BLYTHE HAWTHORNE HAD BESTED FATE FOUR SEPARATE TIMES.
Signa allowed Death to grab hold of her, dragging her to the opposite side of the room as Fate clutched his left hand to his chest, a glowing band igniting upon his ring finger. Blythe wore a matching one that she paid little mind to as a thread shone bright between them, binding them.
“We have to help her,” Signa whispered as Fate crossed toward Blythe in three long strides, looking poised to wrap his hands around her throat. And yet Death held Signa tight.
He made an oath with you. Death’s voice was lighter than she’d heard in ages. For as long as he lives, he cannot bring harm upon Blythe Hawthorne.
Only then did Signa’s body ease, tears of relief spilling from her even as Fate closed the space between himself and Blythe.
“You have no idea what you’ve just done,” he snarled, poised to kill.
Blythe did not back away, but instead pressed against his chest as she tipped her head to sneer at him. “On the contrary, I believe I’ve just fulfilled an oath. Are you not proud of your wife’s cleverness?”
Fate’s nostrils flared. “You are not my wife.”
“I believe this says otherwise.” She held up her finger, wiggling it. Fate looked as though he were seeing red. He pushed from her and whirled toward Death and Signa. Death had his shadows around her in a second, shielding her, but there was no need. It wasn’t Signa that Fate looked to with murder in his eyes, but Death. Fate’s golden eyes glinted, the barely visible threads around him shifting. Whatever he tried, however, didn’t work. The golden band of light on his finger flared bright and he gasped,
the vein in his neck bulging as he doubled over and clutched his hand tight.
Blythe’s footsteps were as light as a dancer’s as she closed the space between them and wound her fingers into his blond hair. She bent toward his ear, speaking the words as softly as a lover, “I want my father freed this afternoon.”
When Fate laughed, the sound was manic. “You’re going to regret this.” There was no masking his rage. His sorrow. Yet Signa could not pity him. He had laid this trap; he shouldn’t have been surprised to have ended up caught in it.
Just like during their game of croquet, he should have known better than to underestimate Blythe. They all should have.
“Don’t worry, darling.” Blythe laid a kiss upon his cheek, leaving a press of rouge. “You’ll have the rest of your life to make it up to me.”
Never had Signa seen such anger. Such a promise of destruction in one’s eyes as she did when Fate turned, storming into the threads of light that disappeared his body within seconds. To where, Signa didn’t care to know.
With only the three of them left, the parlor fell silent. Signa couldn’t say whether seconds or minutes passed before Blythe sighed and perched herself on the edge of a leather chair, inspecting the band around her finger.
“Is it horribly noticeable?”
Signa took her first breath in who knew how long. She hadn’t realized how tight her body had become, chest so constricted that it felt on the verge of collapsing. Peeling from Death’s grip, she moved toward Blythe for a closer inspection.
“No, actually.” Signa’s words were loosened with a breath. The band on Blythe’s finger was cleverly masked—little more than a dim shimmer one had to squint to see, like white ink on fair skin. It reminded Signa vaguely of a scar, and she clutched her chest when it became even tighter with guilt. “I was going to take care of this, Blythe. You never should have gotten
involved.”
Blythe dropped her hand, inspecting Signa now. “And yet I did.” And yet she did.
Signa stared at her cousin, uncertain whether she was meant to shake her or hug her or tell her how much of a fool she’d been to make a bargain with someone as powerful as Fate. Though Blythe must have had some sense of the power he wielded, not even Signa knew the extent of it.
“He is Fate.” Signa kept her voice soft, desperate to know that her cousin understood the gravity of her situation. “You cannot break an oath with him.”
“Why not?” Blythe sat straighter, calm as she looked at Signa. “Have I not bested him before?”
Death and Signa shared a look as she wondered whether Blythe had any idea just how true that was.
“Regardless, I’m not certain I’d want to break it.” Blythe hopped down from the chair, and before Signa could ask what she meant, said, “There are no false pretenses between us. I may live my life however I’d like, and all pressure of courting will be gone. Everyone will even believe I’m a princess.” Blythe may have dazzled with her smile, yet the corners of it wavered. Still, she reached to take hold of Signa’s hand with the same softness she’d shown earlier.
“Don’t worry about me. I appreciate you being so willing to save my father, but I’ll take it from here.” Signa’s chest nearly broke when Blythe placed a gentle kiss on her hand.
“After all that I did,” Signa whispered, “why would you help me?”
“Because you were willing to help me.” The answer came too easily, in a voice that was too light. “You deserve to live, too, Signa. I may not understand everything, but I know Percy was the reason I was dying. I know that you saved me from him.”
The unexpected words brought immediate tears to Signa’s eyes and had her stomach so sick that she bowed at the waist. She hugged herself tight, trying to keep herself together.
“You were never supposed to find out.”
“I know,” Blythe whispered. “But I needed to. Now, leave it to me to take care of Byron and the others. It’s time that I go pack. I don’t want my father coming home to an empty house.”
Elijah, home. Never had there been words more magnificent.
“I’ll be on a train first thing tomorrow morning,” Signa said, only to stumble over herself as she realized her misstep. “I mean… if that’s all right with you.”
Blythe’s smile was like birdsong on a warm spring day. “It is,” she whispered, and Signa’s heart softened when Blythe squeezed her hand once more. “I’m sure my father would want you there, too.”
Death had given them some space after Fate had left, but he slowly drew back to Signa’s side. He pressed a kiss onto the top of her head, and Signa nearly wept when it didn’t steal her breath or still her heart. She eased into Death’s arms as Blythe started toward the door. At the threshold, however, Blythe turned to look back not at her cousin but at Death, whose shadows had slipped from him.
He didn’t notice at first because it was impossible. A fluke. And yet he stilled as Blythe continued to stare, observing his human form with narrowed interest.
“Take care of her.” Blythe’s words were not a kindness, but a threat. “My cousin seems to see the good in you, and I’ll trust her judgment. But if you so much as bring a single tear to her eye, I’ll have your head on a pike. Do you understand me?”
Both Signa and Death were at a loss for words as they stared at Blythe’s retreating figure. They listened to the soft clacking of her boots against the stairs before they turned to each other, and Signa could not help herself as her sob gave way to laughter.
They had won. They’d conquered Fate. They’d saved Elijah, her relationship with Blythe was on the mend, and now Signa could see Death. She could hold him.
“Blythe can see you.”
“A side effect from nearly dying, perhaps,” Death said, though he sounded distant as he continued to stare at the door. It took Signa laughing again and cupping his face in her bare hands to steal his attention, which he was more than happy to offer as he bent to her touch.
“You’re so warm,” he whispered, “I can feel it.” The crack in his voice was enough for the emotion to swell within her once more. Signa threw her arms around him, kissing him through hot, happy tears. She wound her legs around him as Death all but tackled her to the ground, squeezing her tight. Signa savored each one of her breaths as she tucked herself against his chest. They had won, and for the rest of their eternity she would never let go.
“So I take it that you’re staying, then?” Tilly stood at the edge of the parlor, her head poking inside. The disappointment in her voice had Signa cackling as she clasped Death’s hand in hers and raised it toward the spirit.
“Yes, I’m afraid we are.”
The other two spirits approached then, timid as they glanced around the room. Eventually Tilly’s mother, Victoria, looked to Signa with a disapproving pucker of her lips. “We would appreciate if you at least kept better company. The man was far too bright for my taste.”
“There was another who glowed, too, just like the lady’s maid,” Tilly added, voice conspiratorial. “I do wish you’d stop bringing them. The light is bothersome on my eyes.”
Signa felt her grin slip. “There was someone else with a glow? Who was it?”
“She’s asleep upstairs now.” Oliver was once again trying to wipe away the smudge he could never seem to clean from his glasses. “The one everyone’s making such a fuss about.”
“As they should!” Victoria piped. “She’s pregnant and unmarried! They were up all night scheming up ways to conceal it. How tasteless it is to—”
“They speak of Eliza,” Signa interrupted, ignoring Victoria’s huffing as she spun toward Death, who didn’t look nearly as concerned as she felt.
“You healed her, Signa.” He tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, no longer silver. “Perhaps the glow is a side effect of that.”
“Perhaps,” she echoed, though the words didn’t sit right in her gut. “But I’ve never done anything for Elaine.”
It was then that her eye caught sight of something behind Death. Or rather a lack of something. Signa’s spine went rigid as she looked to where the tapestry had once lain. Blythe had torn open her palm in that spot, and yet despite all the blood she’d spilled, there was not a drop of it on the wood.
Cold dread swept over Signa as she thought to the ring of light Blythe had showed her, upon the finger of an unblemished hand.
“Death,” Signa spoke his name slowly, testing each word before allowing it into existence. “Amity once asked me whether there was a constant to Life’s magic. Something present whenever I used it.” From the vines in Elijah’s study, to the foal in the stables, and again with Eliza… Blythe had been a constant. “What if it’s not me who caused that glow?” She picked up the poker Blythe had slashed her hand on—uncomfortably warm from being near the hearth—only to find that there wasn’t a speck of blood upon it. Death took it from her, and the moment the iron fell upon his fingers he jolted back, dropping it with a clang.
He clutched his hand to his chest as the skin hissed and smoked, shadows swathing over it. Immediately Death crouched for a better look at the poker, and though there was a long moment in which he wore no expression, in the end his face broke into the most joyous laughter Signa had ever heard as tears rolled over his beaming cheeks.
“You found her.” He scooped up the poker once more, laughing as it sizzled against his palm. With his free hand he grabbed Signa, pulling her into his embrace. His tears were cold as they fell onto her shoulder, his voice soft as snowfall as he whispered, “After all these years, you truly found her. It would seem, Little Bird, that fate always has a way of working itself out in the end.”
Signa’s body numbed with disbelief, her mind a whirlwind of thoughts.
It couldn’t be true… and yet it was the only explanation that made sense.
Signa had seen Life’s memories, but every time they came to her, Blythe had been there. The realization brought such a great relief that Signa had no words.
This was why her body burned, and why she had such trouble accessing those powers. They’d never belonged to her, but to Blythe.
Blythe was the reincarnation of Life.
“Do we tell her?” Signa whispered as she stared at the poker, unsure what to feel. For as much as she could understand Fate, Signa hated him for what he’d tried to do. But if Fate were to find out who Blythe truly was…
“No.” There wasn’t an ounce of hesitation in Death’s words. He squeezed Signa close, pressing a kiss against her temple with no care for the spirits who stirred uncomfortably behind them. “Let them figure it out on their own time. Theirs is a story in which we should not interfere.”
Signa wasn’t certain she agreed. Part of her wanted little more than to hurry up the stairs and tell Blythe then and there. But Death’s joy kept her in place, wound tight in his arms.
Perhaps she would tell Blythe soon. For now though, she would trust that Death knew what he was saying.
“They may try to kill each other,” Signa noted, though her voice held no argument.
“You once tried to kill me, and look where that got us.” Death’s eyes beamed brighter than ever as he rose to his feet and pulled her up alongside him.
“Now, Little Bird, why don’t you show me around this house of ours?” He offered his hand, and with a heart so full it could burst, Signa took it.
