by Liz Meldon
Nine o’clock. On the dot.
“I can put it out, lover,” Cordelia croaked as she raised a trembling hand, her demon-eyes narrowed on the SUV. “Just give me—”
The enormous black beast exploded in a great, raging fireball, its flames licking up the side of the building. Windows shattered. Car alarms erupted up and down the street, their windshields dented with debris. Moira shrieked, turning away and shielding her face, and Severus lumbered over to her with his stumbling cousin in tow. Alaric staggered against the force of the blast, his trench coat flaring, his red waves bristling, but he held his ground.
More sirens wailed from different ends of the city.
A second explosion, somewhere up north, close to campus.
A third.
And at 9:01 p.m., the screaming started.
This was chaos.
Chaos that the only chaos demon Moira knew personally had no part in, which was fucking ridiculous. Screams. Explosions. Sirens. Figures in black poured into the street at lightning speed, ripping doors off hinges, shattering windows, eyes wild and fangs bared. The only time she had seen Farrow’s Hollow look like this had been after the FHU football team won a championship game on their home turf, but that had been years ago, way back when she and Ella were still innocent middle-schoolers and the supernatural world was just something they watched on TV.
The university football team hadn’t come anywhere close to that kind of victory since then, and that was nothing compared to this.
This was violent.
Bloody.
Destructive.
Malachi would have loved it.
Glass shattered nearby from somewhere high up, shards sprinkling the sidewalk, shattering on impact. Seconds later, a body slammed into the concrete with a sickening thud, and Moira stumbled back, horrified. Her palms burned, and she curled her hands to fists, wide-eyed as she took in the havoc unfolding around her.
Severus passed his cousin over to Alaric, though Cordelia appeared steadier now, the blood oozing from her mouth reduced from a waterfall to a trickling stream. They all called the witch an asset, but the bigger, darker spells really seemed to knock the wind out of her sails. Protectiveness flared deep inside her, and Moira sidled closer to her companions, positioning herself in front of Severus and his black-eyed stare.
“We need to move,” Alaric barked as a gang of rabid vampires descended upon a police cruiser up the street. Red and blue lights washed over the buildings, over the blood and debris, only to be snuffed out seconds later when the vampires swarmed like ants, crawling on top of the vehicle, ripping its doors off and the officers out. Gunshots echoed ineffectually.
“Back to the house,” Severus agreed. “There’s too many of them… We’ll be overrun.”
“Severus,” she whispered. “I can do something—”
“You aren’t strong enough to take them all on.” He snatched Moira’s hand and dragged her away from the unfolding brutality. “I love you, and you’re strong, but not this strong.”
The pair of uniformed officers screeched as vampires ripped into them, and she stumbled, bile creeping up her throat, resistance burning in her belly. Severus hissed and yanked his hand away when her angel light ignited.
“I’m sorry,” she murmured, falling in line beside him, finally turning her back on the two hopeless cases, forcing her legs to go as the group raced down the street, Alaric’s smoldering SUV a distant memory. Try as she might, however, she just couldn’t block out the screams. “I didn’t mean to… It’s got a mind of its own.”
“I know, darling. I’m fine—not to worry.” His hand certainly didn’t look fine, all blistered and red, but Severus shoved it into the deep pocket of his coat before she could properly inspect it. The wound would heal, but the guilt of hurting him—him, a creature immune to so much in this world; him, the man she loved with every fiber of her being—had become a permanent fixture in her life.
The deeper into the city core they jogged, occasionally slipping on ice or blocked off by concrete barricades, the more humans they happened upon. Frightened, panicked, screaming, bleeding humans. And she wanted to help. In fact, Moira was desperate to help, desperate to do something for them—anything. Anything was better than nothing, but Alaric and Cordelia hadn’t broken their stride yet, skirting skirmishes and blasting any vampires who so much as staggered toward them. They couldn’t stop.
Ella was at home, stuck inside but vulnerable with some vampire asshole whispering threats inside her head. It was only a matter of time before his lies sounded like truths.
“Malachi will fight for her,” Severus insisted as they bolted down one of the main streets and headed toward a smaller two-lane avenue that would save them some time. As always, the incubus had an uncanny knack for reading her mind—or, more realistically, her facial expression. He grabbed her by the elbow, his black gaze oddly reassuring. “With pleasure, I’m sure.”
Moira nodded. “I bet sitting this out is killing him.”
Not that she cared about Malachi’s happiness right now. He was a six-foot-seven wall of muscle who seemed to genuinely care about Ella—that was all that mattered. While Moira could defend her, the chaos demon was a worthy substitute until she arrived.
But all these people…
All these defenseless, helpless people.
Cordelia lent a hand as best she could, zapping at feeding vampires with bursts of brilliant red light. Alaric, meanwhile, had found a brick along the way and seemed to take great pleasure in cracking vampire skulls with it.
And Severus… As always, Severus was focused on her, on moving her forward, on keeping her by his side. Moira loved him for it.
But she wanted to fight. She might not have been strong enough to blast an entire colony, but she had to do something.
Because human police, even the ones in riot gear, couldn’t stop this.
Where the fuck were all the angels?
With the smaller side street they planned to take full of vampires and screaming people, upturned cars and broken windows, bloody snow and overwhelmed police, Alaric led them on to the next one a few blocks over. It would lead them away from the main intersection of downtown Farrow’s Hollow, which Moira was all too happy to skip, until she saw it.
A bus.
A bus full of nighttime commuters, stopped diagonally across two lanes.
Crawling with vampires.
Like an army of ants storming a sluggish caterpillar, the black figures swarmed the city bus, ripping off its doors, dragging wailing passengers out windows.
Moira couldn’t turn a blind eye to that. No. No more running. Her protective instincts kicked into overdrive at the sight of a kid being hauled out one of the front windows, his little body tossed to the mosh pit of awaiting vampires.
The more angel she became, the stronger her need to protect. She had felt it growing over these last few months, the desire to nurture, to defend, to stand guard over those who needed her. Zachariah praised the instinct, insisting that it was a common trait amongst true angels. Moira, however, didn’t exactly relish the fire burning in her belly, the stubborn, intense desire to look after those around her, whether they wanted her help or not.
Wrenching her elbow out of Severus’s grasp, she detoured away from the side street, headed straight for the bus, just as everyone else rounded the corner.
“Moira!”
As much as it hurt, she ignored Severus, ignored the panic in his voice, his desperation clawing after her. Instead, she unzipped her jacket and peeled it off. The black garment fell away in a heap on the pavement. Next came her necklace, laced in angelic magic courtesy of Zachariah’s feather, strong enough to hide her wings. As soon as it left her neck, headed for her pants pocket, her wings flared under her sweater.
“Get away from them!” she shrieked. With a roll of her shoulders, her wings broke through the cotton, the once downy and soft appendages stretching a good three feet in either direction, half the breadth of Zachariah’s wing
s and finally more white than grey, more steel than velvet.
A few vampires rounded on the spot, glaring, sneering, bloodshot eyes darting to her wings. Two took off immediately, vanishing in a blur of vampiric speed. The rest continued their bloody chaos, ripping the bus apart piece by piece. Metal. Wheels. Nothing was off-limits. No one was safe.
The likelihood of any of the passengers surviving this was so slim it physically pained her, but she had to do something.
“Moira, stop!” A quick glance back showed Severus racing after her, Alaric and Cordelia at his heels. She finally slowed from an all-out sprint to a brisk march, her hands glowing.
“Stay out of the light,” she shouted back, then turned to the feeding frenzy before her, the sea of writhing bodies, clad in black and caked in blood.
Faces, hands, necks—everything was soaked in the blood of the people of Farrow’s Hollow.
Potentially old friends, acquaintances, coworkers.
Family.
If Serafino had built his colony from the local population, then the creatures hissing at her, striding forward to meet her head-on, were the people of Farrow’s Hollow as well.
But they were a threat. A fucking fanged apocalypse.
And Moira wouldn’t, couldn’t, stand by as they tore her city apart.
“Stop,” she ordered, raising her hands, palms alight with a pure white glow. “This is your final warning.”
None of them looked like Ella. A part of her had been so fearful that she wouldn’t be able to do this because the vampires might remind her of her best friend, her sister—but they were worlds apart. The bare bones were the same: sunken cheeks, sallow skin, two sharp and deadly canines. But these were monsters. Snarling, sneering, advancing monsters, ashen-faced and skeletal. Ella looked like… Well, she looked like Ella.
And that made everything so much easier.
When none of the ten vampires marching toward her even slowed, Moira gave them all she had. Light erupted from her hands, stronger than anything she had conjured before, digging deep inside herself for an intensity that could rival the sun—or, at the very least, some real intense floodlights.
Shrill cries filled the air, monsters dissolving to dust at her feet, blowing away in the wind. Her reach must have only been about twelve feet or so—not enough to shield the bus. She stumbled forward on stiff legs, her arms trembling, aching, relentless light pouring out of her.
Vampires swathed in black scattered, screeching and covering their faces, scaling the walls of nearby buildings and disappearing over the flat rooftops. Her boots kicked through the ash of their fallen, but a few became bold, dancing just out of reach, waiting for her to falter. Calling on every ounce of energy she had left, Moira upped the ante, her light brighter, her reach a few feet farther. Her wings flared like a horse rearing back before the charge, and she screamed through the final moments of her assault, the street, the bus, the broken shop windows bathed in light.
Until there was nothing left. Until she was empty.
In an instant, the angelic light flickered and died, and she collapsed to her knees, shaking and panting. Staticky energy prickled beneath her skin, and she caught herself on a weak arm when she pitched forward. A fat drop of blood fell from her nose, splattering on impact. Shivering, she brushed the rest away.
Footfalls thundered toward her, and two familiar arms wrapped around her body, dragging her against a muscular frame. Severus’s aura hummed pleasantly, soothing, inviting, comforting as her body reeled from the exertion. Five feet away sat the bus, split open along the advertisements plastered on its side. All the windows broken, their spiky shards bloody.
Slowly, with immense difficulty, she dragged her gaze from one side of the steel contraption to the other, a sob ripping up her throat when figures emerged from the wreckage. A couple in their fifties stumbled down the steep front steps, the man collapsing as soon as he reached the pavement. His shaking partner stooped down to help, eyes wide with fear—fear that went nowhere fast when she looked to Moira and Severus.
In the distance, way up at the next intersection, a fresh horde of black-clad vampires swarmed the street. They came pouring in from all sides, united, charging as one.
“I c-can’t,” she whispered, her hands sparking with the faintest bit of light. Exhaustion tore through her, heavy and unrelenting. “I can’t do it again.”
“Hush now. You did so well,” Severus murmured, stroking her hair. As Alaric ushered the couple back on the bus, insisting it was safer there and to get behind a seat, Cordelia loomed over her and Severus, hands up, expression determined.
“Run.” Moira looked heavily between the three, then to the tidal wave of screeching, hissing vampires racing toward them. “Just go.”
“We…” Severus trailed off, mouth set in a thin line. The vampires slowed. Alaric rushed to Cordelia’s side.
Over the roar of the uprising, she finally heard it: the high-pitched whistle of an incoming angel. Like a screaming bomb locked on target and falling fast, they plummeted toward Earth with the same war cry every time.
In the past, it had frightened her.
Now, Moira welcomed it with all her heart.
Zachariah and his beige trench touched down some ten feet away like a meteor. The ground shuddered beneath his enormous feet, his wings unfurled in all their feathery glory. The impact vibrations tickled the nearby buildings and brought the vampire horde to a halt.
Actually, maybe it was the enormous flaming broadsword that finally stopped them. Zachariah wielded the blade like an extension of his arm, as easily as angels fought with their bulletproof wings. A rush of air washed over her when he ruffled said wings, flaring them out and tucking them back in, his expression hard—but not angry. Focused. Determined. He was on duty tonight, no longer her too-formal, slightly uptight mentor.
But when his ethereal blues found hers, Moira could still feel their warmth.
They gave her strength—strength enough to rise, Severus’s hand on her lower back, and limp toward him. While her hybrid body healed faster, this was different. The light she had expended… It was almost like there was nothing left inside.
“We t-tried to find you,” she called, hoping to immediately dispel any suspicions that the demons behind her were involved in this mess. “Phone lines are down… We went to your apartment, but you weren’t there.”
“We were deceived,” Zachariah told her in that impossibly deep voice of his, its rich timbre soothing in the face of a starving vampire army.
At the helm of which—that redheaded bitch from this morning’s ambush in the park. Sneering, Grace marched onward, leaving her gaunt, pale siblings behind. Smugness painted her features, as if she was so fucking proud that her earlier threats had actualized. Moira faced her with a scowl, squaring her shoulders and feeling rather small beside Zachariah’s towering frame. The vampire removed a jagged black dagger from her belt and looked like she was about to break off into a sprint…
Until Zachariah slammed his flaming sword into the street. The black pavement splintered, cracks skittering in every direction. Wide-eyed, the vampire staggered to a halt just before the breach could touch her, arms falling to her side, her smug sneer faltering.
“We keep several of the colony in our cells,” Zachariah remarked, unnervingly calm, like there wasn’t over a hundred vampires lurking down the road, so much more than she and the others predicted, just waiting for the chance to rip them apart. “Tonight, they all told us of a gathering outside of the city, beyond the hell-gate. They spoke of human sacrifices and blood magic. Naturally, most of the garrison saw to it… but we were all deceived.”
Moira glanced up at him slowly, noting the twinge of disappointment in his features, the barest flicker of shame. It must have been a grave insult to be outwitted by a demon like Serafino.
“What I am about to do will make you feel better, Moira Aurelia.” The angel raised his huge hands, palms out, one to Grace’s vampire horde, the other in the opposite d
irection—a direction from which more vampiric screeches erupted. They were coming. They were closing in. She swallowed thickly, her depleted body desperate to collapse.
Make her feel better…?
Light. Zachariah and his fellow angels had a limitless supply.
Light that would turn all demons to ash, not just vampires.
Moira whirled around, heart hammering as she sought out Severus. Her incubus stood a few feet away, black-eyed and silent, expression stern and expectant. It looked as though he had followed her toward Zachariah but hung back to give her space.
Or because Severus still despised the angel and all his garrison, even if he would never admit it. Not that she could blame him, but Zachariah really was different.
And a beat later, he proved it.
“Get off the streets, little demons,” Zachariah rumbled, his gaze jumping from Severus to Alaric to Cordelia, then back to the vampire horde. Severus reached out to her, beckoning her to him, but she shook her head, barely, and held her ground. No. Moira needed to stay. She needed to see this through, needed to appease this protective urge inside her—needed to feed her own kind of inner beast.
As Alaric and Cordelia hurried to Severus’s side, she held his black stare, silently begging him to have faith in her. Have faith that she could do this, survive this. He hesitated still, even when Cordelia snapped a hand down on his shoulder, already bleeding from an open wound on her forehead.
Go, Moira mouthed. She expected a grim twist of his lips, a surly frown that would stay with her for weeks. Instead, Severus placed a hand over his cousin’s, then flashed a quick, warm grin that tingled between her thighs.
I love you, he mouthed back. Moira stood taller, tears welling, and nodded to him. He nodded back. Cordelia gripped both Alaric and Severus, her eyes clenched shut, and in an instant, the trio disappeared with a dainty little pop.
In their absence, the second horde came into view, charging toward them from the opposite end of the street. The two bands of snarling vampires seemed intent on pinning them, trapping Zachariah and Moira from either side, the pair sandwiched in by buildings to the north and south, vampires to the east and west.