Asten raised his bow. “Who are you?” he demanded.
“Just a beleaguered ghost—weak, and not worth the time it would take you to fight me.” Though he claimed weakness, I didn’t miss the grinding of his teeth and the determined look in his eye. He’d surely give as good as he got.
“We’re looking for our friend.”
With a calculating expression, the little man said, “I know where he is. I can take you to him. If you’ll give me something in exchange.” He poked my rucksack. “You’ve got some powerful stuff in there.”
“I…I suppose we could share them,” I stammered.
The ghost cackled with glee and led us through the Field of Fears.
Halfway through, Asten slowed.
“He’s stepped into a fear,” our guide complained. “Bleeding hearts with their bleeding silly fears. He gets stuck here of all places? Ridiculous.”
“What is he afraid of?” I asked.
“This is the no-one-loves-me-and-I’m-all-alone fear,” he answered in a mocking singsong voice. “Who cares about blinking love? What good does it do? I’m alone every day. Don’t hurt me none.”
“He feels alone?” I asked, my voice huskier than usual.
“How do we get him out?” Ahmose asked.
“Easy. Give him something more fearful to think about.” The little man grabbed hold of my arm. His monkey screeched and bit me, hard. A giant pustule rose on my skin. Asten suddenly moved, breaking free of the fear, and picked up the little ghost with one hand.
“What did you do to her?” he demanded with burning eyes.
“What I needed to,” the ghost answered as he kicked his legs futilely.
“Asten, I’ll be fine. See?” I channeled the power of the healing stela and the angry blister on my arm shrank until it disappeared.
“My price just went up,” the ghost said. “I want that healing thingamajig.”
“No,” Asten answered bluntly. “It wouldn’t work anyway. Your injuries are your penance.”
The ghost tried to stare them down, but they weren’t having it. “Fine,” he said, giving in. “Just don’t go getting stuck in the fear of kittens or puppies. If you do, I’m leavin’ you there.”
When we finally passed through the field, I breathed a sigh of relief. We’d made it.
“You’ll find the one you’re looking for thataway. Now give me what you promised.”
I offered the surly ghost my bunch of raisins, and he disappeared.
We’d only walked fifteen paces when Asten said, “I’m afraid we’ve been deceived.”
“But the scarab says Amon is truly this way,” I said.
“Perhaps the path to him lies beyond,” Asten replied.
“Beyond what?”
“That.” He nodded, indicating the path before us. “The worst place you can end up in the netherworld—the Mires of Despair. It’s far too vast to circumnavigate. I’m afraid the fastest way is through.”
“If we survive,” Ahmose mumbled.
“Great, another near-death experience…” I paused, reaching into my bag to offer Asten a sip from the flask of cider. He was sweating. It was the first time I’d seen him sweat in the netherworld, which was disturbing. I wondered if, at that moment, Amon was being abused and they were feeling the effects and not sharing it with me.
Distracted, I dug into the gaping maw of my bag and came up with nothing. “He stole it all!” I shouted. “That scheming monkey on his back stole the cider and the cakes. Now he has everything!”
I looked back toward Ahmose and sweat had broken out on his brow, too. Both their mouths tightened into thin lines. “She’s hurting him now. Isn’t she?” I asked.
Asten nodded rigidly.
“Every moment Amon is in the hands of the Devourer is a moment too many,” I murmured quietly.
A heavy weight soon fell upon my shoulders as well. The Devourer was draining Amon, and it now affected all three of us. I slumped against Asten. My body trembled, but I was comforted by the idea that the energy she took was shared among all of us, and that as long as we were alive, we could rest assured that Amon was, too. A shudder went through me, and though I wanted to know what had happened to Amon, I didn’t at the same time. It was at least an hour before we felt recovered enough to resume our journey.
“Are you ready?” Ahmose asked. I nodded. He rubbed his hand across his jaw. “Going through could take at least a day.”
“You can find the quickest path,” Asten encouraged his brother.
Relieved that whatever was torturing Amon was over, I looked down past the perilous, jagged rocks descending to the valley floor below, to the countless waves of white grain. A ghostly moan sent an eerie echo, and I stared at the movement of the grain, puzzled by it. The plants moved haphazardly, and not at all like wheat on a farm. “What is it?” I asked.
It is unnatural, Tia whispered in my mind. Not of the earth.
“Not it. They,” Ahmose answered.
“They?”
“Yes. They are the undead. Those who were banished and who were unable to fight off their demons like Asten did,” Ahmose explained.
“They’re like our ghost guide,” Asten added, “only they’ve been discovered and brought here. Some feel they have no reason to fight their demons. Others try but are quickly overcome and grow too weak to stave off their tormentors. Here in the mire they are plagued for eternity as their hearts are dangled like bread before a starving man.”
“So they’re like the ghosts I saw the Devourer consume? They weren’t as solid as our guide was.”
Asten’s fists tightened, though I wasn’t sure he was entirely aware of it. “Yes. This is her garden. Her stores of…food.”
“That’s horrible!” I exclaimed.
“There’s no choice but to pass through,” Asten said. “If we hurry, we can make it through before the reapers come.”
“Reapers? Why does that sound even worse than the existence of an undead farm?”
“The reapers are not to be trifled with. Any soul caught in their path will be harvested. Trust me when I say we don’t want to linger in this place.”
“So how do we get down there?” I asked. “Can you find a path, Ahmose?”
“There is only one safe path down. We’ll have to carry you,” he answered.
“Carry me? Are you going to jump?”
“Not exactly,” Ahmose hedged. “Come. You’ll go with me.”
“I’ll take her,” Asten said, and stepped forward, placing a hand on my arm. Ahmose gave his brother a long look but then nodded and backed away. Apparently Ahmose wasn’t feeling the effects of the heart scarab as keenly as his brother at the moment. Ahmose raised his arms and levitated in the air, immediately heading over the side of the cliff and descending rapidly.
Asten moved in front of me and gave me a small smile with just the tiniest glint in his eye, reminding me of the cocky version of Asten that I was more familiar with. Taking my arms, he placed them around his neck and leaned down to whisper in my ear, “Hold on to me tightly now.”
I nodded as he leaned down and scooped me up. Within the space of a heartbeat, he had risen in the air and we slowly began to float down to the valley below. Again I felt my heightened senses become attuned to the man carrying me. The feel of his strong shoulders beneath my palms, the hair that brushed my fingertips, and the way he held me enchanted me.
As I gazed up at his face, an inner part of me tried to recall Amon’s, but the details I loved so much seemed to pale in comparison and I found I couldn’t hold his image in my mind, not when Asten was so close. A tiny sound of dismay escaped from my lips and he looked at me.
“Are you all right, Lily?” he asked, clutching me closer.
“Yes,” I managed to squeak out.
Asten studied me and seemed to see something in my expression that I’d been trying to hide. Warmth spiraled between us, and his eyes melted into liquid pools. With my heightened vision I could see the spark of little star
s that glinted in them. The corner of his mouth lifted, not in a smirk but in a smoldering promise, and whatever it was he was silently promising me, I wanted, needed, to say yes.
He edged closer, touching his nose to mine and then grazing our cheeks inch by tantalizing inch until his lips found my ear. Tangling my fingers in his hair and stroking the nape of his neck, I focused on the feeling, imbuing the touch with my power, willing him to feel the caress and the contact of his skin on mine. I heard his sharp intake of breath and then his quiet murmur shot goose bumps down my neck. “Careful, little lioness,” Asten said in a husky voice. “A man can only resist a woman like you for so long.”
I swallowed thickly. “But I’m not…” I couldn’t finish the thought. My pulse pounded in my throat and the warm scent of him—cedar, amber, spice, with a hint of cocoa—enveloped me. He smelled delicious. Like something I wanted to taste. Something was very wrong with what was happening, but another piece of me thought it was very right. We want this, a voice whispered in my mind. We want him.
Asten lifted his head, flames of heat flickering in his eyes. He wanted this, too; I could sense it. The space surrounding us felt feverish and frenzied. I cocked my head and pulled him closer, his lips only centimeters from mine. “Asten,” I began with a sultry, pleading tone to my voice.
“Lily,” he answered with an echoing hunger.
Tilting my head up, I waited breathlessly, with an almost aching anticipation, for his kiss. But it never came. I opened my eyes and found his closed.
“Asten?” I whispered, confusion smothering the passionate fog I’d been in.
“We can’t do this, Lily.” His eyes finally opened but what I saw was not the desire I hoped for, but regret and self-recrimination. “Though you are as pure and lovely to me as the most brilliant star in the heavens, I will not do this to my brother.”
“But…Asten, I—”
“I’m sorry. I won’t add you to my list of mistakes.”
“That’s all I’d be to you?” I accused. “A mistake?”
“No. That’s not…” He shook his head. “Don’t misunderstand me.”
Our feet touched the ground and Ahmose approached. “Misunderstand what?” he asked.
“Nothing,” Asten answered.
I put my hands on my hips, feeling the stabbing pain of rejection mingling with the sick nausea of guilt. “That’s right. It’s nothing,” I said brusquely, and adjusted the bow across my back, automatically checking my knives at the same time. As I turned to head toward the field of ghosts undulating in an unseen netherworld wind like thousands of gray, inflatable air dancers, I pushed the thought that I wasn’t at all afraid of flying when held by Asten to the back of my mind.
Ahmose took my arm. “Wait, Lily,” he said. “Let me find the path first.”
I nodded and folded my arms across my chest. When Ahmose crouched down and stretched his palm out over the sand, I briefly made eye contact with Asten, who wore a half-confounded, half-guilty expression that echoed my own.
As we walked through the field, trying but not succeeding to avoid all contact with the ghosts, I pondered why I was feeling so upset. Asten had done the right thing. I didn’t know what had come over me or why being close to Asten inspired thoughts of tearing off his shirt with my claws.
There was no denying now that I was acting horribly disloyal to Amon, and the idea of the pain he would feel over my betrayal made me want to cry. And not just shed a tear or two, but sob in absolute heartbreak like the time Anubis had made me kill him. That was what it felt like. Like I was slowly but inevitably killing Amon. I couldn’t stand it.
Tears leaked from the corners of my eyes, and I felt like screaming and ripping out my hair right along with the ghosts who clutched vainly for me when I passed. Through my watery vision, I noticed that the rows of souls near us had access to their hearts. The glowing orbs were almost close enough to touch, but none of them bothered trying. If they helped one another, they might even be able get their hearts back.
Stopping before a sad, broken woman, I stooped to pick up her heart and hand it to her, but Ahmose took hold of my wrist before I touched it.
“Don’t,” he said. “They’re too heavy. The despair will only sink your own feet into the mire.” Remembering my inability to pry Asten’s heart from the Lake of Fire, I nodded and we went on. It seemed that the only ghosts paying attention to us were those we came into close contact with, and as the hours passed, I began to see a change in the rows. Farther down, the specters were more…lively.
Half of them seemed to be affected by their love for me, while the other half clutched hungrily like the Devourer had. With most of them, one or two of their tormenters swirled around their legs, taking little nips now and then. Each soul had its very own brand of persecutor. I saw a variety of bugs, snakes, worms, bats, tiny lizards, and even something that looked like a cross between a miniature garden gnome and a gargoyle torturing them. The number of demons attacking the ghosts increased with each hour.
Aside from the disturbing view, Asten seemed determined not to make eye contact, which was fine by me. The more distance between us, the more in control I was. What was wrong with me?
I tried to ask Tia, but she had locked herself away from my consciousness. She was there. I could feel her, but she was curled up in a ball, and as much as I mentally poked her in the back, she wouldn’t turn around to face me. Not that I blamed her. I thought she might be ashamed of me, considering the way I’d been acting.
As we traveled on, the path became narrower. Ahmose apologized and sought a better direction, but there was no better way. We’d have to get up close and personal with the Devourer’s victuals. Grasping hands and arms got closer and closer.
Then a specter who appeared to be more solid than those around him, who had at least a dozen fist-sized beelike creatures swarming around his head and repeatedly stinging him, reached toward me and actually caught hold of my sleeve. He plucked at me desperately, crying out to save him. His legs seemed rooted in place, like they’d been planted in the sand. Even though most of his fellows were insubstantial, he had enough matter, for lack of a better word, about his form, that his grip was rather strong.
When I told him I was sorry and that there was nothing I could do, that he had to fight off his own demons, his pleas turned to rage. “You will help me,” he spat from his swollen, horribly stung face. “Or you will die alongside me. I’ve killed plenty of pretty young things like yourself. I wouldn’t even bat an eye.”
“You’re already dead,” I said, wondering if I’d have to call forth my claws and if they’d even find purchase in his form.
“I know that, stupid, beautiful girl,” he hissed. “I meant the second death. The first for you, the last for me. We’ll go down together. It’s almost romantic. Maybe if I offered her a pretty girl like you, a live one, she’ll take her time digesting you and I’d have enough time to escape.” He began hitting himself on the head. “No. No. No. We like her. No. We’ll eat her ourselves.”
“I don’t think so,” I said. “Besides, you can’t escape the Devourer. I’ve seen her in action, and she doesn’t let anyone go. But cheer up. We’re going to try to kill her, so you may make it after all.”
“Ha!” he cried. “She can’t be defeated. Everyone knows that.”
“Well, we’re going to try.”
“You’ll die in the process.”
“Better to die fighting than to be gathered up like grain,” I said.
The ghost’s gray face turned a darker shade and a kind of black spittle oozed from the corner of his mouth. “You’ll pay for that.”
Other ghosts nearby began to react to the one holding me. Though stuck in mounds of sand, they reached upward, like zombies finally catching the scent of fresh brain, and with expressions nearly as vacant. But none of them were close enough to do much more than paw at my legs and arms, their limbs passing right through my skin, leaving a chill behind on my flesh.
The ghost
holding me yanked and struggled, trying to pull me closer, but I was able to dig in my heels enough to stop him from making any headway. Still, he didn’t seem to be in any kind of mind-set to let me go. It wasn’t until Asten and Ahmose stepped around me and stared the ghost down that his demeanor changed.
“Guardians!” he cried, keening as he rocked back and forth. He released me and went back to beating his own head with his fists. “Stupid. Stupid. Stupid!” he called as he abused himself. “Should have seen them there. Why are they here?” The ghost looked up at us in a hopeful, desperate sort of way. “It’s a mistake, right? I shouldn’t be here. You’re here to take me back?”
“Back!” one ghost echoed.
“It’s a mistake,” another called.
“Yes! Mistake.”
“Mistake.”
“Take us back.”
Asten took hold of my shoulders and pulled me against his chest while Ahmose approached the corporeal ghost. “I’m sorry,” he said. “We’re here on our own business.”
“Your own business? What business could you possibly have here? This isn’t your domain! You don’t belong. Get out! Get out!”
The other ghosts began to wail, the intensity ratcheting up and spreading until nearly the entire field was screaming in cacophonous alarm. “Out!” they cried. “Don’t belong!”
I buried my head in his chest, inhaling the warm scent of him as he stroked my hair.
“We’re only halfway through, and it gets harder after this,” Ahmose said. “The ghosts near the front have been here longer. They’re less…well, less. The ones back here were planted more recently. They’ll be stronger. And they’ll have the ability to detour our passage.”
“We can fly over them, can’t we?” I asked, secretly delighted at the prospect of being in Asten’s arms again.
Asten shook his head. “We’re weighed down here. We feel the effects of their despair. There’s no levitating again until we’re clear of them.”
“Ah, hence the name Mires of Despair.”