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aspenwritesstuff · 2 years ago

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Part One: I’m Not Ready

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Typically, a single soul would never have gotten this much attention from him. He’d have forgotten every bit of them, down to their name. There was just something surreal about the way you made his heart feel…alive again, that he couldn’t quite let go of.

warnings: death, snakes, grieving

w/c: 2247

a/n: I’m so excited to bring this work to you. It’s been an idea of mine for a few months now, I’ve just been struggling to figure out how to start this. The motivation came out of nowhere for me, luckily, so I’m happy to be able to share this now 🖤 Feedback is very appreciated, and genuinely fuels my motivation to write. This is more of an introductory chapter to the series, most future parts will likely be a longer wc.

There were exactly ninety seconds before you were destined to die.

Death watched from afar as you gently plucked sprigs of lavender from your beloved garden. Instead of minding the countdown and focusing on his duty, his watchful eye instead followed your skillful hands. Though tinged with green stains and dirt, they were soft. The obvious work you’d put into the cultivation of your harvest had yet to harden the tips of your fingertips with a single callous.

In seventy-five seconds, you would die with soft, earth stained hands.

Despite your ever encroaching demise, Death found himself captivated by the melody you’d been humming under your breath. It blended naturally with the birdsong and insect chorus of the surrounding forest, remarkably peaceful for what only he knew was coming. Although he hadn’t once heard it before, Death had already decided that this song was, indeed, his favorite.

In sixty seconds, you would die with that very melody on your lips.

His chest ached where a heart should typically reside as he witnessed the bloom of a smile cross your features, rounding the wind-chapped apples of your cheeks with the most innocent of joys. It seemed a shame to have to extinguish such a bright, shining light - though it had been several centuries since Death had found himself experiencing guilt.

In forty-five seconds, you would die wearing that cluelessly happy smile - and Death would feel remorse.

His molten amber gaze followed the curve of your arm, dainty stems of chamomile joining the bundles of lavender you’d placed in a hand-woven basket to bring back to the village you and your coven had long called home.

In thirty seconds you’d spill the bundles of flowers around your lifeless body, a preemptive floral arrangement for the fate you’d been so cruelly dealt.

His lips pulled into a deep frown as he watched you happily tend the flowers, resisting the urge to warn you of the looming danger, physically pained by his inability to call out to you.

In fifteen seconds you would collapse, able to hear his voice mere seconds too late as you took your last breaths - and Death himself would mourn you.

Your eyes widened then as you finally spotted the source of peril in your otherwise unassuming garden, the eyes of a viper glistening in the light filtering through petals and stems. You froze then - melody stuttering to a halt, face paling as every hint of the smile you’d worn shifted into an expression of pure panic.

He watched helplessly as the viper hissed, fangs bared menacingly before lunging for your arm - clamping it’s jaw shut and holding on, injecting the venom into your veins. Death couldn’t blame the animal, likely feeling threatened by something exponentially larger than itself trampling around its home.

His unnecessary breath fluttered as he watched you collapse, gripping your arm as though you could stop the end yourself. Tears welled in your eyes as you fell to your knees, staining the white skirt of your dress with the soil beneath.

He reached a hand to his own chest, clutching the black silk of his shirt as his long-dormant heart dropped. Your grandmother’s voice could be heard from afar, shouting your name as her old legs tried to carry her quickly to your side.

“Y/N!” She shouted, though the paralysis had set in and you couldn’t respond had you even heard her. You’d fallen to the ground, surrounded by plants supposed to bring peace, with glazed over eyes and a single tear still stuck to your colorless cheek.

“Y/N, my darling,” your grandmother pled, holding your cold hand in hers as she stared down in horror at the two distinct holes in your arm.

You could watch now, too. Your spirit stood behind your grandmother, attempting to comfort her with a gentle hand to her back - despite your own shock at what had befallen you.

Death had never seen one so concerned for another so soon after passing.

“I’m sorry, gran…” you whispered through tears, watching as she unsteadily brushed hair from your face, pleading through sobs that you not leave her all alone.

“My darling girl, you don’t deserve this!” she choked, pressing her forehead to your body’s, “This isn’t right!”

He’d approached your body then, preparing himself for the foreign difficulty he had with taking a soul - your soul - with a deep sigh.

Death had heard similar pleas before, but had never felt so inclined to agree before now. This wasn’t right. Your vibrant soul standing behind the woman looked so tragic, eyes filled with an undeniable sorrow as you watched the woman who raised you son over your corpse.

You looked remorseful, though there was no fault of your own. You continued to rub the old woman’s back as she began mashing different plants together - creating an antidote less than a minute too late. Your voice soothing her through your own choked-back tears felt like fire in Death’s ears. You looked so nurturing. So delicate.

So beautiful.

“Please…” you finally whispered, looking up to the sky as though to plead with God. Death didn’t find it in himself to be offended, only pained as he listened to you beg, “I’m not ready.”

As you’d been looking up, Death had knelt next to your body - mouth hesitating less than an inch from your barely-warm lips as he heard you cry.

“That’s right,” he admitted, alerting you to his presence for the first time since you’d stopped breathing. Your watery eyes met his, lips parted in shock as you took in the man - if you could call him that - before you.

His dark hair was swept back from his face, putting his chiseled features on full display. His jaw was tense - as though he were arguing against an unseen force. Angular eyes burned with an unexplained resolve as he held your gaze - the slightest furrow between his strong brows showing that he was, indeed, listening.

You knew instantly who - what - he was.

He was the reaper, and he was here for you.

You should’ve been scared. You should’ve screamed. Most people meeting Death face-to-face would be horrified.

But you wanted to ask his name.

You should’ve cried. You should’ve cowered.

“Please…” you asked him instead, a single word in a last ditch effort to be allowed to stay. Not that his intimidating presence would allow much else to leave your lips.

He said nothing, opting instead to raise his head away from your body, giving you a moment of hope - never once looking away from your gaze.

“Don’t leave my gran all alone,” you begged, courage finding you despite the dread you felt. It seemed like an eternity as he stared into your eyes, almost as though searching for something, “You can take me after she’s gone, but don’t leave her all alone!”

You could almost see the wheels turning in his head as he contemplated your offer, head tilting to the side with no change in expression.

“Please…” you asked again, voice softer than it had ever been. You were past begging, recalling the legend of death having been a mortal once before, too. You were simply reaching for any hidden shred of humanity he might have had hidden inside.

And you had found it, despite Death having believed it gone.

As your grandmother held the salve to your arm, praying through her tears, the warmth that had hit him before grew exponentially - filling his being with a profound, alien sensation. He assumed that he must have felt it before, in his previous life, but that didn’t stop him from reeling at his sudden shift in mentality.

He remembered absolutely nothing of his mortal life, all memories having begun after his ascension into godhood. He was certain, at least in this life, that he’d never wanted to protect anything - or anyone - as much as he did you, in that moment.

He wanted to tell you that you’d brought these newfound thoughts and, daresay, feelings into his existence. He wanted to tell you he’d keep you safe, no matter the cost. He wanted to tell you that he wouldn’t want to take you, even if your gran had passed.

Instead, all he said was, “As you wish,” with a wistful look on his face.

As quickly as he’d appeared in your field of vision, he vanished. The breeze held a chill despite the warmth of the day, and with a whispered, “Thank you,” you found yourself back in your body, gasping for air.

Gran’s cries shifted from pain to joy, a smile blossoming on her cheeks as she looked away from the salve to your ever-brightening complexion. She pulled you into her lap gingerly, stroking your hair as you coughed - lungs reacclimating to filling with air.

“My dearest,” she whispered, “I thought I’d lost you…”

“I thought you had, too,” you croaked, bursting into another fit of coughing as she shushed you gently.

Death was always spoken of as a horrible, frightening thing. Everyone thought of it as an irreversible tragedy.

But, you knew - at least for now. You knew differently. Death was a man with gentle eyes who listened to your pleas and let you stay.

Death spent the next few hours searching within himself for what had come over him. He had always been very by-the-book; a soul is due to move on, they get taken. It was the way of the world, the correct cycle of life.

He had never had an issue before. He’d never found himself stalling, stopped in his tracks by anyone or anything. He wasn’t cold, no. He just knew his duty, and hadn’t ever had a problem following through.

Until you.

Was it your genuine, selfless care for your grandmother? Asking to be spared not for yourself, but to not abandon another? Was it the contagious peacefulness of the song you’d hummed before, bringing the reaper a sense of calm that he’d not experienced since his rebirth?

Perhaps it was the way you tenderly plucked the stems from your garden, experienced hands leaving enough as to allow for regrowth. Or maybe it was the tender smile on your face as you’d inhaled the aroma of the blossoms you’d gathered.

He pondered even further, now. Was it your eyes and the light they held? Was it your lips and the way they curved up without a thought? Was it your gentle voice? It could even have been your graceful demeanor.

He couldn’t come to a conclusion as to why he was so drawn to you, which left only one answer.

It was everything.

What cemented the strange new sensations as what they were was much less complicated than it may have seemed.

Death himself had no regrets on sparing you, despite the scolding he was sure to receive from the fates. In fact, his only regrets were being unable to kiss your lips and knowing you would have to forget him.

You woke up in a fog from a much-needed rest, Gran snoozing peacefully in her rocking chair across the room. Your head throbbed as you sat up, reaching for the water grab must’ve left out for you with a grateful sigh.

The squeak of the bed roused the sweet woman from her slumber, a soft voice instantly soothing some of the pain.

“Hello, dearest,” she rose from the chair to sit on the foot of the bed. She placed a gentle hand on your forehead, checking for fever, before patting your shoulder affectionately.

“Hi, Gran,” your voice cracked, still residually rough from your lack of oxygen.

“How are you feeling?”

“Tired,” you murmured. And you were, on such a deep level that you wondered if you’d simply imagined sleeping at all.

“I’d be worried if you weren’t,” Gran scooted closer to you to place a kiss on your forehead, “You’ve been through an ordeal.”

“Yeah…” you trailed off, realizing you had no recollection between the viper bite and waking up. This could easily have been attributed to the trauma - which you truly believed was the case - yet there was still an itch in the recesses of your mind that you just couldn’t seem to scratch.

Something had to have happened but like a word on the tip of your tongue, you couldn’t for the life of you recall what it was. It was then that you caught a glimpse of yourself in the reflection of Gran’s glasses - a gasp escaping you as you barely exhaled your words.

“My hair.”

Gran delicately pulled the strand of interest up from behind your ear, running the pad of her thumb over it with mystery swirling in her eyes. Unlike the remainder of your head, this patch was stark white, shimmering in the light from the fireplace.

“It’s…changed,” Gran nodded, allowing you to adjust to the change and find your words. “Do you…know why?”

You figured she’d have an answer for you, being among the few elders in your small township community. She held more knowledge of the strange happenings than others. She said nothing for a while, however, opting instead to continue rubbing the pearly tresses.

“Yes, my dear,” Gran finally answered, “You’ve been touched by death, after all, darling.”

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