“No one looks at the Keepers. They keep to themselves unless approached for information. Let’s just hope no one does that to you. If you keep your head down and your hood up, with a little bit of luck, you won’t get caught.”
“If I do…” I hesitate, looking deep into Michaela’s blue eyes, silently thanking her for everything.
“If you do, I won’t even know about it. You’ll just disappear without so much as a goodbye. And I won’t even be able to ask about you. So don’t get caught. I don’t want to worry about you for the rest of eternity.”
“You wouldn’t have to. I’d be gone.”
“Exactly.”
I take the robes from her and change. Once I’m done, I leave my human clothes carefully concealed behind the cloud. “If anyone should find them, we’re toast,” I say.
“They won’t. These have been hidden for almost a week on Earth. As soon as Kismet’s name appeared on my list, I knew I had to come get you. I just needed to wait for the right time.”
I think of my last moments by her graveside. “I couldn’t have left her before today anyway.”
Michaela nods knowingly as we approach the gold gate. “You go in first, I’ll be right behind you. Don’t call attention to yourself. No one can know you’re here.”
“That’s going to make it hard to do any kind of recon work.”
“We’ll talk about it more later.” She gives me a little shove toward the gate, and I put my hand out. The moment I make contact, the gate dissolves and I pass through it.
I expect a bustle of activity, but I’m not sure why. I’ve never even been to this side of the heavens before, and I’ve never seen the gates from either side. And based on how empty it appears to be, I imagine not too many others have seen it either.
Michaela bumps into me in the doorway. “Sorry, I expected you to keep moving,” she says. “Only Reapers frequent this area. If one of them sees you, they might think it’s odd, but you probably won’t be questioned. We’re all too busy lately to pay much attention to anything but our work.”
That’s a little sad. “Don’t you want a break?”
Michaela looks at me like I have six heads, but then she actually pauses to consider my question. “Maybe. But to even have a chance at getting a break, I need help. That’s where you come in.”
I nod, doing my best to keep my head down and my face concealed as we walk. Because of that, I can’t get a good sense of where we’re going. Michaela guides me with a light touch on my elbow, telling me when to turn, when to slow down, and when to speed up.
I occasionally hear other footsteps, but the Reapers—if that’s what they are—never speak to us. All I can do is hope they won’t notice the banished soul walking among them.
A few twists and turns later, we arrive at a door. Michaela ushers me inside and shuts it behind her.
“Okay, you should be safe in here.”
I pull the hood off and look around. It’s much different from my quarters. Hers doesn’t look out on the heavens like mine did. Mesmerized, I walk to her back wall, with my hand held out. “Earth,” I breathe.
“Yes. Reapers get to see anything on Earth they’d like. I change mine based on my mood. That’s a waterfall in the Brazilian rainforest. One of my favorites. I haven’t gotten to see it in real life yet, but it’s on my list. But I have seen some other beautiful things.”
In an instant, the wall changes to the painted deserts of Arizona, then to the northern lights in Alaska, to the colorful fish of the Great Barrier Reef, to a volcano in Hawaii, to a lightning storm, and on and on as I watch all the beauty I missed with my mouth hanging open.
“I thought New York was nice,” I whisper, not wanting to disturb the moment.
She giggles. “It is nice. They have some great things. But the world is more than that. So much more,” she says. There’s an undeniable hint of longing in her voice.
I understand. Now that I’m home, I wonder if I’ll ever be able to go back and see all the things Michaela has seen. Although part of me is glad to be back in the heavens among my friends, a larger part of me misses Earth, and my family there. The feeling makes me feel out of sorts, as if I don’t know which place is truly my home.
Michaela doesn’t give me much time to dwell. “I have to go. I’ve already been gone too long. I can’t let them notice. I’ll be back when I can. Try to discover what you can, but for the love of God—”
I cut her off. “Don’t get caught.” I nod. “I know.”
“Good luck,” she says.
“You too. I hope you don’t get any more surprise names on your list.”
“Me too,” she says. And with that, she leaves me alone in her room.
I look around the small space, similarly furnished to my own. I never thought I would find myself back in these surroundings again, and now that I’m here—as a fugitive—I’m not sure what to do.
First thing’s first. I need to write a note to Fia so she can tell the others I’m okay, which is true—for now. There is no need for everyone to know the danger I’m in.
Fia,
Thank you so much. For everything. I hope you know how much you mean to me.
I’ve gone home. You were right, and so was I. Michaela needs my help, so I’ve gone back to the heavens with her. Something isn’t right, and Andrew and Kismet aren’t the only ones to have been taken before their time.
Please tell Cedric I’m sorry. And tell the others I’m all right, and I love them. I’ll check in on you all from time to time, and maybe someday I can come back.
I will make this right, or die trying, Fia.
—Penn
I fold the letter and leave it out for Michaela. Next up is to find some answers. But as I sink down into a chair facing a wide expanse of turquoise water and white sand beach, I wonder where in the heavens I’m going to start.
17.
Because I’m dressed as a Keeper, my first thought is to go to their side of heaven and search for anomalies among their literature. It’s quiet work, where no one will bother me. But I fear it will take too long, if the information I need is even in there.
So I decide to poke around where I am. Maybe if I can see the names for myself, I can make a connection between them. It would be easier with Michaela’s help, but she isn’t back yet. Probably still trying to make up for the time she lost while she was collecting me.
With absolutely no idea of where to go, I set out, hoping to find what I need before someone finds me.
As I wander the halls of the Reapers, I find myself wishing I’d followed Michaela when she left, so I would at least know my way around a little.
“Keeper,” a deep voice calls.
I freeze. I don’t recognize the voice, but if the soul behind it recognizes me, I’m done. Briefly, I consider running, but I know I won’t get far. My best chance is to play it cool and make the guy believe I’m a Keeper.
“Yes?” I ask as I turn to face the owner of the booming voice.
A tall, muscular man with dark skin, dark hair, and dark eyes, he’s dressed in a black shirt and pants that fade from black to gray to white. A Reaper. But he isn’t familiar to me. I can only hope he doesn’t recognize me either.
“Are you lost?”
I clear my throat. “Yes, actually. I’m looking for the most recent list of names. For our records.”
“Of course. This way.” He holds out his arm and falls into step beside me as we walk in that direction.
“Are you new? I’ve never known the Keepers to send someone to collect the names before.”
“Yes, I’m new.”
“I see.” He chuckles to himself. “Are they punishing you for something, or do they really want the names that bad? Usually we deliver them at the end of the day.”
“Considering the number of names we’ve been getting lately, we wanted to get a head start on the task.”
The man nods grimly. “There has been a slight influx.”
He stops in front of a gl
ass door that pulls silently into the wall, allowing us passage. Inside, LED screens line three walls of the huge room. Names cover the screens, and more than once, I see the list trickle downward so a new name can appear on top.
Pearl Hughes
Frederico Gillam
Jeff Rummel
They’re my creations.
Thinking I might take a chance, I ask, “How many surprises have popped up today?”
The man lets out a sharp sigh, but I’m not sure what it’s directed at. Me? The situation? The fact that I know about the situation? All three? Despite his obvious hesitation, the man answers. “The last one was about four hours ago. Kismet something.”
Four hours ago. It had been just over a week for me.
“Do you have a list of the surprises?” The man gives me a sidelong look, and I worry I’ve gone too far. The longer I stay with this man, the greater the chance he will recognize me or realize I’m not a Keeper. I quickly try to cover my tracks. “We’re keeping a record of what’s happening.”
The man nods. “This way.”
I follow him to the end of the room, and then over to the corner on the right. There’s a door there I couldn’t see from where we entered. The door is glass, like all the rest in the Reapers’ section of heaven, but this door is an opaque white, so I can’t see through it. It blends in seamlessly with the walls. In fact, if the Reaper hadn’t led me here, I never would’ve seen it.
The man leads me to the end of the dark room. A small LED screen is there, with just over half a dozen names on it. Kismet’s is among them, as is Andrew’s. I know who all of them are. I created each of them.
“I’ll leave you now,” the man says. “Please, show yourself out.”
“Of course. Thank you for your kindness.”
The man tilts his head in acknowledgment and leaves. I move some boxes off a chair and take a seat in front of the list, wishing I’d brought something with me to write the names on. Even so, I can tell that Michaela was right—the only two that appear to be related are Andrew and Kismet.
The only fact they have in common is that they are all adults. No children are on the list. That seems odd. There also aren’t any elderly people. They’re all in their twenties or early thirties. There are only seven of them.
I look at the very first name, the one who started it all. Nysa Amberry. What’s special about her? She was only twenty-four when she passed, so I must have spun her thread fairly recently. I try to think back to her order, wishing I could touch her hand to get a better picture. She was energetic. I remember that. Energetic but disciplined. A nurse. That’s right. The order was for a Healer on Earth. I smile to myself as I put the pieces together, but they still don’t add up to a full picture.
As I try to puzzle it out, Michaela comes into the room. “Thought I might find you here when you weren’t in my room. How did you get here?”
“A very kind Reaper helped me out,” I say. “Hey, what happened with Nysa?” I nod to her name at the top of the list.
Michaela sighs. “She was the first, we think. An anomaly, or so we hoped. Her death was blamed on some infectious disease she came into contact with in the hospital where she worked. It killed her quickly and quietly, leaving no trace behind, or so the humans said. We Reapers knew something else had happened to her, but we couldn’t figure it out.”
“What happened when you took her?” I ask.
Michaela scans the room before she speaks. She’s obviously nervous talking about it, no matter how private the creepy room appears to be. “She wasn’t ready. Just like all the others, her soul knew it wasn’t the right time. She didn’t have a family yet or anything like that, but she just knew. She fought me some, but quickly gave up when she realized it was futile.”
I frown. It’s a familiar story, but it doesn’t provide us with any information about the who, the why, or the how. I need to spend some time at the tapestry and find a connection between these people. We’re missing something.
Michaela glances around again. “We need to get out of here. Someone is going to notice you lingering.” I suddenly notice her expression. She seems agitated and flustered.
“You okay?” I ask as we walk back toward her room.
“Just frustrated. And antsy.”
I nod, but something nags at me. “This is going to sound horribly insensitive, but there are only seven names on the extra list. How many Reapers do you work with? Why would seven souls make so much more work for you?”
She sighs, and I immediately regret the question. But I want to know. How did they even notice seven names? Seven souls must seem like a drop in the ocean of souls who leave the world each day.
“There are about twenty Reapers total, give or take. The problem is that we were already busy. It’s the life of a Reaper. It doesn’t help that one of the Reapers is on leave right now. When you consider how many people die each day, and how many of us there are, it’s a tremendous workload. So, when one person gets added to a Reaper’s list, it dominoes, because it means someone else has to pick up one or two names from our list, then someone else has to pick up a few names from their list, but then another name pops up on someone else’s list, and before long, we’ve lost control of the situation.
“Like I said, a lot of people come easily, not everyone, of course, but it helps the job go faster. When you have a surprise pop up, you know it’s going to take longer. You saw the way Kismet looked back at you. She was so confused.”
“On top of that, it’s happened in just over a week. Nearly one a day. It’s exhausting.”
We walk in silence for a few minutes as we continue on toward Michaela’s quarters.
“I didn’t see an obvious connection between the names either. I want to spend some time at the tapestry, see their lives. Maybe I can find something there.”
She turns to me in the doorway of her quarters. “Are you crazy? You can’t go back there. You’ll be recognized. What if Webber is the one who finds you? That’ll be it.”
“But we need to watch the threads. It’s our best chance of finding out what happened,” I argue.
“There must be another way.” She says it as if that closes the discussion, not giving me the opportunity to respond. Looking back and forth, she makes sure no one sees me go inside. When she’s satisfied, she shuts the door behind her.
“You need to be careful coming and going. Someone will think we’re having an affair.”
I smile. Affairs in the heavens are rare, and those who participate in them are thought to be too much like humans and totally out of touch. “If only that were the least of our concerns.”
Her smile manages to banish some of the frustration etching deep lines on her face. It spurs me on.
“Can you imagine the gossip in the common room? The whispers? A Reaper and a Keeper?” I put my hand over my mouth and gasp. “Oh dear.”
She slaps at me. “It’s only funny because it’s true. It really would create quite a scandal. I don’t know why, though. Keepers are truly interesting souls.”
“Oh, imagine what they’d think if they discovered your lover wasn’t a Keeper at all. The speculation that would create! Certainly, they would all decide he was an archangel in disguise, because that’s the type of man you deserve.”
She wrinkles up her nose. “What do you mean by that? They’re so serious.”
I look at her, surprised. “The archangels are the best of us,” I say simply.
Her smile warms her whole face this time. “That’s very kind of you, Penn.” Then her expression turns mischievous. “But the angels are too stiff. You saw them. Not exactly the best conversationalists.”
“Maybe not. I assumed they were just like that because I was around. Maybe they crack each other up?” I lower my voice, making my best attempt at being serious. “Did you hear the one about the angel who tripped over his wings? No? That’s because he fell. Har-har-har.”
She shakes her head, but she’s still smiling. “All right. We should at
least attempt to be constructive.”
“I did notice one thing about the list,” I say. I’d been stewing over it on the way back to her quarters.
“What?” she asks.
“I don’t think Webber would know who the others are. The other five. I mean, he wove them into the tapestry and everything, but why them? Remember how he said he liked the dark threads? There were dark threads in the mix. Why would he cut dark threads short if he likes them? Something doesn’t add up.”
“I know you’re focusing on Webber because he wronged you, but I don’t think he’s behind this. I truly don’t.”
“You are too trusting,” I accuse.
“Thank you.” Her response gives me pause. I didn’t mean it as a compliment, but she chose to take it that way, robbing the sting from the barb completely. Honestly, I’m glad. Her kind heart is one of the things I like best about her.
Flashing a small smile at her, I sit down in the nearest chair.
She sees the note I left. “You know what, I’m going to go deliver this while I have a break.”
“All work and no play makes Michaela a—”
She cuts me off. “A Reaper. That’s what it makes me.”
“I know, but take a breath, maybe stop by the observatory to center a bit before diving back in.”
She sighs, nods, and her eyes narrow. “Don’t do anything stupid while I’m gone.”
“We’ve had this discussion already today.”
“I know. Doesn’t make it any less true.”
I know I’m heading to the weaving room as soon as she’s gone, whether she thinks it’s a good idea or not. Fates are the only ones who can watch the threads. To others, the tapestry looks like the gorgeous landscape it is, nothing more, nothing less. Because of that, I can’t send her to do it. It has to be me.
I nod toward the letter in her hand. “Thank you.”
She smiles and walks out, but I’m not far behind her. We both have things to do.
After the day’s wanderings, I’ve learned my way around the Reaper’s area enough to make my way out of it. Like all the other factions, it dumps out into the common room. From there, I know how to make my way to my old stomping grounds. Even with my hood concealing some of my peripheral vision, I know exactly where to go. I’m home.
The Children of Wisdom Trilogy Page 15
