Reaper's Ascension The Complete Series: Reaper's Ascension

By Shelley Russell Nolan

'The first dead body I ever saw was my own' - Tyler Morgan. Twenty-five. Murdered by the Grim Reaper

Welcome to the Reaper's Ascension Series, where death is only the beginning!

After she is resurrected by the Grim Reaper, Tyler Morgan discovers a dark and hidden world. Not sure who to trust, and with enemies closing in, she will have to master her newfound abilities to have any hope of staying alive.

This set contains all three books, and the prequel short story, delivering a spine chilling urban fantasy sure to delight fans of the supernatural and suspense.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Shelley Russell Nolan
• Release date: Sep 30, 2019
• ISBN: 9781393534549

Shelley Russell Nolan

Shelley Russell Nolan is an avid reader who began writing her own stories at sixteen. Her first completed manuscript featured brain eating aliens and a butt kicking teenage heroine. Since then she has spent her time creating fantasy worlds where death is only the beginning and even freaks can fall in love. The first two books in her debut adult urban fantasy series, Lost Reaper and Winged Reaper, are published by Atlas Productions Born in New Zealand, moving to Australia with her family when she was seven, Shelley currently lives in Central Queensland, Australia, with her husband and two young children. They share their home with two wrecking ball kitties, a deformed budgerigar and two dogs that are fairly normal as dogs go. Shelley loves to hear from her readers so feel free to contact her on Facebook or leave a review on Amazon or Goodreads or on her website - shelleyrussellnolan.com

Book preview

Chapter 1

The call to reap came at an inopportune moment. I was enjoying a dalliance with an ambitious reaper who had recently been promoted by Jonathon Grimm. Not that dalliances while in semi corporeal form were as fulfilling as those enjoyed while I’d been alive. But in the Underworld you had to take what you could get.

While the timing might not have been the best, I was grateful for the call. I had five reaps to go to fulfil my soul quota. Five reaps and I would end my servitude to the Grim Reaper and have the chance at rebirth I had foolishly thrown away twenty-five years earlier. I slipped away from my date and moved to the edge of the city all reapers called home to focus on the twinkling lights nestled in the blackness far above me.

Not stars, these lights represented the souls of the billions of people in the world. One shone brighter than the others, calling me.

I let the call sink in, allowing the need to reap to take over as the body I habitually formed to interact with my fellow reapers became insubstantial. My soul was now encased in a shimmering, shifting and nebulous form that was barely recognisable as a person. I lifted into the air, called to attend the soul of the next person to die in my hometown of Easton.

When I reached the glittering canopy of souls a shiver swept through me at the sight of a reaper returning from a job, the diaphanous form encasing his soul far darker than mine.

‘Ash, what do you think of this beauty?’ he called out as we bypassed one another, he with a soul that was blackened around the edges.

Reapers like him were part of Jonathon Grimm’s private army, collecting the darkest souls, those tainted by the deeds they had performed while alive. Not wanting to delay the collection of my client’s soul, I merely gave him a nod as I continued on my way, glad I had never been recruited as one of the dark cohort of reapers.

No, I had been given a more illustrious place, though not until I had served Grimm for almost twenty years.

I was Grimm’s right-hand reaper, given the title of Ash, my former name forgotten. Like Dusty, his left-hand reaper, I was often given specialised tasks, one more suited to a reaper who had proven their loyalty and worth through years of hard work and dedication to reaping the souls Grimm wanted.

Ash and Dusty.

Or more accurately, ashes to ashes and dust to dust.

The Grim Reaper had a morbid sense of humour, naming his lieutenants after the saying humans had long associated with the process of death.

From close up, the light of the souls was so bright it would have blinded me if my eyes were real. Even now, I had to squint as I passed the final layer of souls and burst through the barrier that separated the Underworld from the physical world that lay above it.

Now I found myself in a standard night sky, one lit by gaseous stars and filled with clouds and the occasional bat. I swooped low over the town of Easton, the place where I had been born and died what seemed like a thousand years ago. Time moved slowly in the Underworld when you were fighting to fulfil your soul quota and not give in to the madness that overtook some of the reapers at the monotony and unfairness of the afterlife they found themselves trapped in.

The call of the dying soul was stronger now I inhabited the same world and my speed increased.

This was my favourite part of the reaping, feeling free as I gazed down on the familiar streets, saw what changes had taken place since I had last been in that area. Tonight the call was taking me to a place I knew well, a seedy suburb of ramshackle homes with overgrown yards and all manner of vehicles parked on driveways and front lawns.

This was where I had lived before my untimely death behind the wheel of a car similar to the ones I now flew over. Ones more powerful than my youth and inexperience as a driver had prepared me for. Not that I’d believed so at the time. I was nineteen, full of the belief I was the best driver in the world, that I could navigate the roads of Easton like a rally car driver without consequence. Until the night I crashed and died in my vehicular pride and joy.

The youths who lived in this area were much like I had been, flushed with their pay cheques and full of unwarranted pride. Indeed, I was not surprised to spot a mangled wreck up ahead and realise that was the source of the call to reap.

As I approached, it took a moment to realise the wreck was in fact two cars, slammed into each other with such force the bonnets had crumpled into a fraction of their original size. The drivers had hit head on, broken glass and car parts strewn all around the accident scene.

Two young men were slumped on the footpath, blood covering their faces, moans coming from their lips. But they were alive and presumably would remain so as the call did not take me to either of them.

I rounded the rear of the commingled wrecks and made my way to the driver’s side door of the closest car. The driver, another young man, was gasping out his last breaths, blood gurgling from a deep laceration in his neck, a chunk of twisted metal still caught in the wound. The airbag had deployed, pushing him back, but had also been cut by flying debris and was now deflated.

I stretched out a diaphanous hand and placed it on the young man’s chest, calling his soul to me. His body stiffened before slumping sideways as I clutched his life-force and pulled it free. With his soul in my hand, reaping completed, there was no reason for me to linger. The wail of many sirens in the distance suggested emergency services were on their way. They would take care of the dead man, and the two survivors of the crash.

I turned to leave, catching a flicker out of the corner of my eye as I did so. Two dark reapers barrelled about in the air beneath a stand of mango trees, the shadows making it even harder to see them.

Why were they here?

This was not the kind of death they were called for.

It was violent, yes, but not murderously so.

Still, they were not my concern any more than the living concerned me. My task was half completed. Now I had to return the soul to the Underworld and hand it over to Grimm, before it would count toward my quota.

I saw no sign of reapers, dark or otherwise, on my return. I slipped through the barrier to the Underworld and left Easton behind. The soul I held shone even brighter now it was amongst its brethren, but I could not release if for rebirth yet. It would be up to Grimm to decide if it was worthy of being given another chance to live.

As I lowered myself to the streets of the Underworld city, I focused on my form, becoming more corporeal with each step I took, until I almost appeared to be whole. Satisfaction rolled through me as I checked I had fully attired myself in the Victorian garb Grimm was currently enamoured with. It often amused me to see those charged with reaping the souls of the dearly departed walking around as if they were in 19 th century England, complete with top hats and capes. But it made Grimm happy. Not that his gaunt exterior showed signs of his pleasure often.

His displeasure, now that was easy to see, for he displayed it on many occasions as he berated those who served him should they fail in their duties. To risk the displeasure of the Grim Reaper was a foolish thing to do, one which many reapers did not survive to do a second time.

Reapers swirled and eddied in the streets around me, very few of them achieving a form as corporeal as mine, as I headed for the building that housed Grimm’s inner sanctum. He resided in the heart of the city, his black nature tainting the air around him so that only his dark reapers liked to hang out there.

I straightened my shoulders as I entered what I liked to think of as the dead zone.

Sure, we were all dead. But there was dead, and then there was DEAD. This area was clearly the latter.

The dark reapers were exempt from having to appear human, so they gambolled in the air and formed malevolent dark shadows, tainted by their close association to Grimm. But as I drew near, I saw I was not the only visitor to his sanctum on this occasion.

A female reaper, in a full-skirted dress of a deep, dark red, was exiting the building, her form flickering, features twisting into many different faces as she walked toward me. I stifled a grimace as she stopped in my path, the shifting faces that made up her shattered personality a constant movement that abused both eye and stomach.

‘Ash.’

‘Dusty.’ I lifted my top hat and gave her a bow, using the moment to break eye contact with her.

‘Grimm wants to see you,’ she said, licking her lips as her gaze dropped to the soul I held in my other hand. ‘A tasty morsel won’t save you. The time of reckoning is near. The stars have aligned. The way is clear. Death rides on black wings and it is coming for you.’

I suppressed a shudder and put my hat back on. ‘I had better not keep him waiting then.’ I slipped past Dusty without another word and made my way to the door into the squat black building.

Every time I entered, I felt my soul shrinking. This was where Grimm held court most of the endless nights that existed in the Underworld. The dark stain of his malevolent presence seeped into the floor and walls, surrounding me, tainting each false breath I took.

But it was folly to show weakness to the Grim Reaper. I fixed a smile on my face as I entered the inner sanctum.

Here, the emissions coming from his dark personage were ten times worse, with nothing to buffer them as he hovered over the broken shards of the souls other reapers had brought him and that had been judged wanting.

‘My Lord, I understand you wished to see me,’ I said.

A thin-lipped smile appeared on his gaunt face and he moved toward me, the long black cape he wore billowing around him even as it sucked in the light from the colourless torches fixed to the walls.

‘Ash, what have you got for me?’ He may have requested my presence, according to Dusty, but for now all his attention was for the soul shining in my hand.

For a brief moment, my grip tightened around the soul, not wanting to give it up if it was going to share the fate of its broken brethren. Grimm had a taste for those souls who had died violent deaths. Still, to save this soul I would risk sacrificing my own.

‘Young male, car accident,’ I said in a clipped tone, hoping he would be satisfied with earlier offerings and allow this one to go on to rebirth.

‘Ah.’ His smile dimmed slightly. ‘I suppose it will have to do. The citizens of Easton are not as wont to commit violence on one another as I would have liked, and yet I still must feed.’

He stretched out a skeletal hand, calling the soul to him, plucking it from my grasp.

I resisted the urge to take a step back as Grimm held the soul up to his lips, desire flooding his pale face. His body quivered as he devoured the light of the soul, deriving intense pleasure from the act, and tossed the husk to the ground at his feet.

A sharp pang whispered through my body, whispering of the pleasure to be had in reaping a soul before its time. I had tasted the forbidden early in my career as a reaper, provoked by the one assigned to mentor me when I first accepted Grimm’s job offer. She’d urged me to take the soul of the man who had murdered his lover in a fit of rage, told me I would be rewarded for ridding the world of such a violent man.

I had been rewarded all right, by a wave of ecstasy so intense it had robbed me of all thought for a long moment.

Then had come the pain, and the knowledge I had increased my soul quota by one thousand souls. Not that my mentor told me that until much later, when I had reaped the souls of three others I felt had deserved to die, their victims worthy of the pain I would endure for reaping a soul before its time was due. My mentor had been gleeful as she informed me I now had an extra four thousand souls to reap, on top of the initial one thousand, before my contract was up and I could hope for rebirth. At the time that did not seem too large a number, and I had even chanced to reap another forbidden soul, one who had committed an unspeakable atrocity on a small child and who would do so again and again if he was not stopped.

Then the long years of being a reaper began to weigh on my own soul, and I longed for the chance of rebirth. Much as it pained me to let those humans who had the capability of so much evil to continue to live, I never reaped another soul before its time. And I would not do so. Four more souls and I would be free, to be reborn, to forget all about my time in the Underworld and all it contained.

Washed clean, I would begin a new life untainted by what I had done in my first life and my time as a reaper.

Grimm had recovered from his meal. There was no pain for him. This was a legitimate reaping, a pale flush entering his cheeks as the life-force of the soul energised his form, making him seem more human, though he was still abnormally tall and gaunt, a figure from a horror movie.

‘I need you to kill someone for me,’ he said, wintry voice cutting through the air between us.

Despite myself, I took a step back. ‘I will not reap a forbidden soul. I will not increase my quota.’

‘Relax, Ash. I’m not asking you to prolong your time with me. I just need a young woman killed, and Dusty is not as reliable as I would like at this stage of her career.’

He meant Dusty was off her rocker and couldn’t be relied on to kill the right person. She could just as easily go on a rampage and cause a bloodbath. Not that Grimm was the kind of boss who didn’t like a good bloodbath, but clearly this killing needed more finesse.

‘You have the power to become a wraith,’ said Grimm, ‘though you have not exercised it during your time with me. The next time you are called to Easton, I want you to take over your client’s body, find the girl and kill her. A simple job. Once you bring her soul to me, that will leave you only three more souls to reap before your rebirth.’

Wraiths, like Dusty, were reapers with the ability to inhabit the bodies of the newly deceased. This enabled them to enact Grimm’s dirty work for him when it came to those he wanted dead but whose time was not yet up. Kind of like the zombies that existed in b grade movies, but they didn’t want to eat your brains, they just wanted your dead body to move around in.

‘I’m afraid I can’t do as you request.’

Grimm’s expression became glacial, his glare sharp enough to cut the unwary.

I fought not to backtrack, to stammer out that I would do as he asked. This was my future. I did not want to give myself a handicap in my new life. I needed to be reborn as a perfect soul, not one tainted by having been a wraith for even a short amount of time.

The current Dusty had been in the position for only a few months, and I was sure her soul would never recover. I’d even heard of Grimm devouring the souls of his favourite wraiths. I’d never witnessed such an event but didn’t doubt Grimm was the type to do something like that.

No, I couldn’t let anything jeopardise my return to life.

‘This wasn’t a request, Ash. It’s an order. You will kill Tyler Morgan for me.’

A cold shudder swept through me, making my corporeal form quiver until I regained the integrity of the image I presented. I forced a smile to my lips.

‘My Lord, you didn’t promote me to the position of Ash because of a supposed ability to become a wraith. You made me your right-hand because the younger reapers had begun to look up to me. Turn me into a wraith and the morale of your people will be sure to suffer.’

I didn’t need to tell him that the younger ones had gravitated to me because I was the only one who didn’t try to get them to increase their soul quota. In fact, I warned those who would listen. Unfortunately, some had been as assured of themselves as I had first been on entering the Underworld, cocky and stupid, and had let themselves be tricked by the others, regardless of my warning.

Grimm stared at me, the weight of his glare not diminishing, and I was glad I had no bodily functions in this form, sure I would be coated in sweat.

‘Very well,’ he said finally, voice devoid of emotion. ‘You may go… Ash.’

With a hurried bow, I backed out of the room and retreated from his sanctum as fast as I could, unable to shake the feeling I had just made the biggest mistake of my afterlife.

Chapter 2

Ihurried away from Grimm’s inner sanctum, still uneasy over his response to my refusal to become a wraith. There was no sign of Dusty, for which I was grateful. I was not in the mood to deal with her kind right now, not with the veiled order I’d been given to join their ranks, even if it was just supposed to be for one murder.

Who was this Tyler Morgan that Grimm wanted dead?

What did she have or what scheme would her life prevent from happening to warrant her being murdered by a wraith?

The poor girl, whoever she was, was doomed.

Her name sounded familiar to me; the uneasiness that had beset me when Grimm asked me to become a wraith and kill her casting my mind back to my previous life. Had I met her, at some stage?

I had been young and stupid, prone to reckless behaviour that had led to my untimely death. Since becoming a reaper, I had distanced myself from that life, using the opportunity Grimm offered, life in the afterlife, to remake myself. The memories of the time I’d inhabited a living, breathing body were blurred and I preferred it that way. It made it easier to forget what an idiot I had been, though some of that had carried over to my life as a reaper when I let myself get tricked into reaping illegitimate souls and increasing my soul quota.

Grimacing, I pulled my mind from the past. It was time to dwell on my future.

Four more reaps and I would be free.

Giving myself a shake, I made for my apartment in the top floor of a building several blocks away from Grimm’s sanctum and its dark emanations. My apartment made up the entire top floor. The wraiths had their own apartment block next door, where Dusty had an apartment equal in size to mine. I would often see her on her balcony, surveying the Underworld. She reminded me of Grimm, unbalanced yet deadly, though she could not match him for sheer malevolence.

The reapers who were just under me in the hierarchy had spacious units on the floors below mine. The lesser reapers were crammed into far smaller spaces. Of course, it was an illusion that we needed a place to live. We were dead after all, but I had been pleased to move to the top floor when I’d replaced the former Ash. Even if it did mean Dusty was my neighbour. As long as I wasn’t on my balcony when she was on hers, it was a comfortable arrangement.

I had to admit, being called Ash was far preferable to the name I had been given by my parents.

Who named their son Neville and didn’t expect him to get beaten up on a regular basis?

Not that it mattered any longer. I had been Ash for the last five years and would receive a new name when I was reborn, all the memories of being Neville and Ash washed away. At least, I hoped I would not remember any of this. To be reborn but still to have the memories of my past life and afterlife would be a special kind of Hell.

When I reached my apartment I was pleased to see the reaper I had been about to indulge in some recreation time with was still there. She stood on the balcony, the white dress she had formed to clothe her exquisite body billowing in a non-existent wind. Though I had known her only a short time, I’d noticed her propensity to show off. It was what had brought her to my attention, after all.

Her form was slightly indistinct, but more corporeal than many others; a testament to her ambition. I knew she had set her sights on becoming Ash after I was reborn.

She turned to face me as I neared the open balcony doors.

‘Dannielle, you are indeed a sight for sore eyes.’

No welcoming smile lit her beautiful face, the long strands of her blonde hair ignoring the logic of the wind she had created to hang around her shoulders in a shimmering curtain.

‘You refused him.’

The smile on my face died at her statement, the coldness of her voice a far cry from the dulcet tones she usually employed when with me. Even more concerning was the knowledge at how fast news of the outcome of my meeting with Grimm had spread.

This was not good.

I reached within to muster up as nonchalant an expression as I could, refusing to let fear make me weak in front of a woman I now had to consider as a rival. If I was not careful, I could find myself ousted as Ash and relegated to the depths of the reaper hierarchy, having to fight for the last four reaps I needed to gain my freedom.

For all I knew, Grimm had already demoted me and Dannielle was now Ash.

‘My dear, surely you of all reapers would know how important it is to retain the integrity of your soul, especially so close to rebirth.’

‘Don’t be a fool, Ash. You know Grimm will never allow your soul to be reborn, not unless you give him what he wants.’ Some of the coolness left her eyes as she drifted close enough to lay a hand on my arm. ‘It is no secret that I seek your position, but not like this.’

Wary but gratified that she wasn’t immediately denouncing me and casting me out of my own apartment, I shook my head as I moved over to the fully stocked bar and poured myself a scotch. Like everything in the Underworld, the drink was an illusion but one I welcomed as I gulped down half the glass in one swallow. Then I turned back to Dannielle.

‘Even if I were to go to him now, and say I had changed my mind, the damage has already been done. Grimm does not forgive or forget. I will be fighting for my last reaps either way. But I will fulfil my quota. I will be reborn.’

Dannielle came and took the glass from my hand, polishing off the remainder of the scotch. Then she leaned in and pressed a heated kiss to my lips. When she broke away, a sad smile formed on her full lips.

‘It was nice knowing you, Ash. I hope your defiance proves worthwhile.’ She handed me the empty glass and sashayed out of the apartment, taking the last of my equilibrium with her.

A tremble worked its way through my form and I took a seat on a stool at the bar, pouring myself another scotch. A third soon followed, and my vision began to haze as the oblivion promised by inebriation beckoned. All too soon the illusion shattered and I was as sober as I had ever been, offering up a despairing plea that Dannielle was wrong and I had not destroyed all hope of rebirth.

Hours later, I felt the familiar buzz through my form that signalled someone in Easton was about to die. Dismayed to find that I had lost some of my corporealness while I’d been attempting to drink myself into a stupor, I focused on regaining my form before moving to the balcony.

With a sense of time running away from me, I launched myself into the air and allowed the call of the dying soul to propel me through the sky. Within moments I had travelled through the canopy of souls and passed through the barrier to Easton. A new day had dawned during my time in the Underworld, the fresh light of the morning sun a welcome sight after the endless night of Grimm’s domain.

But for one of Easton’s citizens, this day would be their last.

Was it Tyler Morgan?

Grimm was determined to see her dead. With my refusal to become a wraith for the sole purpose of killing her, he could have decided to use Dusty after all. Or to have ordered one of the lesser wraiths to do the deed.

In fact, it was strange he had chosen me for this distasteful task in the first place.

Was it because I was close to fulfilling my quota? A way to stop me from earning my freedom with a clean slate? Or was there some other reason behind his decision?

Once again I searched my memory for a face to go with the name, Tyler Morgan, seeking something to explain the faint sense of familiarity that came with it. For the first time, I viewed the blurring of my memories with concern. What else had I forgotten that could prove to be important to my future?

No answers were to be found in the recesses of my mind before I arrived at the side of my latest client. A young woman was sprawled on the tiled floor of her bathroom, blood pouring from a gash on her temple and clotting the white tiles beneath her naked, wet body. Behind her, the shower was still running. It appeared she had slipped, hitting her head on the way down.

Though relieved no wraiths appeared to be involved in her death, the knowledge of a young life cut tragically short rankled. Death often had no rhyme or reason to it, taking young and old, good and bad, in equal measure.

Giving myself a shake, I averted my eyes from her naked flesh as I reached out and placed my fingers just below her throat, calling her soul to me. Its brightness chased away some of the darkness of my mood as I spun in the air and prepared to return to the Underworld.

A brittle cackle warned me a split second before two black shadows zoomed into view.

Dark reapers, forms indistinct, writhed with constant movement as they barrelled toward me.

It didn’t take long for me to figure out they were after the soul I had just reaped. I may have been the reaper to take it, but it wouldn’t count toward my quota unless I made it back to the Underworld and handed it over to Grimm.

Keeping a firm grip on the soul, I dodged left, through the bathroom wall. Not that moving through walls would prevent the dark reapers from following me. They had the same abilities I did. But it might buy me some time. Wincing at the rippling feeling as I sped through another wall, I twisted in mid-air and shot upwards.

Seconds later I was in the sky above the dead woman’s building, her soul clutched in both hands and cradled to my chest. In my peripheral vision I saw shadows converging on my location. More dark reapers for sure.

I increased the speed of my flight, using up as much of my energy as I dared to stay ahead of my pursuers. I had to get to Grimm. I could not let one of the dark reapers steal the soul from me. As I flew, I could sense them coming up behind me, feel the hatred emanating from them along with the thrill of the chase.

I burst through the barrier into the Underworld, finding a small measure of comfort at the sight of all the twinkling souls. I would soon join them, regardless of what Grimm threw at me.

More dark reapers swooped in from the sides. I ducked and weaved to avoid their outstretched hands, their forms more corporeal on home ground.

I didn’t bother trying to firm up my astral body, more focused on getting to my destination with the soul of my client intact. In a last ditch effort to outdistance my pursuers, I expended more energy to make myself go faster, savage glee filling me at the sight of Grimm’s sanctum in the street below me.

Without slowing down or bothering to take on the form of a Victorian gentleman, I whipped through the roof and into the heart of Grimm’s lair.

He waited in the middle of the room, giving no sign he was disturbed by my sudden appearance or that I had a pack of dark reapers on my heels. I shoved the soul into his hand, using the last of my strength to maintain my form as I waited for him to acknowledge that I had succeeded.

He didn’t even look at the soul as he tossed it to the dark reapers arrayed behind me. My diaphanous stomach lurched at the sound of it being ripped to shreds, all chance of rebirth lost.

Horrified that Grimm would destroy an innocent soul to punish me, I forced myself to meet his gaze. ‘Three to go,’ I said, forcing all emotion from my voice.

He inclined his head in a shallow nod, and then turned his back on me. Within seconds a thick mist sprang up between us, cloaking him from my sight. It became even more difficult to maintain my form as the virtual adrenalin fled my system. Before I came apart completely, I left the room by the door and slowly made my way to my apartment block. I did not have the energy to spare to fly through the air to the top floor. Instead I trudged up the stairs.

When I got there I found the door locked against me. No matter what I did I could not pass through.

It appeared I had been replaced as Ash after all.

Sure the apartment now belonged to Dannielle, I contemplated knocking to see if she would allow me entry. I needed somewhere safe to rest, to replenish my energy if I was to have any hope of making the last few reaps I needed to fulfil my quota. But the fact the door was locked to me made me pause, doubting the welcome I would receive. Besides, if she did take pity on me it could make her the next target for Grimm’s anger.

No, I couldn’t put her at risk.

There had to be somewhere I could hide until my strength returned.

In the end, it was a storage room on the floor below that became my refuge. A bitter smile twisted my lips at the thought of having to hide in what was essentially a broom closet. It was a useless idiosyncrasy of the Underworld where dirt could be swept away with a wave of a reaper’s hand if they had the strength to manipulate their surroundings.

That strength I was sorely lacking at the moment.

I doubted any of my fellow reapers would think to seek me out here, if Grimm had more in mind than making it difficult for me to make the last of my reaps. Indeed, as the Grim Reaper, Lord of the Underworld, he would be able to pinpoint my location at will should he decide to make my afterlife even more difficult.

But as I slowly regained my strength, no one came to my place of hiding.

Uneasiness grew at the thought Grimm wanted to drag out my pain, prolonging the inevitable. He was the Grim Reaper after all. Nothing happened in his kingdom that he wasn’t aware of. For him to leave me in peace now meant he had far worse in store for me.

Knowing this, I sought to prepare myself for what I might find when I finally ventured from the broom closet some hours later.

Unfortunately, no amount of preparation could have prepared me for what I found waiting for me just beyond the door.

Chapter 3

Even in death, Dannielle was beautiful.

The unnatural pallor of her semi-corporeal form, and the dullness of her eyes as the dark reaper leached away the last vestiges of her energy spoke of an eternity of pain. How long had she been held there in unending torment, waiting for me to come out of hiding and bear witness to the last moments of her soul?

It burned, to think of this vibrant and vital spirit extinguished for the sole purpose of punishing me.

How many would lose their hope of rebirth before Grimm’s anger was appeased? Would anything other than the destruction of my soul suffice?

All this ran through my head as I lunged toward the dark reaper, wrenching Dannielle’s spirit away from him. All that was left was a husk.

In my rage, I turned on the dark reaper, ripping, tearing, doing to him what he had done to Dannielle. Only I didn’t devour his spirit, I eviscerated it. When I was done tendrils of dark spirit clung to me and I recoiled, my first instinct to get it off before it contaminated me.

I hesitated, an idea germinating.

Grimm knew where I had been hiding. He’d sent the dark reaper to wait for me to emerge. He would be able to track me for as long as I remained one of his reapers, but the remnants of the dark reaper clouding my spirit might make it harder for him to find me.

I didn’t feel guilty for destroying the dark reaper. Its kind derived pleasure in the destruction of souls. This was one fewer creature to do Grimm’s bidding, and I would make use of its death to increase my chances of remaining free.

Focused on ignoring the taint that surrounded me, I moved to the stairwell and made my way to ground level, keeping my form as indistinct as I could to avoid notice. When I slipped outside, the perpetual night of the Underworld was filled with movement. Reapers swirled through the air above the streets and skulked in every alley and laneway I passed.

None of them gave me a second look and I allowed myself to hope I would make it through this. As I walked towards the edge of the city, I became certain the reapers were looking for me. But it appeared my disguise was working. Now I just had to find somewhere to lie low until the call to reap came and hope the disguise didn’t wear off before then.

It was an imperfect plan, with so much that could go wrong. Yet it was all I had.

When the call to reap did come, I leapt into the air, trying to match my movements to those of the reapers still searching for me. As I got higher in the sky, I heard cries of alarm from below me.

I’d been spotted.

I threw off the last tatters of the dark reaper’s spirit, feeling a burst of energy when I shed its taint. I reached the barrier to Easton and plunged through, not daring to stop. Zooming through the air, I homed in on my client’s soul, travelling as fast as I could, my path taking me through obstacles rather than avoiding them. I didn’t have time for niceties.

When I reached the Easton Base Hospital, my path arrowed downward, into one of the surgical suites where a doctor and her staff frantically worked to save the patient on the operating table, calling out instructions to her staff. I flew across the room, hand out to rip the soul from the dying man’s chest as I went.

There was no finesse to this reap. It was fast and hard.

The machines he was hooked up to signalled his death the second I ripped his soul free. I was through the wall and out of there before the doctor could take a breath. Soul clutched in my hand, I barrelled through walls and ceilings. Just because I had managed to reap it didn’t mean it would count toward my quota. First I had to get it back to Grimm, intact, and that was not going to be easy.

When I reached open sky and could see no sign of dark reapers, my uneasiness grew. This had been too easy. Grimm was planning something, I was sure of it.

It wasn’t until I slipped through the barrier and returned to the Underworld city that I discovered what it was.

All the reapers that had been searching for me before were now amassed above Grimm’s sanctum. The sky was thick with them. There was no way I would be able to slip through them unnoticed. Even if I could procure another disguise, at such close quarters I would be recognised. I also wouldn’t be able to dim or disguise the light of the soul I carried. It would act like a beacon to their senses the moment I edged closer.

Still, I had to try.

I would not give up. Not with my freedom so close.

I returned to the place on the outskirts of the city where I had hidden before the call to reap came, searching the ground for something I could use. Here, on the edge of the fake world Grimm had created to house his reapers, a heavy fog marked the boundary. When I’d first become a reaper, my mentor had told me to never venture into the fog, that to do so would be to risk eternal damnation for my soul.

I’d believed her at the time, the fog giving off a sense of wrongness so powerful it made my stomach heave any time I’d chanced near. Whispers had abounded, of a portal to another plane of existence, one so vile and corrupt it had been sealed for eternity.

All reapers avoided the drop off that led to it, though I had seen Grimm here many times, the fog wrapping around him and carrying him into the crevasse. He returned from these excursions invigorated in some way, the malevolence of his emanations increased tenfold.

I had no intention of entering the crevasse, or getting any closer to the portal to a world that would be viewed as Hell by the living. But perhaps the fog could be of use.

I scrounged around in a dumpster in an alley close to the edge, looking for a container suitable for housing the soul. When I found a discarded jar, I leaned out as far as I dared, retching uncontrollably as I scooped up some of the fog.

With trepidation, not sure how this would affect the soul, I slipped it inside the jar, having to hold my hand over top to keep both it and the fog inside as I’d been unable to find a lid. Stomach still uneasy, hoping the lingering effects of the fog would hide the soul and myself from prying senses, I made my way back into the middle of the city, approaching Grimm’s sanctum from the rear.

Breath held, not that it mattered in the afterlife, I crept closer. At any moment I expected to hear an outcry to signal I’d been discovered. But all was silent. It was an effort to think positive, to see that as evidence of my ingenuity instead of a trap being spun by Grimm to tempt me closer.

It wasn’t until I reached the sanctum that I encountered my first problem.

As had happened with my apartment door, I couldn’t move my semi-corporeal form through the wall. To get to Grimm, to hand over the soul and have it count, I would have to enter the building via a door. But there was only one door. The front door, which was guarded by dozens of dark reapers.

I’d never make it.

I slumped to the ground, back against the impenetrable wall, holding the jar in my hands. I’d been so close. If I attempted to deliver the soul, Grimm would take it and then rip it to shreds in front of me. Then I would be next, all hope of rebirth and a fresh life torn away.

I removed my hand from the top of the jar, stomach lurching when the taint of the fog seeped out and spoiled the air around me.

I may have failed, but maybe there was a way to save the soul. If I didn’t hand it to Grimm, it wouldn’t be destroyed. It may never achieve rebirth, but at least it would not be the end for it, if I hadn’t already poisoned it beyond repair by carrying it in a jar filled with the evil fog.

I tipped the jar upside down, wincing at the feel of the fog as it caressed my fingers with unseeingly delight, seeming to taste me. Then it dissipated in the air and the soul slipped from the jar to land in the palm of my hand.

Its light was dimmed and I winced, sure I had inadvertently destroyed it. But as I watched the soul brightened. Soon I could feel the life vibrating within it, aware Grimm and the other reapers would also be able to sense it. I urged the soul to fly, to flee.

Warmth flooded my palm, travelling up my arm to wash over my body, and then the soul rose in the air.

I heard shouts coming from inside the building, a roar of pure fury from Grimm as the soul spiralled higher and higher, making its way towards the canopy of twinkling souls.

I gaped up at it, amazed by how bright it became the closer it got to its brethren.

Dark shadows streaked after it, but they were too slow. The soul found its way to the canopy and the warmth in my body washed away even as realisation hit.

The soul was where it belonged, awaiting rebirth, and I hadn’t had to hand it over to Grimm. Deep inside my spirit I felt a weight shift, a lessening of a tightness I had only dimly registered, along with an awareness of what had happened.

The soul had been reaped and returned to the Underworld, lessening my quota by one, all without interference from Grimm.

Anger that almost matched the fury I could still feel emanating from within Grimm’s sanctum washed over me.

He’d lied.

There had never been any need to bring the souls to him to have them count against a reaper’s quota. That had been a means for him to feed, a way for him to gauge the strength of the soul and decide which ones he would devour to increase his power.

I wanted to confront him, to charge through the dark reapers guarding the door and tell him I knew what he was doing, to let all the reapers know they had been duped. But that would be a fool’s errand, sure to end with my death.

No, I couldn’t risk it. Not yet.

Once I was safely away from here, then I would find a way to let the other reapers know the truth about the malevolent being who ruled over us.

I surged to my feet and ran through the streets, wishing I hadn’t let go of the fog that had helped hide me. I still held the jar, hoping a lingering trace might exist to obscure my essence as I ran back to the lip of the crevasse and refilled the jar.

This time my stomach behaved, perhaps strengthened by my newly acquired knowledge. I had two more souls to reap, and I would not let Grimm or anyone else get in my way. When the next call came, I would collect my client’s soul and then remain in Easton until I got the second call. Only then would I return to the Underworld to set both them and myself free.

Clutching the fog-filled jar, one hand over the top once more, I turned away from the crevasse and froze. A dark reaper hovered in the air in front of me, savage glee radiating from it.

‘You’re a dead man, Ash. Grimm is going to torture your soul for all of eternity. He’s going to rip you to pieces and then put you back together to do it all over again, and for being the one to find you I’ll get to watch.’ It followed this statement up with an insane cackle, the sound of which had me shuddering.

I dropped the jar and lunged forward before he could cry out and let the others know where I was. The jar smashed on the ground near my feet, the fog twisting free, but I had no time to worry about that. I latched onto the dark reaper, strengthening my nebulous form, and we twisted in the air, ripping shreds from each other’s spirits as we battled.

Desperation gave me extra strength and I was finally able to prevail, the dark reaper no more than tatters when I was done with it. With the jar destroyed, and the risk of discovery preventing me from finding another container, I once again used the dark reaper’s spirit to disguise my own. Then I hunkered down to wait for the call to reap.

People in Easton died every day, many of natural causes, others as the result of accidents or from violent means. I shouldn’t have to wait long, though I did feel like a ghoul as I hoped two people would die so I could fulfil my quota and earn my chance at a fresh life.

But it wasn’t as though I was actively trying to kill people. I was no wraith, wantonly murdering innocents so I could feed their souls to Grimm.

After all, it was my refusal to do just that which had landed me in this predicament in the first place. Though I had to wonder, would Grimm have let me go even if I had done what he wanted? How many of his reapers had actually fulfilled their soul quotas and been released for rebirth?

How many of my kind had unknowingly assisted in their own destruction by going to Grimm with the last soul they needed to reap, only to have their spirit consumed instead of released for rebirth? It would not surprise me to discover that it was all a lie, a false hope he used to keep us in line.

But it would not be a lie for me.

No matter what I had to do, I would be reborn. I would be washed clean of all my sins and have a fresh start, untainted by my time as a reaper.

To make it harder for any of the dark reapers or Grimm to sense me if they came close, aware the tatters of the spirit I was using as my disguise would not hold up to close scrutiny, I reduced my form until little more than a shadow remained. Then I moved along the edge of the crevasse, hiding in dips and hollows as best I could.

Four times while I waited, daring not to move, dark reapers edged near my hiding place. None of them looked in my direction, yet I did not allow myself to relax. Just because I didn’t think they had seen me didn’t mean I hadn’t been sensed. They could even now be waiting to spring a trap.

Nothing happened, except my uneasiness grew with every passing moment when no more reapers came searching near the crevasse.

Grimm was up to something. I was sure of it, and the tension ate away at my fortitude.

It was a relief when the call to reap came and I could shed my disguise and streak through the endless night. No reapers chased me, and I passed through the barrier to Easton without incident. It wasn’t until the call cut out when I was a block away from my client that I realised what was going on.

Grimm had sent his dark reapers through the barrier ahead of me. Now that I was no longer focused on the call of the soul I could sense them arrayed all over Easton. Even as I had felt the call to reap, so had they and the one who was closest had swooped in to reap the soul before I could get to it.

I would never be able to fulfil my quota if the dark reapers beat me to each soul that was due to be reaped. To have any chance of getting to the soul first I would have to be closer than they were. But it was impossible for me to know when an individual soul’s time would be up. I would just have to hope for being in the right place at the right time.

To increase my chances, I returned to the neighbourhood where I had reaped the soul of the young man killed in the car accident. The hospital might have had better odds but many dark reapers were already stationed there. I would have no chance of staying out of their clutches while waiting for someone to die so I could reap their soul.

So here, where drugs and alcohol flowed freely and crime was a frequent occurrence, would be my best bet. There were a number of dark reapers evident in the troubled suburb, but this was not their usual hunting grounds. They did not know Easton as well as I did.

I was ready when the call to reap came, on the darkened street near a pub that had seen many violent altercations between its patrols over my twenty-five years as a reaper.

I darted in and had the soul of the victim of a cowardly attack in my hands before any of the dark reapers could react. I flew straight for the barrier to the Underworld and shoved the soul through. That sense of a weight lifted washed through me once more, but I didn’t linger to savour it.

Three dark reapers were heading for me and I had to use all my concentration to evade their grasp as I ducked and weaved through the air.

Agony surged through my spirit when one of them got close enough to clutch at me, but I dissolved my form completely and whisked away to find a place to hide to recover my energy.

One more reap to go and then I would be free.

Chapter 4

When the call to reap came soon after I found myself a new place to hide, I was more than ready for it. The strength of the call surprised and concerned me. The last time I had felt a call this strongly it had been for a horrendous car accident involving a large truck and a minivan filled with back-packers. Ten souls had died that day, the memory of broken bodies bathed in blood haunting me for a long time afterward.

As macabre as the thought might be, it occurred to me that if this was indeed a call to attend to multiple deaths I might be able to sneak in and reap my last soul without the dark reapers being able to stop me. I steeled myself to encounter a scene of carnage, ready to spring into action to reap a soul before my enemies had a chance to snatch them all up.

Nothing could have prepared me for what I found when I reached the loading dock for a mid-sized shopping centre on the south side of Easton.

Five dead bodies were strewn on the ground in front of a truck piled high with boxes wrapped in plastic. A forklift was driving erratically along the side of the truck, the driver not appearing to know what levers to pull as he targeted a man crouched at the rear of the truck. The man made a run for it, stumbling as he went, one leg not working properly as he attempted to flee. Panic etched on his face, he cried out when the leg gave way and he tumbled to the ground while the forklift rolled inexorably toward him.

I could do nothing for him, so I moved to the bodies lying on the ground, only to curse when they started to jerk and twitch.

Horror washed through me as one by one the dead bodies got to their feet.

The souls of their former occupants were gone. Now wraiths were running the show.

‘You’ve been a bad boy, Ash. Grimm is not happy with you at all.’

It was eerie to hear Dusty’s voice coming from the mouth of a middle-aged man. Even more eerie and disturbing was the realisation this was a trap. They’d used a dead body to kill the others so they could take them over, all as a means of luring me here. Dozens of dark reapers poured through the walls of the shopping complex and even as I turned to flee I knew it was hopeless.

More dark reapers were converging on me from all directions, hemming me in, making escape impossible.

Soon I was ensnared in a net of their dark emanations, unable to move as they closed in.

Dusty, inside her stolen body, shook her head and wiggled a finger under my nose. ‘I told you the time of reckoning was near. Death has you in its sights and will not be swayed from His dark course. You must die so that He may live.’

I stood as straight as I could, doing everything I could to stop the dark reapers absorbing any of my energy and weakening me. No matter that the odds of surviving were against it, I would not give in until the bitter end, so I was as solid as it was possible for a dead person to be, and remain intact in mind and soul.

Dusty’s purloined body twitched and jerked as she forced it to move closer, getting right in my face. ‘You should have killed the girl, as Grimm wanted. Though I’m glad you refused. Means I get to watch when he shreds your soul into tiny little pieces and scatters them to all the corners of the Underworld.’

‘Shut up, Dusty, you sick, twisted bitch.’

She lurched closer, the faint smell of decomposition wafting in the air around her from the body she inhabited. Wraiths burned up the residual psychic energy in a dead body to temporarily reanimate the flesh but that sped up the decomposition process. The other wraiths, those with lesser standing than Dusty, crowded at her back, leering at me.

It was a gruesome sight, all those dead bodies given false life, but I pushed the revulsion aside to focus on exploiting any opportunity for escape, no matter how small it might be.

As two dark reapers latched onto my arms, Dusty wrenched her soul free of her victim’s body. It fell to the ground with a sickening thud even as the ones behind her did the same.

I felt myself beginning to rise, the dark reapers and wraiths using their momentum to pull me along with them. I lifted into the air and was transported through the sky, heading for the barrier that separated Easton from the Underworld.

Once I was back in Grimm’s world it would all be over for me.

Conscious of time running out, I thrashed in the grip of those holding me, trying to make myself unsubstantial and slip free. But they merely adjusted their grasp to suit.

We reached the barrier and some of the dark reapers streaked ahead, no doubt racing to Grimm’s sanctum to let him know I’d been captured. The wraiths, except for Dusty, followed them, leaving her on the Easton side with me and the remaining dark reapers. She spun around to face me, her form shifting into dozens of different faces, all belonging to the dead bodies she had previously inhabited.

She gave a guttural cry as she fought to regain control of her form, lashing out at the reapers to either side of her and tearing strips off their spirits. They moved out of reach, pained cries echoing in the sky around us.

Dusty thrashed closer and one of the reapers holding me let go, moving out of her range when her arm lashed toward me.

I ducked, letting her hand connect with the reaper on the other side of me. He gave a cry of pain and I took advantage of his distraction to wrench myself free.

Before any of them could react I was streaking away across the sky.

Exultation at being free surged through me as I dived for the buildings below, eager to lose myself in the maze of streets and shadows. It wasn’t until I veered inside one of the tall apartment blocks lining the river that I realised I was feeling the call to reap.

In moments I was hovering over a body lying face down on the floor of a luxuriously styled apartment, wind blowing in through open balcony windows.

My client was male, unmoving, a tourniquet around one bicep and a discarded needle on the floor beside him suggesting illicit drugs were the cause of his death. Not that I cared how he had died. I needed to reap his soul and I would have beaten Grimm.

I touched his back just below the neck, feeling his soul rise to meet my call.

I wrapped my hand around it and the world went crazy.

Wind tore at me, whirling me around, even as intense pain ripped through my spirit. If felt as though I was being unmade, every atom of my being disintegrating.

Grimm.

He had found a way to reach through to the physical world