Autumn's Eyes (Storm Season Book 1)

by J. L. Sutton

  Dawn seemed to be working off a list in her head, often turning the questions into guesses. Nothing Dawn asked was something I wouldn’t tell any other acquaintance, but for the life of me I couldn’t understand what was so interesting about the little details of my daily life. I was happy to answer though, as strange as it was to admit I really did enjoy her company.

  Some questions were simple enough—like had I always lived in the apartment, what my parents were like, how much I travelled. Dawn was genuinely surprised to learn that the furthest I had ever been from home was Ohio. Others were a little more personal. As we rounded the corner to my office things got awkward for a while when she asked why I lived alone. Gritting my teeth I told her Claire passed away, leaving out as much detail as I possibly could. It was difficult enough dealing with what she was, the last thing I needed was to be reminded someone like her took Claire away from me.

  “You have my sympathies,” Dawn said quietly. “Would you like to tell me about her?”

  I smiled as we pulled up to my office, fondly remembering the lively girl whose carefree laugh was painted across my memories. “The sweetest, kindest, most unflinching pedantic you could ever meet. Free spirited, and maddeningly neurotic. She always knew exactly what to say. Claire was something else.”

  The strange thing was I really didn’t mind talking about it. It was almost as if Dawn, being something I always assumed was a myth, somehow made it easier for me to open up. Like the confessions weren’t absolutely real.

  Back in the car a few minutes later she picked up right where she left off, and after a while her questions became more unusual. When she asked me if cinnamon rolls tasted as good as they smelled I kept a straight face for less than a second before I burst into uncontrolled laughter. The afternoon had given way to evening by the time I had everything I needed from the grocery store, Dawn staying hidden from sight for the entire duration, and I didn’t want to head back to the apartment just yet. There was no telling how long it would be until she disappeared again, and I wanted to use the time as best I could.

  “Where are we going?” Dawn asked when she realized I wasn’t headed toward home.

  “I thought we’d try something different,” I said casually, trying not to give anything away. From the corner of my vision I could see Dawn looking at me with playful suspicion in her eyes.

  The sun was just beginning to set when we arrived at the end-of-the-line, the brilliant orange and crimson sunset making the edges of the dark ocean seem like they were on fire where they touched the horizon. Dawn lingered by the car, gazing off into the distance for a long moment before following me down to the fence. As we searched for a ledge wide enough for both of us to sit on I noticed she had little difficulty navigating the ledge, her sure footing making me look slow and clumsy by comparison.

  “Dawn?” I asked tentatively as the light over the viewing point turned on behind us. The day had gone by so quickly between all her questions that I never got the chance to ask any of my own.

  “Yes?” she answered, still watching the waves gently buffeting against the rocks below us. What I would give to know what she was thinking right now.

  The last thing I wanted to do was ruin the pleasant day we were having by asking her something I knew she didn’t want to talk about, but me being me I just couldn’t help myself.

  “The last time you were with me, you said you would tell me about your name sometime. I was just wondering if it was sometime yet.”

  She closed her eyes, taking an unnecessary breath before she finally looked at me. “Why do you always have to ask the questions I do not want you to know the answers to?”

  “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to,” I said quietly. In a way it was funny, normally secrets would drive me crazy, but when it came to her I could live with not knowing a few.

  “It is not that I do not want to. I know it may sound strange, but I like the idea of you knowing what I am. It is almost . . . freeing in a way. Of course it never should have happened, but it is far too late now. I keep thinking one day you are going to find out something about me you cannot deal with. You are far more interesting than you realize, and I am just not ready to give that up yet.”

  It was a relief to finally know why she didn’t want to tell me, but her answer wasn’t what I was expecting at all. This whole time I was thinking she was worried, that this was all for my safety, or she thought I couldn’t keep my mouth shut. “After everything I’ve seen, I don’t think there’s anything left that could scare me off.”

  Dawn cocked her head to the side, staring at me with an incredulous expression. Almost a minute passed before she sighed. “Dawn is the name I chose for myself when I became a seraph.”

  “You weren’t always a reaper?”

  She shook her head. “My kind is not born seraphim, we are created. I was human once.”

  I stared blankly at Dawn, utterly unable to speak as I processed her words. Looking at her, it wasn’t hard to believe she was once just like me. Even with all her strange quirks there was always something distinctly . . . human about her—it wasn’t part of the deception. It didn’t take long for the shock to wear off, and my curiosity to begin running wild. Still, forming a coherent sentence took some effort. “How did you become a seraph?”

  “I was chosen,” she said, her dark eyes watching me intently. “We do not really know who will be picked to serve, or even why those of us were chosen. It just happens.”

  There were so many questions screaming at me at that moment, but none louder than the one which slipped from my lips. “Could it happen to me?”

  “It would be very, very unlikely. But yes, I suppose in theory it is possible. I would not worry about it though, the odds are astronomical.”

  I slowly exhaled the breath I didn’t realize I was holding. Not that I knew very much about her kind, but the idea that I could become something not human was a pretty terrifying one. “So you just woke up one day and became what you are now?”

  “Not exactly. Remember I told you I am not tied to Fate like you are? Did you ever wonder why that was?”

  “Not really.” Somewhere between finding out what she was and trying to figure the whole Fate thing out it must’ve slipped my mind.

  “Fate has no hold over me, because I am no longer among the living.”

  There was no way I could hide my shock this time. I barely controlled my body long enough to choke the words out. “You died?”

  “Aye,” she said simply—like it was just another one of her quirks. Dawn died. I was talking to a dead person. It may not have been the most difficult thing about her to deal with, but it sure as hell was the creepiest. My vocabulary didn’t seem to have the words my mind was looking for.

  “I’m sorry,” I said after a long moment, mostly because I had no idea what else I could say. Was there really an appropriate response to that?

  “There is nothing to be sorry for.” She smiled ruefully. “It was my time.”

  My mind was still reeling from her revelation, but against all odds I could feel myself beginning to accept the truth. I couldn’t help wondering if I would be so calm when my time came. I guess being what she was gave her a unique perspective on death, one I could never hope to understand. We sat in silence while I pieced together my fragmented thoughts. Dawn hadn’t chosen what she was any more than I had, and I decided it didn’t matter to me what she was, only who she was. Somewhere in my jumbled mind a thought popped up that I couldn’t wrap my head around.

  “Death is dead? How does that make sense?” I mumbled the words under my breath, trying to puzzle them out.

  Despite the tense atmosphere Dawn laughed. “Your guess is as good as mine.”

  “There seems to be a lot of things you don’t know about all this,” I observed.

  “I never said I had all the answers. I think it is supposed to be that way though.” She smiled then, and I found myself unable to argue with her on that one—life was difficult enough withou
t having to worry about death. No wonder her kind was so secretive.

  “What happened then? After you . . . died.” I cringed, struggling to say the word out loud.

  “I do not remember much of the actual apotheosis, but on some level I was aware of what was happening.” Dawn paused for a moment, and I realized she was editing, skipping over the parts she didn’t want me to hear. “When I could finally open my eyes the seraph that took me calmed me down and explained what had happened to me.”

  I tried to picture it, to imagine myself in her place, waking from the dead next to a stranger that knew more about what was happening to me than I did. “It must’ve been quite a shock.”

  “It was . . . overwhelming,” she admitted. “Nothing I ever knew could have prepared me for this new life. Not just physically either. After a while I started to notice changes in myself, my personality. There was so much to learn, so much I was not willing to accept. It was a long time until I fully understood my purpose in this world.”

  Dawn always struck me as a force of nature. If nothing else, she seemed so sure of her role. I always knew she possessed emotions just like me, I even suspected they had something to do with why we met, but I spent so much time focusing on her more alien traits that I never made the connection. She was once a child, a living human girl with hopes, desires—a family. How could anyone be expected to do what she does when she was once one of us? Of course she would doubt. I knew I would. It sounded like a very sick joke to me.

  “Tell me if this is too personal,” I began, “but why do you do what you do? I know you said that there are rules, but why follow them?”

  “I suppose I could refuse, if I wanted to,” she answered, apparently not offended by my question. “It is not an easy path to travel, and following it carries a high price. I have seen more of death and despair than anyone should ever have to witness. You could not begin to grasp how much of a toll it takes on you. There has been so many times where I would have given anything not to have to take someone. Deaths so senseless that even after all these years they still haunt me, make me question everything I believe. I have been forced to watch good people suffer needlessly while I stood paralyzed, unable to ease an ounce of their pain until it was their time, or let killers walk free because I could not intervene. Someone has to do it though. If I turn my back on my nature another would have to take my place, and I would never allow that. It is my duty, my burden. And it is not always pretty, but I have come to terms with what I am. It is not the only thing that defines me.”

  I listened to her pained words with rapt attention, unable to look away from the weary, tired lines that had formed across her face. In that moment Dawn looked decades older, more human than I ever imagined possible. I didn’t want to think about how much she must’ve seen in her existence, but somehow she still managed to do what she did. It was bitterly ironic to me that the seraphim weren’t attached to Fate like I was, yet they seemed to have even less freedom. The pins and needles prickling against my skull were a constant reminder that I should fear her, hate her even. What little sense of self-preservation I held on to when it came to her still fought against me to run, screaming that she was nothing more than a cold, lifeless abomination. None of those things mattered to me, because I could never look at Dawn the same way again. In a way I pitied her, no one should have to do the task she was given. The strength it must’ve taken was beyond me.

  “How are you doing with all this?” she asked, her voice barely a whisper. I looked up from the smooth stones in my hand I was absently tossing into the waves. Once again she was worried about me, of all things. It was a fair question though, how did I feel? It was comforting to know that despite what she believed, there wasn’t a correct response to the question.

  “I’m fine,” I said calmly, and I meant it. She nodded, for once not arguing with me. I lazily flicked another stone, my gaze following its arc until it slipped away into the darkness. My watch caught my eye as I pulled back my arm. “Is that the time already?”

  I was on my feet before I finished the sentence. Where had the time gone? It seemed like only minutes ago when the sun went down.

  “You are leaving?” The tone in her voice cut through my sudden panic, immediately shifting my focus to her. She looked despondent, like someone just kicked her in the chest. For the first time since I found out about what she was, Dawn looked as vulnerable as her lithe frame suggested.

  “Hey, I’m not going anywhere,” I said quickly, not wanting her to think I finally cracked. The words flowed out of me too quickly for me to edit them. “I told you before—I don’t scare that easily. Even if you weren’t just about the most fascinating thing on the planet, I’d still want to know you as a person. I just really need to get some sleep if I’m going to be able to function tomorrow. Humans do that from time to time.”

  Dawn’s eyes traced my smiling face, always searching for something, though I never knew exactly what. I breathed a sigh of relief when she managed a smile. “Okay.”

  “You need a ride anywhere?” I asked as she sprang up fluidly.

  I knew then why Dawn always left me to decide how much I wanted to know. She didn’t have the luxury of choice with so many things, and she wanted to make sure I did. As long as I wanted her around she would probably be there, even if she thought it wasn’t wise, because in the end it was my choice to make. My wish was finally granted it seemed—I was going to be seeing a lot more of her.

  “Not necessary. But thank you for the offer.”

  She walked with me to the car, as always a few steps behind me, like there was an invisible wall she couldn’t cross between us. I thought she was overdoing it, but if it kept her from worrying then I didn’t mind. “When will I see you again?”

  “Soon enough.” Dawn sounded almost eager, though I knew she was still trying to limit my exposure to her. Then again she also had a job to do, and death didn’t exactly keep a schedule. The motor came to life as the key turned, purring in anticipation while I rolled down the window.

  “Night, Dawn.” Not that she would be doing any sleeping, but it was the thought that counted, right?

  She smiled. “Goodnight, Benjamin.”

  Dawn stepped away as I turned the car around, her midnight eyes glinting brightly in the headlights and I watched her grow smaller in the rear view mirror for a few seconds before she vanished just before the bend. I chuckled quietly to myself as I followed the winding path, wondering where she was heading.

  12. Windows

  It felt like years ago since the last time I was able to sleep.

  Frankly, after the mound of paperwork I sifted through last night—sleep was long overdue. I swear people waited around until a Friday afternoon before deciding to hire me, just so they could ruin what little days off I had. Of course it didn’t help that my alarm was broken. When it began ringing at six thirty this Saturday morning the infernal device was dangerously close to flying out the window.

  Finally deciding eight was my limit I dragged myself out of bed. The thick rain clouds looming over the coastline had only darkened since yesterday, draping the city in shadow so that I had to turn the lights on in the living room just to find the remote for the TV. As I tucked into my breakfast the nervous looking man that did the local weather only confirmed my growing fears—I’d be staying indoors for most of the weekend.

  I flipped through every channel three times before abandoning the couch and began pacing restlessly around the apartment, less than pleased I stayed up half the night working only to have nothing to do on this miserable morning. Even Hansel seemed restless. I could hear him hastily scurrying about in my office from across the room. Where was Dawn when you needed her? It was less than forty eight hours ago I learned the tiny seraph was in fact once a human girl. Not nearly enough time for me to appreciate just what that meant for me, but I was already itching to see her again. Would I ever not want to see her? There were so many questions I wanted to ask, so many things I wanted to know. Looking out
the window I wondered, not for the first time, what it would be like stepping into her shoes. Inspiration struck me then, and I smiled. Maybe there was a way to get her attention after all. Two minutes later I was back in the kitchen, thinking I finally lost my mind as I hastily scribbled onto a flattened milk carton in big letters with a permanent marker.

  I’m bored. Where are you?

  The rain pelted against me, soaking my shirt and the floor as I struggled to hang the message outside of the window. I had no idea why I thought this would work, for all I knew Dawn wasn’t even in the city, but given my options it was worth a shot. Satisfied that I did all I could short of driving around looking for her I settled into a chair at the kitchen counter with my sketch pad, continuing on a piece I started a week ago. At first I hadn’t intended to draw Dawn. It started off as a view of the city framed by my window, but as the lines started to take shape on the page I realized I was working off a memory. After that it seemed only natural to include her sitting on the windowsill, holding the same lazy pose as the night that she told me what she was.

  A full hour passed while I worked on shading in the background, closing my eyes every now and then to better remember the setting. No one would ever dare call me a talented artist, but as the picture gradually came together I was surprised by how well I captured her resigned expression, the way her hair gently spilled across her shoulders. It made me wonder what she really looked like, one of the many things I had yet to learn. Still, it was definitely one of my better works. I was adding the finishing touches on the drawing when I heard a dull snap against glass, the muted sound barely audible over the driving rain. Pushing the sketchpad aside I walked to the window. The milk carton was turned around to face inward, and under my sloppy handwriting there was a short message in blue ink.

  Not yet.