Past Life Strife (Rise of the Discordant Book 1)

by McMullen, Christina

  “Surely not entirely. She had to be lost at the very least to suggest murder.”

  “Do you forget that Order requires a balance between good and evil?” I asked. “I assure you. Her cruelty was hers and hers alone, long before she was lost. I can only assume that there was at that time an extremely pious person to balance her self-serving intentions.”

  “Indeed,” Desmond nodded. “So… did you?” He made a gesture rather than ask directly.

  “No,” I shook my head. “I did not do as she asked. In fact, as hard as it was, I gave up on Amara. Though it killed me inside, I knew that nothing was worth the sin she asked of me. Of course, this angered her and I accepted her hatred. I began to heal and move on. At least, that’s what I told myself.

  “But then one night, as I lay in my bed, just before falling asleep, she came to me. Amara slipped in through the window that I had left open to alleviate the summer heat and lay next to me. She removed her clothing and began removing mine as well. I was scared. I begged her to stop. I wish I could say I resisted for more than a fleeting moment, but no. I was a broken man and my flesh was weak. She allowed me to take her purity and in return, she whispered promises.

  “I was the happiest man alive. We made plans to leave Centralia, to run away and build a life somewhere else, where there were no coalmines and the coal dust was a distant memory. Where we would not have to toil to make a living. Pipe dreams, I know, but I didn’t care. I just wanted to be with my sweet Amara.

  “But as I slept, she slipped from my bed. Running naked through the streets, she yelled for all to hear that I had forced myself upon her. Showing, without shame, the evidence that damned me. I was awakened, still naked myself, pulled from my bed, and beaten by an angry mob and left for dead in the middle of the town square. I believed myself dead that night. I wish it had been so.

  “Just before sunrise, I was dragged away by men in black robes. I was taken deep into one of the mines. There, through the fog of pain, I saw Amara. She stood, still naked and still without shame. Her body now grotesquely disfigured by wounds and covered in blood. I knew, when one of the robed figures proceeded to sink his teeth into the flesh of her neck, that they were vampires.

  “When they set upon me, I prayed for a swift death, but my prayer went unanswered. As they drank from me, my senses became more alert. It was then that Amara came to me, a gleaming silver dagger in her hand. She straddled my chest and plunged the dagger deep, cracking my ribs. I was unable to look away as she removed my still beating heart and bit into it with the fangs of a newborn vampire.”

  A whispered curse too blasphemous to repeat issued from Desmond’s lips as he jumped up and began to pace, like a caged animal, atop the floodwall.

  “No wonder I missed,” he hissed, putting his hands over his face. “I never miss. Seth, this is not good. This is…”

  “This is what?” I asked, though from the look of utter pity which Desmond now stared at me, I wasn’t sure I wanted to know what this was.

  “It is not unusual for the Discordant to accept a lost soul into their fold. You know this as well as I. But I do not think that Amara was lost when she turned.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You were right. Amara was nothing more than an evil soul. Had she stayed within the Cycle, her fate would have been decided based upon her religious beliefs, just as all others had been. But she hungered for more than Order could give her. She sought out Chaos. Seth, she took your heart. Think about that for a moment.”

  “No!” I gasped, but the reaction was involuntary. Desmond was right and my stomach knotted as I realized the truth. “My god,” I croaked. “She isn’t a vampire, she’s a succubus!”

  I hadn’t made the connection sooner because I had purged those memories for all these years. When she ate my heart, it was merely symbolic. She was taking from me the love that I blindly and willfully gave even though she did not deserve love. In doing so, she took part of my soul and gained a protection. As long as I lived, Amara could not be killed. That I became an agent for Order only served to make her invincible for the last one hundred fifty years.

  “I’m sorry, Seth.”

  “So I do need to cycle,” I said. My shoulders slumped with a new weight. I had been expecting it. Sure, it was a little embarrassing to know I would always be known as a short-termer. But it was for the best. I would begin life anew, completely oblivious to my time as an Observer, and Desmond would be free to rid the world of one of the more dangerous creatures that Chaos produced. “Very well. I’m ready,” I said, clearing my mind in order to achieve the meditative state required to slip out of time.

  “No, Seth, wait,” Desmond said, taking my arm firmly. I questioned him with my eyes, but he looked away. “It isn’t that easy,” he said in a voice that was both terse and apologetic.

  “I don’t understand.”

  “I know,” he said quietly, clearly uncomfortable. “If you were to cycle, you would only strengthen her. The only way to make a succubus vulnerable is to die.”

  “As in…” Surely, he couldn’t be saying what I thought he was.

  “As in, your soul would need to be destroyed in order for hers to go as well.”

  He was saying what I thought he was. Because I was once a young and foolish man, who fell for the wrong girl, I had unleashed a succubus and inadvertently allowed her to steal the souls of the lost for more than a century. If I was still a Catholic, I would spend my next cycle in Hell for what I had done. But I was not a Catholic. I was an agent of Order and I knew that there was no clear path to follow. I knew that the destruction of a soul meant a loss for Order and the disruption of balance. But I also knew that allowing Amara’s continued existence would mean the loss of many more souls, and a much larger disruption, as they became slaves to Chaos.

  “I should hate her, Desmond,” I said, still unable to look the Warrior in the eye. “I should want her dead. But after many lifetimes, after all I have seen and all I now know of the Discordant…” I cut off with a stifled cry. I wasn’t sure if it was because of the ache in my heart or the shame of having been used as a tool for Chaos.

  “Do it,” I said at last, steeling myself.

  Desmond stopped pacing and looked at me in confusion. “Do what?”

  “Destroy my soul,” I growled through gritted teeth. Despite my bravado, I was terrified and it showed in the way my clenched fists shook. I closed my eyes as tight as I could to keep the tears at bay. If I had to die, I was going to do so with a shred of dignity. “Make it quick, please,” I added in a trembling whisper that gave me away.

  “Seth,” I heard Desmond say in a drawn out sigh. A moment later, I felt his hand on my shoulder and I opened my eyes. “I cannot, and I will not, destroy your soul,” he said, putting his other hand on the side of my face. As nervous as he made me, and as scared as I was, I was grateful for the gesture, which he meant as one to calm me.

  “But if there is no other way…” I began, but trailed off as his eyes came closer to mine. To an outside observer, it might have looked as if Desmond was about to kiss me, but I knew better and stepped back. “What are you doing, Desmond?” I asked. As far as I knew, only Guardians had the ability to see beyond our current cycle.

  “Forgive me.” His eyes softened and he smiled sheepishly. “The Creator said that I would not recognize you, but that I have met your soul in the past.”

  “So you were trying to soul gaze.”

  “I know. It was foolish. Neither of us are Guardians. It is…” He faltered. A flash of anger flared in his eyes. “I know at least who you are not and I suppose I should simply take comfort in that.”

  “What is that supposed to mean?” I asked, confused and a little scared by the sudden shift in his mood.

  “It is unimportant,” he dismissed, tossing a pebble into the river with more force than necessary. “I have only ever been responsible for the destruction of one soul. It was not within my rights to make the decision and though I still feel ju
stified in my actions at that time, I will not take another. Never again, for any reason.”

  “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to pry.”

  “You have nothing to be sorry for.” He looked up at me. Again, his expression was unreadable and the torrent of emotion he was putting forth was a confused jumble. “It’s… I don’t know. Only the Creator knows what I’ve done. But I feel… I feel like I can tell you things, Seth. You’re an Observer, my equal and also my opposite. Without a Guardian, ours should be a volatile relationship. Hell, even with a Guardian present, my relationship with Observers in the past had been tenuous at best. But you, Seth. You are different. I should feel relief, given the situation we have been thrust into, but I find this worries me.”

  “Um…” Until then, I had no idea it was possible to feel flattered and uncomfortable at the same time. I knew what Desmond was saying. I too did not feel comfortable with the fact that we had no Guardian, yet Desmond did not provoke me in the same way that Warriors had in the past. Perhaps he was right. Perhaps we had met in a previous life. Without a Guardian, it would be impossible to know the exact nature of our past relationship, but clearly, it had been strong.

  “If I am not forthcoming with information about my past, it is because I do not like to dwell on what I cannot change.” He looked at me again with a strange, almost pitying stare that I didn’t like. “When I died, it was at the hands of werewolves. My former master had sold me when he discovered that I had begun a relationship with a woman he favored. When the wolves killed me, I was processed and given the designation of Warrior. I was told, as we all are, that I could not return to the place I had lived for one hundred years. However, there was a slight clerical error.”

  “How so?” I asked.

  “The Admin who processed me listed only where I had died. The bonds that keep us from going home did not prevent me from returning to the plantation. My plan was to save Sarah, the woman I had loved in life. With my newfound abilities, I was going to steal her away and take her north to the area where I had been assigned. But I was too late. She had died only moments before my arrival. When I discovered that her death was due to complications from injuries sustained while fighting off the master, I became enraged. Death was not punishment enough, and I had at my disposal, the means to make him suffer.”

  “What did you do?” I asked against my better judgment.

  “I struck a bargain,” he said with a grin that could have safely been called evil. “I gave him to an angel.”

  I let out an involuntary hiss. In life, I believed angels to be servants of God. I was not naïve enough to believe angels to be winged babies, but I did believe them to be benevolent warriors of light. This was, of course, prior to my knowledge that God was just one of many names given by man to the Creator. We of Order more closely fit the roles that Christians ascribe to angels.

  But true angels, and their demon counterparts, are agents of Chaos. While a demon is capable of calling upon past regrets or influencing behavior that can lead to madness, angels take a more direct approach. Staring into the eyes of an angel will bring about your own personal day of judgment. An angel’s eyes will mirror the darkest depths of a soul, tormenting their quarry with every misstep, every poor decision, and every wrongdoing.

  For the truly righteous, an angel’s gaze is nothing to fear. In all of history, I have only heard of three souls who made it to adulthood and could look without fear into the eye of an angel. For everyone else, it is a slow and torturous death sentence. The angel need not lift a finger, as the soul will slowly tear itself apart.

  “And you weren’t cycled for that?” I asked with a shudder.

  Desmond laughed, a low, menacing sound that made me nervous. “Oh, believe me. I did not come out of that one unscathed. Not by a long shot. I was put on trial. I was this close to having my soul retired.” He held his fingers up, barely a fraction of an inch apart, for emphasis. “But in the end, it was the admin who stepped forward, noting the error. She offered herself in my stead.”

  “Her soul was retired?” I asked, deeply shocked. The loss of a soul is not taken lightly. The entire reason for our existence is because Chaos claims too many souls from Order as it is.

  “No,” Desmond shook his head. “I would not have another blamed for my actions. The Creator acknowledged the mistake for what it was and acknowledged that Order is not without its flaws. The Admin chose to cycle and I was given a second chance, properly bound this time, to remain only in the areas where I am assigned. So do keep that in mind if you decide to chase the Discordant out of Blackbird. I do not yet know how far my boundaries stretch.”

  “Got it,” I said, letting out the breath I didn’t know I was holding. “So… about our succubus?”

  “I don’t know,” he said with an apologetic shrug. “But I think the Creator had a reason for sending me here. I will not see another soul destroyed. If there is a way to destroy the succubus without sacrifice, then I swear on the Infinite Cycle, we will find it.”

  I was touched, but the fact that Desmond was flying as blind as I was didn’t bode well. There were mystics, humans who had the power to see beyond the Cycle, and from time to time, I have called upon a few of our locals to help in certain situations. Perhaps there was something they could recommend. I tried to remain optimistic, but I also had to be honest with myself.

  In the distance, the bell in the church’s tower struck one, then another note, signifying that it was two o’clock in the morning. It had been half past eleven when I first followed Amara out of the Five Penny.

  “Um, Desmond? I know we’ve had a lot to deal with tonight, but…” I looked over at the tower and back toward downtown. “Who’s watching the bar?”

  “Ah hell!” Desmond swore and hopped down off the floodwall. “I forgot about Bogie.”

  Chapter 4

  Demons, Drinks, and Dames

  I don’t really know what I was thinkin’ when I came here. I coulda stayed in Cali, but I knew it weren’t gonna be easy what with my new reputation and all. I was half expectin’ Des to kill me, to tell ya the truth. Now wait, don’t go thinkin’ I’m suicidal or anythin’ loopy like that. It was just a figure of speech. See, Des spared my life once before, so I kinda figured he might feel bad about what he did and help me out this time, even if it was just to get me outta his hair. I couldn’t go home and I couldn’t go back to Hollywood ‘cuz no one had any respect for me at none of those places. But I hadn’t planned on stickin’ around here neither. I sure as heck didn’t expect Des to slap a binding spell on me and run off. So for the time bein’, I was stuck in this… this, uh… gee, I dunno what! Ass backwards pit of despair, I guess would be the best term for it.

  I wonder where he went?

  Probably after that vamp I noticed when I walked in. Ugh, vampires. I shiver at the thought of those slime bags. No joke, they give me the willies. If they just drank blood like the movies suggest, I coulda handled ‘em. I’m a demon, I seen worse. But all that feedin’ off despair and all those other creepy-type things they do? Brr! No thank you! What’s worse, a place like this is probably crawlin’ with vamps, which don’t bode well for me. Not that they would mess with me. Nah, even in the messed up situation I found myself in, vamps ain’t gonna waste their time on me when they is surrounded by an all you can eat buffet of gloom and doom.

  Which is exactly why this place don’t do it for me. I’m a demon. My gig is to find the folks who is at the top of their game and knock ‘em back a peg or two. That’s why I love Hollywood so much. So many people there think they’ve gamed the system. They got the audacity to think they won. That’s where I come in. My job is to make ‘em wonder if it was worth it. I don’t gotta do much, just dredge up a few memories here and there. Things they maybe did to get where they are. Things they thought fame and fortune would make them forget.

  I don’t do nothin’ too harsh, mind you. I’m just a lesser demon. I ain’t got the drive for much else. The ones who go off the deep end and murde
r their families? Yeah, no. Those ain’t me. The ones who go off the deep end and say crazy things to the press? Yup. The ones that end up whacked out or in rehab? Oh yeah, that’s me, baby! King of the celebrity train wreck!

  Well, I was. Up until a couple three days ago.

  I could curse Desmond all day and all night for binding me here! A dive bar ain’t no kind of a place for a demon. Ain’t nobody here at the top of their game. Heck, ain’t nobody here even got directions to the stadium. All those bad things and poor decisions? They ain’t in the past for these folks. They’re all right here in the spotlight. These folks is here under the false pretense that alcohol is some kind of a magical mind eraser that takes away all the bad things life throws at ya. I ain’t gonna tell ‘em otherwise, but you can see how someone like me’s gonna loose interest and fast. Maybe I shoulda gone to New York. I betcha Wall Street’s gotta have a fat load of shifty regrets that could keep me in high spirits for a good long while. Too late now though. I’m stuck slinging happy juice somewhere in Hell’s least pleasant armpit.

  “Yo, bartender!”

  Yeesh! As I was sayin'…

  “What can I get for ya?” I asked, pasting a nice, if not utterly fake, smile on my mug. Mr. Manners weren’t too steady on his feet, but his eyes was still clear and he was carryin’ some serious baggage.

  “Pitcher of Bud and four glasses for me and my homies.”

  “Hey, ah, you sure about that?” I asked, sizing him up. “I mean, you’re kinda wobbly there. How much you already had?” Like I said, I’m a demon, but I got standards. I ain’t about to be responsible for people goin’ off and drivin’ drunk. I had some principals.

  He glared at me and raised a cane I hadn’t seen ‘cuz of the bar bein’ in the way. “I’m always kinda wobbly, a-hole.”

  “Ah hell, sorry, buddy,” I said, sliding him the pitcher and a couple of glasses. “I musta missed my sensitivity training. You take that one on me, ‘kay?”