I find his face.
He doesn’t look at me.
Moonlight catches on his cutting cheekbones as he watches the wind disturb loose dirt on the ground.
Without looking at me, he says, “This soil was once our sacred chamber, Hella. Here, we loved—and brought a curse upon us both.”
My heart twists inside of me, more cracked than the stone one left to sit abandoned in the centre of the circle-patch.
“I have wanted for so long to be free of our curse,” he goes on. “To be a free being.”
Now, he looks at me, his eyes pure vacuums of onyx.
“I admit there were times I resented you.” He sounds so far away, so distant, that if I close my eyes, I wonder if he might slip away to other worlds. “There were moments in which I blamed you.”
“And I, you.”
It’s the first I have spoken since the soles of my feet touched the hard earth of his ritual circle.
“Our deed,” he tells me, turning his gaze down at the Siren, “was so blasphemous that it ripped a hole through the worlds. It created a fifth gateway.”
“Not to criticise,” I say lazily, “but I believe it was the strike of my punishment that formed the gate.”
Their lightning bolts will do that…
Typical Death, always thinking the entire existence of every life and soul encircles him, that he is the centre, and all else is secondary.
He says nothing to that. A wink of gold passes over his ghostly hand, and draws in my attention.
“Knife of Llawfrodedd.” My voice is breathless with wonder. A blade so ancient that it can destroy millions of lives at once, with a single strike.
Death’s feet flatten against the hard earth as he slinks around the stone heart. He brings the knife down, hard, and drops to one knee.
The heart, pierced in the centre, cracks and a violent throb pulses through it. Blood spills.
The ground shivers once before the crumbling begins. And crumble it does.
I stagger against the violent rattle beneath me, watching as earth falls to a gaping hole that glows crimson. The core of the earth—fire and rock. Lava.
“I’ve always wanted to see lava,” I admit distantly.
Death reaches out for my cheek and brushes his knuckles over my skin, as gently as he once did when I was a human.
Nostalgia grips me. But I am scorned, and that consumes me.
“Thanatos,” I whisper.
His fingers still against my cheek, ice running through him at the sound of his true name on my lips. A name I have not spoken for centuries.
“I loved you so.” My eyes lift to his, and I resist the urge to lean into his cold hand cupping my face. “But I did not come to continue our journey together. I came to say goodbye.”
His fingers drop to the side of my neck, growing icier by the second. But he keeps his sharp face clean of panic. He brews a plan together quickly behind the otherworldly veil of his eyes.
“So be it,” he says.
He does not fight for me. He does not pretend to want me in any life with him again.
The blade in my heart that he left there long ago gives a sharp twist, and I almost buckle to the ache. But I must wield it—as power, as strength.
“Where is Scythe?” I ask only to convince him of my gullibility.
I believe you, Death. You have fooled me.
It is all too easy to convince him. Not unlike human men, the trick with Death is to tickle his ego.
“There.” He gestures a pale hand to somewhere behind him.
I lean to the side, searching for the black steed I’ve known for so long. And I find him. Severed. Butchered—heart cut out of him. An elaborate murder purely to be a guide for me.
My eyes snap shut and I cringe away.
I cannot look. Not for another moment.
Shadow will be devastated.
A memory flashes in my mind, of Scythe and Shadow so untrusting of Death and I. Our first mission—a day of birth for the steeds, and myself in a way. Death was the only one of us unaffected by the rebirth. His memories stayed intact from the moment he left his grave as a Horserider.
“Do you remember the day of our first mission?” I ask distantly. Even now, the ghosts of hurt haunt my voice. “Famine dumped me by the river, and left me to figure out my curse alone. I didn’t even know who I was.”
Death watches me, eyes guarded like the gates to the underworld.
“You rode straight to my side.” A faint smile slips onto my face, but it is poisoned. A lie. “I did not recognise you, I did not know you or Shadow, or Scythe.” I cut my gaze to the butchered steed, all black and crimson bulk. “You promised me that day, you wouldn’t leave me. I trusted you. Not knowing who you were, I trusted you.”
The smile is gone now, and hurt twists my face into something ugly from time long ago.
“You could not even manage to keep your promise for a full night. In the morning, I woke to the first time you abandoned me. And shame on me, because I forgave you when I found my memories again. I should have known you would only betray me again and again—until it came down to this moment, right here, right now, when you choose your own ideas of freedom over me.”
Still, he watches me, assessing me.
How much do I know, he wonders.
The mask I wear against him is one of ancient agony I have suffered at his abandonments of me. I let it out, free the pain I kept caged for so long.
And it’s liberating.
“I haven’t come to berate you,” I add, and take a step forward. “But before you turn your back on me for the last time, I want you to know why I will not go with you.”
He tilts his head, curious lines furling between his black eyebrows. “My sweet disease,” he says, so lovingly, “I already know why.”
For a moment, my blood runs cold. Has he caught on to me? Does he know that I know?
If he does, I’m doomed. Already this fight is unfair, misbalanced in his favour. The advantage of surprise is all I have.
“I hurt you.”
His words strike me silent and my face slackens. “What?”
“I hurt you.” Sorrow wears down his voice into a breeze of memories, echoes of broken hearts and pasts. “Too often. You will not come with me for many reasons—heartache is one. And trust. In me, you have none. Not anymore.”
It’s all I can do to simply nod and turn my sad eyes down at the flattened dirt between us.
“Are you sorry?” I ask him.
Death ignores my question. And I know it is because he is not sorry—he does not regret it, any of it. Maybe he is more of a monster than I am.
“Eternal love is a sweet thought,” I whisper, almost to myself. “But a thought too terrifying for you.”
Death watches me, as quiet as the choked wind frozen all around us. As quiet as the world is now without the humans.
Then his voice drops to a low, seductive sound that once made my legs weak, and he offers his hand in place of the apology I crave; “One final kiss will serve as a goodbye to stay with me through my next life.”
I let him.
His fingers curl around the side of my neck and take a gentle grip; he pulls me in. My feet drag lazily over the dirt, betraying me, betraying my thoughts—this is not what I want.
But I feel his bitter, cold mouth on mine and let my eyes flutter shut. Death kisses me softly. One hand keeping me in place. One hand unaccounted for.
I know he reaches for a weapon.
Tears sting my eyes.
I can do this. I can do this.
I must do this.
“Thanatos,” I murmur against his lips. “I am sorry.”
His teeth graze my bottom lip, and as I open my eyes, I see that his bleak eyes bore into me like chasms greedy to swallow me whole. “I forgive you.”
My mouth quirks and I draw back a little. “Forgive me for what?” I challenge him in a silky voice so unlike me. It’s enough to bring a frown to his ghostly face. “I don�
�t apologise for our end. I don’t apologise for our curse, or our journey. I apologise for only one thing.”
Death lets his fingers slip from my neck as he studies me in a quiet storm of thoughts.
“For this,” I say—and I leap back from him.
Death whips out the dagger he kept hidden behind his back and cuts it through the air at me. But the wink of silver is too slow, barely grazing my neck.
I land on my knees beside the dead Siren, whose blood pours into the earth, fertilising it against the decay Famine left in every grain.
I plunge my hands into the soil. Disease spears through the cracks like black water down forked streams.
It catches his ankles, fast.
Disease, black and inky like him, snaps through his pale skin in spears, and I think of broken marble.
Death cries out and falls to his knees. The dagger clatters to the soil. Death clutches at his chest where the disease tangles within him.
Then I hear him before I see him—my Shadow, bounding through the trees, a whizz of grey fury headed straight for Death.
“Shadow!” I cry out, panic gripping my scream.
But my fear is useless, for my steed is magnificent.
Shadow reels back just as he reaches the crippled Death, spins around, and kicks out his back legs. His solid, razor-sharp hooves cut into Death’s chest, and send him whirling back through the air.
He lands in front of me, writhing in agony.
I only have a moment. My gaze lands on the dagger. Once I move for it, take my hands out of the soil, Death will need only seconds to collect his strength. Maybe less, since he’s consumed so many souls along the way.
But Shadow, my dearest, my sweetest, reads my mind. With his teeth, he snatches up the dagger that Death dropped and throws it my way.
My hands rip out of the soil. I lunge forward, above ground, hands caked in mud and reach for the blade.
I grab it, cutting along my palm. I feel no bite of pain.
I land on Death’s body—he catches his breath, catches his strength. And I take the only moment I have left.
I plunge the blade into his chest and, with a hard slash and gritted teeth, I rip it down to his torso.
Death’s cries fall on scorned ears.
“You should never have tried to kill me.” My voice is as low as it is vicious.
Unforgiving, I hack at his insides until I have his loose heart in my fist—I rip it out of him, blood spraying up at me from the writhing body I straddle.
“Never break the heart of a killer,” I spit at him.
And he hears me.
Bleak, tear-stained eyes find mine. Scarlett blood smears his mouth, and he smiles.
“Remember that,” he groans. “For I cannot truly die—and when I am reborn, I will come for you, my sweet disease. My Hella—”
“The name is Pestilence.”
I jump off of him and, with a hard kick to his side, I boot him into the crumbled earth. Death’s body falls into the glowing red light of the earth’s core, but his heart still bleeds in my fist.
Shadow slinks closer to me.
As I turn to look at him, he passes me by and heads for the Siren.
“Do you still despise her?” he asks softly, gaze on the butchered Siren.
Tilting my head, I turn my thoughtful eyes to the heart of stone. The heart that bleeds for Death.
“No,” I admit. “She is not unlike me, or Scythe. Those who loved him, only to be destroyed by him.” I lift my stare to Shadow, standing over the Siren. “I pity her.”
“I do, too.”
Shadow uses his nose to gently nudge the slimy corpse over the edge. And quickly, she falls too. She will meet Death’s heartless body at the bottom.
But I give her an advantage. I return her heart.
With my foot, I tap the stone heart and watch it roll over the edge to join its owner. A soul and body to be reunited, perhaps. But down there, she will simply … be.
Trapped for all eternity.
A fate I save for Thanatos.
Shadow and I stay in the circle, long after the gate has closed. At my steed’s request, we bury Scythe’s remains.
There is no hope for him. Not when his heart, life, and soul was never really his own. The same reason I would never use the ritual for myself—because then Shadow would cease to exist. As Scythe does now.
Come morning, we have left the old vineyard where I once longed for a different life. A saying comes to mind, and it brings a smile to my face.
Be careful what you wish for, for it will be granted in middle life.
If only we were to have a middle life—it would mean a life after this one.
Shadow and I ride across the now-silent earth for days. We hear only the animals re-taking this world, and we carry Death’s heart to his resting place, his place of slumber, to bury it.
I never once thought it would end like this.
Once, I gave Death my heart, my life, my everything.
Now, I take Death’s heart, his life, his everything.
And all I am left with is a steed to love for eternity, and a victorious smile set on my mouth.
I will not be careful what I wish for.
For I am Pestilence, and I can face whatever is thrown at me. Even an eternal slumber.
365 B.C.; AUSTRALIAN COAST.
Death found his Hella where Famine deposited her—the coast of a misshapen land, not far from her grave.
Now, as a Horserider, Death’s Hella was no more. She was Pestilence, born in the grave far beneath the sea, awoken to her first ever mission.
Pity lightened Death’s onyx eyes as he watched her tread carefully into a river, disorientation clinging to her furrowed, pale brow and her grimly set mouth.
Knee-deep in the murky river, Pestilence jutted and staggered around, watchful gaze on the water’s ripples.
“Fear not the animals,” said Death gently, standing on the riverbank, a shadowy figure looming in the daylight. Unbelonging. “They fear you now.”
For the first time since the sun reached the peak of the sky, Pestilence looked at him. Confusion shone in her grey eyes, shimmering like pools of melted metal.
It was as though she didn’t know who he was.
Only pieces of her memories endured. Fragments of broken glass, slowly fitting back together to make a cracked remain that would never be the same again.
“Rest your hands on the water.” Death’s command was gentle. A nudge in the right direction, the beginning of her unofficial training.
Famine the Conqueror had abandoned Pestilence in the marsh by the river. Left her to suffer her first plague alone, dazed and confused, not knowing why she was cursed to agony and sickness.
Warily, the sickly Horserider flattened her shaking hands on the ripples. Her gaze swerved around, searching for any signs of a water beast to rear up and swallow her whole. She didn’t remember these beasts, but her instinct remained.
“Look within yourself,” Death said. “Find the core of who and what you are—let it flood your veins.”
Frowning at the water, Pestilence cocked her head to the side and wiggled her fingers. Nothing happened.
She turned to look at the shadowy, pale being on the riverbank. He offered a reassuring smile, so small and slight that it shouldn’t have even caught her notice, but it did.
At the mere sight of it, she felt a bud of relief swell in her gut.
Closing her eyes, she tried again—really tried.
She prodded against what felt like a door. Amusement seeped through the cracks under it.
Her eyes flew open.
“That is our bond,” Death said, smile still playing on his lips.
The amusement, she realised, was his.
“I can feel you?” Uncertainty clutched her tone.
A slight nod was his answer. Then, he cut his gaze to the water and made a pointed face—try again.
She did. Again and again and again, until darkness began to claw at the light o
f the sky. It was when the moon crept out from behind thick clouds that Pestilence found the other door—only, it wasn’t closed like the ‘bond’. It was open, wide open, and the moment she touched it within her body, something grey and thick, like smog, poured out from it.
This time, her eyes flew open in awe.
Pestilence looked in wonder as black spears of smoke fell out from the pores of her palm and spilled into the water, and webbed over the surface in black lines.
A moment after Death’s praise pressed against the bond, schools of fish and a scaly monstrous beast lifted to the surface of the river. Dead.
Pestilence frowned. “Did I do that?”
Death stepped into the river, water swishing around him like a new cloak.
“It is difficult to control at first,” he comforted her, and made to touch her cheek.
She jerked back and glared at him as though he were a stranger. Death let his hand fall.
“It will be easier with time,” he went on. “And you will wield disease like it is little more than a whip in your hand.”
Warily, she still watched his hand, as if it would lift to touch her again. But Death kept his hands by his side, and merely watched her.
“Hella,” he said gently. A frown furled on her face and she looked up at him. “Soon, you will remember me—all of me. Perhaps not in this mission, but you will regain your memories of me some day.”
“What memories do I have of you?” Her suspicious gaze remained hard as stone. “Wha—who am I?”
“You are Hella. Pestilence.” His finger twitched, aching to touch her. “Once, you were a human. Now, we are both Horseriders and we may live out our missions together.”
“Together,” she echoed, then blinked her eyes for a long moment, as though trying to grasp the meaning of the word.
“We will rest in different parts of this world,” he told her. “Our duties might tear us apart at times, and you will forever have a sleeping companion in your steed, but always—I will seek you out, because I love you, Hella.”
She swerved her gaze over his shoulder to the riverbank, where two steeds rested under the cover of a lofty tree. A grey steed and a black one. She could only tell them apart by their coats.
The grey one was hers—he was dragged out of the underwater grave with her, and taken here to this river, by Famine.
Feared Fables Box Set: Dark and Twisted Fairy Tale Retellings, (Feared Fables Box Sets Book 1) Page 46