Juniper Kynes will never escape me again.
Yeah, we’ll see about that, bastard.
I’d watched everything from a distance, hidden behind the stone shed where we’d killed Kent. There was a chain on the door now, so I couldn’t get in, but I’d needed something between me and that massive monster Jeremiah had summoned. The Eld, the Watcher, the Gollums — they were all bad enough. But this creature was no mere monster, it wasn’t just a beast.
It was intelligent, and it was dangerous as hell if it regarded something a God had told it to do as merely a request.
I hated to keep hiding there, but even after Jeremiah had left, I waited. I didn’t trust that the bastard wasn’t watching from somewhere nearby, or that he didn’t have other gunmen posted up somewhere. Zane lay still for several minutes, before he began to struggle as if to get up. He kept reaching for his back, clawing at it as if something there was hurting him.
My hands shook, and my throat tightened as I watched. It made me sick to see him like that. Jeremiah hoped I’d come back to fight the Reaper, and he was going to get his fucking wish. If it could bleed and draw breath, then I could kill it.
I’d find a way.
Finally, after enough time had passed that I was almost certain no one was watching, I moved in.
Zane’s eyes were closed, his breathing weak and far too slow. He was riddled with bullets, the wounds still bleeding. None of his wounds had even begun to heal. My hands hovered over him with uncertainty, furious tears making my eyes sting.
“What did he do to you? Fuck…” I brushed my fingers over his face, over the blood drying on his skin — and his eyes fluttered open.
“I should have known.” He tried to smile, but it turned into a wince of pain. He lifted his hand and I caught it, holding his bloodied fingers against my face. “You couldn’t just do the safe thing and stay away, could you?”
“Fuck no,” I hissed. “As if I’d fucking leave you. Don’t be ridiculous.”
He shook his head. “You can’t fight a Reaper alone, Juniper…”
“Watch me! Don’t you dare tell me to go again: I won’t. Just tell me how I can help you.”
The few words he’d said had left him out of breath. He was silent for a minute before he managed to say, “The amulet…the one Kent had. Do you remember?”
I nodded, and a sudden stab of terror pierced into me. “Yeah. I buried it…I left it behind…”
Fuck. No, no, no…
“Jeremiah used it,” he said. Slowly, painfully, he clenched his teeth and rolled over to his side. There on his back, beside his shoulder blade, there was something swollen beneath his skin. Horrifying bruises were concentrated around the area. “Stabbed me…I can’t heal.” He lay his head down, eyes closed. “Cut it out…cut deep.”
It had been my mistake. My mistake had led to this. I’d left the amulet behind. I’d forgotten about it entirely. I pulled out my knife, shaking my head, cold guilt washing over me. “Zane, I’m so sorry. I forgot…I completely forgot it…”
“So did I.” This time, he managed to smile. “Doesn’t matter, Juni. Don’t…don’t berate yourself. Go on, love. Cut it out.”
I grit my teeth, set my blade against his swollen skin — and cut.
Zane shuddered, but other than that, he didn’t react as I cut open the wound. The wretched little amulet was deep; it twisted my stomach when I had to keep cutting deeper, digging the blade in until it hit metal.
“Ah, fuck,” Zane hissed as I finally got my fingers on the amulet and tugged it free. The moment the metal was out of him, goosebumps ran over his skin, the bullet wounds pulsing like tiny heartbeats. He groaned, pressing his forehead against the grass. “Fuck, that is…extremely…unpleasant…”
I stared at the bloody bit of metal in my hand. It was hot, almost too hot to touch. “Does this work against more than just demons, Zane?”
He pushed himself up from the ground, head swaying dizzily. “Yeah. It would have an effect on most monsters…especially now.” He winced as he stretched his arms and reached for his back. “That thing absorbed a hell of a lot of power from me. It uses the power it absorbs to make itself stronger. It’s fucking dangerous.”
I nodded, my mind turning. “Good. Perfect. Look, I know this is gonna suck, but…” I held it out toward him. “I need you to crush it.”
He looked at the amulet like I’d just offered him a literal pile of shit. “Why?”
I tapped the muzzle of the shotgun on my back. “I need it small enough to fit in there. Jeremiah was so damn cocky, he left us a weapon without even realizing it.” I grinned. “When the Reaper comes back, it’s getting a face full of metal.”
His expression was serious as he looked at me. “It won’t be easy, Juniper. I’ve only heard of Archdemons killing Reapers, and that was during the wars.”
“I don’t need it to be easy. I just need it to work.”
“Fuck…alright.” He held out his hand, his broken claws slowly starting to regrow. “Let’s get this over with.”
I dropped the amulet into his hand, and his eyes immediately rolled back. He grit his teeth, inhaled sharply, and curled his shaking fingers around the metal. I hated to ask for it. I hated to make him hurt even more than he already was.
But when the Reaper returned, there was a good chance we were going to die. If there was anything I could do to reduce that chance, I had to do it. I wasn’t going to go down without fighting.
Part of me already felt like it was too late. Jeremiah had sent that Reaper after Leon. He intended to take Raelynn tonight, and the last sacrifice would be made. Who could stop him now? The witch and her Archdemon? Did even they stand a chance?
Maybe it was over. Maybe we were witnessing the last breaths of a world about to fall to an ancient God. Maybe the Libiri would have what they wanted after all.
But I wasn’t going to sit there and wait for death. I’d rather go out running toward it, arms open, than sit in the dark and wait to be killed.
“Here.” Zane tossed the amulet toward me, shaking his hand as if burned. “Hopefully that will work.”
I plucked up the bit of metal from the grass, now crushed small enough to fit in my shotgun. “It’ll have to work. It’s the only thing I can think of right now.”
“If the Reaper would just wait a few days to come back, we could give it a real fight,” Zane said. He was staring at his own shaking hands with complete exasperation. “So fucking weak. Now would be a really good time to…”
He stopped, his eyes fixing on something behind me. I looked back, heart pounding, ready to shoot.
But what he’d seen was a light, glowing in the upper window of the Hadleigh house. A shadow moved past the window and I frowned, but Zane was already on his feet.
“A soul,” he said. “Now would be a really good time to claim another soul.”
