The Heartbeat Thief (30 page)

Not like Gehring, she thought with a pang. That wound was still so fresh, made bigger with all the years of shame that engorged it. She would not steal anything from Piotr. She had every intention of giving him all the extra time she could, to help him lift his hand to thumb his nose.

She’d pilfer his life from the clutches of Death himself, and steal His hollow victory.

The sun rose and bloomed and fell, giving up to a purple twilight that draped itself over the cottage. She kept watch over Piotr, holding his hand, smoothing his brow, slipping him a heartbeat when he rattled for death. It would ease his pain and calm his struggle a little longer.

And so Death was kept at bay, beat by stolen beat, through the long, dark night.

“Senza.” She roused from a waking trance to a gentle tapping on her hand. Daylight had arrived while she slept, a thin hope that seeped through the window.

Piotr was lucid. “Senza.”

“You’re awake. How do you feel?”

“I had the most incredible dream,” he said. “An undertaker came for me and you told him he couldn’t come in.” He chuckled. “I did it. I should have died yesterday. It was my time. But we kept him away, didn’t we? Senza and her magic tea.”

“Shh.” She stood and smoothed her skirts, needing to do something with her hands. “It’s not magic tea.”

“Doesn’t matter.” Already the heat in his hand was fading, even as the sun brightened the sky outside the window. The sunrise was a haze of pink fuzz, too low in the sky to give warmth. “Death came for me yesterday. I saw him. He stood by the door, and held his hand out to me. It would have been so easy. So easy. Part of me was already there with him, ready to walk out that door. But I said no. Because you wanted me to stay. I told him I’ll go when I want to go. I can die now. I can do it on my own terms.”

“No, Piotr. Tea. No need for a big breakfast. We’ll take some small tea together.”

He shook his head. “I just want to sleep. Okay?”

She stood over him, eyes ablaze with a fierce sting, knowing if he closed his eyes, he would never waken. And all these weeks he’d spent here in her cottage, trying to outsmart Death, all this time he had encouraged her to open up to him as he had done with her. In the span of a month, she knew him better than she’d known all the people she’d met since her Unbirthing day, since the moment her dark lover Knell had placed her last heartbeat into the amulet.

She opened the locket and peered in, wanting to bolster Piotr’s strength.

There was only one beat left.

Her heartbeat, the very first one Knell had stowed inside the locket when he’d cast his spell of eternal youth upon her.

One beat. It was barely enough to sustain her until she could get to town and steal more. She had to get outside, find someone. It was so early in the morning, she’d have to go to the coffee shop, she’d have to find a person with a few beats to spare.

Senza stole a look at Piotr’s face, the deep lines, the dark circles under his eyes, the jaundiced glow of his skin. No. This was the right thing to do. It was destiny.

She dipped her finger into the final beat, which had been the last she’d experienced as a mortal. She felt the affinity her flesh had for the great beat. It was her. It was the last remnant of what had truly been her. She’d been alive and eager and passionate and full of heat and emotion. All those things had gone away when that beat was lifted from her.

She could have that beat again. She could experience it all once more.

But this moment with him would be lost. Piotr would die, either way. Death could be held off no longer. But at least, she could give Piotr a glimpse of all she’d failed to share with him, even as he shared his entire essence with her.

She pressed the beat into his heart, and with it all the compassion she’d ever felt. He had to know. He couldn’t die a grey, shallow death. Let him go to the other side knowing that he’d meant something to her.

The pulse sped to his heart. She felt the crash within his chest when his heart responded. His eyes opened, eyes crinkling in a smile.

“Senza,” he whispered. “Thank you.”

The sun broke free of the hazy dawn, emerging as a separate entity of its own glory. Piotr breathed his last, his life slipping out of him.

On his own terms. Death had taken nothing Piotr didn’t want to give.

Her vision blurred. One hundred fifty years. It took that long for her to learn regret. That final heartbeat had been her everything, and the expression that had illuminated his face was proof that in that moment, he knew. But it wasn’t enough. He’d deserved so much more.

She’d given him all she had to give, and she knew she could not have given him more. He’d been smitten with her, and in the end he’d loved her more than anyone he’d ever known. But she never could have returned that love.

Her empty heart had always belonged to another.

Suddenly, a terrible force gripped her chest, squeezing. The pain was galactic, lancing through her like needles and molten silver. Breath was lost. Coherency was lost. She clutched her chest, her empty heart in an endless constriction of agony.

Dying. After a century and a half of running away from death, she was finally dying.

Somewhere, unseen, the great grandfather clock began to toll, heavy sonorous peals that traveled right through her, ringing in her very bones.

Her midnight hour had arrived.

Senza pitched forward, landing hard on her knees. The pain tunneled her vision, draining her strength. Face to face with Piotr, she bit her lip. So glad he hadn’t lived to see this.

She hung her head over her clasped hands as she knelt next to his body. Closing her eyes, Senza sipped at the air, trying to breathe around the pain. This is what she’d wanted, wasn’t it? She wanted to die, wanted to break this spell—

Another toll of the massive ebony clock, another wave of pain sliced at her and she cried out. No one would hear her. She’d die alone.

Just like Knell had told her she would.

The twelfth peal sounded, the pain curling her into a constricted mass of agony.

And then, there was silence.

Alone.

No. Not alone. You were never alone.
His voice was a whisper, a watercolor of intonation. It raised the hairs on her neck and dripped chills down her back.

She sobbed, recognizing his voice. It had been so long but she knew that voice, a melody to a song she’d never stopped singing. “All I wanted—”

“Was to escape Death. And you did an admirable job. Although
he
was an unexpected twist.” His footsteps sounded behind her, his strong hands scooping under her arms to lift her up to her feet.

She wanted to wilt back against him.

Knell stroked his hand across her collarbones and the gnawing burn of pain subsided. Wrapping his arms around her, he rested his chin on her shoulder, mouth close to her ear. “You surprised me, Senza Fyne. I never thought you’d give your last beat to another, especially not to one as hopeless as he.”

“You don’t know me.” She wrapped her fingers around his arms. Would he disappear again? All she’d wanted was to be with him, all this time; she’s spent decades coping with a life that would not end, a solitude that left her haunted, and only after she broke the spell that bound her to life did he return. “You don’t know my heart.”

“Do I not?” He tugged her away from the body and gently twirled her to face him. He stroked his chilled fingers along her jaw, gaze caressing her face. “Don’t you see? I have always loved you, since the moment I first laid eyes on you. It was the hardest thing I’d ever done, granting your wish.”

She gritted her teeth and glared at him, wanting to scream, to cry. She would not. “It was a game to you. You enjoyed seeing my torment and you knew how to make it go on forever.”

“Torment you? You think I did this to torment you? I did this because you wanted it. I was the one in torment.”

“And yet, you stayed away! I was always alone. Always without.”

“Never alone. I was there. You just didn’t know to look for me.”

“I looked everywhere. No matter how fast I ran, you kept slipping away from me.”

“But I was there. At every funeral you ran from. At the salons and the opium parlors. In the stables of an inn. And I was here now, for him. Always with you.”

“I couldn’t reach you.” Senza dropped her forehead onto his chest. It caused a sweet pain, the comfort it gave. “You were always a step ahead, an eternity away.”

“You did not want to reach me. You’ve spent the last century and a half running from me. Until today. When you cast aside your fear and realized I am not one to be feared.” He lifted her chin, urging her to meet his gaze. “Your grandmother…she loved you so much, Senza Fyne. She’d only wanted you to live a life worth living. She never meant for any of this.”

“How do you know about Grandmother?”

“Because I was there. And that was the moment I had fallen in love with you.”

Senza shook her head, uncomprehending. She hadn’t met him until that ball, when he kissed her hand and called her
beloved
. But he said Grandmother—

Grandmother. Begging a moment more from an unseen visitor. The dressing gown slipping to the floor. Senza’s vision blurred, first with memories, then with tears.

She realized who her lover was.

She finally knew who he’d been all along.

“Your name. You said it was Knell, but…” The last of her breath was stolen in a crumpled rush. She knew his name, as clear as any hindsight. She’d learned his name in so many languages, so many tongues. As she readied his name upon her tongue, it struck her heart hard enough for a great crashing beat, born of her epiphany. “It isn’t. Not really.”

Her lover and her greatest fear had been one and the same.

“Ah.” He twined his fingers around hers and raised them to his lips, his kiss warm and welcoming. “Finally, you see, Senza Fyne.”

“Thanatos. The angel of Death.” Saying it made him real, made him here, and laid bare all her foolishness. “If I knew—”

She bowed her head, resting her forehead against his chest once more, feeling a terrible sob swell inside her chest.

He wrapped his arms around her, encircling her within his shadowy embrace, warm and secure. Thanatos pressed a kiss upon her head, a gentle touch from the gentlest of all souls. “But you could not know. No one is ever allowed to know, not until the end.”

“What happens, now?” She wrapped her fingers into his lapel, pulling him tightly against her. So afraid to let go. If she turned her head just a fraction, she’d see the couch, see Piotr, see proof that life ended, that love and light eventually succumbed to the endless night. “Does it all just end? Will I just end up, lying in this cottage like him, until he and I are discovered?”

“No. I could not allow that,
bien-aimé
.” He untangled her fingers from his jacket and stepped back half a step. With a gentle touch, he pushed back her straggled curls, blinking his suddenly bright eyes as he studied her. An unfathomable sadness had settled into the lines of his face, a weight that had never before existed. “We go back. We go back and you live the way you were meant to live. Without fear of the end. Are you ready to go home?”

She raised her eyes to meet his, those deeply dark pools, seeing her face reflected within them. So long. She’d lived for so long and it was all for this moment, simply to be held by the one who always loved her. What lay in store for her, her future?

Senza swallowed hard and closed her eyes, spreading out her arms to receive whatever he deemed to be hers. A single tear slowly curled down her cheek, a tear that had taken a century and a half to swell. That tear held all the joys, the regrets, the thrills, and the longings of a girl who’d never grown up. Not until now, when she realized that all she’d ever truly wanted had been right there in front of her, all along.

After a lifetime of living in the present, Senza realized the future held nothing she wanted. After an eternity of selfish running, she deserved nothing but an end.

But in the end, it was her past he presented her.

In the space of a heartbeat, the crashing of the Atlantic Ocean disappeared, and the cold salty air lightened, acquiring a taste of sunlight and lavender. Birdsong.

She cracked her eyes, wondering if Heaven’s Gates stood before her.

It was not Heaven. Not at all.

Senza blinked a few times. It was…Surrey.

She stood outside Felicity Keating’s manor. The great square home, white glazing that had once captured the sunset and reflected its glow. The stone paths were just as she remembered, lined with carefully-tended flower beds. All was painted in the muted shade of grey.

Everything, the house, the grounds, were cast in a grey dimness. Knell’s limbo.

Senza stood on the walk, the windows of the parlor just behind her, Knell before her. If she turned her head toward the home, who would she see? Would she be able to peer in through the window? Would Felicity’s casket still be inside? Would the shades of the living that milled through the home look like her long-dead family and friends and acquaintances, all dead these past one hundred and fifty years?

And, as distressing as it should have been to find herself back on these grounds, she had no fear, no grief, nothing but a sense of acceptance. She’d lived too long to feel any sort of surprise now.

Senza quietly looked up at her stately lover, as they stood on the very spot where they’d once spoken.

He stroked her arms and studied her face, another stolen moment. “You have a life, Senza Fyne. It must be lived and it would be lived better if you were not afraid of the end. You have all your life,
bien-aimé
, and it waits for you in there.”

Suddenly, she realized what he planned to do. He meant to leave her here.

“No, Thanatos. You can’t.” How could she go back in time, after everything that had happened? She’d lived a century and a half past this particular night. She’d seen the deaths of queens and presidents and lovers and soldiers in great wars and she couldn’t be just a girl in Surrey. Not ever.

Not ever again.

And Knell—how could she face the dreadful suitors knowing her heart, whether it beat or no, would lie within his forever?

She clutched at his arms, trying to hold onto something she knew she couldn’t keep. “What about you? What about us?”

“There will always be us. I’ve waited this long,
bien-aimé
. I can wait a little longer. But you have to do something, now.” He grasped her shoulders and steadied her, brushing her tear-streaked cheek. “You must live.”

He stepped back and opened his cloak, and reached into his breast pocket. When he withdrew his hand, he held the shimmery mass of her life that he’d pulled from her so long ago.

“I’ve kept this for you.” He cocked his head. “Are you ready?”

Senza shook her head, a wild fear in her eyes.

“Good.” Like a viper, he struck, slamming the essence into her chest. A thunderous blow, it knocked the wind out of her and she stumbled backwards.

Clutching her chest, she dragged in a great breath. Pain sliced through her, dimming her vision, and she held onto her knees to keep from pitching forward.

As the pain subsided, it was replaced by a rhythm, a sensation in her chest. She looked around her, watching color seep into her surroundings.

Limbo had melted away. She was back in the world. Her heart was beating.

And he was gone.

“Miss Fyne? Are you out here, dear?” A handsome voice called from the front of the house and she turned toward the sound. Twilight was spreading, a lush layer of purple and early stars. She didn’t want to be alone in the dark. Inside would be better—

Rounding the corner, she ran straight into a young man, nearly spilling his glass. Mortified, she haphazardly curtsied, almost forgetting her manners. “I’m so sorry, I—”

“It’s quite all right, Miss Fyne. I brought you something to drink but it appears you’ve recovered substantially.”

Senza drew him closer to the lamps glowing by the door to better see his face. Who was he? He was almost familiar. But she couldn’t remember. Hadn’t she seen him at the last ball? Did they dance together? She scratched at a pin that held her coif in place. That dance seemed like a lifetime ago.

She accepted the glass. “Thank you, Mr.—”

“Vitalli,” he supplied. “Jonathan Vitalli. We’ve been introduced. Last month at the Westmore’s.”

She stared at him, trying to sift through a stack of muddied memories. Last month? Was it…in London? Echoes of crowded streets and grand soirees and alleys. She shook her head, as if the images were discordant notes of a cacophonous tune. When had she ever been to London?

And carriages without horses, and televisions, and cottages overlooking the cold Atlantic—one by one, the words and images melted into oblivion, bringing her present into sharper focus.

The faces of those she’d known were the last to release their hold, fading into ghosts, a lingering touch of the softest place of her heart.

His expression fell. “You don’t remember.”

“I’m sorry, I don’t.” She cleared her throat and flexed her fingers, feeling the world slip that half-step back into place. “Quite a lot has happened since then. But I should like it very much if you were to remind me.”

Senza slipped her hand into the crook of his arm. There was no hunger, no beckon of heartbeat or pulse to steal. He felt…ordinary.

He smiled down at her with an expression that was far from ordinary. “Of course, Miss Fyne.”

“Senza. Please.”

“You have a very unique name, Miss Senza. But I do not think it befitting a woman like you.”

A blush warmed her throat, despite the evening breeze. “How do you mean, Mr. Vitalli?”

“My grandfather, you might deduce, is Italian.” He winked at her. “A proper scandal, I know. But I hope to follow in my father’s footsteps and take over the family trade business one day. I was taught Italian, among other languages, for the sake of our business. Senza is the Italian word for
without
. And you, Miss Fyne, should never be without.”

She swallowed, mouth dry above her fluttering heart. His dashing good looks and earnest gaze touched her in a way she’d never known before, yet seemed familiar. Her cheeks flushed and she dipped her chin, suddenly shy. “I think you would prove a great tonic to a poor name, Mr. Vitalli.”

He grinned, pleasant surprise lifting his expression. As if remembering the solemnity of the occasion, he cleared his throat and gestured to the door. “We should—ah, go back inside. I know this entire experience must have been dreadful for you, Miss Fyne, but we have an obligation. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t apologize, Mr. Vitalli. I am quite recovered. We do have a duty, but I seem to have gained the clarity of perception I’d been lacking. Death is not at all what I’d always imagined it to be. It’s simply a reminder that we are alive, and we should live that way. After all, tomorrow may never come, and what we do today will have to be enough to last.”

“Profoundly spoken. Would you care to converse further, inside?” He tugged his watch out of his waistcoat and glanced at the face. “Surely we have time before the vicar arrives.”

“My dear Mr. Vitalli.” She smiled up at him, full of courage and bold hope. The last vestiges of her haunted past released her, slipped away in the night. Finally free of the fear that had shackled her for so long, Senza experienced a feeling of rebirth that swelled with every beat of her boundless heart. “We have an entire lifetime.”

They turned and strolled back to the doorway, disappearing inside, into the comfort of the life within.

Thanatos remained on the path, peering through the window, making sure Senza had settled back into her life. She would not remember him, nor the decades of extra years she’d endured in her efforts to evade a mistaken impression. There would never be a Gehring for her, nor a Piotr. There would only be Vitalli.

And Vitalli would be enough.

His own heart beat in time with hers, always would. He took comfort knowing he’d glimpse her throughout the years to come, as her long life inevitably would be darkened, at moments, by grief and loss. Such was a human life. Death came for them all.

He kissed his fingers and raised them in a farewell. Though he loved her best, and looked forward to their reunion, he would be happy to see her happy, and he would be content to wait.

Such was the devotion Death holds in his heart, that day and each day and every day. Such is the devotion Death hides in his touch, in the fragrant warmth of his embrace, in the tender kiss he bestows on each brow. Death is known but by very few, but those few know of a joy and comfort unsurpassed by any mortal imagination.

Death is not the end. He is the welcome home.

A distant sensation, like a tug on the sleeve, drew his attention. He turned toward it, dissolving into the night, pulled to another whose heart called his name. So many called his name.

They
all
called his name.

And as he loved Senza Fyne, so he loved them all.

Selfless, pure, and without end.

FIN