Soul Music - Ultimate Reality

Susan did so, and stood before the Ultimate Reality.

Death was seven feet tall. He looked taller. Susan had vague memories of a figure carrying her on its shoulders through the huge dark rooms, but in memory it had been a human figure - bony, but human in a way she was certain of but couldn't quite define.

This wasn't human. It was tall, and haughty, and terrible. He might unbend enough to bend the Rules, Susan thought, but that doesn't make him human. This is the keeper of the gate of the world. Immortal, by definition. The end of everything.

He is my grandfather. Will be, anyway. Is. Was.

***

Soul Music - p99