Into The Light (The Fallen Shadows) Read online

  Rosehill Church sat on the corner of Long Avenue tucked behind a group of brownstones. The Church had an old world appeal. The gothic exterior with sphere shaped columns broadcasting the entryway, monstrous dragon gargoyles atop the roof and stained glass windows with paintings of angels in a multitude of colors shared the Church’s rustic background.

  The lights from within shown through the windows depicting shadows of angels on the streets outside. The shadows danced as the wind blew the pine trees in front of the windows.

  With all of the sunlight shining on the streets of the city there seemed to be a dark cloud hovering over the church. There was an eerie calm that surrounded the area. The buzz of cars and people rushing about ceased to be as if Katharine and Ash were the sole survivors of an apocalypse confined to Long Avenue.

  A cold breeze tickled the back of Katharine’s neck. The Guide felt a chill similar to the one she felt moments before she was attacked in the quarry. There was darkness about the church that frightened her. As the darkness consumed her, Katharine felt a rush of anxiety flood over her. She stared at the artwork on the stained glass windows and felt as though the eyes of the angels were looking back at her, judging her. Katharine grabbed Ash’s arm as if holding on to him was just another reflex. As he looked at her and smiled a searing pain coursed through her head sending her crumbling to the ground. She screamed in pain and then they returned…the visions.

  Like they had the first time, the visions came in flashes, blurred puzzle pieces of images. Descended standing in a circle surrounded by a bright blue fire wearing smiles upon their grotesque faces, a young woman, not much older than Katharine, standing on top of a pile of rubble as if she’d been responsible for a cave-in, a bright blinding light with the blurred figures of angels scattered about within it.

  The same blue fire that burned around the Descended fell together with the blinding light erupting in a fiery blaze where nothing survived. Katharine’s skin burned as the flames engulfed her mind. She screamed as if she were on fire. The smoke and ash clogged her lungs choking her. She coughed and inhaled as though there were no air left in her body.

  “Katharine!” Ash’s voice played in her ear but sounded so far away. She gagged and choked as tears poured down her face. “Katharine can you hear me?” His voice became clearer and sounded as if he were running toward her. “Are you with me?” The visions began to subside and the dark section of the city began to come back into focus. “Are you okay?” Ash held Katharine’s shoulders tightly rubbing them with his thumb gently. She realized that Ash was sitting behind her holding her head and protecting her as she convulsed on the ground. He cradled her in his lap the way a husband would cradle their pregnant wife during a birthing class.

  Her head was pounding and that same feeling of nausea made her stomach churn.

  “What did you see?” Ash asked once Katharine showed signs of being back to her normal stubborn self.

  She sat up abruptly and wore a look of sheer terror in her eyes. “Ash, I think we’re too late.”

  “What did you see?” Ash repeated the questions.

  Katharine pulled her legs behind and took his hand and cupped it within hers. The flashes played in her mind like a broken record, the horrifying sight of the Descended standing around the bright light of blue fire and the girl not much different than Katharine. The smell of burning flesh and the searing pain she felt. The blinding images echoing in her mind.

  “I saw them standing around a fire that burned a bright blue. Angels walking through light as bright as the celestial sun and a girl, much like myself, standing on a pile of destruction leading them,” Katharine said trying to relate the images as she saw them. “Did I see what I think I saw? Are we too late? Have they already gone through?”

  Ash gently pushed Katharine aside and jumped to his feet. He reached his hand down inviting Katharine to take it. It was cold and slippery as if he had been sweating. His touch was clammy. Once steady on her feet she let go of his hand and wiped the wet residue off on the bottom of her dress.

  “No, they couldn’t have. I would have felt it if they had.” Ash said almost as if he were trying to convince himself. “What you saw, it wasn’t the type of vision most Trackers see. You saw a vision of the future.”

  He continued to speak but his voice trailed off as Katharine tried to wrap her head about the fact that she had seen images of future events.

  “I can see the future now?” Katharine interrupted. “No one mentioned this as one the abilities I was to acquire.”

  Ash stared intently at her in perfect silence; he looked at her as if it were for the very first time. “You’re not. I mean, no other Tracker has been able to do that before.”

  “Another wonderful surprise to check off the list of things I didn’t want.” Katharine said almost singing the words. “If I’m not meant to see the future, then why the hell am I?”

  Her patience had worn all too thin. She had enough trouble being the center of attention and being special in school and she sure as hell didn’t want to stand out in some heavenly battle. It was a good way to get yourself killed.

  “I didn’t know. As far as I knew Trackers could only see what was happening at very specific moments with the Descended, not what will happen in the future.” Ash scratched his head baffled by Katharine’s newfound ability. “There’s something about you. Something unlike any other Tracker I’ve ever come across. I felt it when I first laid eyes on you and I saw it when I saved you in the quarry. I just assumed it was because you were fighting back against the Descended.” He had more to say, it was written all over his face but a loud explosion coming from within the church silenced him.

  The sound was so loud and abrasive that Katharine was startled so deeply her nerves went into massive spasms. Her body trembled. She hadn’t been that jolted since she and Molli had taken Meadowbrook's haunted hayride through the quarry on Halloween night a few years earlier.

  Ash drew the sword from his belt, the blade rubbed against the edge of the belt creating an ear piercing scraping sound. The sound Katharine had heard in movies for so many years were echoing in her ears.

  He approached the Church cautiously taking care with his steps. He lurked the way a predator would lurk just before striking. He held his sword out in front of him and kept his free hand behind him to keep track of where Katharine was. She grabbed his hand and held on as tight as she could. They drew closer to the door that now looked like two large pieces of solid cobblestone held together by carefully placed cement.

  Within each section of black and grey stone, that created the church doors, were small carvings of heavenly figures. The carvings looked as though they were done with a knife soaked in blood. The bright red outlines of each figure shot out at Katharine like a 3D movie with vibrant colors and wild scenery.

  The wind kicked up soil from the flowerbeds that sat just below the set of stained glass windows to the right of Katharine. She choked and coughed as the dust particles tickled her throat. Ash turned around and placed his finger above his mouth, “Shhh!” Katharine raised her hands showing him her palms in an apologetic manner.

  He nudged her playfully and smiled. He did enjoy her sarcastic nature, it matched his quite well; although since she came along he noticed that his sarcasm was quite toned down. It wasn’t something he was doing consciously but somehow she seemed to level him. That was something that not even Angelina had been able to do. With Angelina he always felt like she was the better of the two of them. She was confident in a way that many would see as arrogant but Ash saw as a facade, something to hide the insecurities she harbored inside.

  Angelina always denied having any feelings of self-doubt but on the day she and Ash were caught kissing by Chance in the east garden, all of her self-doubt and insecurities came to a head. She crumbled under the pressure of being in trouble with the elders and the consequences that she was sure to face. She feared for Ash and couldn’t bear the idea of him being cast out into Purgatory. When the
time came for their punishment to be revealed she welcomed the ruling as it kept Ash in the garrison.

  Angelina may not have cared much for the rest of the Guides, the elders or the angels, but she loved Ash with every fiber of her being and would have given up a million memories to keep him safe.

  Ash placed his shoulder against the door and began using his body to force the door open. It creaked, sending an echo throughout the church’s interior. “Shhh!” Katharine said placing her finger against her lips in a mocking manner to which Ash replied with a roll of his eyes.

  Clinging to his sword in one hand and Katharine tightly gripped in the other Ash entered Rosehill Church.

  13

  ROSEHILL CHURCH

  Despite its uninviting exterior, Rosehill Church was beautiful. The rafters in the ceiling were made of cedar with its original textures, ridged and covered in waves and swirls. Glass chandeliers hung from the stacked rafters and shimmered with color each time the sun hit a new spot on the stained glass windows that sat along each wall of the house of worship. The stained glass that danced so eloquently on the streets outside began dancing shadows on the cedar pews and rosewood walls of the Church’s interior.

  The angels within the stained glass wore painted white robes with golden halos shimmering above their heads. Their faces showed looks of concern as they gazed down from their white clouds upon which they sat. The subject of their concern, humanity; men, women and children standing below the clouds stained in their own blood and surrounded by hundreds of the Descended. The pews were lined in rows of ten and sat side-by-side with a narrow aisle running in between the two sections.

  At the altar sat a glass statue depiction of Jesus nailed to a rose colored glass cross. The statue had drops of red falling out of its eyes as though the statue of Jesus was crying tears of blood. Katharine found the image terrifying. Is he crying blood? The pulpit was a short black stand that sat atop a group of three wooden steps.

  Behind it stood two marble columns with cherubs looking out upon the place where the people of San Francisco often gathered to pay tribute to their lord and savior. They weren’t the types of cherubs that Katharine was used to seeing; they were midnight black with bulging red eyes protruding out of their sockets. Their bodies were covered in burns and wide gaping gashes.

  Each cherub wore a sinister smile. Katharine swore they were following her with their eyes as she made her way down the long aisle leading from the entrance of the church and through to the altar in the front of the room. Rosehill Church was nothing like the church back in Meadowbrook.

  Every Christmas Eve, Katharine and her parents would go to Meadowbrook Cathedral for midnight mass. She remembered how elegant the church seemed and out of place. Meadowbrook wasn’t an elegant place but the church that stood in the middle of the town square between De’Lore’s French Bistro and the post office stuck out like a crystallized thumb among a parade of sore ones.

  The entire exterior was painted pure white with a gloss coating that kept it from being stained by mud, snow and any other elements that crossed it. Two tall cylinder shaped towers stood high on the roof in direct parallel with one another. In between the towers stood a steel cross with the words, “God is good,” inscribed across the horizontal bar of the cross. She never really wondered how true that was until the moment she arrived at the Anchorage.

  The interior was made entirely of what Katharine could only figure was wood from a bar on one of the farms just outside of Meadowbrook.

  The wood walls had small slits in between their large wooden slab. Although the walls were reminiscent of a barn, they had exquisite murals painted by Haram Mitchell, the local painter, who did most of the artistic work on the town’s businesses. Meadowbrook’s church also had cherubs but they were the usual fat babies with golden curly hair, smiling faces and of course the white cloth diaper hugging their backsides.

  Katharine was never a huge fan of going to Church because her family never really followed their religion but every Christmas Eve they made their way to the church for mass. Katharine would often protest claiming she had to study, an excuse that her parents never fell for. Studying over Christmas? Come on Katharine you can do better than that. Royal would always say. Since she never lied to them her parents could always see right through her excuses for not going to Christmas mass. Standing inside Rosehill Church Katharine wished for that dreaded Christmas mass.

  She quickened her steps so she could catch up to Ash who was a few steps ahead of her.

  “Okay now that’s just creepy,” Katharine said regardless if Ash were listening or not.

  Ash followed Katharine’s line of sight and gazed upon the black cherubs stopping quickly in his tracks. He gazed around the room and began to take notice of the terrible pictures embedded within the stained glass windows.

  His eyes continued to wander and he began to see that the ceiling, just above the rafters, was covered with yellowing oozing spots as though stained water had been seeping through from the roof. He began to put the pieces together.

  All of the signs were there all along, the discouraging façade outside the church, the Descended embedded within the windows, the blood dripping from Christ’s eyes and the devilish cherubs. The doorway was there inside Rosehill Church. Katharine’s vision had led them straight to it.

  “Badass!” Ash said quoting Molli’s reaction to Katharine’s wounds being magically healed by Davon. He pumped his fist in the air the way soccer players would after scoring the winning goal.

  “What did you just say?” Katharine chuckled. She’d seen Ash be flirty and joking around but she just always assumed that cursing was blasphemy, even a simple word like, ass. “Did you really just say badass and in a church no less. Ash, I am surprised at you?” Katharine nudged him with her shoulder gently.

  “It’s here Katharine, the doorway it’s here!” Ash grabbed her by the shoulders spinning her around to face him head on. The Guide looked her square in the eye and landed an unexpected kiss on her lips. They were soft like satin against hers.

  The Guide didn’t use his tongue but Katharine felt her entire body begin to tremble. It was as if all of her senses were on overdrive. At first she thought it was her abilities kicking in but when no visions or voices came around she knew it was just the excitement of feeling Ash’s lips on hers.

  The kiss only lasted a matter of seconds ending with Ash pushing Katharine away forcefully as if she’d bitten his lip. He looked at her completely baffled. His hands remained pinned to her shoulders as she stood silently looking at him waiting for him to say something, anything.

  “Ash?” Katharine finally said having grown too anxious to continue to stand in silence.

  Ash jumped as if he’d been sleeping with his eyes open and the sound of his voice startled him awake. The Guide slowly but abruptly removed his hands from her shoulders and clenched his fists as if to make sure he could still feel them. Keeping his gaze on the ground beneath him Ash was doing his best to avoid all eye contact with her.

  The embarrassed Guide remained still but then shifted the bag of arrows strapped to his chest and began to walk toward the room just beyond the devilish cherubs. Katharine stood in place unsure of what had just taken place. Did he not mean to kiss me? Does my breath smell bad? Her mind was racing trying to figure out what spooked him so suddenly. It hadn’t crossed her mind that Ash had been there before and felt himself falling on a common mistake.

  “Come on!” Ash shouted as he disappeared into the backroom.

  Katharine remained in the Church’s main room still lost under the spell of Ash’s kiss. Barely noticing the breeze that began to blow at first, the hairs on the back of Katharine’s neck began to stand on end as the cold air began to make its presence known.

  With each burst of bitter air Katharine began to hear the whispers of multiple voices that sounded like growls snarling all around her. She could not understand what the voices were saying as they traveled behind her growing louder as they pushed thro
ugh her ears. The whispers became dull growls as though a snarling creature was trying to climb out of a hollow tunnel above where she stood. Descended. Katharine’s feet sprung to life and took off into the dark room where Ash had disappeared moments earlier.

  Katharine felt a sharp pain soaring up her leg as she slammed into something all too solid. “Ouch!” Her voice carried through the main hall of the Church and bounced back inside the room before Katharine heard the sound of Ash shushing her. She looked around but could not see him or anything further than a few inches in front of her face.

  The room was completely dark with only the dim lighting from the Church’s main hall coming through the open door of the room. The small light allowed Katharine to see silhouettes scattered about the room. She saw the silhouette of a rectangular shape with thin rectangle shapes holding it in an upright position.

  Katharine assumed what she was seeing was a desk that sat in between the silhouettes of smaller rectangles with vase-shaped objects sitting atop them. Ash’s silhouette shot out from behind the desk. Katharine could see the outlined frame of his body and the sharp edges of the arrows that sat in the bag upon his back. She turned her attention back to the object that had caused her so much pain upon her approach.

  The light from the main hall hit it at the right angle to allow her to see exactly what it was. No wonder that hurt Katharine thought as she gazed at the square object that stretched nearly six-feet off the ground. The box had seams on all sides and four-sided openings. It looked as if something had either broken into it or broken out of it. The wood was bent outward and partially shredded.

  “What is that?” Katharine asked looking in the direction of where she’d last seen Ash’s silhouette only to find he was no longer there.

  Ash stepped around from behind the box using his hand to feel the edges and the broken pieces of wood. He knelt down to examine the bottom of the box and pulled something out from underneath it. Katharine watched as he made his way back into the main room so he could see what it was he had pulled from the box.