Page 57 of The Souls Harvest
His breath stinks like rotten meat washed down with cheap wine when he says, “And now let’s take care of your chatty mouth…” - before pressing a rough piece of cloth, wet with something sweet, against my lips.
My eyelids turn heavy, and when the stranger puts his hand against my forehead to keep my head up, terror pervades me at the sight of a thick, redHbranded on the inside of his wrist.
“Tell me, girl”, he whispers in my ear as I struggle to stay alert, “How does it feel to be in the presence of someone you thought was just amyth?”
Chapter 24 - A Life for a Life
July
The night before a crossing is a night of rituals.
I’ve heard of Reapers staining their pillows with the blood of their past crops, or spending the night in the woods between Evemerys and Anagessys, to focus their minds on the task ahead and not on the comfort of their beds.
Galen always carries with him some memorabilia, like a gemstone fallen from a bracelet, or a button ripped from a crop’s jacket, after he’s delivered the empty vessels to the Deleteri permanently stationed at the Fields.
“Let. Her. Go.”
Although tonight, there will be no sleep. No luck-summoner gesture. Not even a morning after—by the look of it.
“You forgot‘If you hurt her, I’ll rip your spine off and send it to your family’, isn’t that what the dark hero always says? And let me guess—I do what you ask, and then you let me walk away? Don’t embarrass yourself, boy, and drop that gun.”
As I fight to stay alert, Galen’s silhouette stands out tall against the dark staircase behind him. His posture doesn’t betray anyuncertainty when he takes a step forward. “I said, let her go and step away. What I’ll do with you after is a surprise.”
“You know you won’t make it far againstus.” The thick cotton of the stranger's uniform grazes my neck when he lifts me like a shield between him and Galen.
He’s fast, despite his size, but also distracted enough to release the pressure on my mouth.
“Galen…” I mumble. Tears of pain and rage sting in my nose like the stranger’s smell as I inhale deeply to send enough oxygen to my brain and shake my senses awake.
Despite my blurry vision, I detect a grey wall of smoke dotted by small, random explosions of orange and red rising from the top levels of the Wise. The fire breaking free from inside the building is now devouring the head of the castle as well as its foundations.
“You may want to rethink that. I offered the same choice to your friends, up there…” Galen replies, oddly calm, jerking his chin to the tower behind him. His smirk makes me shiver. His eyes darken as he shrugs and adds, “They didn’t listen to me…”
There is something savage in his eyes when he raises his fist in the air, the other hand steadily aiming a gun at the stranger’s head. With a husky laugh that sounds more like a feral growl of satisfaction, he opens his fingers and lets a bunch of white pebbles drop to the floor.
No. Not pebbles—
“You rotten piece of shit,” the stranger barks in my ear, making the small hairs on my neck stand up, as we both stare at a bunch ofteeth rolling towards us.
The man’s confidence shakes and cracks like the Wise’s body. His hands are busy keeping me still, one holding my cuffed wrists, the other looped around my shoulders, but his body tenses against mine as if sensing his luck is one step too close to a precipice.
Galen stalks towards us, crushing some of the teeth under his boots. In response, the stranger presses his forearm against my neck, cutting off my air supply.
Surprisingly, Galen doesn’t flinch. “Did you really think you could simply cross our skies, unseen, using fire as a decoy? I thought that centuries of waiting in your filthy, shitty rabbit holes would create at least a slightly smarter generation of Herionos.”
I gasp, and for a split second, Galen’s eyes meet mine.
The stranger chuckles, “Perhaps not smarter, but surely better at making allies...”
As the stranger’s words float and vanish in the space between us, Galen shifts his weight onto his left foot, a stance that promises nothing good. His rage is charging to a level that could force him towards a regrettable decision.
The stranger seems to notice as well, and he pushes me forward, my feet barely touching the ground, as if challenging Galen.
His lips are like sandpaper against my cheek as he lowers and hisses in my ear, “Let’s see where you stand on your friend’s scale of priorities.”
The man loosens the grip around my wrists, his movements precise and swift.
One moment, I think I’m almost free; the next, I hear a click as something hard presses against my back. My eyes widen, and my jaw tightens when the stranger’s gun bites at my spine.
