An Angel's Secrets Series
BOOK 1: SERAPHIEL
Prologue
Upper East Side, Manhattan, March 15, 1995
The streets of the Upper East Side of Manhattan have never seemed more quiet and dark. The streetlights, which normally shine brightly, are only casting dim flecks of light every few yards. Every single building lining the entire block all had an ice-cold feeling about them that sent shivers down Amanda Reinheart's spine. Everything surrounding her was like the setting of a horror film come to life—silent, dark, and empty—the total opposite of the Upper East Side that Amanda knows.
Every step that Amanda took to her apartment building made her feel like she just ran a mile weak and tired, but she wasn't sick at all. She groggily pulled herself to a nearby tree to lean onto. She reached for her necklace that bore a beautiful and ancient golden locket, and flipped the locket open, showing a picture of herself and her mother in a beautiful embrace.
Callie & Amanda Reinheart, their names were engraved in a fancy font at the back of the locket.
"Hold onto it when you feel afraid," her mother, Callie, had said that night in the hospital before she had died of a tumor in her brain. Callie had died in her sleep—a peaceful death.
Amanda stared at the picture of the two of them which was taken just days before her mother had been hospitalized. Amanda was sixteen when this picture was taken, two years ago. She still looked like the girl in the picture embracing her mother. She and her mother looked nothing alike. While Amanda has pale skin, golden brown curls, green eyes, and a very angular face, Callie had tanned skin, blond hair, brown eyes, and a round face. Callie had always said that she reminded her of her father and that she looked very much like him.
Before Amanda could fight back the tears that welled up in her eyes, she was already crying. She had no idea how much thinking about her life and her past would affect her. She also had no idea how tight she had clutched the locket in her fist that its edges had pierced her skin, letting out drops of her blood. This is nothing but a simple cut. It was worth it anyway, she thought.
In her entire life, she didn't really grow up in a family like the other kids in New York. Her father died on duty as a soldier when she was a few months old. She never got to know her father well. Would he have been a great dad? She doesn't know, and every time she brings up the topic of her father to Callie, she just says that he was a good man and switches to a different topic. Maybe she did get to know her father, but just for a while—just when she was a baby.
She lives with her "aunt" Amy in an apartment in the Upper East Side. Amy and Amanda are not the blood-related aunt-and-niece pair. They were actually strangers to each other before Les Gardiens—an institute that handles and takes care of people like Amanda—assigned Amy to her. Aunt Amy doesn't really speak much to Amanda. She would just cook, clean, do laundry, and read books. She and Amanda still are like strangers to each other despite that they've spent the past 2 years. Les Gardiens, The Guardians in English, payed for every single one of Amanda's needs. They payed for her tuition, covered up for her expenses on her hair, clothes, shoes, and bags. But, all of that meant she would also have to do things in return. She was required to attend weekly sessions for her betterment.
As Amanda sat down on the cold and hard pavement, two figures—a man and a woman—hovering over what looked like a bundle of cloths in their arms, emerged from the corner of the street. They clearly weren't from around here. Both the man and the woman, hooded in cloaks of a velvety gold to obscure their faces, had a gait of pure swiftness and elegance. They walked side-by-side in unison, like cats, until they reached a thin and dark alley where no light could reach them.
"Is it safe now?" The woman said, gently lowering her hood, exposing strikingly beautiful features—luminescent reddish-gold curls tied into a neat ponytail, silvery-gold eyes that gleamed in the dark, high and prominent cheekbones, and lips that were set on a perfect pink line across her pale face.
"Ah, my love," crooned the man, sliding back his hood just as the woman did, baring his face. Like her, the man's features were also equally handsome as hers were beautiful. He and the woman looked very much alike as if they're twins, but Amanda knew that was outrageous. After all, the man had just called her "my love". To top all of the strangeness they posed to Amanda, something else was definitely familiar about the man and woman, but she was sure that she's never seen them before.
"It's safe, yes, but I sense her," spoke the man, turning his head a fraction of an inch to Amanda's direction.
"She's been here since we arrived, dear," replied the woman and pain shot up through Amanda's entire arm, making her paralyzed and even weaker. But, despite the pain, she still tried to lean closer to listen in on their conversation.
"I think it is best that she witness and experience this. It hurts more when one does," the man smiled, evil glinting in his eyes as he spoke.
Amanda writhed on the cold pavement in pain since the shock spread to her entire body now. She tried to scream for help after hearing what they had just said, but no words would come out of her mouth, as if something is blocking her voice from coming out. It was like someone knew she would scream and cause attention to shift to her.
A few yards away, in the same street, the man and the woman began to chant in deep Latin.
"Sum Lucifer, stella matutina. Lilith sum, Adam uxorem. Seraphiel dicimus animo. Venit tempus," the man and woman chanted. Amanda was lucky she took Latin classes otherwise she wouldn't have understood. Amanda's eyes widened as realization stepped into her mind. "I am Lucifer, the Morning Star. I am Lilith, the wife of Adam. Seraphiel we call your soul. The time has come."They're back, she thought. Within a few seconds after the chant was over, Amanda's body had gone limp and lifeless—the pain had stopped.
A bright flash of silver light—a light bright enough to light up the entire block—enclosed her entire body. When the light disappeared, a split second later, Amanda Reinheart's body was nowhere to be found.