Seals (3 page)

Kara felt the eyes of the all the higher
demons on her. Their gray, identical faces were frozen like ugly
life-size demonic dolls. Their black eyes glimmered with evil. How
could Horizon make a deal with these treacherous, vile
creatures?

She glowered. “Well, you’ve seen them, so
get lost.”

She waved her blade menacingly at the
demon’s face, knowing all too well that demon lords were powerful
and that her puny blade probably wouldn’t do much damage.

Salthazar laughed playfully as though Kara
had said something very funny. “Of course.”

His black eyes rolled over her body once
more, and she resisted the urge to shiver under his creepy, oily
stare.

“See you soon,
butterfly
,” he said
and turned on his heel.

“Not if I can help it.”

Kara hated the fact that only moments ago
David had called her that, too. But now, hearing it from the lips
of the demon lord made her feel dirty somehow.

Kara watched the demons leave. Butterflies
were beautiful and fragile, while Kara was nothing of the sort. She
wasn’t weak, and she would prove it.

But first she’d have to apologize to
David.

Just as she turned to leave, a choking,
mind-searing pain burst from her chest and extended to her
fingertips and to her wings. White lights exploded from behind her
eyes like a giant migraine, like someone beating her head with a
sledgehammer. Her ears popped, and she could scarcely hear her own
screams. She was on fire, burning from the inside out. She closed
her eyes. She could feel her body swell. She was changing into
something else.

Kara dropped her blade and crumbled to her
knees. The weight of her wings was like a backpack full of bricks.
It pinned her to the ground and paralyzed her. She could feel the
infection coursing through her. She gritted her teeth as another
spasm of pain hit her. What was happening to her? Fear replaced her
pain. She was sick with trembling and felt a madness infecting her
mind. Darkness. Evil…

She struggled desperately to cling to her
sanity—to herself. But it was no use. Fighting it was useless. The
darkness was now part of her, like a piece of her soul. She
couldn’t stop it. It consumed her.

And then the pain subsided, and she could
move again. But she was different. She could sense it.

With a trembling hand, she pulled up her
sleeve and held back a scream.

Intricate designs of large black veins
throbbed in her arm from her wrist to her elbow, foul and
monstrous.

She was changing, and not into a beautiful
butterfly. She was becoming an abominable and evil monster.

Chapter
2

T
hree days had
passed since the archfiends had escaped from their eternal prisons.
Dark clouds had formed over the entire mortal world, and the sun
hadn’t shone in three days.

Kara stood in what was left of Mr.
Patterson’s bookstore. It wasn’t much. It had four walls and a
roof, and it looked like it’d been hit by a tornado. With the help
of Jenny, Peter, Ashley and David, she had done her best to rebuild
his shop with old planks of wood and drywall that hadn’t been
destroyed by the imps. They had created a haphazard building with a
crooked roof, boarded up windows, mismatched exterior siding, and
trickling wet gray paint that oozed from the boarded windows. The
bookstore looked like it was crying.

While the rest of the legion were making
important and secretive plans with the servants and Lords of the
Netherworld, Kara and her friends had been charged with rebuilding
one of the safe houses. They had chosen Jim’s Old Bookstore, partly
because it was one of the key safe houses, but mostly because they
felt a close connection to the place.

It pained Kara to see the look on Mr.
Patterson’s face as he picked up the remains of his beloved
collections of books, magazines, and other memorabilia. He looked
like he’d just lost a member of his family. His books were a part
of him. Even though they had rebuilt his store—Kara knew it would
never be the same.

Just like her. Too much had happened. Too
much had been damaged and couldn’t be fixed. She couldn’t be
fixed.

That’s exactly how Kara felt about herself.
She was damaged goods. No one could stop the mutation from
happening. The black veins continued to spread, and darkness
coursed through her mind. It was like developing some deadly
disease. She was watching her body change. She barely recognized
herself. All she could do was wait in pain for the mysterious
transformation that preoccupied her to manifest itself completely.
The lingering hope that she
could
fight the demon that
dwelled inside and wanted to come out was fading away.

The white oracle mother had told her that
she was, indeed, part archfiend, or something along those lines—a
monster. She had
seen
that in her, and Kara had
seen
it, too.

The white oracle had showed her a world of
fire—buildings burned and smoked as millions of dead mortals lay
piled and splayed out on the streets of dead cities. She remembered
the sound of people dying in battle. She remembered seeing Horizon
burning and devastated. But worst of all, the white oracle had
shown her herself…or the black-hearted angel-killing monster that
she was to become.

Kara wanted to scream at the injustice of it
all. She had screamed in the sky many times before. Alone in the
sky, her screams echoed like thunder.

The white oracle had said,
“Remember who
you are, Kara. You can still change the future.”

Kara planned on doing just that. She was
going to change the future. She just didn’t know how, exactly, she
was going to do it.

Kara focused on the bookstore. Although they
had managed to salvage half the books, the store would never be the
same. The cheery old bookstore with its knickknacks and smell of
mothballs and burnt wood still looked abandoned. Even their hopeful
attempts to find the bookstore’s sign and lift everyone’s gloomy
spirits had failed miserably. There was no more sign. There was
nothing but ash and crumpled chunks of plaster.

Mr. Patterson had lost the bounce in his
step and the twinkle in his eyes. The escape of the archfiends
weighed heavily on him, but Kara was sure most of his gloom was
caused by the destruction of his shop and the loss of his cherished
crystals.

Most of his crystals had been destroyed in
the fight with the imps. And now, Mr. Patterson stood behind what
was left of his counter, which was nothing more than a taped
cardboard box with legs, and polished his last remaining crystal
ball.

Kara wished she could do something to help
him.

Suddenly, the old man’s face slackened and
he looked as if he were far away, like he was in a trance. His blue
eyes and skin blazed and turned a soft golden color. The crystal
ball shimmered and glowed brighter. Its insides churned until it
was glowing like a tiny brilliant star. She knew he was
seeing
or communicating with the legion. He would be
gone
for a while. Maybe it was better this way. It would
keep him preoccupied with matters of the legion. He needed a break
from the devastation that was his bookstore.

Kara sighed. Her thoughts returned to her
own gloom, and her eyes settled on David.

During the days of rebuilding, David still
hadn’t uttered a word to Kara. He didn’t much look at her either,
and he ignored her many attempts to apologize. When they had
returned to Horizon, Kara had joined David and Ashley as they had
welcomed back Jenny and Peter from the Healing-Xpress. But David
had ignored her completely. He was his usual friendly self with
everyone except her, and that made everyone else uncomfortable,
too. Jenny kept looking at Kara for an explanation. But she had no
answers, nothing she wanted to admit yet, so all she could do was
look down. She had made a real mess of things with David.

But she was determined to make it right.

Even now as he hammered the last nail into a
supporting beam, David was a lot quieter than usual. His face was
pinched, but it couldn’t hide his handsome square jaw and his
perfect cheekbones. When he finished nailing the beam, David tossed
his hammer into a red toolbox and moved toward Peter, who was
painting the back wall very badly.

Did David know she was watching him? If he
did, he didn’t show it. He continued to avoid her gaze.

Kara could feel Jenny’s eyes on her while
she and Ashley organized some of the books on the rescued
bookshelves. But Kara couldn’t look at her. She didn’t want to see
the pity in her eyes.

“Kara?” she heard Jenny’s voice. “Since when
do you wear gloves?”

Kara braced herself as everyone, even David,
turned to look at her hands. She could feel their eyes like laser
beams piercing through her black leather gloves. If she had been a
mortal girl, her face would have been beet red. Thank goodness she
wasn’t.

Kara stared at her hands. Her chest
tightened. She hadn’t told anyone about the mysterious black marks
on her arms. The markings had started to spread to her legs as
well. She had panicked and hid her hands with a pair of leather
gloves she had found back in the lockers at the Counter Demon
Division.

It was a foolish way to try and pretend the
change
wasn’t happening. She felt it in her body, felt it in
her soul. There was no denying it anymore—she was changing. First
she had sprouted wings, then ugly black veins on her arms and legs,
and then…

Kara looked up at Jenny and forced a smile.
“Thought these black gloves would look cool with my new wings. You
know, thought I’d make it a
look
or something.”

Jenny’s bright green eyes sparkled in
delight.

“Yeah, totally. You look amazing. Maybe we
could find you a complete leather outfit? That would be
killer
. You’d look so badass in leather.”

The spark faded in Jenny’s eyes for a
moment.

“I wish I had wings. Then we could fly
together and beat those stupid archfiends.”

Jenny’s camaraderie only made Kara feel
worse about lying to everyone, especially to David.

Kara kept her eyes on Jenny. “Let’s start
with just the gloves. I’m not sure how flexible a leather jumpsuit
would be.”

“It is time!” announced Mr. Patterson.

He made his way to the center of the
bookstore, and Kara could see that his bare feet were dangerously
close to sharp wood splinters. His eyes gleamed their natural blue
again, and he held his crystal close to his chest, like he was
protecting it, as though he feared it would suddenly burst.

As they gathered around the old man, Kara’s
eyes automatically went to David. She expected him to say something
sarcastic or make a joke, as he always did. But his lips were
tight, and his eyes never left Mr. Patterson. It was like she
wasn’t even there, like she didn’t exist to him, not anymore.

David’s indifference felt a lot worse than
her stupid mutation.

“It is as I feared,” said the old man.

He looked like he’d aged a few centuries
during the past three days. His eyes were bruised with deep
circles.

“What is?” said Kara as she found her voice.
She tensed. Did David just look at her?

Mr. Patterson closed his eyes. “The end of
days.”

Kara and Jenny exchanged worried looks.

“I’ve just received vital information about
what is to come,” continued Mr. Patterson.

He opened his eyes. “I wished…I prayed to
the souls that I might be wrong…but as usual, I was not.”

“The end of days,” repeated Ashley solemnly,
and as she shook her head, her long blond ponytail brushed across
her shoulders. “You mean the end of the world? Because of the
archfiends? Because they escaped?”

Mr. Patterson nodded. “The apocalypse. It
has already begun. The archfiends have cast a shadow over the sun.
You have already seen it.”

“This is bad,” said Jenny as she crossed her
arms.

“It gets worse,” said Mr. Patterson.
“Without the sun, the earth will freeze over.
Without the sun, plants will no longer be able to
inhale carbon dioxide and exhale the life-sustaining oxygen that
mortals and all living things need. By the end of this week, the
average surface temperature will be below the freezing point. The
planet’s ocean surfaces will freeze over.
Temperatures have
already started to drop. Within a year or so most of the human
population will die. Life on Earth cannot survive without the sun.
The planet will die. The archfiends want death.”

Peter cursed and then raised his brows at
everyone’s shocked expression.

“This is serious stuff. My uncle owns a
farm, that’s how he supports his family.”

“His farm will not last.” The old man shook
his head. “If we don’t stop their
infection
, it will
ultimately destroy
all
the worlds. They will start with this
one and then move on to the others. First, the archfiends will
cloak mortal world in darkness, and then they will unleash
their…”

He faltered. His lips moved but no sound
escaped his mouth.

Kara leaned forward. “Their what?”

Mr. Patterson lowered his voice. “Their four
knights
.”

A strange tingling spread over Kara’s body.
“Their
four
knights
?”

“SHHH!”

Mr. Patterson jumped on the spot. His eyes
widened, and he looked over his shoulder, as if he were expecting
these knights to suddenly appear. He clasped his crystal closer to
his chest like a safety blanket. “Do not speak their name so
loudly.”

“Okay, sorry.” Kara raised her gloved hands
in apology.

She caught David’s eye, and for a moment she
couldn’t speak. His face was unreadable, but he was
looking
at her. There was eye contact, and that was definitely a huge
improvement. She tried not to show her relief in her face or in her
voice.