of my life in that church. Now, I could only dream from afar.
“And yet, you’re there.”
He took a deep breath, which reached my skin. “Where am I?”
“In my soul, in my mind, in every breath I take. You’re there to hold my hand and make me smile and feel as if I were worth anything.”
“Ana,” he said and kneeled for the second time in front of me, “you deserve everything pure and golden in this world. If I see that, with all my wrongdoings, you need to see it too.” He took my hand in his, kissing my knuckles.
“I might not understand the deep adoration you feel for your god because I had none. But you made me believe in something other than my own selfish purpose.”
“And that is?” I whispered, leaning closer to him.
“Love.”
I thought I stopped breathing for a few moments.
Besides my mum and my sister, nobody else told me that they loved me.
And I was sure not to expect it from anyone else.
Let alone the eternal Goat Man. My eyes roamed over his face in search of the mockery, but I had found only the purest feeling of them all.
I knew the same resided in my soul for him.
“I know it is difficult to accept that a man who destroyed your life might nurture feelings for any beings other than himself,” he whispered.
“And I know you said that I had a place in your heart.” He made me stand by tugging my hand gently.
His fingers found my chin and brushed it.
“I do not want your whole soul, inim?, I only want to be a part of your journey on this Earth as you’ll be part of mine. ”
My eyes closed, imagining that I could have it all. I just needed to let my walls come down. At least to taste what could possibly be.
“I said to you that I don’t think myself pure anymore,” I whispered, lifting my eyes to him.
“And that is because you are in my soul as well as God is. Nights, I stood and pondered if this was my path. Maybe God steered all the men at the Girls’ Fairs away.
He must have known that I would meet you.
And you made me feel and see so much in the last months.
” I took a deep breath, my eyes searching his. “You were never my darkness, Tiberius.”
“But you were always my light, inim?. I knew from the moment I uttered that word that maybe someday, I would have one.”
We stared at each other, letting our eyes speak.
“Will I ever kiss you, Ana?”
As I pressed my lips lightly to his, a part of me flourished. The taste of him was unique, made just for me. My eyes closed to capture the moment better.
His hands wrapped around my waist, pulling me closer to him.
My hands flew to his neck, my fingers curling around his dark locks.
I didn’t need to breathe; he would give me his air if I needed it.
His lips moved one inch, opening mine, giving way to possibility.
An endless abyss I would lose myself in.
I loved every second of it, and I wanted more.
So much more.
I felt as if we became one while our lips searched, tasted and found themselves.
He broke the kiss, my lips feeling numb from his loss. “We really need to get back. Three souls still await you, and only two months are left,” he breathed.
He pulled me again for another searing kiss.
“And we still need to search for a way to get out of your mess,” I mumbled against his lips.
Nodding, he took my hand in his. “And afterwards, I promise you, Ana, I will be forever yours.”
I pressed my forehead to his, nose to nose, mouth over mouth. “And I will be yours, Tiberius.”
And with that promise, we kept on living.