Eleleth's Heir

5,000 Years Later:

Once upon a time, a dying father sold his child to the man of many names.

Death is a judge, but he is also a lawyer, and he makes fit the scales of life to balance with his gall. Life for a life, blood for rain, and never a rose without a thorn. Stains of the earthly kind do not wash out, not when they are upon the soul, and the father’s girl was wine red. Born kicking and screaming with a birthmark in the shape of wings on her back. Her mother died in labor, for no one cheats the Reaper.

The Devil always gets his due, and tithes to Hell named Janet end up betrothed to infernal Tam Lins. There is not much justice in fairytales, and Sam Hill takes all in time.

Seven winters pass. She has the face of a starving angel. Her mother dies in labor in Bethlehem, one of the many Bethlehems that have sprung up since a mad messiah walked wild in the desert long ago with thorns and roses in his hair.

The father does not remember his bargain.

Each night, she has a visitor.

“Daddy