Chapter 53 Helena
I could only gaze on in horror and in dread as Cedric basked in his victory, his dark cackle like that of the heinous wizard—and now hand of death—he had become.
Just as soon as they’d whipped up, though, the winds Cedric had conjured died.
His newly acquired robes of pure darkness settled around him, his form became fully human once again, and his magic calmed, too, the sparks and flares of lightning-like energy fizzling before, like his villain’s laugh, abruptly ceasing the instant he brought the staff of his scythe down hard against the marble with a resounding clack.
A moment of pure silence passed in which all of us regarded him with skittish terror.
Then a more genuine grin than I’d seen on him before spread across his face.
“I’ve always wanted to do that—with legitimate reason,” he purred.
I spun to put my back protectively to Grim, who, gripping me by the upper arms, whirled me to face him again before swinging me away from Cedric.
“What are you doing?” he demanded, peering down at me.
“Defending you,” I replied. “And standing up to the bully.”
“Let me talk to him,” he rasped.
“No offense, Grim,” I said, “but that’s not going so well so far. Listen, I’ve got an idea.”
“An idea?” he snarled. “What do you mean you have an idea?”
“Well, I was going to try to barter.”
“With what? Library cards are already free.”
“I know a lot of people with connections,” I told him. “Rare-book people. He seems the type to—ah!”
I jumped to find Cedric at our side. Grim grabbed me and shoved me behind him.
“Are you two ready to go?” asked Cedric as he smirked at Grim, a renegade swoop of that white-blond hair half concealing one more-mischievous-even-than-usual eye.
“Helena’s going home,” Grim said. “And you’re going to let her.”
“I’m going to escort her,” Cedric corrected. “You as well.”
“I’m not going back into that Basin.”
“Frankly,” said Cedric, “thanks to Miss Hart, I’m not so sure it would have you anymore. But that’s beside the point and not really my concern any longer. At least, not for a good long while.”
“What are you yammering about?” snarled Grim.
“Oh, if I must explain it to you,” said Cedric, rolling his eyes. “I’ve decided to punish you with something far worse than death—life. All the rest of the life you never got to live after you took on the cloak and the scythe.”
“What?” barked Grim.
“The Few and I felt that would teach you,” he said. “If you wanted so badly to meddle with the affairs of the living, then meddle you now shall—and must.”
“You’re not making any sense,” Grim growled even while I tilted my head at this, hope springing in my chest, making my heart flutter.
“You’re returning to the land of the living,” said Cedric. “For the foreseeable future. Which means you have to get a new job. A life, while you’re at it. God knows you’ve been in need of one of those for nigh on centuries now.”
“This is a joke,” said Grim, even though I was starting to think… it wasn’t. “You’re toying with me.”
“Not anymore I’m not,” said Cedric. “Just take the gift, Grim. Loxley. Ren. Can I call you Ren? Consider it something of a long-overdue tax refund, if that helps you to compute.”
“I’m not going anywhere without Helena,” he snapped.
“Which works out,” said Cedric, “since I’ve been instructed to escort you out of the Hallowed Halls as well as her. Humans—living humans—aren’t allowed here. You know that.”
“Helena’s a Fated,” Grim argued. “If you think—”
“About that,” said Cedric. “You were right when you accused me of following you to that party. Watching from a third-story window, I did indeed witness everything that happened on that balcony. Nothing short of astounded, I hurried back here and told Lady Red right away what I’d witnessed—a miracle of sorts.
Someone, a human of all creatures, got through to you. ”
“What are you talking about?” demanded Grim.
“I strove to help you so many times,” said Cedric.
“No matter what angle I tried, though, I could never get close enough to even begin to reach you. That was my task, you see. In exchange for refuge in the Hallowed Halls, I agreed to try to talk you into moving on. The Few… they had no complaints against you. You did your job well. Too well. You became a machine, Grim. You forgot what it was like to live. And that made you an efficient agent of death. But it also transformed you into a, forgive the term, dead man walking. I never wanted to hurt you, but ultimately, Lady Red helped me to see how the rehabilitation of your immortal soul—and mine—was the true objective. And I eventually concluded I was not averse to playing the role of villain if that’s what you needed.
And when I followed you to that party that night, when I saw this woman do what I—or any one of us—had not been able to do, to touch your heart, I knew that would be the role I would have to play. ”
“I knew you fucking followed me,” growled Grim, but I gripped his hand, squeezing, hoping to ground him and settle his temper. Cedric hadn’t been trying to undermine him so much as he’d been trying to… what?
I couldn’t say for sure. At least not yet.
“Did you know?” Grim asked, glancing toward Flora and then Johann. He even eyed the bird.
“They didn’t know,” said Cedric, speaking up before any of them could. “They couldn’t. The bond the four of you share was too precious to tamper with. If I was to be your adversary, well, then you would certainly need friends.”
Cedric smirked again, arrogant as ever.
“But why?” asked Grim. “All this just to take my place?”
“As I said,” replied Cedric, “taking your place was and always has been secondary to the goal of saving your soul. That’s what The Few tasked me with in exchange for asylum and potential release of my own soul. They were worried about you, too.”
“Impossible,” scoffed Grim.
“Yet true,” Cedric rebutted. “And your stint in the Black Basin should tell you that.”
“Why did they send me there?” roared Grim.
“You sent you there,” said Cedric, his voice soft—even kind now.
“The Black Basin, it has no true guardian. It’s a place souls go when they are…
damaged to the point of unrepair. But only because they refuse intervention.
They go there because they cannot go anywhere else.
The souls of the Black Basin. Within, they face no darkness but their own—but it is all by choice. ”
“I would have been stuck there if not for Helena,” said Grim, still angry.
Several beats passed before Cedric answered. When he did, he spoke with a gentleness that I wouldn’t have imagined him capable of. “My point entirely.”
Grim looked away as though he’d taken a punch, like Cedric’s compassion hurt worse than anything he’d done to Grim before, and now he refused to meet anyone’s gaze—mine included.
“Helena reached you,” Cedric stressed. “Obliterated in an instant the impenetrable barriers you’d erected around your soul—the ones I had spent years just trying to peek beyond.”
“She wasn’t trying to get under my skin,” grumbled Grim.
“That’s just it,” said Cedric. “I wasn’t trying, either. Like everybody else… I just did.”
Grim’s scowl deepened. He went silent yet again. Maybe because he was still mad. Or maybe because he was reflecting on that.
“You’ll find it interesting,” said Cedric, “that Lady Red, a romantic at heart, became particularly enthralled with the idea you might have feelings for someone. You know the rules as well as I do, though. True, you’d already broken them by the time I brought your would-be crime to the attention of The Few.
But… no one wanted you fired so much as they wanted you…
free. As you know, a swift firing would have sent you straight to the Black Basin, which you were always bound for.
Not through any misdeed, mind you, but rather through the lack of grace you seemed—miraculously and despite your taciturn demeanor—to grant everyone else around you.
Everyone aside from yourself. And, if I may say so…
me. Perhaps because caring for me meant you would feel some responsibility toward me.
And that prospect reminded you too much of your perceived failings.
Regardless, who knows how long you would have insisted on staying in that Basin?
If, however, you could be enticed to go a step or two further in your delinquencies—and perhaps, well, grow a little in the process—a more creative ‘punishment’ could be dealt. ”
“You played me?” snarled Grim, somewhat and endearingly missing the point. Or maybe just pretending to.
“I wasn’t the only one,” replied Cedric.
“The Few… Well, at my behest, they might have orchestrated a few scenarios… manufacturing a call or two to Helena’s soul by staging some…
incidents. Lady Red with the elevator… Lady Green with the train.
Sir Blue, as you have perhaps guessed, planted the note.
Because the fact remained. No matter what, you still had to face your own shadow.
And The Few—they agreed with me that Helena was the only person who could even begin to tempt you out of your own darkness.
Because, until her, you could not see the light. Not even your own.”
Grim’s hand shot out to grab Cedric by the collar, and he seethed his next words between his teeth. “You tried to kill her with a fucking bookmobile!”
Cedric raised his gloved hands. “I just caused a small ruckus.”
“Small!” roared Grim. “Third Street was a fucking war zone.”
“Most of the cars were phantasms,” said Cedric. “And I might have sent a few vehicles after her, including that colossal bus, but I had all the faith in the Netherworld that you would not let me—or any other force in existence—harm a hair on Helena’s head. Including, as you say, a bookmobile.”
“What about the damn McDonald’s?” bellowed Grim.
Cedric scoffed. “Please. If I’d wanted to be a genuine menace, I’d have managed a better ambush than that. That whole debacle. I’ll have you know, it hurt me more than it did you.”
“In what fucking way?” Grim demanded.