The Sinner

Two

The torch’s flame flickers, sending shadows dancing across the walls. Bloodstained walls. The stones are slick with it. The floor too, and it’s so dark. Screams echo through the narrow corridor. His screams, rising from the very bowels of the temple.

The corridor widens to a chamber. Bodies—four of them—lie on the stony floor, pools of blood beneath their heads, matting their black hair. The fifth of their number, a woman, is still alive. She is bound and gagged and on her knees. She faces the man who’s been screaming. He’s bound too, his hard, muscled flesh slashed open in a dozen places, his body broken by torture.

Their eyes meet across the blood-soaked stones, the air thick with death and pain. He shakes his head, agony bright and sharp in his dark eyes. A blade glints in the torchlight and is laid to her throat. His screams begin again, hoarse and ragged; he writhes against his bonds like a man possessed. A quick motion and blood flows in torrent, and the woman falls to the stones. They are made of shadow. She falls in, falls away, and the man’s screams—tinged with rage now—chase her down.

The screams become a raven’s cry, black wings outstretched…

Then a plea, choked with grief.

“Forgive me…”

 

My eyes flew open with a gasp. I jerked up against the wall in the empty lot. The twilight’s shadows had thickened as the sun sank. I’d lost at least an hour to…what?

A dream. It was all a dream…

Whatever it was, it was quickly slipping away from me—I couldn’t hold on to it. A temple? And so much blood…

“About time,” a deep voice muttered tiredly. “I was about to give up and find someone else.”

Another little cry tore out of me, and I pushed myself tighter to the wall. The man was still there, slumped against a wooden moving pallet, his legs drawn up to hide his nakedness.

At least, I thought it was the same man.

He wasn’t as tall but built more solidly and packed with lean muscle. The wings were gone, and the black-on-black eyes were now deep amber, watching me. Intense. His skin wasn’t a bloodless white but a healthy olive tone…except for the scars that scored his body. So many scars. Slashes across his torso. A gash on one bicep. Another at his neck. And a circle the size of a silver dollar square over the left side of his chest. Over his heart.

I scrambled to my feet. “What’s happening?”

“What is happening is the begi

“I don’t understand. How long have I been…?”

“Unconscious? About an hour.”

I shuddered at the idea that I’d been passed out for that long with a naked man sitting across from me. He seemed to read my thoughts and put his hand over that terrible scar on his chest.

“ Gek pro’ma-ra-kuungd-eh. A sacred vow. I will not harm you. Not in this life or any other.”

I had no idea what he’d said—or even what language he’d said it in—but the conviction in his deep voice calmed me a little.

I eased a breath. “Who are you?”

“I am Casziel.”

Like Caz-EE-ell but with a hiss in the middle. The sound sent half-frightening, half-electric tingles down my spine. I wanted to say it. I wanted to taste it on my tongue…

“What kind of name is…that?”

“An old one,” he said. “And what do they call you?”

“Lucy.”

“Lucy is from the Latin, meaning ‘born of light.’” Casziel smirked. “How fitting.”

He looked to be about twenty-five or so but spoke as if he were older. A jaded, sarcastic tint colored his every word, and I couldn’t place his faint accent.

“How did you get here?” I asked. “Were you mugged?”

I hoped that was all it was and not what it looked like—that he’d been stripped naked, assaulted, and left for dead.

Casziel cocked his head. “Are you concerned about my welfare already? That bodes well. But save your pity; no one hurt me. Crossing Over is always difficult.”

I nodded as if that made sense and inched for the wooden stairs that led to my place. “Okay…well, then I’ll just call the police—”

“No police.”

“But you’ve been robbed…haven’t you?”

“I have been robbed, yes. But what was taken no longer belongs to me.”

“Um, okay.” He spoke in riddles, but the pain in his voice was real. “Is there someone else I can call for you? Family—?”

“You’re not afraid of me?”

I swallowed. “Should I be?”

“Most humans are.”

“Okaaaay,” I took a step back. “I really think I should call someone.”

The police or maybe mental health services.

Casziel pi

The yawning chasm of bloody death and grief from the vision or dream or whatever it was fell on me like a shadow. I went cold all over and nearly missed that he knew my full name.

“I-I never told you—”

Casziel muttered in a language I didn’t recognize—something exotic and old.

“Forgive me, Lucy De

“You need clothes,” I said stupidly. “Right. Okay. Sure. I’ll…be right back.”

I took the rickety stairs up to my studio and unlocked my door with trembling fingers, nearly dropping the keys twice. Once inside, I shut the door behind me and threw every lock, barricading myself within.

Everything looked the same as when I’d left for work. This morning’s coffee cup on the counter. My bed neatly made. My houseplant—Edgar—in the window. All the strangeness of the situation with Casziel seemed more unreal against the ordinary realness of my place.

There was a naked man in my back lot. That’s all.

And the wings? And black eyes? And bloodless white skin?

“There’s a plausible explanation for all of this,” I murmured, taking a steadying breath. I hit my head on the wall harder than I thought.”

Except I’d discovered Casziel before I hit my head. Did a version of him have wings…?

Not going there.

I raised the phone, my finger poised to dial 911. The police would show up and this man would be out of my life. Everything would go back to normal. I could take a hot bath, heat up some ramen, and curl up in bed with my books until the weekend was over and I had someplace to be again.

Same as last weekend. Same as the weekend to come.

Would it be so terrible if I brought Casziel some clothes first?

Yes. Yes, it would.

I dialed nine and stopped again.

The heroines in my favorite romantic fantasies were always finding themselves in dangerous situations. They faced them bravely and wound up learning they had special abilities, or they became queens of fantastical lands. Bringing clothes to a naked man—a beautiful naked man—with scars and exotic eyes wasn’t the same as saving a kingdom or stepping into Narnia, but it was something.

Ridiculous, scoffed the sneering voice that always seemed to pop up when I wanted to stand up for myself or try something new. This isn’t a book, it’s real and you’re not special. You’re Silly Lucy, living her silly little life.