Then the darkness swallows me, and there are only the sounds of misery and the glowing eyes of the beastly guards to mark the path forward. The temperature drops fifteen degrees—though I only know this because of the way the hot breath of the beasts hangs in the air—the atmosphere damp and cavelike.
It is terribly silent here, as though this space swallows sound, but I can feel the stone growing thicker around me, the presence of the place somehow both utterly dead and frightening alive.
No one stops me as I enter, but I can already see how this place would seem impenetrable to anyone other than a reaper.
As I move, the ground slopes steeply downward, and I feel like a parcel sliding down a throat. Around me, things I cannot see slither and skitter.
The pull of the name in my pocket tugs me deeper, and deeper still.
The moans and groans of the prisoners I pass are nothing compared to the outright screaming of others clearly in the midsts of unimaginable torture. Their cries echo from every corner, seem to seep out of the very walls. The place pulses with pain; there is no other way to put it.
If the monstrous structure I have entered was a body, I would say I found the owner of the name somewhere near the bowels, having visited all the horrors along the journey there.
Torches hanging at intervals along the wall provide a flickering orange light that makes the shadows move as if dancing to an eternal tune. I pause before a hole in the wall, just big enough to put an eye to, if one dared.
As it is, I do not need to see with my eyes to know my quarry is on the other side of this wall. And I do not need a key to enter.
I simply step right through.
There are no torches inside the windowless cell. No light at all to speak of. Darkness as thick as this could drive a sane man mad.
There is a click, and a small flame appears in the corner. It hovers before touching to the end of a hand-rolled cigarette. The end of the joint flares as the smoker draws from it, and in the dim glow, I catch sight of the face attached to the name that drew me here.
“I can’t see you, but I know you’re there,” says the male. “I’ve been waiting for you. Knew you’d come eventually… Who sent you? Was it Annabelle? It was Annabelle, wasn’t it?Never mind, don’t tell me… Just get on with it, then.”
He draws from the smoke, the scent of cloves mingling with the putrid aroma of the prison. The glow of the cigarette reflects in the curved blade of my scythe, and provides just enough light for me to make out his features.
I pause. He is grimy and underfed, but he is handsome, and looks mostly human. I’m not sure what I’d been expecting, but this was certainly not it.
Questions try to bubble up in my mind—Who is this person? What did he do to get in here?—But I put a stop to them before they can fully manifest.
The very first rule of becoming a reaper? Don’t ask questions about the souls you reap. It can only lead to misery.
Then again, as far as rules go, I was on the precipice of breaking quite a few of them.
Unless I stopped now. I could still stop right now…
Or maybe I’m just kidding myself. Maybe Samael had been right back at the bookstore. Maybe I’m already cascading down a slope too slippery to climb back up.
The handsome male draws from his square, blows out a slow puff of smoke, smacks his lips as if he is about to say something.
What, I will never know.
I swing my scythe, same as I have countless times before, and reap his soul before my right mind can demand better of me.
The Abbah claps her hands together, a jubilant smile lighting up her old face.
Her features seem far less motherly and kind than just the last time I was here.
“Less than hour!” she says. “You accomplished what I’ve been trying to do for centuries in less than an hour!” She cackles in delight, and my stomach flips at the sound of it.
“Now, that’s efficient!” she continues. “Such a shame you have to go. We would make a good team, me and you.”
She reaches into her skirts and holds up the vial of glowing green liquid. She extends it out to me.
A big part of me does not want to take it. I take it, anyway. I study it for only a moment before slipping it into my pocket.
When I just stand there, the Abbah looks at me, cocking her head this way and that in that birdlike manner of hers.
“What are you waiting for, child?” she asks. Her head tilts, listening. Understanding lights her face and she smiles slowly. “You have questions but you don’t really want the answers to them.”
She is right, but I don’t have to give her the satisfaction of acknowledging it. Instead, I take my bounty and turn on my heels.
In two short strides, I am out of her tent, the sounds, scents, and sights of the Market filling in the world once again.
But before I slip away entirely, I hear the Abbah’s triumphant laugh.
9 5:45 p.m.
“The Father has not yet set a bounty for your soul, but he will do so soon enough,” says the reaper. “So if you’re determined to doom yourself, you might as well indulge a little first, don’t you think?”
I don’t jump at the sudden appearance, the deep rumble of the voice, though it does raise the hair on the back of my neck and chill bumps over the tops of my arms.
I look over at Samael. He looks the same as ever; strong, imposing, handsome and unyielding. His dark hair eats the sunlight, the muscled wings on his back doing the
