Chapter 16 Timothy
TIMOTHY
“I’m going to kill him,” Miranda said for the tenth time, pacing rather violently along the concrete flooring of Echo’s large underground warehouse.
Countless screens flickered across the far wall, cycling through anime, surveillance footage, and dossiers only Osiris understood, while Echo typed furiously at the desk beneath them.
It had only been a couple hours since Seth disappeared with Aaron, and the moment it happened I realized how horribly I’d failed.
My brethren still lingered in the room, watching me with cruel amusement or pitying gazes. I’d lost everything in their eyes. My power, my sway, my status.
I was no longer the one they’d answered to. I’d fallen right into Seth’s plan for public humiliation to strip me of my power.
I’d failed to keep the mantle of God of the Dead sacred.
I failed to keep Seth in check.
Worst of all, I failed to keep Aaron safe. He’d blipped out of existence along with Seth to only heaven knew where, but certainly out of my reach.
Rage and despair warred for dominance inside me, until my teeth cracked from clenching my jaw and my heart threatened to burst from my chest.
Everything had gotten out of hand. Which is why I’d resorted to coming to Echo, a fae so grouchy she was practically crusty with it.
Regardless of her dislike of the gods, the heavy-set Samoan woman hobbled on her cane over to her spot where she spent her days hacking to fulfill my request. If she could pull this off, I’d ply her with an endless supply of computer parts and floral muumuus.
Across from the tech-heavy part of the warehouse, a cozy living space was set up in the middle complete with a large area rug over the concrete floors, a floral couch set, and Victorian lamps that cut the cold computer lights with their warm glow.
Jamal and Xander sat with Echo’s husband, Ryuki. With Seth out there, I couldn’t leave them vulnerable. I wouldn’t put it past Seth to target them. Afterall, Miranda did possess the only blade that could hurt him.
While I could do absolutely nothing. I’d proven to be powerless and an utter disappointment.
I couldn’t take Aaron from Seth when I had the chance.
I couldn’t see what was coming even when my sole attention had been on Aaron, the centerpiece to his plans.
And even with the utmost power at my disposal, I had bound my hands up in rules that were meant to empower me.
I swallowed back the bitter feelings, acid burning my throat as I forced them down. Self-pity would only waste precious seconds while Seth had Aaron. I may have failed, but I had a plan.
“I don’t understand, don’t you wield all the souls of the dead? Doesn’t that make you the most powerful of all the gods?” Aioki asked as she spun around in a desk chair until I was dizzy watching her.
The teenage Asian girl was dressed in her usual school uniform.
Sharp-cut black bangs were offset by the playful pigtails that were bound by fluffy purple ties.
Despite being hundreds of years old, she did in fact still attend a local high school.
Though I couldn’t say if she went because she was bored or simply wanted to be social.
From the way Jamal stole glances at her, I’d say Miranda’s young son was rather smitten. If I wasn’t mistaken, they were in a lot of the same classes at Neon Valley High School.
I swallowed the bitter pill before speaking. “I do, but souls of the living are far more powerful than those of the dead. An ocean of dead souls cannot combat a couple thousand of the living.”
And Seth now wielded millions of living souls. I fought against the pulling drag of hopelessness that threatened to pull me under again. “It’s why we forbid gods to take worshippers anymore. I should have known. I should have figured out Seth’s plan, but I was distracted.”
Distracted by Aaron. By trying to resist him and what I felt. If I hadn’t hesitated, hadn’t held myself back, I would have claimed him and prevented Seth from using him so poorly, and from getting away with such treachery.
“Well, also,” Xander leaned back on the floral couch, a cup of green tea in hand, “No one has ever thought to use a blood-bonded Sekhor like a separate bank to hold all that power until they cashed it out from them like a damn ATM machine. It’s...it’s godsdamn diabolical is what it is.”
Xander uncrossed his legs to reach over and hold out his cup to Ryuki for a refill. Unlike Echo’s permanently sour disposition, her husband was always ready with a kind smile and pot of green tea to welcome any visitors.
“Seth should never have escaped the Blade of Bane,” Echo huffed from where she sat, her fingers not even pausing as they flew across the keyboard.
Miranda and Xander flinched almost imperceptibly while Aoiki turned away abruptly, but not before I caught the raw pain in her expression.
They were the reason Seth, along with a countless number of other monsters and gods had escaped Bob’s prison back onto our plane. It had been to save Xander, and they were still dealing with the consequences. Miranda’s full-time job was hunting down the beings that needed to be reimprisoned.
Seth just made the list.
But we couldn’t touch him now.
“So if Seth is all powerful, what exactly are we doing here?” Jamal asked, tactfully directing the conversation away from his mom and adopted dad.
“We need to get a message to Grim,” I answered, arms crossed so tightly over my chest that my knuckles blanched white against the charcoal of my suit. Each heartbeat sent a fresh wave of dread through me. I needed to know where Aaron was. Now.
“I thought they went into the Afterlife to work on some secret mission for Osiris?” Jamal said, petting the small white rabbit with black rings around its eyes.
Darth Vader had all but melted into a puddle on Jamal’s lap.
Lulu, a brown rabbit the size of a medium dog with ears longer than Darth Vader’s body, lay at Jamal's feet, splayed out on the floor with his legs sticking out behind him, only a few crumbs of Cool Ranch Doritos sprinkling the carpet around him.
Echo may be prickly, but the way to her hard heart was always through treats for her familiars. The fae rabbits had a very specific palette for bananas and junk food.
Assirak lay next to Lulu and they occasionally traded affectionate licks.
“I spoke with Hraf-Hraf,” I said, “the ferryman in the Afterlife, and Grim and Vivian have traversed so far into the Underworld that they may have entered an alternate universe at Osiris’s behest.”
Miranda’s brows raised at Echo. “Can you do that? Find people in another universe?”
Echo simply threw her a scowl with a gruff harrumph.
The things Echo could do as a fae being would probably blow Miranda’s mind. After learning about the centuries-old woman operating out of the basement of the unassuming industrial building, I’d long since done my research on the magical little family.
“My love could hack her way into the stars above or hell below,” Ryuki said in a thick Japanese accent with a heavy dose of pride and admiration.
Echo didn’t turn around, but her face softened with a small smile.
“But if you got Grim to come back, what is he going to do that you can’t?” Jamal asked.
A sickly lurch sloshed in my stomach. I combatted it by tightening my tie until it practically choked me. “The other gods respect him, fear him. He could rally more support. In greater numbers we just might be able to take on Seth, and cut him down with Bob, recapturing him.”
“Bob says he’d rather chew dirt,” Miranda chimed in, “but as long as we give him a nice cleaning and sharpening afterward, he’s game to take that scumbag down.”
“I’ll give him a cleaning,” Echo muttered.
Miranda’s face flitted through some emotions as she undoubtedly heard what Bob had to say about that. Based on her face, his words were very loud and or very impassioned.
“Uh, it might be better if we use Timothy’s blacksmith again,” Miranda posited.
“I’m not ham-handed,” Echo yelled, directly looking at the blade. “You are a sissy and could use some sharpening from someone who knows how.”
“Why don’t you do what Grim does?” Jamal asked the question again.
The room stilled, a heavy weight around my failures.
“I’m not strong enough,” I said. The words hung in the air, a bitter confession I never wanted to voice. Sharp pangs jabbed at my heart, each one reminding me of my failures, of the moments I should have acted but didn’t.
The memory of Aaron purging my blood replayed in my mind, a haunting reminder of rejection that cut deeper than any blade.
How could I admit to anyone that I felt powerless?
They all expected more from me—more strength, more control.
I was the God of the Dead, yet here I was, crumbling under the weight of my inadequacies.
“Well, how can you get strong enough?” Jamal asked, his face tense with concentration and thought. He was like me in how he calculated and problem-solved, unable to let go of a problem once he sunk his mind into it.
“Take souls of the living,” Aoiki said from where she absently spun for the eighty-sixth time. “Fight fire with fire.”
“I can’t break the rules,” I said, a little harsher than I meant to. Aoiki paused her incessant spinning, and I felt the eyes of everyone on me, even the rabbit familiars.
“Timothy,” Miranda said, compassion in her tone.
I broke them for Aaron, and it didn’t matter.
I was willing to take him, by force, from Seth, and it hadn’t made a bit of difference.
In fact, the pain of failure had almost been more than I could bear.
Not only because I had to face the wall of my own limitations, but because it smashed the small yet strong hope that Aaron and I could be, into a small bloody pulp.
“Why do you think Grim can do what you can’t?” Jamal asked. He was still in calculation mode, no judgment attached to his words, but they hit me like boulders.
“Jamal,” Miranda said in warning, shaking her head.
I’ve always enjoyed Jamal’s inquisitive mind, but his questions were pushing me to the brink.
I couldn’t help but pull at my hair in agitation. “Because he will do whatever is necessary to take Seth out.”
“Then do that,” Jamal suggested quietly.
Another blanket of quiet fell, except for the clacking of Echo’s keyboard.
I stared at Jamal, and he met my gaze unblinking. How could he make it sound so simple? How could the logic of it eschew all my arguments to stick to the rules?
My objective was to stay in control of the gods, to punish any who stepped out of line. To protect the souls of the living and the dead. To protect mortals from the machinations of gods.
I had all the power Grim had at his disposal, so him returning would not necessarily yield different results. I hadn’t counted on his power. I told myself I counted on his influence, but truly it was because I expected him to return and do whatever it took to win, to assert power.
And if I couldn’t do that myself, I was never worthy of the mantle of God of the Dead. I wasn’t worthy of Aaron. And he needed me.
As the new logic settled, clicking into place, overriding my old logistics, my spine straightened, shoulders squaring as a new energy flooded me.
Even as I processed, Aoiki stared at Jamal with something that resembled amazement, as if she was seeing him for the very first time. He blushed under her gaze, putting his attention back on Darth Vader.
“Echo,” I said, a new authority in my tone. “Keep looking for Grim, but I need eyes on Seth. I want to know his movements.”
A kaleidoscope of possibilities morphed in front of me, patterns arranging themselves into perfect order, illuminating the dark corners where I'd been hiding the truth from myself. My purpose crystallized with such clarity that blue hieroglyphic light briefly flickered across my fingertips.
I knew what I had to do.
The woman paused to grin at me, a terrifying visage if I ever saw one. “Thought you’d never ask.”
I was going to throw everything I could at Seth. The only question was, would it be enough to overpower tens of millions of souls of the living?