Tres Morass's Arc

Chapter 2 of 4

The golden vessel rode against Tres Morass's chest as he walked home. His wife was safe inside, whole and glowing. But safe was not alive. A soul needed a living body, and he did not know what body could hold hers without breaking her all over again. Guess wrong, and he might lose her forever. He knelt in the mud outside his hut and pressed his forehead to the painted lid, begging for an answer. A voice answered instead. "You'll ruin that dress kneeling in the muck." Tres spun. A young woman stood at the edge of his clearing, out of place as a jewel in a ditch. Her gown was pink and clean. A crown sat crooked on her tangled blonde hair. Mud caked the hem she lifted with two fingers. He clutched the vessel and hissed, backing toward his door. "Don't skitter off," she said. "I'm lost, and I'm hungry, and I've been walking this swamp for two days. I'm Scarlett Fontaine. My carriage sank." She looked at the golden vessel in his arms. "What is that? It's glowing." "Mine," Tres said. "Stay back." But he could not stop staring at her. She was young. She breathed. Her heart beat under that ridiculous pink dress. A living body, whole and healthy, standing right in front of him. His hands shook on the lid. He thought of his wife's soul, so bright behind the gold. He thought of pouring her into this stranger. He took one step toward Scarlett. She saw his face change and stepped back. "Why are you looking at me like that?" Tres stopped. His stomach turned. He looked at his own filthy hands, at the girl's frightened blue eyes. He had crossed the swamp on love, not greed. The guardian had let him pass because he wanted to save his wife, not steal from another. If he emptied this girl to fill his wife, he would be the very thing the guardian turned away. He would be a murderer. And his wife would wake in a stolen body, over a corpse. "No," he whispered. He backed off and sank down in the mud. "No. Not you. Not anyone living." He understood it now, cold and clear. A soul could not simply take a body that already held one. He could not steal a life to give one back. Whatever vessel held his wife again, it could not be a person he emptied to make room. "You need food," he said hoarsely. "There is a tree with mushroom caps near the water. Follow the moss. It leads out." Scarlett studied him, then nodded slowly. "Thank you." She picked her way past him and vanished into the green. Tres held the vessel and stared at the empty trees. He had his answer, and it was a wall. No living body would do. He needed a body that belonged to no one. He needed to build one, or find one already dead and empty. And he had no idea how.