When We Were Mortals
Page 24
“Fine,” she said, dragging me through the ruins. She begged I tell her everything in the time it took us to reach the catacombs.
“Ugh, I can’t believe I missed all that,” she said, at the top of the stairs. “And Ryan! I can’t believe he just left like that.”
“It’s fine,” I replied, waiting for everyone else to catch up. “But I still don’t understand why you had to leave!”
"Ksenia will explain everything when you see her,” she paused. “Well, that’s if she will talk to you.”
“Why wouldn’t she talk to me?” I asked. “I didn’t do anything to her.” “It’s not you,” Zara replied. “She isn’t exactly a fan of Elaina Renaldi. She’s part of the reason why, well…she’ll tell you,” Zara said, leading us deeper into poorly lit passageway.
When we reached the end, Zara pulled back a curtain and invited us to go in. But, being the protective type, Elaina and Alistair walked in ahead of me.
“Oh no,” Ksenia cried, jumping to her feet. “I don’t think so!”
“Come on, Ksenia,” Zara begged. “Just hear them out!” Ksenia grimaced at the thought that she would have to deal with them. Her hatred for them, Elaina especially, made her adamant that she wanted nothing to do with whatever reason they were there. It wasn’t until she saw me walk in behind them, that she calmed down a bit, but still made it perfectly clear she didn’t want to help.
“No, I know why you are here and I will not do it. I have no reason to go back there.”
“But you do,” Elaina replied, walking towards the Gypsy “You can save Sabine and Erik.”
“Who are Erik and Sabine?” I whispered to Zara. “Her mother and husband,” she whispered back. “Leviathan took them years ago.”
I had never seen Ksenia so emotional. She was usually one to keep her composure all the while keeping an air about her that ensured nothing could phase her. Now she was hyperventilating and turning red the more she thought about the void.
“Please, listen,” Elaina begged, reaching up and cradling the Ksenia’s face. “I know what I am asking you to do. But Hyperion has stashed Eva’s real body there and we need to get it back.”
“Her real what?” Ksenia asked. “My other body,” I growled, glaring at Elaina. I wasn’t going to be told I wasn’t real. My father made a good point, I was an echo of the myself. So that meant, I was still Evangeline.
I turned to Ksenia who couldn’t grasp what she had just said. “Long story short, my father tried to have me destroyed. It didn’t work. Instead I was turned to stone, leaving another version of myself to remedy things, however somewhere along the line, I lost my identity as he hid my other body in the void and now Raphael and Michael are trying to get me back.”
“Then let them deal with it,” she barked, throwing her hands in the air and turning away from us.
“I have a bad feeling,” I told her, “Something isn’t right and I need to get there, I need your help Ksenia.”
Uriel, who had enough of us trying to convince Ksenia, walked over to her and slapped her in the face. “Snap out of it Queen Bee,” she demanded. “I would take her but you know none of us can go. Suck it up and do what needs to be done. It is what I’ve had to do.”
“What the hell?” Ksenia snarled, raising her fist. “You don’t know me. Do not tell me what to do.”
“It is what it is!” Uriel replied. “I know who you are and I know you are better than this.”
“Was that really necessary?” Constantine asked, running to his daughter’s side. “You can’t blame her for feeling the way she does.”
“And why is that,” I asked Zara. “Why is she so terrified of Leviathan.”
Ksenia heard me and came storming towards me. She grabbed my arm and pulled me towards the couch to sit down.
“You want to know why? I’ll tell you why,” she said, plopping down on the old ratty cushion. She looked over at Zara.
“I need you to go ask your father to start dinner, we will at least be kind enough to feed our guests before I ask them to leave.”
Zara hesitated, desperately wanting to hear the conversation, but bowed out when Ksenia hissed at her to leave. Ksenia then explained that Constantine had once been a Praetorian Guard working under Elaina. He was sent to Romania to reclaim an old ward of his. However, while he was there, he fell in love with the ward’s daughter, Sabine. Instead of taking her father and leaving like he was supposed to, Constantine stayed to be with her. Once Elaina realized he had not returned, she sent for him and demanded he come back immediately. Little did he know, that when he finally left, he would not only be leaving behind the woman that he loved, but the child she unknowingly carried.
Nineteen mortal years later, he returned as ordered by the Supreme to escort Leviathan on his one-hundred-year feed. Constantine’s curiosity got the best of him and he left Leviathan to feed while he went off to look for Sabine. He had heard she and a child had moved to a small coastal town, where she married a shop keeper named Andrei and settled down. He didn’t account for the fact that his desire to find her was strong enough to lead Leviathan straight to her and her daughter, Ksenia.
“I don’t know what I was thinking,” Constantine interjected. “I led him right to them.”
“Yes, but can I continue?” Ksenia barked.
He nodded and stepped back from the conversation. She told me that the moment he saw her, Leviathan actually started to feel something. He instantly fell in love with her and desired her more than he had anyone. He didn’t want to feed off her, he wanted to marry her. But when Sabine refused to let him have Ksenia, he fed off her and Andrei, and took Ksenia anyway. Constantine tried to go after them, but Elaina would let him.
“Duty over family,” Ksenia snarked, glaring at Elaina. Constantine eventually defied orders and went after his daughter. But it wasn’t soon enough in her eyes, as she spent what felt like a lifetime living with a creature whose obsession with her felt more like torture than love. He kept her locked in a large cage to keep his creatures away from her, but close enough to him so he could worship her every moment he could get. When he wasn’t around the ‘cursed’ would try to get to her through the bars, and when he was, he spent most of his time staring, touching or just smelling her.
When Constantine managed to free her, Leviathan was still a bit weak from his lack of feeding and was easy to evade. And, since he couldn’t follow them, Leviathan did the only thing he could think of, curse them. He ordered a Magasian to curse them with immortality so that he could come after them in a hundred years. When he saw them again, however, he realized that killing Ksenia and Constantine would not be punishment enough, so instead, he vowed that every time he surfaced for a feeding, he take someone they loved from them.
You could see what she was going to say next was near impossible for her to say out loud. “He took my husband, Erik and vowed to take my unborn child when he returned.”
“Your unborn child? You had a child?” I asked. “Who?”
She looked around the room, as if she was searching for someone and when she didn’t see them she answered. “I gave her up the moment she was born,” she replied. “I could stand the thought of him taking her too. So, I gave her to the cook and his barren wife. When Leviathan returned, I had told him the baby had died. He could have found her, smelled her, but he still loved me, so he believed me.”
“Zara?” I whispered. “Zara is your daughter? Ooooh, that makes so much sense now!”
“Yes, but she doesn’t know,” Ksenia snarled, slapping my arm. “So, don’t say anything to her!” She stood up now that her story was over and looked back at me. “And that’s why I don’t want to help you. I cannot go back there.”
“So at least show me the way and I will do the rest,” I begged. “Please, help me do this and I promise I will do my best to get Erik and Sabine back for you!”
She stood silent, with her back towards me.
“Please,” I begged again.
“Ksenia, think
about it,” Constantine said. “If we help her, she can help us.”
She took a deep sigh and glanced over her shoulder.
“My father and I will escort you as far as the opening to the void,” she announced. “You must do the rest on your own.”
“If we go, we go all the way,” Constantine argued.
“Fine,” she said sitting in her favorite chair. *****
“Wait here,” Abraxas ordered the Praesidions standing outside the Cathedral. “If we all go in, Hyperion will get spooked.”
“How do we know that you aren’t going in there to warn him,” Lilith asked, tapping her sword.
“You don’t,” he replied. “But you just have to trust that I’m going to do what I need to do.” “If Samiel really trusted you, do you think he would have sent us to go with you?” she asked.
“Do you think I care?” Abraxas retorted. “Just give me a five-minute head start.”
“Fine,” she said, backing off.
“Thank you, your Majesty,!” he said sarcastically, walking through the door, leaving Lilith to tap her foot in wait.
“Samiel has asked me to bring you back,” he said, approaching the King at the pulpit.
“I figured it was only a matter of time before you switched sides again,” Hyperion countered.
“I haven’t switched sides,” Abraxas replied. “To be honest, I chose myself; and to go along with Samiel’s plan will give me what I want in the end.”
“So, he bribed you with the throne then,” Hyperion stated. “And how does he suppose he thinks he as a throne to give.”
“I have no idea,” Abraxas replied. “Honestly, I don’t care about the specifics, but I have to take you back.”
“And he sent just you to take me back?” Hyperion asked. He chuckled at the thought that his brother thought so little of him.
“No, he sent them too,” Abraxas answered, pointing to the guardsmen as they walked through the doors. When he saw them, Hyperion started roaring at the thought that his brother sent his little mistress and her brothers to deal with something they were not equipped to handle.
“I’d tell you to go back and tell Samiel to come get me himself, but I don’t think he honestly has the guts,” Hyperion announced. “He will when he gets his hands on what he wants,” Lilith argued. “You mean Eva?” Hyperion asked. “He honestly thinks he can convince her to help him destroy me.”
“He is on his way to Abyssus now to get her,” she replied. “Once he has her, it’s only a matter of time til he gets what he wants.
“No, see, that’s where you are wrong,” Hyperion said. “But he will figure that out on his own, soon enough.”
He walked back behind the pulpit and opened the book in front of him. “You can go back and tell him I am not coming with you,” he said, never once looking up. “I do think it’s funny that he sent you to get me, I imagine it was only to test me to see if I still had my powers or not. Send him my love when you see him,” he said lifting his hand into the air.
Abraxas knew what was about to happen, so he lunged at Hyperion and grabbed his other arm. The others vanished, but he remained, holding on to a very irritated King.
“I’m not going back there if we have failed,” Abraxas said, letting go of Hyperion’s arm.
“You didn’t fail,” Hyperion reiterated. “I proved what he wanted to know. He now knows I’m not powerless.”
“Then why haven’t you just destroyed him? Why are you hiding?” Abraxas asked. “Ugh,” Hyperion growled. “I am not hiding. I may not be powerless, but I for some reason can’t just kill him like I can the others. Trust me, I have tried. Every time I inflict pain on him, it bounces off him and onto me. It took me a while, but I realized to destroy him and Evangeline, I must destroy everything else. It’s literally life itself that is making them impervious to death.”
“Huh?” Abraxas asked. He wasn’t the smartest man, so he needed Hyperion to spell it out. “Everything that has been created is tethered to all three of us. And although I gave them life, Samiel is crucial in their survival and these creations are what sustain us. And all of us, are what sustain her.”
He paused, checking to see if Abraxas was understanding. His eyes were a little glazed over, but Hyperion continued anyway.
“Her vessel of flesh and bone, is somehow impervious to anything I throw at her, so I must weaken her by destroying everything else.”
Abraxas, shook his head as if he understood, but completely ignored the point. “I still don’t want to go back.”
“Seriously?” Hyperion asked. “That’s what you got out of this.”
“No, I’m just saying,” Abraxas replied.
“Fine then,” the King muttered. “Then I’ll just use you to get what I want.”
“I’m at your service,” Abraxas replied.
“Good, this is what I want you to do,” Hyperion said as he told Abraxas his plan. *****
The mood at the Gypsy table was much lighter than it started as Zara, overjoyed that her best friend was back, made sure to keep the conversation light and happy for as long as she could. Even Uriel, who was enjoying a good beer found herself laughing at our hosts jokes and stories.
I, sadly, was a bit distracted by the nagging feeling that Michael and Raphael were in great danger. “I am going with you,” Ramiel announced, leaning over to whisper in my ear. “You are not going to change my mind about it, so don't bother trying.”
“Do they know?” I asked, nodding my head towards Gabriel and his sister.
“No, but I don’t care,” he replied. “They’re my brothers and I need to help get them to safety." “So, you think something has happened to them too?” I asked. “I know it has,” Ramiel responded. “And yet we are wasting our time feasting with these Gypsies.”
“These Gypsies are my friends and the only way we will get what we need,” I said, trying to appease his irritation. “If something has happened to them, that means Samiel has my body it’s only a matter of time before he or my father come after me too.
“All the more reason I need to go with you,” Ramiel replied. I saw his point but had to disagree. “No, I want them to come find me. There is no point in running anymore. He has my body and I need it in order to become myself again.”
Gabriel heard me and immediately objected, “Absolutely not. Father will try and hurt you.”
“He won’t,” I reassured. “Use me, yes. Hurt me, no.”
“How can you be so sure?” he asked, loud enough for conversation to die down. “Because unlike my father, yours wants me alive; he needs me to destroy my father. He could never do it on his own. It’s my father who wants to hurt me. He wants to hurt all of us.”
“How?” Ramiel asked.
“He says he wants to end the world,” I replied. “He thinks it may be the only way to defeat me.”
“All the more reason we need to hurry,” Ramiel blurted. “We need to be one step ahead of him.”
“We will leave in due time and you can go with me if you feel that’s what you need to do,” I offered. “He can’t go!” Uriel argued. “None of us can.” She jumped up from the table, spilling her drink. “You are not going Ramiel.”
“I am,” he replied. “I love you Uriee, but you can’t treat us like children forever. It’ll will be ok.”
Gabriel understood Ramiel’s need to help, because he felt just as helpless. “Just let him go,” he said. She needs all the help she can get there.”
“And we are supposed to sit around and do what while he risks his life?” she asked, pointing at Ramiel.
“You can wait at the entrance with Elaina,” he replied. “As soon as they escape, they’ll need your help.”
“And where will you be?” Uriel asked her brother.
“I will go back into the city with the Alistair and look for Hyperion,” he replied.
She shoved back her chair in a small rage, slamming down her glass of beer and glaring at both of them. “Are you both suicidal?”
“Yes and there are people for that,” she argued. “You can’t tell me the Annunaki or the Guard don’t have people for this.” “Who better suited to deal with this than the ones who know them the best,” Gabriel said, hoping to calm her down. “We are the only ones strong enough to attempt to fight them. Anyone else would get hurt trying. “
“Then it is settled,” Elaina announced, interjecting herself into the conversation. “We will leave at dawn.” “No,” I replied. “I think it is best we leave as soon as possible.” Ksenia, who had tried to stay out of the conversation leaned back in her chair, as she began grinding her teeth. I glanced over at her, waiting for her to argue with us about it, but instead she just looked down at her lap and muttered, “then, we will leave in an hour. Better to get it over with than sit around stewing about it.”
“Thank you,” I said, reaching over to touch her hand. “Honestly, thank you.”
“Don’t touch me,” she barked, pulling way. “You know what that does to me.”
“So, get over it,” I replied, with a tiny grin. “You’ll live, I assure you.”
Chapter XI
“I’m so sorry I’ve been distant,” Gabriel said, pulling me aside. “Finding out that you were not exactly you, really threw me.” “I get it, I do,” I said holding his hand, “I’m still trying to wrap my head around it myself. But it doesn’t mean I am not still Evangeline. I know in my heart I am.”
“I know,” he said pulling me closer. “If you weren’t, I wouldn’t feel this way around you. I wouldn’t be so drawn to you.” He stood for a moment, staring into my eyes, with a smile on his face before leaning into kiss me. I could taste the confusion on him and the desperate need to fully understand what was going on.
“But,” he said, looking at me again, “You are Anessa too. It’s almost like you are two different people. I don’t know, I just can’t explain it. I need more time to figure it out.”
“I completely understand,” I replied, with my hands on his chest. “Hopefully this will be over soon and I will remember.”