The Edge of Everything

by Jeff Giles

Banger seemed touched by the invitation. He smiled, and sat back down on the stone floor. Zoe pointed to a tattoo on his right arm: a weird, spotted animal with a spiked tail and a long curving neck that nearly touched the ground.

  “X has that one, too,” she said. “I never asked him about it. You have different animals in the Lowlands, huh?”

  Banger snorted.

  “We actually don’t,” he said. “The guy who inks all the bounty hunters? He’s this senile old dude who’s been dead since, like, Pompeii—and he doesn’t remember what a lot of animals actually look like. This one is supposed to be a giraffe.”

  “No way,” said Zoe.

  “Way!” said Banger.

  “People don’t say that anymore either,” said Zoe.

  “I figured,” said Banger. “Anyway, I wigged out when I saw the tat. This thing with the horns is supposed to be a monkey.”

  Zoe laughed. She thought of “Never Don’t Stop.” Would she ever date a guy with normal tattoos?

  “Does X know they aren’t real animals?” she said.

  “I never told him,” said Banger. “It’d break his heart, and I’m kind of protective of him—because, like you said, he’s an innocent. Don’t you tell him, either, okay?”

  “I won’t,” said Zoe. She smiled. “I’m kind of protective of him, too.”

  Zoe glanced at her watch. It was nearly ten. Soon, her mom would be outside honking for her. She didn’t want Banger to go. He was her only connection to X, and she liked him. But he had an evil bus driver to find. His eyes had lost their glint. His sugar high had ended. He seemed to be crashing, and was sweating faintly again.

  Banger had endangered himself by taking even an hour to deliver X’s message—he’d put himself at the mercy of not just the Trembling but the lords. Zoe had been so obsessed with her own feelings that it hadn’t occurred to her.

  “Are you going to get in trouble for coming here?” she asked.

  Banger shrugged.

  “Yeah, maybe,” he said. “But after the mess I made of my life, they can’t do anything to me I don’t deserve.”

  He stared down at his hands just for something to look at. They were calloused and bruised and held nothing.

  “You know how you said you didn’t judge me?” he said.

  “Yeah,” said Zoe.

  “You should,” he said. “I’m not anything like X. I wish I was.”

  Zoe didn’t know what to say. She waited.

  “You know why I stabbed that guy?” said Banger. “Because he was acting like a dipshit, and I was in a bad mood.” He paused. “My whole life was a bad mood.”

  Zoe didn’t want to hear any more.

  “You don’t have to talk about this,” she said.

  “I want to,” Banger said. “After I killed him, I emptied the cash register and bolted. Never spoke to my wife or daughter again—because what would I say?” Again, he paused. “My daughter was autistic. She had this thing where you couldn’t hug her. It just, like, overloaded her system. She’d totally freak out. She’d be eight now. Probably has no idea if I’m alive or dead.” Banger looked away. “So, anyway, yeah—you can judge me.”

  It was Zoe’s turn to look at her hands.

  “Are you sorry?” she managed.

  “God, yes,” said Banger. He pulled off his hat, revealing again the catastrophic bruises that he’d inflicted on himself. “Have you met my forehead?”

  Zoe frowned—seeing his forehead the second time was no easier than the first.

  “Being sorry’s got to count for something,” she said.

  “Does it?” said Banger, as he pulled his hat back on. “I’m not so sure. It’s pretty easy to say you’re sorry—especially once you get caught.”

  Zoe asked him if he ever thought of trying to visit his wife and daughter while he was out of the Lowlands.

  “I’m too ashamed,” he said. “I’ve had a lot of time to think deep thoughts, and here’s the thing: you can’t do what I did to my family and expect them to forgive you. Hearts are fragile—the good ones, at least. Best thing would be if they decided I was just a bad dream.”

  Banger stood, wincing as he unfolded his long limbs. Zoe followed him to the door. The candy in his pockets creaked and crunched with every step.

  Outside, the wind was blowing the snow around. After the warm, humid air inside Piping Hot Springs, it came as a shock to the skin. There was a lamp above the door. Banger stood in the small cone of light, as if it would warm him. He rubbed his bare arms, and squinted into the distance.

  “You can’t go running around Montana without a coat,” said Zoe.

  “What’s it gonna do—kill me?” said Banger.

  Zoe groaned at the joke. She went inside and retrieved X’s overcoat. She held it open for Banger.

  “You serious?” he said, slipping his arms into the sleeves before she could change her mind. “You are the bomb diggity.”

  Zoe rolled her eyes—but fondly. There was no way this guy had ever kept up with slang.

  “Will you tell X I love him?” she said. “And will you give him some of the candy?”

  “I’ll tell him you love him,” said Banger, “but no way can he have my candy.”

  He stepped out of the light, and onto the snow.

  “No matter what happens with you and X,” he said, “I’m glad he ran into you. He’s a good dude—and you’ve given him a little bit of a life.”

  “Do you think the lords will really set him free?” said Zoe. “Be honest, I can handle it. No, wait—don’t be honest. I can’t handle it.” She released a long, tired breath. “The odds aren’t very good, huh?” she said.

  Banger was just a voice in the darkness now.

  “Who cares about odds?” he said. “What were the odds that he’d ever meet somebody like you?”

  part four

  A Divided Heart

  fifteen

  One more soul.

  The words shouted in X’s brain.

  He turned on his side in his cell. Despite Ripper’s nursing, his wounds weren’t entirely healed, and they cried out as they scraped the ground. He didn’t care. He lived in his mind now. His body existed only to prop it up.

  One. More. Soul.

  He could only see Zoe again if he brought the lords a final bounty. He thought of the Overworld—of the hunters with their necklaces of geese, of the cannibals who wore skulls on a rope. How many could you wear before the weight of the dead pulled you to the ground?

  He would snatch their soul for them. Of course he would. All that troubled him was how simple it sounded. He turned the phrase “one more soul” over and over in his head. He searched for the trapdoor hidden between the words. What if they required an innocent man? What if they demanded a child? He was consumed with seeing Zoe. Thinking of her, thinking of Jonah—even thinking of their mother who had grown cold toward him—sent a bolt of anguish through him. Still, there were things he would not do, even if the lords commanded him. It was not that he was too noble. He wasn’t. It was that he didn’t want to disappoint Zoe. She would not want horrors committed in her name.

  X decided that he himself was the only true danger. When Regent—it was too perilous to even think of him as Tariq—sent him to the Overworld to hunt the last soul, would he run to Zoe instead? Would he enrage the lords and obliterate his single hope for happiness? Could he stop himself? Even now, he could feel Zoe’s fingers on three very particular places: his lips, his hips, his shoulders. He shivered, as if she were in the cell with him, wrapped around him like a vine and breathing onto his neck. How could it be that the thing that made him strong also brought him to his knees?

  A sudden noise interrupted X’s thoughts. The Russian guard was escorting someone down the corridor. X heard a voice say, “Chillax. It’s not like I forgot where my friggin’ cell is, dude.”

  It was Banger.

  X leaped to his feet. He had to know if his friend had seen Zoe, as he had asked him to—had begged him to, really. It wa
s all he could do not to scream the question in front of the Russian. He held his tongue. He waited for the men to come into view. The guard strode in front. Rather than his usual powder-blue tracksuit, he wore a shining cherry-red one. He was so towering and wide—and strutted so proudly in his new finery—that X could barely see Banger behind him. But there he was. And he too was dressed in some new garment. It was so deeply blue it was nearly black.

  X did not recognize it for a moment.

  Then it struck him.

  It was his own overcoat—Banger had seen Zoe.

  The guard thrust his key into the cell next door. He waited for Banger to catch up, idly snorting up phlegm and then swallowing it.

  Banger shuffled into his cell. X craned his neck, desperate to catch his eye, but the Russian blocked his view. X cursed silently. He was about to withdraw into his own cell when Banger leaned back out and looked directly at X. He flipped up the collar of the coat—and winked.

  The Russian loitered for ages. Mostly, he paraded manfully back and forth in front of Ripper, who took a perverse pleasure in flirting with him.

  “You have noticed new suit, yes?” said the guard.

  “Oh, I have indeed,” said Ripper. “You cut a dashing figure. You will be the talk of the Lowlands!”

  “You may touch suit,” said the guard. “Do not tell others. They may not touch suit.”

  The guard reached his arm into Ripper’s cell. X shook his head as he watched. He was not in the least surprised when Ripper bit the man.

  “You are monster!” cried the Russian, pulling his arm back and inspecting his cherry-red sleeve for rips. “You have teeth of animal!”

  Still, he lingered at her cell another half hour. X had nearly exploded with frustration when he heard Banger whisper.

  “Come to the bars,” he said. “Fast.”

  X did as he was instructed.

  “One, two—three,” said Banger.

  He thrust the coat through the bars. X grabbed for it and pulled it into his cell.

  “Zoe rocks,” said Banger. “She said she loves you, and I said you love her, et cetera, et cetera. It’s all good in the ’hood.” He paused. “There’s a candy bar for you in the pocket.”

  “How can I thank you?” said X.

  “It’s just a candy bar, dude,” said Banger.

  “You mistake my meaning,” said X. “How can I thank you for being a true friend to me—when I was never much of a friend to you?”

  The words must have meant something to Banger, for he was silent awhile.

  “Ain’t no thang,” he said.

  “You are wrong,” said X. “It is very much a thang.”

  A thought occurred to him.

  He took off the purple shirt with the curly white stitching. He folded it carefully, smoothing out the creases as best he could. It was a garish object, yet he had seen Banger covet it.

  X crouched down by the bars.

  “One, two—three,” he said.

  He passed the shirt to Banger. He could hear him giggling as he slipped it on.

  “Dude,” said Banger. “I look friggin’ hot in this.”

  By the time the Russian lumbered away, Banger had fallen into a deep, animal sleep, exhausted by his adventures in the Overworld. X sat against the wall, the overcoat spread over his lap. It was wet from Banger’s fall into the river. Still, when X pressed his face against it, he could detect the faintest scent of Zoe’s skin. It went through him like a flame.

  Thanks to Jonah, X actually knew what a candy bar was, and, looking for relief from his thoughts, he slipped a hand into one of the coat pockets.

  Instead of candy, he found a piece of paper.

  Both sides were covered with markings he could not identify. The mystery of what it said was unbearable. Maybe it was a message from Zoe?

  He asked Ripper if she was awake. He spoke just loudly enough to ensure that he would wake her if she wasn’t.

  “I am always awake,” said Ripper. “Surely you know that by now? My brain is like a fireworks factory.”

  “Might you read something to me?” said X. “Something I have discovered in my coat?”

  “Pass it to me,” said Ripper. “Quickly. That ridiculous Russian will soon be back for another bite.”

  X maneuvered the paper through the bars. He listened as Ripper unfolded it, his heart racing.

  “It is a list of some kind,” she announced at last. “Is this the hand of your blurting girl? Heavens, she scrawls like an unschooled child. She is incapable of spelling ‘raisins’—and her fondness for the capital Y borders on the terrifying.”

  She studied the paper further.

  “Wait,” she said. “The writing on the other side is not nearly so maddening.”

  “Read it out to me?” said X.

  Ripper cleared her throat, and began:

  Dear X: Here is a letter for you. You’re probably thinking that (a) I have no way of sending it and (b) you don’t know how to read anyway. So, yeah, this isn’t a totally practical letter. I get it. Can we move on now, please? I have to get these words out of my brain—they’re killing me. I don’t care if they never go farther than this piece of paper. Maybe that will help. Anyway, here’s the main thing I want to say (I’m taking a superdeep breath—picture me taking a superdeep breath, okay?) … The minute you left, I realized I loved you. Crap, I’m already running out of paper. I should have written smaller.

  Ripper broke off suddenly.

  “I must say, she is a very unconventional correspondent,” she said.

  “Is there no more?” said X desperately.

  “Yes, yes, there’s more, my lovesick boy,” said Ripper. “Restrain yourself.”

  She continued:

  The minute I wake up now, my thoughts go straight to you, like gravity pulled them there. You tried so hard not to take Stan. You trusted me when I said it was wrong. Watching you suffer for what was right was the first thing that made me love you, I think. Then there were a ton of other things that I don’t have enough paper for. I hate your sadness, X—even more than I hate my own. When you come back (please come back), let’s get rid of our sadness, okay? When you come back (please, please come back), let’s bury our sadness under 15 feet of snow. Love, Zoe.

  X said nothing. Zoe’s words faded into the air, and he leaned forward, listening hard, as if he could pull them back into being.

  “Would you read it again?” he said.

  “Of course,” said Ripper, “for even I think it is lovely in its way. But might I ask how many times you shall require me to read it?”

  “Until it is fixed in my memory—and I can speak every word back to you,” he said.

  After a dozen readings, X finally let Ripper rest. She returned the paper to him, and withdrew to the back of her cell, complaining about the state of her throat. X ran his fingers over the letter, trying to connect the markings on the paper with the words he had memorized. He taught himself “love” and “Zoe,” as well as “superdeep” and “crap.”

  Then he sat for hours holding the paper and the coat. He wondered when Regent would send him for the final soul. He wondered if he could survive the terrible wait.

  He whispered to Ripper that Regent had told him his true name.

  Ripper did not answer immediately.

  “Do not even tell me what it is,” she said. “He is a lunatic for having revealed it.”

  “I will never tell a soul,” said X.

  The churning of his brain finally tired him. Sleep hit him so unexpectedly that he dropped off while sitting against the wall and balancing Zoe’s letter on his palm as if it were made of glass.

  He dreamed he was back in the lords’ giant chamber. It was empty. He had snuck in. The marble steps gleamed, the river rushed overhead. He had only seconds to do what he needed to do. He strode to the wall where the map of the Lowlands was embedded in the marble like some massive fossil. He searched for clues about where his parents were held. He ran his fingers along the symbols. T
here were too many—and he could not decipher them. The rock began to burn under his touch. He was not supposed to be there. The map knew that, somehow. His face was hit with a wave of heat.

  When X wrenched himself from the dream, he found that the dark bruises on his cheeks were burning, and that Regent had come with the name of the 16th soul.

  X was startled to see the lord in his cell. How long had he been there? Why hadn’t he woken him? What reason could there be for delaying, even by a moment, his final hunt?

  X rubbed the sleep from his eyes, but that only made the pain worse. He took a breath to steady himself. He looked up again at Regent, and saw that his face was heavy with sorrow. Something was wrong. The certainty of it hit X’s heart like a hammer.

  Regent didn’t speak, didn’t move. He just regarded X miserably, his dark, muscular arms hanging at his side, as if the blood were draining out of him. Nothing about the moment was ordinary. Nothing was right. X wanted to ask Regent what he meant by his silence, but his brain was so frantic now that it could not build a simple sentence.

  X began to stand, desperate to break the stillness of the cell. Regent, moving for the first time, like a statue suddenly coming to life, shook his head and gestured for X to lie on his back. X should have been relieved that the ritual was about to begin—that the moment he could touch Zoe again was finally drawing nearer, that something like life would finally unfold. Instead, he lay down as if into a grave.

  Regent knelt beside him. He opened his right hand. X could see the lines that ran like rivers through his palm. He closed his eyes and waited for the hand to descend. It did not. After a moment, X opened his eyes again. He stared up at the lord questioningly. He did not think he could bear another moment.

  At last, Regent spoke.

  “The Lowlands require another soul for its collection,” he began, as he always did. “He is an evil man—unrepentant and unpunished.”

  Instead of going on, Regent paused and another maddening silence filled the cell. When he spoke again, he departed from the ritual’s ancient text.

  X had never heard a lord sound so wounded and raw.