The next morning the cage was empty and the ring was back on my finger. Seb went off to work and I went to bed Dreading my alarm in a couple of hours. Before laying down I tossed the ring in the trash bin next to my door.
Alarm buzzing I rolled over, turning it off and cursing. Stretching, I opened my eyes and the ring was back.
Getting dressed I threw it in the bathroom trash.
In the kitchen making coffee, it was back. Into the trash, it flew. Waiting for the machine to finish brewing I stared at my hand. Nothing. I looked at the clock. It was back.
Growing more and more frustrated I kept throwing it, not even in the trash at this point. Into the other room. Into drawers. Out the kitchen door. Every time I look away from my hand it’s back.
All the way to work I sent it flying out the window with no success. At one point I could swear I saw a flicker of black wings at the corner of my vision. Work was long and busy with a lull and slump around three. The entire shift I tossed the ring even trying to leave it in room 333 where I had found it.
Halfway home I saw a deer on the side of the road it’s Entrails on the shoulder. It couldn’t have been hit very long before as puffs of breath fogged the air around it. Slowing to a stop I put the truck in park and grabbed my knife.
Kneeling next to the deer I put a hand on its cheek partly to hopefully comfort it and partly to hold its head in place. I drew the blade across the deer’s throat shuddering at the resistance of the spine. I sat there in the dark as the eyes glazed over and it relaxed under my palm.
Getting up I cleaned the knife and my hands before getting in the truck and sitting there. Eventually, I turned the key and drove home.
Standing in the middle of the living room I let myself feel the hurt. Everything welling up in my chest seemed to claw at my throat and push on my teeth. Finally dropping to my knees I screamed. Jagged and hurting and raw like something more feral than an animal.
“I feel for you kid. I wish I could Choose someone who wants to have the responsibility, but it's not my choice” The gruff voice came from inside my head but seemed to pull towards the space behind me. Turning I found the raven perched on the lamp by the couch.
“Please, I don’t want this. I can barely handle my life already” I said through tears and a raw throat “ T- take me to whoever gave me this stupid ring. He can take it back can’t he?”
“I can’t take you to him. He doesn’t exist anymore. At Least not in this realm.” The raven seemed, if it were possible, to be remorseful” You were chosen long before your birth and in fact at the birth of your line. You've been a reaper since you were born. Like it or not it’s as much a fake as the changing of seasons. Even without me or the ring, you have been doing your duty. How many bedsides have you sat at so that someone's final moments aren’t spent laying alone in a strange room? How many deer have you saved from hours of agony by ending it with your blade? Now it won’t be much different except it goes beyond the veil. At the bedside, as they take their last breath you, their last comfort will be able to send them on their way after the last beat of their heart.”
In the middle of the room, The walls seemed to be falling in on me, the air being sucked out leaving me with a heavy and breathless heart racing breath stuck in millions of different puddles. Ignoring the pain and the numbness and the telepathic bird thing I did the only thing I could think to do. I lay down and cried until without my consent or even acknowledgment it was day.
Light from the big bay window streamed in, warming me in a way that only sunbeams can. I lay there feeling warm and light floating on the edge of sleep for a moment before everything came crashing back.
