Page 80 of Fated In Forever
Did souls even weigh anything?
I remembered something about a scale and a feather, but I wasn’t sure that theory applied here. Or hell, maybe it did. Who knew? This place didn’t exactly come with an instruction manual. I was winging it.
They rushed in, a swarm of fireflies, glowing brighter than I’d ever seen them, and somehow, that made me feel good. Like they might be happy. Like I was doing something good that made them happy, and who the fuck was I kidding, because this fucking boat was going to sink, the second we got too far out and I was going to spend the rest of my pathetic existence drowning.
While the souls loaded themselves in, I picked up the chain again, inspecting the tools I had to work with.
The chain was anchored into the shoreline by an enormous spike, then fed through the open mouths of the gargoyles. The other end disappeared beneath the river’s churning surface, but I had a feeling I understood the assignment.
Get this boat to the other side, through sheer brute strength.
When the boat was full—overflowing, we’d never pass a safety check, good thing this was hell—I climbed aboard, groaning as the boat shifted beneath my weight. The seat was large enough to accommodate me, and I settled in and picked up the chain and began to pull.
Every heave dragged the hull across the stony shore, and then we were floating—no, not floating, being tossed wildly around by the currents, and every time I pulled us closer to the opposite shore, we tipped back and forth, like we were caught in a storm.
By the time I dragged the cursedly heavy boat up on the opposite shore, which I would have kissed on my hands and knees, except my hands were a bloody mess, my knees the same from bracing myself against the deck, every muscle, every bone in my battered body ached.
But as the souls flooded happily onto the shore, something else washed through me.
Something I had experienced so very little in my life, I had to stop and examine it.
Pride. I’d done this. I’d given them…something.
But as I watched them dance away through the darkness and disappear—without so much as a thank you—I knew I’d found my purpose.
Then I had to get the motherfucking boat back, which was a bitch, because it was unwieldly and unbalanced, and Iguessed souls did weigh something, because I nearly capsized and fuck my life.
I managed two more boatful’s, every crossing more treacherous, the dark current fighting me at every stroke, trying to pull us under or sweep us downstream into unknown depths. But I hung onto that chain, my will stronger than the river, my determination not to drown absolute.
On the far shore, the souls disembarked and disappeared, heading toward whatever peace awaited them beyond. I watched them go with a satisfaction that made me happy and cringy at the same time.
And when I limped back to the castle, and collapsed on the bed that still smelled like us, I slept better than I had since she’d left.
I took four boatloads across the next day.
Five, the next.
Weeks passed, or perhaps months—time moved strangely in the Underworld, until I had lost all sense of its passage. My task was all that mattered. I ferried group after group across the dark waters, my arms burning with effort, my back aching from the constant rowing. But with each crossing, my sense of purpose grew stronger.
This was something good.
Something worthwhile.
Something that mattered.
But every day, no matter how many I took across, more souls appeared on the bank. Hundreds became thousands, thousands became millions. They stretched back from the water's edge in an endless sea, like a glowing ocean of light.
Billions of souls.
More than I could count, more than I could possibly ferry in a dozen lifetimes.
The realization should have been crushing. Should have made me drop the chain and abandon this impossible task. But instead, I smiled, filled with a strange kind of peace.
Evie would have called thisjob security.
This is what I was meant for,I realized as I guided another boatload across the treacherous waters.
Not to rule the Underworld as some terrible dark prince, like that witch’s curse had foretold.
