Almost.
Had his childhood not been the Stygian hell it was, he might have mustered a degree of compassion for her. But as it was…
He’d hate her for all eternity.
Most of all, he’d hate himself. His life had never been anything more than one bad decision after another. A choice between being mauled by a lion or devoured by a dragon.
“Are you all right?”
He looked up at Valynda’s question and had to force himself not to wince over the unfortunate circumstances that had made her a member of this Deadman crew. What had been done to her was the cruelest blow of all. Bringing her back in that temporary body to serve in this latest fiasco had probably been the worst bargain he’d ever made.
“You’re wrong, by the way.”
Thorn scowled. “Wrong? About what?”
“This is nowhere near as bad as being dead. I will never be able to thank you enough for your mercy, my lord. Even if I’m never human again, I should rather spend eternity in this body than spend it where I was.”
He wondered if Valynda would always feel that way toward him. Funny thing about gratitude…
Like snow, it never stood up to the test of time. And people quickly forgot all the nastiness it’d swallowed the minute the warm summer of abundance came again and melted the bad memory ofthe cold snowstorm away. No one ever remembered being out in the frigid wind when the sun was shining bright on their face.
But worse than that, gratitude left a chill on the soul once it was gone, as the person who ought to feel it oft held it against the person who’d once done them the favor.
Aye, gratitude was a double-edged sword that was too often turned against the one who was only trying to do good in the beginning.
Thorn wasn’t sure where the corruption came in. If it was the pettiness of the person who did the original favor wanting more for their sacrifice, or the guilt of the person who received the favor who knew in their heart that they didn’t really give a shit about the person who’d made the original sacrifice, and were only using that person to get something from them they hadn’t earned.
Either way, he had no use for gratitude. It, much like the balls of a flea, was a tiny useless thing.
But what stunned him was the guileless depth of hers. Valynda actually meant what she said and truly felt grateful to him for what he’d done. Even though that meant trapping her in such a horrible in-between state.
How peculiar.
“You’re a remarkable woman, Ms. Moore.”
“Not really.” She handed him the cup in her hand. “But I should like to think that I’m not a stupid one.”
He smiled at her logic before he tipped the cup to see that it contained wine, and not the blood Devyl was fond of feeding him whenever he wasn’t paying attention to the large, hulking bastard.
“Can I ask you something?”
He swallowed his drink. “You can always ask.” He just seldom ever answered.
“What made you bring me back?”
Thorn started not to answer, but there was something vulnerable about her. Something that reminded him of a girl he knew a long time ago, and it weakened him. Before he knew it, the truth came out against his will. “I owed a favor to a friend.”
“Do you always take such elaborate steps for friends, my lord?”
“No. I normally kill them.”
Her eyes widened at another truth he was shocked to hear leave his lips. Being around him was indeed hazardous to people’s health. They hadn’t once called him the Death Collector for no reason. Mercy and compassion were alien concepts for him.
Just ask his son. Cadegan’s current stint in hell, where he cursed Thorn’s every breath, testified to what a heartless bastard he was.
You save the world, spare all those around you, and yet leave your own flesh and blood to suffer. You are despicable.
From my first breath, to my last.
