Chapter 24 The Present
The void.
There’s no escaping it, is there? Every once in a while, it just has to pull me back in. Like a black hole designed specifically for me.
I’m starting to hate this place.
Even more when I feel him here.
“Skye,” Death says.
I wish I could curl up and disappear. Too many things churn inside me. None of them are appropriate for a conversation with him. Especially when he’s here to scold me.
And I know he is.
“Yes,” he says, voice smooth and booming. “For once, your instinct is correct.”
I swallow. Or… imagine I do. The habit makes my phantom throat ache.
“Hi,” I say slowly. “So, uh—”
The void tightens around me.
“Do not test me with pleasantries,” he says.
“I wasn’t—” I start.
“You attempted to reap with a fractured soul,” he says, the word fractured ringing through the dark like a struck bell. “You tried to sever a life that has not reached its terminus. You reached for a thread that was not yours to cut.”
A spike of cold runs through me. “Mark’s time—”
“Has not come.” No hesitation, no mercy. “You abused the powers I entrusted to you.”
I go still.
He’s right. I did.
But Mark and I aren’t black and white. I’m his victim. If I waited for him to die naturally, I could judge him in the afterlife. But I wanted justice now. And I chose to kill him.
I press my back against nothing; the instinct to brace is so strong my phantom muscles tremble.
“You told me to fix what I broke,” I say. “You told me to end the wraiths. You said if I didn’t, my mistakes would consume me.”
“And I did not tell you to meddle in the living,” he replies.
This is bullshit.
“I was trying to stop a chain reaction. He’s the root of all this. If I’d cut him free—”
“You would still be in pain,” Death says, calm and unyielding. “You already know this.”
“Yes, but—”
“Acting on it only deepens the fracture in your soul.”
“I don’t understand,” I say. “Pain wanted me to kill Mark, too. He even helped me capture him. And I can’t just keep listening to Mark breathe and pretend that’s balance. I’ve done everything you asked of me—everything—and now you tell me to let Mark live? That’s too much.”
“Do you seek release?” he asks.
Release? I don’t think we understand the term the same way, Death and I.
“I just… want it to stop. I want to stop hearing that shovel in my head.”
“You will. In due time,” he says. “But obedience comes first.”
Something inside me rises like a tide. “No. You don’t get to ask for obedience. You don’t care about me. You just erase, and end, and call it balance. I don’t want to do this anymore.”
A pause.
He tastes the shape of my defiance like a sommelier savoring wine.
“You misunderstand both your station, and my patience.”
“Do I?” My laugh scrapes the dark. “Because from where I stand, you summoned me here to lecture me while you leave twelve ticking bombs under my feet. You say ‘end the wraiths’ and then threaten me and my men. I don’t even have a choice.”
“The wraiths are consequences of a prison the living built,” he says. “They must be undone.”
“But why me? Why won’t you handle it yourself? Why not send someone else?”
“Because fate chose you.”
That stops me. “Fate?” I echo.
“There are powers older and stranger than you—or me—at work,” he says. “I am not the only one pulling the strings. And it seems you are the spark meant to ignite something new.”
Something new. I don’t understand. I don’t think I could, even if I tried.
“Listen carefully, Skye,” he continues. “I will help you now, because help is what you need. From this moment until the split in your soul is mended, you will not use your Reaper power. Not to reap. Not to cut. Not to stitch, call, or command. You will not draw, pull, or touch the seam between body and soul.”
If I could blink, I would.
Is he… Is he talking about taking my powers away? As in, fully?
“You can’t—”
“I can,” he says. “And I have. Consider it a stay of execution before you sever your own fingers.”
My mind snaps to the wraiths.
“No, wait—you can’t leave me defenseless. I’ll be helpless. Powerless.”
“Haven’t you realized yet?” he says quietly. “You are never powerless. Not even now. You split yourself. I am merely entrusting your power to your other half.”
To Pain.
My jaw locks. “You told me that Pain—”
“Is you,” Death finishes. “Which means I do not take your power away from you. You will still have access to it, as long as you become whole. Don’t reject him. Face him. Accept what you cast away.”
I… what can I do? There’s no point arguing. Not with him.
I hate it, but compliance is the only choice.
“Fine,” I say, brittle. “What about Mark?”
“What about him?”
“You said his time isn’t up,” I say. “So what happens when it is? You’ll stop me from reaping him then, too?”
“You are forbidden from reaping Mark’s soul,” Death replies. “Whether his hour comes now or in a hundred heartbeats, someone else will take it. Not you.”
The words burn through me like wax and fire. “You’re assigning him a different Reaper?”
“Yes.”
“What about my men?”
“They cannot kill him either,” Death says. “They may try—but it will be impossible.”
Something in me cracks.
This hurts.
Worse than the wraiths. Worse than anything. Because it means my anger and grief are invisible. To Mark, and even to Death.
It means I don’t matter.
“Do not mistake the denial of a kill for the denial of your worth,” he says. “You are not a blade because you cut. You are a blade because you know what it means to be cut.”
My chest tightens.
Is that supposed to comfort me?
I don’t have time to ask or argue. The void begins to fold, just as it always does when he’s finished. The darkness collapses inward, rushing to a single point like an iris closing, a pupil contracting, the end of a tunnel narrowing into a door.
For a flicker of a moment, I hang in the seam where I once tried to keep Mark, caught in that thin place between decision and consequence. Then the nothing exhales, and it spits me back toward breath.
I return to the living world.