A sigh, then; a rustle of wind in barren branches.You do not have much longer to stop it, you realize. This tree dies by the minute, winter flower. I do not know whether you will fade or it will, but either way, you cannot hold me back for long.
“I will do what must be done,” Azaiah said, swallowing past a lump in his throat. “I have found the one who will carry this when I have gone into the river.”
For your successor to carry the scythe, my foolish flower, you must be willing to give it up. Givehimup. Inasmuch as he has not enough fire in his soul to summon a glimmer of you anymore, I do not know why you haven’t already.
Azaiah didn’t know, either.
“There are others I love,” he said to the tree, fingers rubbing over the rough bark. “My siblings. I would not want them to end, just because I have.”
They need not,the voice murmured, seductive.Here you have a choice, my captain. You board your own boat for the distant shore, or I take them in the flood I will bring upon the world. Will you give up your Nyx, then, for them?
“Yes,” whispered Azaiah, though it felt like a lie.
Hisothermust have thought that, too, for there was a chill in the wind, like something spectral was laughing at him.Then why haven’t you? Why wait for the last blossom to fade? The world trembles in your hands. That is what you feel on the wind. You are meant to bond with a companion, to walk with them. Instead, you are dooming the world because you cannot have the one you want.
“That isn’t—” Azaiah shook his head, frustrated, but he feared it was the truth. He was taking a huge risk, waiting for a man whom he hadn’t seen in centuries. A man who hadn’t loved him enough to stay with him when he could have.
Only let me have control, and when I take his soul, when his eyes fill with the water of my final flood, I might let you see him.
What did it say about Azaiah, that he was tempted?
Everything dies, in the end,Death whispered, sly and seductive.You cannot hold back the storm forever, my boatman.
“Not forever,” Azaiah whispered, looking at the tree. As he stood there, as the wind from the coming storm picked up, dead leaves fell around him. “Just a little longer.”
There were no more whispered comments from his dark mirror, nothing but the sound of thunder… and the rain that mixed with the tears on Azaiah’s face as he wept not for the life he’d lost here millennia ago but the one he now promised to give up. The tree might be Azaiah, but the leaves and the blossoms were Nyx, and neither could exist without the other.
A mighty wind sent a tumble of leaves down around him, catching in his hair, taking his breath as he stared up with bated breath. That branch with its few leaves was something, but what did it matter? The rot would reach it, and then it would be over. Azaiah wanted to stay, wanted to be here when the final red blossom fell and he knew for certain Nyx had gone too far into Death’s domain to ever be his.
That certainty would come with rain, the kind that wouldn’t stop, and Azaiah knew what must be done. He had to make Aleks ready, pass along the scythe, accept that he would have to go before Nyx. Though everything in him rebelled at giving up, even centuries after that terrible moment in the Palace of the Moon, the world did not deserve to end for one man and the god who could not hold him.
Azaiah straightened and drew his cowl up over his hair. He nodded at the tree. “I will see to my successor, bid my siblings farewell, and I will return. I will scale this tree like the girl who fell and broke my successor’s heart, I will kiss the last flower, and I will go across the river. The rain will not take the world. It will not take me.”
He would give this up to keep the world safe. In the end, it was all he could think to do. He had been chosen long ago, in this very spot, to serve the Harvester. He had done so with compassion and care, and while he might have been the most beautiful of the winter flowers that once grew here… even the fairest of them faded in time.
Azaiah walked on, face wet with tears and rain, and behind him the tree died by the second, leaves falling soundless to the ground below.
* * *
Glaive sat in a quiet bar in the tunnels of the Misthotoi, looking down at his drink. He’d been there for two hours. The first time he’d seen the bar, it had been brand new, freshly carved into the stone, but now most mercenaries ignored it for the brick tavern just over the foothills. It was easy to get a table to himself, which gave him plenty of time to curse every god he’d ever heard of.
Ranger was back. Glaive had seen him often enough over the years, a rising star in the Misthotoi, the only one who could finish his apprenticeship with Glaive without running home. He had a nice string of beads to represent his contracts, and he’d come into his own. But he still blushed like a fool every time he saw Glaive across the room. Today, he’d had a young man with him who looked tired and happy in a bewildered way, like a kicked dog who wasn’t sure he was allowed to do more than fawn. They’d kept bumping shoulders and glancing at each other, two puppies in love, and Glaive had almost offered Ranger a beer to celebrate before he saw his latest assignment.
Marius Chastain was wanted by a number of very wealthy men in Duciel who’d paid handsomely for Glaive to make him suffer. One of them even wanted a piece of bone—nobles always found a way to make a bad situation worse. But while on any ordinary day Glaive would have gritted his teeth and done the job, seeing Marius give Ranger those woeful, affectionate looks in the mail room had been enough to sour Glaive’s mood.
So he’d asked Ranger to meet him for a beer. But there wasn’t anything celebratory about it.
Ranger appeared looking like he’d descended from a cloud, grinning and bright, and Glaive grimaced into his drink. This was going to hurt.
“You fucked him,” he said as Ranger slid into his seat. Ranger looked wounded, and Glaive cursed internally. The fool was in love. Young love, maybe, but he’d gone and found the one partner he couldn’t have, and it might break him. Ranger tried to brush it off, keeping things light, but Glaive interrupted him.
“I always forget how much stock people put into that,” he said, keeping his words short, his tone harsh. If he hurt Ranger now, maybe Ranger would call it off with Marius, find someone new. “Fucking. Anyway, you should toss this one over. It’ll make it easier for you.”
If Ranger didn’t really care for Marius—if he saw him as a fling, nothing more—then he’d laugh it off. But he didn’t, and Glaive’s stomach sank when Ranger went tense. “Don’t think that’s your business, actually.”
“I’m phrasing this wrong.” Glaive wondered what it would have taken for it not to hurt, when he was Nyx and Tyr was heading off to his final battle. If anything would have made his loss sting less. “All right. I know you think you’re in love. I’ve seen it more than you know. It happens. For you, it was inevitable. You always were too soft on people. I’m not saying that’s bad. Human lives are too short to hold back, most of the time. I get that.” He leaned forward. He didn’t tell the truth easily, not the whole of it, and this came dangerously close. “But I like you, Red.”You remind me of Tyr. You remind me of Nyx, gods save him, that poor fool.“So I’m warning you. Walk away from him while you can.”
He knew before Ranger replied that he wouldn’t. Nyx wouldn’t have. He hadn’t, had he, when he was torn between the children he’d practically raised and the man he loved? He’d made the hard decision—possibly the right decision—until he’d forgotten what was right and tossed it all away.
