Just a Little Death (Children of the Apocalypse Book 1) (6 page)

The waitress came out with our food and he remained silent for a moment. Once the waitress walked away he answered. “I think so. Holidays are a big deal in my family, we get together, cook up some fantastic food and enjoy each other’s company.”

“That sounds lovely. We normally go out for Thanksgiving dinner.” My mom looked at me and I grinned.

“My mom tried to cook a turkey once, it was still frozen in the middle even after ten hours in the oven. One year she tried a ham, and she burnt that one. She gave up and we started making it a tradition to go out or have it catered. We’re always grateful for the staff that works Thanksgiving.” The memories made me laugh, neither my mom nor I were much of a cook.

We ate and passed the meal with small talk about classes and the school. My mother made sure I hadn’t done or tried anything stupid while I wasn’t under her supervision. We finished our meals and leaned back in the booths.

Jared paid his ticket and bowed his head. “Sorry I have to run. I’m meeting up with some friends tonight. I hope you have a good evening out with your mom.” He stood and took my mother’s hand. “It was lovely to meet you.”

“And you. Take care.”

He walked out the door and my mom looked at me. “So? You like him?”

“He’s a nice guy, yeah.” I nodded and pushed what was left of my salad around the plate. “I think he’s way out of my league though. I mean, look at him, he’s hot, high class and…”

“I think he’s more of sex on a stick than hot.” My mom said and I blushed. She laughed. “No sex before marriage, but you have to admit he is sexy.”

Now that I knew she was a fallen angel, her obsession with me not sinning made sense, but I still wondered what sin caused her to fall. “Can I ask you something, without you getting upset? It’s just been on my mind.”

“It depends on what the question is.” She folded her hands and looked at me. “You’re an adult now, we should be able to talk as such.”

I took a deep breath. There was no real way of asking her what her biggest sin was, so I switched my question. “If you could see my sperm donor face to face again, what would you say to him?” She’d always referred to him as that, now that I knew him, I felt guilty calling him that and I knew it sounded in my voice. All he wanted to do now was to make sure I was taken care of and safe.

A strange smile crossed her face. “You know that he and I never really knew each other, so I’m not sure what I would say to him. I’m not even sure I would know him if we passed on the street. I’d want to make sure he knew that you existed now though, and see what a beautiful woman you’ve grown up to be.” She shrugged. “I don’t know how he’d take that news. It was just a one-night stand.”

The good news was I knew how he’d take it. I smiled. “You don’t hate him for leaving you with a child?”

“At first I did, he told me he couldn’t produce children. Don’t ever fall for that line.” She laughed. “I was in disbelief when I found out I was pregnant.” She shook her head. “It’s a long story, but I wasn’t even sure if I could have children. You are my miracle baby.”

Because all the cards happened to fall right. “Let’s go. I want to run by the dorm and change my shirt before we go to the movie and we need to get you checked into the hotel room.”

She paid the bill and we headed back towards the car. I got in and tried to start it. Nothing happened. I hit the dashboard and tried again. Still nothing. Crap.

“Call a tow truck. You have AAA.” My mom reminded me.

This probably was the last straw for my car. I wasn’t ready to part with it. I sighed. “Good thing your hotel is just down the road, huh?” I asked.

She was already getting her suitcase out of the trunk. “And how far is the school? Do we need to get a cab?”

I shook my head. “No, luckily everything is within walking distance.” I pulled out my phone and called the tow truck. After the call, all we could do was wait.

Once the car was taken care of we walked towards the hotel. The small evening crowd thinned as we approached the park that covered the last couple of blocks to the hotel. A shiver went down my back and I closed my eyes, praying we weren’t under attack. When I opened them again my mother had stopped walking. I turned to face her and raised a brow. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.” I tried to keep my voice light.

“There’s a demon coming. This shouldn’t be happening.” Her voice shook and she backed up until she hit the barrier. “You should be innocent, protected.” She shook her head and black wings spread from her back. “You are human.” She growled out.

She had been in denial and her refusal to believe wasn’t going to help me. I opened my mouth to protest when a growling came from behind me. I was going to die because my mother was having a panic attack. I turned around slowly and came face to face with a giant black-skinned demon. It bared its teeth at me and snarled. Drool and spit splattered my face and my heart stopped beating for a moment. It hit me with the back of its hand, sending me into the barrier, and I landed with a thump.

The pain radiated through my body, but it would pass. Right now, I needed to figure out how to defeat a demon without a weapon. My mom jumped out of the way when the demon tried to hit her. She landed in a crouch and held her hand out, but no weapon came to her aid. Just my luck.

“You’re fallen; your abilities have been limited.” I reminded her and the demon’s red gaze turned to me. The razor sharp teeth formed what would have been a smile if he had lips.

I held my hand out but nothing came and I cursed. Where was Ruthie?

“And yours haven’t appeared yet.” My mother snarled at me.

The demon rushed me and I rolled out of the way. I could keep dodging him, but it wasn’t going to help. “Yeah, it’s a huge problem right now.” I snapped back. “Thanks for the heads up about demons, mom.”

The demon laughed and stalked towards me, I dropped back into a defensive stance. I had no idea if I could fight it hand to hand, but I wasn’t going to let it kill me.

“How was I supposed to know? I thought you were human.” She launched from her spot, slamming her shoulder into the demon and driving it back a few feet. She flipped away from it, but its tail caught her across the stomach and threw her away.

“Seems to me like everyone has flashing neon signs on their heads that say who and what they are. Ruthie knew who I was the moment she set eyes on me.” I jumped as it swatted at me with its tail. It turned back to my mother who was still trying to recover from the blow. Everything seemed to move in slow motion. It brought down a massive claw and I knew the blow was meant to kill. I sprinted over to them and put all my energy into throwing my hands up to block the blow.

I closed my eyes as I realized my plan wasn’t going to work and waited for the pain to come, but a familiar weight filled my hands and a pressure pushed down against it. I opened my eyes to find my scythe there. I grinned and pushed the demon back with the scythe. He stumbled backwards as I twirled the scythe and widened my stance. Fear flashed in the demon’s eyes and I knew this fight was mine. He hadn’t been expecting me to summon a weapon. He rushed me, but I held my ground. I brought the handle of my scythe around, knocking the demon in the head and throwing it off its feet for a moment. I jumped and brought the blade down across the back of its neck and the head dropped from the body.

I took a deep breath, realizing I hadn’t focused on my breathing and moved purely on instinct and adrenaline. The soul floated away and the body disappeared. I glanced around to make sure nothing else was going to appear. I let go of my weapon and it disappeared. The barrier faded and I went to help my mom off the ground.

“Ruthie knew me on sight as well.” She shook her head and dusted off her pants. “I never wanted this for you and now you’re going to fight your father’s war.”

I sighed. “Did you know that you hooked up with Death?” My voice raised in pitch.

“No, I had no idea. It wasn’t until after I got pregnant I even thought something was strange about him.” She threw her hands in the air. “He never showed back up so I figured he thought I was human or didn’t care about me being a fallen angel.”

“Yet you didn’t even think to warn me that demons could pop into my life?” I put my hands on my hips. “I’m half angel, like it or not. And how the hell did you miss that he was Death? Seems pretty damn obvious to me.” I clenched my fists as I yelled at her.

She trembled slightly. “With my abilities limited, I can’t always tell when someone isn’t human.” She snatched up her suitcase and motioned for us to continue forward like nothing happened. “Where did you learn to fight a demon?”

I laughed and it defused the situation a little. “My first night here Ruthie, Aeron, and I were attacked by one. Death summoned Ruthie one night and I went along for the ride. He’s been teaching me since.”

“Death…” She shook her head. “Many angels wanted him, but apparently he’s a one-night stand kind of horseman.”

I held my arms out. “Why didn’t you warn me about this? All those times I knew the death toll of a situation, every time I showed signs of anything odd you pushed it away. There was no Halloween, no scary movies…”

“I was trying to protect you. I didn’t want you to be raised to fight demons and be assigned a human to guard your whole life. I wanted you to have what I wanted.” She hesitated. “That’s neither here nor there right now. You’re a Child of the Apocalypse, that’s much different than being an angel.”

Had Ruthie been forced to watch over me my whole life? She had mentioned every creature held freewill, so she had to have chosen to stick with her assignment. “Either way, demons were going to become part of my life.” I pointed out.

“Not if you didn’t develop abilities. When you turned eighteen and nothing came, I thought we were safe. That’s why I let you move here.”

I whistled. “Boy were you wrong. Did you know that twenty percent of the United States population will die from the plague if we don’t find Pestilence and get him back to work?”

“You know the death tolls.” She nodded. “That’s the only thing you’ve been able to do.”

“Until now, now I can summon my weapon.” I shrugged. “From what I understand, this is what I am and there’s nothing I can do about it.”

She stopped in front of the hotel and faced me. She cupped her hands around my face. “That’s not true. You can leave all this behind you. Run from it and choose not to join the others.” There were tears in her eyes and I knew that’s what she wanted. “Come with me and I can protect you.”

I opened my mouth to say something, but spotted Ruthie behind her. “Ruthie!”

My mom kissed my cheek. “Just think about it, please. Think about those who care about you and make your choice on that.” She pulled away and turned around. “Ruthie, so nice to see you again.”

“Sorry I wasn’t there in time to help with the demon, Kaleb and I got trapped at the library by a low level one. By the time I made it, Sammy had it taken care of.”

My mother nodded. “A nasty one that was.” She sneered at Ruthie. “We’re lucky Sammy’s abilities started to shine through or we would have been dead. You should have been there to protect her.”

I didn’t miss the venom in my mom’s voice. “Okay, stand down. Let’s enjoy our weekend and we’ll work out our issues later.”

They both nodded and my mom held her hand out. “Truce?”

“For now.” Ruthie shook it. “Where’s the car?”

“It’s at the shop, it wouldn’t start.” I motioned to the hotel. “Mom, why don’t you get checked in then we can walk to the theater to see what’s playing.”

She nodded and kissed my cheek again before walking into the hotel. I looked at Ruthie and sighed. “She truly thought I was human. I got tossed around by the demon a bit, so did she.”

“You okay?” She walked around me, her eyes scanning over me and I imagined she was taking mental notes of damage. “Some dirt on you, that’s about it.”

“I’ll feel it in the morning, but I’ll be okay. I’m just glad I was able to summon the scythe. Mom can’t summon a weapon anymore because her abilities are limited.” I rubbed my head. “This just got more complicated. You said you and Kaleb had to deal with one?”

Ruthie nodded. “The demon’s dead, but that’s two in one day and we haven’t seen anything but the RAs since the first day of school. Things are starting to heat up. I wonder why.”

Someone coughed as they walked by and a few people gave them a wide berth. Their paranoia showed as the group of people eyed the coughing person. The plague was spreading and instead of media myth, the idea of catching it was becoming very real. “Because the effects are getting worse. Their plan won’t be complete until Death is locked away.”

“The Plague is spreading and it’s not pretty. War will be next, then Famine, followed by Death.” Ruthie looked around. “I can’t tell you what to expect, but…”

“A lot of people will die if we don’t figure this out.” I finished her thought.

My mom stepped up. “But you may be forfeiting your own life if you pursue this.” She spoke through her clenched jaw. “You aren’t like the others, you’re not hundreds of years old. You’re eighteen. I won’t bury my child. I won’t let these creatures,” she gave a dramatic wave at Ruthie, “drag you into a war.”

“That’s her choice to make.” Ruthie stepped up, her face a mask of calm. “The life of one is not worth the lives of many.”