Unable to look any longer, Gauri shut her eyes.
And soon, the horse slowed to a stop.
Gauri slid off, quickly backing away and facing the horse so that it could not snatch her again.
“That was very difficult,” huffed the horse. “I know you will taste bad, but I admit that I still wanted to break your skin. Just a quick sip, you see. Running makes me hungry. I much prefer just appearing behind someone when they least expect it.”
It grinned.
Gauri stared at it. “Why are you helping me?”
The horse’s withers rippled. Its ears swiveled and pointed at her.
“Because you need it.”
“But whyyou?”
“Because,” said the horse, and this time its voice reeked of something ancient, something that might have once been sinister but grew bored of malice and had landed at a strange medium. “I am trusted. Not everyone fights on behalf of those whose life thread is split. And perhaps you have more friends than you think.”
Gauri’s hand flew to her neck. It was a habit that she still could not shake, for it happened every time she thought of her sister, Maya. Once upon a time, her sister’s necklace had dangled against her throat. A heavy sapphire pendant on a delicate string of seed pearls. But she had since stored it in her jewelry chest.
It did no good to wear a ghost around her neck.
The horse’s words nudged at a memory that brought her solace.In it, her sister told her a tale until the sun rose, and promised to see her again.
“Very well then,” said Gauri uneasily. Trusted or no, that did not mean she had to face her back to the creature. “Where are we?”
“This is the first gate.”
“How many gates are there before the threshold of the Kingdom of Death?”
“Two,” said the horse. “The Gate of Names and the Gate of Grief.”
Gauri had seen many gates in her life. And this did not resemble one. It looked like a grove gathered from scraps of children’s nightmares. A sickly crescent moon hung in an unfinished sky, the ends of it unraveling into the solemn gloom that coated the entirety of this in-between place. Trees that looked more like twists of iron than any living thing grew in tight spirals. No fruit dangled from their branches. What swayed from their branches were voices.Names.Names repeated softly, deliriously, like a person who has lost all but this last cut of themselves.
The voices took all kinds of forms. The nameChayatransformed into a silver anklet when a young man reached for it. The nameUrvashidangled like a dried-out root. None reached for it.
People wandered through the grove. Plucking names and putting them back. Some looked stricken as they held the name to their ear. Others looked disgusted and turned around, leaving the Gate of Names instead of passing through it. Still more people wept when they held the name to their ear. But those who wept did not turn. Instead, they gathered the name to them, and walked into the grove and through the gate.
“Why names?” asked Gauri.
“Would you rather they have a Gate of Skin?” asked the horse.
Gauri recoiled. “No.”
“Names are powerful things, my inedible bone!” said the horse. “They are the gristle of destiny once fate has chewed a life down to its death. Mmm, gristle. Names are sweet as blood spatter. Names are cobbled-together hopes. Why else would someone name a wrinkled blanket of a newborn if not to impress some hope upon them for what they mightbe? But, you see, my little bone girl, while a soul can leave a name behind, a name cannot let go of a soul’s hold. A name can get enamored of a person. They’re very sensitive.” The horse tilted its head in thought. “And also very tasteless. Pity. They always seem so succulent in life. But that is why the discarded names find their way to this place and affix themselves to this gate. Here, they become a window of a kind. A way to view what might have happened to the one who bore it.”
In front of her, people twisted their way through the groves. They held up the names as if they were inspecting fruit. Gauri watched as one man flung a name down onto the dirt. Fury twisted his features. Whatever he had seen in the name had made him abandon the soul who it had once belonged to. The man turned on his heel. And then he walked out of the grove.
“What happens when someone holds a name?” asked Gauri. “Does it show the future?”
“A little,” said the horse. “It makes no pronouncements upon the name-bearer’s end. But it shows a direction that soul will encounter should that name be allowed to ripen. It is up to the one who plucks the name in this gate whether they believe it is a direction worth suffering.”
The horse turned its head, its unsettling gaze pinned to the manwho had thrown the name onto the dirt and now stalked down the hall.
“You can always turn around and leave it behind.”
No. She could not leave him behind. She would not. And yet that did not stop the shadows of her anxiety from falling across her thoughts.
