Scythe Does Matter

showed up demanding the paperwork.”

Then Conrad’s voice changed. He sounded predatory and insincere.

“That Reaper came back just now to tell me the verdict. I’m so sorry. I didn’t think it would go down like this. I promise, when the next Reaper comes for me in two months, I’ll tell him the truth.” His voice still sounded wrong. I could hear him lying. Funny how he’d always managed to convince me—and everybody else for that matter. I recalled that I’d felt the same thing when he’d been weaving his spell around my ex-colleagues when he’d announced my untimely coma in his crappy memorial speech, which was essentially: “Kirsty would have wanted us all to go back to our desks and work.” Not!

I could see right through his highly manipulative rhetoric now. He sounded pathetic and slimy. Apparently I had just enough bodily control to roll my eyes, even if I couldn’t open them.

“Only problem is, Kirsty, I don’t have a soul anymore since I already sold it. I doubt they’ll let me trade mine for yours. But I’ll do everything I can to get you your life back. To save you. I’ll talk to your aunt. She loves you so much and has been so miserable since you’ve been in here. And she’s gotta be, what? Sixty? Sixty-two? She’ll be happy to trade her life for yours. I’ll talk to her and to the Grim Reaper. No one’s ever out-negotiated me!”

Awww, that’s sweet. I knew Aunt Carey loved me more than enough to agree to trade her life for mine. I had finally learned that, although I still shuddered when thinking about what an ungrateful brat I’d been, never recognizing all the sacrifices she’d made after taking me in and raising me.

Wait. What?

I struggled against the Valium-induced brain fog.

He was lying! Trying to play me! Hedging his bets. Now, if I got the stapler and proved he’d tricked me, he wouldn’t lose his extension and go to Hell—he’d just flash a brand-spanking-new contract amendment. He’d get yet another innocent victim to sign away her soul on his behalf.

And the victim he had in mind just happened to be my beloved Aunt Carey.

Under no circumstances would I want Aunt Carey to trade her soul for mine. And that wasn’t even what was going to happen. She would be trading her soul so he could get another extension regardless of whether I got my life back or not. But knowing Conrad, that’s what he’d tell her. I knew that sly tone of voice—he believed he’d won.

Over my almost-dead body!

I couldn’t let it happen. I had to get back to Hell. While I hadn’t made quite enough effort on my own behalf, I would defend my aunt to the death—and from beyond the grave!

I needed to take this skeggin’ bastard down.

Struggling against the tethers of modern medicine and the natural order of things, I battered my soul against the shell of my physical body. But that wasn’t working any better now than it had before. Since the definition of insanity is trying the same thing over and over and expecting different results, I decided to try the rational approach instead.

For a change.

I concentrated on relaxing, taking the deep, centering breaths Dante had once told me not to. Thinking of Dante calmed me.

Slowly I stopped panicking and began pushing against my bonds with deliberate, focused effort. I started to see results. I could feel whatever holds a soul inside a body stretching, loosening its metaphysical grip. I guess I’d been so close to death for so long that the ties that bind had weakened. Just as I decided I’d exhausted my mental and emotional reserves and was going to need a short nap before trying again, I felt the ethereal umbilical cord snap and my soul floated free.

I could see again! Looking down, I noticed the room was empty now. As empty as the body lying lost and alone beneath me. Even Conrad had gone. Time must have passed while I struggled to freedom.

Since time was so wonky, I had only a couple of months or so until Conrad would try his evil tricks again. I’d better hurry.

When Dante had first brought me to Hell, we’d walked a long and winding road. But I’d somehow transported almost instantaneously backward from Hell to my body today when I’d fainted. Despite screwing up my eyes and my courage, I couldn’t duplicate that journey. I was desperate enough that I even tried clicking my heels together and saying, “There’s no place like Hell. There’s no place like Hell. There’s no place like Hell.”

I guess I’d just have to walk. Or at least run/float. No newbie anymore, I charged through the hospital wall and along the path Dante had led me on that fateful day. As I ran, I checked my pockets. When I’d disembodied my soul again, I found myself in the same outfit I’d donned this morning: black leggings, an oversize purple T-shirt and my usual hiking boots. Uh-oh. No coins. In fact, since I wore leggings, I had no pockets, either. Well, Charon would just have to front me. He knew I was good for it and besides, nobody rips off a hugely powerful demon like him. He’d hike up his evening gown, toss off his high heels and chase them down.

Like a bat into Hell, I raced home as fast as my insubstantial legs would carry me, red dirt flying under the awesome hiking boots Dante had given me on my second day in hell. I really covered ground. When you don’t need to breathe, you can’t get winded.

I charged right through a huddle of gee-gnomes. Two of the little creatures leapt at me, colliding midair where I had been a moment before. They must have stung each other because when I looked back, their bodies lay on the ground, bubbling and mutating. Serves them right. What goes around, goes to ground. Or something.

I ran on. Reaching the slippery slope, I dashed downward, slipping, falling, tumbling ass-first on the Good Intentions. It didn’t hurt, though. It felt like a dream from which I was just now waking. I continued to fall, my surroundings becoming more and more dreamlike. In the way of dreams, I knew I wasn’t really here.

Where would I wake? The Coil? The slippery slope? Or home?

And when had I started thinking of Hell as home?

Chapter 2 Get an Afterlife!

I AWOKE BLEARILY. It had all been a dream. Except not.

I opened my eyes just wide enough to see I was still in bureaucracy’s staff lounge, just down the hall from the courtroom where my appeal had been so cruelly denied.

In my peripheral vision, I noticed dark stains on the pillow—tearstains or drool marks or venomous leakage. Who knew? They were long dry, so not from me. Ick.

I rocked up so quickly my head spun.

“Oh. You’re awake. Finally. Bene.” Dante put down his book.

“How long have I . . . ?”

“How long have you been asleep? About half an hour.” He shook his watch and held it to his ear, before shrugging and turning his attention back to me. “But it’s so difficult to tell.”

“Difficult to tell when I’m awake?”

“No, silly. Hard to tell how much time has passed.” He held out his wrist. The little hands were wringing across the face. It looked very alarmed. “How are you feeling?”

“Like death warmed over—literally. I’ve been to Hell and back. No, wait. It’s so confusing.” I scrubbed my hands over my face. My cheeks felt tight, as if tears had dried there.

Dante moved to my side, kneeling on the floor next to me. He grasped my hand, peering at me till I met his gaze. “Kirsty, I’m so sorry. If only I hadn’t made arrangements to get the wrong stapler. If only I hadn’t scythed you wrongfully in the first place. I can’t begin to—”

I placed my fingers on his lips. Okay, maybe I used my whole hand and I was not that gentle.

“Look. Nobody made me jump in front of Conrad.”

Dante started to speak again. It came out as “gihcr fab gkoin.” I still had my hand across his mouth. I ignored his interruption and continued.

“Like the judge said, I’ve treated Hell as a way station. As if I were just passing through. Maybe that’s true