Hidden Worlds

by Kristie Cook

  “I want you gone,” I whispered, my eyes shining with dread.

  I just wanted them all to leave me alone so I could pick up the pieces of what little life I had left and move on. It’s why I’d sought him out tonight, for answers and to find out how I could end all of this.

  Marcas shook his head. “You think either of us has that choice right now? Because if you think we do, you’d be dead wrong.”

  I blinked, all grogginess gone. “What do you mean?” Of course we had a choice.

  “Quit pretending you don’t know!” Marcas spat.

  I backed away from him until I was pushed up against the headboard of Monroe’s bed in an awkward sitting position.

  I refused to look at him. Know what? What was I supposed to know?

  Marcas snarled. “You can’t run away from this. You can turn a deaf ear and a blind eye, but when you open yourself back up, it’s still going to be there.”

  What was he talking about?

  I stared at my lap. “What am I running away from?”

  Everyone around me was crazy! Plain crazy! And my aunt was the most mentally impaired of them all. I didn’t have to stay at the Abbey and be a part of this crazy Sethian/Demon idea. The whole thing was ludicrous. Marcas and his brother could go back to Hell. Literally.

  Marcas didn’t reply. Minutes ticked by.

  I risked a glance only to find him watching me cautiously. Did he think I was falling apart? I wasn’t weak, damn it. Nervous break downs were not my style. I just didn’t want to be a part of whatever was going on. I wanted to be normal. The whole thing made me angry.

  “Can the pity stare!” I hissed.

  He didn’t blink or remove his gaze. “Don’t mistake disgust for pity.” He moved away from me. “I need—”

  A loud gasp interrupted us.

  I cringed and Marcas backed further away.

  “What the hell!” Monroe cried out sleepily from the side of the bed.

  My gaze drifted from Marcas’ only long enough to stare at Monroe, a message in my gaze. She knew enough about the situation to put two and two together.

  Rubbing sleep from her eyes, she shook her head, her blonde hair almost white in the dim light as she moved. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

  Making her way slowly up onto the mattress, she gave Marcas a wide berth as she settled next to me. Her body trembled.

  “What’s going on?” she whispered urgently.

  Placing a placating hand on Monroe’s flannel covered leg, my gaze flew back to Marcas. “What do you need?”

  Marcas watched us, his eyes full of feral heat. “I need you to go somewhere with me,” he said.

  I froze. Monroe’s nails dug into my arm.

  “No way!” she hissed into my ear, but I found myself regarding Marcas thoughtfully. The strain around his eyes and the white that spread through his clenched knuckles was proof enough that he was not happy about needing anything from me. It made me oddly triumphant.

  “No fucking way!” Monroe reiterated.

  I looked at her.

  As soon as my gaze met hers, she blinked, her hands thrown up in exasperation. “You’re crazy!”

  I turned away. “What could you possibly need me for?” I asked Marcas.

  Monroe’s nails dug deeper into my arm as Marcas and I regarded each other carefully. We were both holding back. I was still smarting from the betrayal of all that I’d ever known, and he had to deal with me. This was war, and I was somehow a liability. I could see it in his gaze.

  “You need me too, Blainey,” Marcas muttered.

  My eyes narrowed. “You’re not telling me something, Craig.”

  I used the last name Damon had given me at our "recruiter" dinner. I knew now I’d dined with a Demon. Marcas didn’t argue.

  Monroe stiffened. “She’s not going anywhere with you.”

  Her protectiveness filled me with warmth. True family came in odd places sometimes. And Monroe was definitely family.

  Marcas regarded her calmly. “I wouldn’t be here if there was any other choice." He turned back to me, his eyes blazing, heat coming off of him in waves. “But there isn’t. I’m not keeping anything from you, Blainey. They have. I am not your enemy. I didn’t take away this choice for you.”

  He pulled out a small blade hidden within the inner folds of his jacket. My eyes widened and Monroe yelped.

  “Day—” Monroe croaked.

  She backed away from the bed, pulling me with her forcefully.

  I was dead weight, too engrossed by the glint of moonlight on metal. Danger can be like that. So mesmerizing it takes away free will.

  Marcas lifted the blade so fast neither of us predicted the blood we suddenly saw gushing from the palm of his hand, the crimson fluid appearing black in the feeble light.

  We gasped. He’d cut himself, slashing shallowly into the meat of his palm, and not once did he flinch. Pain burned along my skin.

  I froze. “Marcas—"

  Monroe yelped, her hand crushing my wrist. “Oh my God, Dayton!”

  I glanced down.

  It all happened in slow motion, my eyes riveted to each new detail as if I was stuck holding a portable time machine set on repeat. My vision blurred, and I blinked hard as I fought to focus on the sight before me. My hand. My blood. My blood beading slowly up across my palm before dripping thickly onto my wrist. My eyes followed the trail to my elbow. What the hell?

  My gaze swept between Marcas and me, first perusing the palm of his hand and then examining mine. They were identical.

  “What did you do?” I asked in horror.

  Marcas watched the same scene in silence, moving only enough to staunch his bleeding. The blood flowing from my palm slowed.

  “I didn’t do anything,” he insisted.

  I was having a hard time believing him.

  “You are a part of me now, an extension. I bleed, you bleed. I tire, you tire. I didn’t do this to you. They did,” Marcas said.

  Blood rushed through my head, and I grew dizzy. They did.

  I didn’t want to believe him. “How?”

  He leaned forward and Monroe grasped me. The beast versus the friend. I was placing bets on the beast, and I didn’t like the odds.

  Marcas paused. “You drank from the Chalice. It was filled with my blood.”

  I looked down at my hand. The ritual. The Chalice. The thick fluid that’d burned when my aunt forced it down my throat. A lot of things started to make a lot of scary sense.

  My shoulders slumped. “Where are we going?” I asked Marcas wearily.

  Monroe cried out. But what choice did I have? I wasn’t just tied to the beast, we were somehow part of the same person. The freakishly opposite sides of the same fucking coin.

  Chapter 19

  When Cain kills Abel in the Bible, God curses Cain. The ground no longer yields crops for him. He is cursed to wander the earth restlessly. Cain tells the Lord his punishment is more than he can bear, that whoever finds him will kill him. But the Lord says to him in Genesis 4:15“Not so; anyone who kills Cain will suffer vengeance seven times over. Then the Lord put a mark on Cain so that no one who found him would kill him.”

  ~Bezaliel~

  “If you think you’re going anywhere without me, you really are crazy,” Monroe hissed as she followed us out of the house, while pulling an Elvis is alive sweatshirt on over her hastily thrown-on clothes.

  Marcas’ figure loomed in front of me. I wondered absently if he was taller than Conor or if they were the same height. Either way, they both towered over me.

  Marcas’ stride lengthened. “This isn’t a simple day trip.”

  I cursed him in my head. Didn’t tall people realize walking faster meant short people had to jog to keep up?

  Monroe moved past me and tugged on Marcas’ jacket. Talk about bravado.

  He stopped abruptly and spun, his face feral, his eyes tinted red.

  Monroe fell back. “I don’t care how long it takes,” she insisted. I stared at
her in awe.

  Marcas glanced between us. “And she’s worth that much loyalty?”

  I scowled at him. “Bastard.”

  He peered at Monroe.

  She edged closer to me. “Yes,” she answered.

  No other explanation needed. It was all wrapped up in that one word. We had a long history together.

  I touched her arm gently. “What about your mom?”

  Monroe glanced at me, determination filling her gaze. I knew then no one would win this battle. Monroe was in. “I’ll call her later. But I’m going and that’s that."

  I shrugged. Okay by me.

  Marcas’ gaze went skyward. “Is this part of my curse now too?” he asked.

  I watched him, my gaze tracing his strong jaw before working its way down the line of his neck. He had muscles everywhere. And what did he mean curse?

  A thought hit me. “Do you have a car?”

  His head dropped, his eyes finding mine before inclining his head. My gaze followed his gesture, and I gasped.

  Monroe whistled. “Damn, it’s Eleanor,” she muttered, quoting the Gone in Sixty Seconds movie as we both perused the sleek black 1967 Shelby Mustang GT 500 that sat at the end of the drive.

  Marcas didn’t reply, he just moved on, approaching the Shelby before entering the driver’s side. The car surprised me. He seemed more like a motorcycle guy. Instinct told me he was making a lot of adjustments for me. As if he needed more reasons to loathe me.

  Monroe climbed into the back, her head shaking. “Don’t offer to open the door or anything.”

  The snide remarks were usually my forte, but I was still reeling over the whole he-bled-I-bled thing. Kinda spins a person for a loop.

  Marcas glanced at me as I slid in next to him. For a moment, I thought I saw sympathy in his gaze but it was gone too quickly to be sure.

  He shifted gears.

  I stared at his profile. “Who are you?” I asked.

  He backed out of the drive and sped into the night. His gaze didn’t meet mine again. “You know what I am."

  I hated vague answers. “That’s not what I asked.”

  He threw me a quick glance. “I’m going to make one thing clear. I’m not here to get to know you. I could give a damn how you feel, and I’m not here to explain myself to anyone. I’m here because my brother has wild ideas that are going to get a lot of people killed.”

  I just stared at him. “That was helpful. If you’re done with the whole Demon tirade, can you tell me what I have to do with any of this?”

  Marcas stiffened. If he thought his verbal montage affected me any, he was wrong. I had spent seven years in a home where my feelings weren’t spared. Why start now?

  Another quick glance came my way, his voice lowering as he asked, “They haven’t told you anything, have they?”

  I shrugged. “The most I’ve gotten out of all this is that my aunt is the head of some Sethian sect hell-bent on destroying Demons. Somehow she’s allied herself with one, drugged me, forced me to drink your foul blood, and then left me disoriented in a bar. Now I find out I’m somehow tied to you. That’s about the extent of it. A little help would be nice.”

  The car slowed. “It shouldn’t surprise me that they’d do this. But it does surprise me that they’d involve you this unwillingly. I thought you at least knew what you were.”

  Monroe leaned forward in the back seat. “And that would be what exactly?”

  I watched his profile, my thoughts on Amber. “I’m a descendant of Seth right?”

  Marcas’ jaw tightened. “You are a descendant of the Biblical Seth through your mother’s bloodline. Not your father’s."

  Confusion engulfed me. “So?”

  I felt awful slow lately, as if I wasn’t grasping things quickly enough.

  Marcas sighed. “Your aunt runs a Sethian Sect. There are groups out there, other Sethian groups who prefer a pure bloodline. Both parents are descended from Seth. But it isn’t a prerequisite. They are Christian followers who believe their calling is leading through example. Their leaders are Sethian, but it is not a requirement to join them. They do not discriminate. But there are extremist groups. Your aunt’s group is one of them. They marry only within the Sethian bloodline. Those who choose not to marry, the Sisters and Brothers, are the exception.”

  The car was quiet.

  It was Monroe who broke the silence. “And this makes Dayton and her sister an anomaly?”

  I stared out the front windshield, my mind whirring. If my mother was Sethian, but my father wasn’t …

  “My father is the key isn’t he?” Marcas didn’t answer. I looked at him. “What was my father?”

  Dad’s voice rang through my head, "Look to the light, Day."

  Marcas glanced at me sharply. The car swerved. Had he heard that?

  “There’s a road, you know,” Monroe complained from the backseat.

  I watched him as he straightened the car. “What was my father?”

  Marcas glanced at me. Our eyes met.

  “He’s a Watcher. They are Angels."

  He looked away.

  My heart rate increased. My father was what? Surely he was joking! An Angel? As in the Heavenly, I can fly kind of Angels?

  Monroe shot up in her seat. “He was a what? Seriously?”

  This had to be even harder for her to swallow with her Wiccan background. I looked back at her and our eyes met, the conflict obvious in my gaze.

  “My father?” I whispered.

  Marcas pulled to a stop at a red light and turned to me. “Yes, your father. It’s important you know that. It’s why my brother is so interested in you.”

  Monroe unbuckled and moved up between us. “Okay, wait. What does this make Dayton and Amber? And why is it important?”

  The road around us was empty. The light turned green, but Marcas didn’t move the car.

  “Dayton … and Amber were conceived from a union between a Sethian woman and a Watcher. People born from the line of Seth are considered Sons of God. This not only makes them Nephilim, it makes them unique,” Marcas said, his voice even.

  He’d paused before he’d said Amber’s name, but I didn’t have time to wonder why.

  I watched him thoughtfully. Certain things in my life were beginning to make a little more sense.

  Marcas’ eyes caught mine. “Nephilim, or Naphils, are half Angel/half mortal children. In Biblical times, the Nephilim were aberrations. They were giants and blood-thirsty. Mad. The great flood wiped them out. Never has there been a birth between an Angel and a Sethian descendant. They were always born to the daughters of Cain, the son of Adam and Eve cursed because he slew his brother Abel. You and your sister are the first Nephilim born from a Sethian mother. You were not mad, not blood thirsty and not aberrations."

  I stared, my head full, my heart heavy. My mother was Sethian. My father was an Angel. It was a lot to take in.

  A thought struck me suddenly, and I bent over in pain. "He’s a watcher,” Marcas had said. He’d used the present tense. No.

  “Can Angels die?” I asked Marcas, my head resting on my knees.

  I couldn’t see his face and didn’t want to. The car was dead silent.

  The answer when it came was low. “They can’t."

  A sob escaped but I bit it back. Grief overwhelmed me. Then that meant …

  “My father isn’t dead."

  Monroe’s hand moved onto my shoulder. “My God, Dayton!”

  I swallowed the anger that suddenly engulfed me and sat up. “My mother?” I asked.

  Marcas didn’t answer.

  Reaching out, I grabbed his leather jacket, my fingers digging into the material. “My mother?” I pleaded.

  He glanced at my hand before looking at my face. I didn’t give a damn if I was leaving marks on the expensive leather.

  “She’s dead."

  Everything drained out of me.

  I let go of his jacket. A sudden honk behind us made me jump, and Marcas glanced in the rearview mirror
before turning to drive under the light. I didn’t know what to feel. An internal war was being fought in my gut.

  “Where is he?” I whispered, my fist in my stomach. I didn’t have to explain who "he" was.

  Marcas inhaled. “He’s been ordered not to come near you or your sister. It is forbidden that Angels lay with mortal women. He was lucky he got the time with you that he did.”

  Monroe’s hand tightened on my shoulder.

  Lucky?

  He’s alive!

  My father was alive. He was an Angel.

  And he left us.

  My heart was bleeding. Why? He’d obviously forsaken the rules for my mother. Why didn’t he forsake them for me now when I needed him? Was I not good enough?

  "Day—" Monroe said gently.

  And my mother? Dead. How? If my father was alive, then what really happened to my mother? I wanted to ask but couldn’t. I wasn’t going to ask. Not now. I wanted my father. I wanted him to tell me why this was happening. I wanted him to make it all go away. Why couldn’t he?

  I swallowed hard to keep the tears at bay.

  Monroe’s hand suddenly fell away. “What are you doing?” she asked, her voice full of anger.

  I glanced up, my face burning with unshed tears, to find the Abbey sitting in front of us.

  Marcas put the car in park. “I’m coming to see my brother.”

  “What the hell?” Monroe yelled. “It’s not safe!”

  Marcas’ gaze met ours. “I came for explanations.”

  Coldness swept me. I wasn’t sure I cared what happened to me anymore.

  “You asshole!” Monroe spat as we exited the car.

  Marcas waited for me to move in front of him, his hard eyes on Monroe. “I’ve been called worse.”

  He remained at my back. I wasn’t sure if it was to protect me or to keep me from running. Monroe walked beside us. I should feel angry, but I didn’t. I wasn’t angry; I was resolved.

  I glanced at Marcas as we walked through the Abbey’s door, my eyes sad. “Who are you?”

  His gaze found mine. “I am the son of Cain and the Demon Lilith."

  I stumbled. Marcas’ hand found the small of my back, the pressure keeping me erect. The son of Cain?

  There was a gasp from our left, the sound followed by a yell, “Dayton, no!” My distraught sister ran toward us, her eyes full of desperation. “I told you not to come!”