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Various portals to the cursed spirit world exist within the Underworld of the White Ladies who do their best to protect the spirit world. If Isla has never heard the legends of the mountains, I will tell her sometime.
For now, I strengthen my grip on Ifrynna’s fur and direct her through the doorway located on the eastern shore of the Isle of Bones. No more than a slit between two great boulders facing the sea?only accessible to those permitted by a god. In my case, Kryach, but it’s not him I seek today.
The portal energy thrums into our being. A mere tickle for Ifrynna, who ruffles her fur, snapping her teeth at the bits of spirit essence like dust bunnies. Darkness grows, swelling to welcome us. Crossing into the cursed Nether-Void means forsaking one’s earthly flesh for a time. Unless you’re an equally cursed being such as myself.
No mask here.
Stitched eternally into the essence of the Void and drawn to the torturous portal of a window, hundreds of spirits greet me. Thousands of wispy hands claw at me but pass harmlessly through my shroud of shadows. They wail, plead for reclamation, but I’ve learned to banish their voices. These souls committed grievances from torture to rape to murder and must seek the gods’ favor before they may rest. Unlike the lost ones who frequent my river—cared for by Betha. Ifrynna snarls at a few, snaps her tri-jaws in a warning.
Forsaking the tortured souls, I drift through levels, past castles and cottages within the higher ancestral plane where the majority of races reside. Some lower gods wander among the temples, to tempt and toy with the newer elite spirits, to hear their stories glean their histories, eager to feed on the essence of their recent humanity. Never satisfied with their paradisiacal Isles. I flex my muscles and curl one side of my lip back, exposing all my teeth.
Fortunately, the lower gods are not permitted beyond the Void, and the royals satisfy the higher Gods with the Curse. Higher Gods such as Kryach and the Goddess of Love, and theHighestGoddess who never abandons the Isles’ highest Pàrrysian fields where her angyls originate. Nor the Highest God of the deepest Nether-pits of the Void and his infinite demons.
Through more portals and beyond ancestral bridges, I ascend to the thinnest realm bordering the Isles where only the strongest of souls may travel. Or cursed sovereigns past and present. And the rarest seer with bone magic.
“It’s been too long, Allysteir,” my great grandfathyr announces from the familiar courtyard gardens where he often wanders.
“Not here for pleasantries,” I seethe and pass by. He turns, understanding my necessity and does not tread near my shadows.
Through portal windows, my ancestors have limited glimmers into my world. They wish to know more about Isla. Intrigued by the first tribute in centuries and the first official common human. I bristle, smothered by their insufferable spirits.
It’s been a couple decades since I visited. For too long, I held out hope I could comb through my ancestors’ histories and learn something, some universal thread—one tug and the Curse tapestry would unravel. Or any knowledge of the Curse-Ender. But only the Higher Gods know such secrets, such power to rival all races of Talahn-Feyhran.
None would ever surrender their favorite flesh playgrounds.
Without pausing despite my ancestors clamoring for my attention, I drive Ifrynna forward, thrilling in how my tri-hound navigates the higher planes, never tiring?her spirit form stronger, far more at home. Her essence thunders into me while Kryach’s shadows harness me to the mighty Guardian.
Some lower gods fraternizing with the ancestors turn at my presence. One flick of Kryach’s power, and they return to their frivolity.
I am not here for them.
Finally, I ascend to trespass upon the thin slit bordering the Isles, the territory where their infinite gates born of hellfire and heaven’s star-fire protect the higher gods’ realms. She may be a fallen Goddess, but Kryach respects her enough to allow her to wander these realms beyond their gates.
Careful not to tread too close to the hellish flames and celestial inferno, I dismount, pace before the Gates, and speak one word. One name.
“Morrygna.”
Nostrils flaring, my breath threatens to rage, but I steel my spine, controlling myself as the gates shimmer at the edges, bowing before the power of the Goddess of Doom escorted by her hellwylfs.
The dark, ragged robe she wears is closed, bound by silver ropes threaded with the kite tails of stars. Morrygna’s black waterfall of hair is bound around her head in a spiraling, illustrious crown to bare the ruined side of her face, marred by brands until it’s near beyond recognition. Her left eye, a spectral unseeing ghost, is a curse as goddess flesh cannot heal from the Isles’ infinity fire. Doom’s sight—forever dimmed.
Only the gods know the legend of Morrygna’s scars.
“Corpse King,” Morrygna addresses me, then gestures me to follow her through the pathways bordering the Gates. Ones marked by shadow trees.
Jaw set, fists tightened, I bid Ifrynna to roam, then embark into the spirit forests.
She lifts her left hand from beneath her robe, skin blotted to expose her Goddess essence. The dark side of the moon’s teardrops flows through her veins, her arteries bearing the menstrual blood of sacrificial offerings. Doomed blood to grant her more sight to compensate for her blind eye. Her Ban-Sythe do the rest.
“I know why you’ve come, Allysteir. And no, you will not dissuade me. No boon you could offer. No favors you could grant.”
“You risk angering Aryahn Kryach, Goddess,” I alert Morrygna, lingering in her shadow, never raising my eyes to her blind one. Mine may also be ruinous, but it does not inhibit my sight. “My bride-to-be has found favor with him.”
The shadow trees bow to the Goddess, others descend to their knees, whispering prayers the further we travel through the forest while her wylfs trail us. “Yes,” her smoky voice echoes of war, of the embers of hell. “While the other gods are ignorant to Kryach’s interest and his whispers among the ancestral plane, I am not.”
“Is she the Ender?”
Morrygna snaps her teeth. She spews a deadly Doom shaft to force me to my knees. Death’s shadows daunt her hellfire, numbing the pain to an echo. The hellwylfs surround me, teeth bared, threatening violence.
