Page 7 of Night of Death and Flowers

They’re celebrating the upcoming Harvest. My Harvest.

My eyes close briefly as I press my palm against the trunk of a graywar tree, its gray branches bare as the season of Olen captures the world in a frosty grasp. The cold flurries circle Ennismore like vultures, picking at every drop of life left in nature. Olen, the season named after the mother of all, snatches the harvests and crops cruelly, holding life in her grip for four long months.

Excitement pinches the air of the town as I disappear into the darkness of Morcidea Forest. The shadows become my cloak under the moonlit branches, hiding me from mortal eyes as I navigate the rough terrain.

I pass the stone circle in the heart of the forest, a place now abandoned, where each stone and symbol etched in weathered by the flow of time.

Out of the corner of my eye, I notice a mess of blood-tinged feathers on a patch of (snowy) grass nearby. A small bird, its heart thumping erratically, lays nestled in what remains of its scattered nest. Shell from hatched eggs lay scattered, frost coating them like tiny icy crypts. Spiderwebs glisten, blanketed between the branches high above, the moonlight catching against raindrops. I sigh as I watch a Nighbor Spider climb up a strand of thick web, then settle in the center, awaiting a brave creature to venture too close to their hideout. Within the dead branches, I sense their magic. Much like the Shadow Vipers slithering into my presence, drawn by the familiar tinge of death magic from which they were born. I stride around them, their long, red and black bodies forming a knotted pile on the barren ground.

Their hungry eyes latch onto the dying bird, and I kneel, my leather boots pressing against the frost-bitten mud and moss. “You do not wish to live,” I whisper, and lean over, my fingertips darkening, decay magic pulsing under my nails. For her babies are devoured already. Her torn wings tell her story, but she could not save them from my spiders or vipers.

Such hungry little things.

I can at least offer it mercy from the fangs of the Shadow Vipers. My fingertip glides over its feathers, and as my touch presses over its racing heart, the thumps still. Its small eyes find me, and the creature turns to ash.

Quickly carried away by a breeze, my eyes are dragged with the swirling ash to the tree line.

Tenenocti.

I emerge through the dangling vines of the tree line and onto the familiar pebbly shore overlooking the Black Sea. I run my fingers through my silver strands and lift my gaze to the starry midnight black sky. The full moon hangs low behind the silhouette of the small island, casting white light on the turbulent, inky waters surrounding it.

My lips curve in a seldom smile as the wind whips around my ears, knotting through my hair, and the spray of the ocean caresses my face.

As I cast my eyes to Tenenocti Island, cloaked in perpetual clouds, with fog enveloping the trees like a halo, the familiar symphony of death surrounds me. Whispers carry from each wave, and anguished screams cry into the night from the souls trapped within the waters.

From the dense vegetation, a short boat ride from this pebbly shore, I can sense their rage—my family. I have faced countless horrors as the God of Death, and there is little I fear, but as I gaze over Tenenocti, a tendril of dread slides down my spine.

My heart pounds as I stare through the shimmering veil of my domain, cloaking the island and the Black Sea.

My stomach churns as I grow closer to the water’s edge. My Skhola holds them captive. The silver band, carved into a skull, glows as I use it to siphon the powers of my siblings. It pulses as I get closer to the water’s edge, the magic thrumming through my fingertips.

An unmistakable reminder that if I reach too deeply into my domain, encompassing the island and waters, all the magic I took will return to my siblings. My domain is unlike anything else in this mortal world, a slice of the ether with a sense of home created for me so I could exist to carry out my duties here of guiding the dead.

Without my siblings—the gods and goddesses of dreams, destiny, judgment, will, and creation—Dahryst has descended into darkness. The kind where dreams become nightmares, and destiny refuses to be bound. Even in death, there is no peace.

I pull the hood of my black cloak over my silver hair, blocking out the whipping winds. As I gaze around behind, I bring my fingers to the sky. Carved on the trunks of the trees facing my domain, is my sigil, splintered into gray bark by the locals.

They worship me now. Adore me. Admire me. It was not always this way.

For centuries, in the mortal’s eyes, I was the embodiment of lives cut too short—the diseases that killed their children, the arrow that pierced their loved ones’ hearts. I was everything nobody wanted, but I was not the bringer of death. Nyxara wove the tapestries of their lives, carefully creating various paths. Yet, I was admonished.

A flash of anguish steals my next breath when I flick my eyes up and over the waters to the island. I clutch the fabric of my tunic and clamp my eyes shut as the pain surfaces. I count the steady beats of my mortal heart thumping beneath my fist. One, two, three, four, five…. When I reach ten, I open my eyes and inhale sharply.

Being back in my physical form, after all these years of not having to feel anything, is torturous.

An acrid, smoky scent mixed with decaying leaves permeates from the soil, transporting me back to a memory of the Ash War. It was simple then, our goal was to aid the witches against those who persecuted them. While my siblings ruled over Dahryst—each taking glory during the war—their power grew as their subjects worshiped their victories. Meanwhile, I was fated to eternal servitude, forever stuck between life and death, guiding souls from this world into the next until I saved this land and imprisoned them.

Only then was I venerated, and as my powers grew, my siblings weakened. Not that it mattered. However much I was worshiped afterward, it did not fill the emptiness that lingered in my mind, which was likely caused by Nyxara and her memory manipulation.

Waves crash in the distance, groaning with each surge of rising tide. Beneath the turbulent surface, the dead form a barricade against any curious mortals who may try to venture to the island.

My fingers tingle as I sense their exhaustion, how they long to leave this world. To allow them their peace is to destroy the protection, stopping anyone from finding my siblings’ sleeping bodies.

Breathing in the crisp night air, I kneel on the shore and graze my fingers over the surface of the Black Sea.

I summon the souls of those sacrificed in the fourteen previous tournaments and the unfortunate sailors whose ships were drawn into these treacherous waters, doomed to sink into the depths.

Three spirits draw closer, beckoned by my call. Essentria’s magic leaves my fingers in a hue of gold, hovering over the dead in the waters, then drifts like glitter, seeping through a wave.

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