Fate's Exchange (Twisted Fate, Book 1)

Chapter Eight

THE BROTHERS

THE MORTAL REALM

Since we were charged with protecting the girl, I was there when she was first plucked out of transition. I'd never seen it before, the delay into the afterlife. It was too rare, and even now I didn't know why it happened with her. Passing souls were judged by the Brother who ferried them between worlds, not by all the Brothers as a whole. Who was she to warrant such an honour? What made her special?

I turned to the First Brother, trying to measure my voice as my impatience spiked. "So, who is she?"

"She hasn't arrived yet."

He motioned to a bench where the humans waited in the frigid morning air for the bus to arrive with friends. It didn't matter where we went. We could sit in the same spot as another and it wouldn't be detected—nobody could see us unless we allowed it. It wasn't magic; we simply didn't exist here, unaffected by nature and time and human afflictions. Things were better this way. Easier.

"I don't want to do this," I said, but then sat down as directed, always dutiful. Resting my elbows on my knees to lean forward and scan the crowds of students with distaste, I tried but failed to find a reason to make me want to stay. Nothing about humans appealed to me. They were ignorant and selfish, and a burden that marred the perfection my kind had been created with. "There are lower beings that can do this."

"There was one of our kind ordered to watch her," the First said. "He disappeared."

I blinked, otherwise unmoving. "We do not disappear."

"Then do you know where the boy is? Have you found him?" His tone was abrupt but not unkind.

All the Brothers were direct, bordering on crass. We arrived at the point as soon as possible, but even when we were angry our voices were a representation of the Glory within our souls. Our duties, growing in numbers and importance as the human population sprouted out of control, didn't leave time for the nicety's humans were hung up on. For feelings.

"No, I don't, and I haven't."

He scrubbed his hand down his face and lowered his voice to within a whisper, and the resignation was clear in the blue of his eyes when he turned and met my gaze. "If the boy hasn't disappeared, he has died. Or worse, he could have turned."

Leaning back against the bench, I crossed my arms while continuing to scan the crowd. Where is she? "Death is less likely than disappearance." I glanced at him and then continued to survey the crowd. "But I know this boy, Brother. He didn't—and wouldn't—have turned."

"It doesn't matter now."

He gazed at me without apology, looking like one of the many statues carved to honour our kind. He had honey-blonde hair and a deep tan that would never fade, set off in contrast to our uniform white robe. It was his expression that was emotionless, a picture of beauty carved into stone, which had been captured by one lucky mortal to be replicated in art throughout the expanse of time.

"We all agreed you are best suited for this task while we look for the boy."

"I agreed to no such thing."

"You are but one of seven, a single voice of dissention. Majority rules, Brother," he said.

"And yet we don't know why the task was given."

"We don't have to."

"Because we never question orders?" I stood and wiped my hands on the front of the unfamiliar jeans, which were as foreign as the face I was about to wear. The clothing was worlds away from the usual white robe that we donned for our duties, which were so all-consuming the robes had become our only source of apparel. "They aren't His orders."