Page 25 of All Hallows Fate

I jumped hard when I saw the army of ghost dachshunds surrounding me, bathed in rose-gold light from the scales I held. I’d knelt on the floor, the impact of the fall still going through my knees, and power pooled around me in a dark cloud that hissed into steam when it met the scales’ illumination. The ghosts, unaffected, chased each other’s tails, wrestled on the floorboards, or curled up beside my knees and dozed, snoring in their little ghost sleep.

“The scales are part of you.” I tipped my head back, searching the bright glow for Death, remembering the feel of his arms bound around me, his lips pressed to my temple. So comforting it hurt. “They’ll respond if you ask them to draw their magic back inside.”

“Oh.” I frowned, but splayed both hands around the scales’ sturdy stem, balancing their weight as I reached out a wisp of magic the way I’d been taught.

Calm, I projected through that glimmer of magic. There’s no threat, we’re safe here.

Almost instantly, the light was sucked back into the scales, gleaming from a morganite stone near its tip. I exhaled in relief, murmuring a tentative thanks because it felt like the right thing to do. The scales weren’t inanimate; they were a power in their own right, and far older and more powerful than I was.

“You’re cute as fuck, but you need to move,” Miz snarled, and I lifted my head, a tingle in my cheeks until I realised he was talking to Madde’s dachshund army, who scattered out of his way.

I ducked my head as Misery knelt beside me, but warm hands caught my face and tipped it up.

“You’re cute too, my universe,” he said with aching tenderness. His lips grazed my cheek, then the edge of my mouth, and a flash of shivers went down my body, raising goosebumps, making my boobs ache. “Did the scales hurt you? You went down hard.”

“I’m fine,” I assured him, and because my head was still muddled, those visions so close to the surface I blurted, “I think I remembered something.”

He tilted his head, encouraging me to go on, pale hair spilling over his shoulder and making my fingers itch to run through it.

“Did you—” I lost my nerve, all the ferocity of my thirst for judgement and my inner creature fleeing in the face of his vibrant gold eyes and the endless well of love I found within them. He loved me. And I knew I loved him too, even if that love had been stolen from me.

“Did I what?” he prompted, so gentle that it was hard to reconcile him with the glaring, snarling man from my memory.

“Did you always have this hair, and those pretty gold eyes?”

A devastating smile transformed his face. “You think my eyes are pretty?”

I glanced away. “Shut up. Did you ever have blue eyes?”

“Ah.” His fingers trailed down my jaw and through my hair, and we shared a laugh when they met a tangle from the hours of riding. “When we first met, I went mildly insane. I wore a disguise when I stalked you. Shit, I shouldn’t have told you about the stalking.”

I couldn’t explain why I smiled. “It doesn’t surprise me. You were pretty intense in my memory. And earlier,” I added, my smile fading. “When you and Tor argued.”

He sighed. Kissed my cheek and muttered, “Busybody.”

I pretended to scowl. “Rude.”

“We’ll be fine. Don’t worry about us. It’s not the first time I’ve snapped at Tor, or vice versa. We’ll make up.” He dropped his voice, leaning forward to brush my cheek with his mouth as he added, “And you can watch.”

My ears burned. Face scalded. Heat pooled much further south, and I was trying to figure out what to say to that,1 I was saved by the scratching sound that made us both jump. I scrambled to pull out the list, praying the paper hadn’t ripped, or been shredded to bits.

It was still intact; I exhaled a rough breath. The top line was struck through, as if a spectral pen had scratched out the task. But I knew the pen in my pocket hadn’t done this; it was his magic that clung to the paper. My friend’s. Whoever he was.

1. A set of scales for Judgement.

2. A coil of iron to fix the gates.

I glanced up with a frown, finding the others closer than I expected. “Does anyone know where I’d find some iron?”

18

Torment

“You’ll give yourself an aneurism frowning like that,” Miz muttered, dropping beside me in the soft bed of grass just off the road where we’d set up a hasty overnight camp. Even death gods needed rest. It was utterly silent, not a single rustle of wind or chitter of an insect, and normally that wouldn’t bother me but it heightened every sound Cat made.

“She’s whimpering in her sleep,” I said quietly, the frown digging deeper into my brow.

“Her memories are breaking through.” Miz stretched out beside me, the press of his forehead to my shoulder familiar and soothing. “I want her to remember us, but everything else… Is it bad if I want her memories to never return?”