Reaper's Hollow: The Complete Series

Chapter 8

Chapter 8

Ru sat on her sofa, her legs extended down the length of it, her laptop open in front of her, with Piper curled up at her feet. Spotify was blaring The Clash from her favorite punk playlist. Most people would be shocked to hear that she listened to this type of music, but it had gotten her through some dark times.

Her keyboard had a very thick, plastic protector on top of it, and the rest of her laptop was not only in the thickest case she could find, she never sat it directly on her lap, always putting a blanket or pillow between herself and the electronic device. So far, she’d only blown up one computer, and that had been years before. Replacing a hairdryer was one thing, but buying a new MacBook Air was another story.

She’d been home for three hours, and most of that time had been spent researching special powers on the Internet. So far, she hadn’t found much reliable information. Other than some guy in Poughkeepsie who claimed he could move objects with his eyes and a few kids playing around with bending metal, for the most part, everything she looked at seemed more than a little fake, and neither of those stories seemed particularly credible. Was it possible that Cutter actually had her keys, and she just didn’t remember it correctly? She doubted it. Ru would never be one to tout her strengths, but she did have a good memory.

Eventually, her search for answers led her to a page that had to do with the occult, a topic Ru had always avoided like the plague. Her mother was very serious when it came to discussions of demons and Satan—one of the kind who wouldn’t let her kids trick-or-treat because she believed it was the devil’s holiday and thousands of children each year were kidn*pped on All Hallows’ Eve and sacrificed to the devil. Ru could remember being terrified as a child when there was a lunar eclipse and Liddy Brown insisted the moon would turn to blood, signifying the beginning of The Tribulation.

One particular website she stumbled upon caught her interest. It was a listing of demons, complete with artists’ renderings of what they were supposed to look like, dating back to Biblical times. Most of them were horrific and scary looking. Azrael caught her attention. Some of the pictures showed him as a hideous creature with more than one face and dozens of hands and wings, some as a black-winged angel with a dark face, and others as a glowing Archangel of God. “It is said that Azrael was a helper to God, but then he was cast down, like Lucifer himself, and now he resides in the pits of Hell, still overseeing The Book of the Dead as the Archangel of Death.”

Ru stopped and considered what she’d just read. It all seemed silly to her. How could anyone even know who the angels were and which ones had been cast down from Heaven—if any of that were even true? “The demons are all just fallen angels,” she continued to read aloud, as if Piper were at all interested in what she had to say. “Whether or not our depictions of them are true is impossible to say.” You’ve got that right, she thought to herself.

Piper moved, readjusting on her feet, and Ru continued to scroll down the page. One of the pictures caught her eye, and she stopped. The face she was looking at was male, but he was lovely—perhaps the most symmetrical she’d ever seen, with soft eyes and full lips. There was a haunted look behind his eyes, a sadness, and even though it was just a charcoal drawing, Ru couldn’t help but wonder if the artist had actually seen this face before; it looked so real. She began to read below the drawing. “Thanatos, Death incarnate. One of many demons who walk the Earth searching for souls to collect. Otherwise known as The Grim Reaper. There are many who fill this role but none so well-suited as the son of Azrael.”

“The son of Azrael?” Ru repeated. Of course, the words “Grim Reaper” had also stood out to her. Living in a town named Reaper’s Hollow, they were all well aware of the legend of the man with the black cloak and the scythe, but Thanatos looked nothing like the bony depictions she’d seen in every other picture of The Grim Reaper she’d ever seen.

“How can Azrael have a child?” she asked. Piper didn’t seem to care either way, so she started another search. It led her to a passage from Genesis that discussed the sons of God reproducing with the daughters of men. The offspring were known as Nephilim, and they were giants who walked the earth, heroes. Whatever became of them, the passage didn’t say. Ru continued to search and found another word—Gibborim—which seemed like another word for Nephilim to her. Ru ran a hand through her hair. Was it possible that Azrael’s child came from one of these unions?

“This is ridiculous,” Ru finally said, closing her laptop. The house went quiet with the fading out of the music, and despite her declaration, she felt a little uneasy. “All this reading about demons and angels is going to my head, Pipe,” she said, setting her laptop on the coffee table and scooping up her cat. Piper cuddled into her arms and began to purr, and Ru leaned backward, adjusting the pillow behind her head with one hand as she did so.

She almost had to laugh at herself for chasing that rabbit so far down the hole. Trying to figure out how Cutter might’ve moved her car without the keys had led her to research about demons, and now she had scared herself. She felt more than a little ridiculous. Despite her upbringing, she’d never really thought any of that stuff was real. Sure, she believed in God, which meant there might be some angels out there somewhere, but for the most part, she believed the earth was basically what you see is what you get—no other realms, no supernatural creatures. While she had to think there was a possibility some people could manipulate their surroundings differently than others—otherwise, how could she account for her own inability to touch electronics without causing problems—she had always assumed there had to be a scientific explanation. “Either that, or I’m just a jinx—cursed, like Liddy always says.” She yawned and adjusted the blanket she had been using to protect her laptop so that it was spread across her lap. She had no idea what time it was, but the long week was beginning to catch up with her, so she closed her eyes.

Thinking of Liddy saying she was cursed reminded her of a time when she was younger and they’d all gone to the public pool together. Liddy had insisted she wear a T-shirt so that the scars on her back were covered. At the time, Ru couldn’t have been more than four, and she had no idea there was anything at all on her back. “You don’t want everyone to see where your real mom tried to kill you, do you?” Liddy had asked. Ru had shook her head, no. Of course, she didn’t want everyone to see that.

Why had her mom tried to kill her? she’d wondered, and what had stopped her? Now, those scars were faded, but they were still there, and Ru had never cared much for swimming ever since then.

As Ru began to fall asleep, her mind wandered. A face appeared in her mind’s eye. It was the image she’d created long ago to represent her birth mom. Despite Liddy’s warnings that her mother had never loved her, that she’d tried to kill her, that she blamed Ru for ruining her life, the face she saw before her was always kind and loving. She’d brush Ru’s hair out of her eyes and say, “Mommy loves you, always and forever. Don’t you ever forget it, Ru.” That was the mother Ru chose to believe in, the one that loved her, not the one who had cast her aside as a small child. After all of these years, she’d still never given up hope of finding her birth mom some day and asking her why she’d given her away. Surely, her true mother’s explanation had to be something more than Liddy Brown’s account that Ru was cursed.

She rolled over and tucked her hand under the throw pillow, drifting off into a deep sleep….

Ru was standing outside, an impenetrable, misty fog encircling her, rising up from the ground in thick tendrils, wrapping around her and preventing her from seeing more than a foot or two in front of her face.

The air was cool, and a layer of gooseflesh rose up on her bare arms. She was dressed all in black; her clothes seemed foreign. Everything about herself seemed altered, as if she didn’t know who she was or what she was doing.

She took a step and found the ground to be marshy, as it often was off in the hollows around the outskirts of town. A few more steps revealed she was standing in thick woods. The trees here were twisted, their branches extended in long, scraggly fingers.

Another few steps and movement in front of her caught her attention. She stopped in her tracks, wondering who or what it might be. Peering through the dense fog, she made out an outline of a tall figure. Like a walking shadow, it came closer, and she wasn’t sure if she should be frightened or reassured. Was this her savior, here to guide her out of the darkness, or something far more sinister?

The form stopped a few feet in front of her. The fog was still rolling about, but she could see now. By the shape of him, and the height, she guessed it was a man. He wore a cloak the color of night, and his hood concealed his face so it was obstructed from her view. Remembering the research she’d done, she checked his hands. Both empty.

“Who… who are you?” she asked, her voice cracking and sounding as if it was a faint echo even to her own ears.

He was quiet for a long moment, and Ru thought he might not answer. Eventually, his voice resounded in her head. “You know me. I’ve been looking for you for a long time. Now, I’ve found you at last, Ru.”

His cadence was even, his tone rich, like a melody. The words played through her mind like a song. Did she know him? He seemed like a distant memory, like someone she’d known before, in another life. “What’s your name?” she asked.

He chuckled, and once again it carried through her mind like an instrument. “You know my name, Ru. You know who I am. Come, we’ve much to do.” He extended his hand to her, and Ru looked at it cautiously through the fog. It wasn’t bone, as she’d thought it might be, but a strong, human-looking hand, and he seemed assured that she would grasp on to it.

“Show yourself,” she said, her voice sounding more commanding than she felt. “I want to see your face.”

“I would show you my face, Ru, but I fear you wouldn’t be able to comprehend a beauty as complex as my own. Come with me, and I will show myself in good time.” He beckoned her with his outstretched hand.

It was tempting. To reach out, take his hand, trust him. He could lead her out of here, out of the dense woods full of confusion and darkness. He could save her. Ru picked up her foot, but then she thought about her students, her friends. She thought about Cutter. Ru put her foot back down, behind the other one. “No, I can’t go with you,” she said, shaking her head. “I have so much to do.”

“You can still do all those things,” he protested, taking a step closer. “You will be so much more than you ever were before, Ru, if you just come with me. I will help you.” His hand continued to reach for her, though he did not move to grab her.

Once again, she was tempted, but she fought the urge to reach out and take his hand. “No, I can’t.” This time, there was not as much conviction behind her words as there had been before.

“Very well then. You leave me no choice.” His voice was still calm, serene, but a bit more forceful. He reached up and moved his hood so that it rested about halfway back on his head.

Ru gasped, her hands flying to cover her mouth. His hair was black as night, but his eyes were a glowing green, almost as intense as Cutter’s though even more electrifying. Perhaps what struck her most of all was the perfection of his face. He was by far the most handsome man she’d ever seen. She couldn’t take her eyes off of him. Feeling entranced, Ru took a step forward. “I… I do know you,” she muttered.

“Yes, of course you do.” He broke into a smile, his teeth glinting even in the dim light. “Come along now, Ru. We’ve much to do,” he repeated.

Ru took another step forward. How could she fear someone so pristinely beautiful, particularly when she knew she’d seen his face before? Had she known him when she was a child? Did he know her mother? Would he be able to help her find her? “How do I know you?” she asked.

He shrugged, nonchalantly. “You have always known me, Ru.”

She nodded, but his words didn’t make sense. She stopped, drawing her eyes away from his face as she contemplated a memory. Searching her mind, she fought to remember. And then it occurred to her. The computer—the research she’d done. She looked up at him, straight into his glowing eyes. “You’re Thanatos!” she said.

His expression flickered, as if he was caught off guard, but then it changed back into that reassuring smile almost so quickly, she might not have seen the difference if she hadn’t been watching him so intently. “You know me.” He said it as if she shouldn’t have been surprised, like her speaking his name was natural, like they were old friends.

“You’re Death,” she said, taking a step backward, suddenly feeling the fear building within her.

“Ru, I’m not here to take your soul,” he said, stepping closer to her.

Ru continued to back away, tripping over a tree root as she did so. “No,” she whispered. “I will never go with you.”

“Ru, wait! We need to speak. I can tell you so much.”

She wasn’t listening now, however. She turned and ran through the woods, praying that he wasn’t following her. The roots were thick, the branches reaching for her hair, the darkness obscuring almost everything, and she was certain she heard footsteps behind her. Ru picked up her speed and continued to run, feeling the sting of branches as they sliced through her skin, drops of blood dripping down her cheeks.

It was too late to stop. The ground came to a halt in front of her. With a skid and a spray of twigs and leaves, Ru careened over a cliff, plunging into a deep ravine, the ground at least a hundred feet below her. Seeing the terrain rush up to meet her, she screamed.

Ru sat straight up, sucking in air as if she’d actually been running through the woods. At first, she wasn’t sure where she was. A loud noise caught her attention, and she turned her head to see the television was on. Not exactly sure how that had happened, she fumbled for the remote on the coffee table. Piper was gone, likely frightened by the TV. The ceiling fan was also on, whirring around on high speed, and every light in the house, as far as Ru could see, was on, too. A noise was coming from the kitchen, another electric droning, and steadying herself, Ru rose to investigate. The blender was on, and the toaster had also been activated. Ru put on an oven mitt and turned them both off, along with the light switch.

“It was just a dream,” she told herself as she methodically walked through the house, using the kitchen mitt to turn off the rest of the lights and the fan. She left the light on in her bedroom, knowing she’d be back there in just a moment, and went to make sure the doors were all locked, and she hadn’t somehow managed to open windows. Everything was all closed tight, so she grabbed her phone off of the coffee table and headed to the back of the house.

Piper reappeared as Ru stumbled into her room and dropped down on her bed. “Did I scare you, kitty?” she asked, rubbing her cat’s head. “It was just a dream.” The clock said it wasn’t quite 11:00. She wondered if she’d even be able to go back to sleep after that.

It had seemed so real, as if she had actually been talking to Thanatos in the woods. Of course, she knew that wasn’t the case, but she’d never had a dream that vivid before. Or had she? Ru leaned back on to her pillows. Hadn’t she had a similar dream when she was much younger? Only she wasn’t in a thick wood at night. She was near the ocean, its waves calming her soul. And it wasn’t Thanatos whose face she was staring at then. It was her mother’s. Was it possible both of those dreams were real?

Ru took a deep breath and tried to think of something else. She carefully plugged her phone in and saw she had a text from Cutter from several hours ago saying he was looking forward to seeing her the next day. She wanted him to know she was looking forward to it, too, but she definitely didn’t feel like starting a conversation right now, so he’d have to wait until tomorrow. Surely, he wouldn’t think her lack of an answer meant anything more than she’d fallen asleep early.

She headed for the bathroom, hoping she could wash her face and wash away the dream. Ru had never lived a normal life, but things seemed to be getting even more complicated by the moment, and she was more than a little anxious about the situation, particularly when she wasn’t sure what Cutter was going to tell her the next day, but something in the back of her mind made her think whatever it was, her life be changed forever.