(The prologue to my book-in-progress)
They'd told her the Wall was terrifying; that it was built with the twisted expressions of those in the throes of agony and that it would stink like rotting meat. They'd said the screams of the damned would cloud the air, and they'd said that she would feel pain.
And she had, at first - a fierce, searing pain that made it impossible to think, much less move in any coherent fashion.
But it had faded with blessed speed when she opened her eyes to the Realm of the Gods. It was an empty place, as she had suspected it to be, thousands of small, perfect white stones forming the ground beneath her feet and a thick white mist that spread unerringly in all directions, unbroken but for the Wall.
The Wall had no time, no history, no memory, and as she beheld it she felt her own memories fade. Was it meant to be terrifying? She'd heard of this place before, in the world she had loved before she died. Was that where she had felt pain? Had she ever felt pain? Had she honestly been screaming just moments before?
A second passed and she realized she didn't remember what pain was. Another second and she wondered why she even cared.
All that mattered was the Wall.
It was smooth and black, and it ran across the stones as far as she could see. Likewise there was no top in sight; no matter how hard she peered above it simply glided unblemished into the mist.
"Beautiful." Her whisper fled into the white and did not return.
An impulsive desire to draw closer moved her forward. Her feet, bare, made no noise against the stones.
She halted when she was close enough to touch the Wall; she could see flickering patterns upon the black, like the reflections of light off water, or shadows of spirits from the other side. Here the corners of her sight then began to harbor flashing visions of dark shapes lashing out from the Wall, but when she focused directly there was no movement but for the sleepy shifting of the Wall itself.
She was thus surprised when the Wall gave birth to a figure, looming and black, who did not vanish from sight when she turned her eye upon him. He was twice as tall as she, with great expanses of a dark cloak draped about his form, and where his face should have been there was only blackness.
But despite this she felt no fear; only a vague curiosity, and perhaps a wafting tinge of undue fondness.
"I am Keeper of the Boundary, Warden of the Others-Realm, Searcher of Hearts, and King of the Lost. I am Death. Have you come to cross the Wall?" His voice resonated within her mind so clearly she wondered if he had actually spoken. Yet despite this, despite the fact he was the figure most feared in the world from which she came, she knew what she must do. This was a sacred ritual, and to break it was unthinkable.
"I have."
Death lifted his arms, his robes hanging like curtains, and embraced her. She felt his nothingness and tasted something bittersweet.
"You are asleep to them now. Come. Dream."
His robes still surrounding her, he stepped into the Wall.
It melted at the touch of his robes, allowing him to pass, and she within him. Intense peace came, like the stillness of a drowsy mind - but only for a moment.
A great, terrible scream wrenched at the foundations of the world, and she was jerked violently out of the protective embrace, back to the side of the mist.
There were chains, burning and heavy, thrust upon her arms and legs and neck and securing her instantly to the Wall. She cried out.
But this was not Death's doing. The great solemn being stood aside, watching with vague disinterest the interruption of the ritual.
No - they were invisible hands that performed this injustice; tearing her from peace and binding her to the thing she had left behind. The hands were cruel, yet they lingered, and for a moment she thought she saw a form behind them, the glancing shape of a man. It flickered; the Realm of the Gods would grant him nothing more.
"Release me!" she cried, and struggled, but the man finished his work quickly and the warm hands left her. Had he gone? "Death! Will you not help me?"
A breath came before Death responded. "I let those cross who come, but I cannot interfere in the workings of man."
"I have come! I wish to cross - I must cross, and you must help me!" Even the mist could not absorb her cries this time.
But Death did nothing; only repeated: "I cannot interfere with the workings of man."
She wailed in despair, and thrashed against the chains, but a heavy voice beside her ear immediately stilled her.
"Patience, my sweet. Are you ready to wake?" The voice belonged to the one with the invisible hands, and his words filled her with terror. Wake? She could not wake; she had just gone to sleep, and a soul was only meant to sleep once!
"I must cross," she cried, and tried to shrink back into the Wall, but without Death's touch the Wall stood as rigid as the chains that held her there. "Leave me be, let me cross. I cannot wake while trapped here - to do so would kill me."
The voice chuckled, and a shifting of light revealed for a moment the unnatural form of his head bent to her shoulder. "No; crossing the Wall would kill you, but I don't want that, not yet."
"What do you desire of me?"
"You know well what my desires are."
Her gut twisted within her and her throat convulsed. "All I wish is to cross. Please, I beg of you, let me go."
Death interrupted then, speaking to the man. "Linger any longer and you will cross the Wall as well."
The man ignored Death, but he bit back additional words. "Daughter of man, I will not. Bound to death you are, yet bound to death you will wake. Unable to flee from it, unable to cross through it, you will belong to neither one world nor the other. Forever scorned, forever feared, able to see yet not touch, to hear and not speak. Let this be your curse."
And then she felt the hands again, this time upon her face, and a twisting power flooded her, surrounding her, eating at her, digging its claws into her flesh and soul and mind.
It was then that she remembered what pain was.
Screams tore for her throat, and through them she cried for Death, the only thing she knew that could save her. It was wrong, it was agony, and he must help her!
But Death remained still, watching, unable to interfere with the accursed workings of man.
A faint chanting sounded, and she realized it was the man uttering magic.
"Leave me be!" She shrieked, but could not hear her own words through the burning that rushed through her ears. She knew naught but pain; oh, gods, it felt as if her chest were being split open to bare her heart.
Images flashed before her, vague drifting sights that came from the world she was supposed to have left. Sounds flooded into her mind, deafened her, overwhelmed her.
The magic was drawing her back-
Back to her old, forsaken death-
Or was it life?
Back to the home of the memories she no longer had-
To where there lived pain-
And tears-
And love-
She woke.
