“And those people we encountered back there—” he gestures behind us, “what most of them felt was shock. They had trouble processing the fact that they were dead.”
I’m fascinated by this—to be able to hear about the thoughts of people who died. My mind wanders to my own family. Naturally, grief wells up, just like it always does. But it’s a strange sort of gift to hear about their personalities continuing on, even after death.
“So,” I say, “my brothers and sisters, my mom and my nieces and nephews …”
“They were confused for a moment because their deaths came without warning or pain. After that, there was peace.”
I force down the sudden rush of emotion.
“What is it like, taking souls?” I ask, turning the subject away from my family.
Death gets real quiet, and for several moments, all I hear is the clop of the horse’s hooves.
“I blink and ages have passed,” he finally says. “The man I took only a moment ago has decayed to dust. The roads of the town I just visited have altered their paths. Round and round the wheel of time turns, faster than even I can make sense of.”
“Does it still feel like that, even now?” I ask.
There’s another long pause.
“No,” he concedes. “Being human has made me experience time much differently.” After a moment, he adds, “I used to hate it. Each minute felt like an eternity, and the only thing to punctuate the monotony of my existence was the clop of my horse’s hooves. I thought I might go mad.
“But then,” he says, his hand finding the edge of my shirt. His fingers brush the skin beneath, “things changed once I found you. Now, I am absurdly grateful when the sun takes its time setting or rising. I’ve come to savor it like I do your skin, kismet. Every minute that drags on is one more spent with you, and I cannot imagine life ever returning to the way it once was.”
My throat closes up. No one has ever spoken to me this way—as though the world only turns because I am in it—and it makes me breathless. I can barely process that Death feels that way—and that I react to it. This would be so much easier if Thanatos wasn’t also responsible for all my grief.
I press my lips together, and though my thoughts are racing, I say nothing at all, and the two of us are left to ride in uncertain silence.
Chapter 59
Interstate 10, Southeastern California
September, Year 27 of the Horsemen
We do end up finding water shortly after we enter California. My heart pounds when I realize we’ve just about hit the western edge of the United States. I’m farther from home than I ever imagined I’d be, and I’m that much closer to seeing my son again.
We’re also that much closer to the end of the world, and there are many, many people living on this side of the country. I spent all my time resenting the large swathes of barren land we crossed that I never took a moment to revel in the fact that then, there was no one for Death to kill.
The same cannot be said of the West Coast.
“What would happen if you just let people live?” I say softly. It’s an old question, but one that bears repeating.
“I cannot,” Thanatos responds, and there is true remorse in his voice. “You have your instincts, I have mine.”
After a moment, he adds, “This is the same urge Famine fights even now.”
The thought gives me goosebumps. Ben is in his care. To think that this need to kill and destroy still lingers inside him …
My breath hitches.
“Is it just Famine who feels that way?” I ask, grasping at the hope that the other brothers will temper Famine’s … instincts.
“War and Pestilence are different,” Thanatos says. “Their drives have been cleaved away from them along with their immortality. But Famine … he is still immortal.”
“Why is he still immortal?” I ask. I’ve heard enough of the story to know that he wanted to give up his purpose and his immortality. And he’s proven that he wants to stop Death every bit as much as War and Pestilence do.
“My brother tried to set aside his task for his own personal reasons,” Thanatos says grimly. “It had nothing to do with humanity, which he still wants to burn.”
Does he though? I’ve witnessed enough of Famine’s anger and resentment to believe Death, but then, I saw the unguarded way he looked at my son, and I know there’s more to that thorny horseman. I think Death knows it too.
I frown. “But if Famine believed giving up his mortality for a single human was worth it all the same, shouldn’t that still count?” That says so much about the power of love. Is it being selfish then to choose that over destruction?
Death doesn’t respond, but I don’t think it’s because he’s reconsidering. We ride for the rest of the day in silence.
Chapter 60
Interstate 10, Southern California
September, Year 27 of the Horsemen
That night, I wake from sleep to one single thought. The most obvious, stupid realization, one I’ve been too blind to acknowledge.
It’s not going to end.
I can hear my soft breathing, and I can feel the warm press of the horseman at my back. He hasn’t yet realized I’m awake. All around us, I can just make out the bones of the dead that follow us around. Blessedly, Shane is not one of them. Despite Death and I’s earlier vows, the man’s body was left to rot in the desert.
Things with the horseman are not going to end. Not if I want him to give up his purpose. Because the thing is, if I convince Death to turn his back on all the killing, he’s not just walking away from his task, he’s choosing me over it.
My deal with the horseman doesn’t just end with that choice. I’ve been such a fool to believe otherwise. If this works as the other horsemen hope it will—as I hope it will—then I will be spending the rest of my life with Thanatos.
My breath catches at that. I should feel horror—or at least the crushing weight of reality. Instead, warmth spreads through me. I … hadn’t anticipated a lifetime of this.
If, of course, Death picks me over his task.
And that’s a big if.
Humanity is so close to annihilation, and it doesn’t seem to matter what I do—I can kill Death over and over again, I can make love to him. But so far, none of it has been enough. I am terrified that even once I have Ben in my arms again, beautiful, frightful humanity will still fall.
And there’s another equally frightful thought that I hadn’t considered until now. Bringing Death to the horsemen’s doorstep means exposing Thanatos to the other horsemen’s wives and children. And then there’s the fact that the horsemen are coming back for me and Death. That had been their time limit.
If they find us before I’ve convinced Death to give up his task …
We’re all screwed.
My panic rising, I begin to calculate the time Death and I might have until we could run into said horsemen. It only serves to frighten me. We’ve moved slow and lingered for days at our rest stops.
In that time, Death’s brothers have surely already dropped Ben off—perhaps they’ve long since dropped him off. I don’t know how much time we have left before they close in on us.
Why did I not consider this sooner?
It wouldn’t have mattered, a small voice in my head says. The time would’ve passed all the same.
I take several deep breaths to calm my racing heart. There’s still time to change Death’s mind. He just has to pick me over his task.
He has to pick me.
My breath hitches.
At my back, the horseman’s hand moves to my hair, stroking it back.
“I’ve got you, Lazarus. It’s just a dream. It will pass,” he says, unaware that I’m awake.
I have to bite my lip. Here he is, soothing me from a bad dream in the middle of the night. And it sounds like he’s done this before—murmured sweet things to me when I’ve been restless.
I’m glad he can’t see me, this man who lies awake at my side for hours just
to be close. This man who I’ve fought and killed many times and who has hurt me in return. This man who, despite it all, has chosen me over and over again.
There is no one like us.
Even now, when I think of him, I can feel that lightness within me. I’ve accepted riding with the horseman, and I’ve accepted sleeping with him. But I have never given myself permission to love him.
I’ve been so afraid of what it would mean to give him my heart if he still decided in the end to kill us all. But if I actually give in to the hope that the world won’t end, truly, I lose nothing.
So as I lay out there in the desert, our undead entourage spread out around us, I let that last wall around my heart fall.
Sex with Thanatos is a slow dance.
“Faster,” I whisper to him.
Death grins down at me, the muscles of his chest rippling as he moves. “I don’t think I will,” he says as he glides out of me. “I like this pace.” He thrusts back in, the action causing my lips to part and my back to arch. “And I especially like the way you look at me when I fuck you at this pace.”
He stretches the act out for an agonizingly long time, and just when I think he’s going to speed up, he stills.
“Tell me a joke,” he says softly.
“A joke?” I say breathlessly. “Right now?”
“I crave your laughter.”
That’s … not how this works.
I give him a crazy look. “People do not tell jokes when they’re”—making love—“having sex.”
“Oh good—I do so like breaking tradition,” Death says, thrusting into me once and wringing a moan out of me.
He continues to gaze down at me, and aw shit, he really is waiting for a joke.
“Um …” Trying to think over the enormous dick inside me.
An old joke my sister Juniper told me as a kid comes to mind.
I cannot believe I’m doing this.
“What should a sick bird do?”
Thanatos’s brows come together. “I don’t underst—”
“Get tweetment.”
He stares down at me, and there’s nothing in his expression. Not even the barest spark of understanding.
And I still have a giant, unmoving dick inside of me.
“You know,” I say, willing to help him understand, “because birds twee—”
“That can’t actually be a joke,” Death says disbelievingly.
“Humor is wasted on you,” I respond, shifting a little because his cock is still just hanging out inside me and we’re supposed to be having sex not debating the quality of a joke that I was asked on the spot to make.
“I don’t need to be worldly to know that was a terrible joke,” he insists.
I mean, if he’d asked me at another time, maybe I would’ve had better material.
I lift my arms up in a what-can-I-say gesture. “I’m not a comedian.”
“Yes, Lazarus, you’ve made that abundantly clear.”
I scoop up a handful of dirt and toss it at him, uncaring that much of it also rains down on me.
Thanatos lets out a booming laugh, and it transforms his normally somber face. I feel like I’m falling as I stare up at it.
He notices the shift in me because the laughter dies from his face. “What is it, kismet?”
I shake my head. “I love the way you laugh,” I say fervently.
Still falling …
All mirth has left the horseman’s features, but in its place is a searing intensity. Rather than responding, Death kisses me hard, his hips beginning to drive into me once more. Again and again he thrusts, his pace both quickening and deepening until I’m panting against him.
Between the two of us, Death may have started out the novice, but he’s definitely become the master.
That’s the last thought I have before an orgasm blindsides me. I dig my fingers into his back, clinging to him as wave after wave of pleasure washes through me.
With a groan, Death finds his own release, his hips slamming into me over and over.
Once we’re both spent, he gathers me in his arms.
“This is the most potent magic, kismet,” he says, searching my gaze. “When I am with you—when I am in you—I am alive.”
My nostrils flare, and I have to press my lips together to stop myself from saying something sweet and painfully truthful back to him.
Thanatos notices the action. “What is it, Lazarus?”
I shake my head. Last night I gave myself permission to love the horseman; that doesn’t mean I’m ready to voice those feelings to him, not when I’m only just accepting them.
So instead, I shift my attention to his chest. Reaching out, I trace his glowing markings.
“What does this line say?” I ask, my finger moving over a line of symbols that curves down his chest and abdomen.
Death watches me for a long moment, clearly reluctant to shift topics. The man must sense just how close he is to cracking me.
His attention flicks down to his chest. “Petav paka harav epradiva arawaav uvawa, tutipsiu epraip ratarfaraip uvawa. Uje vip sia revavip yayev uwa petawiev vivafawotu. Annu sia tuvittufawitiva orapov rewuvawa.”
I get chills as the words move through me, and I can feel the power folded in them.
“I am death,” he translates, “an end to all beginnings, a beginning to all ends. I am the one who can take the living and raise the dead. The one who can resurrect souls.”
My eyes drop to his stomach, my finger gliding down the line of text. There’s so much more written across his flesh.
“Are you ever going to tell me the rest of what your tattoos mean?” I ask softly.
There’s a long, weighty pause as Death’s gaze moves over my face.
“One day I will,” he promises.
“Why wait?” I ask. I don’t know how, even with all my pestering, there is still so much about this man that I don’t know.
He catches my hand, bringing it to his lips. “Now is not the time.”
“When will it be the time?” I ask, staring at his mouth.
“In truth, Laz, I am not sure,” he says, releasing my hand. “But I will know when it’s come upon us.”
Chapter 61
Interstate 10, Southern California
September, Year 27 of the Horsemen
It’s only after I’ve eaten breakfast and I’m preparing to get on Thanatos’s horse that the horseman’s earlier words echo in my head.
I am the one who can take the living and raise the dead. The one who can resurrect souls.
I pause mid-step.
The one who can resurrect souls.
I suck in a sharp breath.
My attention shifts to Death, who stands on the other side of his horse, packing up my water jug and a blanket into one of the saddle bags.
“You can resurrect people?” I ask, my voice hushed.
“Lazarus, you already know this,” he says. He doesn’t even pause in his work.
“No,” I say carefully, my skin pricking, “I know you can reanimate a person’s remains, but you said earlier that you can resurrect souls.”
That gets the horseman’s attention.
He pauses what he’s doing. After a moment, his gaze moves to me. His face is as cold and uncompromising as I’ve ever seen it.
“You can,” I breathe, reading the truth on his features.
I don’t know why, but the thought closes up my throat. Maybe it’s hope at Death’s abilities or maybe it’s resentment that he must’ve deliberately kept this from me until now. Had I not even caught the nuance, would he ever have admitted as much?
To be able to resurrect souls … That opens an entire realm of possibilities. Perhaps I don’t have to simply settle for Death giving up his task. Maybe he can also undo the damage he and his brothers have wrought.
All those people who have passed …
I could get my family back. All of them. My mother, my brothers, my sisters, their spouses and children. Even my biological parents,
who were taken from me when Pestilence first rode through, perhaps they too could return …
I stride up to him and I’m desperate, so desperate. And of course this is why Thanatos never spoke about it. I grab his hand, holding it to my chest.
“The day I first met you, you had just taken over a dozen family members from me,” I say breathlessly. I can only imagine how feverish my expression must be.
Death casts me a wary glance. “And you want me to bring them all back for you,” he says.
Yes.
He’s already shaking his head. “Lazarus, you do not know what you are asking.”
“You’ve showed me every other one of your powers,” I squeeze his hand, “show me this one.”
“It is a damnable, unholy power,” Death’s voice rises. He removes his hand from mine.
“And your others are not?” I challenge. I’ve seen him kill off cities, collapse buildings, grow plants, change the weather, and raise the dead.
“No.”
“You are wrong,” I tell him fervently. “This one, this power, is a miracle.”
A muscle in his jaw jumps. “You think you understand my powers better than I do?” Death says hotly. “You think I am so blinded by my purpose that I cannot see the truth for what it is?” His nostrils flare. “There is a reason life begins with birth and not resurrection. This is no miracle,” he vows.
I don’t believe him, I do think he’s blinded by his purpose.
“Please,” I say, even though it’s futile. The man who won’t spare a single city definitely won’t bring someone back from the dead.
I feel my hope splintering apart, but I won’t let this go. I won’t.
The horseman stares at me for a long moment.
“Fine,” he growls.
I open my mouth, ready to argue—
Fine?
… Does this mean he’s going to do it?
“Seriously?” It comes out as a hoarse whisper.
Death (The Four Horsemen Book 4) Page 34