Page 1 of The Scattered Bones

One

My scorched skin and chapped lips blister under the enraged sun. Its molten rays burn me, feed on me, punish me as the singed wind beats my flesh. The whipping dust is so thick it braids into my hair, and I’ve become more desert than human, more sand than soul. Every breath feels like fire, and my water supply ran dry hours ago. I have no food. No water. No hope. I’m lost in the Sivatag. Hopelessly and irreversibly lost in this desert tomb. This wasteland grave.

There’s a reason mortals never enter the Sivatag. None who cross its borders ever reemerge. Their flesh shrivels in this cruel temperature, their bones bleached white until they become grains of sand. There’s no life in this desert, no food, no water, no shade. Just endless dunes, and a sun that plays tricks on its invaders. It’s believed that the Sivatag hides its true form from its trespassers so that those foolish enough to step foot within its boundaries lose their way. This deadly stretch of earth has existed as far back as human memory stretches, but legend remembers the twin gods, even if their names are hidden from the annals, just as their corpses are buried in this desert. Hreinasta, the Pure One—the divine primordial goddess who turned her back on me—declared their names forgotten, her decree transforming their brotherhood into a cautionary tale. The histories recall little of those siblings, but the stories claim that while their appearances were mirror images, the brothers were polar opposites, each one jealous of the other. In the first days, the Sivatag was a lush beauty teaming with life, but the twins waged their war on this cursed land. Nothing within their reach survived the battle, and when the twin gods died, so did the land. A stain upon the realm to honor their shame.

It’s why what I seek was hidden here. It was bound by magic and cast into the sands, and even if one could navigate this wasteland, what I search for is impossible to find. No living soul knows where it landed. Only the dead keep it company, and they cannot guide me. All they can do is welcome me with brittle arms when I succumb to the heat, and it won’t be long before I join their eternal slumber. Dehydration has become my constant friend, and as I stumble through the sand, a hollow ache eats at my chest. I cannot call upon the gods for aid. Hreinasta abandoned me, ensuring no god will ever answer my prayers, and while I don’t regret the actions that caused her shunning, I feel the absence of her blessing. I never realized how empty and dangerous the world was without the gods’ grace.

Hreinasta is not the only deity our realm worships, but the Pure One is our greatest treasure. When she rejected me, the rest followed suit, and I have no one to ask for help as the sun eats at my skin. I cannot even beseech the god of death for aid. Hreinasta outlawed his cult when the realm was still young, but no one knows why. Some say it’s because she loved him, but in his cruelty, he spurned her, inspiring her pledge to purity. Some believe his evil so outweighed her goodness that she refused to allow his malice to affect her flock. Still, others say they are siblings, and like the nameless twins, their falling out was so infinite that Hreinasta emerged as the ruler and obliterated him from history. Whatever the reason, his name is never spoken. It is forgotten, and worshiping even the memory of his spirit is forbidden. No deity governs the afterlife; therefore, no one will answer when I plead for death to avoid me.

But I cannot die. Not yet. This is only the first trial of my impossible journey. The Sivatag is merely the beginning of a daunting quest I refuse to fail. Worse fates await me if I escape this desert, but I must survive… for him. This is all for him. A thief who’s only sin was stealing my heart and offering his in return.

“Please,” I croak, my throat raw after weeks of disuse. I don’t know his name, the man I beg for help. He’s simply The Stranger. Unnaturally tall and handsome, his appearance was both elderly and youthful, his black hair and white eyes adding to his mystery. He stank of a dark and ancient magic, but he appeared in my time of desperation.

“My child,” he’d said as he captured my frail hands in his powerful fists. “Give me your faith, and I’ll return to you what was lost.”

I shouldn’t have believed him. I should have fled, for the more he spoke, the more he frightened me. Yet his solid white eyes stared into my crystal blues as he whispered a promise I wanted, no needed, to hear, and instead of fleeing, I listened. I obeyed. I accepted that handsome yet terrifying stranger’s help, and because of him, I’ll die in the Sivatag.

“Please,” I cry without tears. There’s no water in my dehydrated body to spill. No words beyond the simple plea, but he knows what I ask. He has to.

“You’re not weak, my child.” The Stranger’s haunting voice whispers in my mind.

“Please.”

“You know the agreement. You must do this on your own.”

“I can’t.” I sink to my knees in the burning sand.

“Are you negating our covenant? Are you losing faith in my promise?”

“No.”

“Then complete this task. It’s the only way I can help you in the end.”

“You can’t help me if I’m dead.” I cough on the dust.

“You won’t die. You’re stronger than you know.”

“No, I’m not,” I argue.

“Then lay down and give up.” Even his harsh words sound beautiful.

“No.”

“There she is. I knew you hadn’t lost yourself.”

I force myself to a stand, scanning the dunes for any sign of hope. “Promise me I won’t die.”

“Move, child.”

The Stranger’s voice vanishes, leaving me empty once again. After Hreinasta rejected me, the realm turned hostile. No one looks at me. No one speaks to me, which is of little consequence because I can’t bear conversing with the living. The man I long to talk to is dead, and if I can’t speak to him, then I prefer silence. His fate was my fault, yet he was the one punished. This solitude, this despair, this desert. This is my atonement, my debt to be paid. Only The Stranger bothers to acknowledge me, but his voice appears in my mind. His conversations never fall on my ears, but I hear him all the same. I ignore the implications of our unnatural communication. No mortal has the power to invade another’s brain, which means my dark companion is either far more dangerous than I suspect or my grief has driven me to insanity. I saw him only once during our first encounter, heard him once, and I’m probably a fool for believing his promise, but I have to. If I don’t, I have nothing. My thief has nothing.

I order my limbs to move, and while The Stranger cannot aid me—my faith must be absolute until I’ve found all I search for—I have a sudden sense in which direction to travel.

“Thank you,” I whisper. The Stranger doesn’t answer, but he doesn’t need to. I see it. There, on the horizon, is a darkness that doesn’t belong in this unending sameness. I shuffle toward it. The journey over those last miles feels as if it takes decades, but just as my blistered skin threatens to peel from my body, I arrive at the dark stain. It’s an opening in the sand, a gateway lost in the desert, and my heart can feel it. It’s here.

* * *

My breath fogsas the frigid air burns my overheated skin. The instant I stepped within the gate, darkness swallowed me, the extreme temperatures shocking my system. It’s cold. Too cold. Evil dwells in these walls. Dark magic stained the desert heat here, and I descend deep into the earth as the icy wind bites my skin. The coolness should be a welcomed blessing, but its aggression freezes the warmth in my lungs with every breath. Breathing stings my throat, and I decide I would rather burn under the Sivatag sun than endure this frozen death. This blackness is thick with malice, with magic so corrupt I fear I’ll have no soul left when I emerge… if I emerge. The ice in this tomb makes no promise of survival. It only whispers pain and a frost-entombed slumber.

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