Page 50 of Guarded By Death

The realization hits me and I gasp, "Pierce!" I stutter, "You didn't."

He whirls his head and gives me a look of disgust, "Of course not.” he chokes, then he straightens himself out, and looks at me with a sweet intensity. "I couldn't do it. The children, the babies. They were innocent!" His voice booms through the empty beach and I clutch myself.

He steadies himself, "So I deflected. I went against divine orders." He shrugs.

When his eyes gloss over, I take his worried face into my hands for comfort. "So now that I know your past life and what happened..." I frown, thinking of what a difficult decision it was to turn against everything you know. But, it was undoubtedly the right decision. "I'm curious how all of that made you... this." I gesture to his body and he slowly nods.

"When I decided to stop the insanity, I halted my men and ordered them to return. I stayed to defend the children." He shrugs. "I couldn't risk their punishment for my orders." With a long breath, he says, "I knew it was only a matter of time before they came for me. Angels don’t die so when someone does something to defy the orders of The Council we go on trial and a life sentence to us is a much different monster," he elaborates.

"When they hauled me away I was placed in a room. Large marble pillars cascaded down from the high ceilings. I had heard stories about angels who had been on trial before but they were normally fallen angels, the bad ones. Not men like me, we were considered the darkness of all that was holy but we protected fiercely and did what was right. They created me for that purpose, so why didn’t they see that my actions were for the greater good?" he questions. "I was in a massive marble room, statues adorned the walls in between wide pillars. A man in a hooded cloak walked up beside me, I looked at him for one moment before facing my eyes ahead. To my right was a small woman, tiny in her voice and frame. She approached me with a smile. Protruding from her back were white wings that stretched out so wide they made the statues behind her look insignificant. She reached her hand out to me and I placed mine in hers. The cloaked man firmly grabbed my arm, taking me by surprise as the angel tugged me her way. Her strength didn't match her size, she was incredibly strong. No words were spoken between the two of them as she gently pulled me towards her and he forcefully jerked me back,"

A beat of silence passes between us before he speaks again. "The massive doors opened and a third person stepped in the room. I knew it was my judgment time, they would decide right then if I was going to stay in heaven or be banished to hell. His tone was authoritative but calming as he looked between the three of us. 'Neither of you can have him,' he stated as he walked further towards me. They both released me and tilted their heads to the old man,"

"I looked back and forth between the angel and the cloaked man, but my gaze was stuck on his hooded face as a set of white teeth peeked through the black in his hood. He held a terrifying smile and then just vanished, his cloak falling in a heap on the marble floor. I looked back to the angel and she started to back away slowly until she faded out of sight. I fell to my knees against the hard floor and lifted my hands to my face, I felt a thick fabric fall down my arms and I looked down to see that I now had on the cloak the other man wore." He shivers. "I was stripped of my rank, but they respected what I had done so they didn't want to banish me to an eternity of burning."

I straighten my shoulders, taking a deep breath. "How did you know what you had become? Did he explain?"

He throws his hands up. "The man walked up to me, ethereal light was surrounding him as the cloak laid against my skin. He looked me in the eyes and said, ‘You have been given the burden of being the Angel of Death. You will pay for your abandonment by serving the very humans you protected. Since you turned your back on us, you can stay with them.’ After he spoke, I can't explain how, but I knew what I was and what I now had to do. My soul purpose now was to bring souls to decide their fate. For so long, I've done this." He gestures to himself. "But then I met you and it all changed."

"Why me?" I ask in astonishment; I still don't understand it myself.

"I think you were meant for me, Scar," he says, and my heart does its usual flutter when he’s around. I try to calm the butterflies in my stomach. "Before you, I was a void, a shell doing one duty. I had no one, no friends, no family. But you gave me all of this." He gestures around us. "Love, companionship, family." His voice is low as his eyes bore into mine. I can't help but admire the way he is looking at me, lines of seriousness between his thick brows and his emerald eyes like an amethyst crystal staring back into mine.

I can't hold it in any longer. "But... you spent your life before that trying to make the world a better place and that can't be overlooked. Which if I were in your shoes I would have done the same thing, they were children! Everything else be damned, they were just kids!" I shout. I see the guilt behind his tired eyes. He was an angel, an innocent angel shipped down to earth, caught by the horrors of our race. I see him in a different light now, a man who was once a soldier of God, a soldier of the angels. I wonder what the previous reaper did to hold the spot before Pierce.

"Wait," A light clicks on in my head. "you obviously took the place of the previous Angel of Death, so do you think one day you'll be free?”

He laughs, "No, the hope to be something else, even just nothing, diminished in me long ago." His longing gaze prompts me to deflate. "I won't ever be anything more or else, just always this."

Tears threaten to release, "But you did what was right Pierce! It’s unfair." I stand up, pacing in the sand. "You are good." I grab his face and look into his eyes. "You didn't deserve this. Why would they strip you of everything you've done for them? Why would they sentence you to this life?" I spit.

A defeated look on his face is all it takes for me to sit back down, he grabs my hands as he speaks. "It’s a loaded question, one that I can’t understand nor answer. But from what I can gather, I wasn't good enough for heaven anymore, but I wasn't evil enough for hell.”

Twenty-nine

Hi, Kayla!

We’ve been spending the last day in comfortable silence. More so it's Pierce giving me room to work through what I told him about my father. He thinks the silence is also about him and I can't explain why but he doesn't frighten me. I've never felt more secure or better than when he's beside me.

Kayla will be getting here soon and I'm excited to get to know her. We're all going to dinner tonight at a restaurant on the beach. I'm excited to dance with Pierce, the music is supposed to be amazing from what Mom and Brian said.

After playing checkers for the tenth time with Pierce and failing miserably each round, I hear the distant sound of a front door shutting. "Hey, Kayla!" Mom calls from the kitchen.

I grab Pierce's King that's about to make me lose, again, and chuck it across the patio. He -of course- grabs it with ridiculously fast movements. "Cheater." I stick my tongue out playfully and rush inside, him chasing after me.

Kayla's eyes widen in surprise at our chasing game of cat and mouse as we head into the dining area. "Hey!" She smiles, her short black hair bounces as she carries an impressive amount of school books. She sets them on the kitchen table with a huff. I know she's my age, but mom mentioned she started summer classes at her new college already, I wonder what she’s going for?

"Nice to see you not in a hospital," she jokes and I laugh as I greet her with a hug. I know I should feel more awkward since we don't know each other but I miss Liv so much already and sometimes, you just need a hug.

My smile brightens when she pulls me in tight, hugging back. "Thank you for the flowers again, that was so sweet!"

My eyes trail to the stack of titles in front of us. "What are you going to school for?" I nod my head to the table.

"Law," she beams. "You?" I try to imagine Kayla as a lawyer. I don't know her well, but her small frame and soft voice don't scream Lawyer to me. She seems too sweet to deal with such a cut-throat profession, but maybe I shouldn't judge her so quickly.

"I'm undecided," I admit with a shrug. Pierce gives me a confused look from where he sits at the table.

For dinner I opt for wearing a white short sundress, knowing this is an outdoor restaurant at the beach and I don't want to sweat to death.

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