Keeper Chronicles: Awakening (31 page)

It was time.

She stood beside him and drew her father’s katana as the thing—demon, she corrected herself—came up on her side. Swallowing the instinct to scream and run, she looked the monster in its four eyes. “I’ve got this,” she whispered. “I cut down a tree; I can cut this thing down.”

Gabe turned around and looked at her. “Aim for the eyes.”

“Thanks.”

One of its claw-like arms snapped for her; dodging, she ducked to the left and stabbed upward, her sword puncturing the thing’s jaw. The mistake nearly proved fatal. She tried to pull the blade free as it swung again, but even with her extra strength it wouldn’t budge no matter how hard she yanked. Blood scorched the back of her hands, dripping from the wound she’d inflicted.

“No, no, no” she said, panicking as it jerked up, lifting her in the air with it as she held onto the hilt. “Gabe!”

Feet dangling, she put all her effort into jerking one final time. With a jolt, the sword pulled free, dropping her to the ground in a spray of painful saliva and viscera as above her the demon howled in pain, a pair of arrows jutting from one eye as it reeled.

Leaping on one of its outstretched claws, Gabe climbed up near the demon’s head and stabbed his machete through another eye as easily as if he were spearing meat for a kabob. The demon’s screech as it died, like feral cats in heat, rang in her ears. Thankful for the rain dripping down her face, she tried to wipe away the burning blood as Gabe jumped away from the dying creature.

He landed next to her and used his shirt to help clean her arms. “You’ve got to be more careful,” he said. “This isn’t a game.”

“Don’t you think I know that?” Another one of those hideous things swam up the side of the island. This one, half man half horse, floundered on the rocks as his hooves failed to gain purchase. “I’ve got this one.”

Determined not to let him down, she held her sword in two hands as she approached what her mind could only see as a centaur. How were these things real? In the stories, they were often noble creatures. Capable of selfless acts and assisting the hero to finish his quest. This one just looked deranged with blood-red eyes, pointed teeth, and scars down its entire body.

Arms clinging to the rock, it looked up at her. “Help me,” it said, slipping slowly back toward the sea. “I’m begging you.”

Rebecca swallowed the lump in her throat. She understood intellectually that some of the demons looked human, but staring one in the eyes and hearing it speak in English—well, the reality was much more difficult than the idea. Murder. What she was about to do felt like murder.

“Where are you from?” she asked but didn’t offer it in her hand.

“Please, help me. I’m not evil. I won’t hurt you.”

“What are you doing?” Running up next to her, Gabe grabbed her arm. “That thing is a demon. You need to kill it. Now.”

For a moment, she studied the demon again, searching in the downpour for something that she hadn’t noticed the first time, some sign of its demonic nature, horns or something her confused mind can grasp on to and say: okay, this is wrong. This was why it had to die.

“You can do this, Beks.”

Could she? Something in his eyes told her she didn’t have much of a choice. It was do this or fail the test—whatever that meant.

Squaring her shoulders, she took a calming breath. A breaker pounded into the island, fogging her googles with mist. Rebekah held her father’s sword back like it was a baseball bat and swung.

Home run. She sliced the centaur’s head clean off its shoulders. Rebekah watched as it bounced twice and splashed into the ocean, its hair fanning out like one of the Japanese fans they sell at bargain stores. “Remind me again why we have to do this?”

He pointed up to where the biggest crow she’d ever seen flew towards them. “Because if we don’t, even one that size can kill hundreds of people before it’s caught; people who have no idea they’re even in danger. Do you want that on your conscience?”

Taking a breath, she pulled one of her throwing knives and aimed. “No. But I don’t want this either.” She threw the knife, but it missed, dropping into the waves as the crow circled the light tower toward them. The second knife missed, too.

Gabe drew his bow and fired an arrow, burying it in the creatures head. With a flutter, it disappeared into the waves. “Think of it like pulling weeds. It might make it a little easier—we’re just friendly gardeners performing a service so that all the nearby flowers can grow tall and free.”

She snorted. “Never saw a flower that could bite my head off,” she muttered, readjusting her grip as she looked around for the next surprise. Despite the fact that it was November and the rain fell like a spray of ice, she was warm.

“Then remember your father. Think of the thing that did this to him and use that to fuel your anger. Whatever it takes to do your duty.”

Picturing her father as he must’ve been that night, lying broken in the tower with some monstrosity tearing at his flesh like a rabid animal, sickened her. “You’re an asshole,” she said as she readied her weapon. She might not be able to find that demon, but she could find these. Keep other fathers safe.

Time dragged as the storm raged on that night. Although by far not as bad as the storm which had knocked out power the night her father was murdered, this one kept them running for a good five hours, and most of the demons had the courtesy to come one at a time which helped given that she missed far more than she hit with any weapon she used. If he hadn’t been there with her, she wouldn’t have lasted a minute.

After a while, she stopped talking. Stopped trying to impress Gabe or make her father proud and focused on surviving the next monster. To keep from going out of her mind with fear, she started picturing each monster in a ridiculous situation. This lobster-looking thing with the head of a dog climbed out of the ocean hoping to eat Keeper for a snack, so when she tried to fight it she pictured its pincers wrapped in the red tape used at lobster houses to keep the fresh seafood from cutting each other up and imagined tossing it a bone to fetch.

The image worked, allowing her to get in close enough to thrust her blade between the correct sections of its carapace to kill it after only two failed attempts.

Her arms and legs wobbled like rubber, unused to this level of exertion even after days of training and trying to cut down a tree by hand. When the rain finally stopped and the lightning faded into the distance, she wanted to collapse and let her wounds heal. Throughout the night, her scrapes and cuts and burns had been treating themselves—a gift of her heritage, Gabe explained—but she had so many after a while that even her heritage couldn’t keep up.

Gabe didn’t let her sleep. Stopping to check his radar one more time, he called into base to report. She listened, exhausted and ravenous, as he spoke about breaches and containment with a woman who sounded suspiciously like his mother.

“Can’t I go to bed now?” she whimpered when he’d finished talking and hung up the handset.

“Nope,” he said, going over to the refrigerator. “The most dangerous time for a Keeper is right after a storm. Sometimes the slower demons, like the fifth-order ones, take a while to reach land or one might have come in from further out to sea where we weren’t able to track the lightning strikes. While Nicholas has a fancy device that tells them him demons are nearby, out here on our own, all we have is our instincts.”

“So how long are we talking about? I can barely keep my eyes open.”

He patted the seat at the table next to him. “As long as we need. But, there’s no rule that says we can’t eat first. I don’t know about you, but I’m starving.” With a sly grin, he grabbed a few cans of processed beef ravioli and brought them to the table.

Rebekah was so hungry, she didn’t even bother to heat it up and finished two entire cans. Only then did the hunger start to slowly fade. “So, be honest with me. How bad was I?”

“You didn’t die,” he said seriously, no hint of humor or sarcasm in his tone. Instead, he almost seemed sad. “That’s a great start. You’ll, of course, need more training. That’ll come with time.”

“So I passed the test? I’m a Keeper, now?”

He looked at her like she had just been diagnosed with terminal cancer. “Yeah. Congratulations.” After eating one last spoonful of pasta, he grabbed his crossbow and went outside.

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Having sent Rebekah to bed hours before, Gabe was finally ready to get some sleep himself around dawn when the call came through from the council. So instead of indulging in the rest he so desperately needed after the storm and a long night on watch, he woke the naked woman sleeping in his bed.

“Beks. Get up.”

She groaned something incoherent and pulled the blankets further over her head.

“We’re needed at the office. Come on, get dressed.”

“The office?” She peeked at him from beneath the blankets. “We have an office? Since when?”

Putting on his uniform as a pretend member of the Parks Services, he arched an eyebrow. “I do. And they’ve called us in. The Hunters have news about the first. They think he’s coming back here and have asked us to come in and help with the search. They should be flying in now.”

“Oh,” she said and threw aside the covers. No matter how conflicted he felt about her joining the Keepers, having her in his life and bed again made him happier than he’d been since Juliette. In his experience, happiness came at a price. She stretched unselfconsciously. “Do I get a uniform, too?”

He chuckled. “Do you want one?”

Walking on her tiptoes, she crossed over and helped him button up his shirt. “Not really. I’d much rather take this one off.”

Gabe took her fingers in his hand and kissed them. “Me, too. But we have work to do. Duty above all.”

“Is that some kind of motto?”

“It’s the code a Keeper lives by. The code you’ll be expected to live by, now.” Letting her hand drop, he turned around to grab his weapons, not wanting her to see the sadness on his face. Tracking a demon was likely to keep them away from the tower for a few days, so he not only strapped on his gun but the machetes, too. Best for slicing up demons and not attracting undue attention. For good measure, he brought the crossbow.

When he turned around, she’d dressed in boot cut jeans and a yellow, V-neck sweater that showed an ample amount of cleavage. Her breasts looked—larger. Almost swollen. Wanting an excuse to touch her, he helped fasten her father’s sword belt, his fingers lingering around her hips. As he gave in to the urge to kiss her, his hands moving inside her shirt of their own accord, he knew he was in trouble. If something happened to her—if she died, too—it’d be the end of him.

“What’s wrong?” She pulled back. “Are you hurt?”

He drew her closer, his fingers tightening around her waist. “What if I wanted to run—not go to the office, not tell anyone where I’m going. Just leave here and leave this life. Never look back. Would you come with me?”

Beks didn’t hesitate. “Yes. I would. Could you really do it—leave here knowing that someone else might die in your place?”

“You’re right. It’s ridiculous.” She stepped out of his grasp and grabbed his jacket from the hook by the door, holding it out for him. Gabe slid his arms though as though sliding a noose over his own neck. “Ready to go meet everyone?”

“I already know everyone.”

He grinned. “Not like this, you don’t.”

For speed, he decided to take the boat, helping Rebekah in first before untying the lines and tossing them in. He jumped down and started the boat. The ride up the coast was pleasant, if cold, the salty spray stinging Beks’ cheeks a bright red. He couldn’t help but admire the grace with which she’d accepted her new lot in life; others he’d seen hadn’t been so ready to sacrifice their personal times and freedoms for the demands of the Keeper lifestyle. Moore’s husband was among those most petulant.

Since the Meceta Head light was notably absent a decent set of docks for him to tie off at, he steered them north towards the small coast guard outpost where their people had negotiated a deal for safe anchorage. Departmental cooperation and all that politics. A truck waited for them there. Inside sat his mother.

“Hello, Mother,” Gabe gave her a kiss on the cheek as he got in first. “I trust you’re well?”

Her Asian eyes looked from him to Rebekah then back to him, lingering on their joined hands. “I am now,” she said a little too smugly.

Gabe rolled his eyes. This again. The setup. No wonder she’d offered to pick them up herself; she had wanted to see if her hard work had paid off.

“Morning, Mrs. McDaniel.” Beks fastened her seat belt.

“Please, call me Keiko, child. After all, you’re one of us, now.” His mother turned over the engine, and they were soon heading down the road toward the office. Although a short drive, Gabe felt every awkward inch. When his mother spoke again, it surprised him. “What do you remember, girl, of the day you first met our Hunters: Colette and Nicholas?”

Beks looked at him for help but he shrugged.

“I was with Dylan at the bar; he’d taken me out to cheer me up. Then someone found the dead girl. Gabe pulled me aside while they questioned my date at the time.”

He explained. “I thought Dylan was our first—the timing and coincidence.”

His mother nodded, her dark hair barely moving. “And what changed your mind?”

“I thought—and the Hunters agreed with me—that the attack on the girl in Florence had been done by a demon who hadn’t fully transformed into his final, human form. Since Dylan had already been around before that, it meant he couldn’t be responsible.”

“Very good.” She turned down the windy lane leading to the Parks Services Offices and Keeper headquarters. “Now, the both of you were there that night. Forget Dylan. Forget your anger.” She pulled out a photograph of a young man. “Do you remember seeing this man that night? Your answer is very important.”

Gabe shook his head. He’d been so focused on Rebekah and their argument that night that he hadn’t paid much attention to anyone else.

“I remember him,” Rebekah said, squeezing his hand in excitement. “He stood out at the time because he kept sucking face with this girl even after they’d found the body. It seemed kinda gross.”