Crypt Keeper, page 8
Mother forbade me to write anything about the Keepers down on paper as it could fall into the wrong hands. I’m certain your great aunt Mags has come to your aid by now, and if I’m wrong she will be shortly. You can trust the old gal; she may be a bit eccentric but don’t let that deter you. She would do anything for her family and has a great big heart.
I know our paths will cross again as you do, so there is no need for goodbyes. Aren’t we lucky?
Love always,
Dad
Well, shit! This had been one hell of a day.
Chapter 7
“I’m old enough to know better, but young enough to do it anyway.”
~ Anonymous
Hearing the knock on the outside of my bedroom window should have been enough of a warning to stay the hell away from whoever it was, since my bedroom was more than fifty feet off the ground. It certainly wasn’t Levi; I would have felt him by now. Like I said, it should have been but it wasn’t. Wiping my face clean, I slipped off the bed and threw on a pair of jeans and a tank top, then padded over to the window. Kneeling on the window seat, I opened the curtains and nearly screamed at the sight of this person perched on the high pitch of the roof outside my window. Opening the window immediately I shouted, “How the hell did you get up here?” Reaching out I grabbed him by the collar of his button-down shirt and yanked him through. He was lucky that I had full-sized windows in my bedroom or I’d have taken his head off.
Surprising me, he came through with grace and agility, landing on the balls of his feet. “I suppose this wasn’t the best idea I’ve ever had.” Damon stood there with that boyish grin of his.
“Ya think?” I put my hands on my hips. “Explain yourself.”
He ran his hand through his hair. “Sorry, I thought you could use some company after the horrible day you’ve had. I wanted to come by and…well, help if I could.”
“Help me how? I take it from the Spiderman routine that you aren’t what you seem either. Shit.”
He began to peer around the room as if taking in where I’d grown up. “I suspect you have known all along that I wasn’t what I appear to be. People like us have a sort of sixth sense about things. ”
“Yeah, well my sixth sense must suck ass because, God help me, I thought you were normal. Well, mostly. Now that we’ve established that I have shitty instincts, why don’t you get on with explaining why the hell you found it necessary to climb into my bedroom window?”
“You’re upset. My timing has always been poor. I don’t want to upset you further—is your aunt around anywhere? Perhaps she can help explain things better than I can.”
“My aunt?” Of course he knew my aunt. This was bullshit! I stomped across the room and opened my bedroom door. “Mags! Get your ass up here, pronto!” She hadn’t left; I could sense that she and Jewels were now down stairs meandering about. They were lucky that they’d waited until my anger simmered before coming back inside. I stood there, arms crossed, waiting. Damon kept his mouth shut too, the coward. Finally Mags made it up to my bedroom and sauntered in as if she owned the joint.
“A little late, aren’t ya?” Mags narrowed her eyes at Damon. “And from the looks of things you haven’t done your job very well either. Stupid asses, I swear. Am I supposed to do every damn thing myself?”
Throwing my arms in the air I cried, “What the fuck? Somebody better start explaining this shit to me or I’m going to blow and take all you assholes down with me.”
“God, is she always this testy?” Mags asked Jewels just as she slinked inside the room.
She replied, “Nah, not always. She pretty awesome most the time.” She never made eye contact with me as she spoke and it was a wise choice on her part. I was overloaded with emotion at the moment. I’d just lost my father whom I hadn’t spoken to in years and whom apparently had made it his life’s work to protect me from a life he didn’t want for me. I’d kicked my step monster out of her home. My best friend had secrets that she felt important to keep from me. I had a great aunt that was like me. Levi was MIA, and now the hunk from the school I’d been studying at that I’d made out with and was seriously considering so much more with was standing in my bedroom and knew more about my life than I did and wasn’t what I thought he was either. Come on!
“Molly, you need calm down, dear.” Mags smiled and patted my arm.
“Calm down? Are you completely senile? My life is a shitstorm of the greatest magnitude and I’m about to have the meltdown of the century!” And I was alone without Levi to help me cope. I began to hyperventilate.
“Molly, listen to my voice. You need to know something about yourself before you cause something that can’t be reversed.” Mags kept her distance and just pointed to the mirror on the other side of the room.
Damon began to pace, the room began to spin and Jewels looked terrified and that in turn terrified me.
Jewels whispered, “Please Molly, try to calm down and have a look in the mirror.” She stepped closer to Mags. She’s never gotten this far before.” Mags nodded her understanding and whispered something back to Jewels that seemed to comfort her a bit.
This whole scenario was painful for me. Jewels’ behavior hurt the most. I whirled on her. “You! All these years you’ve known about this whole Crypt Keeper business and never said a word to me.” She opened her mouth and I shouted, “Don’t deny it! You’ve been taking orders from Mags while pretending to be my friend. Just like this asshole pretended to be interested in me.” I turned to Damon. “You can see her, can’t you?” He looked away. “Dammit to hell! All of you are sick fucks and I don’t want to see any of you! Get out!” I pointed to the door.
“Molly.” Mags pointed to the mirror again. “Look, then we’ll do anything you like. We’ll leave and never return.” Jewels sucked in a breath.
My hands began to shake as fury filled my veins. I grabbed the first thing in arms; reach and chucked it at Mags. She barely missed getting brained by my paperweight. Jewels shrieked but Mags kept looking at me sternly.
“Molly, that’s enough.” Damon stepped between me and Mags. “You need to learn to control your anger, redirect it.” I wanted to tear his face off and that fact scared me more than anything else that had happened here tonight.
Seeing that no one was going to relent and feeling childish, I gave in. “Fine,” I said, stomping over toward the mirror. “If I never see any of you again it will be—” My eyes! They were dark black swirling orbs. I froze and all the fury oozed out of my body, replaced by sheer terror.
Mags came up beside me. “It seems your abilities may outshine all of ours.”
My hands were shaking as I raised them to touch my face. “What… What does that mean?”
Mags replied softly, “I’m not sure. What I can tell you is that the ability you are exhibiting is one that gives you the power to cause mass destruction. You’ll need to learn to control it. We’ll help you.” My body began to shake. “Think of what’s inside you as an unstable volcano getting ready to erupt. Try to calm the volcanic activity.” I didn’t know how, and the more I panicked the more I seemed to quake. Mags took a deep breath, her brow furrowed in concern. “I’m going to use my ability now, okay, Molly?” I nodded as she placed her hand on my forehead and closed her eyes. Fear filled my veins. I didn’t want to cause mass destruction or explode like an erupting volcano.
“Damon,” Mags called as I began to see double and feel physically ill. Maybe this was all a bad dream. Perhaps I was overtired from studying and I’d wake up in my safe little apartment any minute. Or I was in the Twilight Zone. Anything would be better than this absurd reality that I found myself in. My knees gave out.
“Its okay, I’ve got you.” Damon lifted me in his arms with such ease, I felt as if I was floating. “Wrap your arms around my neck, sweetheart. Everything is going to be all right.”
“I’m so dizzy,” I moaned as I was floating somewhere, but I did feel much more calm and for that I was grateful.
“Dammit, Mags, you were supposed to help her adjust,” Damon whispered.
“Correction—we were all supposed to help her adjust. I can’t do everything. I have my own fish to fry, remember? You have the most to lose in all of this, Damon. You made it very clear to me when I agreed to accept the Night Guard’s request to allow you to pursue her that you were positive you could protect her. How can you protect her from when she’s endangering herself?”
“I have protected her—you have no idea how often.”
“You should have made the connection at the first opportunity,” Mags retorted.
“She’s special, as you know, and I didn’t want to rush her!” Damon growled. “You see how she isn’t even up to speed on her own abilities. This isn’t all on me. Your sister had the responsibility to ensure she was ready when the time came.”
“Night, enough.” I felt myself being laid down on something soft. I was also conscious of the fact that Damon hadn’t taken his hands off of me.
“Is she going be okay?” I heard Jewels shriek over both of them.
“Yes, she’ll be fine—quit your sniveling,” Mags replied uncaringly to Jewels and it pissed me off. I wanted to say something to defend Jewels but my mouth wouldn’t move. I was so tired. The last thing I felt was a cool chill as the room dropped several degrees.
“You see?” Damon’s voice was rough. “He’s always around. He won’t leave her alone.”
Mags replied but I couldn’t make out what she said. Sighing, I let everything else go; I’d deal with them later. Now I could go to sleep with the knowledge that Levi had returned.
~~~
When I woke Damon was putting a damp cloth on my forehead. “How… how long have I been out?” I tried to sit up and the room began to spin.
“Hold on.” Damon helped me lie back down. “You need to get your equilibrium back under control before you attempt to sit up or stand.”
I shivered as he fixed the damp cloth back onto my forehead. I tried to remove it but he held it fast. “I’m cold, Damon.”
“I know, honey, but we need to lower your body temperature a bit more.” He smiled warmly as he kneeled down next to the sofa. “You should be feeling more like yourself in a few minutes.” He held a glass of water to my lips and I managed a few sips before I collapsed back against the pillow.
“Where is everyone?” I asked when I realized that he and I were the only ones in our upstairs living room.
“Oh, Mags had something come up and she took Jewels with her.” That came as a surprise, but then I remembered the bomb they dropped before I passed out.
Fighting against the spinning room, I pushed myself up to a sitting position. “Wait a damn minute. You have a hell of a lot to explain to me.” I gritted my teeth as my head throbbed. I wouldn’t show weakness as I stared him down.
He stood and took a few steps toward the other side of the room, turning his back to me. “I wanted to tell you so many times. Believe me it would have made my life so much easier if I could have confided in you.”
“Oh, forgive me for being an inconvenience in your life—it isn’t as if I asked you to follow me around,” I snorted and stood, finally able to handle the small dizzy spells that seemed to be ebbing some. “Well, what are you waiting for? Spill it, you stupid ass!”
“It will be easier if I just show you.” His breaths were coming in small pants, his shoulders rising and falling rapidly. Then something extraordinary began to happen. His shirt began to tear down his back as his muscles expanded. “What the fuck!” He slowly turned around. His face was the same but his eyes were that strange color they’d been at restaurant, still dark green but they looked very inhuman. His body was a good five inches wider and about a foot taller.
“Don’t be frightened, Molly. Please.” I stumbled back and fell onto the sofa. Instantly I scrambled up and over the back of the sofa just as the room heated up I swear by fifteen degrees. “I won’t hurt you. I could never hurt you.”
“What are you?” I asked, steeling my nerves as something inside me tightened. I recalled how my eyes had changed earlier and I asked before he could answer my previous question, “What am I?”
Slowly I watched as his body relaxed back into the normal human size. He stood there, shirtless in nothing but a stretched-out pair of pants. “You are a Crypt Keeper, like your ancestors were before you—just with a little something extra we all would be interested in finding out about.” He took a couple steps toward me. “In regards to me, because Keepers are hunted so fiercely each of you has a protector, one that teaches you the ways to survive along with the skills needed to perform your job. That’s where I come in. I’m yours.”
Shaking my head I said, “Come again? You’re my what? Protector?”
“Yes. I am from the Night Guard, a secret society that resides in both dimensions. We’re neither alive nor dead, therefore we can never end. We just get sort of recycled.” He sat down on the armchair in the corner, taking a nonthreatening posture that I recognized from my training. The simple act made things feel more normal, which I’m sure was his intent and I appreciated it.
“So your sole purpose at the university was to get close to me?” He gave me a single nod. I wasn’t sure how I felt about that yet, although I was pretty sure I didn’t like it. Leaning against the back of the sofa I faced him. “You told Mags you’d been protecting me. Explain.”
“Well, you ever have the feeling that someone was watching you? Perhaps your heart rate spikes for no apparent reason or the hair on the back of your neck might stand up when you were walking around campus.” Thinking back I realized that yes, I had. I’d just assumed it had been my paranoia that some of the dead had found me.
“Okay, you have my attention.” I folded my arms across my chest.
“Those that wish for the crypts around the world to remain open send creatures from the depths to destroy the Keepers.” I swallowed hard as his words reminded me of the similar information I’d received from Mags. “There haven’t been that many come for you with the confusions surrounding your father’s abilities. Now it will change. That is why I couldn’t allow things to remain the way they were between us. I wanted to give you the time you needed to warm up to me, you know.” Damon smiled. “Get to know me of your own free will. It isn’t unusual for Keepers and their protectors to have a natural attraction to each other since they spend so much time together. The difference with us was that we had that attraction before you even understood who and what you were. It was nice, and selfishly I wanted to see where it went on its own.”
Studying his face for a few long moments I decided that I believed him. “So you could see Jewels the entire time she was gyrating around you and pretending to take a bite out of your ass?” I smirked, feeling a little more like myself.
“No, thankfully—I can honestly say I did not have a clue she was trying to take a bite out of my ass.” He laughed. “Those of the Night Guard have the ability to block those living in the wrong dimension when it is necessary.”
Narrowing my eyes at him I ordered, “Explain what you meant about Levi.”
His body went tense. “Levi is a different entity all together. It isn’t something that one can explain—you have to view him in his true light on your own. But I can tell you that you shouldn’t trust him. He isn’t what he seems.”
None of them knew Levi like I did; they didn’t have a clue who he really was. Feeling extremely protective of Levi I countered, “Neither are you.”
He opened his mouth then closed it again. I could see he was struggling with the words he wanted to say. Finally he sighed and stood. “Yes, well we have much ground to cover, and with the threats that will be coming out of the woodwork now that you have been exposed to our world we really should begin with your training.” He rolled his head around his neck and cracked his knuckles.
“And what would this training consist of?”
“You must learn to protect yourself.”
God, he was going to try and make me work out. “Uh huh. Well, if the training you want me to participate in is anything that remotely resembles exercise then count me out. I’m allergic.” Pushing off the sofa, I headed straight for the kitchen and my little brother’s candy stash.
When I turned around Damon was in the doorway leaning against the doorframe. “Molly, as much as I enjoy your sarcastic personality…well, actually the truth is I find it sexy as hell. However, your ass is on the line now. And since I plan to stake my claim on your hot ass soon…” I nearly choked on the peanut M&Ms I was scarfing like a pig as his heated gaze landed on me. Luckily I was able to cough it up before I lost consciousness. Yeah, I’m a class act. Damon didn’t seem concerned with my near death experience as he continued with his declaration. “You haven’t a choice in the matter.”
“Firstly, I always have a choice, and secondly, my ass isn’t part of this deal.”
“As I recall you were a little more than interested in my affections a few nights ago.” His eyes began to smolder with the now familiar heat.
Steeling myself against the effect, I smiled. “That was then, this is now, and since your true nature has come to light along with the year of lying I’m no longer interested.”
He lowered his tone. “We’ll see about that.”
Say what? I strode over to the refrigerator and took out a beer from the drawer in the fridge where my dad had always kept them, cracked the sucker open and gulped greedily. When I finished the can I crushed it, then tossed it across the room into the wastebasket. A chill washed over me and I smiled while wiping my mouth with the back of my hand before looking over my shoulder at him. “I think you should leave.”
“I’m not going anywhere.” He stood there bemused by me.
Fine, then I would. “Suit yourself,” I said, shrugging as I waltzed across the kitchen, through the mudroom and out into the night air, slamming the door behind me. Before my feet could hit the ground I was swooped up and into the air by a pair of strong arms. It all happened so quickly, I couldn’t help the shriek that left my lips.
