The Golden Age of Death (A CALLIOPE REAPER-JONES NOVEL)

by Amber Benson

  She’d reached the last stair, and was about to step onto the foyer floor when she felt a tap on her shoulder. She stopped where she was and turned back around to face Jennice.

  “Please don’t tell anyone. About…you know.”

  “I promise I won’t say a word to anyone,” Clio replied. “Not unless you want me to.”

  Jennice nodded, but she still seemed uncertain.

  “I know we don’t really know each other,” Clio continued. “I don’t expect you to trust me. Just try to believe me when I say your powers are your own business.”

  “I appreciate that,” Jennice said, nodding. “I just don’t want anyone to think I’m crazy.”

  Clio wished Jennice understood just what kind of odd company she was keeping here at Sea Verge.

  “What exactly is it that your sister does?” Jennice asked, changing the subject.

  “Nothing as bad as whatever you’re thinking,” Clio laughed. “Here, it’s easier to show you than to tell you.”

  She gestured for Jennice to follow her as she hopped off the last step and headed down the hallway toward her father’s—make that her sister’s—study. As they passed room after empty room, Clio felt her heart ache for the old life she’d shared with her parents and sisters. It didn’t seem like that long ago she was ensconced upstairs in her room, playing around on her computer, doing her homework, and generally driving her mom and dad crazy.

  Just normal teenage girl stuff.

  She’d always been aware she was the youngest daughter of Death, there was no way to escape all the weirdness that passed in and out of their house (unless you cast a Forgetting Charm on yourself like Callie had), but in her mind she’d also been just a typical angst ridden high school senior with no duties other than passing her AP English and History exams. Math and science had always come easily to her, and even when she was in Advanced Calculus and Theoretical Physics, she’d never had a need to study for them.

  “This way,” she said, leading Jennice down the long hallway as the shadowy claws of darkness from the outside windows chased them.

  When they reached the study, Clio stopped, resting her right hand on the doorframe. Jennice stood beside her, both of them marveling at the emptiness of the room and the somber white sheeting covering what little furniture was left.

  “It looks so…empty,” Clio said as she rested her head against the doorjamb.

  “Is this what you wanted to show me?” Jennice asked, her eyes on Clio instead of the room.

  Clio stood up straight, flashing Jennice a sad smile.

  “No, not the room. I just hope what I wanted is still here.”

  She stepped tentatively into the room, eyes roving the sheet-covered bookcases.

  “Hmm,” she said, lifting one of the sheets so she could peer underneath it.

  She moved to the next one and repeated the process. It was only on the third try she found what she wanted, pulling a thick tome from one of the shelves and handing it to Jennice.

  “Here,” she said. “This should explain things more succinctly than I can.”

  She waited for Jennice to open the book, but the girl stared at Clio uncertainly.

  “I don’t know,” she said, her voice hesitant.

  “Just look at the title,” Clio said.

  Jennice looked down at the front cover, her lips silently forming the words as she read.

  “A handbook for Death?” she said, as she raised her eyes to meet Clio’s, a perplexed expression on her face.

  Clio didn’t know why she was showing Jennice the book. Not really. It’d been instinctual, something she thought Callie would want her to do.

  “It belongs to my sister.”

  Jennice flipped through the book, her eyes skimming the pages so fast Clio doubted she was taking in any of what she was reading.

  “Why?” Jennice asked, as she shut the cover of the book with a soft thud and looked back up at Clio.

  Clio shrugged. There was only one answer—and either Jennice would believe her, or she wouldn’t.

  “Because she’s Death.”

  * * *

  watatsumi had known Daniel would call him. Once he realized the magnitude of the situation, he would have no other option—he just hadn’t expected Daniel to call him to a bathroom.

  “What do you want me to do?” Daniel asked, looking into the mirror above the sink where Watatsumi’s image stared back at him.

  Watatsumi hated dealing with earnest people, people who tried their best to not affect others with their needs and wants. These souls were so boring they made Watatsumi wish he could crawl inside his underwater grotto and seal himself off from the world.

  He had always believed there were not enough bad people. Bad people were interesting and made Watatsumi’s job enjoyable. He wished Daniel were bad instead of earnest. He knew that inside, in his true core, Daniel was black, but instead of embracing his true nature, he fought it. Painted over it with goodness.

  It made Watatsumi sick to his stomach.

  But at least he could force Daniel to do some bad things in, what he thought, was the name of good. This made Watatsumi not hate his existence so much.

  “You will bring me the next three people who appear at Sea Verge. They will arrive soon. One of them has always annoyed me. I will punish him. The others, well, we shall see. But you will do as I ask and use the jewel to bring them all to me.”

  Daniel shook his head.

  “I don’t understand. What does this have to do with stopping Drood from merging the two worlds?”

  Watatsumi didn’t think it had anything to do with it, but instead he said:

  “Just bring them to me. Use the jewel and it will guide you.”

  Daniel looked down at the orange jewel clutched in his hand.

  “Do it,” Watatsumi said, “and together we will stop this. I possess Pandora’s Box, the only thing which can contain the creature who is trying to bring about the merging of these two disparate universes.”

  Daniel swallowed hard then nodded. If Watatsumi had Pandora’s Box, then maybe they really could stop this whole thing from happening, saving Callie in the process.

  “I’ll do it.”

  Watatsumi was pleased with how easy it was to make good people be bad.

  Now he was glad he wasn’t walled off in his underwater grotto. For the first time in many weeks, he was excited. He would make Daniel do many more terrible things before it was all over.

  And he would enjoy every minute of it.

  ten

  It was getting dark outside, the air shot through with a bone-numbing chill as the lights came on, illuminating the last few stragglers as they snaked their way toward the exits at the front of the park. Bernadette knew she should’ve been cold, that her body should’ve been shivering, but she felt nothing. She watched as the wind picked up, the amusement park pennants high above her head flapping like sails from their thick steel poles.

  She’d been sitting on the same bench since the police had first dispersed the crowd, then later gone themselves, taking their equipment, but leaving behind a wide swath of crime scene tape and an order to keep the Big Bellower shut down indefinitely. She’d watched them all go—even her distraught daughter and grandson, who’d been escorted from the scene by a policewoman and two paramedics—and now she was left alone, wondering what was supposed to happen next.

  She’d always believed in Heaven and in Jesus Christ’s love for mankind. If anyone had talked to her before she’d died, she’d have told them she fully expected to go to the pearly gates, have a sweet little back-and-forth with St. Peter, and then join her heavenly father and all her dead friends and family as they frolicked through paradise. Sitting on a park bench—a ghost no one could see or interact with—was not anywhere in her plans.

  Where was St. Peter? The Heavenly Host? The pearly gates?

  She was mystified. Her rigid religious upbringing unwilling to let her accept the Afterlife might be very different from what her minister
had preached, and what she’d imagined for herself.

  The boom of thunder shook her from her thoughts, and she looked up to witness a slash of lightning, like a putrefying scar, split open the sky. The rain followed, the heavens opening up to unleash a flash flood of water that blanketed every inch of the amusement park, but left Bernadette dry as a bone.

  She was so busy marveling at the water’s inability to soak her that she didn’t notice the black-clad women, one carrying a long-handled butterfly net in her hands, as they shuffled toward her. They stopped just behind the bench, close enough to touch the nape of Bernadette’s exposed neck, but it still took Bernadette more than a few seconds to become aware of their presence.

  Sensing something or someone was watching her, she turned around in her seat, her heart hammering in her chest. But she relaxed as soon as she saw the two women—girls really—in their high-necked Victorian dresses, their pale white skin luminescent in the moonlight. Identical twins, they both had long raven hair, button noses, and tiny round sunglasses with mirrored lenses making it impossible to look into their eyes.

  “Are you Bernadette?” the one with the butterfly net asked. Despite the fierce wind and rain, not one hair on her or her sister’s head was out of place.

  Bernadette stood up, taking a few steps away from them. Something about these two, odd-looking girls bothered her. Her gut told her not to trust them.

  “I’m not Bernadette,” she heard herself say—her curiosity was piqued by this new ability of hers to lie without conscience. This was something she’d never been able to do when she was alive.

  The twins looked at each other, their faces unreadable. They reminded Bernadette of two cats, sleek and sly and in possession of a secret they’d never share with you.

  “You’re lying,” the butterfly net girl said, obviously speaking for both of them.

  “I don’t care what you think,” Bernadette said, anger bubbling up inside of her. She didn’t like being called a liar even if she was one.

  She took a few more tentative steps away from the girls, and she realized her body felt funny. So light and effervescent, almost like she would float away if she stopped concentrating on remaining Earthbound.

  “Don’t run away,” the silent (up until now) twin said, her voice kinder than her sister’s.

  She stepped forward, leaving her sister behind her then held out her hands, palms up in supplication.

  “Let us help you,” she entreated, moving a step closer to Bernadette. “We know you’re scared. Death can be a frightening state of being.”

  Bernadette felt the tension loosening in her shoulders. Something about this gentle twin’s voice was lulling. It made Bernadette feel like she should just give over to the girls, do whatever they asked of her.

  “Who are you?” Bernadette asked.

  She didn’t really want to know who the girls were, or what they wanted from her, but remaining ignorant to the situation wasn’t going to help anyone.

  The gentle twin glanced back at her sister, and after a moment, her sibling nodded. The gentle twin returned her gaze to Bernadette. She smiled and lifted an empty hand to her sunglasses, hooking her fingers around the right temple and sliding the glasses down her nose, letting them rest there so Bernadette could see her eyes.

  They were cornflower blue, the irises large and oval, framed by a sheaf of thick black lashes the same color as her hair. The girl blinked twice then replaced the sunglasses.

  With the revelation of the girl’s eyes, something inside of Bernadette seemed to relax.

  “Come with us,” the gentle twin said.

  It wasn’t a question now.

  She reached out her hand and Bernadette took it without thinking. It was the first solid thing Bernadette had touched since she’d died—and the intimacy of the gesture made her shudder.

  “Who are you?” Bernadette asked again.

  The girl smiled.

  “We work for Death. We’re called Harvesters and we’ve come to take you away from here.”

  Bernadette nodded. It did seem like a logical explanation for what was happening.

  “Will I see my parents again?”

  The gentle twin squeezed her hand, but didn’t answer, a strange smile twisting her face.

  Something about the smile chilled Bernadette to the core. She dropped the girl’s hand and backed away.

  “Where are you going?” the girl asked.

  But Bernadette didn’t answer her—she just turned and ran. She didn’t stop until she was at the other end of the amusement park, the neon green exit signs illuminating her way out of the park.

  She hit the gates, racing through them before any of the attendants could offer her a reentry hand stamp. Not that they would have. She was invisible to them. Still moving swiftly, she happened upon a tram heading to the parking lot and climbed aboard just as it took off.

  As the tram rambled up and down the empty rows of parking spaces, Bernadette started to relax, her pulse slowing and her breathing returning to normal. But she still refused to look back to see if the twins had followed her.

  She was too scared.

  * * *

  clio had not taken things well.

  As soon as he’d finished his explanation, she’d left the room without a word.

  He’d turned to Daniel, but the former Devil’s protégé was already heading to the other end of the kitchen.

  “I’ll be right back,” he said, flustered, as he opened the side door and stepped through into the back hallway. “Just gonna use the restroom.”

  Jarvis didn’t think now was the most appropriate time to run off to the restroom, but who was he to dictate what Daniel did or didn’t do.

  He turned back to Noh, expecting her to try and escape his presence, too, but instead, she was looking up at him intently, her dark eyes large and curious.

  “What can we do to help Callie?”

  She leaned back against the kitchen counter, balancing her elbows on its edge, waiting for Jarvis to answer her question. When she realized no answer was forthcoming, she sighed and said:

  “She needs our help. And I’m down to do anything but sit here and wait it out.”

  Jarvis sighed, too, pulling out one of the stools and sitting down. He was exhausted already and there was still so much left for him to do.

  “I promised her I would look after Clio and this Realtor girl. If we leave Sea Verge, I can’t enforce that promise.”

  Noh nodded, still leaning back on the counter.

  “Okay, I hear you. Your hands are tied.”

  She didn’t say it condescendingly, or as if she thought he was being silly. There was no judgment in her tone—and for this, Jarvis was grateful.

  “Thank you,” he said, resting his chin in his hands and sighing deeply.

  Suddenly, from somewhere at the back of the house there issued a loud crash followed by a piercing female scream. Jarvis was immediately on his feet, heading for the kitchen door, Noh hot on his heels.

  As he entered the foyer, he could hear raised voices coming from down the hall. Using the voices as his guide, he jogged until he found Jennice blocking the doorway to the study. She looked bewildered, and didn’t move out of the way as he pushed past her and entered the room. Inside, he found one of the bookcases on its side, Clio crouched over it, her hand extended toward a large bear of a man who was sitting on the floor, a dazed expression on his face. A completely nude, blonde woman was sprawled on the floor beside him, a bloody gash etched into the flesh of her right cheekbone.

  “Freezay?!” Jarvis cried, shocked to find the ex-detective here at Sea Verge.

  “Good to see you, too, Jarvis,” he said, letting Clio help him to his feet. “But I’m afraid we might be bringing a shit storm with us. I was attacked back at my place by a bunch of thugs and they seemed to think someone other than Calliope was in charge of Death, Inc.”

  Jarvis was not surprised by the news. It was only the beginning of the end, as far as he was concern
ed. Still, he was rather relieved to be able to finally share his predicament with someone he trusted—and out of everyone here at Sea Verge, Freezay was the only one he trusted implicitly.

  They’d been close friends for many years, but after Freezay had helped Calliope root out the murderers who’d tried to steal the original copy of How to Be Death at the annual Death Dinner, Jarvis had held out hope they would become colleagues, too. In fact, he’d been rather aggressively pushing Calliope to hire Freezay as Chief of Security for Death, Inc.

  He knew she’d offered Freezay the job—and that he’d asked for some time to think it over—but now it looked as though he was going to be dragged into their world, whether he liked it or not.

  “Sorry about the mess,” Freezay added, running his hands through his blond mop of hair.

  “Don’t worry,” Jarvis said, shaking his head. “You’re joining a mess already in progress. The ‘shit storm,’ as they say, has achieved full residence here, my friend.”

  Freezay nodded his understanding then turned his attention to the blonde woman at his feet.

  “Are you all right?” he asked.

  “Hit my cheek on the bookcase when we wormholed in,” she trilled, her voice light and feminine.

  “Sorry about that,” Freezay said, looking contrite.

  She waved away his apology as she accepted an egg-yolk-colored handkerchief from Noh. She placed the handkerchief against her cheek, and the yellow cotton fabric slowly turned brown as it soaked up the blood.

  “Where’s Callie?” Freezay asked, turning back to Jarvis.

  “She’s not here,” he said. “She and the Ender of Death have gone to try and head this thing off.”

  “The Ender of Death?” Freezay asked, surprised.

  “Uriah Drood has gotten ahold of a way to merge our universe with one in which Calliope doesn’t exist,” Jarvis said. “The Ender of Death has become Death’s champion until we can stop this thing—”