Page 26 of Reaper's Pack

“Hello, Cleo.” Scythe on the floor and just out of reach, Hazel arranged all that black fabric around her, then looked directly into those wide, terrified eyes. “My name is Hazel.” She gestured to me with a slight nod of her chin. “And this is my friend Declan. We’re here for you.”

The floodgates opened, and little Cleo slumped into the corner, fighting against the weight of me to curl into a ball. Hazel gave her a moment to weep, then gently stroked the golden ruffles along the hem of her gown.

“Is this Belle’s dress?” she asked, a question that meant nothing to me but something to Cleo, whose sobs softened slightly. Hazel smoothed the skirt out with a laugh like silk, like the flutter of the little winged birds who inhabited our forest. “Is she your favorite princess?” When Cleo nodded mutely, Hazel sat back, her pale hands threaded together on her lap. “Mine too.”

“W-what’s happening?” Cleo had a sweet voice, just like her scent. Quiet but confident, the odd hiccup and sniffle terribly out of place.

“Your heart stopped beating, sweetheart.” Hazel picked up her scythe and planted it on the floor beside her. “It’s time to go on.”

Cleo’s dark brows furrowed as she considered my reaper’s words. Then, with a sniff, she brushed both hands over her cheeks and cleared her throat. “Did I… die?”

I studied her features intently; how wise beyond her years she appeared in just a matter of seconds. How many souls fought it—their new reality? How long did Hazel spend convincing them that they were, in fact, dead? Minutes? Hours? Days? And in that time, how many other new souls slipped into oblivion?

“Yes,” Hazel remarked. “You died.”

I admired her tone—neither pitying nor patronizing, she spoke with a gentle frankness that seemed to appease a weeping Cleo.

“We’re here to take you to the other side,” Hazel told her, “so that you don’t get lost along the way. It’s not scary… I promise.”

Given the child’s age and demeanor, the manner of her death as a withered body in a hospital bed, I had serious doubts she was bound for Hell. Instead, paradise awaited her. The thought that I—a hellhound of no importance, a runt despised by even my own mother—could help her find her way to an eternity of bliss warmed every inch of me.

“What about my mommy and daddy?” Cleo’s breath hitched as her watery eyes drifted to the doorway. The human healers had stopped pounding her chest now, yet her parents remained outside, the mother’s wails gut-wrenching. “They can’t come, can they?”

“No, but you’ll see them again,” Hazel said.

“But they can’t see me now, right?”

“No, not anymore.”

“Can I say goodbye?”

Hazel nodded, white brows twitching up as she murmured, “Of course, sweetheart.”

Gripping her scythe, Hazel rose to her feet, and I followed shortly after. Cleo sat stock-still for a moment, and then her little hand found my side. Fingers worked into my fur, and I barely felt the tug as she used me to haul herself up. Standing beside me, dwarfed by my height and the sheer volume of her princess gown, the child’s soul didn’t let go. She held tight to me, even as she started walking, and I followed at a dreadfully slow pace, one step for every four of hers.

We stopped in the doorway, Hazel bringing up the rear, and Cleo clung to me with one hand while the other reached out for the man holding her sobbing mother.

“Daddy?” Her hand slipped right through him, another curse of the celestial plane. Doors and humans, apparently, would never bar us again. Lips trembling, Cleo tried again, abandoning me for her parents. She stumbled through their bodies, then burst out into tears on the other side. I hurried after her, licking her tears and whining.

“Your parents love you very much, Cleo,” Hazel insisted, seeming to float through the crowd of humans to join us. She crouched in front of the weeping soul, taking a moment to smooth a stray black curl away from Cleo’s tearstained face. “They will miss you for the rest of their lives, but one day, they will stop crying. They’ll remember the good, the sound of your laugh, the way you looked in your flower girl dress and shouted fuck at your aunt’s wedding, in front of the whole church. They will think only of the good times, not the bad. And they will heal. It will take time, but they will. I promise you that too.”

Behind us, the humans drifted into Cleo’s hospital room, and it was written all over her face—she longed to follow them.

“I don’t want to go,” the child whispered, staring forlornly at her parents’ retreating forms. Her chin quivered for a moment before she dissolved into a mess of tears again, but before I could lick them away, Hazel planted her scythe firmly to the floor, then swept the soul into a hug. From the way she cradled Cleo’s head, her eyes closed, her brow furrowed, she cared. This wasn’t just about collecting a new soul and taking it to Purgatory for Hazel; any simpleton could see that.

And it made me feel for her more than I already did.

Which, if Knox and Gunnar found out, would be a problem.

For now, I basked in it—the heady affection in my heart, the closeness we shared to soothe a broken girl.

“You’re so brave, Cleo,” Hazel murmured into her hair, totally focused on the soul, her gaze never once straying to me. “Braver than so many grown-ups out there. And you know who is waiting for you on the other side?” She eased away and wiped the soul’s damp cheeks with her thumbs. “Grandpa’s waiting, and he’ll make sure you find your way too.”

Cleo managed a sniffle and a nod and nothing more.

“Would you like me to carry you, sweetheart?” Hazel asked, lightly gripping her scythe. Anticipation prickled through me; I’d never seen Purgatory before, only heard the stories. Normally every new setting scared the absolute shit out of me, but from what others had said, Purgatory was just… nothingness.

Hard to be terrified of nothingness.

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