Page 45 of Where the Light No Longer Follows

At the small wooden table in front of the house sat a woman, probably in her mid-twenties, rosy hair, wearing a colourful dress scattered with bright flowers all over, and swinging her feet back and forth as she laughed because of something someone from within the house said to her.

Silene stumbled a step back when someone who painfully reassembled her younger brother stepped out into the garden, laying two plates of food on the table. He was much older though, face scarred, so much taller, shoulders filled with muscle she could never imagine her brother having from how little they were allowed to eat and how much he was forced to work in the mines.

A bright, teary grin spread on her face when she realised there was nothing left of the man she used to know. That he’d become better, grown, was happier.

She was about to turn and leave, happy with the closure she’d gotten, when the rosy haired woman screeched as he howled her over his shoulder, “Luke! Put me down!”

A sob escaped her, and she spun fast in his direction, losing footing and collapsing to the ground, her eyes filled with too many tears to see her brother clearly no matter how hard she tried to wipe them away. Why had she called him that name?

No. No. No. Luke Carver was gone. Luke was gone. He couldn’t be Luke again.

She cried and cried, sobbing onto the hem of her skirt to stop herself from making any sound. What did this mean? Had he been sentenced to a fate like hers?

Az had to know. She had to ask Az.

When she braced a hand on the tree and pushed herself to stand, a branch cracked under her foot and the air went silent. Very slowly, as if afraid she’d startle some wild animal, she looked up at where the commotion had stopped, not expecting two pairs of eyes on her.

He was looking straight at her. Not through her as all humans did. No, her brother, or who had once been her brother was looking right at her. “Silene?”

She gasped, starting to back away, and dashing in a run through the forest that wilted under her forbidding touch.

“Silene!” Luke shouted, and she ran faster, her sobs bleeding out into the forest. “Silene, I know it is you.”

Finally, she stopped even though the boat to Asphodel was only a few feet away. She’d left once like a coward, and though she did not dare ask for his forgiveness, he was owed an apology—for what she’d done to him, the brother she’d loved so dearly, harder than anyone.

“How is this even possible?” he asked, reaching for her, but she backed away, half astound at seeing her brother again and half terrified of what might have happened to him to be forced to remember her. Did he also have nightmares as she did?

Silene pressed a hand to her face and cried. No. No. No. She backed away even further. “You can’t touch me. I don’t even know how you can see me, but…you can’t touch me.”

“Why not?”

“Nothing I touch can live.”

He frowned at her—her little brother frowned at her. Then he smiled. And as he did, she was struck, transported back in time. That smile was so like the brother she remembered. “You found me. That is all that matters.”

“I never looked for you, Luke,” she confessed, holding a shaky hand to her heart that felt as though it would fall through her stomach.

Her brother’s face fell, as did hers when he said, “I looked for you everywhere, Lena.”

The rosy haired girl appeared at his side, clinging to his arm. “You’re his.”

Luke looked between her and I, confusion marring his eyes.

“You’re Azriel’s,” the woman continued. “That’s why your brother could not find you.”

“For what I did,” Silene started, feeling time slip through her fingers. “Death wanted retribution.”

Her brother’s expression bled with fury. “I’m going to kill Azriel.” Luke put both hands to his brow, shaking his head. “I’m going to kill him, Aurora.”

The rosy haired girl, Aurora, gave a look of pity at both of them. “He would not be allowed to tell you, you know that, Luke.” She turned to Silene. “As do you, I suppose.”

Something struck Silene. “How do you know of him? How do you know Az?”

Luke would not look at her. “Because I am now like him.”

“A God,” Aurora said. “Vengeance. Gabriel gave him another life. In exchange—”

Silene tensed. “In exchange for what?”