Her top lip curls.“It’s all fucking meaningless.Nothing matters.None of it.So you might as well take what you want from the world and reap the benefits.”
I shake my head at her.“What a sad, sad life you’ve lived.”
“You think you’re so much better than me.But look at you.The roles will be reversed soon enough and then what will you have to show for it?Nothing.Because none of this fucking matters.Just get on with it.”
I chew on her words.They unsettle me.Worm through my psyche as I try to understand if she’s right, or if she’s led a life of no meaning because she’s unloved.
“Bernadette Paulinski, all debts must be paid, in silence or soul.May the weight of your choices carry you gently down.The gods forgot you, the demons won’t.Rest now.Omnia mors aequat.Death renders all equal.”
I bring the scythe to her neck and she closes her eyes, acceptance at last.They all accept their fate eventually, and I wonder what that means for me.
Am I just her in another guise?
I tug the scythe through the pulp of her flesh and through her spine, but it’s not as easy as it usually is.The soul spine must be cut, I have to sever the cord.I yank and finally the scythe slips through her body.
I frown as I wipe the blade against my trousers.It doesn’t slide across the fabric like there are smears of soul on it.
“So weird,” I breathe.
I drop her body unceremoniously on the floor and step over her to the boy.I pick him up, lay him on the sofa and press his lids shut.
“Rest now, sweet child.Omnia mors aequat.”
As I walk out of the flat, I make sure to tread on Bernadette, crushing her fingers beneath my boot.I don’t care if she can’t feel them break.It made me feel better.
I work for hours.Until my back aches, my knees are creaking and my eyes are hot and puffy where they want to shut.By the time I reach Finis Academy, night has long since given way and a new dawn has risen.
I climb off my bike, leave it locked up and halt.Just like that first reaping, the ground rumbles again, harder this time, and it rolls on and on and on.
That must have been a significant rip.
I hold on to the brick as I make my way around the building but come to a grinding halt.There is a Veil tear, only it’s not the underworld I’m staring at.It’s the Celestial Realm.
“What the fuck?”I whisper as the ground rumbles, another slice shreds the fabric before me and out pops a rather dishevelled cat.
“Mortem?”
“I’d close those rips if I were you…”
“Hi to you too,” I roll my eyes as a wraith hand appears in the gap.
“Shit!”I yelp as I grab for whatever magic I can get from the city buildings.Ribbons burst from the walls of the closest house and slide through the frayed seams of fabric.
“Told you.”He sniffs and saunters off, his butt wiggling.
“Don’t worry about helping,” I bark.
He ignores me, plops down a few metres away and licks his arse.
God, he’s annoying.
The wraith’s hand swipes at me, and I duck out of its reach as I wrench the ribbons tight.It squeals as its fingers stiffen and then retreat back into the underworld before I sever them with the fabric.I seal up the tear and approach the other one that peers into the Celestial Realm.I’m not even sure if you seal it the same way.
Tall buildings made of glass that reflects a rainbow of light sit in the distance.As I weave fresh ribbons of magic, the seam shrinks, the glistening city vanishing until the cut disappears and I’m left staring at the courtyard wondering if I hallucinated it.I’m not sure I’ve ever actually seen into the Celestial Realm.
I’m still wondering what tears appearing through to the Celestial Realm mean as I make my way to House Inferos.
Vetch is awake, he looks down his stony nose at me.“You look like shit.”
