“Because you’re not human.” As soon as the words were out, she could have smacked herself in the forehead. Of course they weren’t human. Hadn’t he proven that by materializing in front of her in a black cloud? Humans didn’t do that, unless they were Houdini.
“No,” Octavian answered.
“And you can’t tell me what you are.”
“I could, but it’s not safe.”
“Well, tell her something!” Gideon moaned, dropping his forehead onto the table. “I may be immortal, but even I don’t want to sit through this for another century.”
“It’s safer if you don’t know, Riley,” Kyaerin said gently.
“What’s so safe about it?” Gideon raised his head. “She already knows something’s up. You might as well roast the rest of the pig.”
“You’re scaring and confusing her,” Octavian snapped.
Gideon leapt to his feet. “You’re the one going around and around in circles. Just tell her who you are and let her handle the rest.”
“It’s not that simple,” Octavian shot back. “Knowing will put her life at risk.”
Gideon waved an arm at Riley. “You marked her, Octavian. Her life is already at risk. The safest thing for her now is to know the truth so she can at least protect herself.”
Octavian didn’t seem to have anything to say to that.
“I’m with Gideon,” Reggie said, speaking for the first time since everything happened. “Knowing could save her life.”
“I say we let Mom make her forget,” Magnus chimed in, picking at his nails with a toothpick he’d snatched off the table. “It worked before.”
Riley opened her mouth to ask when the hell that happened, but Kyaerin spoke, cutting her off. “What do you think, Liam?” She touched her husband’s arm. “You’ve been so quiet.”
Liam sighed, shaking his head. “What can I say? I honestly don’t see an out here. The Summit already knows about her. It’s only a matter of time before they send the Guardians to cleanse her and when they do and they see her marked…” He ground his fingertips into his forehead. “We’ll have to go to war. There’s nothing else for it. Octavian won’t let them near her and I won’t let them near my family…”
Kyaerin wrapped her arms around him and drew him close. She kissed his cheek, murmuring something Riley couldn’t hear.
“I think the votes have it,” Gideon said. “Just tell her. No matter what happens, she’ll have us to keep her safe.”
Reggie nodded. Magnus said nothing, but remained fascinated by his nails.
“Gideon’s right,” Kyaerin said at last. “She’s one of us now and we protect each other.”
“Not to say I’m not touched, but can someone tell me what the hell is going on?” Riley cut in.
Octavian took a deep breath. “We’re Selkies.”
Riley waited for him to continue, but he seemed to be waiting for her to say something. “Oh,” she said, nodding slowly. “Okay.”
Uncertain, his gaze flittered over to his family before turning to her again. “Do you know what that means?”
She cleared her throat. “No, sorry.”
“Perhaps I should tell it?” Kyaerin said. “It is my fault we are in this mess.”
“Kyaerin—”
She waved Liam’s protest away. “It’s true. If I hadn’t attempted nobility over… anyway. Not important now, I suppose.”
Liam took her hand and squeezed it gently. “It wasn’t your fault.”
“What happened?” Riley pressed, quickly beginning to realize just how ADD this family really was. They just ran off with things if you didn’t rein them in.
Kyaerin sniffled slightly, wiggling higher in her seat as she faced Riley with the posture of someone prepared to give a testimony to a crime. “I don’t know how well you know your myth and legends, but some think we’re seals who can remove our pelts and become human. Others think we’re walruses or some other sea born creature. They are right on the basis that we are sea born, but otherwise…”
“So what are you really?” Riley prodded when the other woman trailed off.
Kyaerin’s brow pulled together in deep contemplation. “We’re Merpeople for lack of better words, I suppose. We have the power to remove our tails and wander the human world.”
Riley’s eyes widened, shooting to Octavian. “You’re a mermaid?”
“Man,” he corrected with a slight tilt in his lips. “Merman.”
Fantastic. Like that day couldn’t get any trippier. How the hell did she get herself into this madness and where was the train heading out of the Twilight Zone because she was so ready to board?
“Let me get this straight.” She cleared her throat. “You’re part… fish?”
Why couldn’t she see it? She glanced at the six pairs of eyes watching her, studying them, trying to picture them in mermaid tails and shell bras. It just wasn’t working. It was too weird. Also as a child, The Little Mermaid was her least favorite Disney movie because it scared the living hell out of her. But there weren’t such things as mermaids and talking fish, so it had never been a concern. People were people and fish were fish. Yet there she was, in a diner that apparently couldn’t be found by humans, surrounded by… creatures that claimed to be mutated sushi.
Awesome.
“It’s a bit hard to believe,” Kyaerin said sheepishly.
A bit? Lady, you broke the scale on the insane-o-matic.
“Okay, let’s say I believe you’re…” Man, she couldn’t even say it. “Different… special?” she finished lamely. “What’s all this marking business and who’s the Summit and why do they want me dead?”
“Eons ago, a war broke out between Heaven and Hell, a war that would determine who would reign over Earth. Thousands of angels, demons and even humans died in a gruesome bloodbath that spanned centuries. Sides were taken and those who took no sides were slaughtered or forced. All Veil Creatures had to swear an allegiance to the side of their choosing. We,” Kyaerin paused to glance at her sons. “Picked what we thought was the lesser of two evils.”
“You sided with the Demons,” Riley murmured, drawn by the story.
Magnus scoffed. “I wish.”
Riley’s eyebrows lifted. “You sided with the Angels?”
Kyaerin offered her a dim smile. “We thought as you did. They were Angels, defenders of all things good and righteous. They would be fair and merciful.”
“We were rounded up and branded like animals,” Octavian took up where his mother left off. “We were told that we should be grateful for the honor bestowed upon us and the mercy being shown to creatures that had no souls and were born from the filth of the earth. We became slaves to man, bound by our oath to guard the very things that would destroy us should we ever be discovered.”
“Can’t you get out of your… oath?” she said, finally understanding why Octavian always sounded so bitter and cold toward Angels.
“One does not ever go against the Summit,” Octavian said. “We are bound to them until the day the world ends and all things become ash.”
Riley exhaled. “That’s a really long time.” She moistened her lips. “So what do they want with me?”
Kyaerin glanced at Octavian before responding quietly, “I think we should finish the rest of this story so you can better understand that one…”
Riley turned to Octavian, waiting.
Octavian inhaled. “We became Casters to the holy calling. The Sons of Judgment.”
“Is that a supernatural boy band?” she asked, only partially joking.
Reggie snorted a laugh, but said nothing.
“We cast judgment on those without souls,” Octavian explained.
Riley tried to understand this, and failed. “I don’t get it.”
“When a human commits a sin or sells their soul,” Octavian began slowly. “They become monsters we call inanimis. For a human, their soul is the only thing that keeps them earthbound, what makes them human. A human that has no soul relinquishes the
ir right to Heaven and remains here to terrorize and turn others."
“Stipendium Peccati Mors Est,” Gideon said languidly. “The reward of sin is death.”
“Soooo, you’re like soul hunters?” she guessed, trying to follow along.
“We are the… liberators of souls,” Kyaerin said, picking her words carefully.
“That’s a fancy term for underground assassins,” Gideon chimed in. “We hunt down the monsters those people become and kill them.”
“Kill?” Riley gasped. “You kill people?”
“Not people,” Kyaerin said quickly. “We kill monsters.”
“So when the person is… liberated?” she ventured carefully. “You send their soul so it can go to Heaven, right?
The six exchanged glances.
It was Octavian that broke the silence. “We send them to Hell, Riley.”
Chapter 14
Forgetting that she was using the chair as a weapon, Riley sat, or rather, dropped into it. She didn’t even notice when Octavian edged a few steps closer and took the chair opposite her, a safe five feet between them.
“I know I should totally be freaked out, but all I can think about is that there’s a Hell…” She looked up into his face, swallowed hard. “There’s a Hell and you prisoners to… Angels?”
If she hadn’t seen him poof into the room like some dark knight, she would have been freaked all over again at the prospect of crushing on a Kool Aid drinking cult member. But it was hard to dispute the facts when she’d seen it with her own eyes.
“We are slaves to the Divine,” Octavian said. “We judge the Forsaken.”
“All shall be judged,” she whispered to herself, remembering the plaque on the door. “God, you guys are serious! I thought that was some bullshit saying, but it’s for real.” She scrubbed a hand over her face. “This is seriously happening. I’m sitting here talking about souls and Hell with you.” She peered at him from between her fingers. “This wouldn’t happen to be a dream, would it?”
He slowly shook his head, a sad little smile on his face. “Sorry.”
Riley groaned, dropping her face back into her hands. “Of course not. This is not usually how my dreams of you turn out… and I can’t believe I just said that in front of your parents. Just kill me already…” Her head came up sharply. “I don’t mean that literally.”
His grin was a little more amused now. “My dreams of you are a little different as well.”
She should have been annoyed by the small spark of delight that leapt into her chest. “You dream of me?”
He leaned in closer and dropped his voice as though whispering a secret. “Every night, Green-eyes.”
Her heart jumped like an excited puppy in her chest before she reminded it that now was so not the time. The guy wasn’t even human. She wasn’t sure of the rules, but she assumed he was off limits.
“You still haven’t told me what any of this has to do with me.”
Octavian splayed his fingers, palm up in a gesture of helplessness and uncertainty. “I honestly have no idea, Riley. I don’t know how you found your way here or how you’re the one…”
“The one for what?”
His eyes were dark and hungry with a desire that burned her to her toes. “For me.”
Robbed of all her senses, it took Riley a much longer time to respond, and when she did, it was breathy and pathetic. “What do you mean?”
“The day we swore our allegiance, we were given the three laws called the Black Laws. Never harm a human. Never touch a human. Never mark a human. It is because of those laws that no human can find this place. It is shielded from detection. Only Demons can locate the gates.”
“What gates?” she asked.
Kyaerin answered. “Liam and I are the gatekeepers to Hell. By the treaty, we are by law obligated to allow a certain number of demons to roam the mortal world. This diner is a holding ground of sorts for those on the waiting list. But the gate is only available after sunset. Kind of like boarding the red eye and waiting at the airport until your flight is called.”
Beginning to understand, Riley ah’d. “That’s why this place is so dead during the days, but full of really creepy people at night.” She turned back to Octavian. “So those people aren’t really people, huh?”
He shook his head. “They’re demons.”
“Demons look like humans?” That was so not a reassuring thought.
“You’re only able see them as human because your brain is trained to mislead your eyes. It’s the glamour.”
“Seriously?” She thought of the way the customer’s faces changed when she would look at them from the corner of her eyes and the drinks they ordered and a shudder passed through her. “Oh my God… demons!” She shook herself, not allowing the hysteric swell of giggles to take over. I am so screwed! “Okay, but what about me? As far as I know, I haven’t sold my soul.”
Octavian rocked his head from side to side. “That’s the million dollar question. It’s only happened once before and it turned out the boy was part demon. But you should never have made it this far.”
“I think it’s because she’s your mate,” Reggie said, speaking up after what felt like eons of silence. “It makes sense that she would find you no matter where you are. You are linked to her on a level that is beyond all worlds.”
Riley looked to Octavian. “What?”
But Octavian was staring off into some other world she couldn’t see. His gaze was fixed on a point just above her head as he mulled over this new bit of information.
“That actually makes sense,” he said at last.
Flushed with pleasure, Reggie plowed on. “Then you basically handed her your address when you dropped your wallet.”
Gideon punched Reggie in the shoulder. “Look at you! Been drinking out of the toilet again haven’t you? What did I tell you… oomph!”
Reggie returned a fist into Gideon’s side, making the blond grunt and double over. “I’m smarter than you, boy. Own that.”
Ignoring them, Riley focused on Octavian once more. “Is that why you were so furious with me for finding it?”
His soft gray eyes traced her face in loving strokes. “I was shocked as hell to see you here, you, a human… my human in a place that could get you killed. I didn’t want you to be where you are right now. I was trying to protect you.” He looked down. “You should have listened to me.”
“I needed the job,” she whispered. “I still do.”
Doorway to Hell or not, there was no way she’d find another job that paid her half as much as she got paid right now for that number of hours.
“So how is this place even here if people don’t know it exists? I mean, you have electricity and you must have a lease… or something.” She had no idea where she was going with this, but she was pretty damn certain the all seeing eye of the government should have known about this place. “Is this place legal?”
“There is a whole organization behind what we do. We have our own government and people that work as humans do to provide for the things we need. Should a human ever find their way here, they would see a clearing and nothing else,” Kyaerin said.
“Okay and this government knows you traffic demons?”
“We don’t traffic demons,” Magnus muttered.
“The demons submit an application of entry that is reviewed by us and then we judge whether they should be allowed or not. If they break their agreement, we hunt them down and bring them back.”
It was so insane that she wanted to laugh. “So you guys are like the Underworld immigration, bounty hunters and the demon police all roll into one?” Don’t start giggling, don’t start giggling! She’d never freaking stop, but she couldn’t help it. What exactly were the mandatory requirements for a demon to vacation on earth?
She had this absurd image of demons all filed in lines waiting to get blood work and tetanus shots done and their passports stamped. Random screenings and cavity searches anyone? Man she wasn’t even going to go there.
So not ready for that visual.
“We’re what’s keeping humans from being extinct,” Magnus bit out. “We keep the really dangerous demons from coming through and stripping you of your pretty flesh.”
“Magnus!” Octavian growled.
“This is insane!” his brother shot back. “Make her forget and save us all this headache.”
“Well, I don’t want to forget,” Riley snapped back. “God!” She shoved her fingers back through her hair. “You can’t just go up into my head and mess with things. Hell, I have a right to know that demons could creep into my bedroom and eat my eyeballs or whatever. I mean, what’s stopping them from following me home? Do I need to start stocking up on crucifixes or something? Holy water? Will I start making the bed float and vomit pea soup? A girl needs to know this stuff.”
Octavian's Undoing (Sons of Judgment) Page 17