Tholan: Mystic Protectors: An Angelic Paranormal Erotica

by Kathi S. Barton

  Parker got up and left the safe open. She needed to make notes, and there was nothing in this room to do so. Her da hadn’t a television in this room, nor a desk. To him, a bedroom was for sleeping—nothing else. So she’d left it his way. Taking a shower, she thought about March. Parker knew that he’d been killed about a year after her father had passed away. She made a mental note to find out how he had been killed.

  If he had been in on it, which she had no doubt that he would have been, that explained where Angela had gotten money enough to buy her house. Parker would go over bank records more closely now and see just how much they’d been able to skim. It couldn’t have been too much at a time, or she would have noticed it right away when she’d been studying them.

  Getting dressed, she picked up everything that had been in the safe, put the stick in it—again with her socks—and closed it. Then she opened it again, returning everything that had been in it. No one would guess that it was there, and she wanted to keep it that way. Parker made her way to her office first, then to the kitchen. Maggie was there, as she always was, making the kitchen and sometimes the rest of the household smell wonderful.

  “I’ve made you a light lunch, child. Lady Kala called here earlier and said that you were to come to her home early—by four, she told me.” They both glanced at the clock. It was nearly noon now. “I’m glad that you’re getting more sleep. You should try and sleep in more often.”

  She hoped never to sleep like she had last night but didn’t stay anything. Parker didn’t really want to have dinner with them. Not that she didn’t care for them, but as it had been pointed out before to her, they were loud, huggy, and they didn’t take no as an answer very well. All in all, she just wanted to be left alone. But that wasn’t helping her with her life right now.

  “I have some things that I’d like to box up and get out of the house. Not a great deal, but some of the furniture that was left in the house when Angela was moved out. Do you know if there is a charity place that might take the clothing?” Maggie told her that she’d look into it. “I don’t care if they tear the clothing down for the material. Angela never had good taste in clothing as far as I was concerned.”

  “She never had good taste in anything if you ask me. Did I tell you that before your wonderful father passed, she wanted me to put him on a low carb diet? The doctor himself said that your daddy needed carbs more than anything, him being so skinny at the end. Stupid woman. Did she think I’d not ask him before I did whatever she wanted? I’m glad to be rid of her.” Parker said that she was as well. Maggie huffed, something that she’d done since Parker had been a child. “Oh, I’m to tell you that the tea that you got from the deli? It’s going to be brought here, as well as other breads and pastries. I’ve had a bit of it, and it’s very good, isn’t it?”

  “You drink as much of it as you want. And yes, it’s delicious. I guess Judith makes it, along with jellies and jams. She explained to me what the difference is, and I enjoyed an hour just taste testing what she makes. I might put on some weight if I go there too often.”

  Maggie told her that she could use it, and Parker just nodded. Her weight was the least of her problems right now. Someone had promised her to the bug—what she’d decided to call it from now on—and she needed to find out who. But first, she wanted to finish the letter from her da.

  After telling Maggie about the workers and giving her the phone number that she could call, they decided what they wanted in the room and what other room could use some updating. For sure the dining room. The floors needed to be redone as well as the walls painted.

  Parker loved the living room, but Maggie had been right in pointing out that she needed to bring it and the television that was in there up to this century. It was one of those tube televisions that, if she remembered correctly, still only displayed black and white pictures. She and her da were not big on sitting around watching television. They made use of the projector and screening room when they watched their favorite old movies. She’d not watched one since she’d been gone, she only just realized.

  It took them the better part of two hours to get that finished up. Then she had to get ready to go to the Trainor home. Tomorrow she was going to take her driver’s test over and buy a car. It was time to sell the ones in the garage; her da’s babies, as he’d called his cars, were too painful to have around. And she thought someone else might enjoy then more than she would.

  As one of the limos was brought for her to ride in, she thought of the stick again and why Bug hadn’t made a bigger deal about her having it. She supposed that, like her, he wouldn’t want her to think he needed it. But for some reason, Parker knew that he did. Now she had to figure out who she was to tell that she had it. And that would be no easier than anything else she had on her plate at the moment.

  ~*~

  Warrior hurt like he’d never hurt before. And living here, in the hells of—well, Hell—he knew real pain when it hit him. But when he looked down to where his finger should have been, all he wanted to do was go to the child and kill her. But he would have his. Warrior knew that as well as he did his own pain.

  Hiding his hand in his robes, he made his way to the common area. He had had permission to go above grounds. It had been his duty to go and retrieve two people that had been sent to them. But he just could not give up the chance to see what the morsel he’d been promised looked like. Entering where she had been—the prison, they called it—had been forbidden to them all.

  Parker looked like a dream. And her body made his cock harden, his mouth water, and his need to fuck her off the charts to have her under him. Or above him. He cared not how he had her so long as he could. And he would too. Very soon.

  Six years ago, he’d been assigned to pick up a woman who had died in an accident. The woman was wonderfully messy. Her head had been split open, both of her legs mangled to nearly coming off. Even her torso, the meat of her belly, had been spilled out onto the seat she was on, as well as the floor of the car.

  Touching her enough to wake her brought her up and at him in seconds. The fight of her had him leaning her over and fucking her into what he had hoped was submission. Warrior didn’t care if his partner enjoyed a good fucking or not, so when she screamed out her release, he nearly came a second time, just feeling her squeeze her pussy around him. Then he turned her over.

  The part that he had taken looked nothing like the mess in the car. But he’d not realized that this body, his part, was old, and used up. Ugly, he thought she might be called. And she berated him for five minutes before she struck a bargain with him. One that he wished now he’d acted on when he started this.

  To have waited for six years for his prize, while the body got to walk around, was hard on him. There were rules about going into a prison and taking someone. But he did go to the mother’s house, fuck her with his real body, and leave her in agony several times a week until he grew tired of her grievances. She did that well too—complained all the time.

  “You let me live forever and I will give you my daughter. She is beautiful. Like me.” He nearly removed her head—he didn’t think her pretty at all except for her body. “She has flaming red hair. Mismatched eyes, one blue the other green. And a body to die for.”

  “But you said that she looked like you. And I know well enough that you have not had a red head that did not come from a bottle. Your body is old and saggy, and your eyes are the same color as shit, the revolting stuff that humans void out when they’ve eaten too much.” Warrior didn’t know if that was why they defecated; he just knew that it was a vile habit that he didn’t want to ever pick up. “Is this paragon of beauty yours or not?”

  “She is. I swear it.” She asked if she could retrieve her phone. When she pulled it to her and flipped around in it, he had a moment where he thought that this would matter little. If her body was found before they struck a deal, then all would be lost. Then she turned the small instrument to his face. “Look at that face. Is that not the face of a beautiful wom
an that can satisfy your every whim?”

  The woman in the picture did look like she could take a hard pounding. And she would give as good as she got if she was anything like her mother. Warrior asked for her name, thinking to trick the human into being taken and him having the girl too.

  “No, no names until we make a deal. I want to live forever. Be healthy and never catch any diseases. I don’t want to put on weight, nor do I want to hurt. All that for the girl.” He thought it over, the way that she worded her demands. It was just too easy, but he put out his hand and agreed.

  Warrior was sure that she thought not to shake on it, the deal that they’d made. But he took her hand in his and marked her. Marked her with his mark that also told of their bargain. That the child of this woman was his, and none other. When she screamed in pain, he put her back in the car and gave her life back. The only way that she could be killed now was by him, or someone stronger than him. He liked it that way too.

  Now he had not just his prize’s name, but also her birthdate. This was going to be a real coup for him. As soon as he had her, he was going to present her before the king himself. Rollin the Warrior was going to be thought well of forever after this.

  He had thought of taking her himself. Thought hard on it at the time he was promised her. But he also knew that his predecessors had done that, thought to hide the females from their lord. Warrior wasn’t stupid enough to think that he was better than them, nor smarter on how to get her by him. He knew that he couldn’t. So giving her to him as a gift would pave the way for everything that he’d ever wanted.

  “You smell of the otherworld.” Warrior looked at his cellmate and sneered at him. “You have been told to bring back bodies for us, not to galivant around like you own the place.”

  “And how is it you know what I’ve been doing? Tell me that, Peck.” His name was Peter, but Warrior enjoyed calling him Peck. “I know my job and I do it very well. Have you heard of me getting into trouble? You have not. And would you like to know why? Because I do not cause it. Now, be gone with yourself. I have things to attend to this day.”

  His hand was hurting him badly now. Warrior moved to his room and laid on his cot. He hadn’t any idea how to mend himself. No one had ever fought him back before. And whatever that creature had used on him, it wasn’t normal. Pulling his injuries from his robes, he looked at his stub.

  His fingers were gone, with most of the top of his palm. It had sealed when she’d hit him, as if it had been colder than anything that he’d ever encountered before. But it was more than that. It was as if she had had help, from the king of her realm.

  “No. No, there is no way that she had that kind of help. I have her, and I have her fair and square.” He’d been wanting to use that phrase since he’d heard it on Earth the other day. Now that he had, Warrior had no idea why he’d thought it was so wonderful. “The things that humans say when they are telling me why I shouldn’t have them. It borders on insanity.”

  Now he had to figure out how to explain what had happened to his hand. Because even though he was going to be on the up and up about the woman, losing a piece of himself was against their laws. And to have left it behind as he had, it was going to get him into serious trouble.

  “I’ll just go back to her dream state and get it. There isn’t any way that she has the power to pick it up. And if she were to do that, then she’d really be marked as my own.” Then there was the added trouble that if she had picked it up, someone on her end might be able to tell her what it was. There were protectors and watchers all over the place where she resided now. “There is no point in borrowing trouble where none has presented itself.”

  Another human saying, but this one made sense to him. There were all sorts of them that he’d heard over the decades of being the delivery person. Some made no sense at all, like his least favorite—pretty as a speckled pup under a little red wagon. What the fuck did that mean?

  Did the person just call you a dog? And why was a mongrel pretty? They smelled, licked their own asses, chased their own tails, and drank from the portal that humans took a shit in. Then there was the wagon. A thing to carry about goods wasn’t pretty. It was useful. He had—

  His door opening had him leaping from his bed. Too late he remembered to hide his hand. When it was jerked toward Merlin—such a stupid name if someone were to ask him—he whimpered slightly before dropping to his knees and begging for forgiveness.

  “What have you done?” He told him that he’d been collecting and went to check on his prize. “You don’t even have the sense to lie to me, do you? Do you have any idea what caused this? What sort of magic was used to make this mark on you?”

  “I do not wish to lie to you, my lord. I have seen what it did to others of my ilk that have done so. I was made a bargain, a good and solid one. And when I went to check on her, only in her dream state, she attacked me.” Merlin squeezed his hand again, which had him screaming in pain. “My lord, I have no idea where she got it in her head to harm me. But I made a good bargain and was going to bring the morsel to our king as soon as I collected her.”

  “Why have you waited? If she is, as you say, for our king, then why have you not brought her to us?” He told him of her being in the cell, the one that he wasn’t to enter, and that she had only just come to be released. “A prison, huh? Then she is to come here anyway. Why was a bargain struck, and by whom?”

  “Her mother. She said that she killed the prize’s father by setting him up. And that she, the mother, wished to be rid of her for only a longer life. She had other requests as well, such as she should not gain any weight. But I have taken it upon myself to make her saggy, but no weight gain. Then there is the—”

  “Enough.” Merlin looked at his hand and gave it another squeeze before letting it go. Warrior didn’t make a sound out loud, but he was screaming in his mind. “You will not go— Where is the rest of yourself?”

  “I left it behind.” Whatever he had expected, laughter wasn’t it. Merlin, not known for a sense of humor, laughed for a good minute before he shifted, his body no longer that of the form that everyone was used to. No, he had become himself, his royalty as well as his beast. “You will return to get it now. And if it is gone from the place where you lost it, you will stay above ground and find it. Of all the— Do you have any idea what would happen to you should it fall into the wrong hands? The trouble that this would cause, with the king of the Otherworld? He will not be happy. Nor will your own king once he finds out—”

  “Please, I beg of you. Do not tell him. I will find it, this I will promise. I will find it and come to you first thing when I have it.” Merlin didn’t look as if he was going to allow him to leave after all. “I will find it, my lord. This I swear to you.”

  “You will, or the price will be more than you can endure.” He knew that. Even Markum was still paying for his misdeeds. “Be gone with you.”

  Warrior found himself in the human world in the next breath.

  When he’d seen Markum the other day, Warrior was sickened by his wounds, the way that green and yellow pus seemed to bleed from every part of his body. And where his cock had once been, burnt off by all the sex play that was heaped upon him, someone had put another cock in its place. But this one was made of a hot rod, one that would service anyone who used it, but would burn deeply into Markum’s body.

  “I will not have that happen to me.” Then he remembered something from one of the rules that he’d been made to learn when he’d been created for his job. “I cannot be changed or have my head removed without being whole. If I do not find the piece, which I will, then I cannot be harmed as they have done to the others.”

  Chapter 4

  Tholan was somewhat nervous. Okay, he told himself, don’t lie. You’re terrified, he laughed to himself. As he walked around the house of Riss, he admired the things that Riss had gotten to make his home homier, warmer, and more comfortable. One of the things that Tholan had fallen in love with was the fireplace.


  There was no flame in it now, but he could imagine the warmth one would feel when it was going. And there were throw blankets on the backs of couches that seemed to warm the room up. Not by heat, just lying there, but with the warmth of happiness and comfort. He was admiring one such cover when someone behind him cleared their throat.

  “You like the colors? I have earth tones all over my living room. My bedroom as well.” He didn’t know the young woman, not really, but he was looking forward to becoming her friend, as he’d been asked. “I didn’t know anyone was in here. I was just taking a break. They’re a lot, when they get together, aren’t they?”

  “Oh, my yes. I usually end up going back to my cell when they become too much.” She frowned at him, and Tholan tried to think what he’d said. “I’m Tholan. I have no last name. I was made to believe that you are aware of what we are. I’m very sorry if I offended you.”

  “You didn’t, I guess. I was wondering if you were making fun of me when you mentioned the cell. But I’m betting that you really live in a cell, correct?” He smiled at her, feeling as if she might be able to understand him. “I’m Parker Brooks. I’m going to be a part of some of the projects they have going on around town. They’re certainly making some good improvements, don’t you think?”

  She sat in one of the wingback chairs that faced the cold hearth. He sat in the other, trying his best not to fidget. He did that when he was nervous, and Tholan wanted to make a good impression.

  “I’ve not spent a great deal of time in this realm. I have only just started watching someone again. I had been doing desk duty for decades.” She told him that she had just hired someone to do that for her. “You are wealthy then?”

  Her laugh embarrassed him slightly, but her face was beautiful when she did it. There was a sparkle to her eyes, and the lines around her mouth were no longer there in those few seconds. Tholan thought that he could light his new home with the brilliance of her at this moment.