“Another year, another year, another year has come,” she sang softly, and a happy warmth radiated through me at this abrupt change in her demeanor. I didn’t know what had brought about this shift, didn’t understand it, but I couldn’t stop to wonder on it now.My mind raced with a dozen dreams for the future. I pictured us walking back to the house together, hand in hand. I’d brew a pot of the feverfew tea as she made a cake, and after dinner, she’d tell me not to go back to the barn. She’d say I should sleep inside the house with the rest of the family, in a bed of my own, and she would tuck me in, drawing my velvet quilt up to my chin before bending down to give me a loving kiss on the cheek, and I would fall asleep basking in the warmth of her love.
People made mistakes. It happened every day.
But Mama had finally come around, finally saw me as her daughter, as a child to be fondly thought of, a child who was all hers, her flesh, her blood.
“You are one year older now,” she continued. Her crooning wasn’t quite on pitch, her tempo just shy of right.
“So shout ‘Hooray,’ ” a voice said from the threshold of the stall, taking over the song. We both startled and turned to stare at the dark, towering figure of my godfather. “You’re done.”
Chapter 5
The moment that followed seemedan eternity.
I knew I was staring, knew my mouth was open, hanging agape, knew I needed to say something—a salutation, a greeting,anything—but I found it impossible to form words. His presence—hewastall; Mama had never said just how tall he was—filled me with both wonder and absolute dread.
The stained-glass window at the village temple was wrong, all wrong. He was not a dark shadow, a smattering of grays and purples, navy and ebony. He was as black as a moonless sky, a void completely absent of light.
He cast no shadow, I noted, staring at the ground behind him where my lantern should have thrown even some soft pattern ofgray.
Hewasthe shadow. He was all shadows, every dark thought, every bleak moment. He was god of departures and the departed, lord of endings and the grave.
He was the Dreaded End.
My benefactor.
My savior, I supposed.
“Godfather,” I said, finding my voice and dipping into a curtsy that felt patently ridiculous but also somehow right. If you were supposed to show deference to King Marnaigne—a mere mortal with a funny hat—you should do at least that for a god.
I paused before rising.
Should I have bowed?
I should have bowed.
I should have knelt down and humbled my skinny form prostrate before his robes of midnight, pressing my forehead to the ground, pressing my entire body to the ground, into the ground, a worm at his feet.
An errant thought crossed my mind and I wondered what type of shoes the Dreaded End wore. Sandals, maybe? Boots for stomping to dust the souls of people who dared to think such irreverent thoughts in the face of his unholy magnitude?
I was struck with the terrible urge to laugh and clapped my hands over my mouth lest a giggle slip out and damn us all.
“Hazel,” he greeted me, and the corners of his mouth rose, his lips pulling back to reveal a line of sharp, pointed teeth.
Was he…was that a smile?
“Happy birthday,” he continued. “I…I brought you a gift.” He drew back a corner of his cloak, but it was as if the dark fabric swallowed every bit of the lantern’s light. I couldn’t see anything tucked away in such shadowy depths.
“Perhaps we should go outside?” he suggested, and I was surprised to hear his tone quaver.
Was he nervous? This great, hulking, all-powerfulgod? Nervous? Before me?
I wanted to laugh. Again.
Who was I?
A no one.
A nobody.
