The Scattered Bones

One

M y scorched skin and chapped lips blister under the enraged sun.

Its molten rays burn me, feed on me, punish me as the singed wind beats my flesh.

The whipping dust is so thick it braids into my hair, and I’ve become more desert than human, more sand than soul.

Every breath feels like fire, and my water supply ran dry hours ago.

I have no food. No water. No hope. I’m lost in the Sivatag.

Hopelessly and irreversibly lost in this desert tomb. This wasteland grave.

But I cannot die. Not yet. This is only the first trial of my impossible journey.

The Sivatag is merely the beginning of a daunting quest I refuse to fail.

Worse fates await me if I escape this desert, but I must survive…

for him. This is all for him. A thief who’s only sin was stealing my heart and offering his in return.

“Please,” I croak, my throat raw after weeks of disuse.

I don’t know his name, the man I beg for help.

He’s simply The Stranger. Unnaturally tall and handsome, his appearance was both elderly and youthful, his black hair and white eyes adding to his mystery.

He stank of a dark and ancient magic, but he appeared in my time of desperation.

“My child,” he’d said as he captured my frail hands in his powerful fists. “Give me your faith, and I’ll return to you what was lost.”

I shouldn’t have believed him. I should have fled, for the more he spoke, the more he frightened me.

Yet his solid white eyes stared into my crystal blues as he whispered a promise I wanted, no needed, to hear, and instead of fleeing, I listened.

I obeyed. I accepted that handsome yet terrifying stranger’s help, and because of him, I’ll die in the Sivatag.

“Please,” I cry without tears. There’s no water in my dehydrated body to spill. No words beyond the simple plea, but he knows what I ask. He has to.

“You’re not weak, my child.” The Stranger’s haunting voice whispers in my mind.

“Please.”

“You know the agreement. You must do this on your own.”

“I can’t.” I sink to my knees in the burning sand.

“Are you negating our covenant? Are you losing faith in my promise?”

“No.”

“Then complete this task. It’s the only way I can help you in the end.”

“You can’t help me if I’m dead.” I cough on the dust.

“You won’t die. You’re stronger than you know.”

“No, I’m not,” I argue.

“Then lay down and give up.” Even his harsh words sound beautiful.

“No.”

“There she is. I knew you hadn’t lost yourself.”

I force myself to a stand, scanning the dunes for any sign of hope. “Promise me I won’t die.”

“Move, child.”

The Stranger’s voice vanishes, leaving me empty once again.

After Hreinasta rejected me, the realm turned hostile.

No one looks at me. No one speaks to me, which is of little consequence because I can’t bear conversing with the living.

The man I long to talk to is dead, and if I can’t speak to him, then I prefer silence.

His fate was my fault, yet he was the one punished.

This solitude, this despair, this desert.

This is my atonement, my debt to be paid.

Only The Stranger bothers to acknowledge me, but his voice appears in my mind.

His conversations never fall on my ears, but I hear him all the same.

I ignore the implications of our unnatural communication.

No mortal has the power to invade another’s brain, which means my dark companion is either far more dangerous than I suspect or my grief has driven me to insanity.

I saw him only once during our first encounter, heard him once, and I’m probably a fool for believing his promise, but I have to.

If I don’t, I have nothing. My thief has nothing.

I order my limbs to move, and while The Stranger cannot aid me—my faith must be absolute until I’ve found all I search for—I have a sudden sense in which direction to travel.

“Thank you,” I whisper. The Stranger doesn’t answer, but he doesn’t need to.

I see it. There, on the horizon, is a darkness that doesn’t belong in this unending sameness.

I shuffle toward it. The journey over those last miles feels as if it takes decades, but just as my blistered skin threatens to peel from my body, I arrive at the dark stain.

It’s an opening in the sand, a gateway lost in the desert, and my heart can feel it. It’s here.

* * *

My breath fogs as the frigid air burns my overheated skin.

The instant I stepped within the gate, darkness swallowed me, the extreme temperatures shocking my system.

It’s cold. Too cold. Evil dwells in these walls.

Dark magic stained the desert heat here, and I descend deep into the earth as the icy wind bites my skin.

The coolness should be a welcomed blessing, but its aggression freezes the warmth in my lungs with every breath.

Breathing stings my throat, and I decide I would rather burn under the Sivatag sun than endure this frozen death.

This blackness is thick with malice, with magic so corrupt I fear I’ll have no soul left when I emerge…

if I emerge. The ice in this tomb makes no promise of survival.

It only whispers pain and a frost-entombed slumber.

As I stumble down the steep staircase, I’m careful not to touch the walls.

I tripped when I first entered the stairwell and made the mistake of grabbing the stones for support.

The frozen blocks adhered to my flesh, and when I yanked my palm free, the outermost layer of my skin ripped off.

The torn flesh will remain forever cemented to the wall, and the pain is unlike anything I’ve experienced, so I cradle my hand to my chest as I repeat his name over and over.

He’s why I’m here. He’s why I willingly suffer, and so his name has become my prayer.

I recite the syllables that are all that remain of the thief.

The sound is my mantra, my reason to survive.

So, I speak his name over and over and over and over—

The stairs come to an abrupt end, sending me sprawling, and my knees crack against the floor.

My worn pants shield my skin from the frozen ground, but they do nothing to soften the impact.

I have no tears left, yet I can’t stop the soft sob that escapes my lips.

I cry at the pain in my body. At the pain trapped in my memory, that gods damned memory.

I mourn his suffering. A suffering so visceral and savage and slow, that no matter how the Sivatag tortures me, it’ll never compare to what he endured. How he screamed and bled because of me.

I pray his name again. I won’t stop reciting it until I’m dead.

The dark magic they used and the absence of the god of death means there’s no eternity for him.

There’s no afterlife where I’ll see his face, kiss his lips, feel his arms. If I leave this world, we both end, and my stubbornness won’t allow that.

So, with shaking limbs, I stand and walk.

I walk and walk and walk. I freeze. I ache.

I walk. The earth swallows me whole. The blackness eats at my sanity, and only when I’ve given up hope does the darkness lighten.

I can barely move, the blood in my veins sluggish with this frost, but my feet refuse to surrender.

The dimness turns an unnatural blue, and I follow it as fast as my battered body allows.

It takes an eternity. It takes only seconds.

The blue light hurts my eyes, and I blink as I enter the central chamber of this underground tomb. Magic consumed this place, turning the desert cold and the sand to stone. I squint as my vision adjusts, and when it finally clears, I see where the light emanates from.

My cry is a chilling song of heartbreak and solace.

It’s here. What I seek is here, and I move so fast, I stumble at the base of the altar.

My knees crack against the stone, but I don’t register the impact.

I feel nothing save the relief at finding it and the terror this object evokes.

For a second, I’m no longer in a freezing tomb but in the past, standing before him as they begin, as he screams.

“Calm yourself.” The voice is so quiet, I assume it’s my imagination. Even if it’s my mind conjuring The Stranger, it anchors me to the present, and I push to a stand.

I stare down at the altar, afraid to touch it.

To touch him. I hate myself for being a coward.

He wasn’t a coward. He screamed, but not because he was weak.

He greeted his punishment with a dignified rage, regretting nothing despite our brutal outcome.

No, he was brave, his gaze never leaving mine so I wouldn’t be afraid.

I forced myself to watch everything they did to him so he wouldn’t be alone.

It took a long time, magic keeping him conscious to prevent oblivion from softening his suffering.

He was awake until the bitter end, and I saw the agony and sorrow and love in his eyes until they blinked shut for the final time.

Cowardice never marred his features, and I won’t be weak now when he was remarkably strong.

With a fortifying breath, I pick the object up, knowing the frost will hurt, but I welcome the pain if it means I can hold part of him.

Because of the ice, it’s perfectly preserved.

The blood is as crimson as the day it was spilled.

I scream as black magic shoots through my flesh, but I clutch it to my chest, all the same, pressing the icy surface to my cheek so I can feel him through the ache.

I’ve finally found his second severed body part, and I cling to his leg, enduring the sting of its curse.

Tears flood my cheeks as I embrace his thigh, the drops melting his skin where they land.

It’s just one leg. A single fragment of his once powerful form, stretching from hip to foot, but it’s a piece of him.

Along with his torso that I rescued from Hreinasta’s holy fire, I have more of him than I did yesterday.

I can do this because his love gave me faith.

His training forged a warrior in my soul, and his death hardened my resolve.

I’ll find the rest of his scattered bones.

I don’t care how long it takes, how far I have to travel, or how much evil I must battle.

I’ll recover every severed limb, and then?

Then I’ll learn if The Stranger was telling the truth.

If he’ll keep his promise, or if I’m simply a foolish girl so desperate for hope that I’ve placed my trust in a madman.