Grim Love - A Novella by Grae Lily Page A

place to ask.
    Evangeline wondered if Kane and Brick were having the same
difficulties. Were they trying to figure out why they’d been
chosen? She shook her
head. It seemed unlikely. Both of them had stepped into the role as
though they were meant to be reapers, while she tried the
impossible task of understanding the motivations of those in
power.
    Being confused proved more irritating than
anything because it would have been so much easier if she could
just accept what happened the way everyone else appeared to be
accepting it. Her curious nature and penchant for rebellion didn't
allow for her to take things in stride.
    How could they have done that? How could Kane and Brick
look at the immortal Lucius and think they're qualified to be
reapers? Perhaps, because they were chosen? Could it be as simple
as that for them? Evangeline wished it could be that simple for her, but it
wasn’t. Dying had been difficult. She hadn’t been ready for it and
she remembered screaming at the unfairness of it all as Lucius
stood there grinning at her. The first words he’d said to her had
been: “Life isn’t fair, so why did you expect death to be?”
Quirking his eyebrows up, he added, “You made a stupid choice and
you ended up dead. Deal with it.”
    It didn't surprise her that the reaper
responded with cold words. She’d expected him to be evil, but she
didn't expect to look into his eyes and see time passing. In them,
she could see the souls of the dying calling out to him to guide
them to their eternity. No words could describe those images and
the haunted feeling they gave her.
    She
couldn't help but stare. She allowed her mind to delve into the
abyss and see pieces of what he’d experienced and what others were
experiencing. Perhaps a newly dead had more insight or maybe it
boiled down to the fact that her destiny called for her to be a
reaper. Lucius had never been one for answering questions. She
thought she caught a glimpse of him smirking as she bombarded him
with her questions. Evangeline wondered if there had ever been a
time when he asked the same questions of the one that came before
him. Did they
leave those same questions unanswered?
    Lucius knew he shouldn’t, but he watched
Evangeline as she walked through the city she'd been told to avoid.
The look on her face told him she'd been replaying recent events in
her mind. He knew she had questions – they all did in the
beginning. The answer as to why such a young soul had been chosen
would be one Evangeline would have to figure out in time. For now,
allowing her to become familiar with her new role would be his only
concern. He couldn't explain to her that some spirits were meant to
be reapers and she, by her choices and the lessons she'd not
learned in life, had been chosen to fulfill a destiny in order to
come to terms with her own mistakes in life.
    Her young soul would prove to make her
transition difficult. It hadn't been long since the beautiful girl
once lived. She'd spent an insurmountable amount of time worrying
about petty things like keeping her red, curly locks coiffed to
perfection and maintaining an ever-expanding social calendar. Her
life had been one filled with one raucous adventure after the next.
Nineteen years had been filled with egocentric behaviors that
became more risque with every new year. While most toddlers learned
to crawl and walk, Evangeline became adept at sprinting and
jumping. When girls her age were taking ballet lessons, she spent
her evenings giving chase to prepubescent boys, hoping to win their
affections. As her nineteenth year approached, her once slender
build transformed into a voluptuous figure that garnered the
attention of men and boys at every turn.
    It wasn’t going to be easy for her to come to
terms with what her calling meant. Young reapers, as Lucius knew
from experience, would always do the unexpected. That explained why
he felt it necessary to watch her. He waited to see what would
happen on her first mission,