Dominic’s Hourglass
10,000 Minutes
Dom pulled his bag onto his shoulders and lifted his own heavy hourglass from the satchel across his chest. He reached his hand out to open the gate.
‘No. You are not leaving.’ A hand slapped his away from the heavy wood. Dom was startled and turned quickly to see Satarial, covered in sweat and dirt, standing beside him.
He sighed. ‘What now? Just get over it and let me go. Why do you even want me here?’
‘I don’t want you. I want nothing to do with you. You were just a novelty. A child. I don’t even remember being fifteen. I just wanted you to fight. To lose. But I met your sister.’ His face almost lost its composure.
‘Well, you should never have gone—’ Dom was silenced by a swinging slap across his face.
‘I have never met anyone like her. There was no one like that in my time. She truly loves. Everything. She loves and feels everything. I don’t understand it. I don’t . . .’ He trailed off.
‘I don’t understand it either. I never did.’ Dom looked at him with a sudden compassion.
‘I’ve never felt that . . . happiness. Ever. And for a few moments with her . . . I did.’ His face filled with rage again. ‘And all you had to do was kill her body. A body that was already destroyed. And you couldn’t do it. She is now lost to life and death.’
Dom stared at the ground, there was nothing he could say. Satarial was right. It was his fault. He heard a sound and saw movement further up the path, more Nephilim were coming. A sudden panic filled him. Eva was waiting for him, her minutes were slipping away.
‘Let me go.’
‘No.’ The word was spat at him. Dom glanced at the coming crowd, six or seven Nephilim. He wasn’t ready to fight again, he was still tired, his right side ached where the ribs had been shattered. He looked at the gate and wondered if he could make a run for it. Satarial had no hourglass with him. He inched closer and instantly the Nephilim’s hand was around his throat, lifting him upwards and cutting off his air. He knew he could survive it, but he couldn’t find a way to relax, all he could think about was Eva waiting, unable to get back, but not going forward without him. The hand was a vice and the lack of air was clouding his mind, sending it into a mute mist of confusion. He wondered if Eduardo would fly in and save him this time. The Nephilim were close and he heard Satarial’s name being called. Satarial ignored it and stared into Dom’s eyes. Dom tried to prise the hands away, but he couldn’t move the stone grip; he tried to strike, his palms lifting limply towards Satarial’s neck. The blackness crept closer.
And then he could breathe. He was on the ground and he could breathe. He looked up. Satarial was gazing at the others in shock, his face paler than usual and taut with strong emotion. Dom followed his gaze and felt the same tidal wave of emotion.
‘Kaide,’ he croaked.
‘I told you to leave him alone.’ Kaide was walking towards the Nephilim, her long legs taking confident strides, her body straight.
Dom watched her in awe. She was truly beautiful; her face glowed the way it always had and there was no trace of any injury.
‘What happened? I thought you were dead.’
She smirked at him and changed her course, offering him a hand and pulling him to his feet. ‘I am dead.’
She left Dom standing in stunned silence as she took a step to Satarial’s side and put her arms gently around him. He leaned forward and buried his face in her neck and the two of them stood very still for a long moment. As Dom watched them it began to sink in. Kaide had died after all. He smiled. Satarial raised his head and their eyes met, a long silent stare that said more than any mere words would have been able to.
‘Kaide?’ He called her attention. She turned and he noticed that while she had the same greyish tint to her skin that everyone in the Necropolis had, her eyes had stayed the same violet colour that had always startled him. ‘What’s going on? What happened?’
‘I died. That simple. I think my body tried to hold on a few more days, but it was too broken, Dom, it just eventually died. Not your fault, before you start feeling all guilty about it. I am exactly where I am supposed to be.’ She put her hand on his arm. ‘You won. I knew you would.’
‘We can go. I have plenty of minutes for both us.’
Kaide paused. ‘I want to, Dom. I do. But . . . not yet.’ She glanced at Satarial, who was silent and tense, and then she looked back past him at the City. ‘I need to stay here.’
‘No you don’t. Please don’t. I’ll never be able to do this knowing you are here with him.’ He glared at the Nephilim, who had the grace to turn away.
Kaide smiled a little. ‘It’s not just him. We are meant to do this when we die, you know? Whatever it is this place is about, I need to find out for myself.’
‘I would have been happy to skip the Necropolis,’ he said.
‘And maybe I can help fix up the mess you’ve left behind.’ She smiled more broadly this time, gesturing back to the City where smoke was rising in plumes from more than one place. ‘Seriously though, Dom,’ she leaned in and whispered, ‘you’re okay now, you’ll be fine in there. But he needs me. I have to stay.’
Satarial’s face had softened into a look Dom had never seen before and couldn’t place. Hope, maybe? He became regal with it, a king.
Dom sighed. ‘I have to go.’
‘I know.’ She smiled. ‘We’ll just think of it as back to school for the term, hey? I’ll see you next summer? Or Christmas? We’ll see each other again soon.’
‘That works for me.’ He wondered if he would ever see her again, but the thought caught in his throat, it was too hard to breathe it in. He raised his voice, ‘I probably don’t need to say it, but take care of my sister okay?’
The Nephilim merely raised an eyebrow. Dom held Kaide for a moment and then turned to the gate. ‘And take care of my Angel,’ he called over his shoulder, and he thought he heard Satarial laugh.
The gate was heavy, but it swung easily on its giant hinges. He expected to see Eva’s impatient face on the other side, but there was nothing, just an empty path. He took a breath and lifted his hourglass up. Inside the liquid swirled, like the Glass of the lake. He wondered what he would see if he looked into the Glass now. He imagined his mother and father side by side with Angie at the clinic, handing out cheap sodas and administering needles to wide-eyed babies. He turned the heavy hourglass over. It was full of time yet to be filled with action. He whispered, ‘I’m ready.’
The minutes gurgled and swirled and then began to slowly drip downwards. Dominic smiled and stepped onto the path.
With his first step the vision of the path dissolved into blackness and he felt himself falling. It was a tumbling freefall and it took so long that he could no longer tell which was up or down. He held his hourglass and satchel tight to his chest and curled to keep the bag on his back and eventually he felt the spray of a waterfall around him and heard its roar growing louder. A very dim, diffused light showed him he was falling down a huge waterfall and the water below was rushing up to meet him.
He hit it hard and the heavy bag with its weapons and tools, rope and torches pulled him deep under the water. As he struggled for the surface he found that it felt thicker than water and was full of heavy reeds that made it difficult to move. They swarmed through the churning water and held him, tangling his bag, his legs and arms. He finally found purchase on something hard and pushed upwards, getting his head free of the water long enough to take a breath. He looked for an edge, something to swim towards, but he could see only a few drops of water catching the dim light and little else. He sank again and let himself drift downwards until he found something else to push off. The bag was too valuable to lose and he was determined to hang on to it. He went deeper this time, but eventually found a rock to push upwards from, his legs pumping to get him high enough for a breath. This time he managed to tread water for a moment, and he heard something in the darkness. A voice calling.
It had to be Eva. He called back. The voice called again, but he couldn’t make out what it was saying or be sure where it was coming from. He repeated his process a few more times, pushing himself closer to the sound. The light seemed to have vanished and he was in complete darkness, making it very difficult to know where the surface of the water was. He struggled to swim a few strokes with each breath, but the bag was too heavy. Just as he was about to give up and let it go he heard the voice again. Much closer this time, echoing so much it was clear that they were in some sort of cave.
‘Dominic?’
‘Yes. Eva? I’m here.’
The words tumbled around themselves with the echo and it was hard to decipher what her reply was. He swam towards the sound.
‘Rope.’ He heard the word and reached around to try and unhook the rope from the side of his bag. He sank immediately. When he spluttered to the surface he tried to explain that he couldn’t get the rope free, but something bobbed gently against his head. He grabbed at it. Rope. He pulled himself along it, arm over arm as quickly as he could. Finally his feet hit solid ground and he clambered gracelessly onto a rock ledge, gasping for breath and reaching around in the dark until he found Eva’s hand and pulled himself closer.
He panted, ‘Thank God I found you. That was crazy.’
He heard the sound of a flint being struck a couple of times in the dark and suddenly light flared around him, blinding him for a couple of seconds.
‘I know.’ The voice was clear now and it scalded Dominic’s breath from his throat. He rubbed his eyes quickly and peered into the soft light that surrounded the pale face and wet blonde hair of Deora. ‘I thought I’d lost you. But here you are.’