Belladonna

BY THE TIME SIGNA AND ELIJAH RETURNED TO THE STABLES, DAWN had crept into the sky.

She was relieved that Elijah hadn’t pressed her about the garden. That he’d not yet asked about Percy or how she’d known Lillian was truly gone. She was glad for the moment of peace his silence gave her. The opportunity to sink into her bed just before the sun awoke.

She felt Death before she saw him, that familiar cold slipping into her bones. That icy chill she’d come to anticipate drawing her eyes open and her attention into focus.

He was not his shadow self but the stable boy she knew, a hound at his side. Gundry took one look at Signa, jumped into her bed, and circled a few times before curling up at her feet.

“I understand if you don’t want to speak with me,” Death said—or was she meant to call him Sylas now? “But I promise that I’ll answer your questions with nothing but honesty, if you’re ready to ask.”

Of course she was ready to ask. There were a million questions spinning in her head. “How long have you been at Thorn Grove?” was her first. “How long have you managed this charade?”

He kept his head dipped low. “I was never truly at Thorn Grove,” he admitted, grimacing when Signa rubbed her temples. “As far as anyone else here knows, Sylas Thorly never existed. To anyone but you, I was invisible.” He took a seat on the edge of the bed next to Gundry but stood swiftly when she gave him a pointed kick. She had no intention of letting him relax for even a moment.

She took her time responding, letting him stew as she thought through all that had happened in the past weeks. When Elijah had sent for her at Aunt Magda’s, she’d certainly thought it odd that he’d have her travel with a young man who was not a blood relation. At the train station, too, he’d walked ahead without communicating with anyone, and he had let her catch up. But everything at Thorn Grove was strange, and she merely thought Sylas rude. “The sweets on the train,” she said aloud, remembering how he’d devoured them. Tasting them for the first time most likely. “Elijah doesn’t seem like the type who would have gifted me those.”

Sylas let his shadows form a chair beneath him. He lounged upon it, so comfortable that Signa glared until he righted himself. “I couldn’t help myself. I was so angry when I picked you up that day, Signa. You looked half starved.”

She had been, but that didn’t mean she had to be grateful for all his lies. He’d led her to the garden after that… Where he’d gotten lost just so that he could appear as Death and help her get inside. He’d been the one to help her at Grey’s, too, and with getting into the library. With each step—whether he was in this form or made of shadows—he had been there to help. But…“Were you truly helping me?” she whispered. “Or did you know the truth all along?”

Beneath the glow of the moon, his eyes were no longer dark and smoky but the shade of starlight, like his hair. There was still a darkness within them, though, like swirling galaxies had made their home within those eyes. Signa understood then that this was his true self—the face he never revealed to anyone. He was more beautiful than she’d ever seen him. “If at any point I knew the truth, I would have told you.” It was a firm, earnest answer. “I never wanted you to lose Blythe. I never wanted you to lose anyone else. When Lillian died, she didn’t know who killed her, and so I did not know, either. That was up to you to figure out. And you did a brilliant job, Signa. You saved a life.”

“Yes, but I had to take another one to do it.” Even as Signa said the words aloud, she couldn’t get them to bite the way that she wanted them to. She’d meant to repair the Hawthornes, and yet she’d taken another child from Elijah. Even so, the guilt wouldn’t come. Percy’s death, as far as she was concerned, was just. And in exchange, Blythe would get to live a long, healthy life.

It was a life taken for a life gained, and without a body… Perhaps the Hawthornes need not ever know what had happened to Percy.

“I want to know why you did it,” Signa said suddenly. “Why use this form at all if not to fool me?”

Death looked like a sculpture, the dim light casting deep hollows into the contours of his cheeks as he flexed his jaw. “I know you’re no fool, Little Bird. I had no intention of mocking you, nor did I realize what I was getting myself into or the ruse I was creating until it was too late. For that, I apologize. But as for my reason, I admit that it was merely out of a selfish desire to discover who you were. It’s as I’ve told you already—I’ve spent the entirety of my existence waiting for you. Waiting for someone I can talk to. Someone I can feel. When I realized that was you… I needed to know who you were.

“Then you asked for my help,” he continued, “and I wanted to be there for you. But I knew that I could not help you in the form you were familiar with because you were afraid of me. You said once that you hated me, and so I remained as Sylas. Not just to get you to Thorn Grove but to spend time with you and help you, without the stigma. Without the fear. Had I approached you in my shadows, you never would have trusted my help.”

He was right, and although she was angry about the lie, part of her was relieved, too. Relieved that he’d stayed with her, no matter the form, because Blythe was still alive. And in the end, that was all that mattered.

He stood and took hold of her hand. “I won’t pretend to understand what you’re going through, as I was not born as you were, and have never been human. But I will be here with you every step of the way, assuming…”

“Assuming what?”

The stars were a canvas behind him, glowing as brightly as those silver eyes of his. Even the moon seemed to pull her closer to him as he asked, “Assuming you’ll have me?”

Death had told her once that people’s fates were predetermined, and she wondered if perhaps she was finally looking hers in the face. For so long she had resisted it. For so long she’d fought against this part of her—and oh, how exhausted she was. She was tired of the pretending. Tired of making herself someone she was not while running away from all that made her feel good and whole. Tired of questions and puzzles and guessing.

She just… wanted to be.

She knew who she was now, and she would no longer hide. She was a reaper, she was Death, and that darkness was her home. He was her home.

And so she curled her fingers around his. “Neither of us will ever be alone again.”