Seizing Year Four (Grim Reaper Academy 4)

“In two hundred years.”

“In two hundred years,” he confirmed.

I couldn’t have it. I wouldn’t have it. I felt everyone’s eyes on me, and I hated it. GC, Paz, Francis, and Sariel were silently begging me to look at them, but I couldn’t. For now, I couldn’t follow them. They’d have to wait for me. Would they? Maybe if I had the guts to meet their eyes, I’d have my answer, but I was too afraid. So, I turned on my heels and started toward the door. The former Grim Reapers had teleported away, and I was the only one who was delaying the ceremony. The two shrouded figures were waiting for me to leave, so they could reveal their faces and grant the new Grim Reapers strength, power, and immunity to death.

I’ll find him.

He found me first.

He materialized right on the threshold. Valentine Morningstar, in his frightening glory. For a fraction of a second, hope made my chest swell. Then I saw the others. They were materializing one by one, teleporting from God knew where. Twenty-one Grim Reapers in dark cloaks torn at the edges. They all had their heads covered, but one could tell they were rugged and dirty, as if they’d just returned from a warzone.

“My daughter.” He spread his arms wide, and his skeleton-like body glowed stronger.

“You’re here.”

“Not for you.”

He pushed me aside, and since my body was already falling apart, I didn’t fight him. The strange Grim Reapers followed him. One of them removed his hood, and I gasped. His blue eyes met mine. He looked exactly like… No.

He was Sariel. Not my Sariel, but an older, crueler version of Sariel. My Fallen One had never killed anyone, although, on his bad days, he’d tried to get rid of me a couple of times. This Sariel… he’d killed plenty. One could count the dead bodies he’d left behind by counting the wrinkles around his eyes and lips.

The others removed their hoods, too, and I recognized Lorna, Pandora, Klaus, and Caspian instead of Merrit. GC’s curly blond hair was dirty and disheveled. Pazuzu’s red eyes were shooting out literal flames. He didn’t even look my way. When Francis grinned, a set of sharp, long teeth came into view. Not like a vampire’s, though. Those were the fangs of a person who ate…

I shook my head, closed my eyes, and hoped that when I’d open them, they would all go away and this whole thing would prove to have been a nightmare concocted by my disintegrating brain. No such luck. When I opened my eyes, Headmaster Colin was yelling and throwing spells at the intruders, which they easily blocked with the blades of their scythes.

“Out! Keep them out!”

Lorna and Klaus stepped forward to help him. Meanwhile, the other Reapers formed a protective circle around the two shrouded figures. I understood they had to protect them. We all had to protect them.

“Move out of the way, old man. This is futile. My Reapers have done this before, they will do it again.”

Morningstar was after the two people on the large throne. Which meant…

No… Those are… Life and Death.

He wanted to kill Life and Death. Not the concepts, not the metaphors… the actual living beings that were Life and Death. And we couldn’t let him. Forgetting that I was in no condition to fight, I jumped into battle headfirst. My scythe blocked someone else’s scythe, and when I looked up, it was Lorna. Not my Lorna. This one was leaking blue energy from her eyes, and her grin revealed rotten teeth. Her long black hair was a mess of dirt, leaves, and twigs. She looked like she’d been sleeping in a hole in the ground for the past couple of decades. I fought her with all my might, but she was stronger than me. At this point, pretty much anyone was stronger than me. She pushed me off her, and I fell into someone’s arms.

“You have to go,” Paz said. “Save yourself.”

“N-no. I can’t leave! This is my war, not yours!”

“Look at me.” He grabbed my jaw with a strong hand and made me look into his eyes. “You’re too weak. Anyone here can kill you. Anyone! And you can’t die!”

“Why not?”

“Because believe it or not, you’re still the only one who can do something about Morningstar. Go!”

He pushed me inside the circle. And I knew I could teleport safely from here, but I didn’t want to. I wasn’t going to leave them. Francis was fighting with his doppelganger, and Merrit was throwing energy balls at Caspian. Klaus came face to face with his own version of himself and freaked out so hard that he almost fainted. Headmaster Colin and Lorna were busy keeping Morningstar away from the circle and the throne.

The throne…

I turned to the shrouded figures. Something was off. Their hands were on their lap, but… not four hands. Two. Unnaturally apart, like the black one had stuck her right hand out, and the white one her left.

“You could do something if you wanted to,” I said. I didn’t know how to address them, or whether I was supposed to address them at all. Fuck that. “They’re fighting to protect you, and you’re just…”

The white figure raised her hand, grabbed the front of her shroud, and pulled. When the white piece of fabric fell, the black one fell, too. As if they were knit together. Because they were…

They were knit together… the two women. I covered my mouth with both hands to stop myself from screaming. Conjoined twins. Life and Death were conjoined twins, glued to each other not only at the hip, but at the waist, ribs, and shoulders. They had four legs, but only two arms. Death had long black hair, blue eyes, and parchment skin covering her glowing bones, and Life had long white hair, silver eyes, and pale skin that covered full, healthy flesh. They looked young and gorgeous, but every time I blinked, I had the impression that their features changed. They looked feminine one second, and masculine the next. Hermaphrodites.