by Kai Leakes
Sanna felt Lenox and Kyo trying to kick the door open. Her body shook and hummed as she felt her brothers and Khamun approach. She knew Khamun would find a way in, so she stepped forward again and wasn’t shocked as he stood at her side, her brother Darren with him.
“San . . . ” Khamun unsheathed a hidden gun as he assessed her and readdressed her, “Oracle-Vessel.”
Sanna saw Darren’s eyes light with his own power, and she stood closer to them both.
“Dr. Merril, who are you? And what did you do?” Darren quietly asked. His voice was so low, so deadly, it made Khamun flash a dark smile as he reached to open the door.
“Leave it closed,” Sanna heard herself say. “There is not enough room for everyone.”
Darren reached toward her and placed a hand on her shoulder. The touch was innocent and filled with concern, but it triggered something else that broke like an overflowing dam. Power seemed to expand and ebb as both Sanna’s and Darren’s heads dropped back then bowed forward, their eyes locked in on the threatening target as they spoke as one.
“Tell us now what you want with the Oracle-Vessel,” they said as one voice, one mind.
Something in the change had Khamun breathing hard, his fangs at lethal length as he stood to block them both.
“Speak, or I will drain you of every ounce of dark sin you carry, bitch.” The Reaper was in full mode, and his body shook with a power he never felt before. He had to roll his shoulders to keep his wings from expanding.
Those wings and that thread had Winter scraping at the walls, ready to run. “No, no, don’t. Please, please, hear me out. I am not here to play games. I am an ally!” she stuttered, scraping some more.
She couldn’t believe her eyes. She was standing in front of bounty hunters for the Most High himself. She felt a trickle between her legs at the realization. This was something none of her kind had ever witnessed for generations.
Yes, her kind was trained to kill the enemy, to kill the pustules who made their love for hunting humans strenuous, and who sat at the feet of the one who shunned them. She was told her kind was an Alpha, but what she was witnessing told her different. She had found information about what she was witnessing, and seeing it in the flesh had her ready to die now for all the wrongs she had committed.
“But you helped some in later life? Your soul opened, and you saw the truths.” The disembodied voice of the Oracle-Vessel and Darren filled the room, tearing into her brain as their stare commanded her gaze.
The tall, handsome one with the extended fangs made her soul shake with fear as she felt a coiling tightness in her chest the closer he got.
Tears poured down her lips, and she opened her mouth to speak, stumbling as if she was mentally incapable, “I know the truths. I found the records.”
“What records?” the Reaper asked. Suddenly he was in her face. He watched as her eyes rolled in the back of her head, and he inhaled with a malicious smile. His large hands slid over her shaking body and gripped under her jaw to expose her creamy neck. “What truths?” he cooed.
She felt her blood pump colder than anything Reina or her father had ever done to her. Why? Because she knew if she died by his hands then there would be no return. It would be nothing but eternal pain and suffering, which had her clawing at his wrists as he squeezed.
“She has found the records of truths. The Nephilim scrolls. Only, it is one. The rest are well hidden, waiting to be found by others,” the pair echoed.
And the Reaper squeezed in satisfaction as he lifted her with one arm, his bicep pumping. “Is she to be trusted, Oracle-Vessel? Because I am very hungry, and her sins smell succulent.” The Reaper gave a menacing chuckle.
Winter’s eyes widened. She instantly prepped her body to kick and flip him over her desk but only ended up with having her leg being blocked.
“Fight me again, and I will suck your knowledge from you,” was all the Reaper had to say to make Winter obey, her eyes still locked on the Oracle.
She licked her chapping lips while the door to her office shook and voices bellowed outside. She knew the others would be here and they had to be careful, or the Cursed who watched her would be ready to start a war on UIC’s campus. “The book is on my desk. I wanted to give it to you to show my loyalty.”
“She speaks truth. Her soul was chained in protection. Those chains have broken over time, as is written in the pages of the Scrolls,” the disembodied voice replied.
The door to her office slowly opened as others from their team stepped inside.
The Reaper narrowed his eyes, his head slightly tilting to the side, and he held tight to Winter’s throat. “Prophecy? Why hasn’t the Eldress seen this?”
“With the loss of potential Oracles, the Cursed knew it would blindside us. This is what has happened. Surviving Oracles have been weakened, and many have been without teachers to know how to reach the Most High, but the awakening has begun. This Vessel will not be taken. Sin-Eater, you are linked with us. It is your duty as is the duty of the linked Gargoyles to carry out the truth. In this, salvation will come.”
The Reaper blinked and cast a glance behind him, his attention still on Winter, but also focusing on what the Oracle-Vessel had said. “Sin-Eater?”
“Yes. Your kind goes by many names, but you are a Reaper, as you deduced. But you are also a Sin-Eater. Their sins are your power. Your line has been lost through the generations, hunted, killed, or turned, made to be extinct, just as with the Oracles of anon. The awakening has begun. Seek out your history. These bodies must rest. It has been drained. This joining was unbalanced. Reaper . . . Sin-Eater, protect us now.”
The Reaper let go dropping Winter as she slide to the floor. She coughed. Her eyes still locked on the powerful being before her. She wrapped her arms around herself, her knees buried in her chest.
“That one can be trusted. We will keep her cloaked. To the Dark she will appear the same, but we will see the truth. We will also cloak the one named Amit. It is time he came into his birthright as well. He will be a tracker of the Curse. His bite will let him seek those to hunt us. Trust him and use him well. He wishes to be of help, and he is a chosen child of the Truth, just as you all are.”
The room filled with power that ebbed and expanded, moving through the streets of Chicago, finding its mark. Amit lay weak and sick, his body so thin, you could make out every bone and vein in his body. The bite had spread fast, and he was slowly dying and turning against his will. It felt like his very life force was being pulled from him, and he fought for breath. His prayers slowly spilled from his cracked lips as Kali fed him water.
Tears spilled down her face, and she prayed with him.
The Oracle light watched the pair. It dispersed an ebb of warmth to fill the compound then wrapped around the two before snapping back and slamming into Kali.
Kali’s body arched then bowed forward, her hair spilling over her face, before she sat up and stared at Amit. “Your shell is dying. Changing and activating the dormant Wrath gene within. This too must be healed,” she said, her disembodied voice splitting in two, sounding like another’s.
Amit sat back in amazement, his body aching and shaking with his jagged cough. Blood spewed from his lips as he looked up.
“Oracle-Vessel? Is Kali okay?”
“We will not hurt this one. This one will anchor us and heal thee. Trust and do not be afraid. Her power will anchor you always.”
Bowing his head, he had seen himself. He was nothing but a shell. His eyes had started fading, and he didn’t understand why until now. He had no clue that he had the Wrath gene, which meant he was not going into the Death process.
“Do not fear. You will not die, but . . . you will be broken. What you’ve seen will help you and this team. Trust in Him for we are His mouthpiece.”
Before he could say a word, he watched Kali’s glowing body bow back then reach forward, clasping unto his chest, and he screamed.
Power rich and ancient flowed through him as it split with
in him. He felt the silky, energetic, spicy power of Kali mixed with that of the Oracle-Vessel. In that moment, he felt his own dormant power twist and bind with Kali’s.
Silent tears streaming down his cheeks, his body lifted in the air.
Moments before Kali had been flipping through a book talking with Amit about new information she had found, and now she was not only a part of her cousin’s ancient power, but now she could feel the very DNA of Amit, and he felt good.
The darkness that tried to taint him was purified and changed to help their cause as the Wrath gene pulsed and fought to make him living dead. She didn’t want him to die, and it scared him. She already was on edge because she felt the SOS her cousin sent out, but now she was privy to her cousin’s true power. She now was acting as an aid in helping the man she helplessly watched contort in shattering pain.
Her hands were controlled by her cousin. They fisted and tugged, pulling the light Amit’s soul tried to attach to his skin as if it was a sticky web. She twisted her hand, snapped back, then pushed forward, that sticky web softening and becoming delicate like cotton candy as it misted and flowed back into his body.
His deep screams burst through the compound, hitting Kali in her senses, and she fell to her knees. She slowly connected with an awareness of what was going on. Her eyes adjusted to everything around her, and she caught the vague undercurrent of power in the chambers.
It was a beautiful sight, and she wanted to cry from the magnificent look of it all. She let go, heaving, sweating, and she felt her cousin’s power leave her, but not before amplifying her own gifts. Her cousin’s power kissed her mind with knowledge unlike anything she had ever pulled through the net, and she was grateful. She stood wavering, slowly looking around, and saw the power spread through the whole hidden bunker and upper-level building.
Tears spilled down her eyes as she cupped her mouth.
“Sanna,” she whispered. She knew her cousin was the baddest Oracle-Vessel in history. Her searches through Nephilim records had given her snatches of old first-generation history supposedly lost through translation, oral traditions, wars, and politics. In what she found, throughout Nephilim history, in every Nephilim Society around the world, the Scrolls of Nephilim kept popping up, or the Book of Understanding, as some called it.
As she searched deeper, she learned that others also called it the Book of Truth, and she kept finding words like Mouthpiece, Triad, and something that was the real reason why she kept digging, Sin-Eater. That word rang familiar to her, and it upset her that she couldn’t remember why, so she kept digging.
Amit’s falling body brought her back to reality. The power that had saturated into his body was now gone as he lay in Kali’s arms. His sweat-drenched, shiny, jet-black hair lay plastered to his face, and she couldn’t help herself from pushing it out the way.
Once greying and sickly yellow skin was now flushed with health as warm sepia copper skin washed away the grey, and Amit’s once erratic breathing regulated. He was okay. He was really okay, and according to Sanna, he was now not only a Disciple but a Broken Wrath Angel.
Outside of the bite where the venom spread like dark fibrous threads from his neck, over his shoulder and down his forearm, the fluid seemed to harden and form an intricate woven design.
She traced it with her fingers, and it hummed with power. Power that felt clean and safe. Something within her made her lean in and place her plush smooth lips against his heated skin where the bite was, and she inhaled. He smelled so good. She knew what had just happened had pulled them together, and though she wanted to deny it, she couldn’t.
His arms wrapped around her, and she felt her own power amplify. Strange crap was happening all around, flowing through her mind. She quickly sat up and saw Amit was still asleep.
“Hmmm. Sanna, what did you do, cousin?” Kali muttered as she watched the rest of Amit’s color return. She definitely was going to ignore this guy and be about her business, but she was glad that a former Initiate was healed, something no one thought ever possible.
Smirking, she half-heartedly laughed. “Team Light one, Team Dark negative one.”
Back at the UIC campus, the same surge of power fluxed through the tiny office as currents lifted Winter from her position against the wall, tears spilling down her cheeks. Everything she was blocked from opened in her mind, and her eyes locked on a tall, handsome man with dark black hair and a jawline clenched in anger and awe. He was hers, and she smiled as warmth filled the coldness and shattered scars through her body while she was dropped to the floor, panting.
“You will be able to be as you are supposed to be, without them being made aware of our enemies. What we gave, only He can gift.”
With that, both Darren and his sister crumbled like bricks, both drenched in sweat, their clothes plastered to their bodies.
She weakly watched her other student, Takeshi, drop down and shoulder-lift Darren with a grunt.
The Reaper quickly scooped up Darren’s sister to hold her to his chest, sparks of power fusing and flowing between the pair like links, and it was beautiful.
“The one I gave the paper to . . . it is a key. It is sealed on his hands to open that book.”
The Reaper hissed, baring his teeth, his gun cocked and pointed her way.
She dutifully dropped her head in acceptance as a prayer she remembered her mother telling her flowed from her lips. She felt a power in her she knew she wasn’t ready to connect to just yet, so she patiently waited.
“Talk,” was all she heard as she opened her eyes and saw that the gun was no longer pointing her way.
“I found a scroll around nineteen fifty-five, hidden within the healing chambers. It was like it sang to me—”
“Speed it up,” a dispassionate voice interrupted.
She looked up and noticed the handsome, dark-haired man staring at her with a slight coldness.
“The scroll took long to decipher, but when I did, I saw it led me to a book. That book. I tried to read it, but it was blank, but it had symbols stamped into the pages like Braille, which let me know the only ones who could read this were those of the Light. I don’t know why that book was there and why it went undetected, but there it is. When I helped”—Winter glanced at Marco then the Reaper and saw both men grip their guns tight.
She quickly added, “A boy escaped. That was the day a page opened to me, and I saw what led me to you all. Sin-Eater, Mouthpiece, and Triad.”
The Reaper slowly stood, hoisting Darren’s sister up like a feather, and he looked down at Winter’s slightly flushed skin and saw that she had indeed changed.
He was through with her, as far as he was concerned. Drain her, he wanted to. Snuff her out? Hell, yeah, he was ready too, but the woman in his arms kept him from that task. He didn’t feel alone in what he was anymore. He felt more.
The power that rose in him and filled every bit of him scared the hell out of him, but what calmed him was that his power matched Sanna’s. He knew that if he touched her, a gauntlet would be thrown and a sensual war would start. But he knew it wasn’t time for that, so he stayed away. Plus, something in him said she needed balance, and her balance wasn’t all there.
Stepping back, he kept his eyes on Winter.
“That book will tell us what that means?” asked the dark-haired man, dressed in dark grey jeans and a black button-down up at the sleeves. His well-maintained anger occasionally flashed in his icy pupils as he stayed in the back.
“Yes, some of it. The book looks like it connects to another book, so we—you all have to find the next book,” Winter whispered. Her head quickly snapped to the side, and she tried to pull herself up. “Some of the Dark are coming. You all must leave quickly. The key is in Amit’s skin. The Oracle can retrieve it. That was a spell I also found and hoped it would work.”
A tall cocoa-hued man with protection sigils that swirled with his constrained anger walked close to her and dropped down in a squat in front of her. A deep accent made her warm, but the st
ill coldness behind it had her pressing backwards again.
“Just to be clear, shawty, you backslide in anyway”—He quickly grabbed her hand, flipping it, and pressed two fingers into her palm, and a sudden burning sensation hit her. The smell of charred flesh had her sick, as memories flashed across her eyes of her being burned at the stake, and the words Witch and Whore being thrown at her flooded her mind.
“You will relive every pain of your past lives and what you did unto others while you lived in the Dark. Ya heard meh?”
Winter gulped and shook her head up and down in understanding while the man stared her down, his fingers still pressing deep.
“This mark will remind you, and I will be able to find you wherever you are, Witch. This is magic you can’t reverse.” He calmly stood and grabbed the book, sweat beading at his forehead, before the Reaper glanced at her one last time, his power emitting that same ominous current the Oracle and Darren had emitted. “You need us, call us.”
A heavy, blank, midnight-black card lay at her feet. She smelled the silver in it. Words scripted in silver appeared before her eyes and burned in her mind as she touched it. A phone number and scripture, she had heard, appear just for that cardholder who has the gift of Light in them, lay on its surface and misted to connect with her inner Light.
“Use it smartly, and Calvin will find you. We will be in touch,” said the man she used to know as the Attacker but now knew as the Reaper.
Suddenly, the room darkened, and everyone in it was gone, and her office was back in order. She felt at peace, and she took a moment to breathe in that satisfaction before shifting back to “play the dark game.”
She quickly cleaned herself up and sent a dark charge through the room to balance out any Light that may be picked up. Just then a member of the Dark society knocked on her door.
