The Last Soul: A Reaper Novella (Reapers Book 1)

by Lena Hillbrand

  She nearly sank to his feet to beg, but at the last moment, she froze. “There was an angel.” The words burst forth as if they were living things bursting from the shell of an egg to catch their first glimpse of light.

  Lucifer’s smoldering eyes narrowed. “An angel?” He spoke the words with such venomous disgust that the reaper shrank back.

  “Angels can’t lie,” she said, rushing to speak before he banished her from his presence and from the world above, sequestered her in some dark corner of hell where she’d never have a chance gain the freedom that was her due. “I’ll go find him, and he’ll give you his word. And then you’ll know.”

  “Get out,” Lucifer screamed. Tendrils of smoke twisted up from the ends of his black hair. He stepped forward again, raising an arm and pointing to the door with one sharp, claw-like nail. Sparks rained down on her, sizzling like acid through her skin. The reaper screamed, twisting away from his agonizing gaze, and ran.

  Chapter 3

  Celebrations and Revelations

  “I got him,” the reaper said, standing and holding up her tin mug. “I harvested the last living soul today.”

  It took a moment for her words to sink in, but one by one, the other reapers fell silent. They turned their sober faces to her, firelight flickering in their eyes. For a moment, no one spoke, and she felt strangely exposed. A flicker of doubt gnawed at her gut. They couldn’t kill her, it was true, but they could attack. They would be jealous, maybe even angry.

  “And you’re just now telling us?” one of the men asked, holding up his own cup to her before dumping it down his throat. The others came to life then, yelling, “Huzzah!” and raising their own chipped mugs, dented tin cups, and cracked plastic glasses.

  She relaxed. Of course they were happy for her. They all still had jobs. Soon, they would have to discuss strategy for harvesting the hordes of souls that wandered the earth, but tonight, they had reason to celebrate. They danced around the fire, swilling drink from the bottle when they lost track of their drinkware.

  The wind shook loose an empty cardboard box that had stuck against the corner of a nearby building, and it tumbled away down an abandoned street. Two aimless, plague-devoured souls trailed after it, but the reapers had put down their scythes for the night.

  “Look what you’re missing,” one screamed after the souls, shaking a bottle with a swig of vodka left at its depths. “Drunken debauchery! Lewdness! Gluttony!” Throwing back his head to take the last shot, he swayed dangerously close to the fire. He reacted by laughing and hurling the bottle after the departed souls. It shattered against the building, and a three-legged mongrel quickened its loping pace as it passed.

  Another reaper cursed the one who had finished the vodka, and they fell to a writhing mass of fists and feet. The rest of the reapers let out a great cheer at the turn of events, as if similar didn’t happen every time they had cause for celebration, or simply because they’d grown bored of seeking the last human and failing once again. Their rage boiled over, and several more leapt into the fight. Several others rolled those fighting into the fire. They leapt up, screaming, grabbing at others and dragging them into the flames.

  Someone grabbed the woman and she bit and scratched, and soon they fell onto the writhing mass. Knives were pulled and plunged into each other, forks used to skewer opponents, clothing ripped from their bodies. Soon, every reaper had joined the exuberant depravity. The brawl turned into an angry orgy, where it was impossible to determine who was fighting and who was fucking and who was doing both at the same time. Reaper celebrations usually ended in this way. Later, they would strategize and organize, but for now, they participated in the unique bonding ceremony that let them all participate in one member’s success.

  *

  When the reaper woke the next morning, her hair had been torn to tatters that ended well short of the previous length. Someone had pinned her down on a coal, which had burned a large hole through her jacket and into her shoulder. Her pants had been ripped to tatters, her legs didn’t look much better, and she couldn’t find one of her blades. She limped around the smoldering remains of the fire, kicking aside empty bottles and a heap of smoking leather. The day after a celebration was always torture, and this had been an especially raucous one. She suspected some of her comrades had taken out their jealousy on her, being especially brutal in their encounters. But it was a small price to pay for remaining in their ranks.

  Reapers didn’t go for sentimental attachment. After harvesting insubstantial souls for weeks at a time, the physical contact was a necessity, in whatever form it took. Long ago she had learned to stop distinguishing between pain and pleasure. A painful touch was better than nothing, and when she trained her mind to enjoy it, she did. It was like going to a dentist who told patients that the pain they felt was only cold—the mind could make it so.

  But now, she had business to attend to. She had to descend to the underworld for another uniform and blade first, though. On her way, she passed two emaciated teenagers on all fours, vomiting strings of bile. They had been there forever, as long as she could remember. They couldn’t do much besides vomit, even though they wasted away. Hungry, starving, wracked with pain from it but unable to stop. She turned her face away and hurried past. Lucifer’s kindness towards the reapers did not extend to everyone.

  When she was outfitted, she returned with scythe in hand, ready to embark on a new mission—to find the angel.

  *

  It took the reaper several years of harvesting before she came upon him once again. Unrepentant souls were easy, but sometimes, she had to convince one. In the process of one such conversion, an angel dropped nimbly to the ground beside her.

  “You can’t take an unwilling soul,” he said. “You know the rules.”

  “Sure I can,” she said, not looking up from where she knelt on the woman’s soul. “I drag them screaming to hell all the time.”

  “But this is not an evil one,” he pointed out. As she reached for the woman’s throat, a boot slammed into the side of the reaper’s head and she went sprawling. She scrambled to her feet as the woman leapt up and ran screaming down the dusty alleyway. The reaper turned to chastise the angel, since he had just wasted a perfectly good soul. But the words stopped on her tongue when she saw his familiar profile, glossy black hair, square jaw.

  “Well, hello there, Stripper Ken,” she said. “I’ve been looking for you.”

  “How do you know my name?”

  “Your name is Ken?”

  “Kinto,” he said. “Yours?”

  “I don’t know,” she said with a shrug. “I don’t have one.”

  “Ah, that’s right. Another nameless no one from hell. Don’t you miss having an identity? Knowing who you are?”

  “I don’t know,” she said, straightening her hood. “I haven’t thought about it in years.”

  “Maybe you should.”

  “Do you remember me?” she asked. The thought was strange. No one knew her but the other reapers. That was her whole identity. Lucifer himself probably didn’t care enough to distinguish one reaper from another. Certainly no one else did. She quibbled with angels on a regular basis, and would have forgotten this one if not for his presence at her moment of victory.

  “Of course I remember you.” His smile appeared genuine, though minutes before, he’d kicked her hard enough to make her ears ring for the next week. “You cut down the soul of the last living man right in front of me and disappeared like a ghost, leaving me to grasp at air.”

  Her hand hovered near her thigh, where she could whip out a weapon if he made a move. “Very funny.”

  He smirked and said, “You got me. I could have stopped you if I’d wanted.”

  “Why didn’t you?”

  “Maybe I felt sorry for you.”

  “Charming.” She sneered at him. “How about, if you feel so sorry for me, you come and tell Lucifer what I did. He needs proof before I get my reward.”

  Kinto leaned against the bri
ck wall and crossed his arms. “What’s your reward?”

  “Freedom to come and go.”

  “Really?” He raised his eyebrows. “That’s some reward.”

  She waited, suddenly nervous. This was her moment. It would be proven, and she’d finally win her freedom.

  “I’d help you if I could,” Kinto said, his voice softening. He reached out, like he might touch her, but she had a blade in her hand before he could. “I can’t go past the gates into hell,” he reminded her. “I’m sorry.” This time, it was the angel who turned and disappeared, leaving her standing in the alleyway alone, all the hopes of the last years crashing at her feet. She should have known.

  Chapter 4

  Bargaining with Reapers

  The next time the reaper met Kinto, she brought a demon with her. This, of course, meant that she’d had to drag a demon around for the past year in case she ran into the angel. And though demons could be quite large, she had chosen a small one, since she had to keep some semblance of control over her. Unfortunately, her size made it easy for her to slip away and hide, which she was prone to do. The reaper was searching for the little demon inside a line of rubbish bins when she heard the echo of scrabbling claws inside one. She threw back the lid and leapt inside. Her demon hissed and began racing around the empty bin, her black claws scraping horribly against the grimy metal.

  “Oh, stop that,” the reaper said, snatching at her companion as it streaked past. “Get over here before I harvest you and send you back to hell.”

  Siki cowered in a corner, but when the reaper lunged at her, her fingers encountered only the congealed grease that coated the bin’s interior. Her nails raked over the metal, compacting black gunk under their tips. The demon streaked up the side of the bin and over the edge.

  A deep-throated laugh that could not have been further from Siki’s piercing cackle interrupted her cursing. She spun, already gripping her scythe before his familiar face registered. He stood peering into the bin, his forearm resting along the edge.

  “Looking for something?” he asked, infuriatingly perfect smile firmly in place. He held up her shrieking demon by her scrawny neck. She writhed in his grip, clutching his fingers with her scaly, lizard-like hands.

  “Give me back my demon,” the reaper snapped.

  “I don’t think she wants to go back. Are you not being nice to your little friend?” He held out the demon, who squirmed like a kitten when picked up by the skin on the back of its neck. A tiny flicker of pity awakened in the reaper. She was used to the plague-ravaged souls with their festering sores. But the little demon was so much more pathetic than it had been in human form.

  “Don’t torture her,” the reaper said. “That’s cruel.”

  He raised an eyebrow. “I’m cruel?” But he dropped the demon, who let out a shriek that made the bin’s metal walls vibrate as she dove behind the reaper, cowering out of the angel’s view.

  “See? She loves me deep inside her tiny, stupid demon heart.” If the reaper had thought she could hold the demon like a kitten and pet her, she would have—not out of kindness, but to gloat.

  “What’s that saying? The devil you know is better than the devil you don’t?”

  “Stop doing that with your eyebrows,” the reaper said. “It’s distracting, and it makes you look like an asshole.”

  The angel laughed and pushed away from the bin. “Always nice chatting with you, nameless albino reaper. Hey, while we’re on that. How come you’re the only lady reaper?”

  “I’m not,” she said. “I’m just the most memorable.”

  “You certainly are that,” he said, looking her up and down in a way that was plain wrong for an angel. When she bared her teeth, he smiled and shook his head. She thought better of her aggression and turned her snarl into a smile. The angel stepped back, glancing around and crossing his leather clad arms.

  “Remember the first time we met?” she asked. “When I killed the last living human and harvested his soul?”

  “Of course,” the angel said, his eyes darting to the demon and back to her face. “Is that why you have that thing? That’s your witness?”

  “Demons are too stupid to deceive,” she said. “Tell her about it.”

  “What if I don’t?” he asked, smirking now. His top lip was almost nonexistent, but his bottom lip was unjustly full. She wanted to bite it so hard she drew blood.

  “Then I’ll have to hope what you said so far is enough.”

  “What if it isn’t?”

  “Then eventually, all the souls will be gone from this place, and I’ll have to return to hell.”

  “And you won’t be able to come back here?”

  She paused, not wanting to admit it. Finally, she did with a curt nod.

  “Okay,” he said. “Let me speak with that ugly little thing.”

  She crouched slowly and pried the trembling creature loose from her leg. Siki clutched her fingers, her black scaly body like a tiny human covered in the skin of a water moccasin. Larger demons could be intimidating, but this one was only hideous, with its big brown eyes and tiny white teeth and little nubs in place of horns. Holding Siki in both hands so she couldn’t make a sudden bid for freedom, the reaper leapt from the bin and crouched, ready to throw Siki into the angel’s face if he attacked.

  Instead, Kinto leaned forward and braced his hands on his knees as he spoke to Siki, recounting the story of the last living soul in simple language that a demon could understand.

  A strange feeling came over the reaper as she watched him speak, his voice low and gentle, almost hypnotic. The demon stilled in her hands and hung there, listening. The reaper couldn’t see the demon’s face, but she imagined it had gone still and calm, its torment and terror momentarily forgotten. The angel’s eyes were kind as he spoke, but she caught traces of sadness and pity that a demon would never perceive.

  When he’d finished, he straightened. “Is that all?”

  “Yes,” the reaper said, her chest tightening with hope. This time, Lucifer would have to grant her freedom. Wouldn’t he?

  But she’d thought the same last time, and he’d refused. What if he found some way…But no. This time, he’d have to give her the reward. Angels couldn’t lie, and demons didn’t have the requisite cleverness to deceive anyone, let alone Lucifer. Poor Siki would be nothing but a quivering puddle of terror before him.

  “Where are your manners?” the angel asked. “Forgotten them so soon?”

  The reaper smiled, revealing all her teeth. “I never had them.”

  He put a hand to his chest. “All that, and not even a thank you.”

  “What did you expect? I’m not an angel.”

  “Would it kill you to say thanks?”

  “Possibly.” Her stomach sank as a slow smile spread across his face. “What?”

  “Okay, you don’t have to thank me,” he said. “How about an exchange? I helped you, and in return—”

  She let out a barking laugh. “You think I’m going to help an angel?”

  “No,” he said. “All you have to do is watch me release a soul.”

  “I can’t do that. I have to win them.”

  “Just one.”

  “I can’t do that,” she said, tightening her grip on the demon until it began thrashing again. “If you want to bargain, next time, make the bargain before you do the favor. I already got what I wanted. Why stick around and watch some frou-frou nonsense about heavenly rewards?”

  “So I help you, and you’re just going to walk away?”

  “What did you expect? I’m a reaper. Watch me work.”

  With every step she took, she expected him to fall upon her, throw her to the ground and stomp her throat out. Her body remained tense, expectant, as she walked. Her fingers clutched her scythe, though it was largely useless against an angel. But he didn’t come. Finally, at the end of the street, she couldn’t help herself. She turned and looked back.

  Kinto was standing where she’d left him, watching her. For a s
econd, their eyes caught, and something heavy settled into her mind, some sort of knowledge. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d looked into someone’s eyes, or when she’d stopped. In hell, everyone had too much pain and torment to bear. Meeting someone’s gaze was too much—to revealing, too burdensome. It was as if a bit of her personal torture was conveyed, and she became vulnerable. And she caught a bit of theirs, and she couldn’t bear that on top of her own.

  An angel’s eyes were different. In the smoky stillness, with nothing between them but the space of a hot, dirty street, she couldn’t hide behind taunts, competitive banter, or challenges. All she had was her demon. She busied herself cuffing it, under the pretense of having stopped for that very reason. When she’d secured the creature to her belt, she turned and stepped behind the nearest building.

  Chapter 5

  The Reaper’s Reward: Part Two

  Though the reaper’s first instinct was to rush straight to Lucifer, breathlessly waving her demon about and shouting in triumph, she knew that would not convince him. First, she needed to gather her thoughts, and only then could she approach him with calm and confidence. The memory or Kinto’s eyes, the steady rhythm of his speech, flashed across her mind. But he would not calm her that way. She was a hellion, an enemy by nature.

  She spotted a listless soul drifting past a heap of smoldering trash, but she did not ready her scythe. Even when she heard Kinto’s footsteps approaching, she did not race to harvest the soul before he arrived. She did not step into his path to compete for the soul, as they had with the last man’s. Instead, she kicked out the remaining shards of glass that formed a jagged opening in a windowpane behind her. Without another glance at the soul, whose presence normally would have sent her into attack mode, she slipped through the window and crouched inside.

  Kinto strolled by like he had all the time in the world. He didn’t pounce like a reaper. Instead, he made his way along the street until he stood before the soul. In a few bounds, the reaper could have leapt between them and cut down the soul. But she didn’t. She waited, frozen in place by his soothing tone.