Netherworld, Soul Guardians Book 4 (27 page)

“
I wish we could have done
something.” With his hands in his pockets, Peter teetered back and
forth on the balls of his feet. “I feel so useless.”

Kara squeezed his shoulder gently. “So
do I, Peter. I wish we could have helped in some way. These poor
people didn’t deserve to die like this.” Kara sighed loudly. “It’s
horrible.”

The Sensitives huddled together in the
center of the room with their heads bent in conversation. Their
faces were hidden beneath their black hats.

Thor crossed the room and sniffed the
bodies gingerly. Taking time with each one, he moved with purpose,
like a police dog sniffing out drugs from luggage at the
airport.

A Sensitive with gleaming dark eyes
watched the dog from under his black fedora. An angry-looking scar
marred the left side of his face. He spotted Kara, and after a
moment he walked towards her. The tread of his heavy boots cut
through the eerie silence. He tipped his hat in a greeting. “Kara.
I’m glad you’re here.”

Kara gave a slight nod and kept her
eyes on the scene. “Santo, what happened here?” She kept her voice
low, afraid of disrespecting the dead.

Santo let out a heavy sigh. “A
bloodbath.”

“
But...” Kara met Santo’s
dark eyes. “But I don’t see any weapons. It’s almost as though they
were executed.”

Santo’s finger stroked the
scar on the side of his face. “They
were
executed—by a group of
murderous cowards. I should have been here. I would have ripped out
their hearts with my bare hands.” Santo gripped the hilt of his
sword until his knuckles turned white.

“
And you’re sure the Seirs
did this?” said Kara, in more of a statement than a question. The
lifeless eyes of the dead watched her, as if accusing her of the
massacre—that somehow this was her fault, that she should have
protected them. She suppressed a shiver and looked away.

“
Yes, it’s how they kill.
It’s their signature, one slash across the throat. Cowards,” hissed
Santo, and his expression darkened. “They weren’t prepared. They
never had a fighting chance.” A large vein pulsed on his forehead
below the rim of his hat. “I’m going to kill every last one of
them. I swear it.”

“
Here! Here!” said David,
and he squared his shoulders. “Their days are numbered. You can
quote me on that.”

Kara blinked to clear the fumes of
disinfectant from her eyes. The whole situation was worse than she
had anticipated. “What will you do with the bodies?”

Santo shifted his weight
and stared at the floor. “We’ll bury them together in our sacred
burial site outside the city. We’ll have a
ceremony

and then
we’ll bury our dead.”

The other Sensitives were intrigued as
Thor pressed his paw on the body of a woman and waited. After a
moment, he waddled up to her head and sat beside her. His lips
moved and strings of drool dripped onto the woman’s face. Kara
cocked her head to the side to try and get a better view of what he
was doing. Why was he so interested in a dead mortal?

“
Santo, what about their
souls? Were the souls saved?”

Santo was silent for a while. “We got
confirmation that their souls are dead. The Seirs slaughtered them
and then destroyed their souls.”

Kara had witnessed the brilliant tiny
crystals detaching themselves from the bodies of dead mortals many
times. Most of the time she or another angel was there to take the
glowing white ball back to safety. Unless the soul was saved, the
mortal spirit would die.

The legion had lost thousands of
angels in the battle against Asmodeus and his demons. Now there
weren’t enough guardians to look after all the mortals. The
situation was beyond horrendous.

“
And you think the Seirs
killed their souls too?” asked Kara. “But that doesn’t make any
sense. They’re mortals. Why would the Seirs be interested in their
souls?”

Santo closed his eyes and rubbed his
temples with his thumb. “Seirs use mortal souls as payment—it’s
part of the deal they’ve made with the netherworld. They help the
demons to stay in our world by giving them souls. It’s all part of
their plan to become demons themselves one day.”

Kara dug her fingers into her leg.
This had Lilith’s signature all over it. Somehow, she knew her
half-sister was involved, and she had to be stopped.

The young woman sobbed as she scrubbed
the floor.

Kara looked away and shifted her
weight uncomfortably. “I don’t see any children among the dead.
Were there any children?” She bit her lip and prayed that the Seirs
hadn’t hurt the children.

Santo clenched his jaw and stared at
the bodies. His voice quivered when he spoke. “We think they took
the children.”

“
What! Why would they take
the children?” Kara leaned forward and searched Santo’s face. A
musty smell filled her nostrils.

Santo turned to face her and scratched
his stubble. His mouth was pressed into a hard line. “We don’t
know—it’s never happened before. I’ve never heard of Seirs taking
children...Sensitive children even less. The elders are
dumbfounded. We don’t understand what’s happening.”

Kara and David shared an uneasy
glance.

She turned her attention
back to Santo. “You said they
took
them, so that means they’re still alive, right?
Then there’s still hope that we’ll find them. If they’re
alive—we’ll find them. The legion will help you—I’m sure of it. We
will find the children.”

Kara pressed a hand on Santo’s arm.
When he didn’t say anything, she continued. “We’re going to find
the children, I promise. The Seirs couldn’t have gotten far. My
team and I will search the city. We’ll get them back.”

“
It’s not just in this
city.” Santo’s thick brows lowered into a scowl. “We have reports
of killings and kidnappings all over the globe. All the children
are missing. They’ve taken them and vanished. We don’t know how
they did it, or how they were able to kill so many and get away.
They must have gotten outside help.”

Kara had an idea of where
this
help
had
come from. Stone-faced, she kept her guilt at bay. She didn’t want
Santo and the others to get a sense of what she was thinking. If
she was right, and Lilith was behind this, it meant that Kara was
partly to blame because Lilith was out for revenge. She knew how to
get under Kara’s skin.

As Kara tore her eyes away from the
dead bodies, she made a promise to herself. She would find the
missing children and bring them back. They were innocent. Who knew
what horrible things the Seirs were doing to them at this very
moment? One thing was for certain, she had to find the children
before the Seirs killed them.

“
Kara.” Thor’s big eyes
gleamed with urgency. “Quickly, she doesn’t have much
longer.”

Kara followed the dog over to the body
he had paid so much attention to earlier. David and Peter followed
quickly behind. Strands of black hair were stuck to the woman’s
sweaty forehead, and her chest rose and fell with effort. Her face
was streaked with blood, and the deep gash on her throat gurgled
quietly. Her eyelids fluttered open, and she stared up at the
ceiling, unfocused. She blinked slowly and then saw
Kara.

“
A—are...you...Kara?” she
croaked, each word making her wince.

“
She’s still alive! We
need to get her to a hospital . . .”

Kara’s words caught in her throat.
Thor’s expression was solemn. He shook his head slowly and lowered
his eyes.

Kara frowned. She leaned forward and
took the woman’s hand in hers. Her touch was icy and Kara squeezed
her palm gently. “Yes, I’m Kara. What...what can I do to help
you?”

The woman’s mouth moved. Her bottom
lip trembled, and she wheezed and closed her eyes. She opened her
eyes after a moment and spoke. “I...have...a...message.”

Kara looked up and met Santo’s
questioning look. The other Sensitives gathered around
them.

“
What’s the message? Who
gave you this message?” Kara searched the woman’s face.

The woman’s eyes glazed over as she
coughed up blood. Kara cringed at the sound as the woman tried to
suck air into her lungs. She wasn’t sure she would be able to give
the message.

“
She’s in pain...please,
can’t we do anything? She needs a doctor. ” Kara felt a slight
squeeze on her hand. The woman stared at her and then opened her
eyes wide and spoke with renewed vigor.

“
To my dearest sister,
Kara,” said the woman in a new voice—smooth and mocking. “Because
of you, I’ve decided to take the mortal world as my own and kill
all of these
disgusting
humans you care so much about. My army of Seirs
will annihilate the angels and exterminate the Sensitives who
resist us. All free people will be killed or enslaved—and I will
bend you to my will, too.

“
You know that I’m doing
all of this because of
you
.
You
will be to blame for the
destruction of the mortal world, sister dear. Ta-ta!”

A soft breath escaped the woman’s
mouth. Her eyes rolled in the back of her head, and her body went
limp.

About the Author

Kim Richardson is the
author of the SOUL GUARDIANS series. She was born in a small town
in Northern Quebec, Canada, and studied in the field of 3D
Animation. As an Animation Supervisor for a VFX company, Kim worked
on big Hollywood films and stayed in the field of animation for 14
years. Since then, she has retired from the VFX world and settled
in the country where she writes fulltime.

To learn more about Kim Richardson,
visit:

www.kim-richardson.blogspot.com

www.facebook.com/KRAuthorPage

http://twitter.com/Kim_Richardson_

Don’t miss the new series by Kim
Richardson

MYSTICS– Coming 2013