Keeper of the Innocents

by Kristy Centeno

  “I didn’t know.” His gaze finally met mine.

  Anger quickly threatening to get the best of me, I clutched the dagger in my right hand and took a step forward. “Yes, you did.”

  “I didn’t know you’d be able to. Not exactly,” he insisted. “I hoped you would.”

  “Yeah, like that makes a boat load of sense,” I replied icily.

  There was no mirror in front of me but if there were, I was pretty sure I’d be able to see the sudden paleness that took over my features. I had no idea if he knew it, but his words could be taken as a confession. It almost sounded as if he’d been spying on me. I got the impression that he’d probably watched me before. That he knew more about me than he let on. Just because I hadn’t detected him prior to a week ago that didn’t mean he hadn’t been lurking around, watching me when I was at my most vulnerable.

  He was a demon. A demon I knew very little about. He could have supernatural powers I’d never encountered before. What little I knew was what I’d seen in those sporadic images he’d shown me, which could be false, for all I knew. He could be lying his butt off to gain…what? My trust? Why? Why would he want me to see his humanity—if indeed he even had any humanity left?

  “You better start explaining yourself or I’m really going to have a reason to send you to hell.” My voice sounded loud even to me.

  Rhyzel tossed the remote control on the coffee table in obvious frustration. “What exactly do you want me to say?”

  “The truth. I know how hard that is for your kind, but that’s the only ally you have right now and I suggest you give it a try.” I didn’t miss the way his eyes widened when I emphasized the words ‘your kind.’

  He opened his mouth to respond but I raised my left hand to stop him.

  “Before you say anything, I want to try something.”

  Raising my left hand slightly, I whispered a series of phrases to one of the many truth spells I knew and watched contentedly as a small purple ball of energy formed a few inches from Rhyzel’s upper body, rotated in the air for several seconds before slamming into his chest and disappearing.

  Rhyzel shot forward the second the mystifying ball entered his chest, and judging by the way his eyes widened and the groan escaped his lips, I was pretty sure it’d hurt.

  “Can’t you witches ever do something that doesn’t involve pain?” he hissed.

  “To be fair, you’re half demon, so that would explain the discomfort,” I retorted. He was anything but amused, though. As a matter of fact, he looked downright pissed. “Look, I’m not about to apologize here. I need to know the truth and this is the only way I’m going to get it.”

  He nodded. “That doesn’t make things easier on me.”

  Closing the gap between us, I sat on the couch to his right, still clutching the dagger in my hand. “Now, how did you know about my visions?”

  Rhyzel sat back with his hands on his lap. “You cast a truth spell, didn’t you?”

  “Of course. I want the truth. Since you’re half human, you can’t lie.” I was fairly certain he didn’t like the idea very much—if that frown he wore was any indication. “Besides, you suggested it earlier, remember?”

  “I know,” he whispered. “But you’re not going to like what I have to say.”

  If I had any doubts before, they were nothing compared to what plagued me then. Would he confirm my suspicions? Had he been watching me all along? And if he had, did that mean he was conspiring with another demon to hurt me? Was he working with someone? Or was I just being paranoid?

  “Spill it and I’ll let you know just how much I don’t like.” I held his gaze so that he knew just how serious I was. My tone alone could have been warning enough though.

  Rhyzel let out a long, slightly exaggerated sigh and then said, “Two years ago you saved my life.”

  My entire body went numb. “What?”

  “Liberty Park. Midnight. You appeared out of nowhere and I was too busy trying to stay alive to pay attention to who you were. All I knew was they wanted me dead and I wanted to live. It was survival of the fittest. My biggest problem was I was exhausted from running, hiding, cloaking myself. It takes a lot of magic and I’m only half demon. My magic drains pretty fast. By the time you arrived they had a big advantage over me. I was on the ground, bleeding and drained of magic.

  “Who are they?”

  “Demons. Three of them,” he said as if that alone would jar my memory. “You blasted two of the three shifter demons present with power spells. They fell dead, but when you went to attack the third, he disappeared. I was lying on the ground, my back to you, but I could hear your footsteps as you got near. Even without turning around I knew who you were. I didn’t want you to see me, so I tried my best to hide my face. The last thing I wanted was for you to vanquish me in the heat of the moment. With all the bad energy surrounding the atmosphere around us I knew you couldn’t pick up on my supernatural side, but I wasn’t about to chance it. I knew once you saw the color of my eyes you’d know something was not entirely human about me and—”

  “Wait.” I tried so hard to remember what he was talking about, but there were many aspects of that night that vanished after I was hit from behind by…I wasn’t sure if it was dark magic or something else. I’d been trying to put together the pieces of what happened that night but nothing conclusive came back. “That was you? You were the guy I tried to save?” I remembered bits and pieces but that was it. Nothing major and that scared me. “I thought you said you just moved back a week ago.”

  “I came to visit my mother often.” He couldn’t lie because of the spell so I knew everything he said had to be true.

  “You were visiting your mother?”

  He nodded. “I was only supposed to stay for the weekend. I knew those demons had been tracking me down, but I was caught off guard when they showed up in town.”

  “How exactly did I save you then?”

  Rhyzel kept his gaze on me the whole time. “You walked toward me, calling for my attention the whole time but I purposely avoided raising my head or turning around. I was in deep. If I faced you, you’d be able to tell I wasn’t entirely human, but if I ran you’d know something was wrong. So I debated what to do. Planning for a safe escape was interrupted when you touched my right shoulder.” He paused, his eyes studying me intently as he added, “You asked how I knew you could see things—have visions. Well, I know because when you touched me then, instead of you seeing into my life, I saw into yours.”

  I could barely breathe. He saw into my life? Just how much did he see exactly? Would that come back to bite me in the ass?

  “We had some weird…connection. Something went wrong. I saw aspects about your life that allowed me to know the kind of person you are.”

  “What…did you see?” I asked, already regretting the answer.

  Rhyzel raised an eyebrow. “Are you worried?”

  “No,” I lied. “Tell me what you saw.”

  He shrugged. “Not much. I saw your fight against evil, bits of images from when you were at school and after school activities. Your tight knit family. The kind of life you led at home. That kind of thing.”

  I swallowed hard. Knowing he couldn’t lie didn’t make things any better. I was one step away from freaking out. There had been a point in my life I’d been vulnerable to him, much more than I had been tonight, and that didn’t sit well with me.

  “What happened after I touched you?”

  “You started to say something but then I felt the demon counterattack with dark magic and you went down behind me. When I turned around you were on the floor and the demon was standing behind us. I had very little time to react so I did the only thing I could do, I killed him.”

  “I thought you said I saved your life? It sounds the other way round to me.”

  “You did save my life. If you hadn’t shown up when you did the shifter demons would have killed me. I only returned the favor.”

  How could this have happened? And why couldn
’t I remember any of it?

  “Mom said that when she got there I was alone.”

  He had the nerve to roll his eyes at me. “I wasn’t going to stay behind and be discovered. What do you think your mother would have thought had she found me next to your unconscious body? She would have given me a one way pass to the underworld.”

  He had a point. Mom would have been livid and probably wouldn’t have stopped to ask questions.

  “Okay, so you accidently discovered my secret.” That made me really mad. How could I have messed up like that? “So you know things about me?”

  He nodded.

  “What’s my favorite color?” I asked, wanting to test him.

  He actually smiled and my heart skipped several beats in response. “Purple,” he responded with a grin.

  “I thought you said you didn’t get much info?” I hadn’t meant for my tone of voice to sound so icy and cold, but that’s how it came out. Then again, it matched how I felt inside.

  “I couldn’t help it, you know,” he retorted with the same icy tone. “It’s not like I asked you to come help me.”

  I wanted to slap him with the same intensity as I wanted to kiss him. “Fine. Whatever.”

  “Why did you come, anyway?” He shifted the conversation.

  “Tonight? You know why.”

  “Not tonight. That night. The night you saved my life.”

  I opened my mouth to respond but then realized I couldn’t remember much of what happened that night two years ago, including my reason for being there in the first place.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “I can’t remember.”

  Neither of us spoke for a couple of minutes. I needed to gather my thoughts and I suspected that maybe he needed to do the same.

  After a brief staring contest however, I finally said, “I’m not done questioning you yet.”

  “I know,” he said, frowning. “I didn’t think it’d be that easy.”

  “I don’t make it easy for demons,” I hissed.

  Rhyzel raised his chin defiantly. “You don’t even know me and you’re already condemning me for what I am.”

  Purposely ignoring his words, I said, “Have you ever killed a human—innocent or not?”

  “No.” His response was so sharp it could have cut right through me. “I have never killed anything but demons.”

  “Is that why they’re after you? Because you’ve killed your own kind?”

  Amongst the many demon laws, it was written that demons should never turn on their own kind. If Rhyzel killed demons in order to keep hidden, that would explain why they wanted him dead, too.

  “No. That’s not the reason they’re after me.”

  “Okay, so, what’s the deal with you, really?”

  Rhyzel furrowed his brow. “What do you mean?”

  “Stop beating around the bush. You know what I mean.” I had no idea if he was just playing dumb or really didn’t know what I was trying to get at. “They want to kill you because of what you are?”

  “Yes.” Even after what I’d been through the past ten hours I was still surprised by his answer.

  Ezekiel the angel had mentioned during our meeting that someone was or had taken measures to investigate how this half human, half demon had come to be. I could only assume that if the good side wasn’t too thrilled about this development, neither was the evil side.

  Someone had broken a very serious law and they had to pay. And I had the gut feeling that whether he wanted to or not, Rhyzel would pay the consequences, too. Seeing as Rhyzel didn’t know who his father was, he would be the one who would have to pay—with his life.

  “Was everything I saw real? It wasn’t something you conveniently wanted me to see?” I prodded, hoping to get the full scoop on the visions.

  “It was something I wanted you to see, yes, but it was very real. It’s a part of my past. My mother was killed by a group of demons trying to get to me, but she was a good mother. She took care of me and never abandoned me. Those were aspects of the life I once had and will probably have for the rest of my existence,” he said. “They will never stop chasing me.”

  “Then why did you come back?”

  “I had to.”

  “Had to? As in, you had no other option?”

  “It wasn’t exactly safe at my friend's place anymore. They don’t always find me right away. I can cloak my presence, my supernatural nature, but once they catch whiff of me they hunt me down until I have no other choice but to surrender, fight, or go somewhere else. Fighting them isn’t always easy. Many of them are a lot more powerful than me. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve come out of a fight half dead,” he said. “And I’ll be damned if I surrender to them.”

  “How long do you think it will take them to find you again?”

  “A few weeks. Maybe more. I don’t really know.” He lifted his chin in an almost defiant manner. “With my mother gone they won’t think to look for me here so soon, but they will…eventually.”

  “Then why settle down? Why get a job? Why go to college?”

  “The longer I’m around humans, the better. They don’t attack in public places and living among normal humans lets me blend in easier. I can cloak my supernatural side better when I’m amongst humans.”

  “Because of your half human side?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Are you working with someone, such as a demon lord or something to hurt me or my mother?”

  He stiffened. I was pretty sure that if he could lie he would have. “No. I’m not working with anyone to hurt either of you.”

  His words made me feel so much better. At least I knew he wasn’t lying about that.

  “Do you really work and go to college?” Okay, so now I was delving in personal matters. I shouldn’t care to ask, but I did anyway.

  “Yes, and thanks to you I missed a double shift today. My boss probably blew a fuse or two when I told him I wasn’t going to be in today.” He glared at me.

  I rolled my eyes. “Oh, he’ll get over it and so will you.”

  He leaned forward. “Seriously? I almost lost my job and that’s all you can say?” Now he really looked angry and even more annoyed.

  “Can you blame me for acting the way I did?” I shot back.

  Though he was unmistakably frustrated, he agreed with me. “No. I can’t blame you.”

  “Good.” I scurried to my feet. “I have to go.” I had some serious thinking to do and it was best if I was in the sanctity of my bedroom when I thought over what to do with him.

  “How long does this spell stay in place?” he asked, popping to his feet. “The last thing I want is to go to work tomorrow and tell my boss exactly what I think about him.”

  In spite of myself I smiled. “You don’t like him much, do you?”

  He shook his head. “No, but it’s good money.”

  “Since when do demons have a decent job and pay rent?” I blurted.

  He picked himself off the couch. “I don’t expect a witch to understand why I choose to live as normally as possible.” He took a step forward, his gaze locked on me. “Do you even know how hard it is for me to normal? I’m not going to lie, I have a good side and I have a bad side, and they are constantly battling each other. Existing as what I am alone is difficult enough, but you know what? I didn’t ask to be born. I didn’t ask to be this way. I can’t help what I am any more than you can.”

  No matter how much enmity I felt for demons, even I couldn’t deny the string of emotions I could easily see in Rhyzel’s greenish red eyes. In that instant his human side showed and it clearly told me he was as conflicted about himself as I was over being a teenage witch.

  “I’ll remove the spell, but if I ever have need of it again—”

  “I know. I know.”

  I frowned, but quickly lifted my hand and recited the few words that would remove the spell. Within seconds the ball of purple mist exited Rhyzel’s chest and rotated in front of him for several seconds before disappearing.
/>
  “There. It’s done.” I let my hand drop to my side. “Before I leave, I’d like to issue a warning. If I so much as suspect you’re doing something other than coexisting with us, I won’t hesitate to vanquish you.”

  The look on Rhyzel’s face told me exactly what he thought of my warning but to his credit he said nothing.

  “I’ll be keeping an eye on you.” I hurried to the door. “Keep that in mind.” I reached for the knob, turned it, and swung the door open. “Don’t make me regret the decision to give you a chance to prove yourself.”

  “Is that what you’re doing?” he asked.

  “Yes.” I turned to look at him. “Watch yourself.” Clutching the dagger in my left hand, I walked out the door, but before I could slam it shut, he said, “I thank you for the kiss.”

  It sounded as sarcastic as he had probably intended and that really infuriated me. The nerve of him to mock me after I decided to spare his life… which was something I might come to regret later on.

  I slammed the door so hard I was pretty sure Mina heard it upstairs.

  Chapter Eight

  Reasons For Doubts

  Mom followed me into my bedroom as I stormed in. I barely had time to slip the dagger back inside the box and under the bed before she started pounding me for information.

  “So what happened?” she asked, her eyes wide as she assessed me for what I could only assume were injuries. Typical mother.

  “Mom, I’m okay.” I raised my hands so she could see I wasn’t hurt. “He didn’t hurt me.”

  Mom tried to hide it, but I could easily see her expression softening as she realized I was okay. Hopefully, I came off as totally normal because by this point I was feeling more than a little flustered. Plus, my inability to forget about Rhyzel’s lips on mine really made me angry.

  “I’m not sure I appreciate your lack of confidence, Mom.” Not that I could blame her much. I’d been caught up in a most precarious situation with my next door neighbor and I was suddenly very grateful she hadn’t been there to witness that embarrassing scene.