Mani

The Death Dodger

Mani - Spirits of the dead in Etruscan mythology.

-

His bones clack together as he beckons you closer. You don't know why you go - you are terrified of his exposed bones, writhing muscles under threadbare skin - but your feet carry you without your consent.

"I have to tell you a secret," he rasps. His voice is as weak as his body looks, like it could fall apart with a blow of the wind. You come so close (so unbearably close) and his stench is so overwhelming that you gag and spit bile onto the sand below. You haven't straightened before his lips are on your ear and you shudder.

"Do you know how it feels to have Death's claws around your throat and have her be powerless against you?"

He chuckles, a wheezing thing that sound more like the scavengers on the Boneyard than a dragon. His claws are on your neck, and through the terror that spikes through you you are astonished at the power in them.

"It makes you feel like a king. And you will kneel in pieces."

-


Stuffed between the young dragon's feathers is a note. He does not know of its presence, even as it flutters to the ground and lays harmlessly on the floor.

In odd, withering scratch, three words lay on its surface.

I'm so sorry.

-

Oh mother, tell your children
Not to do what I have done
Spend your lives in sin and misery
In the House of the Rising Sun

Well, I got one foot on the platform
The other foot on the train
I'm goin' back to New Orleans
To wear that ball and chain

Well, there is a house in New Orleans
They call the Rising Sun
And it's been the ruin of many a poor boy
And God, I know I'm one