To Reap and Shatter

“Are you coming tonight?”

The boy wriggled with discomfort under his father’s sure stare, neglecting to meet his eyes.

His father sighed, and the boy detected the disappointment behind the simple sound. “You don’t have to. That’s why I asked.” 

The boy crossed his arms over his chest self-consciously. “I didn’t like it last time. Everyone was so sad.”

His father squatted to his height, cupping his round cheek in his calloused palm. “You make them happier, Marat. They’re more at ease when they see a child with me.”

Marat shook his head. “I don’t want to see them. I don’t want to see their families.” He shot his father a glare. “I might cry again,” he said as if it were a threat.

His father smiled, a soft expression against his chiseled features. “I don’t mind your tears. They show your compassion for these people.”

Marat didn’t feel any better. “It’s not fair. You like the job.”

“I feel content to bring aching souls to peace, my son,” his father told him gently. He stood again, going to the wall for his scythe. Bringing it down, he weighed it in his hands. “The reaping is light tonight. There will not be many to retrieve.”

Marat sighed deeply, his chest rattling. “I’ll come.”

His father’s smile grew wider, his eyes shining with pride. “Thank you.”

Hand in hand, clad in cloaks of charcoal, the small family strolled down the cobbled roads to wherever the father was pulled to. They soon arrived at a red-bricked house, already seeming to droop with the sorrow within.

Marat’s father let go of his hand to knock gently on the door. After about a minute, a weary-eyed woman with a wilting expression opened it, grief weighing down her gaze. “Ah, Sephtis. We’ve been expecting you. Come in.”

The city’s reaper and his son were well-known and often gently welcomed into the homes of the day’s deceased. They were treated with care and respect by most, though there were a few on occasion who would lash out in their grieved anger.

“It’s a child,” Marat said, so softly that his father barely heard.

Sephtis’ eyes widened. “Is that so?”

Marat had recently begun to sense things about the souls they came to collect that even his father couldn’t. Sephtis told him it was the tellings of a strong reaper, but it just made Marat more nervous of the future he had ahead of him.

“Come this way,” the woman told them hoarsely, and they followed her into the house.

The sounds of agony within caused Marat’s feet to drag and his heart to throb. This was why he didn’t want to come.

As they were led inside the bedroom of the deceased, teary-eyed family members backed away from the reaper and his son to let them do their job. 

The dead girl was small, no older than seven, and had the ghostly pallor of one ill for a long time before passing.

Sephtis put his hand on his son’s shoulder. “You bring her soul out. Seeing someone her age will be a comfort.”

Complying, Marat stepped forward, taking the young girl by the hand. Pulling gently, he separated her soul from her body, and the phantom apparition of what had once been a living person sat up and blinked blearily at him.

“Hello,” Marat said, his voice barely a murmur. “We’ve come to escort you to the Next.”

The girl nodded, morosely taking in her surroundings. The acceptance of so many of the dead always jarred Marat. How could they be so willing? Did they not see the happiness they were leaving behind?

Then again, he had no idea what it was like to die.

“My name is Tanda,” the girl’s soul told Marat softly, climbing out of her deathbed.

“I’m Marat.”

She smiled a little. “I know. People talk about you.”

Marat felt himself freeze up. “They do?”

“Good things,” Tanda assured him, her ghostly hand giving his a squeeze.

Sephtis crouched to her height, dipping his head. “And I am Sephtis. It will be our pleasure to escort you to the Next, dear Tanda.” He turned to his son then, putting his hand on the back of Marat’s head and kissing his forehead. “I’m proud of you. Keep hold of her hand, now. It’s time to move on.”

With nods of respect to the family as they left, Marat, Sephtis, and Tanda left the little house behind them.

The next man was so recently dead, people crowded around his body on the street, giving shouts of dismay and panic. A horse and carriage were pulled to the side of the road, and its driver was pacing, veins bulging in his neck. A woman who looked to be a doctor knelt beside the man who had been struck by the vehicle, but when she saw Marat and Sephtis coming their way, she stood, shaking her head solemnly. They never arrived unless a soul was ready for collection.

Sephtis took charge of drawing out the mangled man’s spirit, softly exchanging a few words with him before having him follow in their deadly parade.

They reaped only four souls that night, the last two dying of old age. The six of them walked back to the reapers’ dwelling together in eerily comfortable silence, the kind that Marat would never get used to.

When they arrived back home, Sephtis led the dim spirits to the doorstep, pulled Marat back beside him, and grouped the souls of the dead close to each other. “Close your eyes,” he instructed, “and do not fear. Dream of what you loved most in life.”

When the last soul’s eyes closed, Sephtis raised his scythe above his head, his expression glazed over. Marat clutched his father’s leg. With a strong swing, the reaper sliced through the souls, shattering their spirits into the Next.

In a trembling voice, Marat asked his father the same question he asked every night. “Where did they go?”

And Sephtis answered him the same way he always did. “I do not know. A reaper will never know the Next. Only the Now and the In-Between.” He took his son’s hand in his and offered him a small smile. “I hope the Next is full of whatever I asked them to dream of.”

“I hope so too,” Marat would say.

“Thank you for coming tonight,” Sephtis said fondly, ruffling Marat’s inky hair. “It means a lot, to them and me. Someday, you’ll be comforted by the peace you’re bringing these people.”

Marat nodded, sliding his hand back into Sephtis’. His father’s palm was calloused from his work with the scythe, while Marat’s was still soft, untouched by the work of Death. But one day, the burden of the reaper would be his alone to shoulder, and Marat’s own soul couldn’t help but tremble.