Page 2 of Where the Light No Longer Follows

There it was. She scratched her cheek absently and muttered under her breath, “Wouldn’t say I’m his favourite.”

He chuckled and Silene fought the urge to look at him. From afar it had been such a despicable sound that mocked her, from this close, it had sounded so warm, as if the sun had shone directly on her. “Are you still crushing on him even after so long?”

Her eyes flew wide. “What? N-no,” she stuttered, a little flustered that he still remembered her silly infatuations early into her death. Had she really been that obvious even from afar? “Besides, he is waiting for the human girl he met years ago.”

That usual grim shade fell back over his eyes again and he turned his attention to the young couple preparing to recite their marital vows. “We can still love things that don’t love us back.”

Even though Silene did not love Azriel the way he had meant it, she didn’t say anything else, forcing her attention on the altar as well. From time to time, she threw quick glances at Gabriel, at his blonde hair that fell in soft curls a little longer than most kept it, the ring piercing on his lip that he was nudging with the tip of his tongue, his eyes that were a little too dull, too empty to belong to the God who had given life to almost everything Silene had once touched, breathed, seen and felt.

“See something you like?” he asked, startling her.

“Still looking.”

His tongue pressed against his cheek as he smiled ahead.

“This realm is the most miserable place to hide in,” she found herself commenting, feeling persuaded to break the awkwardness.

He glanced at her. “Hide?”

“You haven't visited Azriel in a long while. Your brother even sent looking for you. If he wasn’t able to find you, I can only guess it is because you were hiding.”

“Maybe I was.” Lifting a finger up, he pressed it to his lips. “Let’s keep this a secret.”

“I can’t lie to him if he asks me. You shouldn’t have shown yourself if you didn’t want me to tell on you.”

“Then how would you see me?”

“Why would I need to see you?”

He raked one long look over her. “Maybe I needed to see you.” Pushing from the door arch, he strode to her until they were just two feet apart, and Silene almost found herself recoiling. Not as much afraid of what would happen to something like her if she was grazed by his deadly touch, but because she was afraid of feeling remotely human again. “To keep an eye on you and make sure you do your job properly,” he said. “Wouldn’t want you screwing things up only five deaths away from finishing your service to Az.”

Forcing her feet to obey her command to stay still and not back away like a coward, she asked, “What are you? My keeper? The work bureau?”

“Are they above me?”

“To me, yes.”

He put a hand to his chest where Silene was almost sure there was nothing under. “Your disregard hurts my feelings a little.”

This was the closest he’d been to making her smile. Satisfaction filling her. “Then leave so I can do my job properly,” she said, pointing at timekeeper, the magic touched, silver pocket watch gifted to her by Time herself when she’d been made a Reaper. The very same watch that had stopped working all of the sudden. The very same watch that was never meant to stop even when death or life would cease to exist. There was only one person capable of stopping death’s time from running, and he was standing all so close to her.

He tipped his chin at the couple. “Let them marry. Time wouldn’t mind us borrowing just a minute.”

“Time might not,” Silene said. “But right now they are just two people who love one another. In another minute it will become eternal. He won’t die as her lover. He will die as her husband. As her forever. Bound to her by human vows not even gods will ever understand the meaning to. You could give them one more minute, but you would be taking eternity from her.”

He tilted his head back, his eyes curiously boring into hers. “How can you always make me feel like the bad guy?”

Always? That word ticked her when he knew how her end had come from his own gilded hands.

Silene had always made sure to keep most of her thoughts about him to herself. Unlike now. “You’ve never been the good guy, Gabriel.”

“How so?” he asked, amusement flashing across his face as he studied her with a gaze filled with some sort of fascination.

She looked at the couple who’d finished their vows and were about to exchange rings. “You always seem to think you’re wanted or needed.”

Suddenly, Gabriel stepped away from the chapel, and the watch in her hand started ticking again. Time was following its course anew and death was chasing along.

Silene watched the myriad of emotions catapulting around the house of prayer as the woman’s lover clutched his heart and drew out a choked breath before dropping to his knees. Screams followed by cries reverberated around the four walls that had been filled with so much laughter not even a minute ago. Even though his heart had been weak since birth, even though he’d lived longer than what Death had originally planned for him to live, Silene couldn’t help but feel guilt. That was her curse. It wasn’t her lethal presence that had been gifted by Azriel hundreds of years ago when she’d stepped on his lands. Her curse was to feel guilt she didn’t deserve to carry. It wasn’t her fault. She was merely a messenger. A guide. But she was taking—she was taking something that didn’t want to be taken. She’d been cursed to take, just as she’d taken from him, the one nor man or God standing so closely to her.