"They deserve to die," he says.
He takes the form of a man more and more, nowadays. It's easier to walk around on two legs in the towns. Sometimes he still forgets to hide the ears, but it's never anything a well-placed hat can't hide.
"Everyone dies, mon lapin," Grim answers dryly.
He prefers talking to her in the towns. She always seems more distracted, easier to catch off-guard. The presence of so many people sets him a bit on edge as well, but he's never shown weakness in the Reaper's presence. He isn't about to begin now.
"It's unfair."
"And who ever said I was fair? Neither is life, you know."
"It isn't right."
"I'm sure many of the townspeople would do the same in the prince's place, given the opportunity," she argues.
"But they won't, because they don't have the opportunity in the first place. You can't tell me you approve of this!" he complains.
Grim's expression is pensive. "There are a great many things I don't approve of, dear. Not that anyone consults me on them."
A man nearby coughs, and Grims glances over at him. "Oh dear. There goes another one. Can you blame the prince for wanting to avoid this?"
This, as indicated by the Reaper, is a fit of coughing followed by rust-colored sweat. This is marked by numerous boils and sores. This makes its mark with blood everywhere, leaking from every opening, every pore in the unfortunate man's skin.
"No," he admits as the man keels over. "But I can blame him for holing up in that bloody abbey of his while his subjects are dying in the streets!"
"Honestly, the abbey is the least bloody place hereabouts for probably a hundred miles," Grim remarks.
She sees his eyes glint harshly. The clouded sun stubbornly dispersing its light in the sky above turns his green gaze venomous.
"You could change that," he suggests.
The suggestion hangs in the air, daring her to reach out and take it. She doesn't, not immediately.
"Why should I?"
He answers quickly, too quickly. "Because you hate it when people cheat you, and the only thing you hate more is when they hide behind others to do it."
He's thought about this, she realizes. This púca has been contemplating how to persuade me into murder.
Well, it would be a shame to have all his planning go to waste.
"I've heard that he's planning a masquerade next week," she proposes.
The púca grins. "Going to a party uninvited? Rude."
"Well, you said it yourself: the prince and his cronies cheated me. He has practically invited me, doing a thing like that. Anyway, when's the last time we've been to a good party?"
He blanches. "We?"
"Yes, we. You expect a lady to go to a party unaccompanied?"
"What makes you think I'll escort you?!"
She rolls her eyes. "Don't tell me you really want to miss it."
"I do! I really would rather miss this, thanks very much!"
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
I'd really rather be missing this, he thinks.
They're colorful. That's the only thing he can say about the rooms that's vaguely positive: everything else is very clearly negative. And even the colors are a potential point against it- they're bright, but also gaudy, garish, and just plain old ugly in some cases. The costumes are all ugly. The dancing is only such in the barest sense of the word, there's too much lighting in most areas and nigh none in the others, and the only reason he's guzzling the wine is because his need for a drink is currently outweighing his good taste.
He blames the clock for the last part. He isn't sure which room it's in, but it chimes every hour far too bloody loudly for his liking. At least the revelers shut up for a bit when it does: if he had to listen to the clamor of voices, the screeching music, and the clock banging on over all of it, he might go mad.
As if to accentuate this point, the musicians start up a particularly raucous song that's as loud as it is tuneless.
He takes off his hat to cover his ears, because he is all out of bothers to give about anyone who recognizes his non-human status. Anyway, everyone who might notice presumably won't be able to tell anybody else, not after tonight. If Grim would just. Show. Up. Already.
He flinches as someone grabs his tail, or where his tail would be if he wasn't in possession of only two legs at the moment.
"Meet me in the purple room," a voice slurs, and he wrinkles his nose at the stench of alcohol on her breath. He's glad it isn't Grim: hammered or not, he doesn't want to break his façade of fearlessness in front of her.
"Aren't we already in the purple room?" he points out, disentangling himself from a pair of wandering hands.
The woman giggles, and his rabbit ears flatten at the shrill irritation of the sound. "This is the violet room, silly!"
"...Right," he says, resisting the urge to ask What's the bloody difference? "Um, see you there, I guess."
She laughs and weaves away, and he breathes a sigh of relief.
"Fancy not knowing the difference between purple and violet," another, familiar voice teases.
A spark of indignation coupled with a heavy feeling of finally! and a lighter-but-still-significant feeling of about bloody time, he turns around to see the Grim Reaper.
She's dressed entirely in red, which he would've thought gauche but for his current surroundings. Her costume is at least somewhat tasteful in construction: a scarlet gown with no frills, no ribbons, and only a slight train; a crimson cloak, with a hood that encircles her raven hair so as to enhance the vividness of her complexion; and a single piece of jewelry, a blood-colored gem hanging from a red ribbon around her neck.
"You look like you've been beheaded," he comments.
She smirks. "Thank you, but you haven't seen the real pièce de résistance."
Grim whips out her mask with a flourish. She puts it on, and any elegance the costume might have had is immediately ruined. He's almost lost for words.
Almost. "That thing is ugly as sin."
She removes the mask and waves her hand dismissively. "You're too kind."
"Yes, I am," he mutters, raising a horribly overdecorated goblet to his lips and taking a gulp of wine that tastes far too cheap for such an expensive party. "What took you so long?"
She shrugs, twirling the mask carelessly in her hands. "I wanted to make a grand entrance."
And make an entrance Grim had, for he could see the stares being drawn to her even as they spoke. She could, too: he notices her eyes flicker at the surrounding crowd before she looks back to him.
"Having fun?" she asks.
He takes another, longer draught of wine. "Like a hen in a fox den."
"Or a rabbit?"
He rolls his eyes, and she cackles as she replaces her mask.
"Now, if you'll excuse me," she says in a voice like velvet, "I've some business amidst all this pleasure."
Grim begins to stride off, then pauses.
"The real party's starting in the blue room, if you're interested," she murmurs.
She vanishes, and he begins shouldering his way through the crowd, making his way to the blue room. In the purple room, he briefly notices the handsy woman from earlier and freezes, unsure if he's in her line of sight.
The clock begins to chime, and everyone around him goes still. He takes the opportunity to slip through to the blue room.
The final chime rings through the air, and he sees Grim standing in the middle of the chamber, bathed in cerulean light. Her cloak hangs around her, the color as bright as a fresh cut.
The idiot prince is the first to approach her, and the second to get a clear view of her mask.
The mask is pale, and the face it's in imitation of is so thin as to be skeletal. That in and of itself wouldn't be so shocking, considering some of the more outlandish ensembles Grim finds herself among. But the pale face is daubed with rosy cheeks, and the forehead adorned with vermilion streaks.
He grins wide when he sees the prince's expression.
You though you could escape Death?
The prince shrieks for this audacious stranger to be seized. No one complies. Grim begins walking away, and he glimpses the permanent grin of her mask.
Is this the last thing people see before they die?
The question comes back to him in force, and now he can answer it.
For these people? Yes.
The crowd trails after Grim, none making a move to stop her, or even so much as touch her. The colors of the walls seem to change around them as they walk: blue, purple, green, orange, white, purple again.
The last room is black, but the windows are tinted vivid red. The only other feature of the room he takes notice of is the ebony clock standing against the wall.
So that's where the bloody thing is.
The stupid prince draws his dagger, and Grim glances over her shoulder, eyes burning. The prince drops dead.
The prince's idiot cronies rush forward into the room, but he lingers behind.
There are shrieks of horror and pain. Then there is silence.
He doesn't flinch when Grim appears next to him unannounced.
"Are you glad?" she inquires.
He doesn't know. He doesn't feel sorry for any of them, not a whit, but the rush of satisfaction he feels is...lacking. Tempered by some realization that had leaked in while Grim had worked her trade.
"How do you keep doing this?"
She isn't wearing her cloak or mask. It strikes him that she looks tired.
"Do I have another option?" the Reaper jokes, but her eyes are dull, with no spark of joy or amusement to light them.
He suddenly can't stand to look in her eyes.
Her lips twitch. "This party's pretty dead, yeah? Why don't you go have a drink someplace decent. I've got a little cleaning up to do."
He doesn't vanish, exactly, but Grim is certain that if she'd blinked at the wrong time, she'd have missed him leaving.
All the rooms are black now, the colors drained away with the light. Death walks the empty chambers, far too aware of her own presence.
She realizes hers is not the only presence there.
"Pitch."
He's standing in one of the doorways, eyes somehow glinting gold despite no light remaining. "Grim."
She smiles automatically, thinks better of it, and drops the façade. "Like what I've done with the place?" she scoffs.
The Boogeyman shrugs. "A decent renovation. Bit too much red for my taste."
Her laugh is real, though not untinged with bitterness. "Would you prefer white, then? I'm sure there's some wine left over."
He shakes his head. "I was hoping to collect on some of that fear while it was running high. It seems I'm a little late to the party."
She strides over to him, holds out her hand. "Why, not at all. I saved a dance for you."
The Nightmare King smiles and grasps the Reaper's fingers in his own. "Well then."
In their new dominion, Death and Darkness dance.