by G. P. Ching
“Lillian, Jacob, and I will take the first patrol tonight.”
When Bonnie began to protest, Malini held up her hand. “I know you volunteered, Bonnie, but I need to get the lay of the land.”
Bonnie shifted sideways and rolled her eyes.
Malini stepped in front of her, a hard look on her face. “There is something I need your help with.”
“What?” Bonnie asked defensively.
“I need you to feed the angel,” Malini said.
Bonnie kicked her fallen chair and stormed off toward the bathroom.
Chapter 34
The Scorekeeper
Malini arrived in the In Between gracefully, a ballet dancer landing a giant leap. She’d been shredded her last several times coming over, distracted by Lucifer, the war, problems with the Soulkeepers. But today, she had a singular focus. The apocalypse had toughened her. No longer the meek teenager who jumped at her own reflection, the power and responsibility that used to scare her, now motivated her. When she watched Abigail die, something inside of her shifted. A holy rage blossomed, a contained wildfire for truth and justice. With a tight grip, she held the feeling, strengthening it in the kiln of her resolve. The hot ember fueled her hurried steps.
“Welcome, Malini,” Fate said.
On the veranda of her stucco villa, Fate sat at a table with Time and Death. Malini gave them a tight smile. Mara and Henry would always be more human to her than Fatima. Maybe because she could clearly picture them dancing at prom. That night seemed so far away now. It was hard to believe it was less than a year ago. A year since she could almost call her life normal. Now, what was normal?
“Am I in time for tea?” Malini said, staring at the pot and cups on the table.
“A celebration of life, Gideon and Abigail’s,” Fatima said. From her abdomen, she produced a brightly colored cloth made of raspberry, turquoise, green, and black thread.
Mara gave a little wave of her hand in lieu of a hello. “Lucifer stole Abigail’s thread, but Fatima wove a tapestry from all of the lives she helped. Gideon’s thread is part of the green.”
“I got the idea after we followed Lucifer’s missing thread.” Fatima held out the tapestry to her.
Malini ran her fingers over the glinting material. “Gorgeous. A masterpiece.”
Henry nodded. “We thought so too. We loved both of them.”
For a moment, Malini wondered why they had excluded Master Lee, but then they’d never really known him, not like Gideon and Abigail. As former Angels, the immortals had known the two for thousands of years. Immortal before mortal. No two people had ever lived a life like Abigail and Gideon.
A brown face popped up beyond the stucco border of the veranda. “Hi, Wisnu,” Malini said to the mongoose. The animal gave a high-pitched bark and returned to playing in the yard, trotting out to the edge of the forest beyond.
“Would you like a cup?” Fatima pointed to the teapot.
“I’m not here for the tea,” Malini said. “Sorry, I don’t mean to be rude, but I can’t partake in the pleasantries while my team is fighting for their lives against the apocalypse.”
“The apocalypse?” Mara asked. “You’re calling the challenge the apocalypse?”
Malini’s hands balled into fists. “How dare you sit up here drinking tea and ask me that question?” She glared at Mara, not even flinching at the girl’s black eyes or the way the universe revolved inside of them. “Don’t you think it’s fitting? The veil has lifted. The Watchers occupy Earth openly. They kill openly. Everything has changed, Mara. This is the end, the final battle between good and evil, and we’re losing. Everything. You must know how desperate it is down there.”
Mara glanced away, but Henry angrily stood from the table. “It’s hard for her, Malini. She sees the past, present, and future all at the same time. Mara doesn’t mean to be harsh. She has to concentrate to focus on the pinpoint that is your existence.”
“I understand but—”
“You’re not losing,” Mara blurted. Her eyes waxed vacant, staring off into the distance, toward the hill with the scorekeeper.
“What do you mean? We just lost two of the most important people in the fight.”
“The Lord has given the third gift. You just don’t realize you have it yet. A weapon, a Helper, is in your presence with the power to change everything. The fate of many is tied to the fates of few. Only one can cure the many, but many will deliver the cure to all.”
Malini scowled. “I have no idea what you just said.”
Mara turned to face her, looking as strange and otherworldly as Malini had ever seen her.
“Wait, do you mean Cord? Is he the answer?”
“Cord?” Fatima spat in disgust. “The Watcher?”
“We’ve captured him. He came to kill us and now bleeds white, smells like an angel, and has feathers that stay feathers when they fall off. He says he was transformed.”
“Impossible!” Fatima shook her head.
Malini shrugged. “It is what it is. We haven’t been able to figure him out.”
“Cord is not the gift. Cord is your key to understanding the gift. The gift is not a thing or a person. It isn’t material. It can’t die or be used up.”
“What is it, Mara?” Malini asked.
“Hope.”
“The baby, Hope?”
Mara stared off into the distance, squinting and then closing her eyes with the effort. “Hope is the bringer of the virtue she is named for. The baby is a symbol, but the gift is so much more. The gift is hope. The gift is knowledge that God is far from finished. Believe it, Malini.”
Henry shivered. “She has the gene.”
“Huh?” Malini placed her hands on her hips. Talking to immortals could be so frustrating.
“Hope. Gideon and Abigail drank the water. They lived in Eden for months. Recreated human by God, their bodies carried the recessive gene. Their daughter, Hope, now carries the Soulkeeper gene. I can feel her soul right now. She’s special.”
“Special how?”
“No way to tell. Like all Soulkeepers, she must be challenged, and she must make the choice, but all of the potential is there,” Fatima said.
Mara squinted. “I can’t sort out her future. I’m blind to it.”
Fatima cleared her throat. “Of course you are blind. The challenge is changing the fabric of our power. The thread I use is shifty between my fingers. Colors change in the midst of my weaving. None of us can see the outcome. The closer we are to the destination, the less we can see the path.”
“And what about Cord? Can we trust him?” Malini asked.
Fatima lowered her eyes. “No human soul, no thread. We could follow him, as we did Lucifer, by the emptiness he’s left behind. However, if he has changed by some miracle, what would be the point? We would only see the future of the Watcher named Cord, not the angel he claims he’s become.”
“Great.” Malini tossed her clasped hands over her head and squeezed her ears with the insides of her arms. “Ugh. It’s so frustrating.”
Mara stood and tugged Henry to his feet. “Come, Malini, you need to see the results of your effort.”
Malini followed her and Henry onto the lawn, Fatima joining them at the base of the hill. The horizon folded, and without taking another step, Malini found herself at the feet of the scorekeeper. The blindfolded angel loomed over her, frozen in her marble shell, wings outstretched.
Disbelieving, Malini stared at the scales in her hand. One tray was white, the good side; the other was black, Lucifer’s. At the start of this challenge, before any temptations or gifts were cast, the scales were tipped in Lucifer’s favor. The evil inherent in human hearts seemed to weigh the darker side down unfairly. Now, somehow, the tide had shifted. God was winning. It wasn’t by much. The dark side was only slightly higher than the light, hardly noticeable, but it was true.
“For the first time since the beginning of the challenge,” Henry said. “We can’t explain it. Circumstances on Earth
seem at their worst, but the scales say otherwise.”
Malini tipped her head. “I think you are onto something. Human hearts rise to the occasion. Maybe we are at our best when things are at their worst?”
Fatima crossed her arms. “I’ve seen humans at their worst when things were at their worst. Do you want me to show you?”
Malini held up both hands. “No. I want you to let me bask in the hope that today things are different. Today, people everywhere are changing. They are helping each other. They are asking questions and rejecting the devil’s false gifts.” She stared into the orb, watching black and white lights dance through the crystal.
“Very well,” Fatima said.
A breeze swept over the hill, causing the scales to knock together. “Are you doing that?” Malini asked the three immortals. The In Between was constructed of consciousness. Ordinarily, everything here was Fatima’s doing as this was her realm. But Fate shook her head.
The breeze turned into a gale-force wind. Malini grabbed the scorekeeper to keep her feet planted on the ground. But the grass under her was as untrustworthy as the air around her. The ground shook. Fatima’s eight arms flailed at her sides in an effort to keep her balance. Henry’s skin peeled back from his face and hands, exposing the skeleton within. And Mara floated above the ground, stars spinning around her as if she were the nucleus of a human atom, the center of a revolving universe.
Dark clouds rolled in overhead, through the usually cloudless sky. Malini followed their path until the dark gray turned black and funneled to the grass. Lucifer. He stood in the eye of the hurricane, his black suit and blond curls flapping in the wind.
“Did you think I would go quietly?” he spat toward the sky. Lightning struck a tree in the distance behind him, its branches bursting into flame. “What was your third gift? You cheat! You’ve blocked my power to demand souls! You’ve changed the humans and forced the scales to tip.”
A crack of thunder rocked through Malini’s body.
“Your accusations are false, Lucifer,” came a booming voice. “The scorekeeper can not lie. And as for my gift, you know the rules of the challenge. The die is cast.”
Lucifer howled, skin glowing red. He pointed a finger at Malini. “What have you done with Cord?”
She didn’t answer, even when a painful tug in her chest tried to coax the words from her. Fate, Time, and Death closed ranks, placing themselves between her and devil and blocking her view of Lucifer. She adjusted her grip on the scorekeeper.
“Oh, hell!” Henry said.
All three immortals turned their backs to Lucifer and covered their heads with their arms. Malini took the hint and turned her face away. Eyes closed tight, a gust of heat blasted into her back, blowing her hair into her face. For a solid minute, she wondered if her skin would peel off from the force. Then the storm quieted. The wind died down. She dared to open her eyes.
Fatima’s villa and the forest beyond were gone, replaced by a barren wasteland. The house was nothing but an empty shell with blown out windows.
“He nuked the place,” Mara whispered.
Fatima took a deep breath. “No worries. He’s gone. This is mine again.”
From left to right, Fatima knit her world back to the way it was. Burnt trees regrew, the lawn sprouted green, and the house returned to its former glory. The ambient light of the In Between’s sky brightened.
Malini headed down the hill toward Fate’s villa.
“Where are you going?” Fatima asked.
“To pull out Lucifer’s tapestry,” Malini said. “If he thinks that little stunt is going to scare me away, he is vastly mistaken. I’m going to predict his next move, and then I’m going to return to Sanctuary and help my team rid the world of that bastard.”
The Soulkeepers had come a long way in this battle. Malini was done grieving the loss of the future she’d dreamt for herself. She could see a new future. A new hope. And no one, not even the devil, was going to keep her from it.
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About the Author
G.P Ching is the author of The Soulkeepers Series and a variety of short fiction. She specializes in cross-genre paranormal stories, loves old cemeteries, and enjoys a good ghost tour. She lives in central Illinois with her husband, two children, and one very demanding Brittany Spaniel. Learn more about G.P. at http://www.gpching.com and more about The Soulkeepers Series at http://www.thesoulkeepersseries.com.
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Acknowledgements
Once again, this book is only possible due to the help of a number of dedicated individuals. Big literary hugs go out to authors Karly Kirkpatrick and Angela Carlie, who have come on this journey with me from the very beginning and catch little things about Paris and the Soulkeepers that even I forget sometimes. I could not do what I do without you guys. Also, thanks to Elizabeth Kasper for her fresh eyes on an early version of Lost Eden.
Heather Crabtree, thank you for employing your amazing editing skills on this novel. The Soulkeepers is a better series having been through your hands. Thank you to Steven Novak of Novak Illustration for filling in on short notice when my regular cover artist became ill. I think the cover embodies the spirit of the Soulkeepers series.
And finally, thank you to my husband and family for helping me carve out the time necessary to make this novel happen.
Book Club Discussion Questions
1. There were several ways God could have dealt with Lucifer’s tirade over Fatima’s role in Dane’s transformation. Why do you think God issued the challenge?
2. If the scorekeeper were real, how do you think the scales would look right now?
3. Are there things in your life that remind you of Elysium? Discuss.
4. Lucifer does great evil by disguising it as good. Which do you think is worse, someone who does wrong publicly and gets away with it or someone who disguises their wrong doing? Why?
5. After everything she’d been through, why do you think it was so difficult for Katrina to admit she was addicted to Elysium? Do you see a comparison to The Soulkeepers’ resistance to leave Eden?
6. If you were imprisoned by Lucifer in the way Abigail was, what would be the hardest part for you?
7. Both Lucifer and God use illusion when appearing before humans. How are their illusions the same or different? Why?
8. On a couple of occasions, the Soulkeepers use items gained by sinful means (Dane, the RV, Ethan’s money). Gideon calls the group out on it, but Malini thinks their actions are for the greater good. What do you think?
9. Do you think the Soulkeepers did the right thing telling their families the truth? Do you think they should have done so earlier?
10. At the end of the book, Malini says that sometimes humans are at their best when things are at their worst. Do you believe this? Why or why not.
Books by G. P. Ching
The Soulkeepers Series
The Soulkeepers, Book 1
Weaving Destiny, Book 2
Return to Eden, Book 3
Soul Catcher, Book 4
Lost Eden, Book 5
The Last Soulkeeper, Book 6 (Coming Soon)
Other Books by G.P. Ching
Grounded
The end Is near! Coming soon, the Last Soulkeeper, sixth and final book in the Soulkeepers series.
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