“Has Morpheus returned from the Third Realm?”
“Not yet.” Vigor’s visage shivered out of the wall. “There’s an old bicycle in the garage if you need to run.”
“Death never runs away.” After laying a kiss on Lyra’s forehead, he straightened. “Is Carney with them?”
“Yes. He’s coming to you. He’s coming to you.”
The repetition informed Niko how stressed the ghoul was. “Stay with Lyra.” He picked up his cloak and gloves from the foot of the bed. He stared at Vigor. “Protect her with your undead life.”
“Do you think they’ll destroy the funeral home?”
“I think if they are whipped into a frenzy, which I’m sure they are thanks to Mayor Fergus, nothing is to be discounted.”
“Yes, Death. Will protect Lyra.” The ghoul was so nervous he was shifting in and out of focus.
You’ll protect her so I can—in essence—kill her in a few hours. How ironic?
Stretching out the stiff muscles of his neck, he flung his cloak around his shoulders and lifted the cowl. He ground his teeth together when he remembered holding Lyra during her teary storm. Her rampant thoughts told him she was in love with him but she hadn’t recognized the signs yet.
His heart thudded when he recalled the three words that had sprang to the tip of his tongue—I love you. Three words he’d never uttered in his entire immortal existence.
How or why wasn’t an issue anymore. He slapped his gloves against his calloused palms. No. His big problem was how could he get both of them off the hook upon which he’d set them.
He could refuse to take her soul, but that didn’t help with the problem that was his deadline. It also didn’t fix how her soul was reaching for him. It wanted out. It wanted to get away from the nightmares and the weariness it experienced from being so far from her expiration date.
There wasn’t a shade of gray involved this go ’round, not that there was usually a variance in his duty. He’d lift her soul and be quit of Strange Hollow. Preferably never to return. “Is Mayor Fergus leading the group?”
“Yes.” Vigor nodded.
“Good.” Leaving the room, he walked purposefully down the stairs and out the funeral parlor’s front door. He stopped on the front porch. The early summer flowers wilted the minute he walked past them. The pall of death had fallen over him but wasn’t at its full strength. If it was, the flowers would have dried up and blown away. Gazing at the eastern horizon, Niko willed the sun to not rise.
Time was now his great enemy.
He strode to the middle of the street. “You wanted to see me, Your Honor?” He slid on his right glove and then his left. The bones he was intimately familiar with raced out of thin air to form a perfect skeleton behind him. Several of the people in the mob raced for cover.
Jacinda marched the remainder of her troop toward him. Murmurs lit the night air as people wondered aloud what they had gotten themselves into. “Get out of my town.”
“I intend to once I’ve performed my duty.” Holding his hand out, Carney slid across the macadam to face him. “And, you are my target, Leslie Louis Carney. Your run from the ultimate end is over. Prepare yourself.”
“Lyra isn’t your client?” Jacinda sounded confused. “But I saw her death…” Niko couched his words carefully and kept his mind blank. “If she was my client we wouldn’t be having this discussion right now. She’d be dead, and I’d have left Strange Hollow two days ago.”
Angry grumbles wafted from the crowd.
“You’re an elitist.” Jacinda was struggling to regain control of the citizenry.
“Actually, I’m more than that.” Dipping his fingers into Carney’s chest, Niko pulled the filmy shadow of his soul out. “I am the end.”
“I don’t want to die.” Carney’s eyes widened with fear. “She said that once she put the spell on me… Please, I don’t want to die. If I die you’ll take Lyra next.”
“Not that you care a whit about Lyra,” Niko challenged.
“Don’t.” Carney’s gasped for air. A long, slow exhalation rattled from his chest.
Niko released his soul as Carney’s mortal remains crumbled to the ground. The sound of a bell tolling thrice and then thrice again rent the night in two. A portal leading to the many realms of Heaven opened, and Leslie Carney stepped into the glowing golden light. He picked up his three suitcases and began the long ascent to his final destination.
A communal “Oh” sounded.
“You’ve performed your duty, now leave.” Jacinda propped her fists on her bountiful hips. She had the unmitigated gall to tap her foot in agitation. “After you see Mr. Carney properly buried.”
“Bury him yourself.” Niko turned and nearly knocked Lyra to the ground. Steadying her with his hands on her upper arms, he stared at the woman he loved. Quelling the urge to jerk her into his arms and keep her there where she’d be safe from the big, bad world, he clenched his jaw instead. Nothing could save either of them from the sad fact it was over. Time’s up. “Would you like to take a little trip with me?” His voice sounded strained to his own ears.
She pointed a finger in the air, looked at the spot through which Mr. Carney entered the stairs leading to Heaven, and then back at him. “I … uh…” She took in the crowd.
Her sleep-mussed hair flowed around her shoulders, and Niko’s fingers itched to touch it.
“Sure. Where do you want to go?”
“To bed.” His bed in the Third Realm. There they would have plenty of room to stretch out. No. It’s over. An all too familiar knot of emotion gathered in his throat.
Do it. Release her.
Struggling to contain the emotional pain banging in his chest and clanging in his head, he leaned down. He brushed his lips across hers. The grip he had on her arms turned brutal. He was trying to hang on to her for all he was worth. “You will always be with me,” he mouthed. A single tear slid down his cheek to land on her face. “Always,” he repeated. Her soul eased from her chest. Rather than push her away, he let the filmy figure float toward High Heaven. “I love you.”
He caught her. Cradling her limp body against his chest, he threw his head back and howled like a wounded animal. “No!” In a scattering of bones, with the echo of his scream still bouncing off the buildings, he raced for the Third Realm. “No,” he whispered.
Appearing in his bedroom, he laid her on his bed. He knelt beside her. Removing his gloves, he returned to his mortal form. His hands moved to right her arms so she lay in repose. “Why?”
The feel of a palm landing on his shoulder brought him upright. “Why?” He fisted his hand at his side. The undeniable urge to strike the first solid object he could connect with reared up in him. He forced his hand to relax.
Morpheus stared at Lyra. “It was her time, Niko.”
Shaking his head, Niko tilted his gaze to the beautiful mural painted on the ceiling. It depicted a starlit sky with Death and his faithful mount traveling across the globe. In the background stood the gold pocket watch. A visual reminder, as if he needed one, of the woman he’d mated.
“You finished what was begun a long time ago.”
“Don’t give me that.” Out of his mind with sadness, Niko strode for the balcony. He nearly ripped the French doors from their hinges. Storming out, he stared at the black mist surrounding his castle. It was as if the sun had died.
“She was in pain.”
“Tell me something I don’t already know.”
“That’s your duty. To release those who are in pain from it.” He wanted to blame somebody, anybody, for letting him lose his head and fall in love with her. He couldn’t. It began and ended with him. Bowing, he leaned his weight on the cold marble-capped railing. “Inform Cain of the situation. I’ll journey to the Tomb tomorrow morning,” he gritted out between his clenched teeth.
“Niko…”
Slashing his hand through the air, Niko closed his eyes. The tone of a crystal bell in the distance informed him a new soul had entered Hig
h Heaven. No. In his gut he knew it was Lyra’s soul reaching its final destination. A place he couldn’t visit. His jaw began to ache from grinding his teeth together.
“Leave me.” His tone was like the crack of a whip. He turned to stare at his constant companion for most of his immortal life. “They didn’t give me a chance to mourn Eternity after she was ripped from the Ethereal Dynamic.” Predominantly because of all the souls on Earth who’d required his services then. Disease. War. General chaos had abounded two millennia ago. By the White God, I barely got a chance to say goodbye to her. “The least they can do for me is afford me the time to bury Lyra.” Morpheus nodded. “If you need me—”
“Thank you.” A fresh howl of grief built in Niko’s chest. Shaking his head, he tried to wrap his duty around himself, to enfold himself in the cold, callous attitude attributed to death. It was a lost cause.
The door clicked closed. Alone with only his thoughts to occupy him, Niko stared at Lyra’s body for hours, mentally preparing himself for what came next. He’d bury her in the Goddess’s Grotto, the place where her soul wanted to be released. Then, once he’d done right by her, he’d face his boss.
He’d probably land in Hell for a century or more for his indiscretions, but he didn’t care. Satan couldn’t hurt him more than he already was.
“You are too hard on yourself, Thanatose.”
The whispering voice of the youngest Norn stroked through his room. “Why do you visit me tonight, Wyrd?” For the love of the ancients, leave me alone.
“The Fates are old.” She appeared as a gray misty creature in the far corner of his room.
“As are all of us.” Niko narrowed his gaze on the woman who spun the threads of life. With her two partners they wove the immense World Tapestry harbored inside the body of Yggdrasil, the World Tree. The tapestry was a pathway of sorts for every man, woman and child who ever existed on Earth, but also the ancient gods in the heavens.
Threads were knotted in, woven into the design before being cut, thus ending a mortal life. His thread was a constant, continuously added to by the Norns, and would be until the next Twilight of the Gods.
He almost asked her to break his string from the tapestry.
“Very old.” She floated to the foot of the bed. “Even our life threads grow thin—as thin as a single strand of a child’s golden hair.” She opened her palm to reveal a gossamer filament. “Pitted like bones left out in the weather too long.” Niko understood that. He had felt it too. “I wish to diminish.”
“You can’t.”
Stunned, Niko strode to the bed. What the blazes? “Fate is a constant. The same as death, dreams and time. You can’t leave the Ethereal Dynamic. Mankind needs you.”
“I can—now.” She nodded. “You always live beneath the weight of a deadline. I have too for the last twenty years. I had to wait … wait … and wait.”
“For?” Niko frowned at the ancient. Though Wyrd had never appeared a day over fourteen, she was older than he was. An ancient amongst the ancients.
“For my replacement to grow up.” She smiled innocently at him. “To experience all the things I never could. To live,” she admitted in a shallow whisper.
“Lyra.” Her name left his lips on a gasp.
“Yes. Tested was she. So were you, Death.” She clasped her hands. “We had to be sure the knots we tied binding her life-thread to yours were strong. That you would understand not only the joy of being in her arms, but also the pain should you fail us.”
“You never told anyone?”
“None save the other Norns. Satan has ears to every wall and eyes around every corner except inside the World Tree. His reach is long.” Pulling a packet of letters out of thin air, she held them out to Niko. “These explain my intentions and the deadline. They will exonerate you from punishment since I alone bound you to Lyra. My sisters were not present when I wove the strings together.”
Niko held his breath as the string lifted from Wyrd’s other hand and traveled to hover over Lyra’s chest. A glow grew from the life-thread, illuminating Lyra’s face.
“You must protect her from his corruption.” He took the packet from her hand. “I will.”
“Love her forever. Please.”
The Norns designed her for me.
“Yes, we did. Tested, judged—found worthy of immortality.”
“I will love her until the world ends,” Niko vowed.
“Then my time is over.” The thread dipped to stroke Lyra’s tee-shirt-clad chest. “My sisters will arrive in the morning to begin her training. Use this night to your advantage, Death.”
“Thank you, Wyrd.” With all my heart, I thank you.
Wyrd’s smile brightened and she giggled. The thread slipped into Lyra’s chest and color returned to her face. “Take care of her.”
The Norn’s body turned to dust and floated out of the room. “Goodbye, Wyrd,” Niko muttered. Falling to his knees, he brushed his hand over Lyra’s hair. He kissed her cheek.
“Time to rise and shine, sweetheart.” Resting his palm over the place where her soul belonged, he felt the warmth radiating from her essence tingle up his arm.
“What … what … happened?” She blinked several times. “Niko?”
“I’ll explain everything later.” He settled his lips over hers. Kissing her gently, he gloried in her reaction. I’ll never lose you again. If I have to fight all the minions of Hell or Satan himself, you are mine.
She traced her fingers across his jaw when he lifted his head. “I love you too.” There was no heralding snap of his fingers as he removed their clothes. “Thank the White God.” He eased his body onto the bed next to hers. His gaze traced every curve of her body. “Are you all right?”
“I feel great.” She tangled her fingers in his hair and pulled his lips back to hers.
“Would you like to know what Heaven looks like?”
“I already do.”
“Do you?” Love glowed in her eyes along with the ethereal light of an ascended.
“You are my slice of heaven.” He kissed her deeply, lingering in the emotions flowing off her and through him.
She clutched his shoulders. “You are always with me.” He nodded. “And I’m always with you.”
“Yes.” He rolled over so she blanketed him. He stared at the mural. The mural had changed. To the side of where Morpheus and he stood was a depiction of the World Tree.
A long branch reached for him, nearly touching his hand. The other branches flowed to shelter him from the pressure of his duty. Still, in the background was Eternity’s symbol of the pocket watch.
Caressing Lyra’s back in a slow, soothing gesture, he breathed deeply and exhaled slowly. Time was his companion, a distant but trustworthy friend, but his destiny hugged him.
“By the White God and the ancients, I love you.” His penis stiffened. Raking his teeth down the side of her neck, she moaned.
She lowered herself onto his erection. “Oh.”
“This is where you belong. By my side…” He started a slow dance. His hands on her hips guided her up and down his shaft. “In my bed.” He sucked in a gasp when she clawed at his shoulders. “With me, always.”
Her hair shifted across her shoulders as she moved with him. “Niko.”
“I’m here.” He rolled her over. Propping his weight on his elbows, he watched her face. Her vagina hugged his cock. He’d had many a woman in his past, but none who met his passion like Lyra did.
“Yes.” She clutched his biceps when he began to thrust into her. “Oh, yes.”
“Say it,” he demanded.
“I love you.” Her head lolled from side to side. “Harder. Harder.” He gave in to her commands. Plunging deeper, he kissed her cheek, then her lips. His heart was ready to beat out of his chest. “Come for me.” She did on a shout.
He was right behind her.
“Don’t leave me. Hold me.”
“I have you.”
* * * *
“Promise me you w
on’t do anything to Jacinda.” Lyra pushed the argument they’d been having. In the six months since she’d died and been reborn her powers had grown.
She also worked hard with the other Norns on the World Tapestry. He’d held her when she thought she’d made a grave mistake, swearing the whole time that she hadn’t screwed up some mortal’s future. “Niko, please don’t get into a fight with her. Her motives are pure.”
“Lyra, that’s enough.” Steering them down Omega Avenue, Niko turned into the driveway of Spimoni’s Funeral Parlor and Crematorium. Morpheus was quiet for a change, appeased since Cain had allowed him to shift into his preferred form for a vehicle. The classic Rolls Royce rumbled up to the garage. “I won’t harm her.” If he’d had his druthers, he’d never have returned to Strange Hollow unless he was called to do so. Lyra didn’t have a choice. She needed closure and to say her goodbyes to those who had touched her soul before her ascension to goddess-hood.
He exited the car and walked to her side. Opening the door for her, she placed her fingers trustingly on his palm. Nodding to Morpheus once he shifted to his mortal form, he turned his head to stare at the six-story building situated on a narrow lot. Counting the windows, he chuckled.
“What?” she asked. Standing beside him, she leaned her head against his side.
“I thought Jacinda was superstitious?”
“She is—very.”
“Count the windows. Five on the door’s sidelight and six full-sized on the back.” Thirteen in all on this side of the house. He added the number of plants skirting the rear entrance. Again, thirteen. He laughed.
“Stop.” Lyra tried to stifle a giggle but failed miserably. “It’s not funny.”
“A crooked house, on a crooked lot,” he teased her as a black cat hissed before it scurried across the backyard.
“Niko!” Lyra squealed when he lifted her in his arms and spun her around. “Leave Jacinda alone.”
“Fine. I won’t say another word about her.” He slid her down his rigid frame. “I thought after we’re done here we’d take a short field trip.”
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