Unreap My Heart (The Reaper Series) (18 page)

“We can take you through the Ghoul Woods without the ghouls finding out.”

“And why would you do that?”

“Balthazar!”

He pretended he didn’t hear the admonishment in Arianne’s tone. “You don’t need to help us, yet you do. Explain yourself, Nixie.”

The pink fluff pointed at Arianne. “
She is a pure one.”

“That doesn’t explain anything.” Balthazar glanced at Arianne and his gaze landed on the red thread no one else but those from the Crossroads could see. The fray he’d spotted before looked worse now. The blood drained from his face. She didn’t survive the fall as unscathed as he had originally thought. Tomas had warned her about what would happen if she was separated from the thread. She’d turn into a Wraith, a being so consumed by hate that it lived on the souls of others. Balthazar wouldn’t hesitate ending her if that happened. He made a mental note to keep a close eye on the fraying section of her thread. Arianne didn’t seem to notice, and that could be bad, maybe even add to her carelessness.

“Believe what you want, Enforcer,”
said the Nixie, no longer trembling.

The mention of his identity drew Arianne’s attention again. In Balthazar’s periphery he saw her go very still. She stared at the Nixie intently. Balthazar had to tread carefully now.

“If you know what I am, then you know what I can do if you betray us,” he said softly.

“We know many things, Enforcer.”
The Nixie turned from him to Arianne and back. “
We know when we will die, and this is not that day.”

“Why did you help us?” Arianne asked.

The Nixie faced her, joined by several of its companions. “
We pledged to aid the purest of souls.”

“I’m not pure.”

Balthazar would have laughed if the situation wasn’t so serious. Arianne knew so little about what she was. Her purity was one of the reasons why he’d risked bringing her to Granmare Baba in the first place. Now she lived on the witch’s radar. Pure souls were hard to find and held so much power in them, they could feed the Crossroads for a long time. Arianne walking into Death’s den, even without knowing that, was a ballsy thing.

“Be careful of this one.”
The Nixie pointed at Balthazar. “
He means you great harm.”

Arianne looked at him, but not with fear.

He shrugged. “I’ve never lied about what I am.”

She returned her gaze to the Nixie. “Can you give us a moment before we go?”

The Nixies nodded in that full-bodied way they did and moved away from where Balthazar and Arianne stood.

“I’ll just change my clothes and then we’ll go,” she said when the Nixies went out of earshot.

“I don’t trust them.” Balthazar knelt by the water and washed the Nixie kiss marks from his face and hands.

“You don’t trust anyone.”

He looked over his shoulder at Arianne and looked away quickly when he saw she’d removed her jacket. “It’s what’s kept me alive this long.”

“I have a feeling you’re not the fast-dying type.”

“Yet you saved me anyway.” How did he get back to that topic? Balthazar splashed more cold water on his face to relieve some of the heat residing there. He heard Arianne move toward the stand of trees. She wanted privacy while she changed. Not that he found anything she had to offer body-wise appealing, but he gave her what she asked for by keeping his gaze on the placid underground lake.

“I did what I had to.” Arianne grunted, sounding like she struggled against her clothes. The Blood Tree sap was pretty sticky. “You’d do the same for me.”

“You sound so confident about that.”

“Let’s hope I don’t have to put it to the test. You can be so unreliable sometimes.”

Balthazar stifled a laugh by coughing. Arianne was starting to get him. It didn’t sit comfortably with him. Someone who knew too much knew your weaknesses. And Balthazar would rather die than expose himself that way to a girl who wasn’t even old enough to understand what he’d gone through in his life.

“Okay, all set,” Arianne said.

She’d re-braided her hair when Balthazar turned around to face her. His plunge had washed away most of the sap from his clothes, so he didn’t feel the need to change like Arianne did. She still wore the leather pants he wished didn’t hug her curves the way they did, but she’d changed into a new shirt and sweater before shrugging on the jacket she’d discarded previously.

“I still don’t feel like we should let the Nixies help us,” he said, eyeing the pink balls coming near them again.

Arianne pursed her lips at him. “You said it yourself. The pulse on the ring is getting weaker. We don’t have much time. I for one don’t want to fight my way through the ghouls, do you?”

She had a point. Balthazar hated it. Of course, he could just order her not to let the Nixies help them, but he’d be a hundred kinds of stupid to do that. As much as he hated admitting that they needed help since he didn’t know where they were, he let Arianne do all the talking with the Nixies.

“We’re ready,” she said, giving him one last glance that said she could handle it from here. He raised an eyebrow at her but didn’t say anything more.

Chapter 20

OIC

T
HE
N
IXIES
O
PENED
A
NOTHER
P
ORTAL
for Arianne and Balthazar to walk through, this one bigger than the one they’d fallen into to get to Nixie Island. The Nixies hopped in first. Arianne inched toward the portal and stuck her head in. She didn’t want a repeat of the endless fall. She breathed a sigh of relief. The portal opened to a long tunnel lit by spherical orbs floating along one wall. The tunnel seemed like it had been cut from what she assumed was the inside of a mountain or somewhere deep underground.

Not trusting the solid ground ahead even if the Nixies had already gone ahead of her, Arianne took a tentative step, keeping one foot outside the portal just in case.

“Oh for suck’s sake,” Balthazar said. He grabbed Arianne by the waist and lifted her into the other side of the portal before joining her. She yelped a little too late. She’d already been set on her feet when the pathetic sound escaped her lips.

“You keep forgetting we don’t have time,” Balthazar added, the snort in his voice.

“Suck’s?” Arianne raised an eyebrow at him. “Don’t get all gentlemanly on me now.”

Balthazar dropped a nasty case of the f-bomb. “Better?”

“Much.”

He gestured for her to lead the way. Arianne didn’t argue. Considering how little Balthazar trusted the Nixies and vice versa, having her in between both parties seemed like the better option. The Nixies seemed content to move ahead of them, not bothering to look back to see if Balthazar and Arianne followed. They hopped and skipped, bumping into each other and giggling tiny giggles. Arianne envied what seemed like such an uncomplicated life. They lived on their little island, once in a while saving someone like her from killer ghouls. What did they call her? Pure?

She shook her head. After everything she’d been through, pure wasn’t the word she’d use. Exhausted. Drained. Running on fumes. Okay, the last bit was three words, but she didn’t care. She held on to her motivation—saving Niko—so she could keep going.

“You really are pure,” Balthazar whispered from behind her.

Without looking back, Arianne said, “What do you know about that?”

“It’s not about knowing.” She heard the shrug in his voice. “I’ve been alive long enough to know how to spot a pure soul, and yours is as pure as it comes. Even Redeemer quality.”

Arianne laughed at that. “Me? A Redeemer?” She shook her head. “I don’t consider myself that bad of a person, but I’ve had my share of mean girl moments.”

“I doubt that.”

“I once
outed
this girl in front of the cheerleading squad.”

“And why did you do that?”

She recalled the memory like it happened only yesterday. Darla had bullied Arianne for years because she got it into her head that she was in love with her. Arianne admitted to being partially at fault for leading Darla on. She became friends with Darla at the time Carrie had just been diagnosed with kidney disease and needed a transplant. It had been a pretty rough year for everyone, and Darla welcomed her with open arms. When Arianne refused Darla’s advances, the bullying started. Darla lost everything the day she threatened to hurt Niko. Not that she could because of Niko’s Reaper status, but Arianne “outed” her anyway in order to keep Niko’s secret. Arianne guessed that was why Darla wanted to run her over. Niko saved her, which caused Darla to swerve into a pole. Darla had been unconscious and bleeding when the ambulance drove away that night. Since Arianne had been in the Crossroads and now the Underverse shortly after that, she didn’t know if Darla had survived the crash.

In some ways, it did feel like only yesterday that she had jumped in front of Niko to save him from the wrath of Darla. “She threatened to break Niko’s kneecaps. I guess I just had enough of her constant bullying.”

“Amateur.”

“I almost didn’t give my sister the kidney transplant she desperately needed.” Arianne didn’t know why that slipped out. Call it a desperate move to prove Balthazar and the Nixies lied about her being pure.

“The way I’d do it? Just to be un-pure? I’d drug someone, cut out their kidney, and leave them in a tub of ice. Now that’s as far from pure as you can get.”

“You just have an answer for everything don’t you?” She turned around and walked backward, glaring at Balthazar with each step she took.

He stared back, unfazed. “Our actions don’t dictate the purity of our souls. Sure, they taint our souls, but you would have to do something truly heinous to really do some damage to your soul. I’d say you’re just looking for excuses to deny what’s clearly the truth. Why don’t you just accept it and save us the aggravation? The Nixies wouldn’t have helped you if you weren’t a pure soul.”

Arianne turned back around and considered Balthazar’s words. Just because he spoke of the truth didn’t mean she had to agree. “If there was someone with a really pure soul, it would be Carrie. She was the nicest person I know…” She paused, swallowed around the lump in her throat, and corrected herself. “Knew. When Niko reaped her, she had the brightest soul I’d ever seen.”

“You can see the souls of the dead?”

Did she just hear awe in Balthazar’s voice? Arianne shook her head. The acoustics in the tunnel must be messing with her hearing. She shrugged, never liking to make a big deal about seeing the dead. “Happened after the transplant. I died for a second on the operating table. When I came back, I started seeing souls. I wish I hadn’t. No one told me they were naked.”

Balthazar chuckled. “Clothes don’t follow into the afterlife, Arianne. As you well know.”

“Hollywood always gets it wrong, huh?”

“You don’t know the half of it.”

Arianne grew quiet for a second, thinking back to what the Nixies said about Balthazar. They told her he would hurt her. A part of her believed them, but like he’d said, if he’d wanted to hurt her then he would have already. She refused to give up on him. Balthazar had redeemable qualities. Sure he’d left Uluru to die amongst the ghouls, but he did give her a flower to leave on the memorial she’d put together for him. Then the first part of the Nixies’ conversation with Balthazar surfaced.

“What does being an Enforcer mean?” she asked, keeping her gaze on the Nixies yards away from them cheerily chatting with each other.

“I told you, we’re not here to share sob stories,” he grumbled, but she heard him giving in. His tone didn’t sound as stringent as the last time he’d barked at her.

“We’re not sharing sob stories.” Arianne thought fast. “I’m just trying to understand. Granmare Baba didn’t unlock that piece of information, but she clearly put it in my head. Why would she do that if it wasn’t important?”

“That old hag can be malicious sometimes. Who knows why she put that shit in your head in the first place? For all I know she did it to torture me.”

“I get the feeling you really hate everyone.”

“Not much to like in the Underverse.”

Arianne veered away from the topic of why Balthazar seemed to hate all things and returned to her original line of questioning. “So being an Enforcer?”

She waited with baited breath. They’d been traveling together for some time now. She believed she deserved a little information about him.

“It’s what I used to be,” he finally said. “A long time ago.”

“You don’t seem happy about it.”

“Because I’m not!”

“You don’t have to yell.”

Balthazar cleared his throat. “There’s really no point in rehashing the past, little girl. We’re here to find the Redeemer, that’s all. The sooner we do that the sooner I get to challenge D for his seat and you get your precious Niko back.”

She didn’t miss the venomous hate Balthazar sprinkled around Niko’s name when he’d said it. “What is it about Niko that gets you all riled up? What did he do to you?”