Death obeyed. And such became their routine. Rebellyn would spend her days with Death, recounting her youth and spilling her secrets, her hopes, and her dreams. If she had nothing to say at all, that was fine, too. Death would sit and listen, and then when the day came to an end, she’d pick the same path as before, returning to her life with the promise to see him again. If she were anyone else, Death wouldn’t have humored this game. But as the days stretched into weeks, months, years, he became so enamored with Rebellyn that he often forgot to ask her to choose a path at all.
And because Death had been stayed, Rebellyn’s lungs continued to function. While her father attributed it to the ocean air, she knew better. She’d grown aware of Death’s lingering stares, the ones she could feel against her skin when she wasn’t meeting his hooded gaze. The first time he’d called her his “little Rebel,” she’d known she’d won. That type of affection was something she’d heard only among lovers, and just maybe, Death didn’t want to see her go. She’d found a way around her circumstance, but she wasn’t done yet.
“You know, I’ve spent years sharing my mind with you,” she began one morning, her hand placed beside his. His skin was near translucent, his black veins as deep as the midnight sky. Their pinkies grazed with the barest of touches. “I think it’s high time you give me a bit more of yourself.”
Death grumbled, but he didn’t pull away from her touch. “What do I have to share? I’ve not lived the way you have.”
“I’ve hardly lived at all.” She shrugged. “So, since neither of us has been given the life we desired, why don’t you tell me what you would do if you could?”
“I suppose it’s not that I can’t do more,” he mused. “This is just all I’ve known.” His cloak, which Rebellyn had learned was more like a swath of living, breathing shadows, flared around his frame, and the barest hint of decay filled the air. The scent of his magic had initially repulsed her, but she’d learned to hide her reaction and, later, become accustomed to it.
“You could go anywhere, do anything,” Rebellyn said with an elongated exhale. “And yet you don’t.”
“What would you have me do, little Rebel?”
Her lips quirked. “Whatever you pleased. If I had power like yours, I’d never let anyone tell me how to live my life. You don’t have to fear death.” She looked at him with a spark of wonder and hope like Death had never experienced. And perhaps it was the way she inched closer to his body, or perhaps it was because he’d spent years beside this woman, learning to trust her, that Death did something entirely unexpected. He reached into the folds of his shadowy cloak and pulled out a blade made of the same stone as the island.
“Death comes for us all, Rebel.” He rotated the hilt slowly and watched as Rebellyn stared in wide-eyed fascination at the weapon. It was small but precisely sharp, with a color so intensely black and vapid that it was more like a void in space. “I am not exempt from that fate. I’m just harder to kill.” He returned the blade to its sheath, out of sight from Rebellyn’s stare.
She spent the next several years slowly prying information from Death about the world around her—namely, about the magic that lived in the soil, the air, the ocean, the beasts inhabiting the land. Death taught her everything he knew without hesitation, because, in his mind, Rebellyn’s fate was sealed. He’d claim her when the time was right. Whenhedecided the time was right. Rebellyn drew herself closer day by day, until it wasn’t just pinkies aimlessly grazing but bodies on the verge of intertwining.
And then one evening, when their languid touches grew more insistent, more wanton, Death pulled Rebellyn onto his lap. Her lips were bruised from kissing, her gaze heated and ready. Death wanted her like this for the rest of eternity. So long as she stayed by his side, she could go on living. Forever.
With a slight curl to his lips and nothing but hope in his heart, he asked, “Which path do you pick, my Rebel?”
She’d always been cunning. He assumed she knew what he was offering.
But for all his wisdom and all his magic, he never could have prepared for her answer.
Rebellyn leaned close and pressed her chest to his. Then she slid a sharp blade—a mirror to the one Death had once shown her—deep into his gut. A jagged gasp spilled from his open lips, and something warm and sticky began to seep through his shadowy cloak, coating the ground.
“How?” he gasped. “Why?”
When she looked at him then, she was not the Rebellyn whom Death knew. She was a cold creature with an animalistic grin and hunger in her stare. For every day since he first revealed the weapon, she’d stolen a small piece of the island on her way home. Years and years of shale pried loose from the rocks, hidden in the folds of her skirts, and then finally pressed and melted into a blade. A weapon she had fashioned with murderous intent and a desire to cheat Death.
“I will not be tied to anyone or anything.” Her words gutted him more than the wound in his stomach. “I’ll take your life if I must. You will not take me, too. The path I choose is yours.”
We could have been forever.His internal plea would never be heard. A burning agony, the kind fueled only by heartbreak and loss, set fire in his bones. Instead, he whispered, “Spare my life, and I’ll spare yours. Walk whichever path you please. You shall be...”
For... ever.
He swallowed thickly. “You shall be ever living.”
And then he slipped one hand into the folds of his cloak and presented her with a smooth stone of pure moonlight. He’d never shown it to her before. He’d never talked about it, either. In fact, he’d only acquired it the night previously, when he decided he wanted to spend his eternity with her. A gift of love. Of promise. Of life. It illuminated him and all that he was, making it impossible for him to hide within his shadows. He had wanted to bare himself to her and her alone.
Nevermore.
“Stay within its glow and you will never see me again.” Because she wouldn’t. Not like this. Not open and vulnerable and heartbroken. He felt no pain outside the betrayal burning through his body.
She didn’t hesitate to take the proffered gem, twisting her knife. “And for my kin?”
That question sparked a different kind of rage within Death. He’d meant nothing to her at all. She was already thinking of her next lover. Of future children. His stomach churned with the idea, and bile soured his tongue as he forced his next words out with a hiss.
“Split it. Search for more. All jewels of this nature are now bound by this promise, I swear to you.” Rebellyn smiled as she recognized the thrum of magic filling the cavern with an oppressive, heady weight. He’d, of course, taught her about vows, too. Another thing he’d regret for all his days.
“Good.” She removed her blade and with it came a gush of blood—not red but obsidian and slick like oil—as he fell to the ground. Rebellyn paused only for a moment to glance at Death. His chest was tight as he hoped—prayed—she’d change her mind. She didn’t. She walked away without looking back, leaving Death to stare at the stalactites and the winking insects crawling among the stone.
He wanted to howl, to scream.
