A Shade of Vampire 85: A Shard of Soul

by Bella Forrest

  “You won’t get away with this,” Unending grunted, pushing herself back up. But she could barely stand, her being still struggling to adjust to its new, albeit unseen condition.

  Spirit chuckled. “I already have. Your people know not to mess with me. I will forge ahead with my revenge against Death. I will get it. I will prevail. And then, my dear, I will come back to see you and rub it in your face.”

  “The others won’t let you.” Unending was breathing heavily under the seals’ titanic pressure. But her words only brought more amusement for Spirit.

  “My dear. I’ve already taken care of them. They, too, were foolish to say no, so they didn’t leave me another choice. And I cannot rely on Widow, Soul, or Phantom, since they’ve signed themselves over to Thieron’s protection. The fools.”

  “I’m sorry,” Arya whispered, a single tear streaming down her cheek. She knew what she’d done by not doing anything, and she was already learning to live with it.

  The Unending was conflicted. I could feel it. The rage inside her bubbled to the surface as she raised a hand and presented her scythe. I marveled at the beauty of its blade and the delicate handle. Despite its graceful design, however, the weapon passed a horrible sentence.

  She may have been bound to Visio, but she had not been rendered powerless, and she intended to fight this with everything she had. But before she could attempt anything against Spirit, Unending had to punish the Aeternae.

  “Don’t be sorry, Arya,” Unending said. “Everything that comes your way from now on will be on you. It will be your doing. Not one of you sought me for days. You dared question my being. You allowed the Spirit Bender to screw with your minds,” she continued, her voice rumbling like thunder. It made the Aeternae woman quiver as Unending’s scythe shone brighter and brighter until it blinded her momentarily. “You stood by and watched as he hurt me. He bound me to you, and now you will all be bound to death and blood!”

  Before she could utter the curse, however, Spirit threw a powerful blue pulse at her. It hit Unending in the solar plexus, and she fell on her back, unable to get back up. Arya breathed a sigh of relief, lowering her gaze.

  This could’ve been the moment in which the Aeternae would’ve become blood drinkers, but Spirit stopped it. I wasn’t sure how the rest of this encounter would go, but once the last seal was placed and three reincarnations later, Unending would eventually catch up and finish what she’d started here, dooming their entire species to life by blood and blood alone.

  I quickly remembered the texts from Kalla’s books—the so-called legends regarding Eternity and how she’d become bound to Visio. They’d been substantially embellished, though I wasn’t sure why. Maybe it was because the tales had been transmitted orally at first, before they were put on paper. After all, in the legend, Spirit had offered to be Unending’s Lord Supreme. In reality, he’d offered a partnership. He’d revealed to have been the one who killed Erethiel, too, but Unending was already aware of this by the time he got to Visio. There were several inconsistencies in the mythology, but one thing did become clear, as Unending whispered into her scythe, angrily eyeing Arya.

  “My misery will haunt you all,” Unending said, prompting the Aeternae to frown and quiver in her boots.

  “What are you talking about?” she asked.

  “You’ll see someday,” she replied, before Spirit cast another shimmering pulse in her direction, enough to push her back down. It was too late, though. This was the moment where the Black Fever had been born, from her suffering. At some point in the future, it would take hold of the Aeternae, and they would experience their first outbreak of this terrible curse.

  The Unending’s own creation betrayed her, and that was why she would never be able to rise against Death. She couldn’t do to Death what they had done to her because the feeling this entire affair had provoked inside Unending was so terrible, so unbearable, that she couldn’t wish it upon her worst enemy.

  In here, the dice had been thrown. Her fate had been decided a long time ago. Out there, we still had an inkling of hope. It wasn’t much, but maybe it would be just enough to get us all through this fresh hell we found ourselves in.

  The worst part also awaited us in the real world. I had a few things to clear with Arya over all of this.

  Kelara

  It felt like a long time since I’d last visited the Nightmare Forest. That wasn’t the case, of course, but as I looked around I had the distinct impression that I was finally reunited with an old friend. The Nightmare Forest was a cold, dark and savage place, riddled with all kinds of dangers for the living. Wild animals big and fast enough to tear an Aeternae’s head off. Creatures with poisonous venom that could cripple and kill every other species that lived in this world.

  “Where’s Taeral now?” I asked. “He’s been staying out of sight from everyone, us Reapers included.”

  “Death has a gag order, so to speak. He’s not to intervene unless she commands it,” Soul said. “It was a recent communication. She can see through his eyes, now, as well as ours… she’s holding him back until she considers it appropriate for him to intervene. Oh, there we go, more ghosts…” His gaze wandered somewhere to my right.

  What our living friends didn’t know, however, was that the Nightmare Forest was also home to a handful of wandering souls. Ghosts that had slipped through the cracks, having learned to hide themselves from everyone and everything. Seeley had done a planet-wide search for their kind upon his arrival, but they’d managed to escape his sight.

  “Regarding Taeral, I have to admit, it’s pissing me off. He might be useful,” I muttered, watching the spirits walk between the trees.

  “But Thieron is more important. Hence the hesitation. I say we don’t rely on him, for now. I don’t trust Death with the proper judgment on this,” Spirit replied. “Notice how they’re calm. Not running scared or anything,” he added, nodding toward the ghosts.

  It had become common knowledge to us that the Darklings’ Knight Ghouls were often let loose to feed on these souls, since there were no Reapers left to take them into the afterlife—the purpose had never been to spare the dead their wandering misery, but rather to silence any witnesses.

  I’d seen some of these ghosts moving through the woods before. They watched us with curious eyes, never daring to approach us. I would catch glimpses of them out of the corner of my eye. Faint, translucent figures that flickered and vanished from sight whenever I turned my head.

  “We should reap them at some point,” Soul said as we walked through the woods.

  The night had settled over the realm, frost gathering at the base of gnarly old trees and covering the dark green leaves in a thin layer of snowy white. This was the first sign of a colder season coming—sudden drops in temperature that we Reapers couldn’t exactly feel but could still observe. We moved through the twilight, unheard and unseen by anything that breathed in the night.

  “I wholeheartedly agree, but we should get them to open up a little bit first and tell us what they’ve seen,” I replied. “If anyone knows about Darkling movements in the Nightmare Forest, it’s the ghosts.”

  “And since their eventual cooperation might not give us anything useful, you didn’t tell the GASP people about them, so as not to get their hopes up. Am I getting that right?” he asked, and I shook my head no in response. “Then why keep it from them? You asked all the Reapers, plus Nethissis, not to tell GASP or anyone else about the ghosts.”

  I offered him a dry smile. “We’ve been breaking so many of Death’s rules lately, I figured we could at least stick to this one. The living don’t need to know about the dead here. It’s not their business. If we can get the spirits to talk, if we can gather any kind of useful intel from them, you and I are perfectly capable of relaying that knowledge back to GASP.”

  “Look at you, all stiff and rule-abiding,” Soul muttered, not hiding his amusement.

  “Like I said. We’ve been absolute rebels. I see this as one way to sort of… sweet
en the pot when our bill is due. You know Death is going to flay us every which way, right?”

  He chuckled. “Why? We’re helping.”

  “Yeah, but we’re also setting a bad example for other Reapers,” I replied. “Think about it. How many death laws have we broken so far?”

  He did think about it, and I could see the humor fading from his expression. “Quite a few.”

  “And yes, she will obviously commend us if we succeed. By the stars, she will kiss and hug each of us. She will weep tears of joy and gratitude. But then she’ll take charge of the kingdom of the dead once more, and you know what will happen after that.”

  “She’ll have to set an example.” Soul sighed. “Yes. You’re right.”

  We stayed away from any beaten paths, making our way through the underbrush and the most obscure parts of the woods—we’d already learned the hard way that the Darklings had ways of spotting us, so why risk it? Darkness was our friend in the Nightmare Forest, because darkness hid pretty much everything. Our enemies were alive, and they had their eyes to rely on. It was time to go back to the basics, which I didn’t mind at all. It reminded me of my own living days. And the many mistakes I’d made prior to my last breath.

  To our left, a spirit walked in silence, barely giving us a glance. He didn’t seem to care much about us, unlike the others who dwelled here with him, and that made me curious. We’d been following ancient tracks, and we weren’t making any progress in finding the Darklings—Corbin in particular—so a new approach was sorely needed.

  “Look to my nine o’clock,” I whispered.

  Soul gave me a sideways glance, then saw past me, noticing the spirit. “New travel companion?”

  “He’s been walking in the same direction for the past twenty minutes,” I told him. “Maybe he’s trying to tell us something.”

  “We could approach him, but remember, not all spirits are sane or coherent. Some wander for too long. They lose their minds eventually and end up functioning on loops,” Soul said.

  I shrugged. “It depends on how long he’s been around, really. Centuries are not as bad as millennia. At least he’s not running away from us, so that should tell us something.” Pausing for a moment, I reflected on all the times I’d seen ghosts during my reaping missions. Most of them had been around for a few days, at least. Sometimes decades, at the very most. They had yet to lose their minds or function on loops, like Soul said. “Have you ever come across such poltergeists yourself? I mean, I’ve heard stories about them, and I’ve been instructed on the topic, but I haven’t encountered ancient ghosts myself.”

  “Oh, yeah. Some were impossible to even reason with,” Soul said. “Others were too angry, decayed by the feeling of abandonment. The existence of such entities used to be really rare, though. Maybe one lost soul for every thousand reaped. The ratio in these woods, where the ghosts seem to have found a scrap of safety away from the Knight Ghouls, is infinitely more troubling.”

  Soul and I stopped walking, just to see what the spirit would do next. He stilled before finally turning his head to look our way. He seemed faded, like a glitching hologram that could barely hold its own form. His hair was black, and his skin looked darker. “He’s a Rimian,” I whispered. “Well, at least he used to be a Rimian.”

  “Don’t be afraid,” Soul told him. “We have no intention of harming you.”

  “We just want to know what you might’ve seen in the forest lately,” I added, taking my first step toward the spirit. He didn’t budge, but he didn’t give me a friendly vibe, either. Silence hung heavy between us, until he found the strength to answer.

  “Will you end it?” he asked.

  “End what?” I replied.

  “My life like this. I cannot take it anymore…”

  “We’ll take you where you belong, I promise,” Soul said. “Your world has been thrown off its natural balance, but we’re here to make things right. Tell us what you’ve seen, and I’ll make sure you get to move on.”

  The man sighed and walked toward us. “You’re on the right path.”

  “How so? I haven’t seen a single fresh trail,” I said. “It’s been days since someone’s passed through here.”

  “Look for the eyes. The trees have eyes.”

  I frowned, glancing around and trying to make sense of what the Rimian ghost was talking about. All I could see was the hard, dark-brown-and-black bark, a thick crust enveloping each tree trunk. There was no… My own mind trailed off as I recognized the carving. It was so subtle that it was barely noticeable. “Soul, look here…” I murmured, reaching the nearest tree. I ran my fingers over the eye-shaped rune, which had been cut with a sharp knife. Beads of amber had formed, and they looked like tears.

  “What is this?” Soul asked, visibly troubled. He hadn’t seen this sign before.

  “It’s on all the trees,” the ghost said. “Wherever the Darklings go in the Nightmare Forest, they leave these marks. They know you’re here.”

  A chill rushed through me. “What do you mean they know we’re here? What do these runes do?”

  “They know you’re here.”

  “They know we’re here,” Soul repeated after him, his voice fading as he looked at me, fear glimmering in his galaxy eyes. “Kelara, they’ve been watching us through these runes. From the moment we left Orvis, they’ve gone to great lengths to make sure they could see us coming, knowing we’d be following their old tracks.”

  We should’ve anticipated something like this, but the runes were barely visible. There wasn’t a single fresh trace to indicate that the Darklings had been through this area. Nothing throughout our journey so far had pointed to the enemy’s presence in our vicinity. Soul revealed his scythe, giving the ghost a flat smile. “That’s why you were following us, isn’t it? You wanted to warn us.”

  “Yes.”

  “Why didn’t you speak up sooner?” I asked, trying my best not to get angry.

  “I couldn’t find the strength until you approached me. It’s hard to explain, but I’ve been like this for a very long time. I haven’t spoken to anyone in years. Words don’t come as easily as before,” the spirit said. “I’m sorry.”

  “We’re still in our subtle forms,” I told Soul. “What are the odds that these eyes can see us?”

  “I don’t know. They’re using Spirit’s magic, so I wouldn’t hold my breath on anything working exclusively in our favor,” he replied, then shifted his focus to the ghost. “What else can you tell us? How do we find the Master of Darkness? He’s their leader. They all obey and follow him.”

  The ghost nodded slowly. “Follow the eyes. Deep in the heart of this nightmare, you’ll find the Master. He’s waiting.”

  “How do you know he’s waiting?” I asked, deeply troubled by his words.

  “All the spirits are talking. Every lost soul in the forest has seen him. They’ve heard him, like I have…”

  Somehow, this entire moment felt staged. As if we were supposed to be here. As if we were supposed to notice this ghost and the eye runes. As if we were being led in a certain direction, and not to our benefit. The thought of certain trouble made me quiver, but Soul gripped my upper arm and squeezed gently. “We’ve got this,” he said. “We’re well above their level.”

  I wanted to agree with him. I really did. But the Darklings had been one step ahead of us this whole time. Wherever we went, they found us. Whatever we did, they outplayed us. Our only advantage had been Valaine and our ability to keep her away from Corbin. I wasn’t sure how that would turn out in the end, but at least we’d made it this far. Yes, the Darklings had a way of getting under our skin. But we were Reapers. We had our nature as an advantage. It didn’t guarantee our victory, but it did help. We had to keep trying.

  Death’s release depended on it, along with the liberation of Visio. Soul exhaled sharply and cut the ghost with his scythe. The blade glimmered white as the spirit disintegrated into a puff of silvery gold sparks. One by one, they vanished, and the Rimian man was
gone. He’d moved on into the afterlife, where something else awaited. At least he was finally free, no longer hiding or running from Knight Ghouls and Darklings.

  “We need to consider the possibility that they know we’re coming,” Soul said as we resumed our walk. Headed toward the center of the Nightmare Forest, we moved carefully, mindful of the other spirits that lingered and wandered aimlessly around us. I found comfort in their presence, since their sudden disappearance would’ve alerted us to Knight Ghouls approaching. As long as there were ghosts around, Soul and I were relatively safe.

  “We must assume they can see us in our subtle forms, through these carved eyes.” I nervously glanced around and spotted more runes along the way. The Rimian spirit had been right. They’d carved them on every tree. “They all look recent. The bark hasn’t even healed yet.”

  “It must’ve been a collective effort after Orvis,” Soul said. “It’s a good thing they didn’t do this earlier; otherwise, Orvis would’ve been discovered.”

  “I’m thinking this kind of surveillance magic must take its toll on the spellcaster’s energy,” I replied. “It can’t be easy to monitor hundreds of miles’ worth of dark woods all the time.”

  “The Rimian ghost said we’ll find Corbin at the heart of the Nightmare Forest. It’s likely he will be expecting us.”

  We stayed in our subtle forms and continued to move through the darker spots, doing our best to stay out of sight. Jumping across large swaths of space, we made sure that we would at least try to lose our watchers—if they really could see us. We stayed on the ground, coming across other spirits along the way, runaway souls that were keeping their distance from the center of the Nightmare Forest. They all confirmed what our Rimian friend had already said. Corbin was there, waiting. He knew we were coming, and I doubted we had any way left to surprise him. We weren’t even sure our subtle forms were useful.

  After reaping another witness, Soul gave me a worried look. “It feels like we’re walking into trouble, don’t you think?”