A/n: Media from the last chapter was Proserpine by Dante Gabriel Rossetti, painted in 1874. Proserpine is the Roman term for the well-known Goddess Persephone (Greek), who was kidnapped (literally. Whilst she was out havin' a ball with some gals) by Hades to live in the Underworld with him. After some debate, Hades agrees to free her, but before she can leave she eats the fruit shown in the picture, and is trapped for half the year (during winter) in the Underworld.
--
When I awaken, my mouth tastes of sea salt and the world seems foggy.
Heaving, I roll onto my belly, my head performing pirouettes as I do so. My hands grasp cold, earthen floor, stones scratching at my fingernails. When I hear a groan, it takes a few moments to realise that it's my voice, croaking and weak.
Shivering, I prop myself up slowly onto my elbows and then to my knees. To my intense displeasure, I'm still wearing my goddamn wedding dress. Thankfully, it is ruined; dropping leagues beneath the water level and then being washed up onto a musty, charcoal bank did wonders to spoil white ivory. My hair is knotted around my head, plaits that were once neat are now stuck together with seaweed and foam. I'm picking off my wet accessories and chucking them when it sinks in that I'm alive.
You did expect to be, I think.
There's still some fog around, but I can see a barren wasteland around me, filled with odd bits of rubble and bare, spindled trees. An odd light in the distance makes me think of the sun, and daylight, but somehow, I know it isn't. And, stretching before me lies a massive, tumbling, churning, white-water-rapids river.
'How typical,' I remark. 'I hope Mercer still has those coins...'
He may yet come in useful. That reminds me...where is he?
That's when I listen, and realise that above the roaring sound of the river, I can hear a faint sobbing sound. I step towards it, hobbling in heels across an uneven surface, until I locate the boy, standing waist-height in the river and looking very much like he's about to drown himself for a second time.
'Hey! What are you doing? Hey!'
He doesn't even turn. The sobs just get louder. Rolling my eyes, I pull off my heels and wade into the river after him.
The current immediately lures me.
I hear voices...voices and music. I can't make anyone out in particular, but I have a feeling that I know them. If I just follow the river— if I let it take me with it—
Just lie down, I think. Haven't I been through enough? All this pain. All that torture. I should take a moment to relax...
'Nerissa,' says a voice, 'Nerissa, it's me. Don't you want to see me again? Nessie, you're nearly there.'
Who?
The nostalgic music continues, rising into a drumming beat that seems to flow in between the rhythms of the water and the blood in my veins. A pulse in my temple throbs. I step further, until my hips are immersed in the water, and I know that if I let myself float now, I wouldn't be able to get back. The river would catch me, and hold me, and not let go.
And I feel relief.
'Nessie, please, hurry!'
Nate's voice.
It has the opposite effect. Like someone clapping in my ear, I blink away the temptation. I miss Nate like hell, but he's the closest reminder I have to why I'm here.
I'm sorry, Nate. Not yet.
I look down at the water's surface, and flinch when I see no reflection there. Instinctively, I grab Mercer's elbow and pull him from his own death fantasies, dragging him forcedly in my heavy weighted dress against a current that does not want us to leave.
I stumble up the sand bank and onto dry land, Mercer still impersonating a wayward balloon, bobbing back towards the river.
'Wake the fuck up, Mercer!' I growl at him, wrenching at his skin. Nail marks bite across his arms, and I see him jolt. He blinks three times, his mouth agape.
'Nerissa?' he says, and his hand trembles to his forehead. Tears are streaked down his face, and his curly blond hair is now matted and stuck to his cheeks.
He looks as ridiculous as I do.
And to my surprise, he doesn't say anything. He just bursts into tears.
'Fuck,' I say again. I had no idea what could help him.
In my most uncomfortable manner, I pat his shoulder as kindly as I can. He turns to me for support, taking a rush at my shoulder and crying noisily onto it.
I go rigid. Close human contact? Not unless it involves fighting, and I didn't think putting Mercer into a choke hold would make him feel better.
'Uh...uhm...' I try to think what my dad might say. In the past, if he wasn't sober, he was chatty. And when he wasn't sober he seemed to think he could solve the world's problems on his own— including his reclusive teenage daughter's. Combined, the two led to my father desperately trying to get me to tell him what was going on.
Perhaps, on reflection, my dad isn't the best person to take example from. But as my stepmother has as much feeling as a metal stove, she's even less of a role model.
So I settle for the shoulder squeeze and, 'Want to talk about it?'
And secretly hoping that he really, really doesn't want to talk about it, because what would I say? That I'm not unhappy because I have some pathological desire for revenge? That being dead isn't so bad?
Mercer sniffs, and draws away from me, hiccupping.
'You should have let me go there,' he mumbles, 'that's where we're supposed to go. We're dead.'
I pause as he wipes snot-filled tears onto his sleeve. Pointedly, I say, 'We're supposed to find the God of Death here.'
'Here? Where's here?'
'The Underworld, of course. Where did you think we were?'
'I don't know!' he shouts shrilly, 'It's my first time being here!'
I give him a deadpan look. 'Mine too.'
'But you— you obviously know a lot more about it, heaven knows how but I'm so not prepared for this—'
'You are, look, we just have to find the Ferryman—'
'—and we're dead, for god's sake, and you...how are you so calm?'
I wiggle my fingers experimentally. 'Still feel alive. It's not as bad as I envisioned.'
'What did you envision?'
'Skeletons,' I reply.
Mercer starts to laugh, and at first I think it's an improvement. That I've managed to make him feel better. But then I realise that he's laughing only because if he wasn't, he'd be crying, and hysterical laughter is always the solution.
'I can't believe this,' he says, his knees giving way and crashing to the floor. He slumps, and I begin to lose patience.
I don't need him, I think stubbornly, I could just leave him here.
'I'm only calm because I volunteered to be the bride,' I sigh. I kneel beside him. Damn my conscience.
Mercer looks like I just announced I was pregnant. Before he can lose it again, I quickly elaborate.
'I've researched. I've prepared. I know all the myths. I don't know how many are true, but this looks promising. These here are the rivers of the Underworld. They join and take you to an afterlife, of sorts.'
I say it all as fast as I can, in case he starts blabbering again.
'Why?' he demands. 'Why volunteer to...die?'
I stare at him, seeing the dark circles where he hadn't slept properly, and the thinness of his arms, and realise that this boy really was despairing.
'I miss my girlfriend,' he wails, and at that point I really don't know what to say.
Of all the things I could have said, I choose the stupidest one. 'She could have volunteered too.'
Mercer looks like he's going to cry. 'No, she couldn't. She was terrified of being chosen, so we...you know...so she wasn't a virgin.'
'Oh,' I say, wondering if I should add congratulations. Considering the occasion, I didn't think it necessary.
'We never expected that it would be me...there's so many men in the city! The chances are much slimmer than the girls, because anyone can be picked.'
I nod, understanding this part. Girls must be virgins. And virginity is extremely rare, given the life-or-death situation as an incentive to have sex. Personally, the God of Death's taste in so-called purity was just one of many things I had to bring up with him.
'It had to be someone,' I say, and Mercer gives me the darkest look imaginable.
'Thanks,' he says dryly.
I am hopeless at this.
'So you...you deliberately avoided having sex?' Mercer asks curiously. I pretend to be cross, folding my arms and huffing. But it's the first sentence he's said without a sob.
'What is this, truth or dare? Never have I ever?'
'No! It's just, you know, we're stuck here,' he laughs, humourlessly. 'And I'm dead. Why the hell not?'
'It's private,' I say in mock affront, when I realise Mercer's smirking. 'Oh, all right. Fine. I've never had sex because one, I've been planning this since I was thirteen and two, I've never gotten to know anybody, let alone be attracted to them.'
'You're shitting me...thirteen? What kind of psycho are you?'
'Psychopathy is a serious condition and not to be made li—'
'You know what I mean!' Mercer looks close to hitting me in frustration. I must bring out the violence in people. 'What possessed you to want to be a bride to the ruler of the Underworld?'
I don't answer. Then Mercer's eyebrows rise.
'Oh, dear Lord— do you...have one of those fetishes? You know, the one with dea—'
'No, you idiot. Will you let me speak?'
Mercer looks as though he's about to retort, but snaps his mouth closed. I take a moment to settle my thoughts in my head. I have one of those awful problems of being unable to transfer things in my mind to words that form a coherent sentence. After a brief pause, I begin to explain begrudgingly.
'Just so you don't think I'm a fetishist, or that I'm Death's fangirl, I'll tell you. Plus, you're right— you're dead, so you can't tell anyone else anyway.'
Before he can interrupt, I shoot him a silencing glare. I haven't spoken this much in months. Not since I'd been chosen for Bride, since I'd left whatever gang I'd been with before.
'When I was thirteen, my twin brother Nate died.'
Mercer's eyes soften.
'I was there when he— when I found him. He had gone missing a few days before, and I found him, slowly dying, in an alleyway in the slums. He was badly cut. But as I tried to help him, a dark figure emerged up the alleyway. Thinking it was the attacker, I tried to hide him, but he knew exactly where we were. I was terrified.'
Even now, I shudder at the cold, dim alleyway, the memories of clutching at my beloved brother lying in pools of blood, his eyes beaten shut, his pulse thread-like and faint.
'The figure pulled out something that looked like a knife, only larger, and I screamed. It was only later I realised that it wasn't a knife, or a sword— but a scythe. I thought he was going to harm Nate. But instead of hurting us, he cut through my brother. Didn't leave a mark...and then I saw Nate, standing there, over his own body. I saw my twin brother's soul, and only then I realised that the man wasn't human.'
'And?' Mercer prompts me to continue.
I sigh. 'That was it. He didn't say a word to me. Didn't acknowledge I was there. I saw Nate step up from his body, and follow the man into blackness.'
Mercer lets out a long, deep breath and I nod.
'That's not all,' I say wearily. 'I thought I had imagined it out of grief, that somehow seeing Nate saying goodbye was closure for me. Until I saw Nate again three days after we lay his body in the ground.'
As I speak, I've curled up my legs against my chest and I clutch at them. Instead of looking out at the river, I'm seeing that day in the busy streets, being sent out by my stepmother in a futile attempt to get me out of the house to cheer me up. I wandered around lost without Nate.
'...and then, I saw him, out of the corner of my eye, with another young child. I knew Nate's figure anywhere, and it looked like him, but didn't feel like him, you know? So I followed them. I didn't know what else to do. City's so big, chances are I'd never find him again.'
My throat is starting to crack now, parched from the sea salt and lack of water. I wish death didn't bring with it the earthly needs, but apparently, it does.
'I followed Nate as he took the child away, and I knew something wasn't right. He looked like Nate, but he didn't act like Nate: too wooden. Too lifeless. Too robotic. I followed him all the way out of the city, into the fields, and I couldn't hide anymore.'
Mercer swallows. 'What did he do?'
'Attacked me.'
'Attacked you? How so? Did you run? What—?'
I shake my head, letting his questions drift into silence. Images are flashing through my head, blinding my ability to think clearly. Nate's eyes, blank and cold. My fear. The child screaming. Nate not recognising me. Nate, knife in hand. Me screaming.
'Too much,' I say, 'I can't carry on, I'm sorry. I've never told...'
And I don't think I ever will tell anyone, I realise numbly.
My hands, coated in Nate's blood.
'That's— that's okay, I didn't expect—' Mercer stutters, and I flash him a relieved smile.
'Can we move? I'm starting to get chilly, and I'm paranoid that the light will go out...'
'The sun?' Mercer squints at the light, his face frowning. 'No...that doesn't look like a sun. It looks like the entire sky is just grey...'
Shuddering, I stand, my arms wrapping around my body for warmth. Either my temperature is dropping, or the Underworld has gotten a lot colder. I'm grateful for the heat as we began to walk along the river.
'We have to look for a Ferryman,' I say from ahead of Mercer. I take the lead because he looks at me to.
Such a great guide he is.
'Ferryman?' I hear him say. 'What for?'
'To take us down the river,' I reply shortly, my toes forming blisters against the rock. I'd left my heels behind for some lucky wayward soul to find. 'Do you still have the coins?'
'Yeah, but they seem pretty useless. Is it just me, or do you see people drifting in this river, below the surface? Every now and again?'
'I'm not looking, and maybe you shouldn't, either. We need the coins. They're not useless, they're the one good thing they gave us.'
I hear him mutter curses that I'm certain are aimed at my dreadful companionship. Then he says, 'The ring looks like it's worth more. Is there some sort of Death Pawnbrokers where we can trade them?'
'No.' I take note of his sarcasm, and ignore it. 'We give them to the Ferryman, of course.'
'Yeah, yeah...'
After what may be ten minutes or ten hours— the light hasn't changed in the slightest— we see a small dock upstream. A wooden jetty reaches out across the river, and a boat is moored next to it.
'Holy...' Mercer swears, 'You weren't kidding! There's a bloody kayak!'
Canoe, I want to correct him. But I'm too busy wondering why I can't see anyone standing with the boat.
Mercer's still not shutting up.
'This place is cracked up, I wish I could tell my girlfriend about this, it's weird—'
'Mercer. Shut up.'
I halt in my steps a few metres away from the jetty, eyeing the ageing wood and creaking boat. Something feels wrong here; I can sense it. The air stirs from its deathly slumber, sending chills up my spine.
Behind me, Mercer whimpers. Useless guide.
I have no weapons whatsoever, but I believe I still have surprise. I tread softly, the crunch of my feet disguised by the river. As Mercer stomps, clumsily I might add, I whip around to face him and motion for him to wait.
'In case something happens,' I mouth, and he thinks I'm being tactical.
I sort of am, in a going-solo kind of way.
I edge up to the wooden platform, and bite my tongue in shock.
There's blood and footprints, all across the decking, seeping into the brown wood in heavy globs of scarlet. Next to it, the boat is tied up as usual, and rocking in the current.
Inside it is the remains of a skeletal figure, half-humanoid, half-bone, and now with its torso ripped open. Innards slip over its ribs, slopping onto the floor of the boat and over the sides. The Ferryman's eyes have been gouged out; bloody sockets are the only indications that he— or she— ever had eyes. Their feet— which had been entirely bone— are smashed and broken, as if his attacker had aimed for his legs to render him immobile.
Quickly, I squint over the footprints, making out strange dragging marks along the wood.
The Ferryman tried to crawl away. They were retreating to the edge.
My mind clicks with understanding. They were trying to get to the river. Trying to make it to pass on.
A lump rises in my throat. They hadn't made it.
'I found the Ferryman,' I whisper to Mercer. 'He's dead...well, more dead...'
'And I have found my culprit.'
The voice is low and deep, and definitely not one I recognise.
I leap around, staggering, my eyes finding Mercer in the clutches of the speaker.
Fucking hell, Mercer. You had one job.
The man is taller than him, and has one lazy hand clamped over Mercer's mouth, and the other on Mercer's arm, twisting it behind his back.
Mercer tries to catch my attention, but I've already given it to the newcomer. We stare each other down. His eyes are a cool blue, and they do not move as I take in his dark hair, his dark, sharp eyebrows and the sinister smile slanting across his face. If I weren't vulnerable, lost and dead, I would have found him dizzyingly attractive.
But the truth is, I have no weapons, the worst guide in history, and a wedding dress.
Time to think of a Plan B.
--
A/N: Edited version!
What did you think of Mercer's relationship with Nerissa? What else do you think Nerissa didn't tell him? And finally...what do you think of the newcomer?
lots of love
Larissa