“Dammit, Seeley, you Death-drone!” Soul snapped. “If you don’t let the boy see his father, I will. He deserves that much!”

Seeley scoffed, clearly displeased to be in the minority in this, since we were all throwing arrows at him over it. Widow nodded. “Do the right thing, Seeley.”

He did. He raised his scythe and whispered something against the blade. A moment later, a translucent, shimmering figure emerged from the air. It was Sherus, understandably sad and angered by what had just happened.

“I’m so sorry, son,” he said.

Taeral shot to his feet, suddenly energized. “Dad… No, I’m… I’m the one who’s sorry. I couldn’t save you.”

“I’m going to get my ass whipped for doing this,” Seeley grumbled, but Soul shushed him, eager to witness this exchange between Sherus and his son. I now understood why Amelia had kept referring to the old Reaper as a “functioning psychopath.” He was sort of getting off on this scene, and it made my stomach turn itself inside out.

“Don’t, Tae,” Sherus said. “She had you locked down. Either you killed me, or she did.”

There was no soul-chain link left. It had been destroyed, and Sherus was now a ghost, a lost spirit. But who would reap him? I looked at Seeley, but he didn’t seem keen on doing it. I doubted Soul or Widow had been tasked with it—they were free Reapers, after all. And surely, we would’ve seen or heard an assigned Reaper the moment Seeley had revealed Sherus. This was against the rules, and therefore would have drawn some kind of protest.

“What happens to me now?” Sherus asked, glancing at Seeley.

Surprisingly, he didn’t have an answer. “I’m not sure. There’s no one here to reap you. Your guardian Reaper is nowhere to be found, but I will find an answer soon. I’ve already reached out to the higher office.”

“The perks of telepathy,” Soul grumbled.

“It’s not fair,” Taeral said, shaking. “Brendel killed him deliberately. Not the Hermessi’s influence. It’s not right. It’s not natural. My father deserves another chance, and you need to give it to him!”

“Death hasn’t said anything yet,” Seeley replied.

“I don’t care!” Taeral snarled, and Raphael and Herakles had to hold him back. Fury was taking over, and it was a difficult thing to control. I knew that better than most.

Soul groaned with frustration. “Come on, bucko! You are seriously disappointing me right now! What did I tell you earlier about listening to your instincts?”

We all paused, confused by what the Soul Crusher had just said.

“I really don’t have any patience or time for your stupid mind games,” Taeral replied, gritting his teeth. “If you have something to say, just say it.”

“Tae, wait,” Eira murmured, her eyes wide as she seemed to catch on, one step ahead of us. “He didn’t say it without a reason. He knows something.”

The Soul Crusher smirked. “It just so happens that she’s right. But it’s getting really tiresome having to explain it all to you.”

“You never explained anything in the first place,” Raphael retorted.

The Widow Maker grabbed the Soul Crusher’s arm and twisted it around his back. It seemed to hurt enough to make him howl. “I’ve had enough of your crap. Less than an hour out of Zetos, and you’re already getting on my nerves,” Widow growled. “Out with it, already!”

“Ow! Ow! Ow! Okay! Dammit! Stop!” Soul whined, and Widow let him go. The “functional psychopath” Reaper moved his arm around, wincing from the pain. It was good to know they could still experience that, if only at the hands of other Reapers. “No one is reaping you, Sherus, because your death wasn’t planned. It’s not in the books. A Hermessi deliberately offed you, not their… what did you call it? Influence.”

We looked at one another, wondering if that was all that Soul had to share. Judging by how Widow had crossed his arms and kept glowering at him, I had a feeling there was more.

“What happens to him now?” Taeral asked.

“Two options. One, you give a Reaper time to be assigned to Sherus, given his current one is… I don’t know, missing? Or, two, you get Phyla and use it to resurrect him,” Soul replied.

Heat washed over me as the realization sank in. Taeral was beyond astonished, his lips parted in shock. Amelia couldn’t help but gasp.

Noticing our collective befuddlement, Soul rolled his starry eyes and proceeded with a much-needed explanation. “You’ve already learned that Eirexis can heal anything. But it can’t bring the dead back, obviously. Zetos can cut through anything, though I’m not sure whether you’ve already realized that or not.”

“No,” Taeral said. “But I did see the damage it inflicted upon Brendel.”

“Which makes it all the more intriguing as to how she managed to put herself back together so quickly, but we’ll mull that over later,” Soul said. “Point is, each of Thieron’s pieces has an independent power, a sliver of Death herself. Eirexis is healing. Zetos is… well, cutting. And Phyla, bucko… Phyla is the most important. It’s the gemstone of life. It takes life, and it gives it back. So, if you find it, if you get to it, if you get past the Phantom, you will have a shot at getting Daddy dearest here back.”

Minutes slipped by in leaden silence as Taeral and Sherus stared at the Soul Crusher. None of us dared speak. There was so much tension, I worried our heads might explode.

“And you didn’t think to mention it sooner?” Sherus finally replied. “Ideally before my son collapsed, grieving and crying his heart out?”

Soul chuckled. “Where’s the fun in that?”

The Widow Maker groaned with frustration. “On behalf of Death and all of us in her service, I apologize for him. He’s irredeemable, I’m afraid.”

“I don’t really care right now,” Taeral said, a glimmer of hope lighting the embers in his eyes. “I know I have a way of saving my dad. That’s all that matters.”

Corrine settled next to Sherus’s body. “I’ll keep him safe. Preserve him with all the magic at my disposal. You get Phyla and bring him back, Tae. Okay?”

Taeral nodded, giving her and Sherus a warm but sad, heartbreaking smile.

“All in all, it’s just one more reason to retrieve Phyla, if you think about it,” Herakles chimed in. “Save the world, save Sherus… save all of us.”

We still had a shot at this, and that was all that mattered. The Hermessi had some limits, and we’d delivered a crippling blow to Brendel, despite her evil retribution. We had two pieces of Thieron in our possession already. The number of influenced fae grew slightly every day, but all of us were making efforts to slow the process down, to derail the enemy and to give Taeral and his crew the time they needed to pull through with this mission for Death.

There was one last hurdle left. Once Taeral got Phyla, he could resurrect his father before handing a completed Thieron over to Death, who, in turn, would stop the ritual. Easier said than done. Nothing had ever come easy to us, and, given what we’d done to Brendel, she was bound to come after us with even more fire and fury.

“You should be aware of one teeny-tiny little thing,” Soul added. “And I think Widow here will agree. Out of the three of us, the Phantom is the absolute worst.”

“You think we can’t defeat him?” Varga replied, raising an eyebrow.

“Just letting you know,” Soul said with an innocent shrug.

“As long as he’s got Phyla, I will drag him out of whatever hole he’s hiding in, and I will resurrect my father,” Taeral said firmly, his chin up.

It made Sherus smile, his entire ghostly figure twinkling with fatherly pride. Even in death, Sherus glowed with all his might—not just because he was a Hermessi child. His character and his very soul were precious and unique in this world, and the universe seemed to know it, having blessed him with such an inner light.

What could the Phantom do that could possibly be worse than everything else we’d come across until now? I figured he’d be resourceful enough to surprise us, but none of the other challengers had ever made it this far.

If anyone could pull this off, despite all the adversities, it was Taeral. And he wasn’t alone in this. He had his crew. An extremely old and powerful Hermessi in Fallon. Three Reapers. The whole of GASP by his side. Ramin and the other rebel Hermessi, too. Oh, Taeral definitely wasn’t on his own. We all had his back, for our future was in his hands.

Ready for the *PENULTIMATE* book of Season 9?

Dear Shaddict,

Thank you for reading A Blade of Thieron.

The end of Season 9 is nearing… ASOV 76: A Phantom of Truthis the penultimate book as we move toward the grand finale, and it releases May 24th, 2019!