The Garden of Death (9 page)

“Sounds perfect. My boyfriend loves looking
out over the river,” I told her.

“Okay, great. What time shall we be
expecting you?”

“In around thirty minutes. Listen, I was
looking to meet up with some friends who are also staying at the
hotel, would you be able to tell me if they’ve checked in yet? Eden
Daylesford and Asher Christien.”

“Um, I’m not really supposed to give out
private information but seeing as they’re friends of yours, I’m
willing to make an exception. And because I am in a romantic mood.
My boyfriend just proposed to me, you see.”

“That’s… lovely.” Gosh, I didn’t need to
listen to her squawking about her love life all night. I needed to
find Asher and the skank. The woman was also very gullible, which
was working thankfully in my favor. After a few moments of
listening to her rattling away at her keyboard, she spoke
again.

“Ah, here we go! I remember the cute couple.
They were so in love! They booked a room a few hours ago under the
young man’s name. It looks like they’re still inside.”

I grinned wildly “Thank you very much. I’ll
be there soon.”

Finally, something had gone according to
plan.

Eden

I felt the ground shake as it shuddered
beneath me, and I still couldn’t move. I knew what was happening,
and I was powerless to stop it. Well, almost powerless. I could
feel something cracking. I looked down… Wait! I could look down! I
could move my head. I looked down at my hands, and the purple vines
had twisted themselves around our bodies, covering the power of
whoever did this to us, making it null and void. My power was
overtaking theirs! Soon, Asher and I could wiggle our fingers and
look up at each other. I made the most of the freedom we had
because time wasn’t on our side. I pressed my forehead against his
again, and repeating the words I had said earlier, pushed Asher’s
soul out of my body and into his. It hurt like nothing I have ever
experienced. I screamed, and like a mother giving birth, I gave it
one last push. Asher’s soul shot out of my head and straight into
his. At least it knew where its home was. I collapsed backward onto
my butt. Asher flopped down beside me.

“What was that?” he asked.

“I just gave you back your soul.”

Asher

Did I just hear her correctly?

“You what?”

“I gave you back your soul. Aren’t you
glad?”

“Yes, but Eden. You used an awful amount of
power. I could feel it all around. I saw flashes of purple and
green and felt its heat surrounding me. You shouldn’t have
exhausted yourself like that.”

“But I needed to, Ash. I needed to give you
your soul back because I need you to help me. It’s almost midnight,
and we still have to harvest a lot more souls before the zombie
creatures begin to rise out of the ground.”

I looked down at my hands. I shouldn’t be
angry with her. I knew she was only trying to help me, but I really
hoped this didn’t affect the capacity in which I could help. I
didn’t know if I would be stronger with my soul or stronger without
it. After all, I kind of do miss sneaking up on Jazmine and Markus
and following Cecelia around unnoticed. Oh, well, if this meant I
could be with Eden more in the physical sense, then heck, I did
want that. I wanted that a whole lot. The sex we had in the dingy
hotel room was amazing, but imagine how amazing it would be when we
could both feel each other completely—body, heart and soul.

“Sorry. I am glad.” I gave her a smile so
she could see that I wasn’t mad at her. She smiled back and stood
up.

“Come on, we have work to do.”

Eden

We went straight back to transferring souls
into the little crystal Soul Spheres, and it wasn’t long until
Abraham informed us that we had only five minutes until midnight.
Asher and I picked up the pace, and that was when I noticed that
the souls weren’t affected by Asher like they used to be.

“Asher!”

“What?” he asked, with his hand reaching
halfway up to Abraham’s staff. He almost dropped the sphere.

“The souls aren’t doing that weird thing
anymore.”

“What weird thing?”

“They’re not jumping around like over
caffeinated fleas.”

He looked down at the newly captured soul
inside the sphere in his hand and smiled.

“You’re right. It must be because I was a
ghost or something before or missing my soul. That’s strange.”

“Very strange.”

We quickly got back to work when all of a
sudden Abraham abruptly stood and took the staff out of the ground
where he had lodged it.

“It’s time.”

“We haven’t finished. There are still more
souls to collect.”

“I know. We’re going to have to hope and
pray that their lost souls are amongst the ones already
harvested.”

I could tell Asher wanted to ask what he was
talking about, but he didn’t get a chance. The earth quaked
violently beneath our feet. I had to grip Asher’s arm to stay
balanced. That was when I noticed the hand that was clawing its way
out of the ground in front of us.

“Holy crap, it’s like a freaking Michael
Jackson video!” Asher exclaimed. I stifled the urge to squeal or
scream at the sight of the undead figures climbing out of their
graves. I heard a groan, and that was when I noticed the zombie
creature wasn’t the only one rising from the dead.

“There’s more. We’re surrounded!” I huddled
in close to Asher and waited for Abraham to do something or to tell
us what to do. Hurry up! Hurry up! Hurry up, Abraham!

As if he could hear my thoughts—he probably
could—Abraham picked up the bag full of freshly harvested souls,
reached inside muttering something incoherent, or in another
language that I couldn’t quite understand, before pulling out a
Soul Sphere.

“What’s going on?” Asher whispered.

“I’m not sure.” I had no clue what Abraham
was doing. Really, he was a crappy teacher. If this was meant to be
my job, then I was meant to know how to do what he was doing, but
he hadn’t taught me anything other than how to manifest my own
Trait into a pretty awesome purple orb. In regards to giving lost
souls back to zombies, my orb wielding was pretty much useless.
Abraham held up the soul sphere in front of him, muttered something
else, and I gasped as a brilliant white light poured out from the
little sphere and shot straight through the body of the newly risen
zombie. The zombie creature stumbled and howled in pain, covering
its eyes as the light blinded him. I couldn’t see what was
happening because the light overwhelmed everything and completely
covered the body of the zombie so I couldn’t see him anymore. A few
seconds later, someone walked out of the ball of light. It was a
good-looking man in his late twenties or early thirties.

“No way!” I gasped.

Abraham turned and grinned at me, smug. “Yes
way.”

“That’s… impossible.”

“No, it’s possible. You just witnessed me
bringing someone back to life. Now it’s your turn.”

Asher

When I picked up the soul I had just
collected, it didn’t register what was happening until Eden pointed
it out to me. I then remembered how the little soul in the Soul
Room back in the Realm of Death jumped up and down and went crazy
when I held it. When I was dead, the souls had some kind of
reaction to me. I didn’t know if they were telling me I didn’t
belong with them, or they were scared of me. It was strange. And
holding a soul in my hand now, the soul was calmly swimming around
in a circle and had no reaction whatsoever to me.

When Abraham stood up, took his staff out of
the ground and grabbed a sphere out of the bag and held it out in
front of him, I was intrigued. He muttered some mumbo jumbo, and
then the brightest light I had ever seen shot out from the sphere
and went right into the undead creature in front of Abraham. But
what happened next completely stumped me. The once-zombie like guy
that was standing in front of us was gone and had been replaced by
a guy about Abraham’s age and was completely fine. He was not a
zombie anymore.

Had Abraham cured the zombie apocalypse?

Eden

“Wait, what? You want me to do
that
?”

“Yes. Your death caused this unfortunate
epidemic, so you are the key to fixing it.”

“But you just fixed the first guy. Why do I
have to do the rest of the entire world?”

“Because I said so.”

My eyes widened. He did not just say that! I
narrowed my eyes and crossed my arms.

“You are not my father. Even my father isn’t
allowed to tell me what to do. The only reason I am even
considering this is to save the world.”

Then Abraham did something that I least
expected him to do. He laughed aloud—a deep, belly-shaking laugh. I
growled.

“Has your father ever told you that you’re a
brat?”

“Has anyone ever told you that you’re an
arse?” I retorted, seeing red. I would have charged at him, if
Asher hadn’t been holding onto me. Abraham, the arse, kept
laughing, so I turned around and ignored him, looking down at the
rest of the Soul Spheres in the bag at my feet.

“How am I going to do this, Ash?”

“Hey, don’t forget that I’m right here
beside you,” he said, tipping up my chin with his finger. I met his
amazing grey-blue eyes and immediately sank to the bottom of their
deep pools. At that moment, I knew I could do almost anything with
him by my side.

Jazmine

I arrived at the Premier Inn within twenty
minutes and checked in. I wasn’t met with the perky yet gullible
bird that I spoke with on the phone, with which I was both glad and
disappointed. It meant I wouldn’t have to listen to her glowing
about her love life, but it also meant I couldn’t find out where
Eden and Asher were located. As I only had my purse, and nothing
else—I wouldn’t be staying long—I refused any help in finding my
room so I could snoop. I wished I had some awesome Trait like the
Nephilim. I would kill for the ability to be able to read people’s
minds right then. But being punished and stuck on this shit hole of
a planet didn’t come with any cool extra perks. At least I was
still the Angel of Fate.

I dumped my purse on the bed in my basic
little room and went into the bathroom to check my makeup and hair.
The dreadful weather outside did not compliment my hair or makeup
at all. The freezing wind coming off the river had blown my hair
everywhere, and the rain smudged my eyeliner. I reapplied my makeup
and brushed my hair. I added a coat of pink lip gloss and puckered
my lips at my reflection in the mirror. Why, oh, why wasn’t Asher
interested in me? Oh, that’s right. The skanky Nephilim. I groaned
in frustration. The Nephilim had to go! I exited the bathroom and
searched my purse for the tool I needed to do the job. I found the
bobby pin at the bottom, and after checking my hair once more in
the mirror, I exited my room.

I had specifically asked for a room on the
top floor where I remembered Perky had mentioned Asher and the
skank were situated.

“The mind reading ability would be really
good about now,” I muttered to myself. It wasn’t until I reached
the very last room on the floor at the opposite end of the hall
from mine that I heard someone talking. I pushed my ear up against
the door and listened. Being an Angel, I still had exceptionally
good hearing on my side. From this position, I could hear it was a
young guy. I smirked when I realized what he was doing.

“I’m right here beside you, Eden.”

I perked up.

Eden
. It’s Asher. Bingo! I found
them. Asher was talking in his sleep. I decided to make sure they
were really asleep before bursting in, so I listened a bit
longer.

“Asher, help me! Yes, we did it!” It was
Eden’s voice. They were both asleep. Good. I popped the bobby pin
in the key hole and jiggled. I was thankful this hotel was so old
and crappy that it hadn’t yet updated their system and began to use
keycards to open the doors. When I heard the little click I was
waiting for, I quietly pushed the door inward and crept in.

The blinds were drawn, so the room was dark.
I could just make out two sleeping figures on the bed in the center
of the room. I scowled and bared my teeth when I saw Eden with her
arm draped over Asher’s chest and that he had one of his arms
around her almost- naked back. I smirked when I realized what was
going on here. They had come here to this seedy hotel to consummate
their dirty little affair. I wondered what the Michaelites would
say when they find out about this! But revenge would have to wait.
Right now, I had to wake the sleeping lovers out of their fantasy
world. This had to end now.

I stomped over to the blind and yanked them
up, flooding the room with light.

I heard a moan come from the bed, and
someone stirred. I looked down and saw that Asher had rolled over
and was now facing away from Eden. His light brown hair was all
messy, and I felt a sudden urge to reach out and run my fingers
through it and smooth it out. Bugger it. I walked around to the
other side of the bed, to his side, and did just that. I dipped my
fingers into his luscious locks and ran them back. When a piece of
hair fell over his eye, I pushed it back. He stirred again. I
leaned in close to his ear.

“Morning, baby.”

It worked. Asher blinked, and just like
that, I pulled him out of Eden’s dreamscape.

Eden

Asher and I stood our ground and waited for
them to approach. As we stood in the middle of the cemetery,
hundreds of the once living staggered toward us.

“We’re surrounded. Asher, help me.”

“I’m right here beside you, Eden. Remember
that.”

We each took a full Soul Sphere and held
them out in front of us. One after another, lost souls were
reunited with their owners. Each undead person was transformed into
what they looked like before they died.