Warning: from now on the chapters might contain DH spoilers.
Also, I liked the Tale of the Three Brothers. Of course, it makes it a little harder to fit a Death who speaks in capital letters into the story, but it's also quite inspiring. And in the next chapter (Xeno Lovegood, probably) I think it will start to make sense.
II(:
Ignotus Peverell
Ignotus Peverell folded the Cloak neatly, hid it carefully under a loose floorboard(1) and stepped out of his house without it for the first time in years. He was ready now. He had had enough. You couldn't keep on hiding forever. It got boring after a hundred years or so.
Ignotus looked around. In the far corner of the garden the Grim Reaper stood looking impatiently at what appeared to be an hourglass.
FINALLY, he said, ARE YOU READY?
'Yes,' Ignotus replied 'Happy?'
QUITE. YOU HAVE USED YOUR GIFT WELL.
'I'm not going to give it back,' Ignotus said fiercely 'I'm leaving it to my son!'
AS YOU WISH, Death agreed. It was too easy. Ignotus looked at him suspiciously.
'What are you up to this time?' he asked.
EXCUSE ME?
'I know you!' Ignotus said 'I might have been hiding, but I know what you did to my brothers!'
Death shrugged.
I GAVE THEM WHAT THEY ASKED ME FOR, DIDN'T I? he said.
'You killed them!'
I DO NOT KILL, Death told him, LIFE DOES. AND SOMETIMES PEOPLE'S OWN STUPIDITY.
'Who are you calling stupid? They escaped you once!'
AND YET, Death said calmly, THEY MADE A MISTAKE. AND ANYWAY, I CLAIMED THEM IN THEIR DUE TIME. SPEAKING OF WHICH… Death glanced at the hourglass again.
'What is this?' Ignotus asked.
YOUR LIFE, Death explained as the last grain of sand fell down in the third brother's lifetimer.
'All right, all right. I'm coming.'
(1) Whenever something needs to be hidden, it is always put under a loose floorboard. Nobody ever bothers to look there, possibly because no-one would ever hide anything important in such an obvious place, would they?