for a few minutes, but I knew that he was trying to formulate a sincere answer. I could feel it. There were upsides to hitching a soul-ride in other creatures’ bodies, it seemed, for I could sense their thoughts and intentions. Granted, I could only do this with Ramin and ghouls—though, so far, I only trusted Herbert to take me in without eating me.
“I never really wanted to become a ghoul,” he finally said, surprising me. “Perhaps that’s why I was so easily trained by the witches. Why I obeyed and listened to Ibrahim over the years. Why I was more or less okay with being cooped up in that pencil box for so long. It kept me from committing heinous crimes… eating souls…”
“Then how did it happen?” I asked, trying to understand. At the same time, I couldn’t help but feel a pang of sympathy for the guy. He seemed genuine.
“I was tricked by an original ghoul. You see, darling, being a Reaper isn’t at all easy, especially in the beginning. In my time, there was something we referred to as the Critical Hundred Years. The first hundred years spent as a Reaper are crucial, a difficult adjustment period, during which time we learned to leave our lives and everything we knew behind. Reapers have to be neutral and controlled in their demeanor. They must tell people that they’ve died, that this is the end for them, and that they cannot tell them about what’s on the other side. Believe it or not, it’s a tough one, even though we all were in that position before. It’s difficult to deal with the five stages of death that beguile one’s soul.”
“Five stages?”
“Oh, you know, the classics. Denial, bargaining, anger, depression, and acceptance. It’s grief that you experience first, when you realize that this is it for you. So, even though you’re a soul, you still go through these motions,” Herbert explained. “And it’s heartbreaking for a Reaper, especially a young one, like I was. To listen to people crying and pleading and cursing and bargaining… Some took longer than others to accept that everything that was happening to them was real. It got to me.”
“And you wanted a way out?”
“I did. I begged the other Reapers to get me off this task. I couldn’t do it anymore, but they all encouraged me to keep going, saying that it would all become better, eventually.” He sighed. “One day, I came upon an original ghoul. He’d been like this for a long time, simply scavenging the world for souls to eat. As you may know by now, some souls just… slip away. A distracted Reaper. A late Reaper. You’d be surprised. But anyway, that’s how ghosts come to be. I don’t think there is a single Reaper out there who hasn’t lost a soul, at least once. Whether they admit it or not.”
“What happened then? You said you didn’t want to become a ghoul.”
“Well, this original ghoul, he was nothing like his kind had been described to me by the elder Reapers,” Herbert said. “He was friendly and kind. He seemed to like me. He showed me what his life was like. Unfortunately, I didn’t know at the time that it was just an act. He told me that all I had to do was eat one soul, instead of reaping it. And then, I’d be free. I’d be like him. I didn’t mind the ghastly appearance of him, as long as it came with freedom. I was miserable.”
“And you believed him…”
“I was young and foolish, my sweet plum. I didn’t know any better. I figured it was only one soul, selfish and desperate as I was to renounce my position,” Herbert continued. “I did it. One day, I just found the courage to do it, and… I ate a soul. A warlock, killed before his old age. I just gobbled him up.”
The mental image made me shudder. I could almost see that moment, through a thin, dark veil, a distant memory of Herbert’s. The astonished look on the face of the warlock, who’d already been reduced to a mere translucent version of his old self. The consumption, the exhilaration that followed… and the dread.
“That’s right,” Herbert said. “As soon as I consumed him, I knew he’d never be enough for me. That I would want more. My insides burned and decayed. My bones began to shift… the process was agonizing, to say the least. And the ghoul… he just stood there,