Page 2 of Against All Odds

“Time’s up!” the demon boomed. “Choose now, girl, or I will choose for you.”

I gasped. Not choosing was not an option. I’d tried that before, and then the demon ate me anyway.

“No, d-don’t! I’ll choose!” With a trembling finger, I pointed to the Bunny on the right – the one I’d carried with me in my hiding place. “That one.”

I knew I’d made the wrong choice as Bunny’s friendly face turned into a devilish grin, fire blazing from his blue eyes.

Then he dissolved into the air.

The demon’s laugh grew louder, enveloping all that was around me. Heat closed in on me, and as the room dissolved into smoke, I screamed out as flaming teeth dug into my neck.

I woke up with a gasp, wide eyes staring at the ceiling. Tears formed in my eyes as I stared up at the ceiling. My dad had painted a starry night there many years ago, before he left and my mom replaced him with another man who turned out to be a violent monster. I never understood why he left us, but still, the stars brought me comfort after a bad dream.

If only my dad was still here. He would have protected me from both monsters – the one haunting my dreams and the one in my mom’s bed.

I sat up straighter, waiting for my body to stop shaking and for the burning pain in my neck to fade. I side-eyed Bunny, who glanced up at me with his innocent smile. I needed to make sure I wasn’t still dreaming, so I counted my fingers. Five on each hand. I glanced at the clock on my wall and counted the numbers – still twelve. Relieved, I took Bunny into my arms. I couldn’t wake up my mom. If I woke her in the middle of the night for what she considered a ‘silly dream,’ she’d get angry, and my stepfather even more so.

Sometimes, when I concentrated, I could fly in my dreams, too. I learned it by pretending to swim in the sky, pushing the air around with my hands and legs. The hardest thing was not to get too excited or scared and wake up.

I didn’t believe my mom was right.

If these were just silly dreams, then how did the pain of the demon’s bite still linger even minutes after I woke? And how could I dream of flying if I’d never done such a thing in the waking world?

Chapter 1.

Seren

I had it coming.

That was my final thought when three men stabbed me to death just outside the casino, their faces obscured by hoodies.

And it was my first thought when I woke again.

I blinked as the world shaped itself around me. Gray clouds as far as I could see engulfed a grayer space, empty save for the translucent plateau in the middle. A single scale sat on top of it.

“Oh, for the love of God,” I muttered. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

“Unfortunately, God won’t hear you here.” A deep voice behind me startled me. “That is, if he exists at all – I’ve never met the man.”

I turned to see an unusually beautiful man, leaning on a golden staff engraved with delicate geometric patterns. Dressed in all-white robes – a stark contrast against his brown skin and black curls – he studied me with a frown. But his eyes particularly struck me – dark, intense, and with a sadness I recognized from the folks I’d surrounded myself with most of my life. The kind of sadness you don’t cure – all you can do is find escapes from it.

My dumb mouth opened, and before I could properly think this through, it asked the most cliché question anyone could ask in a situation like this. “Am I dead?”

The man’s reaction confirmed what I already suspected: I wasn’t the first to ask this. He rolled his eyes to the clouds above him. “Yes, you’re dead – and no, I’m no angel. My name is Jurrian. And to answer your next question about whether you’ve made it to Heaven: we’re about to find out now.”

He paused, raising his eyebrows expectantly.

I lowered my head. Taking the words right out of my mouth.

Following his gaze to the scale, I cleared my throat. “Will, ehm, my soul be measured against a… feather?”

Despite growing up in a religious household, I never cared much for religion – most likely because God wasn’t there to save my parents, my brother and my sister from the fire that orphaned me at a young age. I vaguely remembered the feather thing, though I couldn’t recall if it came from the Bible or another religion.

“The concept of measuring a soul against a feather comes from ancient Egyptian mythology,” Jurrian explained patiently, as if he’d read my thoughts. “Please, do not believe everything you read in religious texts – these have been mistranslated and misinterpreted many times. There’s not a single spiritual practice on Earth that possesses full knowledge of the afterlife. They all, however, got some of it right. The truth is compiled from bits and pieces of various belief systems.” He paused, allowing me a moment to let his words sink in. “Now, as for your question: no, your soul will not be weighed against a feather, but it will be measured. Shall we?”

He gestured for me to follow him to the scale. For lack of a better option, I did as he asked.

Only when I got close enough did I realize this was no ordinary scale. Instead of two sides, like I’d seen in those paintings of Judgment Day in the churches that primary school tours dragged me to, this particular instrument had three.