Page 27 of Up from the Earth

I’ve only just found them. If anything were to happen…

The sky darkened overhead, and a crack of thunder rang out. This was not the storm of lust I’d created before but a manifestation of my apprehension.

“Climb up, little bloom. We must go.”

Shaking myself into action, I hurried toward The Wolf, using his leg to hoist myself up onto his massive back. I wove my fingers through his fur, gripping tightly as he bounded forward through the wood at an impossible speed. Cerberus was right behind us as I looked back, the fading forest disappearing behind us as we left the ritual circle.

Icouldnottellhow much time had passed as I rode atop The Wolf. He sprinted through the massive trees, weaving through the trunks as easily as simply running forward through a plain. A sweeping landscape of grayed-out sand and endless jagged cliffs gradually replaced those thick trunks and the entire host of green itself. They stretched up into a sky made entirely of clouds, and in the far, unreachable distance, I could see the earth we ran on drop off into still more sheer rock faces.

Peering over the side of The Wolf, I tracked the ground as his enormous strides carried us over the desert of broken earth and clay. Skulls of various shapes and sizes littered the ground—animal, human, and things in between. I could sense a resonance in my bones, a thrumming that connected with this part of life and nature, too.

Death, after all, had its place in the cycle.

But there was an echo of something behind the never-nearing horizon. Darkness, that unease I’d felt in Cerberus made manifest, loomed like an angry storm cloud. I could feel it pouting in the shadows, a petulant need to be given everything it wanted—all of it just the wailings of a spoiled child.

“The sun is not up here.” The rushing wind nearly swallowed my words, but The Wolf could hear me.

“The sun is never up here. Sundown reigns over all. These souls,” The Wolf said, turning his head to the side as he sprinted in a great arch that turned to the right, “the sun is not for them.”

As a mortal—as a child of a protective witch—I was taught to fear sundown. Stay out of the forest, especially at night. Stay indoors on the new moon. Forces I couldn’t comprehend would be on the hunt for prey. Now, I saw this realm, the darkness, for what it was. Just another state of being and one suited for the resting place of those who had abused the sun’s gifts.

“They are the punished.”

A gentle nod bobbed The Wolf’s head. Cerberus, too.

“But they have remained sequestered successfully until now. One of them—”

“One has done something, Mother. I can sense the claim of the World of Below on him, the claim of the Pit.”

Swallowing hard, I returned to gazing over the landscape. There was so much that churned in the distance, a brewing malice that was seeking out ground to grow roots in. It couldn’t be. The innocence taken by time and fate were meant to have a peaceful rest. Whatever this thing was, it would destroy that. Itwantedto destroy that.

Tracking the shapes of hills jutting out of the cracked ground, I noticed the protrusions that stuck out of the top at regular intervals. The Wolf rushed past one, and at this closer distance, I could now see that it was, in fact, the massive skeleton of some long-dead creature. The ribs and spine blended into the gray earth mounded up underneath them to form mountainous obstacles, the only things breaking up the monotonous expanse in front of me.

“We must cut through here. It is quicker.”Cerberus veered into an enormous gorge that carved its way through the plain.

“Have care, little bloom. Do not touch the walls.”

I couldn’t for the life of me understand why I would want to, but as The Wolf sprinted after our son, I was unable to keep myself from peering at the dark sides of the winding natural corridor. Skeletons had become something of an expected sight, but not those still covered with an emaciated layer of flesh, not those whose limbs scratched frantically at the air.

“Dear gods.”

My stomach flipped over on itself, the stench of copper and iron thickening in the atmosphere as she rushed through the canyon. The souls were trapped within the walls, half hanging out of the rock and dangling there. Beneath me, the sound of The Wolf’s steps changed, the pattering smack of flesh on stone becoming more of a squelch that had me terrified to look down.

And still, I did.

Nearly black, the lumpy mass of discarded parts and coagulated blood trampled beneath The Wolf’s paws. I choked on the sudden rise of bile in my throat, my eyes tearing as I squeezed the fur between my fingers. The pulverized remains formed a sort of stew, one only the most vile of creatures would digest.

“Why…”

I couldn’t finish the question. I knew that these were the spirits of those whose lives led them down this path, and still, it struck me—the grotesque torture of it all.

“They do not deserve your sympathy, Cerri.”The Wolf’s voice was surprisingly gentle in my mind.“They would have done the same and worse to their fellow mortals.”

It was a comfort to know that those who’d been so recklessly cruel, who were downright evil beings, found a place of comeuppance in the afterlife. And it wasalsoa comfort to know that the whole of the landscape here was not dedicated to this particular scenery.

“It is not them I feel sorrow for, but you.” I smoothed my fingers against The Wolf’s skin beneath his fur. “It is a thankless job to be the jailer. Humans do not understand you.”

There was a pause, and through my mind, I heard Cerberus laugh.“You are among the few that understand, Mother. Still, I imagine that Father prefers it that way.”

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