Reaper(Cradle #10)(128)

Eithan was still there, on his hands and knees, heedless of the dirt on his clothes. His fingers tightened on the soil, and his back shook.

It took Lindon a long moment to realize that Eithan was quietly sobbing. Tears plopped to the ground one at a time.

Lindon placed a gentle hand on his back, but Eithan didn’t respond.

“Thank you, Eithan,” Lindon said quietly. “For everything.”

Eithan looked at Lindon in shock. His expression slowly softened, and he rose to his feet. He placed his hands on Lindon’s shoulders and met his eyes.

“I’m proud of you, Lindon,” Eithan said.

That hit Lindon harder than he had imagined.

The others were looking over to them, and Eithan swept towards them. Uncharacteristically, he didn’t wipe his face or brush his clothes clean.

“I had hoped we would have many more years together,” Eithan said, in something approaching his usual tones. “I wanted to see the sights beyond this world with you. All of you.”

A distant scream of terror echoed in Lindon’s mind, and he looked up. He was just the first. The others looked up a second or two later.

The sky was completely black now. Empty, except for one figure.

He was only the size of a human, so he should have been invisible at that distance, the man in the bone armor. But Lindon could see him clearly.

His eyes blazed under the shadow of his helm, balls of red fire. He wore a full suit of armor that had been carved from yellowed bone, and a pelt of ancient fur fell from his shoulders. Lindon shuddered as he sensed the power emanating from the figure.

It was depthless. Boundless. He twisted the world just by being here.

In both hands, he held a Scythe so black that its darkness stood out even against the empty sky. As he stared at that Scythe, Lindon knew he was staring at the end. An apocalypse given form. It was like seeing his own death.

Eithan snapped his fingers, and Lindon realized that he had never looked up at all.

“We don’t have much time left. If this is going to be the end, then remember one thing from me: I loved every second with you all. I really, truly…had so much fun.”

Yerin met his gaze for a moment and then threw her arms around his ribs.

“If there’s another side, we’ll catch you there,” she said.

He smiled fondly and placed a hand on her head. “Yes, I suppose you will.”

The earth seemed to snap. Not like an earthquake breaking open a canyon, but as though someone had slashed through a painting. Not long now.

Lindon looked around from face to face, and there was too much he wanted to say. Yerin slid away from Eithan and went back to Lindon. He looked deeply into her red eyes and searched for the right words.

But apparently Eithan wasn’t finished. He cleared his throat. “It seems like I’ll be leaving a little sooner than the rest of you. I’ll miss you all when I’m gone. Tell Mercy for me, will you?”

The figure in the sky was now the only thing that seemed real. Spatial cracks spiraled across the black sky, as the entire world crumbled just as Ghostwater once had.

Well, Lindon thought, at least I’ll see beyond this world after all.

Then he realized what Eithan had said.

“Eithan…this is it for us,” Lindon said. “We’re all gone.”

Eithan brushed off his hands and wiped his face clean with a cloth. He let the cloth fall, and all trace of his tears was gone. He held out his right hand, and revealed that he had been holding something else.

A black marble.

“No,” Eithan said, “just me.”

The marble cracked.

Eithan looked into the sky as he held out the black marble. “Remove restraints and release authority. Authorization zero-zero-eight…Ozriel.”





The world stopped shaking.

Northstrider stared into the reflective black surface of his codex. The turmoil calmed, and the message it had displayed—[A destroyer has come]—now flickered out.

It was replaced with a new message, and if the previous one had brought with it the chaos of panic, this one came along with the silence of the grave.

White letters on a black surface declared:

[The Destroyer has come.]





The screams from the Sage of Calling Storms choked off just as all the sirens and alarms around Reigan Shen stopped blaring.

The man jerked up, taking a deep breath.

Reigan Shen had long since given up and slumped into a chair. “What now?” he asked, with little hope.

“He’s here,” the Sage whispered.

Reigan wasn’t much interested—he figured they were all dead either way. He sighed. “Who?”

“The Reaper.”





Emriss Silentborn had earned her title for two reasons. First, she had a long history with the Dreadgod known as the Silent King. Second, trees were notoriously quiet. She was used to reading meaning in silence.

This silence that covered the world was even more frightening than the trembling had been. It was like an axe poised to descend on her branches.

But it was still a relief.

The axe wasn’t aimed at her.





With Mercy in her arms, Malice’s eyes rolled up into her head.

She found herself back in the World of Night, the technique once again activating without her conscious intervention. She looked across the endless darkness, and instead of a field of smoky statues, she saw only one.