#trees writes

The human who called Will to this time and place was…not what he was expecting.

Usually the humans casting summoning spells were deluded, thinking the could somehow control the supernatural and otherworldly, or desperate, visibly without any other hope. This human…well, Will supposed he could consider her desperate.

She was in a hospital bed, after all. Sick and dying mortals were usually terrified things, scared of the pain and the suffering and then end and what might come after it, but this one…

…Desperate wasn’t the word for her. And neither was terrified.

If anything…she just looked sad.

Will hated sad humans. They were just so…mopey and pathetic. All humans were, and Will found them all very irritating, but the sick ones were especially so. He found dealing with them incredibly trying: even after roaming the moral world for centuries, he didn’t have the patience for all the crying and the self-pity and the general pathetic-ness.

But if he wanted her soul, he was going to have to suck it up and put up with her whinging.

Although, continuing to defy expectations, the human sounded remarkably calm when she spoke to him: “Are you the demon I summoned?”

Well, Will was nothing if not adaptable…so even if he wasn’t a demon, Will swept into a dramatic bow: “Will, at your service.”

“I’m Grace.” the human smiled weakly, as if Will was supposed to impressed or something: “I…I need your help.”

Obviously.

“What can I do for you, darling Grace?” Will crooned, containing his irritation by hiding it behind charm.

“I…I was wondering if I could bargain for something?”

Again, obviously – but despite his thoughts, Will continued smiling: “Of course you can, darling. What do you want?”

“I want to go outside.”

Well, back to unexpected it was.

Of all the foolish things humans had bargained away their souls – and some of them had been truly, unbelievably idiotic – no human had ever asked for something so…mundane. Will had heard it all; money and fame, sex, murder, vitality – humans had been always wanted to bargain for things they were too cowardly or too week to gain for themselves.

None of them had ever, ever asked for something as simple as going outside.

What on earth was wrong with this one?

“…You summoned an otherworldly being…to help you go outside?” Will had to clarify.

Grace blushed, her embarrassment bring some colour to her palid face: “They, uhm…the staff here don’t let me out much. And they don’t let me out at all in winter, because I’m not well enough.”

“And you don’t think you should listen to them?” Will raised an eyebrow.

The way Grace’s blush deepened was strangely endearing – especially when it was paired with the way she started twisting her bed sheet between her fingers. Will didn’t often find the mannerisms of humans to have any positive impact on him, but for Grace…it worked.

Will was still going to make this bargain with her, and inevitably take her soul and use it to increase his own strength, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t thing she was sweet in the meantime.

“I mean, yes, but…I really miss the snow. And…I don’t think I’m going to get any better.” Grace whispered, her voice breaking even at the quiet volume she was speaking at: “I just want to out in the snow one more time.”

Well…Will almost felt like a dick.

Grace was holding up well under the looming prospect of death, even for a mortal. Many beings, even otherworldly ones, couldn’t speak so candidly about their own end. Will himself didn’t like to give it too much thought; it was just an unpleasant concept. People bring it up to him usually ended up facing his wrath…Grace, however, was speaking calmly of her death as if it was just another Monday.

Will was almost sympathetic – if he was capable of such a thing, he was sure his heart would be bleeding for her. As it was, he wasn’t quite there, but he was impressed by her dignity.

Impressed enough that he was going to waste his time on this little whim of hers.

“You get one hour to do as you wish in the snow, in which time I will hold off any effects the temperature and elements have on you.” Will offered: “After that, I will stop halting the damage such cold can do. And once those damages – or whatever else is ailing you – takes your life…your soul will be mine.”

Grace didn’t hesitate for a second: “Deal.”

Will shuddered as their bargain was forged, the magic jolting up his spine, then grinned: “It’s done. Come on, darling, it’s time for you to go and see the snow.”

Grace squealed, the sound more joyful than anything Will had heard since before he’d Fallen, and leapt from her bed.

By rights, her illness – a darkness Will could feel crawling though her system now that their bargain had forged a bond between them – should have sent her to the floor…but Will had promised Grace that she could do what she wished, and if she wished to run out into the cold…then that was what she could do. He trickled a small amount of magic into her system, letting it keep her on her feet without her even noticing.

He followed at a distance as she made her way through the quiet hospice, skirting the nurses with the ease of someone who had done this before – probably before her illness confined her to her hospital bed – much to Will’s amusement, before finally making it into the open space behind the hospice’s main building.

There she stood for a few seconds, basking in the cold night.

Will had to admit, it was beautiful. Snow blanketed the ground in a thick layer that glittered under the silvery light of the moon and the stars shining brightly overhead. It reminded him of Heaven, in some distant, muted way: glimmering in a way reminiscent of the clouds that always shone like the edge of a blade of a knife, only…softer. Unlike the blinding light of Heaven, the space was painted in shades of black and silver and blue-white. It was calm, quiet.

Or at least it had been until Grace was released into it.

She fell into the snow like she’d been born to roll around in it – a suspicion that was only strengthened in Will’s eyes when she did roll over in it and started moving her arms and legs from side to side, pushing the snow away from her limbs. Which begged the question of why she’d fallen into it?

“What in the name of all things holy are you doing?”

Grace raised her head to look at him with a shameless smile: “Making snow angels.”

Will tilted his head to better inspect the shape of the hole she’d made in the snow…and concluded that humans were even stranger than he’d already thought: “That looks nothing like an angel.”

“What?” Grace demanded good-naturedly, clambering to her feet to come and stand beside Will and point out the features of her ‘angel’: “See? There are the wings, and the skirt of the robe…”

“Only someone who’s never seen an angel would think that looks even remotelylike one.” Will sniffed imperiously.

“Well, it’s an impression of an angel then.” Grace shrugged: “It’s mostly just an excuse to play in the snow anyway.”

Play in the icy cold and wetness: “Humans are so strange.”

Grace laughed at the open confusion in Will’s voice – but, for once, Will didn’t mind being laughed at. Not when the sound was as honestly joyful as Grace’s laugh.

He even mourned the loss of the sound when she started to run through the snow…although the mixture of gasps and breathless giggles was…nice.

Will was not used to nice.

‘Nice’ was boring. It was safe and bland and, well…nice. It was far removed from Will’s world. Will’s world didn’t consist of nice. Things were ‘glorious’ or ‘decadent’ or even ‘sinful’…or they were bland and disinteresting. Things were not nice, not normally.

But he didn’t hate it. He…actually rather liked it.

He liked the mixture of laughter and gasped-for breaths and crunching snow under Grace’s feet. It was joyous. Uncomplicated and happy.

…Only it wasn’t, quite.

Because underneath the joy and the laughter and the happiness he could feel bubbling through her veins, Will could still sense the sickness in her body. He was shielding her from the effects, but he was very aware of it: twisting and coiling malignantly deep inside her body.

It…it wasn’t right.

It isn’t fair.

Will hadn’t thought about fair and unfair in a long time; it didn’t matter, fair and unfair were concepts made up by the weak (humanity) when they couldn’t stop the strong (pretty much all other beings apart from humans) from doing what they wanted, and since Will wasn’t one of the weak, it hadn’t mattered.

But for Grace…for Grace, it wasn’t fair. And instead of crying about it, she wanted to play out in the snow. Even though there was nothing she could do to stop it.

…Will could stop it though.

Fallen or no, Will was still technically an Angel – if there was one thing he knew how to do, it was heal the sick and help the deserving. And Will couldn’t think of anyone more deserving than Grace, strange little human that she was.

So he did it.

It took little more than a thought: Grace didn’t even notice, focused as she was on crouching down to make snowballs to through up in the air and catch, or at trees. One moment the darkness was lurking below the surface of her skin, and the next…it wasn’t.

The doctors would call her recovery a miracle when they came to give her a check-up in the morning. Such things just didn’t happen to humans, at least not in science.

In magic, they were common. Not usually done without expecting for something in return – but still common. As far as Will was concerned, it was the second part that was the miracle: that he’d done this without having secured payment for his services.

Then again…the way Grace tried to hide her laugh behind her hands when one of her snowballs hit Will in the face, impacting with all the force of a light breeze, the sound of her amusement muffled but still bubbling through the darkness like flickering lights that all the humans put up at this time of year…Will considered that payment enough.

Especially when it had her doubling over as he bent down to slowly make his own snowball. Grace didn’t stop laughing even when that snowball hit her on the shoulder. Instead she scooped up and handful of snow, and chucked it at Will, without even trying to pack it into a snowball.

And after that, it was on. For the rest of he time Will had promised her outside, they chased each other around, throwing snow at each other…but eventually, Grace started to slow, and soon she came to a standstill.

“Did you give me some extra time out here?”

Will…had, even though he hadn’t meant to: “I did. Consider it payment for the entertainment you provided me with.”

Grace nodded: “That sounds fair…do I need to go back to my room now?”

“I’m afraid so, Grace darling.” Will nodded: “It wouldn’t do for anyone to find you missing.”

“I suppose not…” Grace agreed, albeit half-heartedly: “I, uhm…wanted to say thank you. For all of this, not just making the bargain with me, but the playing in the snow and the laughing and the…the everything. I really appreciate it.”

Will could sense her gratitude…and it reinforced that he’d made the right decision: “Don’t mention it.”

“Okay, but…could you just tell me…when does the whole…soul-taking thing happen?”

Never.

Will didn’t know about that – there was no telling how long this unpredicted benevolence would last – but he did know it wouldn’t be for a long time yet: “After you die. Which will happen when it happens; I didn’t set a time.”

“It…well, shouldn’t be too long.”

“We’ll see. Not even I can tell with these things.”

Grace smiled, and Will smiled back. Hers was sad, but Will’s…Will’s was far more knowing.

He might not be able to tell when Grace’s time was, but he knew it wasn’t any time soon. And hopefully, after she had come to terms with her miraculous recovery…