Ugh… it’s cold.

A foul odour hangs in the air. A stench I’ve never smelt before, but instinctually, I know what it is.

The stench of death.

My body lays on its back, in a mangled and uncomfortable position, half-buried amongst corpses warm and cold, chucked in a ditch soon to be my grave, my life slowly slipping away as blood oozes from the open wound in my gut.

After everything I did.

Doing my best to live the best life I could.

This is what I get.

Great.

I just wish I wasn’t so… aware of what’s around me. I thought, or even hoped, that I’d go numb by now as I succumbed to my injuries. That stench in the air, of death and something… burning. The bodies strewn around, across, and under mine. The bony ridges of what’s probably a skull pressing hard into my back.

The fact that I feel… almost fine? Is this some sort of trick the dying mind plays on itself…? Like I could just open one eye like everything was fine…

Upon half-opening one eye, it’s immediately apparent that things are not fine. The sky is red. Either from the sunset, or the source of whatever that burning smell is coming from, I don’t know. This was a bad idea. At least I can’t feel any pain. Discomfort, sure, but it could be worse.

Guess I’ll just close my eyes and wait to die.

…

I don’t know how much time has passed. I don’t want to open my eyes to find out. The smell of something burning is still there, and I don’t want to figure out what that is, and that skull against my back is actually starting to hurt now. Weird that I can feel mild discomfort, but not the pain of multiple stab wounds. I don’t know. Just… get this over with. I want this to be over.

…

Okay.

Dying is taking longer than I expected. I almost don’t think I am dying. I don’t feel like I’ve lost any blood, and the only pain is this bony protrusion against my back that’s really starting to get to me. Thinking about it, my whole body hurts with this haphazard position I’m in.

I haven’t moved in ages, but can I…?

My finger moved. Across what feels like another… oh screw this.

My eyes open and I sit upright. I’m sitting on a pile of skulls in some dark cave. Not a pile of bodies, or even a pile of skeletons, but a pile of skulls. It’s neither warm nor cold, but the air is heavy with a strong earthy scent that smells somewhere between the smell of soil after it’s rained, and the iron-heavy scent of spilt blood, with that background whiff of something foul burning. I can see what I think is the sky through a hole above me; dark, starless, with a foreboding glowing red.

This is hell, isn’t it.

I, Marina Retali, third daughter of the Retali family, have died and gone to hell.

This sucks.

I’m sitting on a pile of skulls, the sky is red, there’s a burning earthy smell, that’s like, hell bingo. Screw this. I’m just going to lay back down, get back to dying, and wait for this nightmare to finally end- Shit!

Rather than peacefully laying back down and accepting my fate, I lose my balance, slip, and slide all the way down this pile of skulls to the bottom, disembodied skulls bouncing down past me before everything settles and I’m now sitting on my arse at the bottom of the highly concerning pile of skulls I woke up in.

I seem to have misjudged the distance of… huh? Were my hands always- no. These aren't my hands.

I take my first good look down at myself, and…

This definitely isn’t the body I died in. I was 15 years and one day old when I died, but now… I look to be in my early 20s.

Tch, guess I’m a late bloomer no matter what.

I seem to be wearing what I was wearing when I died, just, aged up a bit and conveniently tailored to fit my new, more mature form. Button up shirt, check. Pants, check, belt, check, boots, check, underwear… good enough… Hair… longer. It used to be dark brown, but now it’s so dark it’s practically black, and the tips are now bright red. Wow, they give you a makeover when you get to hell? How thoughtful. My hair feels soft to the touch, although I keep bumping my ears as if they’re… bigger…?

They have points.

They’re longer and they have points?! Am I an elf now? Is this elf hell?! But why would I be sent to elf hell if I’m human—unless…

Hold on… hmm. I never saw an elf myself, but people say they have super long ears, and these are too short to fit the bill for that. I could really use a mirror, but I doubt I’ll find anything like that down here, haha… hah…

This really sucks…

Ugh. Sure, this sucks, but enough moping. I’m clearly still alive and in one piece, so I guess it’s time I try to get up… at least my legs work, and my balance is fine. Yeah, this is probably hell, but I’m alive, and everything feels more or less real.

Too real. It seems that since the moment I “woke up” here, this place has been assaulting my senses with simultaneous, contradictory feelings. It’s cold and clammy, and the air is stale, yet the pervasive smell of something burning cuts through, and the ground is muddy and slick. It’s just… uncomfortable.

At least I got here in one piece, nothing’s missing, and I seem to have gained a few years’ maturity.

Whatever… whatever any of that even means. Am I just taking this in my stride really well, or has this new reality not sunk in yet? I definitely died. My whole family probably died. Our homes torched, dragged out into the open to be cut down and butchered, but…

That feels distant, now. That could have happened years ago, given I’ve suddenly grown up. No matter what happened… I’m alive down here.

Now to figure out wherever… ‘here’ is. Beyond the pile of skulls in a cave I woke up in.

I walk a few steps towards the exit of the cave in front of me. The closer I get to outside, the thicker the air gets, but at least it feels warmer. I tentatively step outside the cave onto a ledge. I seem to be on a hill, with what is certainly a… view.

What stretches out before me is not what I expected.

There’s trees, but not… normal ones. They’re twisted and gnarled, with scratch marks all over their trunks and leering faces carved into their bark; they’d look dead if it wasn’t for the dark red leaves covering their branches. They bend and claw upwards to the sky, forming a thick red canopy and blotting out any light beneath their leaves. A thick grey fog hangs just above the treeline, illuminated in dark reds and oranges like the glow of a distant forest fire. Small, glimmering lights shine through the fog - stars, perhaps, but what stands out most starkly are the distant, towering black cliffs that stretch in every direction… as if I’m in the middle of a giant hole in the earth.

Despite the heat and dry air outside, the ground is still as muddy and damp as it was in the cave. A thick, iron-heavy smell like that of old dried-up blood fills my nose, making it difficult to breathe in. Oh, and the smell of blood is probably coming from the small but no less noticeable waterfall of blood directly to the left of the cave entrance I just came from. Really, swap the red and orange for dark greens and blues, and this place makes for a picture-perfect cursed swamp that travellers and children disappear in. There don’t seem to be any insects at least, but still.

This sucks.

Fortunately, there’s a rough path leading down from this hill that disappears into the trees. I don’t know where it goes, but it can’t be that much worse than the Cave Full of Skulls with Waterfalls of Blood that is right behind me. I hope.

I carefully make my way down the path, which follows alongside the shallow stream of blood from the water… blood-fall. Actually, on closer inspection, it doesn’t look thick enough to be pure blood, but it’s still got that unmistakable red hue and the sickly smell of it. Watered-down blood is still blood.

The strong, earthy smell in the air starts to subside into something wholly different and unexpected as I draw closer to the trees. Something smells… sweet. Sugary-sweet. It’s coming from the trees. It’s a little difficult to look up at them, what with their twisted forms and wicked faces towering over you, but if you look past that, you notice the distinct shape of the leaves.

Maple leaves.

There’s a gash in the trunk of a tree at eye level, with dark orange sap oozing from it, which I lean in and sniff.

It looks like maple syrup.

It smells like maple syrup.

Will it taste like maple syrup?

Should I even be considering tasting a fluid leaking from a tree with angry faces scratched into its bark in a giant dark hole full of fire and blood? Isn’t this how you get trapped in hell forever, by consuming its forbidden food?

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…

It tastes like maple syrup.

Well, I’m probably stuck here forever, but at least there’s a source of food. Logically, to survive, I also need shelter and clean drinking water. But is survival here possible? Yes, I’m standing on a path that seems to have been trodden before, and the pile of skulls I woke up on means that there have probably been others here, as much as I’m trying not to think too much about just how a pile of skulls formed there. Point is, I’m alive, I may as well keep living.

I’m still in sight of the hill and the cave I woke up in. That’s the only landmark I know of, so I’ll try to use it to orient myself. If I can’t find anywhere suitable… a cave’s safer than being out in the open. I’ll continue along the path, keeping count of my paces to track how far I’ve travelled. If I really can’t find shelter, that cave I woke up in may have to do.

Fifty paces.

The path winds amongst the trees, which now grow up along cliffs about two metres high on either side of the path, severely limiting my peripheral vision, but at the same time, the cliffs coupled with the thick canopy of trees keeps me out of sight. The dirt is dark brown, or even a very dark red, the colour of blood that’s long since dried out. Despite being under all these trees, I haven’t seen any leaf litter on the ground.

One hundred paces.

It’s hard to settle or focus on anything. The air feels heavy and dry, even as my feet slog through the mud. The trees creak quietly and something burns, yet a smothering silence hangs over the land, as if nothing, not even the trees, wants to make a noise too loud, lest something hears it.

One hundred and fifty.

The unnatural quiet is only broken by my boots squelching through this mud, which seems to get thicker the further I walk, building up on my boots and making it harder to walk. I’d get a stick to scrape it off, yet there are none on the ground, and I don’t feel inclined to climb the slight cliffs on either side of the path and break one off a tree.

Two hundred.

The sweetness from the tree’s sap has slowly turned bitter on my tongue as the oppressive air closes in around me. I have to concentrate on each breath, and each step is heavier than the last. I’ve stopped twice to get the mud off my boots as best I can, but the moment I start walking again, that quickly becomes in vain.

Two hundred and fifty.

Just… keep. Keep moving. One foot in front of the other…

Two hundred and sixty…

I stop in my tracks, jolted out of my exhausted state of mind as I suddenly find myself in an opening, the trees and cliffs having given way to a small clearing. Just off the track, a hooded figure wrapped in robes sits on a log by a small campfire. I go to step back, but somehow, I’m already too far into the clearing to not have been noticed by now.

A hooded figure, by a fire, in hell. There’s nothing good about this situation. I’ll just… take another step back

“You needn’t fear me, child.”

I freeze as he speaks, my body turning cold and numb. Is this his power? Have I already lost?

“You have little reason to trust me, this is true. You needn’t worry for your safety, child. You are safe, with those by your side.”

Those what? What’s by my side other than my wings?

…

My what?

My wings.

…

My…

“What the fuck?!”

I yell out, spinning around to try and get a better look at them. I have wings. Giant, dark red, feathered wings. Are these mine? I didn’t even feel them on my back, were they always here? Were these wings the warmth I was feeling when I was half-buried in that skull pile? Was I, were I-

“Did you do this to me?!”

“You have received a gift, that is true, but it is not of my making, child. Come, have a seat. You must have much on your mind.”

He gestures to the log across the fire from him with his normal-looking hand, his voice calm and steady in the face of my freak-out.

Have a seat. Have a- I’ve only just been enlightened to the fact that I have fucking wings and you’re telling me to sit down?! I-

Well, my legs feel kind of wobbly actually, so I will take a seat. I take him up on his offer, sitting down on the log across from him. He smiles.

“You seem quite exhausted, child. You looked like you needed a rest.”

“I didn’t exactly see anywhere that looked like a comfortable place to take a breather. I wasn’t walking for that long, either…”

The warmth of the campfire reminds me how cold the air has suddenly become. I huddle closer to it, my wings clinging to my sides to… they’re kinda warm. And soft. Did I tell them to huddle around me? Are they just wired to my subconscious?

“You have only just been acquainted with your new friend, hmm? You must have been quite distracted to have not noticed them sooner.” He chuckles.

The lines on his cheeks and the wrinkles near his eyes tell how many times he’s laughed in his life. I almost can’t tell if the warmth is coming from the campfire, or him. He’s exactly the kind of person you’d be pitted against to bring your guard down before something terrible happens.

“You are wise not to trust me quickly, child. This is a harsh land, inhabited by fell beasts and harsher people. You have a gift that is a true rarity - perhaps the first of its kind in this land. Such a gift would likely draw others ‘ire in such a terrible place as this, child. You would do well to hide them from other’s sight. So I leave you with a gift of my own, and… some advice.”

I blink, and he’s suddenly standing behind me, draping a short cloak over my shoulders. Before I can spin around to push him away, he continues:

“You, who have known death twice. Your path does not end within this hole, nay; it leads to the world beyond. You must live. You must guide. You must spread your wings and fly to the world beyond. Only you, having known death twice, will live life thrice. You must go, child, and deal unto those; what they have so wrongfully dealt upon you.”

“You-!”

He’s gone.

The uncomfortable quiet sets in fast. Whatever. I yank off the cloak, but I halt before throwing it to the ground once I realise how… well-made it feels. It feels like some sort of soft linen with a fur lining around the top, and—

One of my wings pokes at the cloak. I didn’t… Did I make it do that? Was that subconscious? Can I make it stop- no, it’s still poking it. I can’t directly control these things, that’s uh… wait, huh? Half my wing pokes its way into the cloak, but it doesn’t come out the other side. Is this cloak magic in some way?

I stick my arm in it, and rather than pushing the cloak aside, my arm just… goes into it, like there’s an empty space inside it. One side of the cloak is normal, but the other is enchanted or something that lets me stick stuff in them.

Do I look inside it?

No. No, I'm not sticking my head in the pocket dimension cloak. Okay. I have wings and a magic item, now. And a mission, I guess.

Looking up at the sky, which is almost clear of fog above this clearing, he said to escape this ‘hole’... I have wings, so I can fly, right? It can’t be that hard.

I tuck the cloak into my belt, look up to the sky, and…

I have absolutely no idea how to fly.

Maybe my wings know how to fly?

Hey, wings, if you can uh… hear me, can you fly? Can you make me fly?

My wings spread out to their full extent—each wing wider than I am tall—slowly reaching up, and… they tilt upwards, then recede in a motion that feels a lot like a shrug.

Did my wings just…

“Did you just shrug at me? You’re wings and you don’t even know how to fly?!”

“You are correct, I do not know how to fly. However, I did not shrug, nor am I wings.”

A voice says out loud, as I heel-turn to face the source of it— and it’s the old hooded guy again, sitting on his log beside the fire like nothing’s happened.”

“Wh- You’re still here?!”

“You were busy inspecting the cloak I gave you. I never left. Where would I go?”

He… has a point.

“Okay so two things.” I start, sitting back down on the log. “First, why can’t I control my wings, and second, is this cloak some magic item of holding that I can stick things inside?”

The man gives another warm, disarming smile, but I know better than to let my guard down now.

“You ask more than I know. The cloak is enchanted to hide things within it, yes, as for your wings, they are as new to this world as you are. A bird is not born knowing how to fly, it can only try.”

“It’s not just the fact that I or they don’t know how to fly, it’s that I can’t… ‘feel’ them on my back. I only feel them when I touch them.”

“You are unfamiliar with your wings, as they are with you. In time, you will come to know one another. You needn’t worry about their loyalty to you.”

Well… they haven’t done anything to hurt me. They may have touched things without me realising, but they just seem to be curious about their surroundings.

“So, uh, is this what you do? Sit by the road and give magic items to strangers when they arrive in hell?”

“You are no more familiar with these lands than I am, I’m afraid. The cloak is simply an item that felt better off in your hands than in mine.”

“... Do you have any other magical items under your robe that you’re willing to donate?”

“Sadly not, child.” He chuckles. He then stands, looking out beyond the trees. “You would be wise to move along from here, before the blood rain comes. It can be very hard to wash it out of your clothes.”

The what- the blood rain?

Before I can get a word out, the man has already turned around and is walking past the clearing along the path. I start to run, nearly falling over as my wings decide to flap forwards to help get me moving—I guess they’re not satisfied with his answers either.

I catch up to him pretty quickly, surprisingly. For someone who moves so fast, he’s a slow walker.

“So you were saying that my wings really do have a mind of their own? They’re entirely separate and possess their own will, yet are still conjoined with me?”

The old man gives a sideways glance as he keeps walking.

“You didn’t question the blood rain. Interesting.”

“I saw a whole blood waterfall when I got here. Of course it rains blood.”

“You are correct; your wings are not yet part of you. That is why…”

He stops and puts his hand on my shoulder, looking me in the eyes. In a place as fantastical and unnerving as this, the plainness of his features are both reassuring and unsettling. I flinch as he touches me, and my wings splay out and point their… strangely sharp-looking feathers at him, ready to strike. He continues, with a small smile.

“It is best if you keep your wings hidden. So they may learn from you, without making… rash actions of their own.”

Given the fact that I can’t consciously stop my wings from pointing at him, he has a point. It’s concerning how on-the-ball he is. I grab the cloak from my belt, looking down at it.

“Do I, uh… just put this on and ask my wings to go into it?”

He chuckles lightly at my question, taking his hand off my shoulder.

“You will certainly bond with them quickly if you are so polite to them.”

I wrap the cloak around my shoulders, tying the strings at the front around my neck. My wings are clinging low to my sides, so I awkwardly reach behind myself and lift the cloak up.

“C’mon, wings, in you get. If it’s like any other magic pocket item it should be safe… I think.”

My wings lift themselves up, reaching into and nestling themselves inside the cloak as it falls against my back. I reach behind to feel the back of the cloak, and it doesn’t feel like there’s wings hidden in there at all. I could probably store other things in there, if I figure out how big that pocket dimension is. This cloak is… awfully convenient to just be given to me the day I get here. Magic items take many forms, but none of them are common; especially one enchanted to hold things in a pocket dimension. Are magic items more common in hell…? I look up to ask,

“Are you supposed to be my guide or guardian spirit down here, or-”

He’s gone. Again.

I spin around on the spot, no sign of him, not even footprints in the mud. He can’t have gone far, right?

“Hey, old guy? You’re still around, right?”

Nothing. He doesn’t look to be back by the fire in the clearing behind us, so he must have gone ahead. I start running down the path, hoping to catch up to him. He can’t have gone that far so quickly. There’s high cliffs and tree trunks all along this path, so he can’t have gone anywhere else but forward. Right?

I haven’t been counting my paces. I’ve just been running, as fast and as hard as I can.

How far have I run? How long have I been running? My legs won’t stop moving. I have to find him. He’s probably the only decent person I’ll find in this hellhole. I have no idea where I am or what I’m doing. I have to find him. I have to, I—

I come skidding to a halt as I suddenly find myself in another clearing. There’s a group of people. They all look at me, with angry red eyes and glowing white pupils—monsters? Demons? They have weapons. I need to get out of here. I go to turn around, to go running back to the path, and-

“Wrong move, girl.”

My face hits the mud, and I pass out on the spot.