Place of Death

Ossuary Submission for IronAge Media

The smell is a fetid musk that seems nearly visible in the haze of the chamber, choking any sense of comfort or decency from the nostrils to the tongue, every breath becoming a labor of gripping back bile and upended meals. Roy pulls the cloth up over his mouth and nose, hoping the sweat-damp rag can do something in keeping the stench at bay.

As he steps into the chamber more fully, he can see the sickly yellow glow being cast by a circle of broken crystals arranged around what looks to be the skull of some giant, polished smooth and staring back at him. The ground is littered with stones and fragments of pottery and dull crystal, along with the malformed skulls of smaller giants littered about. Beyond the central skull, through an alcove and lit by the glow of the crystals, cages hung with the bodies of what were likely humans desiccated and forgotten within. He gripped the handle of the axe in his hand tighter as he took another few cautious steps inside.

To the left, up the along the causeway bordered by the myriad skulls a shrine squats blasphemously, gothic spires framing the boxlike shape and flanked on both sides by pillories and stakes. Roy draws in a hard, unpleasant breath deep into his lungs as he lifts the torch up higher, eyes narrowing as they survey the room for any threat, then beginning the slow and uncomfortably humid path towards the shrine. They nature of the lighting causes the shadows to seem ill and malformed, at once reaching towards him and at the same time seeming to flee, setting his every sense on edge for danger.

The rag helps the stench idly, as the debris-laden floor shifts in short slips beneath his feet, never enough to cause a stumble but never sure enough to feel secure. The light of his torch gutters and chokes in the air, the foul mist becoming ichorous black smoke that drifts lazily behind him as he passes within arm’s reach of the shattered and glistening crystal. Beyond the giant’s skull, in the far alcove beneath the dangling cages that seem to be almost moving in the shadows cast by his torch, Roy is certain he sees something moving along the floor of the chamber, but can’t make it out in the haze, dim glow, and guttering torchlight.

Instead, he focuses his attention on the blasphemous shrine, a strange eldritch femininity to the figures in the frescoes engraved along its entrance that are only now becoming discernable. Something hypnotic lies in the black on dark grey stone and the moist sheen revealed by the light, causing the frescoes to seem as if they move of their own accord.

And, Roy muses to himself coughs lightly into the rag, maybe they do. He’s seen a lot of things since coming here, and while he felt his ability to cope with the strange was high, his limits have surely been tested repeatedly. As he ponders this, a cool breeze snakes down the path from the shrine, caressing his bare chest uncomfortably and setting his skin to gooseflesh from his hair to his taint.

He uses his forearm to brush a strand of red hair out of his eye, letting himself shudder a bit before pushing forward and sliding the worker’s axe into a more comfortable position. Feeling the cool weight of the metal axe head against his fingers helps to ease his nerves, the grain of the wood rough under his grip as he glances around the room once again. There’s a sound now, something low and dull, almost like music, that feels like its flickering through the air.

Something skitters across his boot, the sudden movement prompting him to hoof the small thing a substantial distance away. If he had to, he’d have sworn it was a rat by the size and shape, but as it took flight, it had too many legs and its cry was a little too… human. He grits his teeth against that thought, licking his lips behind the rag and almost choking on the taste of the air that had settled to his skin. Turning his eyes back to the shrine, it occurs to him that no matter how closer he came to it, the space behind it stays just as pitch dark.

From here, he can make out the entrance of the shrine, a curved arch that seems to be cut from a single piece of what looked like a dark metal from where he stood, yards away. Though what’s metal and what’s moist stone is hard to tell here, in the sickly light and the corpse rot mist. Roy pushes forward, the sound growing less distant, but no louder, in a way that turns his stomach.

Taking the first step of the shrine, it’s almost a comfort to be on ground that doesn’t seem to move, though it’s slick beneath his boot. He takes his time, carefully planting each step and ensuring his footing before going for the next, the corpse-slime on the stairs suckling to the bottom of his boots with an unhealthy and discomforting slurping sound as he lifts to the next stair.

The stairs rise up through the arch, and Roy feels almost as if he’s walking into some monstrous mouth, the stairs some misshapen and fossilized tongue as the stench of the path in is augmented by something more funerary, more ritualistic. A pungent, biological perfume that clings to the air and that he can feel settling on his skin. Here, rather than hear the music he can feel it dance across his skin, tickling and taunting at him in a slow, low, drone.

One foot on the platform, glancing back and barely able to see the glow of the pathway below, Roy lifts himself onto the platform and looks around, drifting the torch to each side. He had been given directions by the old oracle, followed the map he bought off the silt rider, and now… he has no idea.

There is a table, onyx or obsidian, that comes to his waist against a back wall replete with reliefs that seem to dance and move and tell the story of some cacophonous orgy or atavistic war. Set into the table is a small basin, the bottom of which glistens with a small amount of what looks like clean water as he shines the torch closer to it.

“Dunno what I’m supposed to do,” he says, his voice echoing in the chamber and louder still for the oppressive silence of the path to get here, “but I ain’t drinking that.”

The torch gutters, then goes out like a candle snuffed by a pinch of the fingers.

The music across his skin stops and becomes an audible sound, something like a child’s giggle if that child was being swallowed into a thresher.  The noise sets every hair on his body standing and every flight instinct he has screaming. He lets go of the torch and grips the handle of the axe more tightly, but straightens his back and pulls down the rag, taking in the foul fleshy humidity, turning to face the direction he’d came, back to the relief and staring down the stairs.

For a long moment, the only sound is his own ragged breathing and the wet suction of the floor’s grip on his boots as he shifts his weight.

Roy swallows hard, setting his jaw and trying to catch a glimpse of some kind of movement.

It is then that wet fingers slide along his sides, the hands easily the size of his own chest, thumbs gliding up the back of his neck and further dampening his hair.

When Roy later tells this story to others, he will admit to the audible swear that escapes his lips in that moment. He will unequivocally deny that it sounded like a small girl.

He tries to hold his ground as his entire body strains to pull away from those hands.

Do you know why you are here?

A woman’s voice isn’t heard as felt like an echo through those wet almost liquid hands, Roy’s own voice strained a moment as his throat clenches in discomfort and fear, “Not specifically, ma’am.” It’s all he can sputter out, taking in long hard breaths at beginning and end.

Do you know who I am?

A question Roy is familiar with, but this is definitely a new context, taking a long moment to force himself into some greater composure, “I’m sorry, ma’am, no.” He can feel the fingers scratch lightly against his abs, thumbs curling against the top of his head, the liquid-like appendages cooling slightly.

Do you know who you are?

This one, for a moment, has Roy stumped. Every fiber of his being screams to not be sarcastic, to try to be poetic or grandiose, to remember the advice movies gave him for when someone asks if you are a god.

“I’m Roy Gideon, ma’am.” Something rational and primal screams in his head, while another part of him feels satisfied with the answer. The air was quiet, the hands shifting slightly on his skin.

I am Death, Roy Gideon. How would you best me?

Again, his mind screams for poetry, for grand prose, for some statement to shake the heavens and carry into legend at least as the kinds of last words people pray for.

“By not dying right now?” He smiles as he says it, unable to keep a bit of smirk out of his voice, and internally shrugs. He takes solace in the fact he’s never considered himself a poet.

The hands tense a bit on him, causing him to stand more upright, bracing for the final hit as he shifts the axe slightly, ready to fight for his life if he has to.

You have been tested and found worthy.

The hands relax, slithering back towards the basin behind him, and with it he feels his own body relax slightly, breathing out a long breath.

Turn and face me, Roy Gideon.

Roy turns, braced for any number of things; from the relief itself come to life to a vast and inscrutable creature of liquid flesh. He is not prepared for the shapely woman draped in black silks sitting in a throne where the basin and table were. Her face is covered with a thick cloth, but the room now seems to radiate the same sickly yellow light as the broken crystals below, casting muted shadows on her contours through the gauzy silks. He clears his throat and blushes as he realizes he’s been giving Death an appraisal.

Nervously, Roy breaks the silence, “So why am I here?” He shifts on his feet, noticing that the floor isn’t gripping his boots any longer with an almost audible relief. “The oracle made it sound like someone was in trouble, and,” shifts nervously again, looking around, “pardon me for saying, but you don’t seem in trouble.”

She laughs, and her voice is a sound now, but still tempered with a feeling of coming regret and misfortune, “I am not. My scion is. You will bear my mark, and my cult will guide you.”

He blinks at her, pursing his lips, then raising a finger, “Pardon, again, but why can’t you go?”

He can almost feel her smile, the kind of smile you get when a child asks an achingly stupid question, but it seems more adorable than frustrating, “I cannot leave my remains.” She motions behind him.

Roy turns, and he can see the skull in the center of the crystal circle, the entire chamber having lost any sense of space. It takes Roy longer than he would like to admit to understand.

“Wait, though, you said you were Death, didn’t you?”

She nods, another small uncomfortable laugh, “I am and I am not.” She motions around the chamber, “I was once a giant astride the earth, and now I am revered as one of the Matrons of Death.”  She pauses, like one does explaining things to children, “The question was a test of your humility, Roy Gideon, not a statement of my power.”

Roy nods, understanding enough to not care much further, taking in a long breath and realizing the stench and discomfort of the room had either subsided or he’d acclimated to it. A small comfort he wasn’t going to argue with as he cocked his head at her slightly.

“So. Bear your symbol, go with your… cult?” He says the word uncomfortably, given his recent history with cultists, but she nods, “Save your scion. Anything else?” Simple, straightforward, the best way to deal with all the magic mumbo-jumbo around here, Roy thought to himself.

She nods again, holding out a hand, “Yes. Give me your hand.”

He looks at her quizzically, then ponders for a long moment about which hand she wants but decides if it mattered, she’d have made a point of asking and gives her the hand that isn’t white-knuckling the handle of an axe.

He screams out, something burning clear through his hand as her skin touches his, from where her fingers brush the back of his hands he can feel the same scorching searing pain in the palm, dropping to one knee as his teeth grit, eyes clamped shut for a long moment before the moment passes and the pain is gone.

His breath comes shuddering out of his lips, almost tripping over a bit of spit that falls from his mouth as he struggles to regain his composure, the feeling of the cool air on his skin an afterthought until his hand touches the ground and feels grass. Roy’s eyes flutter open, standing up and finding himself at the beleaguered entrance to that damned place that he’d entered hours earlier.

He examined his hand quickly. On it, there seemed to be no sign of her touch or the pain that came from it. He spat on the earth, taking a deep breath and rubbing his face with the rag, wincing from the smells that it had collected or that it released as it shifted the oils and grime gripping to his skin. He shook his head, taking in a deep breath and looking around.

He oriented himself by the setting sun, pulling from memory the path he’d taken to get here from the small crossroad town down the mountainside, and then set to start heading that way. He needed to pick up his gear, take a bath, and set about finding a Death Cult.