Page 85 of Saving the World and Other Bad Ideas (Grave Concerns 3)

Instead, he gestured toward the man. “Look closer.”

I forced myself to, even though that was thelastface I wanted to see.

Then I realized…

He had no shell.

He was more translucent than Lilith, more faded, but he lacked the sharp edges just as she had.

He looped, over and over, but in all of it, I saw the same thing. Those bleeding edges, kept in place by whatever drove his echo to keep going.

“What does that mean?” I asked without looking at my father—he’d already proven that he didn’t give direct information.

Instead, I came to my own conclusion, to my own answer. It was obvious even if I struggled to make sense of it.

“She is unique,” my father repeated. “A spirit made by Lucifer himself, with a yearning for freedom that could not be trapped, even here.”

It all came together.

The reason the reapers couldn’t touch Lilith. The reason she could be here, in purgatory, when nothing else could. Lilith wasn’t alive, not anymore. How she had died, I had no idea—maybe she didn’t know either.

Lilith was a spirit stuck in purgatory, trapped in a loop of her own making, trapped by her own fears and regrets and anger, and that was one thing I had no idea how to fight…

“How can she talk to me, then? How could she have been in hell or interact with the living realm if she’s dead? I thought the spirits here were trapped here.”

“Lucifer created something powerful, something special. He gave her one thing above all others—a yearning for freedom. That yearning grew as she did, strengthened into resolve that allowed even the echo of her trapped here to crave it. She was thefirstto come here.”

The first?She had been the first person created with Adam, right? It made sense she might have been the first spirit, the first to die. “So she ended up trapped because she had unresolved issues?”

“Yes. I heard you ask your companionwhythis place exists, but he did not understand enough to answer. This place was never intended to function as a prison, to hold spirits here forever.”

I went to ask why it was happening, but before I got the question out, the answer became clear.Lilith.“She poisoned this place like she does to immortals, didn’t she?”

He nodded. “She was never intended to be here, so she has twisted our realm. It was made to be a temporary stop, a place for spirits to rest before they pass on if they are not ready. Lilith’s anger broke it, trapping all who came here in these loops. This place has become a monument to her pain.”

I tried not to, but I couldn’t help the pity that crept in.

I thought back to how Lucifer had spoken about her, reminded myself that she hadn’t been given a fair hand in life. While Lucifer may have made her to the best of his abilities, he’d created someone destined to fail at the one thing she’d been created to do.

That pity didn’t change anything, though. Istillhad to stop her somehow. It wasn’t as if I could say, ‘Oh, she’s had a fucked-up life, guess I’ll let her destroy everything.’

“It doesn’t matter what she is,” I said. “She’s still stronger than I am. Knowing she’s dead doesn’t change that I can’t beat her. I mean,you’rea full reaper who knows exactly how to use your powers, and you can’t do anything to her.”

“Exactly.”

I went still at his answer.Exactly?He sounded pompous, as if I’d just figured something out, which I hadn’t.

“Exactly what? Exactly I’m screwed? Gee, thanks,Dad.”

He shook his head. “I am a full reaper, so I can’t do anything. You, however…”

“Aren’t a full reaper.” As I finished the statement, it felt like a key that I had no idea the lock it went to. Like an answer without a question. “So what? Doesn’t that make me weaker?”

He held his hand out, but I waved mine to stop his little puppet show. “Enough with the fish-and-birds bullshit.”

He paused, then shook his head. “I forget your communication is odd. Direct.” The way he spoke said it was also not preferable. “There are times when things, on their own, are weaker than when combined. Some believe such things muddy the creation, that it dulls each, but that is not always the case. Some of the time, a mixture can be strongerbecauseof that diversity within it.Youare not wholly mortal nor wholly reaper. You are not bound by the constraints of either, but an amalgamation of both.”

“Then why is my ass being handed to me out there?” I pointed back at the where Lilith still stood, frozen in time.

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