Page 22 of Reaper’s Ruin (Reaper’s Ruin Trilogy #1)

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A royal dagger from the Storm Court.

The information swirled in my mind as we made our way out of the Dark Market.

None of this was making sense. Why would Storm Court royalty target a human girl and her mother in the Mortal Realm?

Were they after Soraya specifically? Or perhaps her mother or someone else had been the true target and Soraya merely collateral damage?

I glanced at her walking beside me, her face still pale from the revelation. She had enough to process without me voicing all my suspicions. The dagger was our only lead, and whether she was the primary target or not, it was a starting point.

As we navigated the thinning crowd of unsavory traders and patrons, movement caught my eye—a familiar silhouette behind the veil that separated the Shadowveil from Faelora.

I froze, instinctively positioning myself between the figure and Soraya.

He stood motionless, staring directly at me with wide, disbelieving eyes.

Even blurred behind the veil, I knew that face.

Taelon .

Fuck. We’ve been discovered.

“What is it?” Soraya asked, noticing my tension.

“Another Reaper,” I said quietly. “Behind the veil.”

I felt her press closer into my back, her hands gripping my coat as she seemed to attempt to dissolve into me. Something unfamiliar surged in my chest at her trust, at the way she sought protection from me—the very being who’d been sent to erase her from existence.

As I stared at Taelon staring back at me, I tried to read his expression.

Was he going to run back to the Veil Lords?

Tell them what I was doing and send a new Reaper for her immediately?

Was he sent to reap her? Could she even be reaped in this form?

Reapers couldn’t hurt humans, and she was technically human in this mortal shell, wasn’t she?

Or because she was dead, could a Reaper still pull her into the Shadowveil and wipe her from existence?

My mind reeled with possibilities as I stood frozen, eyes locked with his.

But then, suddenly, his shocked face broke into a stupid grin, and I realized he at least wasn’t here for her. He seemed genuinely surprised, and of course, happy, to see me.

“Is he here for me?” she whispered.

“No,” I said, fairly certain of my answer. “He’s a... colleague. Probably here for someone else.”

“Does he see us?” she whispered.

Taelon moved closer, his mouth hanging open as he studied me in my physical form.

“Oh, yes. He sees us.”

Taelon stopped in front of us, his gaze raking me up and down, brow furrowing as he tried to process why I was on the wrong side of the veil. Soraya peered out from behind me, her eyes growing wide as she looked at him, then ducking back behind me.

Taelon, his form visible but skewed behind the veil, jutted a finger in her direction. “She can see me?” he asked in amazement, his voice carrying across the veil. “How the fuck is a human seeing me right now? And how are you over there—” he gestured at my physical body, “—like that?”

“It’s complicated,” I replied, acutely aware that to everyone else in the marketplace, I appeared to be talking to empty air. “Not here. Follow me.”

I slipped an arm around Soraya’s waist, guiding her out of the Dark Market. The faster we left this place, the safer she would be. Even though word had spread not to trifle with me, the way the men still leered at her made me itch for my scythe.

Soraya kept glancing at Taelon as we headed toward the exit, her eyes still filled with concern, no doubt wondering if he was going to try to take her. But the way she kept her body pressed to my side told me she knew that I’d never let him.

As we walked up toward Centralis proper, he continued staring at us, his face a mixture of disbelief and amusement while keeping pace just behind the veil.

“This is unbelievable,” he kept saying, shaking his head. “Absolutely unbelievable.”

I ignored him, keeping up my pace until we finally stepped out from the depths of the Dark Market into fresh air. I took a deep breath, not realizing how sweet the smell of civilization could be. The sweet smell of the living world itself.

“Where are we going? I’m dying over here to hear this story,” Taelon asked as I moved us through the crowd toward a place I’d been to several times behind the veil.

“Somewhere we can talk without it looking like I’m talking to myself.” I kept my eyes ahead, and anyone here would think I was talking to Soraya. “And somewhere we can eat. I’m starving.”

“You can eat?” Taelon’s mouth unhinged as he blinked at me. “Okay. Damn. This is nuts.”

I found the tavern I was looking for in the lower district of Centralia proper, where the mix of patrons was diverse enough that no one would look too closely at us. I secured a corner booth, tucked away from curious eyes so I could talk to Taelon freely, and Soraya slid in across from me.

Taelon stood beside our table, still behind the veil that made him invisible to everyone but us.

“So,” he said, crossing his arms and leaning against the wall with a grin spreading across his face.

“Explain to me how this is happening. I’m down in the Dark Market taking out a Tide fae who wouldn’t move on, and just when I finish, I turn around and see this.

” He waved a hand up and down at my physical body.

“Want to tell me why you’re breaking every rule in existence, Death? ”

His eyes flicked to her, a smirk tipping up his lips.

A soft grumble vibrated through my chest as I shot him a warning glare not to press that angle and tease me in front of her the way I knew, without question, he was desperate to do.

Soraya looked between us with interest. “Death? Why are you calling him that?”

Taelon’s furrowed his brow. “Because that’s his name. Or at least, what everyone calls him.” Then he grinned, a slow, devious thing. “Why? Does he have a name?”

Before I could stop her, Soraya frowned slightly and answered, “His name is Rhyker.”

I lowered my head, a soft shake accompanying my sigh as I knew Taelon wouldn’t drop this anytime soon.

Taelon’s eyebrows shot up, and he let out a low whistle. “Oh shit! Death has a name!” He looked at me with renewed interest. “Eight decades I’ve known you, and I’m just now learning your actual name?”

“Why do you call him Death?” Soraya asked, leaning forward with curiosity.

“Everyone in the Shadowveil does. He’s been there for eight hundred years, centuries longer than anyone else,” Taelon explained, clearly enjoying this.

“He is Death. The other Reapers scatter when he walks by. The new ones get warned not to make eye contact. You’re sitting here with Death himself, the scariest Reaper of them all. ”

Her eyes locked on mine, full of something sharp and silent. It wasn’t fear. God help me, I almost wished it was.

I shifted uncomfortably. This conversation was straying into territory I preferred not to explore.

“Enough,” I said sharply. “We have more important matters to discuss.”

Taelon raised his hands in mock surrender, but the amusement never left his eyes. “Fine, fine. But you need to spill. What the fuck is going on? How are you in physical form? And why is she—” he nodded toward Soraya, “—able to see me?”

I hesitated, weighing how much to reveal. Taelon was one of the few Reapers who’d never shown fear of me, who’d persisted in treating me like a fellow being rather than some mythical monster. That didn’t necessarily make him trustworthy, but instinct told me he could be useful.

“She was the soul I was sent to reap,” I explained in a low voice. “But she’d only just discovered she was dead. She hadn’t had time to find her door.”

Taelon’s brow furrowed. “That doesn’t make sense. Souls get weeks, sometimes months to find peace before we’re sent for them.”

“Exactly,” I said, meeting his eyes.

Understanding dawned on his face. “So you didn’t reap her because it wouldn’t be right.”

I nodded. “Our core duty as Reapers is to reap souls who refuse to move on. This soul, Soraya, didn’t have time.

So I feel it is my duty as a Reaper to fulfill my duty in allowing her the chance to get her door.

We’re trying to figure out why she was killed, so she can find her peace.

” I didn’t add that part of me dreaded the moment she would.

“And you need to help her with this?”

I wasn’t sure how much to tell him. That she was a human from the Mortal Realm and had no idea how she’d even ended up in Faelora so she needed my help to navigate our world? No. He didn’t need to know the details.

“Why I’m helping her doesn’t matter.”

He knew me well enough not to press from the sharpness of my answer. “Okay, but why do you need to be in physical form to do that? And how are you in physical form. I had no idea this was a fucking thing! Can I do it? Is it as great as I remember?”

I ignored most of his questions, only answering with, “We believe Soraya needs to solve her murder to get her peace. We can’t do that if we can’t interact with the physical world.

We went to a sorceress who could help. She did a spell to grant us these bodies for a time so we can help Soraya find her killer, get her justice and move on. ”

Taelon’s eyes moved between us, clearly sensing there was more to the story, but he didn’t press. Instead, he scratched his chin thoughtfully. “So, what’s your next move?”

“We need to get into the Storm Court. We have reason to believe her killer came from there.”

His eyebrows shot up again. “The Storm Court? That’s... interesting. I was just there reaping a soul. People have been dropping like flies lately. Even the King got killed.”

I kept my expression neutral, but my mind raced with possibilities. Multiple deaths in the Storm Court, and Soraya connected to it somehow? It was too much of a coincidence.

“I need to get into Thunderspire Keep specifically. Take a look around,” I said. “But without my ability to shadow slice, it’s a problem. ”

“What are you looking for?” he asked.