Keeper of Crows (The Keeper of Crows Duology Book 1)

by Casey L. Bond

  He pointed a finger at me accusingly. “You...”

  “Me?”

  “You tempt me!” he yelled.

  “Well you tempt me, too! You’re like sex on a stick dipped in butter!”

  His brows furrowed. “Sex on a stick dipped in...?”

  “BUTTER!” I yelled, turning my back to him. I crossed my arms over my thundering heart to keep it from leaping out of my chest and beating him to death. He was so frustrating!

  Then he laughed. His deep, rumbling laughter filled the space between us and I wanted him to stop. I picked up a handful of pebbles and launched them at him. He stopped chuckling immediately, his eyes turning a playful shade of pink. I knew I was in trouble. Turning as fast as I could, I took off running from him, but he caught me in only a few feet.

  “What are you doing to me?” he rasped into my ear.

  “I could ask you the same thing.”

  The following day, with the crows keeping watch overhead, I pushed myself off the boulder I’d been sitting on.

  “Let’s go swimming,” I suggested, ticking my head toward the river.

  “Can you swim?” he asked.

  “I grew up in California,” was my answer. His brows touched. “Of course I can swim, archangel. Probably better than you.”

  He stripped to his boxer briefs without another word, and the way his eyes flitted over my body gave me goosebumps. I stripped to my bra and panties and was about to remove them when he stopped me.

  “Leave them on.”

  Squashing my disappointment, I walked over to the edge of the river, placed my feet on the slick rocks, and let the icy, gray water wash over my feet. “It’s cold!”

  “Did you expect bath water?” he teased, waltzing in until the silver water lapped at his waist. I didn’t realize until then that it wasn’t gray water; it was silver like mercury, like the water in the streams that was so still, it didn’t seem to flow at all. But this churned angrily, or maybe it was happy, because it wasn’t still. It was alive.

  “Come on,” he said, splashing silver across my thighs, stomach, and chest. I giggled as he sank into the water to his neck, re-emerging and looking like the tin man of angels. He looked down at his skin and chuckled. “I do look like a tin man.”

  I stepped into the water, my feet finding rocks beneath the surface. “Do me a favor, Keeper. If you ever make it out of this place, make sure to look up ‘The Wizard of Oz’.”

  The creases in his face broke my heart. He didn’t think he would ever leave Purgatory.

  “Can you ask for a new assignment?” I asked tentatively.

  “I have.”

  “Can you clean up the problems here so they’ll let you leave?”

  He shook his head. “I’m not allowed to interfere. My only order is to guard the fissures and try to stop merchants.”

  “Why? Doesn’t anyone care about what Malchazze is doing? Don’t they care about the demons dumping Lessons here? That my father can control them? The trafficking? The souls kidnapped from this place and then sold? What about those souls? They matter, too.”

  “I know they do, and I truly wish I had answers to your questions, because then my own would be answered. I’ve spent years asking the same things, begging for a change in orders, begging to help the situation, and the answer has always been no.”

  The silver water lapped at my thighs, drawing his attention. I kept walking toward him.

  “There’s a tension between you and Gabriel, even though he and you are friendly to one another. I can tell there’s a long history there and some loyalty, but I feel the air thicken when you and he are in the same room. Why is that?”

  Michael blew out a heavy breath. “We haven’t always seen eye-to-eye on things. The archangels were created at the same time. We’ve been together through battles, times of peace, and difficulties you probably couldn’t even fathom. Of all the archangels, Gabriel and I were closest.”

  “Were?”

  “Sometimes siblings squabble.”

  “It seems like more than that, Michael.” Another step toward him. The water swirled around my waist and ribs.

  “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  I nodded. “Okay.”

  He smiled. “I thought you’d keep pressing me for an answer until I exploded.”

  I smiled, looking down at the water sloshing onto my chest. “This isn’t toxic, right?”

  “No, it’s safe, but I’m surprised you’re able to withstand the current. You’ve been so tired lately.”

  “It is strong—the water, I mean.”

  He nodded. “It is.” He wasn’t looking at the water.

  19

  The manna fell and I told Michael to sit and relax while I gathered it. Were his eyes on my ass? Yes. Did I like it? Absolutely. I emptied my cupped hands into his and went back for more. He could eat a ton of this stuff, but it filled me up quickly. I never got hungry before it was time for the manna to fall again.

  “Tell me a good memory from your childhood,” he asked out of the blue.

  I popped a piece of velvety fluff into my mouth, thinking of what to tell him. “Okay. Once when I was in elementary school, maybe first grade, my mom said I didn’t have to go to school that day. She helped me dress and brush my teeth and hair, and then she packed a cooler with food while I gathered toys to take with me. We drove to the zoo and spent most of the morning exploring. It was empty because it was a weekday, and it was like we had all the exhibits, the whole place, to ourselves. We laughed and held hands and she bought me a stuffed penguin from the gift shop because they were my favorite animal. We ate lunch in the trunk of our car, picnic style, and drove to the beach where we just walked along the shore, toes in the sand, saltwater splashing our legs. It was the happiest day of my life.”

  “Your mother loved you.”

  “She did that day,” I said, looking away from him.

  He watched me gather a few more pieces of manna. “She loved you every day. Malchazze is skilled at crushing souls, Carmen, and she was another victim of his, as were you. But she did love you.”

  Hot tears burned my eyes. “I never thought so until now,” I admitted, my throat clogged with emotion. “Seeing her, normal, was the best gift in the world, but watching her walk away, even to Heaven, was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do. It’s like getting a shiny new present on Christmas morning and having it ripped from your hands five seconds later.”

  “Should I not have brought her back? I thought it was what you’d have wanted.”

  “No! Please don’t think I didn’t appreciate it; I just miss her and I’m a mess. I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t apologize. Sometimes, I’m not sure I understand all of the emotions you, and humans in general, feel. I read people and situations wrong sometimes.”

  “Bringing my mother here was the right thing to do. I wouldn’t have traded that minute for anything in the world, Michael. Thank you for helping her and for letting me say goodbye.”

  He was quiet, staring at the pebbles beneath his bent legs. “You’re an amazing person, Carmen.”

  “I’m not. I’m actually a really shitty person, Michael. If you had someone else to compare me to, you wouldn’t say such a thing.”

  “I would. I’ve seen countless souls over the eons, Carmen, but none have shone brighter than you.”

  Maybe I had half of an excuse for being a bad person. I was raised by the antichrist, after all, so maybe that pardoned my attitude toward life and love.

  “You are the most loving person I’ve seen. You don’t love many people, but those you love, you love fiercely, with everything you are. What could be more sacrificing than that?” he asked.

  “Sacrificing everything you are for hundreds of people you don’t know and who don’t care to know you…that’s what you do. Every single day. That’s what you do here, Michael. You may not recognize it, but the love in you is greater than anything I’ve ever seen.”

  20

  For two da
ys, we camped near the silver river. We swam in its cold water, watched it from the bank, let its churning water lull us to sleep.

  Michael hovered around me. His crows flew around us and kept watch from their perches on the spindly branches above. There were no fissures. No shudders. No one crossed the boundary. Not even Gabriel returned.

  It was too quiet, like the calm before the storm we both knew was coming. I hoped we could weather it.

  We didn’t kiss again. Michael didn’t touch me. But we did talk. I told him about my life and he listened, his eyes changing colors with each detail offered. Sometimes I said things just to see what color they would turn next, but he quickly caught on to that game.

  “You can hear my thoughts, but I can see your emotions,” I told him. He didn’t like that so much.

  He thought he was putting distance between us, but it was me. I’d reeled him in and now had to throw him back. He needed a chance to swim. I just had to figure out a way to convince him to take the leap and leave this hellhole. I didn’t know how long the veil would be sealed. It may need to be sealed forever. If I can do it, a tiny voice teased. Self-doubt was a bitch, and I wanted to squash her along with my father.

  “Will you tell me about the city?” I pleaded. The only thing he would offer was that it was crowded, corrupt, and the castle my father had built overlooked it all.

  So we ate, brooded, cleansed, watched the crows, and avoided each other. One night, under the faded gray sky that was only slightly darker than it was during the day, Michael came and sat beside me on the rocks. “You’re still soaked.”

  It was hard to dry when there was no wind, no warmth, and the river splashed beside us, dampening everything all over again once it began to dry. “So are you,” I said, trying not to look at him.

  “You’re upset with me,” he said.

  I was. It was pointless to lie.

  “Why are you angry?”

  “I’m not angry at you, Michael. I’m angry at our situation. And I’m sorry for even speaking about it. I know it can’t be easy on you. These rules would have driven me crazy a long time ago.”

  “I wish things were different,” he said, brushing my knuckles with his.

  I hissed. “You know, I wish things were different, too. I wish I didn’t feel this connection to you. I wish Mom was still here and Father wasn’t the fucking antichrist, but he is. I wish I wasn’t stuck in this awful, gray hell hole, but I am. I wish I could just stand beside you and stop staring at you, and I wish… I wish for once, someone found me worth it.”

  His brows knotted. “Worth what?” he breathed, his eyes turning sapphire.

  “Worth everything,” I admitted, turning my head from him.

  He was quiet for a long moment and then he stood, I thought to walk away from me for good. He should wash his hands of me. I was far more trouble than I was worth. Ask anyone who’d ever known me.

  “You are fearless,” he whispered. “You are a soul, but you tore the veil because you were too stubborn to let merchants drag you through it. You fought, Carmen. Those animals who beat you, who did things… You fought. You never stopped fighting. Even when you looked as though you had lost consciousness, your fingers twitched, trying to stop them. You came to my defense against monsters you couldn’t even begin to fathom. Twice.”

  “I didn’t get to help you, though!” I cried.

  “You tried! Don’t you get it? No one…not a soul, not an angel, not even an archangel, has ever done that for me before. Ever.” His breathing was labored as he looked at me, a pained look creasing his face. “Stand up,” he commanded, whipping around so fast he blurred.

  “Why?” I scanned the tree line, the water, the sky. Nothing. No Lessons lurked.

  I stood and his hands clamped onto my waist, pulling me to him so fast, I didn’t register his lips on mine, his tongue on mine until I was tasting him, moving in unison, the beginning of a deadly and dangerous dance.

  Pulling away, I pushed against his chest. “No.”

  He pulled me to him again. “You are worth everything to me, Carmen. Rules be damned.”

  His hands roamed my back, breasts, ass, pulling me closer to him, so close I could feel every hard plane of him. Every angle. Every heartbeat. I pulled him closer still, trying to commit the feel to memory. One glorious moment.

  He stripped me of my shirt and then his hands deftly unbuttoned my jeans and slid them down my legs, where they fell in a whisper to the pebbles below. His shirt and pants joined mine and then my bra and panties. He inhaled sharply when he saw me.

  “You’ve seen me before,” I said, gasping as his lips tugged my earlobe, his hot breath on my neck as he bit down.

  “Never enough,” he breathed. His hands found my folds and found out how much I wanted him, hot and slick. When he flicked my clit, I came hard, pulsing around the fingers he’d sunk inside me.

  “We’re going too far,” I breathed against his chest.

  “Not nearly far enough.” He removed his boxer briefs and revealed himself to me. I stroked him. Long, hard, steel. “Carmen,” he hissed.

  Michael gently eased me to the ground. I expected him to be like the others, to have me face away from him, to take me from behind so he didn’t have to look at me, but Michael wasn’t like the men I’d been with before. He knelt between my legs, wrapping each around his back, and then he paused. He was having second thoughts.

  I started to scramble toward my clothes.

  “Stop,” he said sternly.

  I obeyed.

  “I am not having second thoughts. I’m simply enjoying the view.” He grinned, stroking the cheeks of my ass.

  Letting out a pent-up breath, I pulled him to me with the strength of my calves, my heels bringing him closer. He rubbed against me, his length against my core, and I could swear that Purgatory burst into a rainbow of color, if only for a moment.

  “Michael, I’m not worth the consequences you’ll face.”

  “Yes, you are.” It was a pledge, a vow. When he slid inside me, he was gentle, almost painfully so. His body echoed the promise he made, while mine accepted his vow and made one in return. Our slow rhythm turned feral, wanting, needing, never enough, not enough. He slammed into me and I rose my hips to meet each thrust, gritting my teeth to keep from crying out.

  Growling, he looked into my eyes, his turning magenta. “Don’t forget this moment. No matter what.”

  “No matter what,” I echoed. I couldn’t forget him or this if I tried.

  “I want this to last forever,” he breathed.

  “I want to explode with you.”

  Garnering his strength and my body to him, we came together. Dark feathers rained down on top of us, tickling our sensitive skin. A sense of foreboding filled my marrow.

  What did I do? What did I ask him to do?

  As Keeper checked on his murder and I slid my clothes back on one piece at a time, I heard rustling behind me from the direction of the forest. I expected Lessons, a hoard of demons. Something. But what I got was my father staring at me and motioning with one finger for me to follow him into the woods. I was conflicted, but I knew he might hurt Michael if I didn’t obey him, and I couldn’t let that happen.

  “Use the Angel stone,” the familiar, velvety voice ordered.

  I grabbed hold of it and brought it out of my pocket. “How did you know I had it?”

  “I have my sources.”

  Have you ever seen eyes that were vacuums; soulless orbs that showed no emotion? Serial killers, mass murderers, and terrorists all had those looks about them. So did my father. Those were the eyes of my father.

  “I want you to come with me.”

  “To the city? What do you want? For me to become a sex slave like you made my mother?”

  His face contorted in anger. “Your mother is a slave no more, but I’m sure you know that already.”

  “I sure as hell do. She’s in a place where you’ll never be able to hurt her again,” I said triumphantly.

 
“Is that what the angels told you? Aww, naive isn’t your color, Carmen. Suicides can’t enter the gates of Heaven. It is forbidden.”

  Rage filled my veins, hot and fast. “My guess, Father, is that you know nothing about Heaven, and you never will.”

  “No, but you may have just cost Michael everything. He’ll probably taste the fires of Hell because of you, and for that, I am forever in your debt.”

  My stomach churned and I vomited toward his polished shoes. Had I damned him?

  Father stepped back from the frothy mess and continued, “You need to come with me to see what you stand to inherit from the labors of my hard work. You’ll never understand this place unless you enter the city and stand in front of your people. The Keeper wants to keep you away. Why do you think that is?”

  I glanced back toward the river, toward the swirl of crows above us, now angrily cawing. “They know you’re here.”

  “He’s coming. If you want to see your empire, take my hand,” he said, offering his palm to me.

  Gritting my teeth, I glanced over to see Michael running as fast as he could, a blur among the landscape. “Carmen! Don’t trust him!”

  I didn’t trust Malchazze, but I couldn’t risk Michael’s fate any more than I already recklessly had. I had to see what he’d done, what he built while crossing the barrier. “I want to see the castle.”

  “Carmen, no!” Michael shouted, his face contorting in worry and pain.

  As I placed my hand in my father’s, we were spirited away.

  21

  The gray on my father’s skin fit him. It suited him like the ashy tone was made for him and only him. He was the gloom of this place, I quickly learned. Did he leach all the color away, or was it simply a side effect of being in the presence of evil?