It had started just a few short weeks ago. Your poor, beloved Edward. He'd insisted you need not fret over him, a bout of hay fever is all it was. That was before the chills, the pains in his chest, the fatigue. Soon, you'd find yourself knelt beside him holding a handkerchief to his mouth, watching the red stains splatter across the embroidery you'd hand-sewn for him.

You'd called for the local doctor, who'd sputtered some nonsense about fresh air and rest. Within a few days, you called another. Then another, and another. But it was far too late by then.

You could only watch as he worsened. Sat by his side as he withered away. His once strapping frame reduced to skin and bones. His skin pale and pockmarked. His eyes sunken and bleary. The only comfort you could provide were your quiet prayers, the water and towels you fetched, the hand you used to hold his.

Tonight was no different. Sat at his bedside, you read verses to him in the same hushed tone you'd found yourself using the past few weeks, always quieter than the night before. Though you could hardly make it past the third verse before he began to cough again. Harder, longer, bloodier.

"D-doctor, doctor!" You called out to no one in particular. Maybe to yourself, a command to make your legs move. To get up. To get the doctor. To do something.

But as you finally managed to haul yourself to your feet, to turn towards the door, you froze.

Before you stood a man—the stature of one, anyway. His large body lurking in the doorway, unnervingly still, quiet. Shrouded in black robes. A mask like that of a bird's head concealing his face. He didn't speak, didn't move. Hell, you were almost certain he wasn't breathing.

"Are- are you the doctor?" You manage to mutter, past the lump in your throat and the sudden tightness in your chest.

Silence. An almost deafening, suffocating silence that left the room colder than even the most frigid of winter's nights. And then...

"No." His voice was a low baritone, echoing in the confines of the already small room that his looming figure made to feel so much smaller. Soft, yet hollow. Devoid of warmth, devoid of emotion. Almost human, and simultaneously so far from.

"Are you here to take him from me?" You whisper breathlessly.

...

"Yes."