“I loved you then,” he said.
Death called her attention back to him. He stepped closer through the water, sending shadowy ripples away from them, and offered his hand.
Pestilence eyed it for a moment before she hesitantly placed her hand on his.
“And I love you still,” he added, clasping his fingers around the frail, sickly bones of hers. “My sweet disease.”
Dragging her legs, Pestilence staggered closer to him. Memories, cracked and fragmented, scattered throughout the shuddering foundations of her mind, but her soul knew him. Something within her yearned for his touch, and told her to seek comfort in him.
And so, she did.
Pestilence let him hold her in the river until the moon swallowed up much of the sky. But then the coughs began, so violent that browned sick poured out from between her chapped lips.
Death carried her to the bank, where the steeds stayed, watchful of those they were loyal to but did not know.
Death cradled Pestilence on the mud as she shivered, as if freezing in the air, but had skin so hot that beads of sweat rolled down her body.
And when her whimpers began, strangled and confused, he whispered into her ear with a ghostly lovingness; “Sweet disease. I am here.”
“For-for…ever?” she asked, breathily.
There was silence. A moment so long that she stirred in his arms, fear spiking through her that he might have left. But he didn’t.
“Eternally ours.” Death kissed her temple. “Eternally us.”
Pestilence fell into a dark place within her mind not long after. She would call it the abyss later in her existence. But the dark place held her captive until the night sky fell to a bright, burning sun.
Death and his steed were gone.
She awoke, feverish, bones bound in aches, alone on the mud. Her grey steed hid from the sunlight behind a cluster of trees. His breaths came out hot, ragged—pained, like her own.
Pestilence craned her neck to get a better look at him. He met her watery stare with bloodshot eyes of his own.
“Who are you?” she wheezed, wind threatening to carry her voice away. But the steed heard her clearly.
I am nameless. I am your servant.
Servant…
That word stirred something deep in her gut, something that tasted too much like the burning vomit still on her tongue.
Brows knitting together, Pestilence drew in a choppy breath. “Where is … he?”
Gone.
Her eyelashes lowered on the tears of pain already brewed. But more swelled in her eyes as she realised, with a cutting hollow feeling in her stomach, that Death had left her.
He’d promised not to. He’d promised to nurse her through the pestilence.
But he’d left her on the riverbank like Famine had.
A guttural groan rumbled over the mud.
Forever? She had asked him.
The silence should have warned her of his panic. The silence should have told her all she needed to know.
But instead, she believed the lie.
Eternally ours. Eternally us.
She cut her gaze to the steed who writhed in agony. Hers, she realised the longer she studied him. Brown stains on his dry lips, crust gathering at his hooded eyes…
“You feel my disease,” she croaked.
His silence was answer enough.
“At least we—are … in this … together,” she choked out.
Pestilence stretched out her hand, but he was too far up the mud-slope, hidden in the trees, for her to reach. And he made no effort to meet her touch.
The steed, wearing narrowed slits for eyes, turned his head away. Pestilence was left to stare at the strip of hair running down his neck.
They suffered their first pestilence together—and entirely alone.
Chapter 29
Complete silence cocoons us.
We are alone, Shadow and I. No bond left to be peeled open.
We’ve been severed now that this world is quiet and the mission is complete, for each of us has been unleashed upon the earth.
It’s over. No more humans for us to cull.
Nature has her world back and it’s something beautiful to be a part of.
Shadow and I have said our goodbyes. Now, we trudge over the seabed to our slumber place. I know our sleep will be eternal. The clues are in the silence of the bond, the song-less Siren that doesn’t call to us, and that I do not regrow my wings. They are gone.
Forever. I am wingless. Disease-free.
I am just a body and Shadow is just a steed.
I make peace with that.
Maybe after all this time, I really did fall out of love with Death. If I loved him, the ritual would have worked on me. The second I tore out his heart, I would have been free, if only I’d tossed it down into the pit.
Instead, the gate closed over after I disposed of the bodies. I made my choice.
I can’t claim to regret the ritual’s failure. Its success would have torn me away from Shadow.
I suppose that’s what is different now. In the vineyard, I cursed at Them. What more can be done to me? I laughed in the face of a higher power and bedded their beloved creature. I loved Death—but never more than myself or Shadow.
As we reach our wet grave, I look at my steed.
He buries his face in my neck. An embrace. A farewell.
We hold each other for so long that I’m sure above, the sky grows dark with impatience. But it’s difficult to tell under such depths of the sea.
We dig. We dig our graves, knowing we will never wake again. We take solace in each other. At least this way, when we bury ourselves and feel the heavy wet blanket of earth press down on us, and we close our eyes for the last time, we know that it will forever be this.
Pestilence and Shadow.
The crushing earth has us.
We sleep, but I do not know for how long before we stir in our graves—
And a hand punches through the dirt.
Chapter 30
Beside me, Shadow is restless, writhing against the soil and rock. Lethargy clings to our bodies, waking somewhere between life and death.
We are not supposed to be awake.
Fists are punching through the dirt that encases us, disturbing our eternal slumber. All I can do is watch. Watch as the mud-caked fingers unfurl and claw at the crumbling grave, until there’s little left, and water pours down on us.
In the crushing fall of salty seawater, I catch glimpses of pale skin, smooth and hard like sanded pearls, and a set of almond-shaped eyes that swarm black and crimson.
Hands snatch at me and drag me out of the hole.
Shadow is next, as I’m discarded on the seabed.
I force myself to my feet. Sleep weighs me down more than my armour dress. I was awoken too suddenly, pulled from my grave before I could take control of my meat-suit.
Still, I manage to face the one who disturbed me. He drags Shadow onto the hard soil and rock at my bare feet, onyx hair circling him like a black halo.
War has come for me.
Only, as he straightens and turns his devious look to me, I see that he’s not War anymore. No steed follows him, no leather armour is pasted over his body, and he wears no sword on his person. The bond still belongs to silence, and the once-Horserider has shed his armour for blackness—
The cloaky gear of a Fallen One.
Fabric cut from the most corrupt souls.
There he is, staring back at me with a smirk born of evil and a toe-curling ferocity in his eyes. But he hasn’t come to end me.
War takes us away.
I never gave much thought to how I would spend my true afterlife.
I always imagined that I would be left to sleep forever. Never had I considered that I would be taken beyond this world, that I would be guided through realms to the place I most belong. The Dark Place.
Humans have names for this place—many names, in fact. But this is not my hell, it is my sanctuary. And it is
here that I live with those most like me.
The Dark Place is home…
epilogue
I watch the river of tortured souls swim by me.
In the shimmer, my reflection smiles back at me—and I wear my assignment proudly. Grey skin no more, I wear skin and hair whiter than bone and eyes blacker than ink.
I am death.
Not as a Horserider, not as Thanatos, or a slave of Them. I am just … death.
A dark-skinned figure moves into my reflection and steals my glory with his wrapped cloak, stark-white eyes, and oversized scythe.
“I don’t know why you need that,” I tell my Reaper.
He smiles at me. “It is a way to honour her.”
I glide my fingers over the razor-sharp blade; “You have always been sentimental, Shadow.”
His smile softens and he gives me a wise look.
Behind him, War watches the souls in the river, souls of more than just human, a tangled cluster of beings from worlds spanning farther than my imagination.
And yet, now I know them.
After awaking from that grave—I just knew everything.
The Famine I knew was once Demeter, an ancient soul as old as Thanatos himself. War is no different. He is a being worthy of fear, the weigher of souls and hearts—a keeper of the underworld. As his true self, while I know all of War’s names, he will always be War to me.
“Go,” he says, his crimson and black eyes like marbles from hell. “Bring me souls.”
I shoot him a withering look. “Haven’t I brought you enough?”
He looks at me, a smile playing on his lips. “As a human, you brought me some souls. As Pestilence, you brought me a world’s measure of souls. Let us see what you bring me now.”
I smirk at him, idly toying with his all-too warm feelings for me. “Trouble.”
There is a menacing fire in the darkest reaches of his eyes. “This, I do not doubt.”
My mouth stays quirked to match my wicked gaze. “What are we collecting for your river today?”
War glides towards me, a movement so dangerous and fluid that for a moment, I forget he was briefly a brutal savage Horserider. His fingers run down the edge of my neck, his gaze tracing every inch of my face.
“Humans hide in other planes where they do not belong,” he tells me. “Retrieve them, bring them to the river.”
Delight sucks through me in a sharp breath. My thirst to destroy humans has never truly quenched.
“Where?” I ask in a breathy whisper.
He gestures to a gate I have never been through.
It’s crafted from vines and, beyond, there’s a tunnel that stretches for worlds, lit by jars of fireflies and glow-worms.
“Fae,” I whisper.
A creature whose cruelty can match my own. A beloved creature of both Them and the Fallen, as the fae exist between us.
I fix my gaze back on War as his fingers wander to the sleeve of my black, inky dress. “Many dance on the edge of death there,” he tells me. “You know what must be done.”
I will do what Thanatos could never do as a slave of Them, or as a Horserider bound by our ways and system.
I will intervene. Take life with a touch of my hand, or a brush of my lips on theirs. I’m not the collector. I am the dealer.
Kill, destroy, and take.
“What of the ones trapped in marriage?” I ask, curious.
Stories of the fae and their deadly bargains are no secret. In fact, we quite adore them for their craftiness.
“Those humans belong to nature,” he tells me. “Those are debts we cannot interfere with. Take only the ones free of deals.”
A smile touches my face as I bring my gaze back to him.
I catch the lingering look he lands down at my body. The same body, now snowy. The same dress, now black.
I pretend his look doesn’t interest me, but it does.
What can I say? I always get myself in trouble.
But now that I am death, what can be done to me?
I am Pestilence no more. I am a slave no more.
Now, I am a Fallen One, and I wander worlds with my companion, Reaper. Then I return to my home near the river, where War is always waiting for me.
Forever there. Forever a god of the underworld.
And I am Hella.
I am a god of death.
end.
Keep reading for a COMPLIMENTARY
HEARTS teaser.
AND
GODS AND MONSTERS TEASER
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HEARTS TEASER
In a time that I felt nothing, Night made me feel something.
When he drew back, I let myself look into his eyes. Hunger burned back at me in those flickering purple hues.
I could have asked him again why he was here. But scraping through the inner workings of my mind didn’t seem worth it in the face of him—a face so striking that the flutter of my stomach reached up to my chest.
In all the horror and destruction around me, I only saw him. I stood with him, his fingertips dancing down to the waist of my skirt, and I felt every nerve in my body strike back against the numbness.
I didn’t care how, but he made me feel, and that was something I had a desperate urge to cling to.
Setting my skin alight, Night pushed up the hem of my blouse, fingertips grazing my pebbled skin.
My breath caught as he yanked me against him, a sudden ferocity in his dark eyes. All hesitation was snuffed out of me with that one, starved look, and my entire resolve came crashing down around me.
My hand found a fistful of his hair. I slammed my lips against his. A shudder set me alight as he tore down the front of my blouse with a single tug.
The agony in my heart threatened to drown me, drag me down into the abyss. I found air in him. And I consumed it.
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GODS AND MONSTERS TEASER
BOOK ONE, PRINCE POISON
Please note that this excerpt is unpolished and may be subject to change prior to publication and those dreaded edits. Some errors may lurk in this excerpt—please ignore them and enjoy!
۵
“So you are the one who stole my aniel’s power.”
Beneath the frost of his tone were waves of tedious curiosity and ancient licks of otherworldly accents. It was as though he could see me in the flames that still danced blue and red.
I opened my mouth, an answer choking in my throat, my tongue unmoving.
But the Prince cut me off. “It is not a question. You took from my creation. Power that does not belong to you. When you take from mine, you take from me.”
If it was possible, I curled in on myself even more. And the Prince finally turned to look at me.
My stomach flipped at the sight of him.
Nothing like I expected.
Prince Poison smiled—all sharp teeth and lips stained by my blood, like he was ready to take a bite out of me, or anyone for that matter.
Silver threads of hair hung over his forehead, absolutely nothing like my own. My hair looked ashen and cloudy compared to his, which wore a natural, unearthly shine, as if every strand was powered by pure magic. Even his skin glowed as if personally kissed by the sun.
From the front, his scarlet military coat gleamed brighter with its silver fallen-star threads and crystallised buttons undone. The black silky shirt he wore under his coat was completely unbuttoned, dishevelled as though he’d spent a year in fights and all-too-private embraces before cursing me with his presence.
Imposing, he stood tall even with his lazy posture. I fought against my wandering gaze. Too hard it tried to drop to his bare, muscular chest that seemed to glisten under the glow of the lanterns and fireplace.
But what stole my breath were his eyes. Moons. Two shining moons, paler than the threads woven through his scarlet coat, gleamed at me without a
shred of kindness. They captured me with a glittering intrigue more dangerous than anything I could have ever imagined.
The Prince smirked, and my bones ached with the chill of dread. It looked wrong. Alien. As though it was painted on a perfect sculpture made from broken dreams and bleeding hearts.
He was both beauty and deadly sin.
My graze dropped to the floor, and I lowered my head in as much of a bow as I could manage all bent on the settee.
Really, I should have thrown myself at his sharp-toed boots, but I got the feeling he wouldn’t like it if I moved from where I was dumped. He had me where he wanted me.
My shoulders rattled in sync with my quivering lips.
“You cower like a human,” he drawled. The icy burn of his eyes coated my shivering back. “You look just as a human does,” he added, “yet, you don’t taste like one.”
The rich carpet threads held my gaze, but a frown buttoned between my eyebrows.
Taste—he must have meant my blood. A taste he liked so little, he threw it into the wall-sized fireplace.
I should have been relieved some—at least he wouldn’t drain me dry for my flavour. But my brown turned hard and, honestly, I was a stab insulted.
Guess it’s true when they say we all seek the approval of our Gods.
Even lost in a fog of fear, tasting early death and suffering, who doesn’t want their God to like them?
Prince Poison took a step toward me. The soft sound of his silver boot on the plush rug sent a chill up my spine.
“You are not a God,” he said. “Not an aniel. Yet, you stole power. My power.”
He drew nearer, silver boots winking like blades ready to cut me down, crushing the rug I clung my gaze to.
My hands bunched fistfuls of my harem pants that punched the air with sea salt and blood. One wrong word—hell, one wrong sound or breath or look—and my head would roll across the rug, severed. A God’s unwilling sacrifice.
Feared Fables Box Set: Dark and Twisted Fairy Tale Retellings, (Feared Fables Box Sets Book 1) Page 47