Chapter 118: Worthless

Rook stared at the old man for several seconds, then dragged one hand down his face.

"So much for helping. You've made a mess of my head, given me enough memories to regret waking up and somehow left me exactly where I started. Still can't Cull. Still no Death Imprint."

"You know why now," the old man said. "For three hundred years, you searched for one missing death. You could have spent another three hundred doing the same and never understood what prevented you from awakening. We have found the difficulty. Now you can begin working through it."

"You just said you don't know how."

"I don't. You may, eventually. These are your memories, Rook. I can reconnect them, but I cannot decide what they mean to you."

"Eventually has already taken three centuries."

Rook lowered his hand. Mara recognized the irritation returning to his voice, though he still spoke without looking directly at either of them.

"And what changed during those centuries?" the old man asked. "You had a Brand and very little knowledge of how you earned it. You assumed something monstrous belonged in the empty space. Now you know what happened there."

"Something monstrous."

He raised his arms.

The old man regarded them without flinching.

"The Brand is no judge of an entire life. It marks what it holds you responsible for. That is its account of you, and you have spent centuries treating it as the only one that matters."

"It's the account that makes me work."

Rook turned his wrists, examining the darkness beneath them.

"I'm a Reaper who can't Cull. I'm supposed to guide souls through this place until these things decide I've done enough. Guide them to a Gate nobody can find, nobody understands and nobody can explain why it keeps fucking moving."

His hands dropped against the table.

"You can call that an opinion. Feels considerably more like slavery from this side."

"I know where the Gate was last seen."

Mara straightened so quickly that her chair scraped against the floor.

Even Rook stopped rubbing his wrists.

"Yama's Gate?" she asked.

The old man nodded. "Further east."

"Of course it's east," Rook muttered. "Everything has been further east since we left the Eleventh."

"When?" Mara asked. "How long ago?"

"About sixty years. I saw it myself."

Her excitement faltered, but she leaned forward anyway. Sixty years was a long time. It was also the first time someone had spoken of the Gate as a place they had actually stood before.

"It will have moved since then," the old man continued. "But the region is still worth searching. You may find traces of its passage, or people who have seen it more recently."

He looked toward Rook.

"How far have you travelled beyond the Hollow Road? Have you ever gone east of the Skyraisers?"

"Once."

Rook's brow tightened as he considered the direction.

"There's a chasm out there. I couldn't see the other side, and I never found the bottom. Unless your Gate has started coming to people who fall into holes, that won't help us."

"The Endless Chasm," the old man said. "A discouraging name. It does, however, have another side. There are Bastions beyond it, settlements and roads that few Reapers from this region ever reach."

Mara looked from one man to the other. Rook appeared to know the place well enough that his expression had grown more guarded at its mention.

"You crossed it?" he asked.

"Several times."

"How?"

The old man turned toward the doorway.

The feline lay with its chin resting upon one enormous paw. One golden eye opened when their attention settled upon it, then slowly closed again.

"Travelling becomes considerably easier with a Seventh Rank," he explained. "She can reach places that would take an ordinary patrol weeks to approach, and most creatures have enough sense to leave us alone."

Rook studied the feline for a moment.

"You're going to lend me the cat?"

"No. She is bound to me and accustomed to my instructions. She would not accept yours, and I will not part with her." The old man shifted his cane beneath his palm. "But there is a crossing you can use on foot."

"A bridge?" Mara asked.

"Yes. Follow the road east from these Skyraisers. It reaches the chasm at the bridge's approach. The structure extends across the entire gap."

Rook's attention sharpened. "And what lives on it?"

"Some creatures shelter along the structure. The greater danger comes from the flying Abominations. They move above and beneath the bridge, and the darkness makes them difficult to see before they approach."

Mara remembered clinging to the feline while the ground disappeared beneath its strides. She tried to imagine standing upon a bridge with that same darkness under her feet and something rising through it.

The old man watched Rook as he continued.

"I would recommend awakening your Death Imprint before attempting the crossing. Whatever experience has kept you alive until now, you will have very little room to use it there."

Rook turned toward Mara.

"You heard him. We should head back."

"No."

He closed his eyes briefly.

"I want to go there," she said.

"You want to go everywhere someone tells you not to."

"I want to reach the Gate."

"Haven't you seen enough?"

His voice rose, and Mara's answer caught before she could give it.

Rook leaned forward, both hands gripping the edge of the table.

"You watched two Seventh Ranks tear a Bastion apart. You saw what was left of me when you pulled me out of that thing. We barely made it this far, and now someone tells you there's a bridge full of flying Abominations over a hole you can't see across, and you still want to go?"

Mara looked at his hands. His fingers had begun trembling again.

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Because I don't want to spend the rest of my life here."

"That's the part you still haven't understood." Rook released the table and gestured around them. "There is no rest of your life. We're dead, Mara. This is the Underworld. Purgatory. Hell, for enough people that the distinction barely matters."

"Then you should understand why I want to leave."

He looked at her.

"I know what's out there," she continued. "I know I'm afraid of it. You don't need to keep reminding me. But going back means waiting inside another Bastion until somebody brings us another rumor, and then you'll tell me that road is dangerous too."

"It probably will be."

"I can't stay here, Rook."

He held her gaze long enough that she had to resist the urge to look away. She could still hear him screaming upon the table. Part of her wanted to withdraw the demand, let him rest and pretend the road could wait without changing anything.

But sixty years had already passed since the old man saw the Gate.

She did not want to add another sixty.

Rook turned back toward him.

"How bad is the bridge?"

The old man considered his answer before speaking.

"Bad enough that I would not advise you to cross without an Imprint you can reliably use. You may be able to injure whatever approaches. Whether you can finish it before something else joins the attack is another matter."

Rook looked at Mara again.

She remained seated with her hands clasped tightly between her knees. He glanced down at them, then back at her face.

A long breath left him.

"Fuck it. Fine. Why not? I almost died a few hours ago. Apparently I should try again."

He pushed himself off the table. Both boots struck the floor, and he stayed still for a moment, testing his weight before straightening fully.

Mara rose with him, but the mention of those hours brought another thought sharply into place.

"Wait. What happened to the Forty-Second?"

The old man's expression settled.

"I have not been there. I cannot tell you."

"The Manager should have reached it by now."

"If the return went as planned, yes. She has her strongest Reapers with her, and she knows where to find the materials needed for the repairs. With her back inside the Bastion, they should have a much better chance of stopping the invasion."

Mara pictured Frederick standing beside the Manager in the ruined courtyard. The injured Reapers beneath the Beacon. The weapons they had gathered before beginning their return.

"I hope she made it."

Rook watched her for a moment.

"If you're worried, we can go back. Find out what happened. Rest somewhere that doesn't involve me lying on another treatment table."

The offer made it harder to answer.

Mara looked toward the hall. Beyond the fragment of the Beacon lay the passage to the enormous metal doors, and beyond those doors the road east.

"I'm greedy," she said at last. "And selfish."

Rook waited.

"I want them to be safe. I do. But I want to get out of here, and we finally have somewhere to look." She met his eyes. "I'd rather follow my own goal. If we can't get across, we can turn back."

He rubbed one hand over his mouth, then let it fall.

"Fine. Let's head out."

Mara moved beside him as he approached the doorway. The feline lifted its head, watching them with half-open eyes. Rook gave it enough room that his shoulder almost brushed the opposite side of the frame.

"Rook," the old man said. "Before you leave."

He stopped.

"What?"

The old man remained beside the treatment table. The curved knife lay upon the cabinet behind him, its edge catching a thin line of white light.

"There are a few memories I chose to leave sealed."

Rook slowly turned around.

Mara's attention shifted to the old man's hands.

"You chose?" Rook asked.

"Yes. What I restored should be sufficient for you to understand the problem with your Death Imprint. There are other things in your past that will serve you no purpose. I advise you to leave them where they are."

Rook's hand rose toward his temple but stopped before touching it.

"What do you mean, old man?"

The old man looked directly at him.

"I mean that if you notice something still missing, do not go looking for it. You have enough to carry already."

For a moment, Mara expected him to explain. His fingers tightened around the head of his cane instead.

"It isn't worth it, Rook. It never was."