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Okay, what was with the afterlife and being so cryptic all the time?
Suddenly, the door opened, and four giant figures strolled in. They weren’t like the seraph guardian, more like very large bikers, but I had a feeling this was simply a chosen form for them. My ears popped, and the room seemed to pulse with some kind of power or energy as if the space was too small to truly contain them.
Upon closer inspection, I realized that they weren’t large like bikers—they were bikers. Or, at least, judging by their attire. They looked like the sort of biker guys who rolled through the diner. Generally, the bikers at the diner looked like Hell’s Angels, but they were usually doing charity runs or something like that. Plus, bikers were always good tippers.
Anyway, the four figures before me were tall and serious, with nearly identical strong, carved faces. Their skin glowed softly like they were lit from within, giving them an almost peaceful vibe despite their intimidating stances. Each of them wore a mix of leather and combat or tactical gear, including badass combat boots. They had lots of pockets on their gear and thick, pulverizing rings on their fingers. They each had a sword on their hip that blazed with light, like the seraph’s sword. Two of them had sleek, modern-looking bows on their backs, and one of them had a shotgun with a bandolier of bullets strapped across his chest. I caught movement behind them and realized I could see the outlines of wings on the nondescript waiting room wall. They had them hidden somehow, but their shadows didn’t lie.
“You have information,” one of them said.
“Speak,” commanded another.
“I—I, um,” I stammered. “About what?”
“Tell them,” Maria urged, comforting me with her motherly presence. She draped an arm over my shoulders. “Tell them of my son. Of Lysandra. Tell them she wants living souls.”
“Oh, um, Lysandra uses living souls—er, or wants to—for her vineyard. Gabriel sacrificed his soul in order to keep his mother from a reaper, but now he’s a soul stealer, and—”
“A soul stealer?” one of the Order cut me off.
I briefly explained the job and made sure to include how they stole souls from Heaven, too. They were equal opportunity stealers, and that fact seemed to disturb the Order as much as it disturbed me.
“Wait,” I said, more than a little exasperated. “Shouldn’t you know all of this already? I mean, the Order… keeps order, right? If everything Lysandra is doing is illegal, shouldn’t you and Satan and God or whoever rain some fiery atonement down on her?”
“Heavenly souls do not require order,” one of them explained. “Each heaven-bound soul she has taken over the centuries has cloaked her further. We cannot find her, and her roots grow deeper than the vineyard.”
“The balance,” I said. “She’s thrown off everything by messing with the natural order?”
One of the Guard nodded. “The very nature of the afterlife has been changed by allowing so many heaven-bound beings to exist below. Limbo has crumbled. It cannot welcome new souls. Hell grows hungrier, greedier from the wine fed by this purity. It grows more disordered by the day.”
“And Heaven?” I asked curiously.
“If a soul meant for Heaven finds itself in Hell, it may lose its faith. Faith in itself, faith in God, faith in its own purity,” the fourth Guard said. He had yet to speak, but it seemed like the subject of faith was important to him.
“Heaven needs faith for strength, right?” I said, and my heart broke at the despair in his slow, heavy nod.
Maria squeezed my shoulder, and I felt warmth run through me.
I sucked in a deep breath. “But what can I do? And will this help Gabe? Will taking down Lysandra free him? He… he didn’t deserve this. He was never meant for Hell.”
The first Guard nodded. “We will review all souls within the vineyard. All will pass fresh judgment.”
“What do you need from me?” I said resolutely. “I’ll do whatever it takes.”
It was Maria who spoke this time. “The vineyard will only reveal itself to someone who has been there before or for a soul that was claimed for it. You, my dear girl, will be our map.”
20
GABRIEL
I wiped the sweat from my eyes, hissing as the salt from it and the dirt from my hands stung the wounds on my face. They would heal fast. And when Lysandra noticed, I had no doubt she would slice me up again. The sky over the vineyard was always the unrelenting, searing sun—the better for the plants and the better to torture the workers. My skin felt cracked, and each time I swung the hoe, I felt like my dried-out skin might tear. It had only been a few hours, but already, the work was grueling. And I had an eternity of it to look forward to.
I sighed and swung the tool upward, then brought it down as hard as I could on one of the rocks. I felt like I was in a prison chain gang. It was a sort of bitter poetic justice. If I’d been arrested for my family’s crimes back on Earth, I might have ended up in a place just like this.
“Enjoying your new position, lover boy?” Lysandra purred as she clicked up to me. A glass of dark wine was in her hand. She looked like the cat that ate the canary. “You play nice enough for a few centuries, and maybe I’ll let you snatch a soul again.”
“As you wish,” I murmured sarcastically. A bead of sweat slid into one of my still-healing cuts, and I bit back a hiss. I didn’t want Lysandra to see an ounce of my pain.
Suddenly, there was a rumble in the distance. At first, I thought it might be thunder, but the unrelenting clear sky above made that seem unlikely.
