Chapter Eighteen
I was no stranger to terror. I had felt it many times in my rather short life but as I stood face to face with Death and Famine, it wrapped its arms around me like an old friend. My feet could have been superglued to the floor and I wouldn’t have noticed as every part of my body froze. Even my heart skipped a beat as I looked into those eyes.
With a gulp, I tried to take a step away from the beings with so much death and madness in their eyes only to find myself pinned in place by a glare from Death himself.
“Come now Miss Holmes,” he spoke softly, his lips turned up in a poor attempt at a smile while he held his hand out to me. I eyed the offer of cordiality as if it harboured some deadly disease. “Stop being so rude, it is unbecoming on you. Take a seat and enjoy the festivities – the party is about to start.”
His brother cackled merrily as he danced from foot to foot before slamming his foot into Castiel’s limp form.
“Stop it!” The words escaped my lips before I could stop them drawing a smile from both horsemen. They knew my weakness.
Even as dread knotted in my stomach I couldn’t find it in me to care. My eyes were firmly trained on Castiel. A vice gripped around my heart as I stared at the fallen angel. I feared in that second that he was too far gone. I feared that he would not be coming back to us for he did not flinch. He did not groan. He did not show any signs that someone had just kicked him while he lay there helpless. He just remained there on the floor. Still. He was too still.
“Please don’t be dead Cass.” I murmured under my breath watching the smallest rise and fall of his chest. “We need you.”
From my limited experience in the supernatural world, I knew that angels, demons and even the fallen could be killed. I just didn’t know all the ways that they could die. Would these wounds snuff out Castiel’s life force? What even happened to an angel when they died – especially a fallen one?
I shook my head and was forced to clench my jaw as death prodded his own booted foot into a particularly deep welt on Castiel’s back, his eyes watching me intently as he groan the toe of his shoe in deeper and deeper. It was only my sheer strength of will that stopped me from reacting the Horseman’s baiting.
When I gave no reaction, Death sighed and took a seat upon the throne of bones, his features shifting as he did so. I sucked in a sharp breath. I felt for the first time that I was seeing the truth behind the human mask. He leant back on the bones of dead while I stared on in horror. Is eyes were cold, lifeless and yet there was knowledge held within those dark orbs. There was too much knowledge.
Those eyes had seen worlds ending and new ones beginning. With certainty, as I stared at Death and understood that out of all of the horsemen, this one being alone had enough power to end the world. He did not need his brothers to help him.
“Stop thinking so hard Miss Holmes. It won’t do you any good. Besides, you are painfully transparent which is ruining all of my fun.” Death tapped his fingers on the white skullcap of one of Famine’s victims. “You do know that your end is coming tonight?”
His eyes watched my every move, a sparkle lingering in his eyes as he waited like a cobra waiting to strike. I pressed my lips together and looked away from Death and stared at my injured friend instead.
“Of course, you were supposed to live until you were eighty five in your original plan. But then He and his children interfered and messed with my original design. So what’s one more change?”
I could feel his eyes staring into the side of my face as he spoke but I refused to give in. It didn’t feel real. How could any sane person process that they were in the same room as death talking about their own mortality like it was the weather.
Death laughed. I failed to see the humour in the situation. Grinding my teeth together, I turned my head and met the cackling Horsemen eyes to eye.
“What is the point to all of this?” I pulled back my shoulder and fought the urge to call out my angel blade. I doubted she would be much help in this fight anyway. “So what happens in this great plan of yours? You win this war, bring about the end of the world and then what? What do you get out of it?”
Death’s skin rippled and he became something different. He became something more. Even with my strange status as the bridge between worlds, I still found it painful to look upon this being. My mind struggled to figure out if there was beauty there or something terrible.
“This is the truth of me.” Death spoke the words softly and yet that made them more terrifying. His hair while was longer than mine and hung about his waist moved like an unseen breeze drawing the very life and vitality out of the air. “I was bound to human flesh by your Gods several millennia ago but I will always be something more and I will never be destroyed or contained. I am death. Without me life cannot happen. There must always be a balance. Why would I destroy your world when there is so much life here just waiting to be toyed with, to be manipulated for my will? I do not want to destroy your world puny human. I want to rule it.”
Famine whined behind me. I almost jumped when his hot fetid breath blew against the back of my neck.
“I’m bored brother, let me play now.” He inhaled deeply as his hand stroked against my wings. “let me play.”
I pulled my wings back into my body as a shiver of disgust rolled through my body. I felt dirty from the Horseman’s touch, like my skin was covered in thousands of insects. The sensation continued the longer he continued to stand behind me, his feverish heat brushing against me. I stepped away and let my gaze turn to Famine. There was no denying the depravity that lurked within. Famine was no more than a slathering beast as he hopped from foot to foot in agitation his eyes shone with his inner madness. His attention was solely on me.
“Have patience brother.” Death waved his hand carelessly through the air. “We have waited millennia to have our fun. What are a few more minutes?”
Famine threw his hands up in the air, stopped his feet against the ground and roared. If he wasn’t so terrifying to look at I would have compared his to a temperamental three year old. But he wasn’t cute. He was terrible, powerful. The floor shook from the very strength of his rage. I clapped my hands over my ears as the sound waves stabbed at my eardrums.
“Enough.”
Death did not look at his brother. He did not speak above a whisper as he examined his nails but he could have shouted for all of the difference it made. Famine stilled in an instant looking contrite as he stared up at his brother. When the superior horseman did not spare him a glance, he fell to his knees in front of the throne of bones and clasped both hands before him as he bowed his head in submission.
I backed up a step as the scene unfolded before me. The cold calm on dark haired man’s face was scariest sight I had ever laid my eyes upon and I had been to Tartarus.
“I’m sorry brother,” Famine whimpered, his entire being lowered to the floor as he cowered.
I took another step back and then another.
“Where do you think you are going Miss Holmes? I have not given you permission to leave.” His white chalky hands lifted and beckoned me forwards.
My body was moving before I could stop it. I looked at Castiel’s limp form for help in my desperation. Some of the wounds had stopped oozing but the healing was happening slowly, too slowly to save me from this.
“Take a seat, your friend will be here soon and then we can have out fun.”
I found myself sat at Death’s feet before I could stop it.
“What will hurt your destined the most?” the horseman tapped his fingers on the skullcap over and over again. I clenched my hands into fists as I bowed my head.
“Your death?” My heart skipped a beat.
“No that is too simple. In death you would get your afterlife and eternal peace. Your soul is not dark enough for the fires of Tartarus.” He tapped his fingers once more before I felt his fingers toying with my hair. “No, betrayal will hurt your so called King of the Underworld the most.”
“I would never –.”
I winced when my head was forced backwards by my hair.
“I know. It’s a pity that men are so fickle though. If you take away his power and his wings – he is just a man.”
Death clicked his fingers and Famine scrambled to his feet looking more composed and human than he ever had.
“You know what to do brother, oh and make it convincing.”
I felt my stomach lurch uncomfortably as the Horseman gave me a leer before his own skin rippled and he became. I shook my head at the mirror image staring back at me. He was me and yet the expression on his face was not one would ever wear. I watched as my doppelgänger rubbed her hands over every inch of my form, groping here and there.
“Stop playing brother. We have bigger target in mind. Miss Holmes will be here when you get back. Won’t you Savannah.”
Another tug on my hair and I forced myself to nod.
“Good girl.”
Famine leered at us and licked his lips before sashaying out of the room.
“Lucius will know it’s not me. He knows me too well.”
Death was silent behind me as his hands continued to stroke at my hair. I didn’t even try to protest at the gesture. I was powerless in this room. And in the silence I felt the doubt creep in.
“He couldn’t think that Famine was me. He just couldn’t.”