Page 101 of Grim Tidings

Frank chuckles and shakes his head. “I should have listened to you. That first night.”

His words are bitten out between clenched teeth. Angry. They slip and slide over one another, wrapped in pain. I study his face and the way his trembling hands are moving dried leaves and flowers off the table. The empty bins.

“What happened to your flowers, Frank?”

He shakes his head. “You told me. You said she was different than she seemed. And I called you stupid.” He laughs again. “You were right.”

“Frank—”

“Do you know what she is?”

I feel myself freeze. Muscles, locking in place. What she is. I consider the pieces spread in front of me. The ring on his finger he never takes off. The dead peonies he can’t seem to let go of. Shattered glass and an empty shop. His fury and his fear, tangled up until it looks a hell of a lot like grief.

Do you know what she is?

Frank knows the truth. I don’t know how, but—

Frank knows she’s a Reaper.

“She takes,” he hisses, his mouth pressed in a line. He shakes his head. “She takes it all away.”

All of Darcy’s worst fears about herself, spoken aloud. Everything I flung at her, when she first came into town. Dread pools in my gut.

“Where is she now, Frank? Where is Darcy?”

“She’s gone.” He tosses his trash bin to the side. “She left.”

“How long ago? Where?”

But Frank is somewhere else, oblivious to my questions—to my panic. His eyes are far away, his fingers plucking at the dried stem of a dead peony.

“I asked her not to,” he says, more to himself than me. “I begged her to let them stay. I did everything I could, but it wasn’t enough.”

I frown. Frank is buried too deep in his own anguish. And Darcy is out there somewhere alone, her magic uncontained and—

“I’ll come back, okay? I’ll come back and I’ll help you with the flowers.”

Frank doesn’t respond. He hunches over his worktable, giving me his back. I want to stay and figure this out. I want to soothe and protect and calm. But I’m being torn in two different directions. Instinct and obligation.

“I’ll come back, Frank,” I say again.

Then I grab for the door, and I go to find Darcy.

Tater Tot bounds down the street as soon as I wedge the door open, his leash forgotten. Magic thickens as we get closer to the town house, the air is practically sparking with it. It makes it difficult to move—to breathe—like static before a lightning storm. Or the pull of the tide before the crush of a wave.

I’ve never felt anything like it. Raw power, spilling in every direction. I have to stop at her crooked gate and bend my neck against the press of it, the magnitude dizzying. Every step feels like I’m slogging through cement. By the time I get to her front door, sweat is running in rivulets down the side of my face. I grip the threshold and pull myself through with a grunt.

Somewhere inside, Tater Tot barks. Panicked. Just once. “Darcy?” I call.

The hallway is dark. The flowers that filled this space a few days ago are dead, nothing but black, dried husks. Shadows cling to everything, like sheets over furniture in a long-abandoned home. They whisper over one another. Curl around my ankles as I move up the stairs.

The dog barks again, and I push forward. I let my wings unfold from my body, using their power to cut through the dense fog. I reach for my sword and more shadows recede, allowing me up the stairs and down the hall. I can hear Tater Tot’s low whine through the cracked door at the very end, the rush and roar of magic as it reacts to my presence in the house.

I expect a fight. A confrontation. For her magic to force me out. I brace myself as I nudge open her bedroom door, my hand flexing on my sword, but there is nothing but stillness here. An eerie quiet.

And in the middle of the room, lies Darcy, curled on her side with her knees to her chest, one arm extended out, her palm up. Her dark hair is fanned around her, hiding her face, her shoulders hitched high to protect herself. Tater Tot circles her prone form, his teeth bared at the shadows that linger at the edge of the room. But none approach.

I drop my sword. It clatters against the floor.