Read Horizon, Soul Guardians Book 3 for Free Online Page A

Her temper flared.
    Kara’s hands shook, afraid of what she
might do to the bird. She kept looking at the wall. “I didn’t
imagine this, David. He was there. I swear it.”
    “ I believe you, Kara,” said
David, and Kara saw the concern in his face. She wasn’t sure if it
was a concerned it’ll-be-okay-face , or a
concerned the-girl-went-crazy-face . She
figured it was the latter.
    Kara’s eyes flicked to Jenny who only
offered a shrug and quickly looked away. Great, now her friends
thought she was a mental case. But she knew the truth. Legan was
real.
    “ Uh … guys?” Peter popped
his head inside the cell. “If we want to go through the Rift and be
able to come back before it closes—we have to leave now. If we
don’t … we won’t be able to get through.”
    “ Come on, Kara. He’s
right.” David strolled towards the doorway. “We have to go now, or
we’ll lose your mother’s soul for good.”
    Reluctantly, Kara pushed herself up
and ignored her friends’ stares. She knew how this scene must look
to them. She had lost her sanity to the grey and lonely walls of
Tartarus, and they felt sorry for her.
    Kara struggled to keep her legs steady
and staggered through the door. She kept her head down and avoided
their eyes.
    “ Let’s go find my mother’s
soul.” Kara ran back to the platform. She wondered what had
happened to Legan? Was he really a figment of her imagination, a
temporary glitch in her brain caused by the isolation and solitude
from inside the walls of Tartarus? Or did something awful happen to
him? Fear welled up inside her. Perhaps it wasn’t a coincidence the
Rift was on Tartarus. Maybe Zadkiel came here to finish him off
before disappearing back to his true master. Something didn’t fit,
and she promised herself that she would figure out what happened to
Legan—after she rescued her mother.
    Kara stood before the Rift. She felt
the anxiety rising inside her, like an uncontrollable panic attack.
This wasn’t a Rift to the Netherworld, so where did it lead? She
saw David standing to her right in her peripheral vision, and heard
the shuffling footsteps of the others behind her.
    “ You ready?” asked David.
Kara noticed a slight waver in his voice.
    Kara just nodded. She didn’t want
David and the others to hear the panic in her voice. She fought to
control her composure. The black wall rippled, but Kara saw only
the laughing face of a bald archangel.
    She clenched her fists—and stepped
into the Rift.
     
     
     

Chapter 4
    Lost Soul
     
     
     
    K ara felt her body being pulled by a powerful source, like a
giant vacuum sucking her in. She opened her eyes. Blackness
surrounded her. It was like being sucked into space. She couldn’t
tell what was up or down; it all looked the same to her. Something
pulled at her leg, then her arms. Was she going to split apart? She
was terrified of drifting in the black abyss until her mind shut
off, and she turned into shadow. She feared that jumping into the
rift had been a mistake.
    Light shone at the edges of her
vision, like a light at the end of a tunnel. A setting sun of red
and orange appeared before her. With a last tug, Kara was propelled
forward towards the light. She fell head first onto a soft surface.
She lifted her head. Her hands were covered in a red sticky film of
cobwebs and strings. She sat on her knees and shook her hands. It
wasn’t coming off. Her nostrils burned with the sudden stench of
rotten flesh and bile. She wiped her hands on her pants and looked
around.
    She stood in a cave. A shiver rolled
up her back. The walls were covered in folds of decomposing and
blackened tissue. Yellow pus-like liquid oozed from what looked
like large, infected sores on the walls. Kara watched a piece of
flesh peel off and drop to the ground, followed by a crack and a
pop. Sheets of meat dripped and slipped to the soft ground in a
sticky red carpet. Torches lined the length of the cave on either
side, like an underground runway. Kara