The Scattered Bones

by Nicole Scarano

“Who knows?” He climbed out into the snowy night, his gaze meeting mine one last time. My breath left my lungs, and he inhaled as if to capture the same air that had occupied my body. “Perhaps I’ll see you again… so you don’t have to be lonely.” He shrugged mischievously. “I’m very good at getting into places I shouldn’t.” And then he was gone, the open window the only proof he’d ever been there.

“Good.” He smiled wide, his scar stretching, and the expression ruined my world only to rebuild it brighter. No one had ever looked at me like that, as if their whole heart was happy to see me. Not the vessel. Me.

“I’ve never seen anyone as beautiful as you. I mean this in the most respectful way, but you are divinely lovely. I’m almost ashamed to share the same air as you.”

“I don’t want to take anything from you.” Conviction fortified his voice. “I want to give everything to you. I’m not here to break your vows. A lonely girl simply helped a lonely boy, and I love the light in your eyes when we’re together. How can that be a sin? How can wanting to be your friend be wrong?”

He sat in the cool breeze under the moon, the dim light clothing him in beauty, and I stared at the demon in the night who’d stolen my soul and captured my longing. I stared at the sinner who made me acknowledge the truth about my future, at the caring friend I’d lose in a cycle.

“I’ll help you live an entire lifetime in the coming seasons,” he whispered. “I’ll make them the best days of your life.”

I’m a thing to everyone but you.” Tears threatened to spill down my cheeks. “I feel real to you, so don’t turn me into an object to be admired and polished. Not yet.”

“I want to tell you.” His expression swallowed me whole. “I want you to know everything about me. I want you in every part of my being. You’re the only person I have.” He blushed at the sad truth. “You’re the only friend I have. The only person since my mother that cares whether I live or die, and I want you to know me.”

“I have scars from those who tried, but as the cycles passed, less and less could wound me, but your tears? They hurt worst of all. Out of everyone in my life, you have the power to hurt me the most.” “Why?” His words alarmed me. “Because I finally found a soul that sings to mine, a friend unlike anyone I’ve ever met, and I made you cry. I can’t take you away from here. I cannot touch you, and in a cycle, I’ll lose you.”

“I’ll even return when you’re old and grey and Hreinasta abandons you for another. It may take a while, but I’ll always come for you.”

“You did well,” he said as he twisted the handle. “Thank you for the incense. Maybe you can practice what I taught you and steal more for me? Enough to last the cycles that Hreinasta keeps you. Then I can burn it whenever I miss you.” I would steal this entire storeroom for him.

I see the end of the greatest thing in my life. You’re my best friend, my confidant, my heart. I love you, Sellah.

You make me whole. You’re what my life was missing, and the longer I stay at your side, the more I love you. Varas may be the god I’ve pledged to, but you’re who I want to swear my future to. You’re the altar I pray at, the deity I worship, and I would sacrifice my life for you, but you don’t belong to me. You never have, and you never will. You’ve belonged to Hreinasta since birth, and I can’t watch the person I treasure most in this world lose herself to a selfish goddess.”

I won’t survive losing you. As it is, I already feel as if a dull and rusted knife has pierced my heart, the pieces jagged and oozing.” Sorrow wove through his voice. “I love you, but I won’t come back. If I do, it’ll destroy me. I don’t want to live in a world without you, but I have to. I might as well get used to it.”

I’d touched him. I had touched Kaid, and it was beautiful.

He vanished into the night like a shadow, leaving me alone in my grief. At least I’d experienced his touch before he ripped my heart from my chest.

Kaid was gone, and he took my will to live with him. At the dawn of the fourth week, I resolved to close off my heart. I was a shell, my soul with the thief who stole it. It was for the best. I was already empty for Hreinasta to invade.

“Thank you,” I say, and I can tell by his eyes, he understands. “When my quest is complete, if I succeed, may we come back here?” I ask. “I want him to see you, to see this.” The fish stares at me and then dives with no indication he heard my question. I sigh, disappointed until I hear that same voice as before. The one that urged me to chase the swarm. “Yes.”

“You don’t understand how badly I want to taste you,” he confessed, his face twisted as if he wasn’t speaking but ripping out his heart. “You don’t understand how desperately I crave your lips on mine, your body pressed against me. My control teeters dangerously on the precipice, and the only way I can stop it from plunging over that edge is by keeping my distance.

“You are my goddess.” His low admission rumbled through his ribs, vibrating against my skin. “You are what I pray to, what I worship, what I adore.”

“I love you, Sellah,” he whispered into my hair. “You own me. All of me. Forever.”

“Come here,” he coaxed, realizing he needed to guide my movements. He kissed me gently before continuing. “Open for me, goddess. I want to taste you.”

“I know, my child.” His voice sounds broken. “Do you think I enjoy watching you suffer? I’ve grown attached to you in these dark days. You’re perhaps the only thing my calloused heart can care about.”

“Please, my love, grab me a blanket. I don’t want to hurt you, but if you don’t stop drinking in the sight of me like that, I’ll take you until you know who you belong to. Please don’t tempt me.”

“I’ll never love another woman,” he said. “I’ll wait for you. I’ll swear a vow of celibacy, and when your spirit returns, I’ll be here because I don’t want anyone else.” His fingers drew abstract designs on my clavicle. “Thank you for trusting me. Would you like me to help you put your dress back on?”

“I want you to wait for me. I hope you’re here when I reemerge, and I selfishly don’t want you with another woman, but don’t swear a vow of celibacy just yet.”

“No.” He kissed my mouth with a fire that would never die. “You own me, and I’ll worship you until your pleasure is so great, you can’t contain it. I want you to scream for me, my goddess. No one can hear you, and I need to know what you sound like when you come undone wrapped around me.”

“Gods, Sellah. You feel like death and salvation and euphoria all at once.”

“I don’t love you,” he growled as he angled his hips to hit the spot that unleashed the stars. “This isn’t love. Love is too simple a word for what I feel. The world could end. Ages could pass. The gods could die, and I would still adore you. You’ve been braided so deeply into my heart that I no longer exist without you.”

“I will love you until my death,” Kaid promised. “And then I’ll love you from the grave until I’m dust. When your consciousness returns after she abandons your vessel decades from now, I’ll be here waiting for you.”

“I don’t want this, Kaid.” A new and primal fear grew in my chest. “I don’t want her to take me. I want us.” I gestured between our chests. “Again, and again and again. I want to grow old with you. Not die here alone.” For that’s what I’d be with Hreinasta. Alone for decades, locked inside my own body. “Then let me take you from here.” Kaid leaned back just enough to look me in the eye and grabbed my thigh, hiking it over his hip so that our bodies remained joined. “I’ve been wanting to ask if you’d run away with me, but I was afraid to voice my desire.”

I would do anything for you, even sacrifice my own life, so if you say yes, I’ll live in the dust beside you.”

To help you, to trust you, to love you. We aren’t two people, but two halves of the same soul. I belong to you, so take me far away so we can build a life and a family.”

but I swear on Varas’ holy flames that when you’re old and grey, you won’t be here in this temple returning to a body you don’t recognize when Hreinasta abandons you for another, but in my arms with our children worshiping the very ground you walk on.”

I miss everything about him, from the way his body moved against mine, to the deep voice I’ve forgotten, to the smile that eclipsed the sun. It hurts to think about him. It brings me peace to remember him.

“Sellah, my best friend, my entire soul, marry me? When we flee this place, I want it to be as husband and wife.

him themselves, and I would never tire of looking at him. “I love your face when you study me,” Kaid said with an unsteady voice. “This must be how the gods feel when worshiped.” I lifted my eyes to his and then lowered my lips to his chest, seductively kissing his smooth skin. “Because it is worship.” “My wife.” Kaid gripped my hair and yanked my mouth up to his, devouring me with a hunger I’d never experienced from him. He’d called me by many names over our time together. Friend. Sellah. Goddess. But Wife? Wife was my favorite.

“I’ll want you even in death, Sellah. There’s no afterlife, but that doesn’t matter. I’ll love you until I’m dead in the dirt, then I’ll love you until my body is nothing but bones. And when my bones fade to dust coating the earth, I’ll still want you.”

“Sellah,” Kaid’s deep rumble cut through my terror. “Sellah, my love, look at me.” I obeyed, barely able to see through the tears. “I will love you until I am nothing but dust, and even then, I’ll still love you.” “Don’t.” This wasn’t goodbye. It couldn’t be goodbye. “My goddess,” he said loud and clear, his beloved term for me a defiant slap to Hreinasta’s ego. “Look away. Don’t watch this.”

“Until I am dust, wife.” “Until I am dust.”

Not even my own mother cradled me when I lived in her home, and I don’t care who this dark man is. He could burn the world to ash, and I would still love him.

“And…” I falter. “Do you know who I am?” “Yes.” He pauses, and I hold my breath until my lungs hurt. “You’re my wife.”

“I told you,” Kaid says against my mouth, his words garbled as he struggles to use muscles that lay dormant for seasons. “I would love you until I was dust.” “I don’t love you.” I cover his entire face with kisses until he attempts a weak smile. “Because love isn’t enough for what I feel. It is too much. It’s everything.”

Every scar, every hunger pang, every fear. I would suffer through all the pain life inflicted on me again, because I’ve loved my thief from the moment I found him in my room, and I’ll love him until I am dust.

Amidst the revelry, I noticed a dark stain watching me with fondness among the sea of vibrantly dressed guests, and while he never came close, my heart surged with joy. Death had come to bear witness. Like a father, he came to his child’s wedding, and as the sun heralded the new day, Kaid and I completed the vows of our body.

“I love you,” I mouth over our daughters’ heads, and he lifts my hand to his scarred lips, kissing my palm reverently, adoringly, worshipfully. “And I, wife.” His eyes twinkle in the darkness. “I don’t love you.”