by Krista Walsh
“How did you get past my traps?” he asked.
The woman made a rasping noise it took him a moment to recognize as laughter. “Did you honestly think they would be enough to keep you safe? Have you learned nothing from your recent encounters?
“I won’t go with you,” he said.
“We wouldn’t expect you to,” said the woman. “Although it’s a relief to know that you take such a stance. Please, get up. We’ve come to speak with you on urgent business and to make a request. The sooner you comply, the easier we can all rest.”
Zach raised himself to his feet without once taking his eye off the three women, but they remained composed, their hands folded in front of them, their expressions stern.
The skin on his back burned as ridges pressed outward from his spine, but he breathed deeply to keep himself calm. As he did, he picked up on the energy floating off the trio in front of him, a power so intense it rippled over his skin like a gust of wind.
“Who are you?” he demanded.
“All your answers are coming,” she said, “but why do you not make yourself comfortable first?”
Zach didn’t trust her poor attempts to put him at ease. If these women really wanted to have a civil conversation, they should have had the common courtesy to knock.
And he definitely wasn’t stupid enough to sit down in the presence of three powerful strangers. They were likely to turn on him the moment he relaxed his guard and take him to Karl. He wanted to wrap his hands around their cloaks and haul them outside, but his fingers were still all pins and needles from his last attempt to make contact.
“I’m just fine here,” he said, crossing his arms. “Let’s get to it.”
“My name is Sandar,” the woman said. “These are my colleagues, Noami and Chiron.” The other two bowed their heads. “We are part of the Gnosis Collegiate.”
Zach scowled. “That’s just a myth. There’s never been anything to prove the Collegiate was real.”
Sandar’s expression widened with barely perceptible surprise. “I’m impressed you’ve even heard the name. I confess, I expected to have to explain it to you.”
“I might look like a lumbering troll, but I’ve done my research. Anyone who lives in this world and doesn’t do some digging into the past doesn’t stand much of a chance of surviving to see much of the future.”
“Too true. Only the truly wise appreciate such a fact. Which is why, of course, we exist. If you know our name, you know our purpose — to safeguard the written lore of the otherworld in this dimension and maintain an ongoing chronicle of all otherworldly affairs, concerns, politics, and conflicts. We track all species, know the weaknesses and strengths of every breed of otherworldly being, and watch to make sure no one steps too far out of the bindings of the signed treaties.”
“A goal you seem to have given up on after the demon wars,” he said.
Sandar’s eyes narrowed, and the other two lowered their heads. “I assure you that was not the case. However, we fear that something else, possibly something worse, is rising. Evidence suggests the epicenter of this new crisis will be here in New Haven, and we believe that in order to protect everything we have striven to achieve, you should not be here once its begins.”
“It may already be too late,” said the one called Chiron.
In a rush, a wave of images spun through Zach’s mind of a city on fire, storm clouds sweeping in and leaving everything barren in their wake. Zach’s heart stuttered and his fingers turned prickly with panic, but he managed to wrangle control over himself. The images weren’t real. Whatever these women were afraid of, it wasn’t here yet.
He hadn’t known what to expect from these people when they’d started talking. The Gnosis Collegiate was supposed to be associated with the guardians, the overseers of the balance that kept the otherworld and the mundane worlds safe. But the guardians had been erased from existence over a hundred years ago, and no one had heard of the Collegiate since. Most sane people believed they had never existed at all.
Now here were these women, not only telling him it did, but that he should get out of town to protect the world from another war?
He snorted. “What have you been smoking?”
“We appeal to your sense of duty. If you desire to keep our world secret and safe, you should do as we ask,” Sandar said.
“What would my running away accomplish?” The headache at the base of Zach’s skull pounded, and his muscles screamed from their earlier workout against the trio’s invisible wall. He rubbed his hands over his arms to soothe the cramps that threatened to strip his strength. “What do I have to do with any of this?”
“We can ensure that you have whatever you need when you arrive at the destination of your choosing,” Chiron said, stepping forward. “You would also have the gratitude of the Collegiate for your role in preventing what might possibly be a worldwide disaster.”
“Your gratitude means nothing unless I know what it is I’m meant to be preventing,” Zach said, and he forced his arms to cross again, hugging them against his chest to stop the irritating tremble.
“We don’t have time to explain it all.” Noami said. “We just ask that you trust us.”
“Sorry, I don’t trust people who sneak into my bedroom and watch me sleep. That’s just asking for trouble I can’t afford to take on right now.”
He walked over to the stove and lit it. If he was going to be hosting company with his headache, the least he could do for himself was brew up some coffee.
“How about you get out of here,” he said. “I know the demons are coming, and believe me when I say I have no intention of letting them take me with them. I’ll fight to the death before I let that happen.”
“Death is no guarantee of safety,” Noami said. “The enemy wants you alive, but they can get what they need from your corpse.”
Zach clenched his teeth. If they were right, that changed things. But he wasn’t about to walk away and leave everything on Daphne’s plate. Not when he had no idea what role these women played. He couldn’t overlook the irony that he was fighting to stay when only a few days ago he’d been packed and eager to walk out. How times changed.
Sandar shifted to face him. “If you will consider leaving, we will tell you the secret of your parents, and why your mother worked so hard to protect you from the world. We will tell you why you exist in the first place.”
Zach froze and his mind closed in on itself, refusing to come up with any ideas on what to say or how to get these people out of his home. His hands trembled around the handle of the French press, causing the lid to rattle against the cracked lip, and this time he couldn’t blame it on any electrical charge.
A voice in the back of his head yelled at him not to be stupid. They were playing him, and he was falling for it. It didn’t matter if they knew something about his mother. His past? It had no bearing on his future.
“You believe that you are the spawn of two star-crossed lovers, a Korvack demon and an angel who fell to remain with her,” Sandar said, proceeding without his answer. A shout bubbled inside Zach to tell her to be quiet, but it lodged in his throat. “You grew up being told that your father was living somewhere on the streets after your mother evicted him from the house. Your mother cared for you and treated you well, but after she died, you had no one. Your angel brothers cast you out, and the Korvack demons nearly killed you, leaving you physically scarred. You sacrificed much to learn the truth, but everything you believe is a lie.”
Zach’s breaths came quickly, and no matter how hard he tried to gain control, they slipped and sped faster. His heart performed a double-beat in his chest, a heavy painful rhythm that kept him focused on his physical reactions instead of any emotions Sandar’s words evoked.
The scales on the backs of his hands fought to come to the surface, searing his nerves, causing them to itch to the point of agony, and he could do nothing to stop it. His palms burned and his back ached as the ridges pressed closer against his skin.
> How did they know any of this?
“The truth is you were not born out of any such romantic liaison,” Noami said. “You were created. You were the result of a science experiment that, fortunately for the world, was believed to have failed.”
Zach’s throat was parched with a fire licking up his esophagus from the pit of his stomach. He clenched his teeth to keep the flames within, unable to ask her what she meant.
“You see, there is a group out there whose sole mission is to achieve the supremacy of the otherworld here on earth. They are the group that instigated the demon wars a hundred years ago, aided by sympathetic groups in other dimensions. They are not mindless beasts who are out for blood and a quick meal, but an organized, intelligent collective. Even after their defeat, they did not dismantle. On the contrary, they have shown an impressive amount of patience, taking their time to set the foundation of their plan in place. They have been making slow moves ever since, avoiding even our watchful eye.”
Chiron lowered her gaze. “We did not see this path until it was too late for us to act. During the wars, we were trapped in the College, unable to aid those who needed us. We have been there ever since, watching the world through our mirrors. But there were no signs of anything changing. We had anticipated some moves might be made, and when there was nothing, we grew suspicious. We kept watch over the areas we thought were most vulnerable. But as the years passed and nothing happened, we started to believe our suspicions were false.”
“We began to think the demons had simply wanted the guardians’ oversight to be quashed,” Sandar said. “To give them more freedom in this world. I must admit, we grew lax in our watching.”
“Until chance led us to the magically sealed room of Jermaine Hershel, and the seven strangers he brought together to solve the mystery of his murder,” said Noami.
The hair on the back of Zach’s neck rose, and he clenched his teeth tighter, ignoring the sharp pain shooting into his head.
“We were led there because of the keeper of a text that might have helped us prevent whatever crisis is coming, but in doing so, we heard all of the stories spoken around that table. We learned about you.” Chiron extended her hand toward Zach.
“From that point on, we conducted extensive research about everyone who came out of that room. Using our mirrors and the few contacts we managed to maintain in the outside world, we discovered the laboratory where you were created. We learned how the cells of two different species were combined together, and how the woman you know to be your mother was inseminated. We learned how your birth was deemed a failure when the combination did not yield the desired results, and how your destiny was to face the incinerator, much like the demons you, yourself, destroyed last night.”
Zach’s heart stopped and then resumed even faster at the mention of his and Daphne’s late-night mission.
“What this group did not expect,” Sandar went on, “was for your mother to respond as any mother would at the prospect of the child she had borne being so heartlessly destroyed. She took you and fled, burying you deep in the heart of downtown New Haven, far from the lab where you had been grown. From your own mouth, we learned how she took you to a place where she believed you could live in safety and instilled in you the importance of your secret. She taught you that it was better to live alone and not let anyone in, and she did this to ensure that the scientists who had created you would never learn that you had survived.”
Noami tilted her head to stare at him, and he swore that stars shifted in her eyes. “Her plan succeeded for over thirty-five years. But then Jermaine Hershel began his research into what had happened in the lab. He followed your mother’s footsteps to this city and watched for you. He heard rumors of your presence in the alleys and dropped hints through his contacts that he could help you achieve the one goal you desired most — to be able to choose a side, instead of being trapped within your incompatible duality.”
The scales at the back of Zach’s throat hardened. With every swallow, every breath he took, they poked into him, driving him mad. He didn’t want to hear any more. He didn’t want to hear about his mother or remember how Jermaine had nearly torn him apart.
Steam rose from between the scales on his arms as they extended toward his elbows. His stomach crusted over, the dark skin flaring bright with angry redness, as though the fire within him were burning him from the inside out.
Chiron stared at his transformation with interest, but said only, “Although our access into the minds of the group coming after you is limited, we suspect they are trying to get you into their grasp so they can take more of your blood. Thirty-seven years ago, your survival was deemed too dangerous to allow, but they now see it as a boon. You are their chance to learn where they went wrong, so they don’t make the same error again.”
“The true danger,” Sandar said, “is that they are now close to possessing the full knowledge of how to carry out their initial experiment. If they manage to interpret the code in The Book of Universes, they could use your blood to complete what they started forty years ago.”
“More truly, to complete what they tried to begin over a hundred years ago, when they eliminated the guardians,” said Noami. “If all of their pieces are in play, they could finally gain control over the entire otherworld.”
“How?” Zach asked. The words came out hoarse and gravelly, air working its way around the scales growing inside him. “What did they try to do to me?”
“From one who has done as much research as yourself, is the answer not obvious?” Chiron asked, one gray eyebrow rising.
Zach snarled and hunched forward. His grip over his patience was slipping, but he couldn’t pinpoint what he was so angry about. These women were discussing decisions that had been made over thirty-five years ago. He had lived with those decisions, accepted them, adapted to them. His mother had done her best for him, and he’d always been grateful for her help in making sure he learned how to survive in this world. He should not be feeling as though the earth beneath his feet were shifting, about to rupture.
He worked hard to get control over himself, but his power strained taut, close to snapping.
“Calm yourself, Zachariel,” Sandar said. “We came here to warn you, to explain to you why it is in your best interests, as well as the interests of the world, to flee beyond their grasp. To once more disappear into the wilds of the streets where they cannot find you. Do you understand now?”
“What were they trying to do to me?” He stretched his arms out at his sides as the scales extended all the way to his shoulders and across his chest. Blood ran down his back as the ridges of his spine pierced his skin, and over his brow as the points of his horns broke through.
“They were attempting to create a new breed of guardian,” Sandar said. “One that they could control. You, Zachariel, were meant to be the first of a new military race.”
15
Molly stayed in her room until the shouting match downstairs between her parents faded into what she hoped was a rational conversation between two calm, reasonable adults. She hadn’t wanted to interrupt their arguing, so she’d spent the last hour pacing the length of her bedroom.
With each pass, she’d kept herself focused on all the small details of her surroundings, experiencing a deeper appreciation for knowing where the corner of her bed was or how far her computer chair had been pulled away from her desk. She’d stood over her dresser and, although she couldn’t tell just by sensing it what each item was, she’d known roughly where everything sat on the smooth, cool surface.
The epiphany of how much she’d taken for granted was still reverberating through her skull.
Eventually, her grumbling stomach induced her to risk any lingering tension in the kitchen, and she headed downstairs. When she stepped onto the cold tile floor, she didn’t sense anyone around, so she snatched an apple from the fridge along with a few wax-wrapped circles of cheese and slipped them into the pocket of her jean jacket.
“Are you going out
?” her mom asked. Molly jumped at her voice, having been too caught up in her thoughts to realize she’d come into the room.
“I thought I’d take a bit of a walk,” she said. “I have a lot to think through.”
“Of course. Are you okay?”
Molly leaned against the counter and pressed her hands against the edge. “I am, actually. I’ve learned some things about the world lately that make your story come as less than a complete surprise.”
A high-pitched squeal sounded as a dining chair was pulled back from the table. “What kinds of things?”
Molly found herself wishing she hadn’t said anything. She’d intended to put her mother at ease about her mental well-being, but she definitely wasn’t ready to get into the whole saving a daemelus from an evil warlock part. Regardless of the things they’d talked about today or how laid back her mom was in general about Molly’s adventures, Molly was certain the information would send her into a bit of a tizzy. The “you’re grounded for life” kind of tizzy.
“Oh, you know, some of the stuff in the news and whatever,” she said, aiming for flippant. “It just strikes me that some of it was more out of the ordinary than usual. More like something you’d read about in a fantasy novel about the end of the world.”
Her mother laughed. “I doubt it’s that extreme.”
You have no idea, Molly wanted to say, but she forced a smile. “Probably not. But, yeah, you don’t need to worry about me.”
“So where are you going?”
“I don’t know. Maybe the park.”
“Do you want company?”
“No, I’m good on my own. But thanks.”
She pushed away from the counter and extended her arms. The chair scraped against the floor as her mother stood up, and a moment later she stepped into them. Molly rested her head on her mom’s shoulder, breathing in the comfortable smells of lavender and laundry detergent.
“Are you and dad going to be all right?” she asked. Now that she’d had time to recover from her own shock, it began to sink in how much the arguing had bothered her. In sixteen years, she’d never heard them go at each other like that.
