by K. H. Kate
"So, we meet finally." A deadly voice said before I passed out from the pounding in my head.
"Lana? Lana, wake up."
Samara...
"Please, I beg you, wake up!"
When my eyes finally opened it was pitch black. Where the hell was I? Dammit! I couldn't believe this was happening right now. This was not what I was expecting when I woke up that day.
"You happy now? Look what you have done." I shook my head in disappointment. “No dolly for you to play with.”
"Talking to yourself?" Someone asked from the door but because of the sheer darkness, it was hard to tell who it was.
"No, talking to your piss poor minion. He forgot to leave the book with me." I couldn't help but let the venom in my voice known.
"You have a lovely character. Pity, you are just needed for a few days. Then you can leave if you want to. Oh and by leaving I meant, die soon, sorry, you look just so familiar that it's hard to think who I am talking to." He let out a chuckle and if possible hid his body more behind the door.
"What? Are you scared of me? Don't want to let me see your dickhead of a face?" I smirked feeling the familiar pull. He was afraid of something, but it looked like I wasn't the reason. He was afraid of what he'd do if I lost control.
Interesting.
"So curious to see me. Hmm...we can work something out of you." He tasked, leaving the switch on. Ah, there it was. Light. Looking around, it was clear that I was still in the manor. In other words, the torture cell to be exact.
Looking back at the man, I saw him carrying the book Hannah wanted to save. He couldn't be more than in his late thirties. He had midnight black hair and deep red eyes. But that didn't faze me as much as the horn did.
Hellhounds...
"How can a hellhound walk on this earth without feeling the pull to hell?" I whispered with a frown but he heard it anyway.
"You're correct but I don't like the term hellhound. It makes me sound like an old dog-" He chuckled at his own joke "And it's not safe to disrespect someone like me for only being a...hellhound." He finished.
"So what should I call you, Almighty?" I spat the word dripping with sarcasm.
"No...but Sage would do." He replied clearly ignoring me. I frowned at the name. Sage? That Sage?
"So...the reason you are here. I want you to read this book and call your Seeker." He straight cut got to the main business. But my mouth went dry upon hearing about the Seeker. He wanted me to call Mikhail.
Everything was good in the world again. Fuck.
"Why? Can't you call him yourself?" I asked. If he heard any bitterness behind the words, he didn't question it.
"It only works when the Reaper calls themselves." He revealed instead while looking at me with curious eyes. Creepy much?
"Sorry, not interested."
"Lana-"
"Look, I'm a very impatient person and I do occasional homicides of the people I don't like. I have got a damn reason to know why I'm locked up here!" I finally snapped.
He gave me a daring smirk in return. "Like mother, like daughter. Now I can see where this stubbornness comes from."
"That’s why Roth Gill is the most wanted lawyer in every damn state."
"I wasn’t exactly talking about her." He challenged.
"Then my real birth mother? That bitch?" I asked not knowing if I should be happy or feel threatened. Maybe that bitch was working with this psycho. Who knew what they were planning now?
"Exactly the one." Whenever I was nervous I tapped my foot. So, I wasn't even surprised when the sound of tapping my foot constantly brought a disgust filled look on Sage's face.
"You do know Seekers kill Reapers, don't you? So when you'll summon the Seeker using this book, of course, he'll have no choice but to kill you. That's where you're dandy. You will kill your mother because that's in your blood and you will be killed by him and all the Reaper bloodline will end with you. Then I can finally walk on this earth." He said dreamily before opening his eyes to glare at her. "Unless you're carrying a Reaper already. Are you pregnant or something?"
Were we doing a competition on who was more insane? This guy was fucked up.
"We're already on earth. If you forgot to look around. And, even if I was pregnant, who said it's any of your business?" I had to chant over and again, control Lana...Control. I didn't want to kill him...not yet. But only laughter could be heard around me.
"It doesn't matter if you're carrying a child or not. It wouldn't get to see the world cause you're dying soon. And are you sure that we're on earth? Cause the last thing I know we're in limbo, where no one can get out without lifting the veil of hell." He finished.
Damn, that bitch called fate...
***
"What are you looking for?"
I jumped at the voice only to see Zedkiel was sitting in my bed. He gave me a weird look which I ignored, slamming the top drawer shut. I told him nicely a few times that since his job was done, he could return to Nola but no, he was starting to interfere in everything.
Even my cases.
"The case files, Zedkiel. If you didn't notice earlier, I kinda have a shortage of a Partner without Aaron. When is he coming here, again? I thought you had his memory erased by now." I asked with a straight face even if it was a lie cause I didn't want him to know that I brought the diary back from the precinct. He already had a lot to say about that and I didn't want words to get to mom.
"Oh really? But I thought you were looking for a diary?" My hands stopped halfway from opening the bottom drawer. Glancing back, I noticed him giving me that weird look again.
Shit. "OK. You got me. I need the diary and I can't find it anywhere. Do you remember where the last time I put it somewhere?"
"I burned it." He bluntly replied. The hell...
"What?" I turned around to gauge his face. "I don't think I heard you the first time."
"You heard me, I burned it. You were too much obsessing over a little diary." He replied again with no emotion.
Before I could truly show what I was feeling he spoke up. "Look kid...you maybe came from the Red clan but Mandy was from mine. That makes me close to your clan leader. I know why you are so obsessed with that diary and I get it. But I want to do what's best for you. That is to let go of that thing."
I dared him to lie on my face when our gaze met. "Why do you think I'm obsessed with that thing?"
Zedkiel shrugged, standing up from the bed. "That you are falling for a Reaper. None the less who already has a beloved and close to a beloved or whatever that was."
I didn't know if I should cry or laugh. Zedkiel actually thought...
"You read it. Of course, you did. You don't understand..." I trailed off, hearing my phone ping. "Wait here. I need to see this."
"Who is that?"
"None of your business." I snapped, irritated at how he was starting to act like an overbearing parent. I looked down to see who it was only to find no ground stopping me from falling. Messages upon messages.
And I never got a single one until now.
What the fuck? Just how?
It started out little by little as my face flinched in pain. I had no control over the transformation like the other times. My blue eyes turned to the natural silver ones, my short red hair slid down to my cheeks, the root turning to blond like my mother. And when I finally looked like myself again, I could only roar at the sky as thunder followed somewhere.
She's gone.
She promised she'd let me figure her out. Instead, I lost her again. Maybe Zedkiel was right at times.
Vermon Hernandez might be a simple warlock, desperately needing of a mentor to help him. But Mikhail? His true shelf was an enigma to begin with.
And I just about was done with hiding myself.
The surprise was still in my mind when I took notice of the messages.
Valentine Godfrey, out of everyone notifying me about her disappearance.
"What just happened?" I snorted at the sound coming from behind me. O
f course, of freaking course, Zedkiel was still pretending that he didn't just see me change completely in front of his eyes.
"The Coven was attacked. She's gone. Did you delete my messages, Zedkiel?" My voice was supposed to make him flinch but all it did was made him frown.
"You never listen to me, Vermon. What do you want me to do?" He gritted out, his eyes on me. "You look..."
"This is my true form."
There, I said it.
If I was in a good mood, I'd definitely laugh at the face he was making now. But I didn't have time to wonder why he was acting so weird. The coven was attacked and she was missing. That should be my concern now. Though before I could take another step, he shoved me with anger blazing over his gaze.
"Oh for devil's sake, please tell me, you aren't the same Mikhail she mentioned earlier."
I laughed, the bitter tone not going unnoticed. "Vermon Mikhail Hernandez, yeah, I got a mouthful of names. Get over it. It's a constant battle of what's right and wrong when it comes to her, Zedkiel. She's my beloved yet she never opens up to me or anything. How could I know that fate just didn't make a mistake? I needed you to tell me that she didn't kill those people while she was still human. I needed something, anything to make myself believe that I wasn't running after a lost cause."
"Oh, fuck." He cursed, rubbing his forehead. "I thought she had a beloved. A seeker...you're one. Of course, your mother opened the gate of hell for me. You two are from the same bloodline. How could I be that stupid?"
"I'm a Seeker, I get it but I can control myself around her. She also has control, I've seen it."
"I'm older than you kid, I've seen things. You might have control but devil forbid if there's a time when you have no choice but to kill her what would you do? And I'm not talking about choices. Some things can't be avoided." He said deadpanned.
"You're not making any sense right now so let me take care of things that actually matter now. Like finding her." He looked extremely uncomfortable as I started to leave with my hands curled into a fist.
"Wait! You can't tell me Mandy didn't sit you down and tell you about the family histories then? Seekers are hard to find. You had to have known what a Seeker would do to a Reaper."
"What? Like I can kill her if not careful?" I scoffed, remembering the lectures I got from mom. "Or that a book is needed for the ritual to go through? I already took care of it, Zedkiel. That book is with her, with the Volkios so no one would dare to take it ever again. Now let me go if you're not going to be helpful."
"You little-fuck! I want you to trust me but there's more. When I told you that my clan was going to help Aaron, I kind of lied. I was using him as a spy to know more about the hellhounds." He did what!? I gaped at that but he didn't finish. "When Aaron was possessed, I caught some of the words like someone was going to use you to open the gate of hell. They said you felt a presence the last time you opened it. Pushing against you to come back-"
"Sage. I know. So, let me get this straight, you used my friend to know the secrets of the pit of hell. Then you ruined my love life...which was left of it anyway and now you want me to trust you, is that it?" No words could possibly describe how freaking angry I was right now.
Zedkiel lied.
The one person I actually thought I could trust...
"No, I want you to be careful. As long as the Reapers are living on earth, no one from hell can return. So, they will most likely trick you to kill her. I'm just being rational here."
"Then what now?"
"You look for Lana." I jerked at the words. Wasn't this whole conversation was about why I shouldn't be looking out for her?
"I...you..what?" I asked him confused.
"You look for Lana. If the Coven was attacked then it will not be a matter of time that every clan will know the threat. Some would want you safe and some won't."
Before I could listen to his warning, the pain started to make my way as screams of thousands of Raven could be heard near me. No way. I knew those sounds and I never wanted to hear it ever again. Zedkiel screamed at me to get out of here but before I knew it...
I was sucked into a vortex of everlasting darkness.
***
Dark.
That's the only thing I saw nowadays. I had been locked up for weeks or months. Who kept notice anyway when my stomach was caving in from not taking in souls. They had humans around me but I just couldn't reach out and take the sweet taste of it. I tried to get out of the rope hexed by Sage again but it just caused me more pain.
"The pain will go away once you get used to it." A raspy voice said near me. Oh, if I forgot about the glorious details, she was always there to mark her presence. Keisha. That bitch just had to be the one with me. It's like Sage knew the irony and was punishing me with it.
“So you were in that sanatorium…” She trailed off with a ting of guilt in her voice. “Did Valentine hurt you? Fed from you? They don’t like me very much. So to get to me-”
I scoffed, not being able to hold anymore. “Don’t give yourself that much credit. Valentine wasn’t even there, he was always busy with this or that business. Byron, however, was a problem but we took care of it.”
“We?”
“Yes. My nurse, my ex, three annoying bitches, and 5133.” I wanted to add Mikhail into it but it was better if she didn’t know that he existed. Or what we were. Something told me she’d have a heart attack right here right now.
“Who is this 5133?”
Always the same reaction I got. Predictable. “My cellmate, like me she prefers the number but she’s Valentine’s beloved, if that helps.”
Her eyebrow raised in surprise. “Valentine threw his beloved in a sanatorium?”
“Why are you so surprised? You are the one who killed dad. And for your information, she admitted herself there just to spite the big bad guy. She thought he’d never expect her to be there, staying right under his nose. It was actually brutal. I like her plan, too bad I can’t do the same with mine. Anywho! How long do you think we'll be here?" I asked, hoping she had some kind of plan. If I knew anything of my birth mother it was this, Keisha Deshayes always had backup plans.
"Until Sage wants or you have some plan."
"What happened to you?" I asked in disbelief. "Where the hell is that woman that was feared by every clan? Where's the woman who always had tricks down her sleeves cause I don't see her."
"Maybe you never knew her." There was an odd tone in Keisha's voice that almost made her sound human for once. Someone who cared.
Cry me a freaking river.
She wasn't that deep.
"Well, I don't want to know her. Now can you be useful or should I do all the work?" I looked over her shoulder to see if we had a new threat. Sage was always up to something. He was almost like Byron at some points. Well, at least Byron was easy to crack. This one seemed to have a personal vendetta against Reapers.
Keisha sighed. "I know you think I'm not useful, but I just need some souls. I have been here longer than you, Lana. My body is almost shutting down at this point. Just a little taste then I can get back to become strong enough to hurt Sage."
"Then why didn't you try something like this when we were caught first? If you are right...how do you plan to get out of this?" I pointed at the rope.
"We need to work together. Do you know any spell at all?"
I stared at her, finding the urge to laugh too much for me to handle.
"Spell? I don't have single magic in my bone. I am not even a good Reaper. If you didn't notice before, I'm kinda fucked up. So no. But you can channel me. That seems to work sometimes."
"Dammit. Try to visualize my power radiating from you. You should feel the pull. I'm trying ancestral magic here so they don't get suspicious." She whispered through the bars.
I nodded, trying to do what she said. The pull she was talking about was weird. I had flashes of a woman running barefoot and then drowning over and over. Water bubbled up to my throat, suddenly light peering through the room and I fl
inched.
The fuck was that?
When my eyes adjusted to the light, I looked around and froze. The entire place was empty and only some nagging human scents were here and there. I looked at Keisha and she also looked around with disappointment. There went the thought of some souls. But at least we were free.
"What the hell did I just saw?"
"My time in Sparkas.” Keisha whispered. “It wasn't always like that, the pain I mean but I chose that life myself.”
"Shit, ok. Can you open the cage?" I asked, bending the iron with my hands. They might've been filled with some kind of herbs but I was immune to the small pain. Bending to the point of finally breaking, I crawled out of the cage to see my birth mother trying to lift the bars and failing.
"Let me help." As soon as that bar was broken too, Keisha crawled out of her cage, standing wobbly around me.
"I don't know what Sage's game is but we need to leave limbo as fast as we can." She spat, wavering around the place. I followed her, keeping an eye on anything that looked out of the ordinary. Funny how everything looked like we were still on earth but we weren't.
"What the hell is a limbo? Sage never explained that one clearly." I wondered aloud once I saw the calculating look in Keisha's eyes.
"Just like Sparkas, it's a pocket universe. Think of it as a two-way street portal. It allows Sage to meet people from the earth just as it gives people from earth a chance to meet the hell's resident."
What?
"Then what is his problem? He can just meet them while sitting here, looking pretty." In theory that sounded good but obviously, there were some holes in it. Keisha shook her head, her ears perked up for any noise.
"He still can't return to earth. In the limbo, there are only two main doors. The door to earth is only open for the people coming from the earth and vice versa. His body will kick him back into the limbo if he tries to cross it."