Marked, Soul Guardians Book 1

by Kim Richardson

“This can’t be happening!” Kara hit her head in frustration and stomped her feet. “There’s got to be a way, there has to be! We can’t stay here—we need to get back to Horizon, this instant!”

  “I am truly, sorry.” The Keeper lowered its head. It seemed to reflect for a moment. “You will find the eighth plane quite agreeable. This is merely a small portion of the plane. It can be … quite beautiful, in its own way.”

  Kara grabbed David’s arm and turned him around. “David. We can’t stay here! We have to warn the Legion.” She fought to control her trembling, and squeezed his arm harder than she wanted.

  David raked his fingers in his hair and yelled out in frustration. “Keeper. Tells us how to get out! There’s a way in, so there must be a way out.”

  The Keeper just shook its head and didn’t answer. Its face was expressionless and Kara wondered if it were laughing at them right now, hidden behind its white mask of a face. Perhaps this was a trickster demon who played with their emotions and deliberately kept their escape a secret.

  Demon or not, she couldn’t stay here and let her soul wither away while Horizon died. She had to do something. She was desperate.

  With desperation, come desperate actions. Kara held her blade with trembling hands. She walked up to the Keeper and pointed her blade towards its face. “Tells us how to leave, or it’s going to get ugly.” She sighed loudly. “I’m not going to ask you again.”

  The Keeper took a step back, its body twisted in an unnatural way. It lifted its skeletal arms in a plea. “You cannot be serious. I am only a messenger. I do not make the rules. Please put down your weapon.”

  “I don’t care who makes the rules!” Kara moved toward the creature, she wasn’t sure what she was about to do, but she had to do something. “You know how to get out of here—tell us! Tell us now, or I’m going to cut you up!” She mimicked the movement with her arm.

  The Keeper retreated. It tripped on its own robe, and nearly fell. It caught itself just in time and straightened. “Please! I am no threat. Please don’t hurt me. I’m defenseless. I am only the messenger—”

  With her anger about to explode, Kara grabbed the Keeper’s arm and yanked it forward—

  The arm came apart.

  Kara stared stupidly at a plastic skeletal arm. It looked like Max, the mascot skeleton from her high school’s biology class. Kara pursed her lips into a thin line. She turned to the Keeper, grabbed a handful of its robe, and kicked it in the stomach.

  Two tiny men spilled out from under the cloth. They hit the ground and rolled to a stop. Scrambling, they got to their feet and backed away from Kara, the whites of their eyes showing. They wore simple overalls with white shirts. The taller one had red curly hair that framed his pointy face. The other was balding, with wisps of light brown hair floating off his head. They were middle aged, with neatly trimmed beards. Both were terrified. If Kara hadn’t been so angry, she would have laughed. Instead, she growled like an animal.

  “What is the meaning of this?” She hissed and threw the robe to the ground. “You better start explaining yourselves … or I will cut your little bodies into tiny little pieces!”

  One of the small men flashed his teeth. He rubbed his hands together nervously. “W—we were just having a little fun, that is all. We never dreamed angels could get so … so violent.” He forced a smile again. His voice was unnaturally high for a man his age, and Kara was sure this was the one who had done the talking.

  “Yes. Please forgive us,” said the other man who looked as though he was about to cry. “We get bored you see, and we just wanted to have a little fun. It’s just a show.”

  Kara heard David snort. Kara raised her eyebrows. She wasn’t impressed. This was no laughing matter. She stood staring down at the tiny men, irritated to be part of this charade.

  “What show? And no more funny business.”

  “Yes ma’am.” Both men bowed at the same time. After a moment, they lifted their arms in the air and shouted. “Okay, boys and girls. Show’s over! Pack it up!”

  The ground shook beneath Kara’s feet and loud noises rang in her ears like cracks of thunder. The fog dissipated. Giant white panels on wheels were pushed away by tiny men and women in denim overalls. The endless heavens of the eighth plane were transformed into a crowded warehouse. Kara recognized the three large smoke machines that were being hauled away. She blinked into massive spotlights. With a click, they turned off. She stood staring around her. This was a set, she realized, with props and smoke machines. This was what the little men had meant by a show. Kara and David had just been part of one. She pursed her lips. It only made her angrier.

  “Hey! Wait a minute.” Kara went for the little man with the red hair and grabbed his arm. She pulled him around to face her. “For your own good, I’m willing to forget the fact that you just wasted our time with your ridiculous show—but you better tell me the truth now. What is this place? What are we doing here?”

  The little man scratched the back of his neck. “Well, it’s as we told you before … when we were in character. This is the eighth plane. And unfortunately, no one is allowed to leave.”

  “Not allowed to leave?” David was becoming irritated, too. “Who says? Who’s in charge here?” His blues eyes flashed dangerously.

  “Orders from the High Council, that is. The archangel Uriel himself,” replied the other tiny person in a voice even higher pitched, “says no one is to leave. Too dangerous. Have to stay here.”

  “Too dangerous? But we have to leave. We can’t stay here!” Kara’s temper flared. Things were just getting worse by the minute. She fought to control her anger. She wanted to strangle the little guy.

  “I’m sorry, but you can’t. You’ll have to sit and wait with the rest of them.” The little man turned and pointed in the direction of a large grey panel that covered an entire wall.

  Another man waddled over to the panel, put his weight into it, and pushed the panel as it rolled away and folded onto itself. Kara stared at a back room packed with angels. A flashing blue and red neon sign was nailed at the top. It read, Customer service, now serving angels. Over a thousand guardian angels sat in small metal chairs. They fidgeted nervously. Kara wondered how long they’d been waiting in that room. She scanned the area for Jenny and Peter. They weren’t there. She felt a pressure in her chest and prayed that they had made their way back to Horizon safely.

  “You have to take a number and sit with the rest of them.” The man rolled up the robe and flung it over his shoulder. “Lilly will take care of you.” He skipped away, the black robe dragging on the floor behind him.

  Kara turned back and searched the room. A single desk of polished wood stood across the room at the far right. A woman sat in a chair behind the desk. She wore a black vest over a white blouse buttoned all the way to the neck. Her grey hair was pulled back tightly in a bun that rested on the top of her head. Her pointy face was pulled tight, and she wore a deep frown that dragged her forehead down to the bridge of her nose. She reminded Kara of her fourth-grade teacher, Mrs. Wiggins, whose frown and cruel face terrified the children. She suppressed a chill.

  To Lilly’s right was a large red arrow secured on a tall metal stand with the words, pick a number, pointed down. A large roll of numbers spilled to the floor.

  David raised his brows. “This is the weirdest day I’ve ever had as a GA.”

  “Let’s just hope she can tell us how to get back. The longer we waste here, the slimmer our chances are to reach the Legion in time before the demons strike.”

  David shrugged. “You’re right. Well, let’s get to it.” He strode toward the desk, pushing his way through the tight space. Kara followed him and looked around. She didn’t recognize any of the faces. But they all had one thing in common—they were frightened.

  David stood before the large red arrow and tore off a number. He stared at it for a moment. He looked up at Kara and handed her the small piece of paper.

  Kara seized the ticket. A bell rang,
and a number appeared above the arrow: eighty-four. She glanced down at her number, thirty-six thousand seven hundred and ninety-nine. They would be stuck here for days. Kara watched the angel with the number eighty-four walk up to the desk and hand the piece of paper to Lilly. She took the number, crumbled it, and threw it in a waste paper basket behind her without turning her head. Kara thought she looked annoyed.

  Kara crumbled her own number and stormed towards the desk. The angel with number eighty-four walked away. Kara took the opportunity, and as the bell rang for the next number she was already standing in front of the desk.

  Lilly looked up from under the deep folds of her brows. “Number,” she said impatiently and held out her hand. She waited.

  Kara caught sight of David standing next to her. She handed Lilly her creased number. She watched the old woman examine the piece of paper. Her eyebrows rose, and the old woman’s face twisted in annoyance.

  “Can’t you read? It says number eighty-five.” She pointed to the number above the red arrow with a long crooked finger. “Sit,” she ordered, and dismissed Kara with a flick of her hand. Kara clenched her jaw. This was going to be more difficult than she expected.

  Kara leaned over the desk, so that the other angels couldn’t hear. “Uh … Lilly? Listen, we can’t wait here. We have urgent information for the Legion. My partner and I must get to Horizon right now.” She hoped she didn’t sound too disrespectful. She studied the woman’s face for any traces of contempt. There weren’t any.

  Lilly stared at Kara without blinking. She smiled in amusement. “Do you have number eighty-five?”

  “No, but—”

  “Then sit down!”

  Kara flinched. How dare this woman speak to her like this? She clenched her trembling fingers into fists. She wanted to punch her. She slammed her hand on the desk. The boom echoed louder throughout the room than she would have wanted. All the GAs were listening in.

  “Listen, lady,” hissed Kara, and she noticed David take a step back. “I don’t have time for your attitude and stupidity!” Her voice carried through the room. “If you don’t let us get back, the Legion will be destroyed! And it’ll be because of you!” She pointed her finger inches from Lilly’s face. That seemed to anger the woman.

  Lilly looked as though she had bitten into something bitter. Her eyes became tight slits and Kara could hardly see the green in them anymore.

  Lilly pushed back her chair and stood up. “Listen to me carefully, guardian. As I have been explaining for the last five hours to the rest of your kin—,” she waved her skinny arm in the direction of the angels sitting in the chairs, “you cannot go back to Horizon. Something has broken the veil. All angels trying to get back to Horizon from Earth will land here. The High Council has instructed us to keep you here safely until they fix the problem. So you see, you cannot go anywhere … no matter how much you raise your voice to me.”

  Kara glared down at the tiny woman. “This is exactly why we must go.”

  Kara tried to calm the shaking in her voice. “There are things you don’t know … don’t understand. Terrible things will happen if we don’t get in touch with the Legion in time, you must believe us—”

  “What things?” Lilly crossed her arms over her chest. “What things, guardian?” she repeated, a hint of concern in her commanding voice.

  Kara wondered if she should tell this old fool. She decided that she would and hoped she would understand. “Asmodeus is planning an attack on Horizon. He used the attacks on the mortal world as a diversion. We know it to be true. He’s also probably causing this disruption in the veil.”

  “With all the angels gone to save mortal souls, plus the ones stuck here—he has a great chance of succeeding.”

  David stood by Kara. “This is very serious, Lilly.” David put on the charm. “We’re not here to get you into any kind of trouble, I promise. We just need you to help us get back.”

  The old woman stood motionless, her cold stare fixed on them both. For the moment no one spoke.

  “If we can’t get through to Horizon … then at least let us send them a message,” pleaded David.

  “You can’t,” said Lilly through gritted teeth. “That’s not possible.”

  “Surely you can communicate with them? You just said they gave you orders to keep everyone here—”

  “No, as I said … it’s not possible.”

  “Why not?” Kara heard the anger in David’s voice. He too was losing his patience with the old woman.

  Lilly studied their faces for a minute. Her green eyes focused on Kara. “You are the angel, Kara? Aren’t you?”

  “Yes.” Kara was running out of patience and time.

  Lilly fell back into her seat, and Kara thought she had paled. “If what you say is true, then it is grave indeed. I had wondered why we had lost all communication with Horizon. They can’t hear us anymore. We are unable to communicate with them. No messages can get through anymore.”

  Kara’s eyes were level with Lilly’s. “Then let us through, let us get back.”

  The old woman stared into space. She looked up at the two of them and shook her head. “It is too dangerous. Your angel bodies will die. I cannot be responsible for your deaths.”

  Kara pressed her hands on the desk. “If you don’t let us go, you’ll be responsible for a lot more than just two deaths.”

  Lilly shook her head again. She looked at them with sad eyes. “You don’t understand. With the veil broken, it is too dangerous to travel back to Horizon. Your supernatural bodies will burn and fall apart. Without vega, your bodies will disintegrate into nothingness. You will die … the true death.”

  Kara refused to believe it. They hadn’t gone through all this mess to be told they couldn’t reach Horizon. “Is there a chance that we might not? Is there a chance we might survive?”

  Lilly didn’t answer. She only stared at her.

  “Well, is there?”

  The old woman closed her eyes. “Yes. There is a slight chance. A very slight chance you might survive—”

  “So we’ll do it. We’ll take that chance.”

  Lilly stared at Kara, bewildered for a long moment. After a while she relaxed. She seemed to have accepted Kara’s request. She stood up and called out.

  “Rosy! I need you to replace me for fifteen minutes.”

  A plump young woman with a tan skirt suit pushed her way through the crowd. Her curly blond hair bounced from her shoulders as she went to busy herself with the angel customers. Lilly made her way around her desk and gestured for Kara and David to follow her.

  She led them out of the room and across the warehouse towards the back. They followed her through a small corridor and down a few steps leading to a bottom level. Kara couldn’t see anything through the darkness. Lilly climbed up a ladder and flicked a switch. Immediately the room was bathed in a soft yellow light. A large elevator shaft rose against the back wall. A metal gate was secured before it. Kara heard a tinkle, and saw Lilly pull out a large set of keys. She waddled over to the large elevator and stood up on her toes. She jammed a key into an iron key hole and turned—

  The ground shook as light exploded from the key hole. The elevator was illuminated in a blue light. Blue shards of light coiled around the elevator and went out. The room stood still once again.

  David smiled. “Wow. What kind of elevator is this?” He walked across the room and dragged his hand against the metal gate. “It looks ancient.”

  “That’s because it is.” Lilly grabbed hold of the gate and with great effort, she pulled it across. Two solid metal doors stood before them. “This elevator was one of the first built by the archangels, thousands of years ago. They stopped using it because it had some defects. Angels would come back missing arms and legs. It became too dangerous to let anyone use it. They then designed the EL20 models—the ones you’ve used, and forgot about this one. It hasn’t been used in over five hundred years. It’s kept only for emergencies. I don’t even know if it’ll work.
”

  Kara pressed her hand against the doors. It was cool. “Well, this is definitely an emergency—”

  The doors creaked, and slid open. Kara jumped back in alarm.

  Beyond the doors was a large compartment. The walls were metal and the floor was crooked slabs of concrete. It wasn’t nearly as fancy as the elevators Kara was used to. But this wasn’t the time to get picky. Kara made up her mind and stepped into the elevator. David stepped in beside her. She looked around. Smooth metal walls surrounded them. There were no buttons anywhere. Kara thought it strange that there was no control panel.

  Lilly grabbed the metal gate and pulled it across them on the other side. She stepped back and watched them with a worried expression.

  “How do we know where the elevator is going?” asked Kara, with her hand on the wall where the control panel ought to be.

  Lilly forced a smile. “You don’t. If you survive the journey, it’ll take you to Horizon. But where, is beyond me.”

  “Great,” mumbled Kara.

  “Safe journey back. Best of luck.” She leaned over and pressed her finger on a panel on the exterior wall.

  With a loud screeching noise the doors jerked and slid slowly across the front. David squeezed her hand in his. She looked into his blue eyes and returned his squeeze. David was as terrified as she was.

  The elevator jerked to life. She felt pressure pulling her in every direction. The pulling increased, and she felt as though her body would rip apart. She hung onto David desperately. What have they gotten themselves into? David’s body shook, and she felt hers move. Kara yelled in surprise. David’s body suddenly disappeared. It reappeared a second later, but it was transparent. She could see the metal wall through him, as though she was looking through a heat wave. She looked down. Her lower body and legs were a white mist. Was this the end? Another wave of pain attacked. Kara let out a cry. She shook uncontrollably. She felt as though she was in a blender. She knew her body was breaking. They were going to die.

  She looked at David’s body. She had to concentrate hard to see him. He was almost completely invisible. She could make out pain on his face. Suddenly, miniscule pieces of his body started to detach themselves. He was coming apart. Panicked, Kara pressed her body against his, hoping to hold him together. Her arms were breaking apart too. Kara shook. She wouldn’t let them die.

  Kara used the only power she had left. She let all her anger flare inside her. She felt the elemental power answering her call. She willed it forward, and grasped it. Her vision exploded in golden hues. A golden light danced at the tip of her fingers. She gently pressed against David’s shoulders and golden beams coiled in and around them as they stood. Soon their bodies radiated a brilliant golden color. She could finally see David’s face more clearly. He was frightened, but he managed a smile. Kara thought he looked beautiful highlighted in gold. Her plan seemed to be working. Their bodies were staying intact.

  There was a sudden loud crack. Kara and David were thrown to the ground. The bond with the elemental power was broken. Kara sensed the elevator had stopped moving. She pushed herself up on her elbows as the doors slid open.

  Loud wails sounded all around them. Blasts of red and white illuminated the sky. The smell of smoke entered the elevator. Kara blinked through a heavy grey haze. The vast desert in Operations was in flames. The tents were on fire. Sounds of battle were everywhere.

  The war had already begun. They were too late.

  Chapter 13

  A war of Angels