Just a Little Death (Children of the Apocalypse Book 1) (8 page)

Pete pulled up to an old house nestled on an overgrown lawn. We got out and rats scattered into the weeds. I didn’t know what I expected. This wasn’t the place I’d want to retire to, but then again, I wasn’t a super old horseman that used to control the plague. Pete motioned for me to walk up the cracking and overgrown path.

I moved forward and he followed me. The old wood of the steps creaked as we walked up them. Wood slats bowed down while some of them had disappeared completely. I found myself waiting to fall through, but all it did was groan as it bore the weight. Pete knocked and the door swung open.

The man who stood there looked no older than thirty. His red hair was styled and his blue eyes met mine before widening a bit. He turned to let us in and I glanced at Pete. The man that greeted us didn’t look like a centuries old horseman.

“Told you, we can change our appearance as we need.” He walked in and I followed. The inside of the house didn’t match the outside. The house was fitted with modern appliances, a computer and television. Every surface held no dust and shined in the light.

The man turned back to us. “Pete, what brings you here? Did you and your father get into it again?”

“No, dad’s missing and the plague has gone wild. Daniel, I hoped you’d come and pick back up the sickles to help us out.”

“Can’t you pick them up?” He asked and sat down, he motioned for us to do the same.

Pete shook his head. “I can’t find dad’s. I still have mine, but I haven’t come into his actual abilities, just mine.”

“Which means that he’s not dead. I can’t help you then. You know there can only be one horseman at a time.” He steepled his fingers.

“Can’t you at least help us fight?” My brows drew together. “Even the fallen angels still have some skills in fighting.”

He turned towards me. “I could, but I’m wary in my old age and chances would be I’d die on the battle field. You might try contacting the others who are in retirement. Maybe they can help you. Was this your idea, Pete?”

He shook his head. “It was Sammy’s, but I thought she might be on to something.”

“Your new girl sent you on a wild goose chase.” He shook his head. “Have you contacted the others?”

He nodded. “The other children are all together, but Famine and War are both missing. Death is the only one who isn’t.”

He considered for a moment. “I’ll try to help you, but I’m not sure what good I’ll be.” He glanced at me. “What do you know about all this?”

I held up my hands. “Only what the others have told me. I’m just coming into my abilities. I’m working hard to get up to the skill level everyone else is at. I know that the horsemen can be sealed away and that might be what’s causing all these problems. I know that by the end of the week over thirty thousand people in the country will die of the plague.”

“Where have you started looking?” Daniel paused and energy flooded into the room. We all stood up and Pete and I summoned our weapons. The weight of the scythe in my hands eased the panic that tried to surface. A woman appeared in the room. Her red hair twisted in out of control curls down her back and her shoulders. The color contrasted with the black leather that hugged her body. She tapped sharp nails against her thigh. A strange smile crossed her face. “Oh, this wasn’t what I expected. Two children and a retired horseman. I suppose that will be enough to ease my hunger.”

“Gluttony.” Pete hissed out. “She feeds on souls.”

That sounded terrifying, but I dropped into stance anyways. Daniel stood up from the couch and stared at the demon. “You aren’t welcome here.”

“Yeah, well, what are you going to do about it, old man? You don’t have weapons and these two are merely children compared to me.”

At the end of the battle one person would end up dead and I assumed that it would be her. We could take her. I tightened my grip on my scythe, trying not to bask in my confidence.

Gluttony smiled and raised her hand as shadows moved up from the floor and swayed towards us. I swung my scythe at one and it disappeared. A parlor trick. Something tackled me from behind, my face hit the floor and my scythe fell from my hand. It disappeared and I summoned it back. I rolled over and tried to push at what pinned me to the floor, but my hands went right through the shadows. This was ridiculous; I should have been able to push it away if it pinned me down. A gaping mouth with long vicious teeth appeared and started towards my throat. Two blades crossed and sliced the creature in half and it disappeared. Pete stood over me with wide eyes.

“Shadow demons. They consume souls.” He helped me up and we turned to Gluttony as she tilted her head to one side.

The crazy smile on her face remained as she took a couple of steps towards us. “The daughter of Death and the son of Pestilence will die together.” She held her hand out and a barbed whip appeared.

My stomach dropped. I analyzed the situation and knew we were in trouble. The whip would have a longer reach on it than my scythe or Pete’s swords. I took a deep breath and watched her move. Her arm tensed and she brought the whip up and let it down with a loud snap. Pete and I jumped out of the way, she turned to pay attention to him and I attacked her side.

My scythe met her hip but she turned and the whip came with her. The barbs dug into my leg and pulled out with the sound of ripping flesh. I cried out as the pain seared my calf. I recovered, but putting pressure on the leg sent agonizing waves through my body. More shadow demons appeared from the floor, their mouths gaping and coming towards me. I swiped the scythe around me to clear them away while another snap echoed in the room and Pete’s scream followed.

I cleared the shadow demons around me and rushed forward, my heart pounding against my chest, my breath burning in my lungs, but I had to get to her. Gluttony turned around with one of Pete’s swords sticking out of her stomach. It didn’t faze her and she pointed a slim finger at me and crooked it as if telling me to come to her. The shadow demons snarled and growled as they moved behind her and around the edge of the barrier, but they were no threat to me. I needed to focus on her.

I brought my scythe down, trying to catch her at the knees to bring her down. She cracked her whip and it wrapped around my handle, pulling me forward. I tried to find my balance, but the pain in my leg kept throwing me off. She caught me by the neck and wrapped her hand around my throat.

“Where is your father?” She squeezed, cutting off my air.

I tried to gasp out an answer, but I couldn’t speak around the pressure. My limbs started to tingle as darkness started to leak into my vision. Pete came up from behind her and put his sword against the base of her neck.

“Let her go.” Gluttony dropped me and I fell, coughing. Pete shoved his blade in, but she disappeared and reappeared behind him.

“You think you’re so strong, both of you have forgotten who else was here. Both of you lost track of the reason you came.”

Daniel. I turned around searching for him and found him nowhere. A strangled noise came from Pete and I spun around to see Daniel’s body at his feet. Grief swept through me and made my heart skip a beat. How could we have let him out of our sight?

“My shadows devoured his soul. My job here is done.” She gave me a little wave and blew me a kiss. “I’ll be seeing you later.”

She disappeared. I ran to Pete and Daniel. Pete shoved me away. “Don’t touch him. He’s gone. We allowed this to happen. We left him defenseless.”

I clenched my fist and knew he was right. One of us should have protected Daniel, we both should have remembered he was there and defenseless. I closed my eyes and turned away. Ruthie hadn’t shown up, but maybe she thought I was safe with Pete. She probably didn’t expect us to run into a Sin.

My focus had been to kill Gluttony because I assumed that’s who the death number belonged to. Assumption would get me killed if I didn’t learn not to do it. We were lucky that her goal wasn’t to kill us, or we both would probably be dead.

Blood dripped down my leg, reminding me that I bore the mark of being careless in the fight. A heavy hand fell on my shoulder and I flinched.

“Let’s get our wounds taken care of and head back to the dorms. I’ll call Ruthie on the way there to fill her in.” Grief weighed his voice down.

“And Daniel’s body?” My voice cracked I closed my eyes.

Pete turned me around to face him and I opened my eyes. Dried tears stained his cheeks, but he met my gaze. “He’s a horseman, his body will disappear back into his plane where it will find its final rest. His soul won’t be released until the shadow demon who ate it is killed.”

There would be no rest for his soul. A lump climbed my throat and I wanted to cry. Our carelessness caused a man’s death. “I’m so sorry. I should have guarded him and let you take care of Gluttony.”

He pulled me into a hug and after a moment of surprise I laid my head against his shoulder. “It was a fatal mistake, but we’re entering a war. We both did what we thought best.”

The idea of running away with my mother started to appeal to me more. There would be no more making fatal mistakes and soul eating shadow demons.

Pete pulled back. “Let me see if I can find the first aid kit.”

I sat on the couch and waited. Daniel’s body had disappeared already and no evidence of the fight could be seen. Other than the pain in my leg the fight almost seemed like a far off dream. Pete returned with a first aid kit and patched up my leg with some gauze and medical tape. He patched his own side up even though I offered to help. We did everything in silence and headed back to the dorms.

Ruthie greeted us in the courtyard. She gave Pete a huge hug and cupped his cheek with her hand. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

Pete nodded. “Thank you. We should have known better.” He ran a hand through his hair. “I’m going to crash for the night. I’ll see you tomorrow.” He turned to me. “You take care of your leg, make sure you keep it clean. We may not be able to get infections, but it needs to heal.”

“I will. Thank you.” I looked at the ground, still thinking about the fight and how it could have gone differently. How we could have kept Daniel alive.

Pete pulled me into another hug and squeezed me tight. “You can’t go back and change it. We can’t dwell on it or it will tear us down. We grieve, we move forward, and we make sure not to let it happen again. Understood?” He left no room to argue with him.

“Understood.” I wrapped my arms around him and returned the hug. “Sorry you couldn’t finish watching the soccer game.”

He gave a small laugh. “That’s okay, there will be other games. Sorry your history lesson got canceled.” He walked towards his dorm and Ruthie stared at me with her hands on her hips.

“You two took on a Sin without calling for help.” She snapped. I opened my mouth to say something but closed it. My mind couldn’t find the words to respond to her sudden anger.

She started walking towards our building and I limped behind her. “I don’t even know how to call for help. I thought you would know if I was in danger.”

“But Pete does and he should have. I should have known you were in danger. What were you two even doing out there? What reason did you have to go see Daniel?” We got to the door and she swiped her ID to get us in.

I pressed my lips together. “We thought he could help with the spreading of the plague.”

“Which led Gluttony to him. She must have followed you two.” Ruthie pressed the button on the elevator. “How’s your leg?”

“Hurts. I have to say I never thought I’d know what a barbed whip felt like.” The doors opened and I walked in, trying to keep pressure off the leg. “I have a feeling tomorrow it’s going to feel worse.”

She pressed the button for our floor and leaned against the wall. “You’ll need to come up with a story on how you hurt it. Someone will ask and it’s not like you can tell them you were hit with a whip.”

I closed my eyes and leaned my head back. “I’ll figure something out.” I took a deep breath. “I’m sorry.” I whispered.

“For what?”

I opened my eyes at the doors opened. “For doing something that was obviously a stupid idea. I didn’t mean to get someone killed. I didn’t mean to get hurt and it sure as hell wasn’t my idea to face a Sin with just two of us. I thought you said we were evenly matched with them.”

We got into our room and I sat down without waiting for her to even close the door. “I said that we were matched with Envy and Pride. Three on two we would have been an even match to their powers. Gluttony is more powerful because she can control the shadow demons. Lust is insane because he can get you begging for sex with a mere thought, though he sucks at fighting. Greed can cloud your judgment and have you focused only on the thing you want most, but during battle that’s not always a bad thing.”

She sat down in her chair and spun to face me. “That’s what makes the Sins so deadly, their abilities that go with their namesakes.”

“That doesn’t ease my guilt.” I laid back and cringed when my calf muscle pulled.

“Nor should it, but now you can learn from the mistake and so can Pete.” She flipped her laptop off. “Now get to bed. You have math in the morning.”

I stripped my clothes off and put on pajamas. Tomorrow would bring new challenges and I didn’t think solving for ‘x’ would be the worst of them.