His Soul To Keep (Dark Knights of Heaven Book 1) Read Online Free Page A

you’ll need to know how all of this started. We’ll have to go back to the beginning."
    "The beginning of what?"
    "Everything."

Chapter Three
     
    Rail waited for some sort of comment regarding his sanity—instead he got a blank look. Before the first word left his mouth, Cassidy interrupted with a sigh.
    "Everything as in…?"
    "The beginning of the world, mankind, everything." He studied her face, waiting for her reaction. It wasn’t what he expected.
    "Couldn’t you give me the CliffsNotes version? Eighty million years is a lot of history," Cassidy quipped.
    "All right. But first tell me about the beast that attacked you." Rubbing his hands together, Rail stood and took a few steps away.
    "Rabid bear," she scoffed.
    "And what about what you saw in the corridor? The fight between Boomer and me?"
    "I...I don’t know. I was hurt and scared and…" She looked up hopefully. "Drug induced hallucination?"
    Rail pressed the heels of his hands to his eyes. "This is harder to do than I thought. How did the others manage this?" He took a deep breath and turned. "Okay, here’s the quick and dirty version. The realms you know as Heaven and Hell are what you would call parallel dimensions to the World of Man—Earth." Rail paused, waiting for Cassidy’s reaction. When she didn’t blink, he took another deep breath and pressed on. "A long time ago, an entity from the Heaven dimension found this world in its infancy. For sake of argument, we’ll call this entity God. God was intrigued, so he stayed, and after a while his energies infused with everything in this world, including the developing life forms. Now we skip ahead a few million years to the time when angels walked the earth with mankind. The angels protected them, helped them, and taught them—some even fell in love with them."
    "I know that story." She tilted her head. "It was against the rules."
    "Yes." A ball of sorrow formed in the pit of his stomach. "And they, along with their supporters, were punished. Forced to watch as everything they had come to cherish was destroyed."
    Cassidy sat quietly, her gaze locked on him.
    Under her stare, his throat became a desert. Rail swallowed several times before the words came again. "You know how Lucifer was kicked out of Heaven? Well, the Hierarchy learned what a big mistake that was. This time the offenders were pulled back to Heaven, imprisoned, and stripped of their gifts. In fact, all the remaining angels were hauled back to Heaven whether they were involved or not." Unable to stay still, Rail paced. "It was during this time that several imprisoned angels escaped, sought out Lucifer, and begged for his help in avenging the loved ones they lost."
    Rail ran his hands through his hair. "Unfortunately, these newly Fallen were easily manipulated and fell under Lucifer’s sway. Idiots even helped him open multiple portals from the Underworld dimension to Earth. That was the first demon war."
    Memories flashed in his mind. Those had been dark days for the humans. So many were lost while he and the others sat in prison, helpless.
    Cassidy’s soft cough pulled Rail back to the present.
    Letting go of the dark thoughts, he snorted. "Imagine how pissed Lucifer was to discover he couldn’t cross over himself."
    "But I thought…there are stories…"
    Rail shook his head. "No. The manifestations of Lucifer are projections, demons, and minions, nothing more than tools and extensions of his power."
    Cassidy gave him a questioning look. "But every religion has angels who intervene on behalf of God."
    "Right. God created a new breed of angels to place on Earth as replacements, but they were no competition for the demons—on the advice of the Hierarchy, God had cut back their gifts. Most were little more than guiding spirits or muses. Those who had once been on Earth had their gifts reduced before they were allowed back. Even the new warrior class was weaker and fled back to Heaven with their tails tucked between their legs." He