Chapter 34

“So, what did it say?” I asked, sitting cross-legged on my bed, PC in my lap. The little dog’s head swiveled back and forth, following Death’s pacing.

“I’ve been given a choice.”

“Choices are good?” Unless they were choices between two bad options.

He stopped midstride and turned toward me. “Alex—” He paused, his expression going distant. This time I was sure the colors in his eyes swirled, just a little. “I have a…job.” He frowned. “Would you like to come?”

I assumed by “job” he meant a soul needed collecting. “A death scene? You offer to take me to the sweetest places.”

He shrugged.

“Wait.” I threw out a hand in a stopping motion before he could disappear. “I didn’t say no.”

Setting PC on the bed, I slid to my feet and accepted Death’s hand. After all, how often did I get to learn more about the collectors? Besides, I was already oath bound, so I might as well learn as much as I could. The cold sea of darkness washed over me and in the next moment we were somewhere else.

The scent of antiseptic and bleach hit my senses as a loudspeaker crackled and paged a doctor. Everywhere I looked there were beds divided by flimsy curtains. Monitors beeped, breathing machines whooshed, and nurses checked patients’ vitals, noting results on small clipboards kept at the foot of the beds. The room reminded me of one I’d spent far too much time in as a child.

“An ICU ward?” I asked, clinging tighter to Death’s arm.

“I can take you back,” he offered. He knew how I felt about hospitals.

I shook my head as a nurse hurried past us without so much as a glance. “They can’t see us?”

“No, but don’t let go of me.”

Right. Why a race who couldn’t be seen by most humans needed extra magic to be unseen was interesting, but more than once I’d suspected he was around. I just couldn’t see him. This pretty much confirmed it.

I scanned the occupied beds. “Which one?”

Death pointed to the still figure of an older woman. Her skin was pale and waxy and a breathing tube disappeared into her mouth, but her brown eyes were open, aware of her surroundings. They were the only part of her that moved.

I swallowed. I probably should have stayed behind.

“When will it happen?”

“If she dies, it will be within the next two minutes.”

I looked at him. “If?”

“See that doctor?” He pointed across the room to a man in blue scrubs and a white coat. “He’s trying to quit smoking, but right now he is seriously considering a cigarette. If he gives in, he won’t be here when she codes, and she will die.”

“And if he’s here he’ll save her?”

Death nodded.

“Then shouldn’t we—”

His hand jerked back, pulling me closer to him.

I frowned. “But you said she could live if he stays.”

Death’s nod was slow, his hooded eyes watching my response.

The doctor glanced at the elevator, and I could only imagine his thoughts. His need for just one cigarette.

“What if he makes the wrong choice?”

“It is his to make. That’s why I’m here.”

“And you don’t know which way it will go?” I asked. Death shook his head. I frowned. So he could see possibilities of the future? I hadn’t known that. Clearly it was different from a premonition witch’s visions. Those were always the final outcome, no matter what anyone did to try to change the future.

I turned to stare at the doctor, willing his resolve to stay strong, for him to fight whatever craving ate at him. “Aren’t you tempted to tell him. Or to stall him? It could save that woman’s life.”

Death’s arms slid around my shoulders, drawing me against his chest. “I think we’re both aware I’ve been more than tempted in the past.”

For me. He’d saved my life more than once.

“Well, I for one think you made the right choice.”

“I wish that were a more popular opinion.” His embrace tightened, until I was engulfed by his heat, his scent. It helped block out the room of people barely clinging to life and the sounds counting down their heartbeats, waiting for the last. “From the moment I pushed you out of the path of that bullet several months ago, I changed the pattern of time.”

“That sounds awfully drastic. You said you see possible outcomes. How could you change what isn’t settled? You made a choice, just like he”—I nodded to the doctor, who pressed the button for the elevator—“is making a choice.”

“Mortals have choices. Collectors are forbidden to interfere.”

I didn’t know what to say to that, so I said nothing. I watched the floor numbers light up above the elevator as it approached, overly aware of the woman who was about to die. I looked at her, at the lines snaking off her that were supposed to save her, or at least preserve her, and I shuddered. For a moment I was in another hospital room, listening to a different set of machines as I huddled in a too large chair beside my mother’s bed.

“You okay?” Death asked, pulling me out of the memory.

I nodded, but my eyes burned. The door to the elevator slid open. Don’t go. Two nurses stepped out, chatting animatedly about something. The doctor in his scrubs and coat stared at the open door. Then he watched it slide closed again and turned away.

I sighed and Death gave me a gentle squeeze.

“We can go now,” he whispered.

I took one last glance at the woman, whose machines were making erratic noises, nurses and the doctor rushing toward her. But I knew she’d live.

This time.

We popped into existence in my apartment, startling my poor dog once again.

“So this teleporting thing,” I said, shivering from the lingering chill of Death’s magic. “You’ve never taken me with you before. Is this something you can do because we switched essences, or…?”

He pointedly didn’t look at me.

“Seriously? So, for example, when I’d been kidnapped by the skimmers, and you and the two other collectors were with me, you could have teleported me out at any point.”

“We’re not supposed to interfere.”

Right. “Tell me you saw that I wasn’t going to die.”

He frowned. “I can only see the possibility threads of those souls assigned to me at their birth.”

“You’re not my collector?”

He shrugged. “I adopted you.”

“Cute. Why haven’t I ever seen another collector come for me?”

“You don’t have one. You must have been born in Faerie.”

I froze. The strange little brownie I’d met when my father had stashed me at his secret house had mentioned taking care of me when I was a child. And my great-granduncle on my mother’s side, who happened to be the king of the shadow court, had welcomed me home when I’d encountered him a month ago. But I had no memories of Faerie as a child. Not one.

“You’ve known I was fae from the beginning, haven’t you?”

“I’ve known you were special from the moment you hit me with that medical chart, but in many ways you are and always have been a mystery.”

“Is that a good thing, or a bad thing?”

“Recently, it’s been terrifying.” He stepped closer to me, moving his hands to my hips, as if he needed the reassurance that I was there, whole. “I can only tell you’re in danger if the possibilities affect one of my souls.”

He’d never told me any of this. After a lifetime of his secrets it was strange for him to share. Almost unbalancing. And I was off balance enough.

I stepped away from his hands, wrapping my arms around myself. “It’s probably time for us to—”

“Have you lost your senses?” an angry voice that hadn’t been in the room a moment before said.

I whirled around as the gray man stormed across my small apartment. Death turned as well, frowning at the other collector.

“It is my choice to make.”

“And you’re a fool for considering it.” The gray man’s cane swung wildly, punctuating his agitation.

In contrast, Death was still, to all appearances calm, his posture relaxed. But it was like a calm before a storm, and the hooded eyes that watched the gray man held a warning.

A warning the gray man ignored as he turned to me. “Do you understand the danger you’re allowing him to put himself in?”

“Leave her out of this,” Death said at the same time I asked, “What is he talking about?”

Death didn’t answer me, but the gray man did. “A mortal body isn’t made for what we do. The risk you’re allowing him to take is immense.” He pressed the silver skull on his cane against my shoulder. “If you care about him, you’ll return his essence.”

The blood drained from my face. I’d already intended to do that. I turned to Death but he held up a hand before I could say anything.

“Alex, we’ll talk about this later,” he said, before turning toward the gray man. “This doesn’t concern you.”

They stared at each other. The gray man displaying his agitation through jerky movements, Death still, like a tightly coiled trap.

“Does she really mean so much, my friend?”

Death didn’t answer, he moved. Fast. One moment he stood with his thumbs hooked in the loops of his jeans, the next he was in front of the gray man. He grabbed the other collector by the shoulders and both vanished.

I stared at the spot where they had been. Gone. Like so many times before. Only this time I could feel the distance as my essence left with Death. It was an odd sensation. I sat down on my bed, picking up PC absently and cradling the small dog as I continued to stare at the last spot Death had been.

“He has to come back, right?” I asked PC, whose only answer was a tail wag, happy for the attention. I rubbed his head.

Death would come back. He had to. I still had his essence.