Page 17 of Haunted Hearts

The fading sunlight that has been filtering into the house blinks out, casting the room in darkness. Around us, the air grows cold, causing the windows to freeze over, and mist forms around my mouth. My heart races as the hairs on the back of my neck begin to rise. I know what’s about to happen now, or ratherwho’sabout to show up. There’s no reason to be scared of Death, right?

Brock steps away from the door as he opens it. Going down to one knee, the reaper kneels for the entity standing there in the doorway. Still dressed in his dark robe, Death is every bit as terrifying as the last two times I’d seen him. Would my terror ever lessen around this guy?

“Death, welcome,” Brock greets, coming to his feet and stepping back for Willow’s father to enter.

Scrambling to get to my feet too, I nearly trip over myself. Viktor’s hand lands on my shoulder to steady me, as he too, rises.

Where. Is. She?

Death doesn’t yell. He doesn’t need to. The barely contained rage wrapped around all three words is enough to splinter my resolve not to fear Willow’s father. Sweat beads my brow as fear chokes me.

“Resting in my room,” Brock answers quickly. He turns and leads Death to the back of the house. The moment they enter the bedroom, I let out a soft sigh of relief and look back at the others. We all exchange looks.

“Do you think he can help her?” Kwil whispers.

None of us answer him.

A moment later, Death reappears, Willow still wrapped in Brock’s sheet, cradled in his arms. Behind him, Brock looks worried. If the reaper is worried, then I feel like I should be too. Against every instinct in my body, I take a shaky step towards Death as he approaches. Before I can ask about what he can do for his daughter, he turns his hooded head towards us.

All five of you are coming with me. Let’s go.

There’s no room for arguing. As he steps out of the house, Brock follows and I’m right on his heels with the others in tow.

“Where are we going?” Theo asks.

Death ignores him. Without having to call upon a scythe or wave his hands, a ripple like the one Brock created, opens up. Death steps in and disappears from sight. Brock steps to the side and turns to us.

“I’ll make sure you all make it through,” he offers.

I don’t hesitate. If I think too much about this mode of transportation, I’ll chicken out. Jogging up to the moving air, I plunge forward, not caring where we’re heading.

As long as Willow’s there, it doesn’t matter where I end up.

Chapter7

WILLOW

Iam everywhere.

I’m floating high above the realm, weightless, bound by nothing. My essence is stretched across time and space. I can see everything below. The different terrains, weather, clusters of the structures that inhabitants of this realm reside in. There are rivers, both long and short, winding and straight, that split through territories. Bodies of water stretching as far as the eye can see glitter in the moonlight which changes to sunlight before my eyes.

No, not eyes.

I have no eyes. I have nothing. Iamnothing. The thought is terrifying. I am and I am not. I’m here, but I am also there. I’m within the homes of a young family telling stories by a fire. But I’m also the spirit of a doe being torn apart by a creature I’ve never seen before. I’m a fish swimming in the depth of an ocean and I am a hiker climbing up a mountain.

I am everywhere.

But I don’t want to be here, where everything is happening, and where no one can see me. I want to be whole andmeagain.

As if the universe has heard my prayer, I suddenly am.

I stand before a handsome, ageless man with dark, flawless skin and the warmest brown eyes I’ve ever seen, and who owns a soft smile that causes my heart to skip a beat.

“Let me help you.” When he speaks, my heart takes off, fluttering wildly.

But then the world goes black. It has been so dark and quiet that I’m afraid I amnowhere. I stay, stuck in that nothingness, for a long time. I wonder if this is hell, or purgatory. Will this lonely, frightening existence be my fate forever?

I’m not sure when it happens, but somehow there is a shift, and I’m something once more, and I am everywhere. My relief is brief and quickly snuffed out. Because I don’t want to be everywhere, and I don’t want to be nowhere either. Why can’t I just be me and with the people I care for? Here, in this frightening state, I am alone. So very alone.

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