Life and Death

Silas:

The alcove breathes a comforting cold against my skin, the stones older than language itself.

I lean into the darkness, letting it swallow me whole. The shadows speak in a cadence I know too well—low and restless, like a tide against a broken shore. They smell of iron and frost, of endings.

A door clicks open down the stairwell.

Soft footfalls. Careful. Hesitant.

Isadora.

Her presence slides across the black like the first cut of dawn. The shadows recoil and reach all at once.

She turns the corner, candlelight pooling around her like liquid warmth. For a heartbeat she doesn’t see me. Then her eyes catch mine and she startles—a sharp intake of breath, hand to her chest.

“I didn’t know anyone was here,” she says. Her voice wavers but doesn’t break.

I step forward, hands raised slightly. “I didn’t mean to frighten you.”

“You didn’t.” A pause, a small tremor in the word. “Much.”

The faint shimmer of glamour clings to her skin; Kai’s lesson still lingers. Her hair is a tumble of black silk, cheeks flushed from the warm midday air. She looks both untouchable and heart breakingly mortal. And tired—gods, she looks tired. Dark rings bruise the delicate skin beneath her eyes.

“You should get some rest after all that practice,” I murmur.

“I'd rather enjoy your company.” Her mouth curves, but the smile doesn’t reach her eyes. “Couldn’t stay away?”

“Guess I couldn’t,” I admit.

The truth presses harder. Wouldn’t stay away is closer to it.

She tilts her head, studying me. “You look… worried.”

The shadows hiss at the lie before I can speak it. They demand honesty.

“They’re louder,” I say. “The whispers. They don’t sound like warning anymore. They sound like hunger.”

Her brow furrows. “Hunger?”

“It was like this once before.” The memory claws up my spine, cold and merciless. “Long ago. Before I came to Ashwyck.”

Her voice softens. “Tell me.”

I hesitate. The past is a wound I rarely touch. But the shadows coil tighter, urging confession.

“There was a girl,” I begin. “Delphia.”

The name alone tastes like long forgotten ash.

“She was quiet. Gentle. Death loved her.” I force the words past the ache in my throat. “Her parents died first—an illness that turned their home into a grave before they were gone. She caught it too.”

Isadora stays very still, every breath a silent invitation to continue.

“I thought I could save her,” I say. “I thought if I wrapped her in enough shadows, if I hid her from the Reaping, Death would forget her. I tried to steal her away from what waits for all of us.”

The memory sharpens—the smell of fever, the way Delphia’s eyes turned glassy while I begged the darkness to spare her.

“When my parents found out,” I continue, “they sent me here. Shunned. A Grim who refuses the inevitable is a traitor to the balance. What is a reaper who will not reap?”

The corridor holds its breath. Even the shadows fall silent.

“I’m sorry,” Isadora whispers.

I shake my head. “Don’t be. I failed her. But this…” I glance at the black ripples creeping along the walls, sigils of cold fire flashing like distant lightning. “This is worse. The prophecy the shadows show me—death isn’t just coming, Isadora. It’s circling you.”

Her eyes widen, silver catching in the dim light. “Me?”

“They speak in fragments. A crown of ash. A heart of fire. And your name, again and again, until it feels like both prayer and curse.”

Her hand trembles on the stone bench. Before I think better of it, I cover it with mine. Her warmth startles me—a living flame against the permanent winter in my blood.

“I don’t want it to take you,” I say, voice low, rough. “Not again. Not like her.”

The shadows surge at the confession, a dark tide threatening to drag us both under.

But she doesn’t pull away.

“What do we do?” she asks, and the question is so bare, so unguarded, that it splinters something in me.

“Kai and I are searching,” I tell her. “Ancient texts, fae prophecy, anything that might break the pattern. We’ll find something. We have to.”

Her lips press into a thin line, but I can feel the tremor in her fingers. “I don’t want to be a prophecy.”

“I don’t want you to be one either.”

The silence that follows is almost a presence, thick enough to taste.

My hand remains over hers, and though the chill of my skin should bite, she doesn’t move.

“I don’t understand why they’re all drawn to me,” she says finally. “Rhett, Kai, Lucian… you. It’s like the world tilted the day I arrived.”

“Maybe it did,” I say. “Or maybe you’ve always carried it inside you.”

Her breath catches. She looks down, lashes casting shadows as dark as mine. “And you? Why are you here, Silas? With me?”

The truth hangs heavy between us. Because I can’t stay away. Because the shadows that once only obeyed me now whisper your name.

“I was sent to guard the threshold between life and death,” I say instead. “But you… you’re the only one who makes me question which side I belong to.”

Her gaze lifts, and for a heartbeat the air is electric—an ache, a promise, a warning.

“I’m not Delphia,” she whispers.

“I know.”

The words are barely sound, but they burn.

The shadows begin to writhe again, sigils blooming along the ceiling like black frost. They whisper of endings, of a crown of ash, of blood spilled beneath a darkened moon. I feel them circling her, hungry.

I squeeze her hand, grounding us both. “Whatever this is, we’ll face it. I won’t let the darkness take you.”

Her eyes close briefly, a single tear sliding down her cheek. I catch it with my thumb. The warmth of her skin seeps into me, a fragile defiance of the cold eternity waiting beyond.

For a long time we sit like that—her warmth against my chill, the whispers clawing at the edges of our silence. I can’t tell if the shadows are warning or pleading, but I know this:

If death comes for her, it will have to go through me.