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I sigh despondently, and Ethel looks at me. “What are you so upset about? I’m the one who’s dead.”
I don’t normally converse too much with the recently deceased. Usually, I just let them look around the cold corners of Tuonela in silence, watching as their past life slowly loosens its grip on them.
I bring the boat along the icy shores of the Frozen Void, where a herd of white reindeer have gathered, their exposed bones gleaming in the faint light streaming through the clouds, munching on frosted bunches of red sinberries. The weathertoday has been pleasant so far, obviously because my father is enjoying himself at the Bone Match—which is where I should be.
“I’m just missing out, that’s all,” I confess to Ethel. “There’s an important family event happening right now, and I wish I could be there. More than that, I wish I could do what you mortals do and take a vacation so I could venture out into your world for a bit.”
“So we both don’t want to be here,” she says in a huff.
“Of course I want to,” I say quickly, not wanting to ruin her experience. “It’s an honor to transport the dead. Truly.”
“I’m sure it is, but we can’t love our lives all the time. That’s unrealistic.” She pauses. “Though, looking back, I probably should have appreciated even the most mundane times. You never know what you have until it’s gone.” She glances at me and gives me a one-eyed squint. “Except for George. I’m glad he’s gone. And if I catch him in this world, I’ll deliver him straight to Hell myself.”
Sheesh. She’s still holding onto her old life with an iron grip, though I have to admire the strength of her spirit.
And I’m starting to hate George now too.
We’re getting closer to the City of Death, just passing out of the Hiisi Forest, when suddenly, a sharp blast of frozen air comes from above, almost like an icy hand pressing down from the sky. In seconds, the clouds gather, dark and ominous, blotting out the sun until everything is a murky shade of twilight.
To my surprise, Ethel shivers, rubbing her hands up and down the nightshirt she died in. The dead are supposed to be impervious to temperature changes.
“Are you cold?” I ask her as the wind picks up, driving snow from above that coats the boat, parts of the river freezing over before my eyes.
“Yes,” she says, her teeth chattering. “Is it usually this cold?”
I shake my head. “No. You shouldn’t feel any temperature at all. I don’t know what’s happening.”
While I’ve gotten cold from time to time depending on my father’s moods, since his moods are linked to the weather, even I’m starting to feel the icy bite of the wind, the snowflakes that have gathered in my hair and on my lashes.
What in the realm is happening?
That curious feeling I had in my gut earlier returns, twisting until I feel sick.
No. Something is terribly wrong here.
It’s not just that it’s dark and cold—it feels like the life has been sucked out of the land, like the very heart has suddenly been snuffed out.
And that’s when I feel it inmyheart.
In my soul.
A horrible truth I never thought could come to pass.
My father is dead.
Chapter 2
Death
The Awakening
Inever feared death.
How could I when I was the God of it?
When my whole existence was built around it?
Even though I knew my own mortality was finite, that there were ways to kill me, it’s not something I lost sleep over. No God did. That was the difference between us and the mortals. Their lives were limited, and they all staggered through it in the shadow of their own death. It loomed above them like a fist, hiding behind the darkest clouds, threatening to strike them at any moment. They lived in fear of something for which there was no escape.
