Chapter Forty-Three
Jackson
T homas says nothing, just stares at me coldly, a glint of something untethered in his eyes. The Death Wardens loom behind him, gripping a struggling Millie, Jeanette and Lucius roughly by the arms. Around us, the walls of the room keep crumbling as the Death realm continues to disintegrate.
“How could you … how could you do this?” Lucius mutters, his eyes wide with horror and betrayal. What have you done with Ginny, Thomas? Where is she?” Lucius tears himself out of the Death Warden's grip and hurls himself at Thomas. But he's not quick enough, and a powerful blow to his already injured head has him collapsing to the floor, his eyes closing as the force knocks him out.
“Get off him!” I yell, but Thomas just looks at me flatly, flexing his fist.
“We don't have much time, Jackson, so I'm going to keep this simple. Do what I ask, and everything will be just fine.”
Millie snorts, pulling against the arms that confine her.
“You can't kill us,” she snaps. “Jackson, whatever he wants, don't do it.”
Thomas turns and chuckles at her. His face is flushed, and sweat shimmers on his forehead. His round blue eyes are too wide and too bright.
“She's right. I can't kill her. But you know, there are some really interesting things you learn when you take over … actually … let's call it a mutiny; it sounds way cooler.” He laughs to himself as he paces the room. “When you stage a mutiny against something as ancient and powerful as Scythe, you learn a few things.”
Thomas's smile turns sour.
“So you're right, I can't kill her, but if you ignore my orders, I can make the next twenty years of her life so unbearable, it will echo through her life even after you've reset time. Maybe she won't remember, but she'll never sleep soundly again. Torture isn't really my thing, but these guys …” He points manically to the Death Wardens. “They actually have training on it? How messed up is that?”
I look at Millie. Her lips part before her face settles into a stony mask.
“Ignore him. Use the Chronica. Bring back Death. Nothing else matters.” Her voice trembles but iron in her eyes.
Pressed against my arm, still in my rolled-up sleeve, I can feel its power, like electricity quivering against my skin.
Thomas laughs, turning to Millie.
“That's a big if, I mean, assuming Jackson could live with knowing that he'd let you be tortured. This plan has been in place for a very long time, just bringing Death back … Do you think that'll be the end of it? You think there aren't contingencies? Plan B's?” The amusement drops from his face, replaced with something cold. “Time. Time and anger make for a very efficient and lethal combination, Jackson.”
“It was you, whispering to the board, all you, this whole time,” Jeanette mutters, her face lined with exhaustion.
Thomas looks up at her, his mouth grim.
“Oh, I did so many more things than that.” He turns back to me, smiling wickedly. “You think it was a coincidence that she walked into our club that night? I used the sands of Hypnos to put the idea in her little friend's head. And who do you think captured Death? I was there every step of the way, leading you right where I needed you to be.”
“Why are you doing this? You hated Jackson being the successor that much?”
“What?” I snap, staring at Jeanette. “I'm not the successor.”
Her mouth drops, her eyes narrowing in confusion.
And Thomas chuckles as he glances between us both.
“Of course, he's not, but it doesn't matter because this has nothing to do with power. This is because a wrong was committed, and I'm here to make it right.”
“Thomas …” I start, but he turns. There's malice in his eyes that I don't understand, but I can feel it radiate towards me like a heatwave.
“We don't have time for this, Jackson. You're going to give me the Chronica. I know you've been searching for it, and I know you have it. You're going to give it to me right now.” There's a tremble in his voice, the bravado slipping away.
“You're not calling the shots here, are you?” Millie mutters, her lips quirking.
He storms towards her, and I pull desperately against the hands that hold me when he stops abruptly and laughs. She glares at him, which makes him laugh harder. He turns, that queasy smile still tearing his features apart.
“Your girl is smart, you know that? I always liked her. She's too good for you. It's a shame it all had to happen like this.”
“Who's in charge, Thomas?” I mutter.
The smile drops, and I see something in his eyes. Something like fear.
“Someone who wants things to stay this way, someone who wants Death to stay gone.” He walks over to me and grips my chin roughly. “You do what I say, and it will fix everything, put things right, bring back Death and save your girl. There's a … civilian casualty, you could say, but isn't that always the way?”
He chuckles again, but the amusement has vanished.
“Casualty? What are you talking about?” The Death Warden holds me tighter as I struggle. I grunt as fire shoots along my shoulders.
Thomas's face shifts, his expression slipping into sorrow.
“You know, everyone talks about the unfairness of death. How wronged they feel when the person they love most is taken from them. Now we know, all of us who work here, that it's just the way it is. There's a plan, and Death follows it. It's fair because it's random. Except sometimes it's not. It wasn't for her …”
“What are you talking about?” I feel something twist and turn cold inside me.
“What I'm talking about is how, over a hundred years ago, there was a woman who was fated to die. She wasn't anything extraordinary, wasn't born to change the world or anything, but she was special to someone. She was special to Death.”
I jerk. My whole body shakes. I don't want to hear this, I can't. I can hear the echoes of my feet, the sound of me running away from an office long ago. When Death started a story with an ending I didn't stay to hear, with a truth I could never face.
“Thomas, don't …”
He laughs bitterly.
“You don't like this story, Jackson? I'm pretty sure you think you know it, but there's a twist. You see, this woman got sick, and it should have killed her, but Death was in love with her. More than that, he knew something. He knew what would happen if she lived. Death would become a daddy.”
I launch at Thomas, but the Death Wardens hold me back. My arms feel like they're being ripped out of my back, blazing like they're on fire, but I don't care. Thomas rushes forward, punching me hard in the gut, and I buckle. The Death Wardens let go, and I collapse in a heap on the ground. Everything in my body aches, but all I know is the roar in my ears.
“Death couldn't do it,” Thomas continues, yelling now. “He just couldn't let her and the baby go, so he did exactly what you did, Jackson. He found an alternative. He took another soul in her place. But it wasn't as simple as what you were offered. There were no monsters, no evil villains lying lifeless in a bed, just another innocent person no more deserving of dying than she was, but he took that soul, anyway.”
Thomas takes a step back. Grief seeps into the lines of his face, his eyes bleak. His jaw is clenched hard, but he's quivering slightly, desperately trying not to shatter as the past and all its pain continue to grip him.
“Who are you, Jackson? Who are you really?” he whispers.
I don't speak, I can't.
“You're the reason he reaped my wife instead of your mother. My children were never born, so you could be.” Thomas’s tears burn in his eyes. His voice is a bitter boom filling the room. “You know why it had to be you, don't you? Deep down. Why you can control the ravens? Why you can enter his office like any other Ethereal? The only reaper, the only person in existence who could kill the Grim Reaper, was his child.”
I turn away, not wanting to meet his or anyone else's eyes. I feel the ground beneath my feet falter. Everything in me seems to collapse as my hammering heart roars in my ears. Memories slam through the storm, the ones I'd been pushing down since I unlocked that door—of Death in his office, his words cracking. The fear in his eyes, eyes the same shade of grey as mine—something I'd never noticed before that moment. Lies shattered as the truth tumbled from his lips. Me, running out, slamming the door behind me, avoiding hearing him utter the real reason he'd brought me there. The reason he'd trained me himself. The reason behind everything. I wasn't the successor or his favourite … I was his son.
I know what I am, who I am. I always had, even if I'd never heard Death call me son. But knowing and accepting … well, those were two different things. Thomas chuckles and grabs my chin again, pulling me to face him.
“Death stole my life, and he offered me this … this half-life out of guilt, out of obligation … I guess I'll never know, but what he took from me, you're going to give back. You're going to help me undo what he did. And I'm sorry, but yeah, that means you'll never exist.”
I'm kneeling on the ground, staring at Jeanette and Millie. It’s rough beneath my palms. I feel glass cut into my skin, my palms growing wet with blood. Millie is shaking, horror etched across her face.
“And if I tell you where the pin is?” My voice is barely a whisper and grit rough. “It will put everything right, and she'll be safe?”
“No!” Millie screams, grappling with the Death Wardens, who are still holding her back, even as she claws at their arms, their faces.
Thomas nods. “I promise. You do this, and everyone is safe.”
I look at her. At the fear on her face. Fear not for herself but for me. She would be safe. I wasn't sure how much I trusted Thomas, but I knew the world was falling apart around us, and if this could put things right, I had to take the chance.
I was born over a hundred years ago, died twenty-one years later and now, because of Millie, I finally felt like I was living. And I was about to lose it all.
I love you, I mouth to her, seeing glistening tracks down her cheeks.
“You have the device?”
“Yes.” I take the small scythe pin out of my pocket and hold it in front of him. He nods.
“That's it?”
“I think so. There's only one way to find out. Give it to me.”
He walks over, and I pull the pin out of my sleeve. He looks down at it like a precious jewel. All of Death's old devices, like the ring, work the same way. You focus hard on a location—in this case, a time, I'm guessing—and zap—you're there. No complications or fancy words.
“I'm sorry,” I say. “I'm sorry he did that to you.”
Thomas looks at me, his face tight and pained, but says nothing, just snatches the scythe pin from my palm.
I look once more at Millie. My Millie. Memorising her features, the golden sparks in the forest green of her eyes, the dark ripples of her hair, her full lips. All the things that make up the face of the person I love.
“Jackson …”
My name tumbles out of her like a prayer. Jeanette is trying to reach her, trying to comfort her. Next to them on the floor, Lucius is dragging himself up, rubbing his head as blood drips down his bewildered face.
Thomas takes a few steps back, breathing hard, eyes never leaving the pin.
“I'm sorry it had to be this way …” Thomas mutters, something like remorse in his eyes. And then he smiles, closes his hand around the pin and focuses on the life he lost, the one he’s about to get back.
I close my eyes. Waiting. Waiting till I cease to exist. Nothing. Still nothing. When I open my eyes, Thomas is still in the room.
“What's going on?” Thomas says. “If this is some trick …”
“No trick.” I shake my head. “That's the Chronica. It has to be.”
“This was supposed to work, this was supposed to …”
He tries again, clenching his jaw hard as he focuses, but nothing …Thomas goes nowhere. And neither do I.
“Make it work, make it work now!” He grabs me roughly by the collar, forcing the pin into my hand and the Death Wardens move forward, their weapons all pointed at me. Jeanette yells and Millie gasps.
Even through the din, I hear her soft footsteps as she walks into the room, her child-like chuckle out of place amongst the violence. My heart leaps into my throat. The Death Wardens split like the ocean, and she walks toward me. An amused smile plays on her lips.
Atropos tilts her head at us.
“Tut-tut little reaper, you didn't really think that would work, did you?”