The Gatekeeper: Realms Of Afterworld

02. Hold My Doom At Bay

Dry, delicate twigs snap under the pressure of my steps. The feeble sound making it all the way up to my ears, an indication, of how quiet we've been this whole time, on our way back home. None of us has said a word since my little feat at the market.

***

My mother's necklace.

"That's mine!", a claiming shriek, that I thought I'd let out only in my head had infact escaped my mortified mouth before I could hold myself back, and made my parched throat throb.

The siblings' eyes rounded wide as saucers while their minds visibly registered what I had done. The market that was live with murmurs of shocked people went pin drop silent and even Reath's sobs fell behind the sole echo of my howl.

That's when, as if the abrupt silence was more alarming to their senses than my arrogant scream was, our seemingly ungenerous visitors stopped in their tracks.

The Heart Chomper at the head of the party, halted his personal snack fest. He leisurely squeezed the little heart in his hand. Thin lines of blood oozed out of the meat, dripped down the sides of his fingers and plopped into the puddle below him. He then hurled it to the ground, making the lump roll away in mud.

I couldn't help but wonder if it was Felix'.

A moment later, with the utmost composure, he turned his head over, slowly skimming the mob of people huddled around him. He subtly scanned the crowd with a questioning look and in a flash, I found him locking his eyes on my petrified face.

I felt Riven move closer to me, his warm breath above my ear, as if to convey that he'd jump infront of me, if need be. But I wouldn't let him do that.

Our hostile guest took a deep, patient breath as he held me down with his gaze. Then, for what felt like an eternity, he waited. I wouldn't dare guess why. Although, it seemed like he was quietly challenging me to so much as open my mouth again. His eyes told me he wouldn't hesitate for a second before shredding me to pieces, if I did.

I stood there in a near vegetative state, waiting for him to either pounce on me or release me from my inexplicable paralysis, but he calmly turned away from me and barked, "To the Linkage!" in his deep, guttural, otherworldly voice. His guards, following their command, continued on their way along with the Heart Chomper, and this time, Reath Bolten didn't so much as squeak.

***

"What had come over you?" Riven snaps me back from my thoughts. So we're finally striking a conversation.

"Mirae, do you have a death wish? Did you not see that monster feast on Felix' heart?"

So Riven thinks it was Felix' too.

"Mirae!?"

"Yes! I'm listening. I'm sorry I wasn't thinking straight."

"That's your excuse, really!?"

Yes, it is. If the heart chomper spared my life today, Karl will offset this small stash of my fortune by selling me for a hundred and sixty gold coins tomorrow. Either way, I'm done for. There's no escape. I'll have to beg him for more time, I'll have to!

"Mirae, you could've died today. You're lucky it was one of the less aggressive Beluas."
Riven knows not what else to tell me.

"And what's that?" I try to deviate him from all the chiding he's about to subject me to.

"Beluas. They're denizens of the Odious Realm, one of the eight most powerful Realms of the Afterworld."

"The Afterworld? You mean they were all subjects of the One King?" That explains their ethereal features.

"Yes. Some of these Beluas get hand picked by the Lords of the other realms as Spirit Guards. Since they're the most loyal, yet most dangerous ones of all Afterworld populace."

"We figured the part where they're dangerous, brother." Jade is annoyed. Whether at Riven or me, we're yet to find out.

"And they took Reath away because she meant something to their Liege Lord, you say?"

"She must be his Soul Fetter."

Jade scrunches up her nose in question.

Riven sighs and explains further, "It means their Lord's heart is bound to her soul. They need to protect her in order to ensure their Lord's safety. That could be the only reason they took her away,"

"How are you so sure?" I refuse to believe Reath Bolten is a resource of any sort. They could be simply craving flesh, who knows.

"The Beluas never intervene in human business unless it has something to do with their Realm's well-being. Did you both never pay attention to the history lessons?"

Jade and I exchange looks at his genuine query. Clearly, we didn't. Riven was always the bright one amongst us. History? I thought those were macabre bedtime stories. Mother should've chosen a better time to impart knowledge then.

"So if Reath dies, their Lord dies too?"

"No, that's not how it works. They're immortals. It's not Reath they care about, but the soul she carries. If her soul ever gets harmed or destroyed, their Lord will lose all his senses. His rule and Realm will collapse into depression."

"So they'll keep her hostage?"

"Guess so. I've heard the Lords normally appoint Spirit Guards to look after their Fetters from a distance. They don't meddle with their Fetter's life as such. But since this is the Lord of the Spirit Guards himself, I presume he'd rather watch over his Fetter personally."

So when I try to make an honest living by selling my mother's last keepsake, I get duped and nearly torn to pieces by monsters of Odious, yet still end up with a death threat hanging above my head from a loan shark who's out to take my life.

But that nefarious woman gets to con me, steal from me and still get the protection of an entire Realm full of magnanimously hideous beings of the Afterworld.

Is life even fair at this point?

I feel Riven's rough hand reach up to my brows. Not until he smoothes out the frown between them do I realise that I was scowling at the design of my fate.

"We'll figure a way out, Rae. I promise." Oh how I wish I could believe him in this moment.

Jade places her hand on my slumped shoulder, I raise my head to look at her. She meekly smiles and nods at me.

All is not lost, per se. I still have these two oddballs by my side. And Amara. We might just figure this out.

Prattling away about the eventual day, while laughing at my foolish display of courage at the market, we walk on.

As we get closer to the huts, I'm about to bid them both farewell for the night and go my own way, when a staunch smell of burning wood overwhelms my nose. They smell it too. We immediately scan our surroundings for the source of the smell.

"Look, there!" Jade points to a trail of black smoke rising up above, at a distance.

"No!" Riven yells.

"There's been a fire!" he darts towards the source of the smoke like he has caught on to something more. Jade and I follow suit.

But as we get closer to the now visible curtains of wild flames in the air, I realise, the direction we're scurrying in, this path to the fire that we see ahead, is the way to my home.