Where was I? Why was I here? Had I died?
Yes… I was dead. This was hell. I was in hell…
My feet squelched as I placed one foot in front of the other, wandering aimlessly through the fog until finally, a light hovered in the distance. I followed it, the hazy glow spreading.
A hollow sorrow fell over me as I gazed upon the land of the dead. A gray sky hung over the rocky, lifeless terrain, and clumps of ominous clouds hovered throughout the landscape. Thunder cracked from above, and a drizzling rain created a mucky mixture of dirt and sand below.
Gray forms moved in the distance with their heads down, arms wrapped around themselves as they wandered aimlessly. Elves, humans, and smaller forms I recognized from a memory long forgotten…
Their heads either hung in grief or they searched blindly, not seeing the other beings wandering around them. Men, women… The old and the young.
The dead.
A wave of nausea rose to my throat.Why did I feel nauseous if I was dead?
I stumbled up to an old man with a long, gray beard and reached for his gaunt arm.
“Where am I?” I asked, my voice coming out shaky and weak as I clasped my hand onto his shoulder.
The man jerked backward, his eyes wild as they tried to find me. He swatted at the air before tremors raced through him.
His nails scraped against his arms before they plunged into what remained of his hair, and he ripped it out at the roots. The scream that left his lips ricocheted off the surrounding obsidian rocks. The sound traveled up into the fog before bouncing back down in a torturous echo.
I backpedaled, my heart racing, as two monstrous winged rodents swarmed overhead, the man’s agonizing cry drawing them closer. Fog closed in on the man as he crashed to the ground, and the winged monstrosities swooped down from above.
Bile rose to my throat, and I froze as the mist blocked them from view. I started as a loud bang echoed from behind. I spun on my heel and reeled to find a short woman. She stood, looking blindly around her, before she knelt to the ground and pounded her fist against it. The resulting bang reverberated through my chest.
“They do that sometimes.”
I jumped, my heart lurching at the sound of the slippery, unholy voice.
Tynan.
Memories slammed into me. I whipped around to face the God of Death, staggering in the mucky sand. My shield snapped into place. Visions of my final moments in the Realm of Vael flooded me.
Kellan.I was here for Kellan.
“Where is he?” I demanded.
Tynan shrugged before looking back in the direction I’d come from.
“A twenty-eight-year-old pirate from the Islands of Votruvia…” Tynan mused, scratching his chin as if he had facial hair. “I’d guess he has several more days in there.”
“Days? How long was I in there?”
Tynan turned toward me and cocked his head. “Time works differently here. But you were in for a few weeks, by my standards.”
Weeks. I’d sinned enough in my short lifetime to have earnedweeksof nonstop retribution. And Lord Astraeus…
“Imagine the sentence dealt for your elven friends.” Tynan raised his black brows and his three-pronged tongue tasted the air.
Oh gods. The elves would enduremonthsof this at their deaths. Bile rose to my throat.
“I see you questioning it. But did Dark King Daimos not deserve years of hell? What of King Saros? Mortals shall reap what they sow, and the Abyss knows all.”
My throat bobbed as I turned and stared at the dead wandering through the land.
“And then they just stay here? Do they find their families? Their friends that have died before them?”
