Crown of Crimson (Underworld Gods, #2)

by Karina Halle

“I’m getting her back and I’m making her pay. No one escapes Death, not even her.” Especially not her.

“If by love, you mean go from wanting to kill and torture me to not wanting to kill and torture me as much, then yes.”

When I woke up this morning, I was certain I’d be bringing Hanna back here. I had made this bed imagining that I’d be throwing her on it later. I had dreamed of this moment, not because there was something binding about being husband and wife, but the opposite. It was freeing to me, knowing I could fully be myself with her.

“A shaman will have three children. One will raise the Old Gods. One can touch Death and together will destroy the Old Gods and the uprising. And one, born from shadows, will defeat Death, leaving the kingdom to Kaaos.

Michael? The head skeleton’s name is Michael? Not Skeletor or Bone Thugs?

She doesn’t say anything for a moment and the pause feels weighty. There’s no feeling like you’re being scrutinized by a twenty-foot-tall naked mossy mushroom lady.

“What’s happening!?” I manage to cry out. Can’t I have a moment of peace where I’m not being groped by skeletons or dragged around by mushrooms?

I had always thought that if I touched his runes that I would feel the energy pass through to me, but the truth is, all of Death felt like that. Every inch of him. I’m not sure I’d ever felt so alive than when my skin was pressed up against his.

“Rasmus was never born in your world,” she says after a moment. “He was born in this one.” “What are you talking about?” Rasmus says quietly, looking frightened for once.

“You were born in a pool of black blood,” she says to him. “Screaming like any mortal child would. Your mother held you close, her hands around your little neck, and thought about killing you then. But she hesitated. Your birth wasn’t an accident, you were wanted, oh yes, all she wanted was the son of a shaman. But she couldn’t be sure which prophecy you would fulfill. Was it the one that she wanted? The one to raise the Old Gods? The one to destroy Death? Or the one that would make Death stronger in the end? The prophecy was a secret at that time, but your mother feared Antero Vipunen, who knows all, and creatures like me, who find things out in time. She was fearful that if anyone else knew the power the child had, they would destroy

“In the end,” she continues, “his mother decided the best thing for her would be to wait and see what would become of him. So she had her daughter take the baby out of Tuonela. Left him at a hospital, where mortals would eventually adopt him, take care of him. But even though the shaman never knew he had a child born in another realm, the baby found its way to the shaman anyway. When he was old enough. When he was ready to be trained. When the shaman needed an apprentice.” The last sentence makes my blood run cold. Rasmus was my father’s apprentice. My father, the shaman.

I stare at Rasmus, dumbfounded. Suddenly I’m looking for every single similarity we have. Our height, our athletic build, the cut of our jaw, our cheekbones. His hair may be red, and mine is mahogany, his eyes blue, mine brown, but I see it. I see my father in him. Because he’s my father’s son.

“If Torben is my father…then who is my mother?” Rasmus manages to eke out, staring at me in the same way I’m staring at him. Silence fills the underground. “Who is my mother?!” Rasmus screams, a vein popping on his forehead. “I have a hard time believing that you don’t know,” she eventually says. “Her blood would be unmistakable.” She pauses. “You’re Louhi’s son.”

Funny how it took a trip to the Land of the Dead to realize my capacity for living.

We were so close to escaping this world. And this is all my fault. All my fault.

“I’m not my sister, I don’t fall for just any magic,” his son says. Then he looks to me, and through his mask I see the twinkle of his eyes. Somehow I don’t need to see his face to know that he’s a looker.

“He doesn’t like me, does he?” I say under my breath, watching as the Son of Death gets in his boat. “Frankly, I don’t think I like you either,” Death says. My mouth opens and I look over at him in surprise.

This is your world, Hanna. You know it is. You know you belong here more than you’ve ever belonged in your other life, and more than that, you belong here with me.”

“But I will never love you. Not after this. Do you understand?”

He’s not just beautiful—he’s powerful. It radiates off of him, entangling you in its dominance until you’re caught in a web, too dazed and submissive to even plot your escape.

His eyes flicker over my features, as if reading a map, and then his gaze steels, a cold wind that wraps around me. “I will never love you, Hanna.” “And if I happen to fall in love with you?” I whisper, knowing that will never happen now. His mouth curls into a contemptuous smile. “Then you have all my pity.”

I don’t protest. I’d rather not see his face now, see how little he cares for me.

A loveless marriage for eternity? I never should have left with my brother.

Suddenly an image of Death as a child fills my head, him sitting on a couch in skull and crossbones pajamas, slurping from a bowl of cheerios and watching He-Man. Inexplicably, he also has facial hair. I have to bite back a smile.

“Enjoy an eternity with your dead God,” she says. “He was especially fun to kill.”

I want to go back to the moments when I was lying with him under the sheets, and I wish I could have just turned off my brain for a moment, ignored the fear, and told him how I really felt. That I loved him. That I love him. My husband. My king.

I am in love with Death. My husband. My God.

“I love you,” I whisper to him, barely able to speak. My throat feels like it’s closing up, choking on tears. “I should have told you that I loved you, but I didn’t know. I didn’t want to know. I was so afraid. Afraid what loving you would mean. I shouldn’t have been afraid, Tuoni. I don’t want to be afraid anymore. Fear is…” I close my eyes, trying to breathe through the pain, “Fear is the real death. It’s what keeps us from living. I should have been fully alive with you.”

I press his palm harder against my cheek, feeling how terribly soft his skin is, wishing upon wishing that I could have done this while he was alive. And still, there is nothing. He does not stir and I am still here.

Death’s fingertips suddenly press into my skin. I gasp and gape down at him. His eyelids are fluttering. Oh my god! “This can’t be real,” I whisper. “You’re telling me,” he says, his eyes focused on his bare hand, the way he’s touching my skin. “How am I able to do this?”

“I don’t know. Are we dead?” He gives me a soft smile. “Does it matter?” I smile back. It honestly doesn’t. If this is death, if it’s us together in a peaceful light, then I don’t know what there’s ever been to fear. Maybe this is the true death, one that lies beyond the city and the stars. Maybe this is the death for Gods.

“Shhh,” he says, placing a gloved finger against my lips. Then he frowns and rips the glove off, tossing it away until it disappears into the light. He runs his bare thumb over my lips, his eyes glittering with satisfaction. “Always wanted to do that.”

Like someone kept in the dark who sees the light for the first time, Tuoni runs his bare hands all over my body. Slowly, tenderly, soaking in every inch of me. He does this like he’s memorizing each section of skin so he can recall it later.

“This is more than Amaranthus,” he whispers to me, voice low and full of awe. “This is something I never thought was possible. The greatest gift.”

“I love you,” I say quietly, the words feeling like raindrops in the desert. “I know we might be dead, but I had to tell you that I love you.”