Reaper (20 page)

                “Well it’s not.” Ethan angrily flipped through the book. I wanted to tell him to slow down and be careful to not rip the pages, but I kept my mouth shut. After going through only the first half, he slammed it shut.

                “I’m sorry,” I began. “I don’t want you to be mad at me.”

                “I’m not mad at you,” Ethan replied flatly.

                “But you’re mad.”

                “Well, yeah.” He sat heavily at the island counter and pressed his forehead into the heel of his palm.

                I stood behind him and put my hands on his very tense shoulders. “Why do the reapers want me?”

                Ethan shook his head and didn’t say anything for so long I thought he fell asleep.  I was wrong because soon he said, “When you killed it, did any blood splatter in your mouth?”

                “Yeah, why?”

                He straightened up, turned and took my hands. “I think the reaper you killed must have really been the leader. You drank his blood and he drank yours. I think you accidentally preformed a ritual.”

                I pulled my hands from his. “No! That’s just…no! I didn’t
 
drink
 
reaper blood. A drop or two splattered in, and I spit it out!”

                Ethan looked at me sympathetically. I knew he was feeling the same panic I was, he was just better at controlling it. “It doesn’t always work like that. But it’s the only thing I can think of right now. Reapers are on the lower level side; they don’t think or plan to wait for better timing like other, smarter demons might. In any other situation, they would have attacked us and won. We were outnumbered.”

                “But why would reapers want
 
me
 
to be their leader? I don’t know anything about stealing life forces, nor do I want to ever do it!”

                “You saw mine,” he said quietly.

                “Hunter’s too. His was blue and purple.” I sat beside Ethan, thinking.

                “As weird as it sounds,” Ethan sighed. “I don’t think the reapers are a threat.” He shook his head. “If they wanted to attack, they would have,” he repeated.

“So,” I began, carefully choosing my words. “If anyone killed the leader and did the blood sharing and drinking, they would become the leader?”

He shook his head. “I highly doubt it. There has to be something more.”

I bit my lip and leaned against the counter. Hunter extended his paw for me to hold and pushed a thought into my mind.

“You’re right,” I told him. I turned to Ethan. “That wasn’t the first time I saw into a reaper’s mind.”

“It’s not?” His brown eyes latched onto mine.

“No. Before I killed the, uh, leader. As soon as it touched me I felt…” I shook my head, unsure of how to describe it. “I felt like I wasn’t all there in my head. It was kind of like I was in his mind, but it made me kinda dizzy and I felt sick.”

“And that was before the blood?”

“Yes.”

“Are you positive?” he asked.

“Yes,” I repeated. I put my head in my hands. “I’m so stupid! I knew something was off. I-I just didn’t think anything would happen.”

“Anora,” Ethan said gently.

“I know,” I finished before he could. “It’s not my fault; I couldn’t prevent it, blah blah blah. Still, my gut told me something was wrong and I ignored it.” I sighed. “Now what?”

“I have no idea. You don’t sense the reapers?”

“Not at the moment.”

He looked out the window, as if he could see anything beyond the darkness. “Go back to bed?” he suggested.

“I’m not tired anymore. The wisp of light that reaper gave me was really energizing.”

“Wisp of energy?” he questioned.

“Oh, you didn’t see it?”

His blank stare answered the questions.

“I don’t think I can explain.” I sat on the floor and hugged Hunter. “You don’t think the reapers have anything to do with Thomas, do you?”

“No,” he said right away. “The reapers followed Sam here. It’s not connected at all.”

“So why me?” I couldn’t help but question…again.

“Maybe because you’re a witch?” Ethan threw out. He shook his head. “I would think that would make them fear you.” He let out a deep breath and ran his hands through his hair. “Honestly, Annie, I have absolutely no freaking idea. I don’t think we’re in danger from them, at least.”

                “Sorry if I attracted them.”

                “Anora, don’t apologize for everything, it’s annoying, and not everything is your fault.”

                “Ok, sor—” I snapped my mouth shut.

                “Anyway, you said the reaper drank your blood before you even injured it, right?” he asked and I nodded. “So it must have been attracted to something else about you.” He put his head back in his hands. “I just don’t know what it is.”

“I told them to go away, but I don’t think they took it as a forever kinda thing,” I explained.

“They need to be killed,” Ethan insisted.

A sick feeling of protectiveness clouded my heart. “Yes,” I agreed and pushed the mother-hen instinct away. “They are demons. Demons that kill people and steal auras. They need to be killed,” I added quickly.
 
“They’ll be back?” I asked, though it was really a statement and not a question.

“I’m sure. Especially if they, uh, look at you as an authority figure,” he spat out, not liking the words he was forced to say.

“Should we call your dad and ask him what to do?”

“No,” Ethan told me. “I think the less people that know about this, the better. “Hell, maybe by not ‘accepting’ the position, you more or less released yourself from being the leader of a group of reaper demons.”

I bit my lip and nodded, letting all of the information sink in. “Do you know any reaper experts?” I asked.

“Not off the top of my head.”

“Oh.
 
I just thought that if we found out a little more about them it might help us understand what is going on.”

“It’s a good idea,” Ethan agreed. “I can ask around. We can’t forget about Thomas, though.”

“Trust me; I won’t be forgetting him anytime soon.”

Ethan looked at me and smiled. “Where is your dagger?”

“I left it upstairs,” I admitted guiltily.

He stood and held his hand out. “Let’s go back upstairs and watch TV or something. If the reapers come back…I can only hope they listen to you again.”

I put my hand in his. “Yeah, I hope.”

~*~

Ethan, Hunter, nor I were able to fall asleep until the sun was up. Hyper vigilance made the three of us jump and startle at the smallest noise, expecting to see a reaper standing in the doorway of the room. Ethan fell asleep first; he kept his arms tightly around me as if it would keep the danger away. Hunter got off the bed and paced around the house, ready for a fight.

I was tired, so tired. But along with being scared, I was pissed. This whole reaper mess was Sam’s fault. If she had done her job, she would have killed the reapers. Or, even if she
hadn’t
killed the reapers and went home like she was supposed to, I wouldn’t have been conned into a ritual. I imagined what I would say to her, pretending as if it was a good idea to share my new role as leader. Part of me wanted to tell her that not only did I kill the ones she failed to, but I gained control over dozens of others. Well, that’s assuming I had complete control over the reapers.

When I finally did drift back to sleep, it was no surprise that Sam was in my dream. We were back at Zodiac. She and Ethan were sitting at a booth going over a hunting assignment. I sat down across from Ethan and offered to help.

“You don’t know enough to help,” Sam jeered. Ethan was nonresponsive. “You don’t know enough about the Order or about Ethan.”

“That’s not true!” I argued.

“Oh, yeah?” Sam cocked her head. “What do you
really
know about him?”

I opened my mouth to protest but didn’t have a chance before the dream switched. I was sitting in my old high school cafeteria. Jill, a stereotypical popular cheerleading bitch, sat down at my table. She smiled at me in a mocking way.

“Hey Anora,” she said, her tone belittling. “Thanks for introducing me to Ethan. We’re going to Blush tonight.”

Thankfully, I woke up.
Stupid dream
, I thought. While I have definitely had dreams with plenty of meanings, even I am subject to the random, stupid dream every once in a while. I flipped over to my other side and tried to go back to sleep.

“Damn it,” I said out loud when I realized that the dream had caused nagging thoughts.

“I thought you’d be sleeping,” Ethan whispered.

“I was, until I had a stupid dream.”

 
“What was it about?” he asked with seriousness.

“It’s nothing really paranormal,” I said slowly. “It was just stupid.”

His arm found its way around my waist. “Then why do you seem bothered by it?”

“Uh,” I hesitated, “it was just unnerving, I guess.”

“Ok,” he said and kissed the back of my neck around me. When I didn’t return the gesture he asked, “What’s wrong?”

“The dream.”

“I thought you said it wasn’t anything.”

“I said nothing paranormal.” I turned to face him. “It’s stupid, and you probably won’t get why it bugs me.”

“But…?”

“Sam was in it. But a long time before that, in real life I mean, she told me that I don’t know you well enough.”

“Anora, we live together. I think you know me pretty well.”

 
“I know.” I diverted my eyes to his chest. “But I know the current Ethan, not the past Ethan.”

“I can say the same about you.”

“Not really. There isn’t much to my past. I was a weird, ghost-seeing, horse-obsessed girl. Was then, still am now.”

Ethan laughed. “What do you want to know?”

I pushed myself up with my elbow. “What does it mean to be on probation? What was it like growing up in the Order? Why don’t you ever talk about your mom?” I let my voice drop at the end of that question. I’d assumed Ethan’s mother had been killed by a demon years ago.

Ethan took a deep breath. “Growing up in the Order was fine, at first. I didn’t know any different. It wasn’t until I started going to regular school that I realized how different we were. Being ten years old and knowing that monsters really
can
hide in your closet isn’t an easy secret to keep from your friends, well, if you were lucky enough to make friends outside the Order. Brandon and Brent were twins a year older than me. Their parents were in the same division as us so I at least had friends until they got transferred. I was sixteen then.”

He paused, remembering the past. With a shrug he continued. “I’m glad my dad believes in education; I’ve gone to a normal school since sixth grade. A lot of Order members ‘home school’ their kids, thinking that knowledge of the paranormal is more important. And as for probation,” he shifted his weight. “The Order is complicated. I guess you can think of it as a company, with bosses of different ranks and power. If you don’t do what your boss tells you, of course you can get in trouble.”

“Do they kick you out?”

“Technically yes, but it’s not like they can take away your ability to hunt. But the social and financial support is gone. Order members take pride in being in it; not just anyone can get in and most of them develop this weird sense of superiority over the rest of the world.”

“What did you do?”

“Went to college.”

“That’s it?” I was stunned.

“Yeah. I was told I was ‘wasting my talent’,” he huffed, still angered by it. “I didn’t hunt while I was in school unless it was an emergency I had to help out with. I was told it was abandonment to live a regular life for a while.”

“But your dad has a regular job.”

“It’s good cover, so they allowed it.”

I was thinking that the Order sounds pretty dumb and old fashioned when Ethan said, “As for my mother,” he spoke with complete indifference, “I’ve met her once. She and my dad dated for about three months before she got pregnant. I wasn’t planned.” His voice remained level. “When I was almost a year old, she just left.” I put my hands on Ethan’s back and slowly traced small circles with my nails. “My dad said he came home and found everything gone…well, everything except for me.”