Rest

"My body lays another league from here.” Perth pointed toward the rising sun, which sent waves of new heat over the formerly cool desert. “After, you will easily make it back here before the cold.” His comrade nodded as he ate his morning rations.

Perth turned away, uncomfortable in the ensuing silence. Around them, the skeleton of a ruined city lay half buried in the sand, the wind sending up drifts to clatter against the crumbled stone.

Perhaps on his first time through, he should have taken this bleak landscape as a sign to continue no further.

The boy - a native to the land - was too casual about the whole affair for Perth to feel at ease. To bring a few bronze coins into the desert and place them over the eyes of Perth's deceased body was the difference between an eternity of entrapment at the entrance of the Underworld, and the granting of entry to sweet rest - worth everything to him. The situation made him regret the hasty decision to put himself in danger of dying in solitude.

There was a short period of time in which a spirit could return to the mortal world and attempt to receive proper burial, in which case they could pay passage over the Styx and continue on into the afterlife. Unfortunately, though, Perth was neither in a country where he could hope to return to any living relatives, nor did he have any ties in this land.

When he returned to the mortal realm, he went to the only place where someone might be moved to help him: the temple.

The priests were alarmed at his state of unrest, but they did not have the means to get to his body, which was far out in the desert ruins and at the bottom of a crevasse - the final result of his adventuring ways. The boy who ended up being sent with him lived at the temple because he had no parents, and only the priests would care for him. The head priest was confident the he could be trusted to fulfill the deed.

Perth was not. Unfortunately, he didn't have time to find another way.

###

Tatum rode silently on the priests' loaned horse. She was old, but if anything, that gave her more experience on desert sands. Supposedly, she had belonged to a late adventurer. Tatum looked out of the corner of his eye at the pale figure drifting beside him.

Adventurers seemed to die quickly, if he could be the judge from his meager experience with them.

He hadn't spoken much with the strange apparition he was supposed to help, but Rasheydd, the head priest, told him about the ghost's predicament. He had been an adventurer, a seeker of danger. It sounded very romantic, but not very practical.

Tatum admitted that most of his ill temper toward the ghost had to do with the journey into the desert and prospective climb down a crevasse to leave a ferry ride's payment on a corpse. There were so many people in his city that he didn't know why one person's soul was so important.

Soon the sun began to beat down in earnest, and Tatum pulled his head covering further over his eyes. The constant jarring steps of the horse beneath him, combined with the heat, made the movements stretch out maddeningly. If it weren't for the thought of Rasheydd never accepting him back into the temple, and returning to the streets, he would have turned around right then.

When Tatum felt the heat and silence getting to him, he opted for a distraction he wouldn't previously allowed himself.

“What possessed you to go into such a place, anyway?”

The ghost looked up in surprise. He was very young and strange looking to Tatum. Tatum looked away at the endless sand. “Everyone knows that the Forbidden Ruins are full of traps.”

At that, the young man looked sheepish. He didn't seem so unnerving when he wasn't acting so serious. "Actually, that's precisely why I went in."

“That seems foolish.”

“Ah, …yes, I suppose so.”

The two fell silent again, but Tatum was determined. The young man was less …ghostly when he spoke, and Tatum preferred him that way.

“Do - did you do anything besides putting yourself in danger? Or is that all adventurers do?”

The young man frowned. “We do not always venture into danger simply for the thrill. Who do you think people come to when they need to have curses lifted or dragons slain?”

“Dragons?” He had heard of them: giant, fire-breathing lizards that lived in the west. “You fought a dragon?”

The former adventurer fiddled with his hair nervously. “Well, …I tried once, but in the end, he flew away with the gold I set out to retrieve.”

Tatum shrugged, sighing.

Admittedly, even though it seemed like a foolhardy thing for someone to try in the first place, he was at least a little impressed.

###

The sun blazed directly overhead when they entered the collapsed gates of the Forbidden Ruins. Tatum left the horse there, knowing she would stay. The spirit led him, with unfaltering memory, into the underground corridors themselves, assuring: “Have no fear. There are no traps this way.” Tatum lit the torch and brought his bag with a second one, a tinderbox, and a length of rope. He doubted a ghost needed light, but he was the one would return alone.

A few times, Tatum had to run to keep up with the young man, so intent on returning to the site of his death. Tatum shivered. He prayed that with his nerves in such a state he would remember the way back.

When they rounded one corridor, the spirit stopped abruptly, and Tatum walked right in to him. He scrambled back quickly from the cold ethereal matter. The young man didn't seem to notice.

"We have arrived."

Tatum walked around him. The chamber they were in was empty but for a shrine at the far end. From wall to wall was a gaping split in the floor - the product of a sprung trap. His light didn't reach the bottom..

“Now I climb down,” he whispered. He turned to look at his companion. “What about y…?

He stopped and blinked. Had it been his imagination, or did the young man flicker out for a moment? The horrified expression on the spirit's face confirmed his suspicions. For once, the young man's ghostly pallor looked completely in place.

“You must hurry,” he said, his eyes wide. “I have little time left.”

Tatum hadn't realized that the ghost would have to leave the mortal realm even if he was not put to rest. For an instant, he thought that he needn't climb down at all, as there would be no one to tell Rasheydd that the task hadn't been completed,.

One look at the hopeless eyes of his companion convinced him, though. The two of them were alone in this place, and in the minimized world they now inhabited, helping him seemed important.

Tatum mustered his bravery. Then, with the rope tied securely around the base of a remaining pillar and his bag over his shoulder, he took a deep breath and swung over the edge of the remaining floor into darkness. He closed his eyes as he shimmied down the rope, trying not to think of the long drop below.

When he hit the sandy floor, he thanked every god he knew that he had made it with his bones intact. He lit the second torch.

And he almost dropped it again when he saw the body lying before him. It lay in a pitiable position, arms bent out of place, but face looking upward. The long, sandy hair spread out around the face indicated a foreigner, but he expected that already.

“It's me."

Tatum started, but it was only his ghost, who had descended behind him. He spoke faintly, flickering.

“Please…”

Tatum inwardly shook himself and nodded. He hurried toward the body, swallowing nervously and searching through his bag for the coins. With shaking hands, he knelt beside the body and hastily put the coins over the eyelids. He tried not to look too closely at the familiar face, which was as ashen as the spirit's.

He turned back to look at his companion. With immense relief, he saw that he was still partially there. The spirit would leave the mortal realm with his passage fare into the afterlife.

The young man sighed, his face smoothed into a serene expression, completely oblivious to the physical world around him. Tatum didn mind that he didn't thank him before peacefully fading away, just to see him like that.

###

He left the ruins as fast as he could, remembering the way out with surprising clarity. He nearly burst into tears when he saw the horse waiting for him at the gate, and he ran to hug her. The feel of her living warmth brought unspeakable relief, and he patted her when she nuzzled his face.

As he road back in silence, he almost couldn't wait to be back sweeping the temple floors again. The one adventure that found him had been more than his heart could take.

Still he would always have one fond, but thankfully past, time to hold high in his memory.