River of Shadows (Underworld Gods 1)

“Hanna, dear,” he says, trying to move his hands to hold me but the skeleton guards are strong. “You didn’t stay because it wasn’t your path. But I never stopped loving you, you know I didn’t, and I know you never stopped loving me. Your earrings…your earrings will let you know.” He looks over at Death again, a vein popping in his forehead. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him this furious before. “You let her go. You keep me, and let her go. I don’t want your cure. I’ll gladly die knowing she’s free.”

“Mmmmm,” Death muses. “How very predictable of you, Torben. But no. I’ll be keeping her. She interests me a lot more than you do. You’ll be going along now, back to the Upper World, and if you know what’s good for you, you’ll stay there. Hanna belongs with me now. She belongs to Tuonela.”

“You let her go!” my father shouts. “Please, I beg of you!”

Death just reaches into his cloak and pulls out a small glass vial. In the glass vial is a writhing white centipede. I want to shrink away in horror, until I realize the centipede is meant for my father.

“You know, it was Rasmus who brought Hanna here,” Death says. “It was Rasmus who had the idea to trade Hanna for your life. Hanna, of course, was willing to do that no matter who suggested it. I have to admit, I’m a little jealous of you, Torben. To have people love you that much, they would go to the ends of another world to try and save you…well, if you take anything away from this experience, it’s that you’re one lucky man.”

Then Death removes the metal stopper and the white centipede crawls out onto his fingers. He grasps it by the writhing end, it’s hundreds of tiny legs wriggling, and holds it above my father’s head.

“No!” I scream, trying to fight him, but Death just holds me back with his arm and lets the centipede go. I watch in horror as the centipede crawls down over my father’s face—mirroring when I saw him in the casket—and up his nose.

My father screams.

I scream.

Then my father’s eyes roll back in his head and he suddenly collapses, dead weight in the skeleton guards’ hands.

“What did you do!?” I screech at Death, rage tearing through me. “You promised you would let him go!”

Death is holding me back by the chain now and I’m falling to my knees, trying to crawl after my father after the guards drag him away.

“He’s not dead,” Death says gruffly, as if I’m overreacting. “The dreamwalker has only put him to sleep. A deep sleep that even a shaman won’t wake up from, not for a few days. Gives my Deadhands enough time to take him out the way he came in and leave him in the Upper World. Where he will stay.”

My heart calms, just a little, in knowing he isn’t dead. “You could have just escorted him out,” I say weakly.

Death lets out another dry laugh. “He’s a shaman, little bird. A powerful one. Don’t base all your knowledge of them on Rasmus. Your father has the ability to fight his way back here and then some. The only reason he can’t use his magic in here is because of all the onyx and iron. And the wards, though I don’t trust those that put the wards in place.”

“He’ll be back. He’ll come back for me.” I know I should keep that knowledge quiet, but I want to prove how strong my father is, how much he loves me.

“He won’t,” Death says. “And not because he won’t try. He won’t remember. That’s the gift of the dreamwalker. All your memories from weeks prior will be gone. He’ll wake up somewhere in Lapland and there’s a chance he won’t even remember coming here. He won’t even know he’s been cured from cancer until he realizes he’s not dead yet.”

I grind my teeth together, the anger and violence rushing through me is shocking even to me. “You extend a man’s life but he won’t even know it? He might spend all his days thinking he’s about to die, that they’re his last! You’re depriving him of the gift of a second chance!”

I hear Death lift up the chain and seconds later the iron collar is pulling back against my throat. “As much as I love the sight of you chained and on all fours, ass toward me, I think it’s time to show you to your room.” He gives the chain another yank until I’m staggering to my feet. “And I’m not depriving your father of anything. A man who thinks he’s dying, as long as his body permits him, will live out his last days by savoring everything life has to offer. Your father will go on squeezing every last drop out of his life before he finds out he has so much more ahead of him. It’s just unfortunate you won’t be a part of it.”