|[ The Soul Reaper - 2 ]| [UNDERGOING EDITING]

Prologue // Sand

Everything was silent. But it wasn't a bad silence. It was a peaceful kind of silence. The kind you heard at night, right before you drifted to sleep. It was a beautiful silence. I glanced around at the space around me. It was a place I had never been. An area I didn't recognise. The ground was a dusty gold-brown and bleak, with no life growing upon it anywhere. Spaced out randomly across the ground were vertical flattened stones, like odd tombstones. I wondered if I had stumbled into an old abandoned graveyard. But where I had I stumbled from? As I glanced behind me I saw only the same desolate landscape that was before me, stretching on for miles. There was no sign of a path, nor any recognisable buildings. Where was I? How had I gotten here?

There was a sudden break in the silence as something moaned quietly. I whirled to see a strange figure suddenly fade away, only a few feet from me. It had looked as if it was made of sand and a blast of wind had dispersed it. I shivered as if from cold though the air against my skin had grown too hot for comfort and was far too humid. I tasted something metallic on my tongue as something brushed against my elbow and I accidentally bit down on my tongue. I suddenly realised I wore none of my armour, or even one of my dresses, but short trousers and a shirt that bared my pale arms. I glanced at the clothes and saw tears through the materials. How had I managed to do that without noticing? When had I put on these clothes? The thing breathed across my skin again, its touch as soft as a feather. The skin itched where it had brushed against it and I reached to scratch it.

My hand came away bright red... blood? My heart jumped to a faster pace as I glanced down and saw the skin of my arm was ragged and torn, flapping in the wind like a curtain in a window. But I couldn't feel any of the pain that my mind told me I should be feeling. How was this possible? Was I hallucinating?

There was another moan and I jumped, feeling jittery, unnerved and afraid. What was happening? I turned on the spot as dark, shapeless figures emerged out of the ground like sandy ghosts and faced me, trapping me in a tight circle. My breath caught in my throat and I tasted that metallic taste again. It wasn't blood. It was fear.

"What... what do you want?" I asked as the figures took form into the shapes of humans. They took a step towards me in perfect unison, making the circle even tighter. It was like a wave of sand, moving smoothly across the ground. There was no reply from the figures. No reply at all except for a breath of wind that whistled past. The figures took another step towards me, a few of them becoming so close they merged together. I felt sweat bead on my forehead and the nape of my neck as I began to panic. This wasn't right; this wasn't possible. This shouldn't be happening.

"Get away from me!" I snarled, reaching over my shoulder to grab my bow and quiver – but they weren't there. I struggled to comprehend this fact. I never went anywhere without my weapons, never even entertained the thought of leaving without my bow and quiver. The figures all took another step in towards me and they melded, forming a thick, shimmering wall of sand. I was sealed in. my panicked mind briefly wondered if it was as solid as it looked. Would I be able to push through it? As easily as one might walk through a wall of water? Or would it be like slamming into a castle wall. I took a step forwards, clenching my hands into tight fists. Suddenly a thunderous voice rang out, inside and out of my head. I clapped my hands over my ears, ignoring the pain it brought.

"STAY!" beneath the word I could hear a slightly quieter chorus of voices: stay, stay, stay, stay.

"No!" I screamed, leaping at the wall. I squinted my eyes shut and clamped my mouth shut as sand whipped against me. I burst through the other side with a spray of golden grit. As soon as I was outside the circle everything went quiet. Everything became still. The wind died down, the voices stopped and I turned to see the figures watching me, hands outstretched.

"You should've stayed." The voice cried and for a moment I saw human faces flicker underneath the swirling sand. Perhaps I should've? Maybe I had made a mistake. The faces disappeared.

"No, wait." I cried, feeling a fresh fear build inside me as they abandoned me. With an explosion of sand the figures before me disappeared and I was left alone again in utter silence.

But this time it was a terrible silence. One that caused your skin to crawl and the hair on the back of your neck to stand on end. A silence that told you that something was wrong, horribly wrong. It was a silence that told me it wasn't the sand figures I should've been afraid of.

A loud crack broke the silence, the sound of bones breaking. I shuddered as it came again and again. I winced every time. I turned quickly on the spot, trying to pinpoint where it was coming from. Crack. Another bone splintering in half. Then dead quiet. Oh Mīla, please save me, I prayed silently. Even my pulse was quiet. Had it stopped? Had I died? No, no, there it was. Racing in my chest.

My muscles were stretched tight, ready to spring into action and my ears were straining for the next noise. I suddenly tasted blood in my mouth and realised I had been chewing into my lip, breaking the skin. I felt something hot and sticky run down my bare leg and saw blood pouring from a gruesome tear in my thigh. My arm still dripped with warm scarlet blood and I fearfully wondered if that was how I would die. If I would simply bleed out. Die in some foreign place, not even sure what had killed me.

The next crack shot out through the air and I turned. I instantly wished I had already died. No pain, no knowledge of what had been tearing into me. Ignorance would've been blissful.

My eyes locked onto the eyes of the creature before me – or where it's eyes would've been if it had had them. It had been human at one point, with two arms and two legs, as well as head attached to an almost recognisable torso. But the skin was gone, with only shreds left as if someone had hastily peeled its body with a rusty blade. Underneath the few threads of bloody hide was rotting flesh, green and black mould covering the pulverised muscles. Black beetles crawled across it, and ivory white bones, broken and jagged poked out of its body, resembling a shoddy version of a skeleton. Organs stood out from the rest of its bloody mass, blue and purple like tumours. And then I saw a pumping black growth on what might've been a chest. It's heart.

I froze, every muscle in my body just... stopping. My mind wasn't working... it had just shut down, and yet I could register the fear biting into me.

The monster in front of me seemed to realised I had stopped moving... and started to walk towards me. It had an awkward, sickening, jilting gait that crunched with every step as bones continued to break and grind against each other. Crunch, snap, crack. I shuddered, my muscles suddenly coming alive again. My thoughts returned, hitting me hard as I stumbled back from it. My foot tripped over something and I landed on my back, groaning in pain. What was this thing? How did I kill it? It made an awful whispering noise, each word accompanied by a sickening sound, like when you dropped something slimy on the floor. I shirked away from it until my back hit a tombstone. The stone was surprisingly hot against my skin, almost burning. I quickly moved away from it, climbing to my feet. The monster was getting closer and I could smell it now, like fetid breath, rotten meat and sour-sweet decay. It was still whispering, as if it was trying to speak to me. I stifled a scream as it fell down onto the ground before me, its leg snapping out from underneath it. As it started to pick itself back up again I could see the sand clinging to its sticky, slimy surface and I began to back away. I had never felt this vulnerable before, or this scared. I had no weapon and no clue about what I was up against. I had even less of an idea on how to kill it.

My back pressed up against something hot and soft – something moving. I turned to see one of the sand figures watching me, hand held out.

"Come." It rumbled. I just stared up at it, utterly confused and petrified. What to choose? Horrifying demon skeleton or a strange sand being. Something squelched around my ankle and I glanced down to see the skeleton had grabbed my leg tightly. With a low groan it pulled itself towards me, its bones snapping angrily. I screamed as its other arm snapped, extending up towards my throat. Behind it I saw a shadowy red stain spread across the landscape and knew I was going to die. Mīla, please...

Death had come for me at last...