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“No Gabriel…it is forbidden!” he ordered firmly.

“You have no right to forbid me to speak the truth or do you believe lying is part of the bigger plan he has in store for us,” Gabriel challenged him.
“And what about Carter?
What am I supposed to tell him when I return?  That I saw nothing? That I know nothing? How stupid do you think he is?” Gabriel asked.

You took a vow and part of that vow is not to interfere or question the order of things here. You know this Gabriel. Your allegiance is to the brotherhood and your vow is to him,”
Camulus
reminded him.

“Yes
Camulus
my allegiance is to my comrades here, and that includes Violet.  As for my vow, I vowed to serve and protect the gates with honor, dignity, and the truth and I will not betray those vows. I will not lie for you or for anyone and I will not betray my friend.  So now I am asking you, do you wish for me to betray my vow and lie for you?” Gabriel asked.

“No one is asking you to lie. We are just asking you not to divulge information that would be harmful to the mission. Surely you can do that Gabriel can’t you?” he asked.

“No
Camulus
, no matter how you spin it I would be betraying Vie and lying to both of them. I can’t be a part of this any longer. It is not right. I won’t do it,” he said storming out of the chamber.

“Gabriel, I am warning you, if you interfere I will not save you,”
Camulus
yelled to him.

Gabriel looked back straight into
Camulus
’ eyes, not holding back his expression of rage and fury and said in his low threatening tone, “So be it!”

Chapter 22

Loose Ends

Gabriel sat quietly waiting for Carter to absorb all the details he had disclosed while traveling back through Carter’s life. Carter looked at Vie, confused by what he heard and asked her if she thought what Gabe had said could possibly be the truth. Vie told him that if Gabe believed it then it was good enough for her. Vie trusted Gabriel with every part of her soul. She still had a few questions about his journey and decided to ask him about them.

“So let me get this straight, you don’t believe Carter has a fear of churches or anything else, correct?” Vie asked.

“That’s correct?” Gabe answered robotically which seemed odd to Vie.

“And you
believe
based on what you saw, that the problem is with Carter’s anger?” she asked.

“Yep, that’s what it is,” he said very briefly stated.

“Hmmm,” Vie thought to herself. Something was not right here. Gabriel is acting way too subdued. He didn’t seem to be the least bit excited about finding the missing puzzle piece to Carter’s soul. She had a bad feeling he was keeping something from her and she was going to find out what it was. The thing about having a best friend is you know absolutely everything about them and Vie was reading Gabriel like a book. “What did Gabriel see that he doesn’t want us to know?” she wondered.

“Well, I’m not mad at anyone that I’m aware of anyways,” Carter said thinking long and hard about it.

“Think Carter, think hard!” Gabriel got up in his face.

“I am Gabe and I swear I’m not angry about anything. In fact, I’m just the opposite. My life couldn’t get any more perfect than it is right now,” he said grinning at Vie.

“Fine, don’t try.   See if I care.  But when Lucian comes and snatches you up, and he will, don’t come crying to me,” Gabe said angrily and stormed out of the guest house.

“What the?”
Carter said in disbelief of Gabe’s actions.

Vie was thoroughly convinced that Gabriel was hiding something now. She had never seen him like that before. “Maybe it was seeing Lucian that set him off,” she thought. But it still seemed awfully strange for Gabriel to be so irate with her and Carter. Vie thought it was time she did some investigating for herself. If Lucian were to blame for Gabriel’s wrath, then she needed to see exactly what Lucian was up to and she knew just how she was going to do it.

Meanwhile, Gabe had some feelings about the way he behaved in front of Carter and Vie. His guilt about not disclosing what he knew about them was eating away, making him irritable and unfocused. He had decided, at least for now, to abide by
Camulus
’ orders and keep what he had learned to himself. It was killing him to look at Vie and not be able to share everything with her, so to avoid her, he left.

Carter drove Vie home and helped her sneak safely back inside. He told her he would see her tomorrow after church and kissed her gently goodnight. Vie was anxious to get to bed since her plan was to find Lucian in her dreams.

Lucian preyed upon ones fears. It was how he got his strength. It was what fed the evil in his soul. Vie figured the only way to find out what Lucian was up to was to bring him right to her. The only way that could happen was for her to fall sleep and succumb to her fears of the darkness once again. Vie knew she was weakened by sleep and vulnerable to Lucian finding her in her dreams and she was banking on that now. Lucian had been unable to penetrate her dreams because Gabriel had stayed with her while she slept to protect her. But now it was Gabe who needed to be protected from Lucian and Vie was determined to bring him out.

She came up with a brilliant plan to set Vivian’s alarm clock for one hour, giving her plenty of time to find him and see what he was up to. She figured if she got into any trouble the alarm would go off and she would awaken, or at least that was the plan. She hoped that it would go as planned but understood there were risks involved. All Vie knew was that she had to help Gabriel and if that meant taking a risk, she would gladly do so. She turned out the light and closed her eyes trying to relax an
d surrender to the darkness. She
drifted further and further into the abyss.

Vie stood alone at the top of the Devil’s Tower waiting for Lucian to show his malevolent face. It did not take long before he smelled the fear of the beautiful Guardian and showed himself to her. He was not the beast Gabriel had described, but appeared to Vie as a man, an extremely dark but beautiful man, both well-spoken and alluring. These were his gifts. Lucian had the power to lure unsuspecting souls with his physical beauty and mysterious charm. But his real purpose is to smash, to mangle, to twist, to mutilate, to disfigure, to darken in every way he can. It does not make any difference whether it is bodies or souls, flesh or ideas, matter or spirit.  The aim of Lucian and his underworld is exactly the same in every case.  It is to distort, to blast, to destroy. He deceives by lying, by counterfeiting, by play-acting and masquerading, by illusion and fantasy. He is powerful and dangerous and not to be trusted under any circumstances.

“
Ahhh
Violet, I hear you have been looking for me? To what do I owe the pleasure my dear?” He spoke in a rich strong voice carrying a slight European accent.

“What game are you playing with Gabriel?” she demanded an answer.

“Ha
ha
ha…is that why you have come all this way, to ask about your pitiful friend Gabriel? I assure you I have done nothing to Gabriel, but perhaps you should ask what he is doing to you,” Lucian said trying to get a rise out of Vie.

“Sorry Lucian, I’m not going to bite today. I have no interest in explaining again the differences between a man like Gabriel and one like you,” Vie said clearing hitting a nerve.

Suddenly Lucian was standing right in front of Vie, breathing his hot breath in her face, circling around her like a snake coiling around its prey. Vie knew she was in trouble and could only hope the alarm clock was ready to go off and get her out of there. “God help me.  What did I do?” Vie thought. She turned and ran away from Lucian. She didn’t know where she was running but kept on going, hoping and praying that she would awaken. Vie was running into the darkness further and further, alone and afraid, screaming to get out while trapped in her fear. “What is happening, why can’t I wake up?” she wondered looking at the watch she wore to track her time. It had been an hour and yet no alarm went off, leaving her trapped in the dark.

Meanwhile, while Vie was knee deep in her fear, Vivian was surfacing. She left Vie trapped in the darkness and took control of her body.  With Vie weak in fear, Vivian was able to awaken gain control of the vessel. She needed to get to Jeremy and tell him that the person he sees is not her and that she still loves him. Vivian turned off the alarm clock and got out of bed. She knew she didn’t have much time so she hurried, still in her night shirt, down the stairs, running through the yards over to Jeremy’s house.

It was Saturday night, date night, and Jeremy was still brooding about the status of his and Vivian’s relationship. “It doesn’t add up,” he thought out loud while pacing back and forth in his room. He couldn’t stand seeing Vivian with Carter.  It was eating him up and yet at the same time when he looked at them together, he couldn’t help but notice they seemed to fit.  He saw in them what others used to see with him and Vivian. They were made for each other. 

Just then, Jeremy heard a noise at his window. He looked at the clock and it was 1:30 a.m. He walked over to the window, pulled back the shades and there she was. Jeremy couldn’t believe his eyes. It was Vivian standing down below in the light of the moon in her night shirt. Jeremy quickly opened the window and whispered down to her.

“Vivian, what are you doing here? Are you crazy? Do you know what time it is?” he said worried about her.

“Jeremy
hurry
,” she said breathless from her run to his house. “I need to see you,” she pleaded.

Jeremy wasted no time, he barreled down the stairs tripping on the last one and falling hard on the floor. “Damn it,” he said biting his lip so as not to make any noise from the pain that throbbed in his ankle. He glanced back up the staircase to make sure no one had gotten up and then hobbled across the floor to the front door and quietly went outside. Vivian immediately ran
over to Jeremy and jumped into his arms. Jeremy was completely taken aback by her actions, but was ecstatic to be holding her again. He held her tight for what seemed like hours and felt her love melt his heart.

“Oh Jeremy,” she said hysterically, “I’ve missed you so much.”

Jeremy just held her saying nothing. He didn’t care why this was happening. He just knew how much he had longed for this moment. Then Vivian let go of him and spoke.

“Jeremy, something is happening to me. Something unexplainable, something I can’t control,” again breaking out into hysterics.

“No, Vivian,
it’s
okay,” he said trying to calm her down, “you have amnesia from the surgery, that’s all. The doctor said it would only be temporary but I didn’t think it would be gone so quickly. When did you start to remember?” he started to ask her but she interrupted him.

“No Jeremy, you don’t understand. It’s not amnesia!” she said frantically.

“I don’t know who or what has taken over me but something has. It’s like I can see what’s happening but I can’t control it. I feel like I am stuck behind a window watching myself, but only it’s not me who is really there,” she tried to explain.

“What? Vivian that’s crazy. You probably just had a bad dream and…,” she interrupted him again.

“Damn it Jeremy! I am not dreaming and I thought you of all people would believe me,” she said as she started to cry.

“Vivian,” he grabbed her tightly, “
don’t
cry. I’m sure there is an explanation for what is happening. We need to go see Dr. Goodwin in the morning. He’ll be able to shed some light on this for us,” he said hugging her.

“No! Morning will be too late. There’s no time Jeremy. I don’t know how long I have before I am behind the window again watching somebody else live my life while I’m trapped in the dark. Besides, I think I know what is going on,” Vivian said cautiously.

“Well that’s great
Viv
, so what do you think it is?” he asked appeasing her.

“Well, I did something, something bad,” she started.

“I don’t believe you
Viv
, you never do anything bad,” Jeremy teased.

“Why aren’t you taking this more seriously? This is not a joke Jeremy, this is my life, our life I am talking about,” she said getting angrier.

“Sorry,” he said “go on.”

“Remember when I found out about the brain cancer?” Vivian asked.

“How could I forget?  It was the worst day of my life,” Jeremy said as if he were reliving the moment.

“I kept having these dreams, nightmares really, and in them there was a man who kept coming to me. He offered to give me more time here in this world with you. He told me he could make my cancer go away. I was desperate, I couldn’t bear the thought of leaving you and so I made a deal with him. He would give me more time here with you in exchange for my soul. I signed his pact and then all of this happened and I…” Vivian began to cry again, sobbing uncontrollably in his arms.