His nerves calmed. He forced his gaze away from her chest area and tried to focus his stare on the water dripping from the spiky cave ceiling. Dazzling blue and violet flowers bloomed on the ceiling and patches of garden sprang up from the floor in the puddles.
The Raven plucked a flower from the ground and smelled it. “Ankhami,” she said with her eyes closed. She twirled the flower by its stem between her fingers and tossed a few chosen objects into the blanket. They vanished inside it. She rolled the blanket up and stuffed it in the burlap sack. “That’s four, five and six for me,” she said.
She kept all the best objects to herself. Out of his three objects, the Latin cross was the only thing he was interested in. Not just because of its wondrous glow, but because of what it represented. It gave him a sense of being and reminded him of his prize in peaceful paradise. One day all his troubles would end. He hung it around his neck. The spoon could come in handy, if he was ever desperate enough to gorge on Nothings, but he was fine with his barbot diet. The comb was pointless.
“What the hell am I gonna do with this spoon and comb?” he said.
“I’ll take them off your hands.” She held her palm out.
Cross stuffed the spoon and comb in his pockets.
“Congratulations,” she said. “You’re now worth thirteen objects.”
She offered him a drink from the empty flask. He took it and drank from it. The liquid seemed to appear at his lips, while the flask itself remained empty. The smoky, syrupy flavor of Peacock whiskey, his absolute favorite brand of bourbon, touched his tongue and fell smoothly down his throat. It tasted better than he even remembered.
And with that shared drink, he knew she had recruited him to be her partner—an unequal partner, but a partner still. It was better than burning to Nothing. He tugged his Latin cross, oddly confident that he was either going to steal all her objects from her or convince her to at least share them with him evenly.
“My neck is on the line,” he said. “Next time I want more objects. More than half.”
“You may deserve more, but when a job isn’t worth my while, I seek out other employment opportunities. Sometimes that hunt interferes with my current position. And I don’t think you want me to be late for your execution.”
“Well, if you’re late, you better not even show up. No one crosses me. Souls that try find out why they call me Cross. Eventually, they all get nailed.”
The two of them could fight off enemies and steal their objects better together than alone, but they weren’t friends. It was in his best interest to go with the flow of things for a while in order to get his hands on more objects of the dead, whether they were new or stolen from the Raven. He needed to collect as many useful objects as he could to help him break into paradise so that he could finally drink from the River Lethe and wipe all his memories away. Then all the damned would leave him alone.
A sting in his palm brought the sign he had been dreading for weeks. He squeezed the splinter from his skin and plucked it out knowing that it meant Cottontail had finally burned. She was a tough little cookie to have survived so long after being swallowed by a worm.
He didn’t count the periods of sleep since the worm had swallowed her, but he guessed that it must’ve been about seventy of them ago, give or take. He regretted giving up on her so easily. He was disgusted with himself. After all that time, he could have searched each of the one hundred eighty-two worm stomachs. She could have been with him.
Her second death would not go in vain though. In the name of Cottontail’s memory he vowed to himself to complete his journey no matter how difficult or who he had to cross.
He spent about a total of two months’ worth of sleeping and waking periods living with the Raven in the canyons, all the while keeping his eye on the burlap sack filled with all those useful the objects.
None of the objects in the Raven’s sack packed any of the fire power he would need to break into paradise, but he could have improvised and used the salamanders to light some explosives and maybe blow a hole in the great wall. He would just have to steal some explosives from one of the warring gangs. Since the compass attracted metal, he could use it to remove any bolts or hinges that stood in his way, possibly even buckle entire entrances, or relieve the guards of their weapons.
Every now and then, the Raven would throw on her justaucorps and fly off somewhere taking the sack of objects with her. He contemplated running away, but she would only find him. Then, the next time they ran their con she’d give him zero objects.
He also tried to line his sleep cycles up with hers so that they would both sleep and be awake at the same time, but she didn’t keep consistent sleeping patterns. He found himself falling asleep while she was still wide awake. When they slept at the same time, he would wake up to discover her up and about.
They lived as a team in the canyons of Viņsaule and developed a strange chemistry between them. She hunted and he gathered barbot. Her rope dart snatched barbot out of the sky as if she were pulling fish from a shallow pond. Very few things could swim in the lake of fire that was the sky. Barbots were one of them.
The underworld itself seemed to also decide that barbots would never become a Nothing. There was no official answer, but perhaps it was because the gentle birds were bred in the underworld, they never died a first death, which meant they could never die second deaths—the only way he knew for a soul to become a Nothing.
Most of his time spent with the Raven sailed by quietly. She wasn’t much of a talker, but she wasn’t so bad. All the shocking stories surrounding her had yet to reveal themselves to Cross. She was clever and beautiful—not primitive and grotesque as the tales depicted her. One morning she even brought back fresh barbot eggs she had stolen from a nest. They scrambled them for breakfast.
He was getting used to having her around. He liked the way she smelled and she was rather pretty, even in those manly clothes. She was delicate underneath. He liked the way her silky black hair swayed beyond her shoulders when she wasn’t wearing that awful top hat. He wanted to run his fingers through it.
Then, one day while he ate lunch, the Raven snuck up on him and began tying him up.
He dropped his barbot leg. “What’re you doing?”
“Binding you,” she said, stringing his hands together by the wrists.
“Why?”
“We’re going for a ride.” She tied his legs.
“Where are we going?” he asked.
“Duat.”
“That’s at least a week’s ride from here, including sleep time.”
“Mmhmm.”
“That’s a long way to go and be tied up.”
“If our little act is going to work you need be bound before we ride into town.”
“I don’t think anyone will notice if you wait till we get a little closer.”
“You just keep your neck attached to your shoulders. I’ll do the thinking.”
She lifted him up and placed him on the back of Gimlet face down. She mounted his cornurus and they made the treacherous journey from the Viņsaule canyons to the desert of Duat.
With endless swivels of Gimlet’s tail, the landscape gradually changed from jagged mountain ranges to waves of sand. From what he could see from his downward angle, the only indication that they had made it to the city of Amenthes were the sandals fitted onto paws. All the people of Amenthes wore funny garments from a time long before his.
He raised his head to take in the most beautiful city he had ever seen in the underworld. Amenthes shined and sparkled despite the sand, but even the sands shimmered in a golden gleam. The folk there sure knew how to take care of their realm.
Until Cross became a wanted soul, traveling throughout the underworld had never appealed to him. That’s why he had never seen many of the wonders—if you could call them that—each realm offered.
The giant pointy structures and temples that made up the realm of Duat were on full display in shiny black, gleaming red and shimmering white. Th
e magnificent triangular buildings rose to different heights, and the smooth stone that each were made of glistened in the fiery glow of the red sky.
He raised his head to see the peaks of each. The drawings in his old boss’s study had always featured an eye at the peak of the structure, but there were no giant eyes on any of the building peaks of Amenthes.
“Are these really pyramids?” he asked the Raven.
“Sure,” said the Raven. “And they have all kinds of objects locked in them.”
Nine pyramids equaled a lot of objects. It could be millions. They closed in on a temple and rode up the causeway. Cross met the eyes of a group of feline-faced women standing aside. He winked at one. She scoffed at him.
A painted gate surrounded the temple; it stretched across the realm from one end to the other and was decorated with colorful drawings of people and animals. The entrance led into a large open room without a roof. The walls of that room were decorated in the same colorful paintings as the front gate.
“Raven, you ever wonder why these souls would give up their precious valuables to chop off my head? I mean, they only want memories. What good are those? Mine ain’t nothing but—they’re just useless.”
“Useless maybe to you,” said the Raven. “To them, there’s nothing more valuable than life, even when it’s just a distant memory. Some would do just about anything for an exodus. No matter how minor the escape.”
A crowd had gathered inside the courtyard of the temple. Among the normal-looking human souls were dog heads and falcon heads on human bodies, human heads on lion bodies, spirits wrapped in bandages from head to toe and more of the beautiful cat ladies.
The souls of Amenthes were nice enough to make his execution more of a festival. In an odd way, he appreciated all effort they put into the decorations on such short notice. They didn’t know he was coming and already musicians were playing instruments while singers harmonized to the wondrous melody. The hypnotizing symphony was all for him, and he loved it for what it was.
He caught himself smiling and bobbing his head to the music and had to thrust himself back into character so as to not raise any suspicions. Hundreds of souls had gathered to see the show, and a show they were about to get.
He and the Raven repeated the con they had successfully pulled off with the squals. She turned him in. He cussed and fussed and protested. She collected the sack of objects. Two dog men grabbed him at his sides.
“Get your paws off me,” said Cross, playing up his role.
The mongrels shoved him past a ghostly spirit holding a sign that read: The Resurrection of the Dead Approaches. The End Is Near.
“You must mean the rear end,” said Cross. “Because your head’s far up your ass.”
One of the dog-men punched him in the stomach—a real punch that snatched all his wind from his lungs. There was no faking in his reaction. He doubled over trying to gather his breath and stamina.
The mangy mongrels dragged him across the glossy black floor, guided him up to a crystal altar and stood him in front of the high priest, a lion with all its hair shaved off. Ugly dark splotches tainted his wrinkled pink skin. The Raven held Cross’s blade out flat in both her hands and presented it to the high priest with her head bowed.
“As a token of my gratitude,” she said to the high priest, “I would suggest you use this blade.”
The high priest waved her off without even glancing at the blade. “We have our own.”
“Oh, not like this one,” said the Raven. “This once belonged to the goddess Sia.”
The high priest dropped his gaze onto the obsidian blade. “Are you sure?”
“I discovered it in Re’s boat. Thought maybe I’d find the sacred papyrus in there too, but this was all I found. The deities sure left in a hurry.”
The Raven lied almost as well as Cross, but he couldn’t figure out why she wanted the high priest to use his obsidian blade specifically. Even the high priest hesitated, lifting a suspicious eyebrow—or where his eyebrow would have been if he had any hair.
“Look, I have my bounty already,” said the Raven holding up the new sack of objects. “I could’ve left town without saying a word and kept the blade for myself. I just thought it would mean more to you and your people than it does to me. But if you don’t want it, I’m sure it can make some hodder happy.”
The high priest placed his paw on the blade. “No, no. We shall take it.”
The Raven sneaked a wink at Cross. He knew everything would be alright even as the dog-men laid him over their altar. He struggled as believably as he could without actually trying to escape.
“Let me go, you dirty mutts,” he said. “Why don’t you go chase your high priest down the road like the dogs you are? Your high priest is nothing but a bald pussy. You know it. I know it. Everybody knows it.”
The Amenthesians prayed over him just like the squals had, but in their own unique, guttural language. Their native tongue sounded as if they were chanting magic spells, even though the only magic in the underworld lay within the objects that special souls brought to their afterlife in their death.
The high priest waved over him a gold object that looked similar to his Latin cross, except it had a loop extending out of the crossbeam. The hairless lion touched Cross’s nose with the object. It sparked and sent a tingle throughout his bones from his head to his toes and then back. The high priest then touched the soft spot on Cross’s forehead with the object and held it there. The skin on Cross’s head tightened and his eyes pinched shut. Upon its removal, his skin relaxed and went back to normal.
“He is ready.” The high priest sat the object down, and then raised the blade to display it for the crowd before speaking a few more words in the harsh but magical sounding language.
With the Raven on his side now, an extra bit of confidence resided within Cross, perhaps more than deserved. But since he was powerless to escape on his own, trusting that the Raven wouldn’t double cross him because she needed him for another con was more respectable than pleading for his afterlife like some yellow belly.
He laid there on the crystal altar waiting patiently for the Raven to strike. Anytime now she would swoop down heroically and rescue him, the damsel in distress. The idea of him being a damsel suddenly felt wrong, but it was better than getting his head chopped off. All he had to do was wait. And wait he did. And he waited some more.
The Raven sure was taking her time to whip out her rope dart. The longer the high priest spoke without any intervention from the Raven the more anxious he grew. Real sweat dripped from his face to his ear. What was taking her so long?
The high priest switched to a language he could understand. “The Man Who Remembers!” The crowd burst into a gleeful yells and hollers at the announcement of his alias. “We condemn him to be beheaded by the blade of the goddess, Sia. May the Great Goddess have mercy on his soul.”
Cross tilted his head up and searched behind the crowd for the Raven. He surveyed the pyramids peak, checked the temple wall, and scanned the crowd. She was nowhere he could see.
If the Raven had decided to end their partnership now, she could have easily ridden off with all those objects and never come back. Had she abandoned him?
He should have never trusted her. No one’s word was their bond anymore. No honor was left in the damned. They had lost all their honor in life. He was a fool, a fool that was going to lose his head because he’d lost his head around the wrong soul. He should’ve known better.
The high priest pressed Cross’s head down flat onto the cold altar. He struggled sincerely.
“Wait! Don’t do this. Please!”
The two dog-men restrained his limbs from either side. The high priest raised the blade and swung down.
DIAMOND TOOTH GUIDED HER HELLHOUND UP THE CANYON WALLS of Viņsaule. She followed the four dead orbs that hung suspended directly over the mesa where Carson’s lonely abode nestled. Two baby barbots strutted around the cliff dwelling. The hellhound barked and the birds flapped
away. Barbot soup aroma swam in the air. A head too big for the body it was attached to bobbed away from behind the drought filled well and raced into the isolated house, probably to warn the rest of the family. Diamond Tooth hoped so.
She tied the hellhound to a post and stood in the doorway of the home. She waited at the threshold for a moment and basked in the family’s nervousness, unrest, and uncertainty. Their wave of despondency showered over her and filled her with mirth.
Across the room, Carson wiped the glass cage strapped around his head with a rag. A larger cage wrapped around his waist and surgical sutures ran along his body where the wounded mutt had stitched himself back together. It was homemade patchwork designed to mend the injuries he had sustained in the wars, injuries that would never heal under the medical supervision of the underworld.
It severely irked her that he wasn’t suffering though. Not only had he made amends with his disfigurement, he wasn’t even afraid of her. The rest of the family’s fear caked the air with the same strength as a baking factory. But Carson’s scent painted him as a pillar of intrepidness.
He must’ve known someone was coming for him. He was prepared. And there was nothing remotely intimidating about her appearance. Souls often underestimated her in that regard. Even though her blond hair always remained undone and she didn’t bother painting her face with silly makeup, she was more equipped to seduce a man than frighten him. But seduction was never her style and she never allowed her physical beauty to prevent her from causing physical harm.
The wife exchanged looks with her husband. She bore no arms; a makeshift arm hung around her neck on a string like a necklace. The whole family appeared as if they had been assembled from body pieces they found lying around. Their daughter with the adult sized head glanced up at her mother. The woman’s fake arm caressed the girl and they walked out the rear of the house.
Diamond Tooth stepped inside the man’s home as if she had been invited. Her heeled boots clomped across the tiled, chessboard-colored floor. She passed a tower of boxes that defied the normal laws of gravity. They were stacked from the ceiling down and never reached the floor. Four brooms came alive, and swept up the dirt she had tracked in. She sat down at the dinner table and helped herself to a bowl of barbot soup.
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