Time & Time Again

Ambrose mumbles under his breath as he collects firewood. The last thing I need is for my "father" to get involved. There has to be another way to send them back.

Sonia hands me a piece of roasted rabbit and I just stare at it. For whatever reason, that is the one thing I've never been able to eat. "What if they stay here?" she asks looking from the leg to me before handing it to the little one who just turns it in every direction.

"Look," Pearl says taking a bite of her rabbit leg.

"We should give her a name?" Sonia says, settling down beside us.

"Like what?"

"How about Poppy," Sonia says.

"Why?"

"Her hair."

"Might as well name her Ruby," I say.

"Ruby," the little one repeats before finally tearing into the rabbit leg.

Pearl just looks from Ruby to me as if debating how to phrase her question. "How come you didn't have a name?"

Ruby looks up from her tilting her head to the side, "I was just born," she goes back to eating her leg as if it were the most logical answer. Which, in a way it is.

"Ruby was born from a flower and my energy," I say, just as Ambrose returns with a bundle of fish, "I sent you for firewood."

"I know," he sets the fish down," this seemed like a better choice."

"Where did you get does?"

"The river."

Ruby stops chewing as she looks at him with horror-filled eyes.

"What?" he asks.

"You can't take fish from the River of Sorrows," I say, "they're the souls of the dead."

In that moment the wind chooses to howl and the earth trembles.

"How was I supposed to know?"

Sonia smacks him upside the head before saying, "It's part of the Underworld!"

There's a hissing follow by more howling as wraiths begin to rise from the earth. Their ghostly forms less clear then Shadow Souls yet visible enough to cause the mortals to panic. It's not like getting them to trust us was easy now these.

"Isn't this bellow your pay grade," I ask the tiny female that now stands before us a skeleton draped onto her back like a fine cloak.

"You have stolen from the Underworld," the Bone Collectors voice is chirpy, "I get to take your bones."

"Not today," I say, as the wraiths begin to attack the mortals. Sonia rushes over throwing out a wall of pure darkness.

"Payment must be made," she moves forward Marty's bones clanking with each move meant.

"Yes," I say, "but not to you."

One of the mortals makes a run for it only to be dragged to the depths of the Underworld by one of the wraiths. I dig one of my claws into my palm before closing my hand around a piece of obsidian that hangs around my neck. The howling eases as I pray to the Empress for forgiveness.

The Bone Collector screeches as she's pulled through a shimmering gateway carved out of bones edged with eyes on its surface. As the portal closes the Crow appears sending the wraiths back to the Underworld.

"Okay," Ambrose says, "now I believe in him too."

"Agreed," Sonia says letting the wall drop.

###

I wake to the rising sun the cocoon of shadows I created still stands. Pearl and Ruby sleep curled up next to a cypress tree their foreheads touching. After we calmed the remaining mortals down again, Pearl told us more about her world. Their people are treated worse than cattle unless they look a specific way. I remember visiting worlds like that when I was small. Father at that time specialized mostly in object retrievals. After I killed a slave owner in the least subtle way, he sent me away to train amongst my kind. His exact words were "I cannot teach you anymore, only the Dark Realm can help." When I arrived, I was sent into the Shadow Realm to fight under the command of the Shadow Princess Crimson. Now that I think about it, the female I saw when I touched the spider lily looked a lot like the Commander.

"So, what's the plan?" Sonia asks.

"As agreed last night, we'll take them to Dragon Isle," I say, "they can start anew there."

"Won't Jian mind?"

"Last time I saw him, he said he was lonely," I say, "he instead Sea Dragons are poor souls who need company not just shiny things."

"Seriously?"

"He owes me one."

"That sounds about right."

One of the older mortals starts to make his way to us, he adverts his eyes keeping his head low he speaks, "Is there anyway Madam could keep Pearl?"

Sonia looks as confused as I feel, "why?" she asks.

"Pearl's mama she used dark arts to have her," the man looks to the sleeping Pearl then back at his feet, "back home her mama was a high priestess. She used a pearl she stole from our masters placing it in her womb then the girl was born."

"Are you certain of this?" I ask.

"Yes, mam."

"You know Raksha can tell when you're lying," Sonia says.

"Old John tells the truth," an older female says, "her mama was a master of the arts."

"Then why didn't she escape? How was she captured?"

"Old Master shot her when she tried to escape with the girl."

"They're not lying," I say, "but what they say makes no sense, unless."

"Unless what?" Ambrose asks, popping a slice of apple into his mouth.

I walk over to Pearl and Ruby, "She wasn't mortal, to begin with," I kneel and place my hand over the sleeping child's head.

"What is she doing?" someone asks.

"Shush."

There was a coolness then there was light and two amber eyes that looked at her with so much love. The female smiled down at her little pearl as she walked out of the foamy water and onto a sandy beach. "You'll grow up to be quite lovely my little Pearl," the female smiles once more as she feeds the little pearl drops of her blood. She's too distracted to notice strangers have boarded their island by the time she notices they've trapped her in chains and placed her onto a massive boat where everyone is chained. To keep her pearl safe, she swallows it praying no harm will come to her. The memories fade and then there is only Pearl watching as an old bastard beats her mama. "See if you deny me again," the man says ripping her mama's clothes open. Pearl graves a hot poker and stabs the man with it, her mama picks her up into her arms and starts running. There's a boom then her mama's falling, they leave her mama behind as they drag her back to the plantation and beat her fifty times. All of the elders are cruel to her believing in their new faith and deeming her a demon.

I pull out of Pearl's mind placing a protective barrier over her mind and Ruby's. I'll have to teach them how to do it on their own but for now, this will do. They believed the lies their masters told and harmed the child in the process. I summon a blade made of shadow and run it through Old John then the female that spoke for him and every bastard who mistreated Pearl tying her up for those bastards to do with her they pleased. "She's only a child," I say cutting off the head of the one they called Nanny. "Regardless of your beliefs, you should have protected her."

Sonia looks at Pearl then back at me, "Is that why her scent is off?"

"Yes," I say, taking my blade and cutting of the dick of one of the bastards that joined in on her torment.

"Mortals are disgusting," Ambrose says taking his panther form and standing between Pearl and Ruby and the remaining mortals.

"No wonder they smelled of sin," I say, "time and time again you had a chance to help her, you had a chance to unite as one and help each other but you chose wrong."

"Please mam we had no choice our Master enjoyed watching, our suffering was less," a female no older than twenty says, tears streaming down her face.

"So, feed her to the wolves and earn yourselves a reprieve?" Sonia asks, her claws wrapped around the female's throat as she tears it out, "your all guilty."

"You should have let me take them last night," comes the Bone Collectors voice.

"You could have said something Moira," I hiss, "no need to send the wraiths."

"The wraiths were not my doing," she chants as she goes about collecting the corpses of the fallen. Chains shoot out from within her blacken robes clamping onto anything that may hold a bone.

Only three mortals remain a mother that's clearly due any day now. A boy around fifteen and a little girl that clings to him face buried into the crook of his neck.

"Forget the Isle," I say, "let's take them to Antares, they can start over there."