Clandestine

(I'm sorry if this one is lacking, guys. Fighting a creative block right now. I hope it doesn't sound forced and I hope you still enjoy.)

Odette closed the door to their apartment and immediately turned to William. "What do you mean Avetta's not dead? Kian said she was!"

He turned an awkward circle in the living room with a hand going through his hair. "Well, he's—wrong."

The redhead's mouth came open in a small gape. "Lord Death lied to him?"

The other raised his eyebrows. "That surprises you?"

Odette blinked, her mouth still open in shock.

"I mean, I'm sure he figured out a way to… not exactly lie to him without… being entirely truthful." He shrugged carefully.

She shook her head a little and stepped closer, hugging herself. "Why would he not tell Kian?"

"Maybe to protect him or something. I don't know." He went to the fridge and got a soda and some whiskey and began to mix them. "Kian's pretty rash and hasty. Sometimes unpredictable. One minute he's fun and games and in a blink he can be ready to kill somebody. Maybe Grim thought he might flip his shit and go after her or something."

Odette looked towards the floor. That was entirely possible. "Still… It seems so wrong not to tell him. But I'm glad you didn't say anything at the pool. That was a good decision on your part for the time being I think… Should we tell anyone?"

William winced after a drink and shook his head, responding through a tight throat. "No. Not our problem."

"He's our friend though. I feel like he would want to know if we knew."

"Just because you know something that someone else would want to know doesn't mean the right thing to do is to tell them, Odette." He leaned on the counter.

She blinked again. That was an unusually profound statement coming from him.

"But I'll tell you what I would like to know… is why Avetta killed him." He shook a finger in the air in front of him. "She's not the kind to needlessly kill. She always has a reason. Typically a good one."

Odette sat down at one of the bar stools at the counter. "What reason could she possibly have for killing Kian?"

"That's what I'm saying. The way I see it, anyone she kills is either in her way, a threat, or going to be a threat." William counted out the three possibilities on his fingers. He let his arm fall back to the countertop. "What do we know about Kian before he died?"

The girl shrugged and shook her head. "Not… a whole lot, but he said he was traveling ever since he left his parents. And after he became a Ghost he joined the D-W-M-A."

"Do we have witnesses that could attest to this?"

Her brow furrowed. "What are you saying?"

"Nothing. You just can't always believe what people tell you." He took another swig of his mixed beverage.

"Kian is honest and sweet. He wouldn't lie to us about who he is."

William swished his draught around in his cheeks before swallowing and giving a nonchalant shrug. "Well, it's my educated guess that somewhere in his travels he stepped on Avetta's toes. Which doesn't have to mean he was in league with her or anything. He could have just been in the wrong place at the wrong time."

"Like you?" She looked at him out of the corner of her eyes.

He hiccupped. "I hope not."

Odette leaned on the counter again. "It's been a week since we started that game. Are you ready for the next turn?"

William nodded and set his drink aside, leaning on the other side of the counter to meet her in the middle over it. "Yep. Your turn first. Why did you run away from home."

She inhaled smoothly. "My parents had different ideas for my future than I had. And I didn't want to be a part of it and they couldn't forgive me. So, I left." She softly placed her choppy red hair over one shoulder.

The look she received from him was pure sympathy, but not a kind of sympathetic expression she had ever received from anyone before. There wasn't so much sadness in his eyes as there was analytical understanding. The upset-look tilted closer to anger rather than sorrow. But somehow it still came off as sympathetic and she wasn't sure how he was doing that. "Your parents wouldn't forgive you for wanting to be your own person?" he asked quietly.

She slowly reached for his glass of soda and whiskey and took a drink, avoiding eye contact now.

"… That's f*cked."

"Your turn. And I have a question."

He blinked at her.

She leaned a little closer to him across the counter. "How did you know Avetta wasn't dead."

William raised his eyebrows as if to say, "Good question." He took his drink back when Odette handed it to him and he spoke over the rim of the glass before taking a sip. "Because I was Grim's weapon the last time he tried to kill her."

(Page Break)

The impact of the massive tree jarred the ground and tossed up foliage and the witch just barely slipped out of its path. She slid in the leaves and whipped her head back to her attacker, tossing her dark brown hair.

Lord Death crashed through the next tree with another hefty swing of the black zanbato and backhanded another with a ghastly, clawed fist and caused splinters to explode outward. "AVETTAAA!" bellowed the Reaper in a bone-chilling cry of challenge. "You cannot hide from Death!"

The witch ducked behind a tree only to pop out from the other side to toss out a black magic attack of swirling darkness towards her opponent. Lord Death sliced through it with his blade and raced forward again at an alarming rate. He chopped down her cover in one clean movement, missing her neck by a mere second. She vanished into thin air and appeared close to another tree behind him. "You exhaust me on many levels, Reaper," uttered the witch in a monotone and almost robotic voice. Her gray eyes shifted around in their sockets, looking at things that weren't there as she took a wobbly step back.

"I'll exterminate you!" Death swung again, no longer treating this as combat but exactly as he described: the termination of a pest.

She ducked with little strain and jumped side to side to avoid his stabs before disappearing again and reappearing on a thick branch of a nearby tree. "Tell me, could you have already killed me if you were using a Death Scythe," she breathed in a light but even tone. Avetta jumped down when the zanbato cleaved through the branch. She closed in and tried more magic attacks, whipping her long gray sleeves about like a drunken swan. Not one touched the hem of Death's garment and he kept slashing away in what could have been blind rage. His attacks carried so much weight and power that for a moment one might guess he were merely a frustrated giant trying to squish a scurrying bug. But his attacks had method and purpose; her evasiveness was just good enough to match.

Avetta vanished again and this time reappeared somewhere out of sight, though close enough to speak to him. "Perhaps you are not powerful enough to defeat a witch without resonating with your weapon."

The Reaper whipped around, slanted and deadly hollow eyes surveying his surroundings. "Show yourself!"

The witch panted quietly, sweat beading on her brow. "Your weapon is unstable. Where is your partner?"

"HRAAH!" Lord Death spun three hundred and sixty degrees, reaching out with the entire breadth of his arm's range and mowing down every tree within his radius.

Forced out into the open, Avetta staggered a little, the tail of her gown trailing in the leaves behind her. Her head cocked a little and one sullen gray eye was curtained by her hair. The other half of her pale face turned to him with not a shred of worry. "I know the origins of that zanbato you wield. I know whom it belongs to."

"Fight me, witch!" The Reaper raised the great sword over his head.

"Today is not the day, Death." She vanished from sight again just as the zanbato crashed downward and sliced into the ground.

"Damn!" He looked around and lowered his voice. "I can't feel her presence anymore."

The weapon started to glow and in a ball of swirling light, William appeared in the leaves, barely standing on his two feet and trembling. He clenched his fists and cursed, too. "We can find her!"

"No. I'm afraid we cannot. I haven't the slightest idea where she has transported to now. It's no use."

William bolted around, swinging his shoulder length hair. "You're gonna give up?! Fine! I'll find her myself!" He started marching off into the trees but only made it a few paces before collapsing to his hands and knees, horribly out of breath and light-headed.

Lord Death's voice returned to its usual light-hearted tone. "Calm yourself, William."

The weapon's breath turned ragged and audible as he cupped his face in trembling hands. His nose began to bleed but he didn't have the energy or wherewithal to tend to it. Black liquid dripped onto the leaves under him and his muscles could barely hold him now as images, colors, faces—everything swirled in his sight. "What's…"

"I apologize. Even without resonating, my soul seems to be quite a shock to yours."

William finally attempted to wipe the inky blood from his nose, his back still to the Reaper. "What did you do to me?" he uttered in a shaken voice.

"This is part of your training and therapy. I'm afraid you're still too unstable to pair with anyone else."

"I never asked for this!" he rattled out. "I never wanted your help! I don't need your training or your therapy!" The young man flinched when a sharp scream split through his eardrums, though the Reaper didn't seem to hear it. He fell on his side with his chest heaving and a little more blood trickled from his nostril.

The cloaked figure of his temporary meister neared his side. A big hearty hand rested on his shoulder. "Come now. You need to rest."

William kept his eyes closed. There was nothing he could do right now. Disoriented, fatigued and beyond the will to resist, he transformed back into his zanbato form for refuge in hopes of silence and nothingness. Lord Death gently lifted up the sword from the leaves and began the journey out of the forest.