Page 24 of Wild Ivy
Tate nods reluctantly. “She’s right. We’re outmatched without them.”
“So, what exactly are you proposing?” Torin asks, wiping his mouth.
I take a deep breath. “We offer them a deal. They fight for us against Life and Morrigan, and in exchange, they get a chance at redemption. Not freedom, but maybe... I don’t know, a less shitty afterlife? A place where things aren’t all doom and gloom.”
“Can you even do that?” Bram asks sceptically.
I shrug. “I’m Death now. I should be able to make some adjustments to their eternal punishment, right?”
“In theory,” Tate muses. “But we’d need to be careful about where and how you place them.”
“Agreed,” I say. “We can’t just unleash a horde of psychos back into the world, but also this is a last resort. If they won’t do as I command, then we bribe them.”
Torin nods. “So, how do we go about asking them to fight? Do they even know what they were reaped for?”
I blink as I contemplate that. It’s a damn good question, actually. “Erm, guys?”
“What?” Tate asks with a frown,
“Not you. The ex-Deaths.” I wave a hand dismissively at him.
Silence.
“Oh,nowyou’re quiet,” I grumble and climb off the bed, pulling a towel around me so I can go and shower and think in peace.
As soon as I hit the shower, the hot water cascading down on me in a torrent of heaven, David speaks.“Some of them areaware. The newer ones. The older ones aren’t exactly a chatty bunch.”
“Thanks,” I mutter. “So, how am I supposed to get them to fight?”
“You stop being weak and be Death.”
“Right, because that isn’t what I’ve been trying to be.”
“This is what I was talking about, Ivy. You can’t be yourself anymore. It’s not who you are. Pleasing these men, going off focus, ignoring the problems… it’s not enough.”
“It will have to be,” I state coldly. “I’m not giving it all up.”
“Then you have to figure out a way to become Death, the leader of the dead, while still pandering to your mortal side.”
He goes quiet then, and none of the rest of them speak. The leader of the dead. That doesn’t sound like a great job, but David is right. I have to stop being such a pussy about all of this. Second guessing myself will get me nowhere. Bribery? Fuck that. I will whip these souls into shape, and they will do my bidding whether they like it or not. But first, I have to take the immediate problem out of the equation.
Morrigan.
She is a large cat prowling amongst my pigeons, and I can’t have her in the way and joining forces with Life. Bram is going to have to give up those powers. There is just nothing else for it.
12
IVY
“No,”Bram states, arms folded, fully dressed in black combat pants and a tight black tee as I march back into the bedroom, wearing only my pink fluffy towel.
“No?” I ask, although my voice goes up a notch, or five.
“You know what I mean. I know what you’re going to say. The answer is a definitive no.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I say innocently, to the amusement of Tate.
He comes up behind me and plants a kiss on my shoulder. The marking of his name on my back flares up white hot, and I gasp. The brand has been relatively dormant since I came back, but now it seems to be back in full force.
