I try to shove past them, but the moment I take a step towards one of the skeletons, the entire group shifts in the same direction, maintaining a three-foot boundary around me as best they can. It puts them frustratingly out of reach.
I try again, stalking towards another skeleton on the opposite side of the circle, and again, the same result. I blow out a breath before I wonder: what would happen if I ignored the skeletons altogether and approached one of the revenants fighting outside of the circle?
I spot one charging towards Pestilence, and I move to cut the creature off. The skeletons move with me, but once I reach the charging undead, my guards stop moving forward, preventing me from getting any closer to the creature.
I swipe at the putrid corpse beyond the skeletons. My dagger sinks into the woman’s mottled skin, but it doesn’t do much, not with a skeleton between the two of us. So, withdrawing my blade, I close my fist around my weapon’s handle and punch the skeleton in front of me right in the skull. It jerks back, smashing into the rotting corpse and throwing both revenants off balance.
The fresher corpse falls to the ground, and moving over to it, I put a boot on the undead woman’s chest and slice her arms off at the joints, trying not to gag at the awful smell of her or the fact that she was once a human. I remove her legs the same way, only pausing to turn aside and retch when the sights and sounds and smells overwhelm me.
I’m not a monster, I chant to myself. Because dead or not, this feels monstrous.
Already, my skeletal bodyguards have reformed around me, but it makes no difference because I can suddenly fight again.
More revenants pour in by the second, and it seems to be taking everything to keep them at bay.
“Famine!” War shouts, slicing through more undead as he speaks. “Forget the revenants!”
At that, the Reaper seems to go still, a disbelieving look on his face. “Are you mad?” he bellows back.
“I may be mortal, but I am still a warlord and you will heed my command. Stop using your powers against the revenants and make a barrier around both you and Pestilence strong and tight enough to keep the undead out.”
No sooner has War spoken than two separate circles of trees rise from the ground. Each tree trunk is so close to the next that not even the smallest revenants could hope to get through. The circles of trees close in around Famine and Pestilence.
“What about you and Lazarus?” the Reaper says, for once not bickering with his brother.
“Lazarus doesn’t need protection. Death wouldn’t dare harm her.”
The Reaper’s eyes flick to me before returning to War. “And you?” he asks.
“One of us still needs to move around freely,” War says, even as he slices through a row of incoming corpses.
“Now, my brother,” War continues, “use everything in your power to get our brother out of the sky.”
My heart is hammering.
“Pestilence,” he calls out, “get your bow ready—once Famine brings Death low enough, I want you to shoot him.”
“Lazarus,” he says, cutting through a few more undead before he looks at me, “once Death’s out of the sky, if he’s not yet dead, you will be the one who must kill him.”
I blanche.
War must see my expression because he adds, “You’re the only one who can get close enough.”
I have killed Death many times, but that was when I didn’t love the horseman.
I do now.
“I don’t know if I can,” I whisper, my voice hoarse.
“Then we’re all doomed.” War’s eyes are hard. It’s the voice of a general, one who knows there’s no room for compassion on the battlefield, not when your enemy has none to offer.
But Death isn’t my enemy, and what he’s doing might be both misguided and wrong, but I don’t know that it’s evil. To be honest, I’m not really sure what evil is anymore.
Do this for Ben and everyone else who hasn’t yet lost their lives.
I breathe in hard through my nostrils, then nod, mostly to convince myself.
War holds my gaze with his shrewd one, and I feel like subliminally he’s saying, We all must make sacrifices. This is yours.
I realize then what he’s not saying—that while Famine and Pestilence are working to bring Death down from the sky, and while I’ll be priming to kill the un-killable horseman, War—mortal War—will be taking on the revenants alone.
He’s not going to survive this.
That’s why he’s giving me the intense look.
I draw in a deep breath. “I will do it,” I say. And I mean it, even if it means breaking my heart in the process.
Slowly, War nods. “Good.”
Still staring at me, he calls out, “Famine, Pestilence, Lazarus—it’s been an honor fighting at your sides. It will be an honor dying at them too. Let’s make it worth it.”
“Aww, don’t get emotional on us now,” Famine quips, but the set of his mouth is all wrong and his sharp eyes glisten.
“An honor,” Pestilence says, nodding to War.
I know nothing about honor and this whole glorious death business. Life still stretches out in front of me, vast and unfathomable and frightening.
But as the undead rush towards the horseman, I have to face all of it, just the same. I slash and kick and sometimes, when my guards get in the way, I shatter bone. My breath comes in pants as I try to be everywhere at once.
War is doing his best to aid his brothers, dragging the undead off of Famine’s makeshift cages as well as grabbing the last of Pestilence’s arrows and slipping them in to the horseman. While he does that, I shadow him, cutting down the creatures that are trying to break the warlord’s bones and tear his flesh.
Above us, clouds gather and the air shifts. A heavy drop of rain hits my head, then another and another. It begins to pelt down on us, washing away the grime but also making the revenants that much more … gooey.
Lightning flashes, and I draw my gaze up just as the bolt strikes Thanatos. His back arches a little as electricity courses through him, and my throat closes up at the sight. Another bolt drives down into Death. He hasn’t recovered from this one before a third slams into him. Famine strikes Thanatos again and again. With each hit, the horseman drops several feet before regaining his composure.
Do I feel bad that my true love is being roasted to death by supernatural bolts of lightning? Yes. Do I think he deserves it for being a bastard and forcing Judgment Day on everyone?
Also yes.
“Can’t steal souls now, brother, can you?” the Reaper taunts.
“That’s it, Famine!” Pestilence encourages, nocking an arrow into his bow while War slices through the revenants climbing up Pestilence’s cage.
Pestilence aims his bow, and for an instant, I stop fighting, just to watch. I can’t say what I feel. My emotions are in tangles. I want War’s plan to work; I’m also dreading that it will.
Pestilence releases his arrow, the projectile arcing towards Thanatos. Just as it closes in on Death, a gust of wind blows it asunder.
Of course, I forgot about this.
Pestilence curses, then pulls out another, aiming it then letting it fly. It too is blown off course at the last moment.
“I need some help with the wind!” Pestilence shouts.
“I’m a bit busy roasting this motherfucker!” Famine shouts back.
I resume smashing the bones of my captors and slicing off limbs of the undead, but it’s slow, aggravating work.
How many minutes do we have left before Death’s power reaches Ben and the others? I’m moving in a frenzy now, panicked by the thought that so much time has already passed, and yet our efforts haven’t gotten us very far.
Pestilence begins to aim not just at Death but around him too in the hopes that something might just get by the winged horseman and land where it needs to.
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
The rain has stopped, but the lightning hasn’t. Bolt after bolt strikes Thanatos, the onslaught so
intense that the skeletal mantel that overlays Death’s face and body looks permanent. His back is arched, his wingbeats a bit erratic. Beneath the skull that shrouds his face, I can see that he’s grimacing. Shared power or not, this is doing something to him.
Near me, War is shouting a battle cry while he fights. He slices into the dead two and three at a time. The bodies are piling up around us, but every second, more are coming.
“I’m down to my last sheaf of arrows!” Pestilence calls out.
I glance up at Death just as, at last, he folds his wings and falls.
For an instant, the lightning stops as he hits the wall of foliage about a hundred feet from us.
My ears ring in the sudden silence.
The revenants are still coming and still attacking, but Thanatos lays slumped in the branches, his wings laying funny.
I take a faltering step towards him, my heart thumping madly.
There is no relief or victory in this. I should be pleased, but all I feel is panic at his state, and grief over the situation.
I slice through more revenants, my gaze locked on my horseman.
As he lays there, the plants around him seem to wither away to dust, the dead caught in their clutches free once more. Death falls to the debris-strewn highway.
War bellows, dragging my attention away from Death. Two undead are grasping the warlord’s sword arm, and the arm itself is bent at a funny angle. Broken.
War tosses his sword into his other hand and begins swinging the blade like it makes no difference. Still, my stomach drops. It’s clear enough that he can no longer fight at full strength, and already revenants were swarming him faster than he could kill them off.
War glances at me, and nods.
Fuck, this is where I come into play.
I grip my dagger tighter, my earlier nausea rising once more.
I take a tentative step, then another, bracing myself for what I must do.
I can make Death’s end swift. It won’t be forever. He put his duty towards God above me; I can put my duty towards humanity above him.
Still, it feels wrong, every agonizing step I take.
Around us, Los Angeles no longer resembles itself. The buildings have all come down, and mountains of rubble sit in their place. The dead are moving over that rubble, and there are so many of them.
They’re all headed this way.
I’m nearly halfway to Death when one of his wings twitch.
Seconds later, Famine’s lightning bolts are back.
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
They slam into Death, the force of them so intense, I lose my footing and fall into a pile of squirming limbs.
The smell, the texture, and the movement, all of it is too much. I turn to the side and retch, though nothing comes out. My stomach has already given up all its contents.
“Lazarus!” War bellows. “Now!”
I glance up at Death, breathing heavily. He’s only fifty feet from me, but it feels like an ocean separates us.
I force myself to my feet, even as my legs quiver. Lightning continues to strike Thanatos, but as I watch, the horseman’s wings move some more, and I can’t be sure, but I don’t think it’s a reflexive movement brought on by the lightning.
Then, Death’s arms move beneath him, and that’s definitely not reflexive.
I slog through twisting corpses, my skeletal guards moving with me.
Death gets a leg under his body, then pushes himself up as lightning continues to strike him. It’s hard to see around the skeletal mantel overlaying him, but I think his dark eyes glint with fury as he stares down Famine.
He reaches out, his fingers looking half like bones, half like the flesh they are.
Abruptly, the lightning halts. I glance back at Famine in time to see him stumble into the living bars of his cage, his eyes and cheeks sunken in.
Pestilence fires off an arrow, which embeds itself into one of Death’s wings, then another that impales him right through his throat.
Thanatos reaches behind his head and drags the arrow out from the back of his neck, his wound healing right before my eyes.
“Death!” I shout at him, stepping over another body.
But he’s still focused on Pestilence, who’s now raining arrows down on him. The wind kicks up around Thanatos, knocking the projectiles away.
Hurry, I tell myself, quickening my pace as I stumble over wriggling human remains.
There’s only twenty feet between me and Death now. Twenty feet of carnage.
Pestilence makes a choking sound, and his back arches. His bow slips from his grip as he falls to his knees. His quiver and the few precious arrows clatter to the ground, and as I watch, the horseman, the very one who took my parents so long ago, now withers before my eyes.
Panic courses through me.
“Stop.” The word comes out as a whisper as I begin to run towards Death. “Stop!” I call out again, louder.
But War’s roar eclipses my words. I turn in time to see that he’s fallen to his knees. I can barely make him out from the mountain of revenants closing in on him. He reaches for one of the daggers sheathed across his chest, his sword nowhere in sight.
War pushes the corpses aside long enough to throw a needle thin knife at Death. The blade makes a hissing noise as it spins through the air. But Thanatos knocks it away with that strange wind just as easily as he had Pestilence’s arrows. War throws another and another.
As he reaches for a fourth blade, I see a glint of metal just as a revenant shoves it forward, into War’s abdomen. The horseman bellows again, and I realize, finally what’s happening.
The undead got his sword, and now they’re killing him with it.
But Thanatos isn’t done with this brother of his either. The warlord is still trying to reach for another weapon when his cheeks hollow out and his skin sags.
All three brothers wither away, succumbing to whatever dark power Death wields over them.
I face Thanatos once more, and now I’m sprinting forward, leaping over bodies and broken asphalt, my skeletal bodyguards keeping formation around me.
“Stop!” It’s a ragged, agonized scream.
Death moves his hand towards me, his eyes unfocused, and for one haunting moment, I think he’s going to do to me what he’s done to his brothers. Instead, the ground cracks and a tangle of foliage rises up, creating a cage eerily similar to the ones around the other two horsemen.
“Thanatos!” I shout, trying to scramble out of the rising cage. One of the skeletons surrounding me shoves me back into it while it finishes forming, branches weaving together. “Why are you doing this?”
For a moment, Death’s eyes sharpen, and he looks agonized. Then his attention returns to his brothers, and he’s cold and unforgiving once more.
My living cage continues to grow and twine around itself. Once it’s filled out, the skeletons that have served me for weeks clatter to the ground, nothing but bones once more. A moment later, the other undead follow, their rotted bodies making wet sounds as they hit the ground.
In their wake, the silence is deafening.
Around me, the other horsemen lay dying. There’s no more lightning, no more arrows, no more knives. I see kind Pestilence, and fierce War, and mercurial Famine twisting on the ground, their bodies aging before my eyes.
“You’re killing them!” I shout. Two tears slip off my cheeks. When did I start crying?
“They cannot truly die, Lazarus,” Death says, his voice emotionless. “None of us can.”
Using my dagger, I saw at one of the trees, but with every passing second, its trunk seems to thicken. I give up cutting it down and start to climb up it. I slip over and over again as I climb, and when I finally do get to the top, the plants are woven inward, amongst themselves, creating a domed ceiling of sorts that is frustratingly impenetrable.
I still saw at it with my blade, my heart beating frantically.
Faster, faster.
There can’t be much time left.
; My dagger slides from my slick palms, and I make the mistake of reaching for it. That knee-jerk reaction throws me off-balance, and I lose my grip. I slip, then fall to the ground, a groan slipping out as I land hard on my back.
I roll to my side, my body feeling brittle and bruised. Through my makeshift cage, I catch sight of Famine’s own enclosure. It’s no longer needed, now that the revenants have fallen back. Inside it, the Reaper lies curled up in a fetal position, his caramel-colored hair hanging lank about him. His skin has taken on a grayish hue, and it sags from his bones. One of his hands is pressed to his chest, and his face is set in a grimace.
A small sound slips from my lips at the sight of the once fearsome man brought to the brink of death.
At the sound, Famine eyes snap open, and they find mine. The terrible, moody horseman and I share a long look.
Finish this, his eyes seem to say.
Famine reaches out a hand towards the plants that imprison me, his arm shaking. The trees caging me in part just enough for me to pass through.
Famine lowers his arm, giving me a slight nod—one that I return to him.
Grabbing my dagger, I force myself to my feet and lunge free of the enclosure.
Death begins to turn to me when Famine calls out, “You fucking fool!” His voice is weak despite the fact that I think he’s trying to shout. “You held the entire world in your arms and you squandered it for what? This?” He gives a hollow laugh that turns into a cough. “You can rot for eternity, Thanatos. You’ll regret this moment until the end of your shitty existence.”
Eerily slow, Death turns to him. He looks mythical, his silver armor unblemished, his dark wings looming behind him.
Famine bought me this moment. Silently, I move towards Thanatos. Right now, Death has eyes only for Famine.
Thanatos takes a step forward, his boot crunching over bone, his wings dragging through the rot on the ground.
“You wanted your mortality, brother?” Death says. “You have earned it. Once this is all over, you will die alongside your beloved humans.”
Death (The Four Horsemen Book 4) Page 40
