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‘Why do you hate me?’
Rio looked up from the knife she was fiddling with to the teenager who stood on the other side of the sofa she was sitting on. As she took in the teenager looking impossibly young in the red, white and black outfit that he had been wearing the day Wanda Maximoff took down her Westview hex, Rio sighed. She could see why Agatha was so protective and fond of him, even if her beloved refused to acknowledge it. He reminded Rio of Nicky too and this was not a conversation she wanted to have with the boy who went against everything she stood for yet was also so like her son, it pained her. Mentally, she once again cursed the Maximoffs and their penchant for unleashing uncontrolled chaos magic upon an unsuspecting world.
Once the coven—minus a very human neighbour and plus a very cosmic green witch—had left Lilia’s tarot trial on the very fake Witches’ Road with the very real revelation that Rio was Lady Death herself, they had carried on in silence towards the next trial. No one wanted to bring up the metaphorical elephant in the room—or Road—and that was completely fine by Rio. The only reason she was even on the Road was because of her beloved and she had absolutely no interest in mingling with the rest of the mortals, a sentiment that the others seemed to share as well. That was until they stumbled across the next trial—the Teen’s—and everyone went off in different directions, exploring the exact replica of the house said Teen lived in when under the hex on a quest to find out how they could get the trial over and done with so that they were all home free. Unfortunately for Rio who had not a single intention of helping out and had thus stayed back in the living room, the current thorn in her side had also stayed back. Worse, he was trying to communicate with her.
‘I don’t hate you,’ Rio said with a roll of her eyes, laying back further into the cushions on the sofa and propping her feet up on the coffee table in front of her.
‘Then why—’ Teen started but was stopped by the look of Rio’s expectant stare and quirked eyebrow. Gulping, he waited for Rio to speak again.
‘You are a thorn in my side, a pain in my ass,’ Rio continued after making sure that Billy the Teenage Witch would not interrupt her again. ‘What you are is an affront to the very precarious sacred balance the cosmos thrives on. When your mother brought down her hex, you were supposed to cross over to my domain, to the afterlife. Instead, your soul squirrelled away into the body of William Kaplan and took over his life, in the process preventing not only your soul from finding peace but also that of William’s. So, right now, in this fragile little mortal body of yours, there are two souls fighting to exist when there should be none. So, Teen, I don’t hate you. I just hate what you represent.’
‘Isn’t that the same thing?’ Billy asked brows furrowed in a manner that left Rio breathless—an almost exact copy of her son and the mother of her son. Shaking it off, Rio shrugged but continued to stare at the enigma her beloved had tried so hard to hide before her.
Something was off.
‘Sit.’
Rio’s command, low and sharp settled into Billy’s bones and she watched, a little amused as he immediately plopped down in the spot the Green Witch had indicated with a pat of her hand.
‘Look into my eyes.’
To said Green Witch’s pleasure, the boy at least knew how to follow orders and for once was blissfully quiet, his incessant queries absent. As the teenager brought his eyes up to hers, Rio gently—she was not a monster despite what Agatha might think—placed a hand over his heart.
‘Wha—’ he started to speak but Rio shushed him, willing her magic to inspect the boy and confirm her suspicions.
The moment she felt it though, the moment her suspicions were confirmed, she drew her hand back as if burned—something that was physically impossible. She felt like she had been left bereft amid a storm in an ocean with nothing to grab onto so that she may at least try to survive.
‘You carry a piece of Agatha within you,’ Rio, great cosmic being that she was, spoke as if in a trance, the words leaving her mouth without her explicit permission.
‘What?!’
Twin exclamations of disbelief came from the boy before her and her beloved. She flicked her eyes upwards and away from the boy to see Agatha and the rest of the coven had come back into the living room just in time to hear Rio’s observation.
‘What does that mean?’ Agatha continued, eyes blinking rapidly as her brain struggled to process what Rio had said.
Rio’s gaze locked onto her beloved’s, ignoring everyone else.
‘The boy’s soul, or rather Billy Maximoff’s soul, has been crafted from the essence of Wanda Maximoff and you.’
Rio’s voice was flat, like a robot reading off a teleprompter with no intonation. Her mind was whirring, cycling through various emotions she was not meant to feel. Yet, here she sat, torn asunder in a storm of roiling emotions and feelings.
‘How is that even possible?’
Rio registered Alice’s words but she could hardly react to them, eyes still on her beloved. Agatha’s eyes flickered over to the protection witch but Rio continued to stare at her.
‘His mother, Wanda,’ Agatha started and paused, tongue wetting her lips as her mind worked overtime to connect the dots of what Rio had so suddenly proclaimed. ‘Was the prophesied Scarlet Witch, a being capable of spontaneous creation. I had assumed that’s how Billy and his speedster twin came to be, that she created their souls out of sheer will by bending her chaos magic.’
‘Unfortunately,’ Rio now took over when it became clear that Agatha did not know how or was unwilling to continue. ‘That’s not how creating souls works. As powerful as Wanda was, she was also mortal. Only a handful of cosmic beings are able to create souls on their own with nothing but their own essence. So, the Scarlet Witch’s magic, in its quest to create life, sought out the nearest and most compatible source to draw from. It would have been Vision ideally, but he himself was a manifestation of Wanda’s grief, not exactly alive so to speak. Agatha, on the other hand, was right there, a powerful witch in her own right with an obscenely high magical potency and absolutely brimming with life. Magic, as it does, took the path of least resistance.’
For a moment no one spoke, sitting with the unexpected information suddenly dropped upon them. Then, after a while Billy who had been silent all the while spoke up.
‘Does this—Does this mean Agatha’s my mom?’
All Rio could do was not cry. He sounded so young, so hopeful that it pierced Rio’s heart. She saw her beloved figuratively melt, soften at Billy’s words. And she also knew what was coming. Again.
‘Oh honey,’ Agatha’s voice, so soft and unlike her usual tone filled the space as she looked at the teenager with eyes full of tenderness she so rarely displayed. Billy in return looked back at Agatha with cautious hope.
Jen, who had been silently observing till now spoke up, breaking the tension-filled silence that had settled upon them.
‘Maybe Teen’s trial is to reunite the family. Mom, mama, bro and himself.’
She had probably meant it as a joke, to try and elevate the tension but the moment the words were spoken into existence, the TV screen suddenly flickered to life and a countdown of thirty minutes began.
As she realised what would now entail, Rio stiffened. She saw Agatha’s gaze fly back to hers, eyes pleading. She could also feel the others’ gazes on her, but she paid them no mind. Even as her eyes stayed locked onto the present Agatha dressed in a purple sweater, all she could see before her was a crying and harried Agatha, breathing through her contractions, pleading with Rio to spare their son’s life, begging for a life that was not supposed to live out of his mother’s womb.
A pause. A moment.
Then, Rio was gone, getting off the sofa and striding into the kitchen on the other side of the house.
Agatha watched as her ex-wife walked into the kitchen on the other side of the house, away from the coven as the timer ticked on.
‘So,’ Jen spoke and Agatha gritted her teeth in frustration. ‘What now? We are down to twenty-seven minutes already. And I don’t know about you, but I would love to get out of this trial alive.’
Shooting Jen a scathing look and Teen a tired but reassuring smile that made him beam with happiness, Agatha resolved to go after the woman who had taken everything from her.
‘I’ll handle this,’ she promised her son.
Divine Mother, she had a son. She had suspected, had thought that the boy under the sigil was somehow Nicky come back to her. She had sat in silent vigil, ensuring Lady Death did not steal him away from her again in the cover of the night. She had not known why, after centuries, she had felt so drawn to a boy again, but try as she might to hide it, she had cared for the teenager, so like the son that had been wrenched from her warm embrace cruelly by the one who had promised her the world. Only, she found out that the boy was not, in fact, her long-lost son and she had been left reeling. Feeling betrayed and deceived, she poked and prodded at the son of the Scarlet Witch, raging against the injustice that he had somehow managed to steal a second life while her son had not. Now, the revelation that by some miracle of fate, even though he was not Nicky, Teen was still hers rocked her to her core. And no, not just Teen. His brother as well. And well, if Agatha knew one thing, it was that, come hell or high water, she would not lose another son to Death. Not as long as there was life in her body still.
Pushing her shoulder back, Agatha marched after the Green Witch. She geared up for a fight with her ex-wife, for another one of their infamous fights that left the world around them burning as they spat vitriol at one another, hoping to hurt the other in order to mask the grief that still left them unmoored.
She had expected to find a raging Lady Death waiting for her in the kitchen, ready to fight Agatha—physically if needed—as she once again droned on about the importance of maintaining the sacred balance and whatnot as she was known to do every time the two had met up since Nicky. What she found instead was a very pensive Lady Death as she stared out the kitchen window. There was a calm about her that left something unsettled in Agatha and as she turned around to face the purple witch, there was something in her gaze that Agatha who had once prided herself on knowing what every flicker in those dark eyes meant could not decipher. It was shocking enough for the spirit witch that the attack she had been so ready to launch died down, not knowing how to act now that the Green Witch seemed to have taken the routine they had rehearsed and perfected over the past centuries and thrown it out the window.
Her ex-wife seemed to understand the fight within Agatha—to do what she had initially intended and hurt the other witch before she could hurt her or wait and see what this sudden change would bring—if the slight quirk of her lips were anything to go by, making Agatha scoff in disdain as she opened her mouth to carry out what she had initially intended to do. A raised hand paired with a pleading look stopped her though.
‘I am a cosmic being who has existed since the dawn of time and will continue to exist until the end. On the off-chance that everything does come to an end, I will probably be the last one of my siblings to go. I was not wrong in thinking myself to be above fate, and if I am honest, for the longest time I was. My folly, however, was thinking that things would stay the same. I cannot see the future and hence, cannot predict what will happen. Getting to know you, falling in love with you was, to me, the greatest wonder. I was finally something—someone—so much more than I ever thought I could be. You made me learn what it is to be human and in doing so I became susceptible to fate and its ministrations. Then, you gave me the greatest gift I never even dreamed I could have. You bore me a son so perfect I can still hardly believe it. The physical manifestation of a love so strong that life sprouted from Death herself and resulted in the most beautiful little boy. You gave me everything—a perfect family with a wife and a son who mean more to me than I can ever articulate. Yet all that love and I could only do so much for my own little miracle. Granting you those years with Nicky filled me with such joy. I watched from afar but it was such an honour seeing you raise our boy, being the best mother I could ever want for my child. Taking him from you, even though it was inevitable and not something I could put off no matter what I wanted, was probably the hardest thing I have ever had to do. The only thing I could ensure was that he would be at peace where nothing would ever be able to hurt him again.’
Trying to stay rooted amid the storm of grief that Rio’s words caused, Agatha, physically unable to listen to any more of it bit out, ‘Is there a point to all this or are you just in the mood for reminiscing how you took him from me? Stole him away in the cover of the night like a thief?’
Closing her eyes, Rio took a deep breath, as if bracing herself for what was coming next. Her voice when she continued was probably the softest Agatha had ever heard. ‘If—If I spare the boy and help his brother and mother cross over from my domain to this one, would you be happy then?’
Having never expected Rio to say these words, even in her wildest dreams, Agatha froze for a moment, caught under the tender gaze of the woman she had loved all her life and hated for most of it.
‘Wha—’ Clearing her throat, Agatha tried again. ‘What are you saying? Why would you say that? What about that precious sacred balance of yours you keep harping on about? For three centuries you have done nothing but talk about it, about how you had to take Nicky to preserve this balance, refused to even talk about any chance of bringing him back, actively hunted me down even to stop me from acquiring the Darkhold just in case I managed to do what you deemed to be an affront to the natural order and now you ask me this? If I would be happy if you were to oh so graciously spare Teen and bring back his brother and mother?’
‘I am bound to my duty and I have finally accepted that you would never forgive me for it. I know that no matter what I say, what I do to convince you how the boy’s very presence on this side of the veil threatens and tears at the balance the universe thrives on, you will never understand it. So please, Agatha,’ Rio sounded resigned. ‘Just tell me. If I were to grant what the boy wishes from this Road, would you be happy?’
Agatha’s eyes roved over Rio’s face, taking in the minute flickers of expressions that her ex-wife tried to unsuccessfully hide behind the mask of calmness she struggled to keep up. Agatha felt as if someone had dropped her in the deepest part of the ocean when she did not even know how to swim. It felt like an out-of-body experience, this conversation with Rio. She had never seen Lady Death like this and did not know what the hell was going on, what Rio aimed to achieve with this line of questioning and Agatha had never coped well when faced with uncertainty. On one hand, Rio seemed ready to give her what she had always wanted but there had to be a catch. There had to be something, for she knew Rio would never so easily acquiesce to something like this and she doubted she would like the fallout. On the other hand, even if she would not get to have Nicky again, she would still get to have the two boys she had helped raise in that damn hex. They would never replace her firstborn but they were still hers. Hers to keep and love and raise and all the things she never got to do with Nicky. So, tired yet hopeful of the outcome, Agatha responded to Rio, deciding that whatever consequences this choice of hers might reap, it would be worth it.
‘Yes. I never thought I would be happy again, that I did not deserve to be after everything, but if you grant the boy’s wish, I would be. More than I thought I ever could be again.’
Rio did not physically respond to Agatha’s declaration of what essentially went against everything the Green Witch stood for, did not seem to have even heard the answer to the question she had asked just moments before. Her eyes instead seemed to tell a thousand tales as they bore into Agatha yet the spirit witch understood none of them. Finally, the Green Witch spoke.
‘You would be a wonderful mother. You were one to Nicky and I know you would be one to the twins. Maybe you can even mentor Wanda, teach her how to wield all that chaos magic thrumming under her skin. You deserve to be happy. You always have and I will treasure every moment I was the cause of it. Now I am positive the coven and your boys will bring you unimaginable happiness,' Rio's eyes and voice were wistful for a moment before her expression turned grave. 'I just need you to promise me something though. You need to tell Wanda and Billy not to resist when they finally reach the end of their natural lives. They can reincarnate into new bodies but doing so would tear apart the very seams of the universe. So, for the sake of existence itself, you need to promise me that you would try and make them understand that they need to accept their deaths, whenever it may come, that under no circumstance would they reincarnate into new bodies.’
‘Rio,’ Agatha breathed out, a chill running down her spine at the uncharacteristic ramblings of Lady Death. ‘Why do you sound like you are saying goodbye?’
‘I am always around, remember? I am Death,’ Rio promised with a placating smile. ‘But will you make me that promise, my love?’
Rio waited a minute for Agatha to make her promise but when none came forth, she let out a rueful chuckle. ‘Well, at least I tried.’
The next moment she seemed to shake off whatever funk she was in and looked at Agatha with her usual glittering eyes promising fun and mischief, tongue poking her cheek. And Agatha, who had never had a normal reaction to Rio hardly knew whether to slap the woman in front of her or ravish her.
‘Come, sweetheart,’ Rio’s voice purred into Agatha’s ear as she moved past the frozen witch on her way back to where the rest of the coven was. ‘Let’s make the boy’s wish come true.’
And all Agatha could do was follow in the footsteps of her love.
Three months.
It took Agatha three months to fly into complete fucking panic.
The moment Billy had successfully found a body for his twin’s soul to inhabit and reached out to Wanda with guidance from both Agatha and Rio, the Road had melted away and the coven found themselves back in the basement of Agatha’s house above the trap door that had led to the Road.
For a moment, everyone had frozen in place, not knowing what would come next before Agatha shook off the stupor and did a complete 180 to where she had last known Rio to be. Only, Rio was nowhere to be seen and from the corner of her eyes, she saw a green glow emanating from the trap door before it disappeared—Rio sealing away the hex Billy had unknowingly created, Agatha was sure. Yet, there was no sign of the Green Witch herself.
‘Where’s Rio?’ Lilia blurted out the question that was on Agatha’s mind as she looked around for any sign of Lady Death only to turn up empty-handed.
Agatha had been about to bite back a cutting remark when she was interrupted by a loud crash upstairs. They all rushed up the stairs—Agatha hoping that the crash had been courtesy of her ex-wife—to find the Scarlet Witch herself standing at the doorway which Rio had previously blasted through, red chaos magic dancing on her fingertips. Quelling her disappointment and rolling her eyes at the giant hole Wanda had made on her front wall, Agatha set about explaining the situation to the volatile witch, hoping to calm her down and spare whatever was left of her house and sanity.
It took the coven a week to even begin preparing to try and look for Tommy. The revelations of Agatha having bound Jen’s magic—albeit unknowingly—and the Witches’ Road being a con constructed by Agatha to dupe other witches into siphoning their magic had, of course, not gone over particularly well with the newly formed coven of misfits and had led to many a fight—verbal and physical. A week later, after words and blows had been exchanged, past differences had been aired out and a truce had been agreed upon by all parties, understanding that for better or for worse, this was now their coven, a plan began to form to go and look for Tommy. Agatha, who had barely been able to function as a human being during that week, had let out a sigh of relief at finally being able to start looking for her other son.
Billy had once suggested calling upon Rio and asking her for help but Agatha had quickly shut it down—uncharacteristically, she did not want to bother Rio about it. She was aware that Lady Death had gone against her very nature in granting Billy's wish and did not want to ask any more of her. A rare show of understanding on Agatha’s part but one she had strongly put her foot down on, going as far as to even warn the rest of dire consequences should anyone go behind her back on this and summon the Green Witch.
Now that asking Rio for help was out of the picture, it took the coven a whole two months to track down Tommy and convince the boy of who they were and who he was.
During those months, Agatha had shoved all thoughts and feelings related to her ex-wife into a box at the farthest corners of her mind, shut it and locked it away. She almost doggedly pursued any and all leads, which probably led to them finding Tommy earlier than they had initially thought. It was only once the coven—plus Tommy—had returned to Agatha’s Westview home that the spirit witch even thought of opening that Rio-shaped box in her head, actually throwing it wide open upon hearing an off-handed comment made by Alice.
‘What did you just say?’ Agatha had sat up straight on the armchair she was lounging on, her wandering attention now focussed sharply on the flummoxed protection witch before her.
‘The anomaly which happened the day after we came back from the Road,’ Alice elaborated for Agatha’s sake.
‘What anomaly?’ Agatha was completely clueless. She had absolutely no fucking idea about what Alice was going on about.
‘The day after we came back,’ Lilia took over, explaining as if she were talking to a child. ‘There was a moment when the world seemed to stand still. There was a huge cosmic shift that we all felt in our bones. Just for a moment plants all around the world seemed to go through their entire life cycle.’
‘Yeah,’ Jen added her two cents. ‘It was all over the news but then everything went back to normal and nothing happened again so people dropped it.’
‘Y—You all felt this?’ Agatha’s throat seemed to dry up and she could hear her heartbeat in her ears. ‘All of you?’
All present replied in affirmative and Agatha felt as if someone much stronger than her was holding her head down in water.
‘Even I felt it and I had no idea what was going on at the time,’ Tommy shrugged, popping a few popcorn kernels into his mouth.
Agatha gasped, trying to take in large gulps of air as she felt her throat closing up. There was a ringing in her ears.
‘Agatha?’
Alice’s worried voice sounded like it was far away and the spirit witch’s wide and terrified eyes flitted over every person in the room before repeating the process.
‘Rio—’ was all Agatha managed to vocalise amid her rising panic.
‘Hey Agatha,’ Jen said, kneeling in front of her in a rare show of concern. She took one of Agatha’s hands and placed it over her heart. ‘Breathe with me. Come on.’
Following Jen’s instructions Agatha managed to subdue her rising panic for the moment.
‘What happened?’ Lilia’s calm voice soothed over Agatha and her eyes shot to the divination witch.
‘I think something’s wrong with Rio,’ Agatha said. The unsettling feeling that she had shoved into the deep recesses of her mind was back with a vengeance. She was too worried about her ex-wife to even pretend to hide behind her usual mask of disdain, sarcasm and devil-may-care attitude.
‘Why do you think something’s the matter with Rio?’ Billy frowned, confused. ‘I’m sure she’s fine. She’s Lady Death, isn’t she?’
‘Usually yes,’ Agatha replied ‘But she is nature. Anomalies like that do not just happen. I cannot explain. I need—I need to look for her. Something’s not right.’
‘We’ll look for her together, okay?’ Wanda reassured her. ‘I trust your instincts. If you think you need to look for her, we’ll help you.’
Agatha shot her coven a grateful smile as everyone agreed but she could barely hold her panic at bay, knowing deep in her bones that something was very, very wrong.
What followed was a month of deep research into various spells from all over the world that might summon or aid in summoning Lady Death, all failing spectacularly. With every summon that failed, the rest of the coven began to truly understand the gravity of the situation, doubling down on looking for new methods. Agatha barely ate or slept, devoting all her time to looking for Rio.
Finally, on what marked the three-month anniversary of their traumatising journey on the Witches’ Road, Agatha flew into full-blown panic. She knew in her heart that something was severely wrong because no matter what, no matter how much they fought, Rio would never ignore her like this. Even if she did not physically appear in front of Agatha, she would send some sign that she was there. So, throwing a ‘Hail Mary!’, she gathered the coven in her living room, prepared to perform one last summoning spell.
She had found the spell long back when she and Rio had just gotten married. They had stumbled across it in the ruins of the Mesopotamian civilisation. Rio had taken one look at it and backed away. An absurdly powerful and potent spell that pulled at the very essence of Death from all across the multiverse and forced her to physically manifest in front of the summoner, Rio had cautioned Agatha against ever using it. She had endearingly promised Agatha that she would never have to summon Death for Death would always follow in Agatha’s footsteps, watching her back and keeping her from harm. Agatha had been smitten then, and they had made love right then and there. Before they left, Rio had carefully removed the piece of wall the spell was inscribed on, handing it to Agatha and trusting her to keep it safe from falling into the wrong hands. Agatha had actually forgotten about its existence until she went diving into the grimoires she had collected over the years looking for ways to summon Rio. She had promised herself that she would only use it as a last resort if nothing else bore fruit.
Hoping against hope that it would work, Agatha channelled all her magic, love for Rio and desperation to find her into the spell as she chanted. She knew very well that it would perhaps be the most significant spell she had or would ever cast in her long, long life.
As the spell progressed, she could see dark shadows start to coalesce and take form in the summoning circle she had carefully and painstakingly drawn earlier. A fledgling hope of getting to see and hold the love of her life again blossomed in Agatha’s heart and she chanted out the rest of the spell with renewed vigour. Once done, she waited with bated breath for the shadows to settle into the features that her firstborn had inherited, the ones that she longed to feast upon again. When the shadows did settle though, she felt as if someone had pulled the rug from under her feet, leaving her floundering to find balance.
In the place where her love was supposed to be, stood a man with skin that looked like the night sky, with shifting constellations and eyes that were an ethereal white instead.
‘Who are you?’ Agatha forced herself to speak as the man’s eyes seemed to bore into her very soul.
‘I’m Oblivion,’ the man—cosmic being—replied, stare not relenting even a fraction.
Identity of the man discovered Agatha soldiered on. She would not let one of her love’s siblings stop her in her quest. In fact, who knew better than one of the cosmic siblings where her love was and why she had not responded to Agatha’s summons over the past month?
‘Where’s Rio?’ Agatha said eyes narrowed at the cosmic being.
‘Lady Death,’ Oblivion responded, voice tight and with gritted teeth. ‘Is no more.’
Agatha let out an unexpected cackle at the response.
‘Nice try. Rio can’t die. She’s Death and correct me if I am wrong but there have not been any reports of people not dying recently. The natural cycle is all well and good.’
‘Let me correct you, Agatha Harkness,’ Oblivion countered, eyes glaring as if he wished to smite Agatha in the spot. ‘While death is and always will be present, Lady Death, the physical manifestation, my sister, is no more.’
Agatha felt like she was drowning. What Oblivion was implying seemed impossible. Rio was the very concept of death itself. How can there be death but not Lady Death? They were one and the same.
‘I am sure my sister has told you that while there are very few in the multiverse as a whole who can match my siblings and me in power, there are still two who overpower us and one of them is tasked with overseeing the sacred balance that we maintain,’ Oblivion seemed to be on a roll, each word spat at Agatha like acid, meant to burn her to her core. ‘The Living Tribunal is fair and impartial and upholds the laws of the multiverse over all else, ensuring nothing disturbs the balance. When my sister decided to spare the demiurge and help his twin and mother cross over to the living plane, she broke the very balance she was supposed to maintain. Her actions led to her facing the judgement of the Death of Death and she was punished for it. She can never again take a physical form. She can only exist in the multiverse as a cosmic essence. That cosmic anomaly that happened a few months ago was the Tribunal’s judgement being delivered.’
‘She promised,’ Agatha whispered, reeling from the news Oblivion delivered, still unable to understand what he meant by saying that Rio was no more. How could that even be possible? ‘She promised me she would always be around. On the Road—she promised me that she would always be around.’
‘She did not lie,’ Oblivion looked like he was about to jump out of the summoning circle and strangle Agatha. ‘She is around but not in a manner where even my siblings and I can communicate with her.’
Oblivion drew a sharp breath, running a hand through his hair and closing his eyes for a moment. He seemed to be summoning the strength to continue.
‘Of all of us siblings, Death was the one who had always been so intrigued by you mortals. Eternity, Infinity and I have resided in our domains for almost all of our existence. Death, on the other hand, perhaps because of what she is, barely resided in hers. Instead, she chose to stay amongst the mortals. She kept trying to convince the rest of us to give mortals a chance. “They know how to live, Oblivion,” she kept telling me. “We can learn so much from them.” We humoured her of course, it was very hard not to, but much to her chagrin, none of us seemed to develop the fondness for mortals that she had. We used to joke that her fondness for mortals would lead to her downfall.’
Oblivion seemed to choke back a sob before continuing.
‘When she told us that she had fallen in love, with a human witch no less, we all laughed in her face. After all, what did she mean that she, a cosmic being, Lady Death, had fallen in love? We are not meant to fall in love. When we realised that she was not joking we tried to make her see reason. Since the beginning of time, mortals—irrespective of species—have treated her with disdain and hatred every time she had to take away someone they loved. We did not want her heart to be broken so we tried to convince her to let go of these foolish feelings. She fought back, told us that her lover would never do so, that she understood and would never revile her for who—what—she is. Later when she came to Eternity begging for her son’s life, we warned her of the consequences. She argued that it was just bending the rules a little, not breaking them. She would help her son cross over, just not yet. A few years to live in the beautiful world, experience his mother’s love. That was all. Against his better judgement, Eternity granted her wish and she promised that it would not break the sacred balance, that she would never bring him back from the other side of the veil.’
Oblivion paused, looking like it took all his strength to keep holding himself together.
‘We had not seen her since. Time passes differently for us than for you mortals so we thought nothing of it. We thought she was living a content life with her lover. The next time we saw her was when the Tribunal summoned us during her judgement. As you can imagine, we could hardly believe the charges levied against her. She knew better than most what it meant to preserve the sacred balance. She was the natural order of all things. She could not have possibly broken that order. When she admitted to her actions, we were shocked beyond belief. When the Tribunal passed his judgement, we did not even consider that losing her physical form was a possibility. She did though. Told us that she knew it was a possibility and accepted her fate. It did not hit me, I think, till later that I would never get to see my sister again. I was in my domain, trying to come to terms with it when I felt the spell reverberate across the cosmos, looking for her and since I am her counterpart, it summoned me here.’
Agatha felt stricken by lightning. As her mind processed Oblivion’s words, she felt like someone had reached into her chest and torn away her heart violently. She barely registered Oblivion leaving or crumpling to the floor in her despair, her mind reeling and heart fracturing into pieces she knew would never be whole again.
During her darkest times, no matter how much she had loathed herself for continuing to love the Green Witch, no matter how many times she pushed the woman away in her rage and grief, she had always been comforted by the fact that Rio would always be there, that she was the one person Agatha would never have to mourn, would never lose because Death cannot die. Yet, here she stood now. What had once seemed impossible now she had to live through and she did not know if she had the strength to do so. When Nicky died, she had thought she would never again feel such despair. Only, this was much worse, because she knew in her heart that no one was to blame for Nicky’s death. It was a horrible and ugly truth but sometimes boys died and it was no one’s fault. But this? The reason for Rio’s demise? It was all her. She had known something was not right, that there would be unimaginable consequences if Rio were to grant Billy’s wish but she had powered through it, brushed her worries aside as inconsequential, thought the reward would far surpass the punishment.
Oh, what a fool she had been.
And Rio, who had loved Agatha with every fibre of her being, whose love for Agatha persevered through centuries of anger and hurt and betrayal paid the price unflinchingly when Agatha told her that granting the wish might bring her a semblance of happiness. Rio had for centuries tried to make Agatha understand the importance of the sacred balance, of why things—no matter how unfair—were the way they were and Agatha in her selfishness had refused to do so. In her despair, she had been content to bury her head in the sand and punish Rio for what she thought to be Rio choosing her job over their love, over their son, over them. Only now, when she finally understood, it was too late.
How was she now meant to survive in a world where half her heart and the other half of her soul was gone?