Immortalis - Book 1 (The Keeper's Immortals)

by Marisa DeMaris

  The Twilight Loophole –

  There is a loophole for The Chosen One, if he or she cannot or will not choose a side to save and deny there is a different way. For The Chosen One there is another choice that he or she can make to save both sides and still bring peace among the immortals if it is something that you are fully prepared to do.

  What I read next shocked me but did give me a way out of the whole situation if that was what I wanted to do. If the words that were written true, then it would work and this gave me something else to think about as well.

  Just as I shoved the small book into my back pocket and stood from the bed I crippled over, grabbing my ears in pain. It sounded like a fog horn from inside my head. My head and heart pounded in sync with one another. I sooner managed to make my way out into the hallway where I was found by Charlie who picked me up and took me to the room where the Hollings were with as well as Trish and Adam. Every member of the Hollings looked slightly uncomfortable as well but they weren’t as bad as I was. I heard Sebastian ask Charlie what had happened and I heard him explain. I could hear fine but the noise was always there, it was like talking while at a concert. You had to listen extremely close or you would miss something.

  “What’s going on?” I asked loudly.

  “You can hear that?” Ashwin asked, seeming shocked that I could.

  “I can hear something. It sounds like a fog horn?” They all looked at one another while Blake looked at me. His look told me why I was able to hear it. Not only was I “the one” I would soon become immortal as well. I was hoping to change that outcome if I could.

  “It’s The Keepers. They’re callin’ us, callin’ all the ones that they’ve change.” Reid explained.

  “Why can Nora hear it?” Trish asked out of pure concern for her best friend.

  “It must be because she’s the Chosen One because I don’t know what else would cause it.’ Sebastian explained. I knew, Blake knew but no one else did. ‘We have to go. They’ll all be waitin’ for us.”

  “All who?” I asked.

  “All the immortals, they’ll all be there waitin’…for you.” Jaryn explained to me. The thought of countless immortals waiting for me, for me to make a choice on whether they lived or died made my stomach turn. I didn’t mean what I said before about it being an easy choice, not in the way that I had meant at that time. No matter what the Hollings did to me, I couldn’t hurt them in anyway because in the end I would lose Blake…Reid, all of them.

  Knowing what we had to do we gathered ourselves and made our way down to the lobby then out to the car that would take us to the chambers. In the

  dark of night we exited the building and waited for the car that seemed to never come for us but once it did all hell broke loose. From out of the car strutted Emmalee with Lucas on her tail as if he was lost puppy dog.

  “Well, well, well now what’s the rush?” She said sarcastically.

  “Back off Emmalee!” Jaryn barked.

  “Oh Jaryn my love, you’re angry with me yeah?”

  “You tried to hurt my friend and my family, you can go fuck yourself.” She seemed to be shocked by his words. She seemed to think that Jaryn would always love her even when she tried such harmful things against his family.

  “Jaryn?” she said in a mousy tone.

  “Don’t, just leave us be.” He said, cutting her off before she could say anything else but before we could move she had ordered Lucas to do something and suddenly we couldn’t move.

  “What did you do to us?” Reid yelled as we all struggled to move. It was as if our bodies were made of stone but could still talk, breath and blink.

  “Oh Lucas just used his power on you. Did you think that you were the only ones with powers given to you? Please, you’re not that that special!” Emmalee said with a bite. Lucas’ power was a stunner; we stood there frozen for the moment and there wasn’t anything we could do about it. Not even Sebastian with his super human strength could get out of it.

  “Take her.” Emmalee demanded from her lackeys. Lucas, followed by Conner walked straight to me and grabbed me by the arms. Suddenly I could move and being pulled away from Blake and the others. I heard them yelling from behind me but I couldn’t focus my thoughts of anything other than thinking that they were taking me to be changed by The Gods so that I would spare their kind. That was the only thing that kept running through my mind at the moment, all I could hope for, that although Emmalee was smart, she wasn’t that smart.

  Twenty

  I watched my friends become smaller and smaller as I continued to be pulled away from them, not being able to help them nor them being able to help me. I was being forced to go with the one person I truly couldn’t stand; Emmalee. Blake’s repulsive thought to be dead ex wife. Where ever we were at it wasn’t far from where they had taken me from because we had walked to where we currently were.

  We were in a large building with mute colors and bad fluorescent lighting that could cause a headache to form – in my case it might have been the fact I was stuck with Emmalee. I was walked into a room and made to sit in a hard wooden chair with Lucas and Conner flanking on either side of me while Emmalee was before us all, sitting in a much more comfortable looking chair while. Although I tried to move I couldn’t realizing that Lucas had me in his stunner again. “There isn’t any point in trying to move because you know that you can’t.” Emmalee said with a chuckle. She was lucky that I couldn’t move because if I could have then my fingers would have been entangled in her golden locks ripping them from the roots.

  “What do you want with me?” I asked knowing that it was stupid question. I knew what she wanted but she wasn’t going to get it from me.

  “Don’t act stupid, you know what I’m after Nora! I want the katana and I want it now!” she barked.

  “I don’t have it!” I firmly stated.

  “You’re lying and until you tell me what I want to know you’re not going anywhere so you might as well make this easy on all of us. Tell me where you’ve hidden it at?” Emmalee demanded from me but I refused to tell her. I wasn’t going to allow her to get her scummy hands on it. I would die before that happened.

  “Why do you want it so badly for Emmalee?” I asked trying to get her talking about something else other than finding it at the moment. She sat back in the chair and ran her tongue over her pink lips as if she was anticipating my reasoning of asking such a question.

  “You really wanna know why?’ I nodded as I couldn’t help but to ask myself silently if she dumber than she looked. ‘Two reasons. One - The Gods want it so that they can destroy The Keepers thus making them the ultimate power, I mean you really don’t think mortals are the ones who run things do you?” she asked with chuckle. I didn’t respond to her actions, only waited for her to continue. “Getting something thought mythical that could take out the enemy would put me high on their radar and on their good sides. Other than that it’s pure revenge against the Hollings, against Blake.” She said as she stared off into space as if she was remembering something that had happened long ago.

  “What did any of them do to you that was so bad?”

  “What didn’t they do? When I was forced to married that worthless excuse for a man Blake Hollings everything just kept going downhill. You would think that someone who was immortal could take things better but we still have feelings!” She snapped.

  “Wait you were immortal before you and Blake were married? How did he think that you had died then? Even if he didn’t see your body you had to look and act sick.” I asked with wonder in my voice. I wanted to know how she had managed to rid her life of a whole family for so long. She adjusted herself in her chair, getting comfortable before she retold me her life story; every detail.

  “I was lost in the woods when I was eighteen. It was a week before the wedding and maybe I was trying run away, although I denied it at the time. I was lost for days and just when I was on the brink of death when I found a fountain. It was gorgeous. The water was clear but ha
d a pink hue to it. I watched it for a moment, it trickling down from the spring. I didn’t think that it was real at first but when I placed my dry hand into the water it felt too good to not be real. Quickly I got to my knees and started dumping the water into my mouth but just as I started I was stopped. Before me stood an old woman who had informed me of what I had done. After I had said my apologies the woman transformed into a beautiful woman who seemed to made out of solid gold. She long flowing hair and the only color on her were her emerald green eyes. She told me her name was Hera. She was the queen of the Gods - wife to Zeus.’

  ‘In Ireland we didn’t know the Gods that the Greek and Romans did. We had our own Gods to worship. I told her this and she seemed appalled at the thought that there were people in the world who didn’t care enough to know her. I begged for her forgiveness and told her that if she would spare me then she would be the only one I would bow to. She liked me as I liked her, a mutual respect for each other so she did in fact spare me.”

  “Such an unfortunate thing.” I said snidely. That comment earned me a slap across my face and although it stung it didn’t hurt as bad as hearing her whole story that I didn’t care about. I simply smiled. “You were saying?”

  “I was returned home and later that week I was married to Blake. He wasn’t from a very well off family so marring me gave his family some sense of title, I myself didn’t have much of one but I was higher in society than any of the Hollings. From the very beginning we were both unhappy, that first night we consummated the marriage because we had to not because we wanted too – I practically felt forced as I’m sure he did. After that it just continued to go downhill. He was always gone…off with other women and when he was home he was always drunk, belittling me. He’s raped me before, when he couldn’t get it with another. The cocky, self centered, prick never cared about me so when I couldn’t take it any longer I talked to a friend, another immortal who was a doctor help me come up with a plan. The fever was going around, killing hundreds so we faked my death. I had the maid call in the doc tor and he told Blake that I was ill, near passing. When he checked on me again I had “died” he said in order to kill off the disease then my body needed to be burned so they did and he was none the wiser until we came face to face this last time.”

  “If you were immortal and you have heightened strength as the Hollings do then why did you let him hit and rape you, if that really happened?’ I asked her. She didn’t say anything making me to think that she was making parts of the story up. I believed the part about how she became immortal and how she died since I had heard that part from Blake himself. ‘I don’t believe it, not all of it.” I stated knowing that some of it was true but I didn’t want her to know that.

  “Then you’re a fool. You really think that he loves you? He doesn’t love anyone other than himself.” That statement about Blake again, it was the same thing that Reid had told me before. I was tired of hearing such things about someone that I loved so much. I didn’t care about his past. He had owned up to me about his dark side, his dark past and I didn’t care because he had did the right thing; he had confessed everything to me while we were alone, in the bedroom at Reid’s.

  “Nora I’ve got to tell you something.’ Blake said as I waited. ‘I’m not always the nicest guy. I have bad past of hurting people, Emmalee even. I wasn’t a good husband to her…but you need to believe me when I say that I will never hurt you. I mean it. I love you, I never loved her.” I smiled at him then took his face in my hands.

  “I believe you because I know your words are true.”

  “How can you tell?” he asked me.

  “I can see it in your eyes.” I explained before he kissed me again. He did have his scary moments, his dark moments and though I admitted to myself that I hadn’t seen the darkest of him yet, a part of me was attracted to that side of him - the bad boy that every girl wanted. I wanted to see that side of him because I wanted to see it firsthand. I wasn’t the damsel in distress; I wanted that evil and the fear. I wanted danger and I knew that he would give me that without actually hurting me and the way he always looked at me knew that he understood what I wanted even if I said differently. If I didn’t want danger then I wouldn’t have kept kissing him, knowing that we were risking our relationships with Reid, with everyone. I thought he was more than worth and the way his lips brushed against mine, I thought he felt the same way about me.

  “Nora!’ Emmalee screaming at me snapped my thought back into reality. ‘I’m tired of all this talk, give me the katana NOW!”

  “I told you that I don’t have it!” I snapped back in a firm tone. She stood from her chair in a stiff motion. She told Lucas and Conner to take me to the holding room and with that I could move again with Lucas lifting his stunner so that they could pull me out of the chair and down the hallway. Throwing me into a small, dimly lit room, outside Lucas sat with his back against the wall. I sat next to the door and peered out the small opening. I was trying not to cry but I could feel the tears forming although they weren’t out of fear or being hurt, they were out of anger.

  “Why don’t you just tell her what she wants to know?” Lucas asked me as he turned to face the opening in the door. It was strange talking to an immortal that wasn’t from Europe, he had an American accent. I would find out that he was born in Boston in the late seventeen hundreds. He was turned after he too drank from the fountain of the Ambrosia when he found in while was hunting during the winter. A snow storm hit and while he should have died he was give the water by Ares himself, the God of war out to save a dying man with a gun.

  “I’m not giving her anything! If Emmalee gets her hands on it then every immortal that has been changed by The Keepers will lose their lives.”

  “And if The Keepers have it then we all can use our lives. I…I don’t wanna die Nora.” Lucas confessed to me. He sounded so innocent and meek. His words touched me in a way I didn’t think could. I had assumed that all of the Ambrosia immortals were the same; dangerous and unpredictable but Lucas was different or so he seemed.

  “You don’t know what I’m gonna do, I don’t know.” I explained. I honestly didn’t know what The Keepers would do if they got the katana as well.

  “Your heart and mind are both with the Hollings which means you’re with The Keepers. The man you love is a Hollings and love is a powerful tool.” Lucas stated. Everyone seemed to know about my feelings and relationship with Blake but something that most people didn’t seem to know was that it wasn’t just my love for Blake or my friendship with these people that had helped me make a choice. It was the fact that if it wasn’t for them I wouldn’t have been born. Many generations a part, I am related to the Hollings.

  “It’s not just that Lucas. If it wasn’t for them then I wouldn’t be here. Ashwin had a child before she was turned and from that baby came many others and from them came me. I may not always like Ashwin but she helped give me life and even if it’s messed up at the time, I’m happy to be alive so…I do know what you’re talking about. I don’t want to choose. I don’t want to kill anyone.” I explained hoping that he would understand as I had understood him. The look on his face told me that he did.

  “You don’t seem like the others, the other Ambrosians.” I said. He didn’t seem as hostile, aggressive or engulfed with rage.

  “I didn’t wanna be this way. When I was lost in that snow storm I was ready, I had made peace with the fact that I wasn’t going to make it. I was so close when Ares showed up saved me. I couldn’t go back home, not after that. What would I tell everyone? What would I say when they all aged and I didn’t. When they were on their death beds and I still looked twenty two?’’

  “So you never knew what happened to your family?”

  “No and they never knew what happened to me either. I set out on my own and finally I found another clan on immortals in South Carolina. I meet Emmalee and Conner there. They took me under their wing, mainly Em because Conner was only a couple hundred years older than I was. If it wasn
’t for her I might not have survived my immortal life. I went through a dark time just like everyone else did. I never hurt anyone other than myself. I wanted to die then because I wanted to be with my family, my friends, the people I knew that I would never be able to see again.”

  “But if you want to see them then why don’t you wanna die now?” I asked. I thought that it was a stupid question but he didn’t seem to think so when he answered me.

  “Yeah I wanna see them but I’ve gotten used to being this way, to being alive and if that was to be taken from me like that.’ He said as he snapped his fingers. ‘I don’t know if I could handle losing the only other life I know. I’ve already lost one life. I don’t want to lose another and besides who knows what happens to us after this life, if there is an ‘after this life’? I don’t wanna be alone again.” I did understand what he was talking about. It was immortals like Lucas that made my overall decision hard.

  We didn’t say anything else to each other and minutes dragged by as I was confined within the small cell without knowing what had happened to the others. I didn’t look out the small opening until I finally heard someone else being dragged in, yelling at his captures to let him go. I turned around to see in horror that it was Adam. They placed him in the cell directly across from mine. I could hear myself yell for him, letting him know that he wasn’t alone even if he thought he was but I wasn’t sure if he could hear me. Wondering what had happened terrified me because I would die if something happened to anyone but the mortals were the ones I worried about more for the simple fact that they could die many way verse one. If something were to happen to Adam I didn’t know if I could live with myself.

  “What’s this?” Lucas asked.

  “We found him sneaking around outside, must be looking for the girl.’ I heard Conner say from the outside of my cell. ‘I remember his face to. He was with her and those pesky Hollings from when we took her.” He explained before leaving, heading back to Emmalee. Lucas waited for a few minutes then knelt down to the small opening in my door.