Page 115 of An Oath at Midnight

The darkness around us was heavy. In here, in my mind, it was just him and me. “Do I get a choice?”

“No,” he said, and the world around me shook from the violence in his voice.

“What will happen to me?”

“You will become an extension of me. My reapers are my right hand. I am Death, you deliver it.”

“I won’t kill for you. I won’t do it.”

He slammed the twisted wooden staff in his hand on the floor. “You will do whatever I say, or I will rip your soul from your body and take you back.” Then he held a large, scarred hand in front of his hood, palm up, and blew across it.

Black smoke flowed from under his hood and into my face. I coughed, choking as it crawled inside me, taking hold, gripping on to my own darkness with unrelenting claws.

“Until you learn to control it, your touch is death,” he said.

What? “I can’t touch anyone?”

He shook his head.

“How do I control it?”

“No two reapers are the same.”

And if I didn’t learn to control it, I’d never be able to touch Bram again. I’d never be able to hug my mom, or Else or my sisters, or hold Willow’s baby.

“You think this is a punishment, witch,” he said, his soul-shaking voice slicing through me. “But I feel the darkness inside you, so vast it would have eventually taken over. I’ve given you a way of channeling it.”

He made it sound like a good thing. It didn’t feel that way to me.

Death took a step back. “You will hear from me, reaper.”

He lifted his staff, about to pound it on the floor, to make his exit.

“Please, don’t hurt Zinnia,” I said quickly. “Don’t hurt my cousin.” I didn’t know if a being such as him was capable of kindness or mercy, but I knew without a doubt he was capable of cruelty.

He froze, his glowing eyes boring into me, and I wanted to shrivel up and die under that frigid stare, to vanish from the face of the earth. Looking into them was like staring into a nightmare come to life.

He said nothing, then finally, he slammed his staff on the ground.

Then he was gone.

Consciousness returned with a harsh jolt.

I was back in that room with Ryan, and it was as if time had stopped. He was still screeching, blood pouring from his leg. I tried to move, and this time I was able to. I wasn’t paralyzed anymore, the numbness completely gone.

Ryan looked up at me, murder in his eyes as he stumbled toward me. I kicked out, slamming my foot into his chest, hard. He stumbled back, falling on his ass.

I didn’t have time to waste. With a scream, I forced my mouth open, tearing the stitches, ripping through flesh so I could speak, and yelled my spell. This one most definitely came from a place of hatred, and now that I was Death’s reaper, I didn’t need to hold back. My voice was strong, cold, pure venom as the words fell from my torn lips.

Ryan was thrown back, and his body slammed into the wall. He yelled and thrashed, but the hold I had on him was strong. It was his turn to feel powerless. Goddess, it was easy, so easy for me when I allowed my anger to fuel me.

The next spell I called, the words came to me without even thinking, in a language so old I didn’t understand it. The wire around my wrist moved, untwisting, loosening as I spoke.

The door crashed open, and I turned to see Bram and Asher run in.

Bram took one look at me and roared.

He ran for Ryan as Asher rushed for me.