“Pits?”
“Similar to gladiator rings. More brutal, really. And when I bound his power to shift, he seemed to sincerely suffer.” He reached down and hauled Bahlin’s head up. “Hard to defend yourself as a man, is it not?” Asmodeus shoved Bahlin’s face to the dirt.
“Stop it. Just…stop it. This wasn’t part of the deal.”
Hellion spun on me and grabbed me by the upper arm. “What ‘deal,’ Maddy? What have ye done?”
I pulled free of his grasp and stepped toward Asmodeus.
The Dominae, led by Agares, moved in closer.
“You let Bahlin go. Now.” I was standing my ground on this, determined to save both men I loved.
“He’s insurance, pet. Nothing more.” He negligently kicked the downed man. “You’ll come to me of your own free will.”
“And you’ll let both Hellion and Bahlin go. Permanently.”
“You think to change the deal?” Asmodeus asked, a lethal edge to his voice.
Agares began to sputter and object.
Asmodeus shot him a hard look and the demon immediately quieted.
“You changed everything when you took Bahlin.”
“As I said, insurance. Drop your weapons and come to me now. We’ll seal our bargain, and I’ll return you to your lover tomorrow at sunrise.” He held out his hand.
I looked between him and Bahlin, avoiding Hellion’s hard stare. Finally, with slow deliberation, I turned to him. “I have to do this.”
“I won’t allow it, Maddy.” He stepped forward. “Take me instead.”
“Unless you can bear the child, I’m not interested. At the moment, anyway.” Asmodeus smiled benignly. “Courteous of you to try and step in, though.”
Hellion spun on me, getting in my face. “No.”
“There’s no choice.” My voice broke on the last word. A hot tear trailed down my cheek, burning across skin gone icy with fear and near shock. I dropped my sword and dirk, stepped around Hellion and reached for Asmodeus’s hand.
“Ecce crucem Domini. In the name of the Holy Mother, by the power of Christ, and with the spirit of St. Peter, I cast you out. I cast you out. I cast you out.” Father O’Cleary moved into the cast of players, a crucifix held in his shaking hand. Behind him, Zerachiel laid a hand on his shoulder, following and praying. Demons cowered away from them.
Asmodeus grinned, indulgent. “You think to do what? Cast me back to Hell? I come and go as I please.”
“No longer,” the priest proclaimed, uttering prayers and reciting scripture as he moved forward.
“You seek to do the impossible. Has the Church taught you nothing in the ways and means of probabilities? Poor form, Father,” Asmodeus said, sneering. “And what do you bring for me but a treat on the back of your cassock? He hides there like a mouse from a wily cat.” He stepped wide and looked over Zerachiel. Asmodeus’s eyes narrowed. “Nephilim. What is your name?”
Zerachiel continued to pray.
“Answer me. Now.”
The command made my bones ache.
When Zerachiel failed to answer, Asmodeus turned to Agares. “Do your worst, you and your Dominae.”
They moved as a unit, circling Zerachiel and the priest. Taunts poured from their mouths, vicious and cutting. Father O’Cleary faltered as they verbally assaulted him, singling him out with cruel efficiency. They called him out on his vanity and pride, his belief that he might be able to conquer the Dominae with his measly faith in a god who couldn’t be seen.
“Faith, Father. Fortify me,” O’Cleary murmured, holding the crucifix higher.
Hellion materialized at his side. “I’ll fortify you, Father.” He turned and cursed the nearest Dominae. Magic stained his palms black. Wind whipped around the clearing, unnatural, funneling tension into the situation.
I looked back at Asmodeus.
He held his hand out. “You can stop this, Maddy. One choice.”
It all happened at once.
I took Asmodeus’s hand.
Lust blew through me like a Chinook wind.
His other hand slashed down, releasing the Dominae on the three men they circled.
Hellion threw out curses as he went down under a dog pile of arms and legs and gnashing teeth.
The priest and Zerachiel were shoved back by the brawl.
I yanked on my hand. “You lied!”
“If you expected less, you’re a more sentimental fool than I believed.” He began to haul me toward the rent in the air.
Bahlin’s hand closed on my ankle.
Oh, shit. It had been him in the house, reaching for me through the floor. I pulled harder against the hand that gripped my own. There was no give.
Chancing a glance back, my worst fear came to life.
Wraiths from every Dominae had been released and circled the madness.
The priest had turned the color of his collar.
Zerachiel had bowed forward even more, like he was curling in on himself. With an upward explosion, he released the priest to grip with both hands a five-gallon bucket he’d been shielding with his body. He swung the bucket in a broad arc, tossing water all over the brawling mass of men.
Screams knifed through the air. Demons rolled away only to end up in surrounding puddles. Skin smoked and bubbled, peeling away like blistering film on a bare bulb to reveal muscle and bone beneath.
Hellion lay a broken mess of a man, worse off than Bahlin. One arm was twisted at an impossible angle. One knee bent awkwardly. His head was turned too far. His eyes were open. And brown.
“No!” I yanked wildly on the hand that held me fast.
The priest looked around in apparent shock. He lowered his crucifix.
Zerachiel continued to pray, though the look on his face was fierce.
Agares, bleeding and damaged almost beyond recognition, clawed his way to Hellion’s side as I continued to scream and fight to free myself from Asmodeus’s grasp. He summoned a single wraith from the group and directed it down.
It dove into Hellion with an open-mouthed scream.
The heel of his one good leg dug into the ground. His back arched. His head flopped back. A faint, silvery cloud drifted from his mouth, hovering above him as his body went limp.
I shrieked loud enough to draw Agares’s attention.
He rolled over, watching as Asmodeus dragged me away. “He’s mine.”
Something pierced my leg. I struggled and it stuck me harder. Remiss to look away from Hellion, I spared a quick glance down. Bahlin hung on to me with a ferocity I’d never witnessed. He’d managed to slide my dirk into my pants, scoring my leg as he did.
“Let go,” I ordered.
The one eye that was partially open glared at me before acquiescing.
I stumbled backward and hit Asmodeus hard enough to cause him to pitch to the side. Using that momentum, I swept the knife from my pants and spun, blade out, to eviscerate him. My strike was true. I filleted that motherfucker from hip to hip. Then I went for the hand that gripped mine, severing tendons with a vicious overhand slash.
Free, I turned and sprinted for Hellion.
Father O’Cleary pulled the tiny humidor from his office out of one pocket. Flipping the lid back, he retrieved the splinter of wood. So insignificant.
My mind accepted what it saw without question as my heart’s focus dominated everything.
Knife in hand, I slid across the muddied, churned earth, going to my knees. I hit Hellion’s body hard enough he rocked away from me. He was too cool when I touched him.
“No!” I screamed again. My hands flickered in front of me. The Fade had started. I’d failed Hellion.
He was dead.
Sobbing, I rounded on Agares.
The demon tried to drag himself to the portal. I stabbed him through the calf, the dirk just long enough and decidedly wicked enough to pin him to the ground.
Zerachiel stepped in, pulling me back from the demon. “Easy, child.”
“I’ll kill him!” I screeched.
Father O’Cleary approached with that insignificant piece of wood. Dropping to his knees, he inched closer to the demon. “Agares, child of Lucifer, bain of this Earth, whose soul is ruled by the Dark Prince, I banish you to Hell in the name of St. Peter. May you find the same eternal comfort that you’ve delivered others in your duties as Dominae.” Gripping the demon’s hair, Father O’Cleary cranked that beautiful face to the side and stabbed Agares in the eye.
The demon cried out in true distress, clawing at his wounded eye. But it was too late. He began to smolder, the harsh smell of brimstone making my eyes burn. With excruciating slowness, dark flame spread and burned him from the inside out. Ash floated on the air, coating my nose and throat, leaving gritty residue on my lips and a sour, sooty taste on my tongue. On my tongue.
Lunging to my feet, I turned on Asmodeus. He was almost to the gate he’d opened; I had no doubt it had been him, had no doubt he’d coordinated this whole thing. Agares had been a puppet. Asmodeus was the puppet master, and that made him indefensibly guilty in my eyes.
Stalking toward him with hip-rolling swagger, I caught his attention with a shouted, “Hey!”
He stopped and watched me come toward him. “I’ll exact my bargain, Niteclif.”
“Which is why I’m coming with you.”
Bahlin grunted my name in protest.
Asmodeus narrowed his eyes.
“Better to get it over with, don’t you think?” I stopped just out of reach. “But I want proof you can give me the pleasure you promised.”
“Proof?” Lust burned in his gaze as it traveled over me.
“A kiss. Here. Prove to me you can do what you say you can, and I’ll come with you.”
He licked his lips, hunger in his stare. “A kiss.” With sure steps, he moved toward me. Grabbing the hand I held out, he flooded me with the same mind-bending need I’d experienced in the house.
I couldn’t help but let my head fall back as I gasped at the sensation.
A hard hand came around the base of my skull. With exaggerated care, he lifted my head as he lowered his lips to mine.
I kissed him with a fervor I’d not shown before.
“Maddy.” Bahlin’s broken cry carried to me, nearly swaying me from my course.
Instead, I held on to it, to the love I felt for him, to the absolute loss I felt over Hellion and kissed Asmodeus deeper. I finally broke away, pulling my hand free to wipe the back of my mouth and run my hands through my ashy hair. A coy smile curled my lips.
“Promise fulfilled.” I stroked the corner of his mouth.
Asmodeus’s tongue darted out to follow the path of my fingers. “I’ll fulfill your every fantasy.”
“No, you won’t.”
His brows winged down. “Pardon?”
“So polite for a lying sack of shit.” I backed away, a slow, feral grin spreading across my face—a grin I knew was reflected in my eyes. “You’re pathetically naïve to believe I wouldn’t lie to you.”
“I’ll kill you, you traitorous bitch.” Asmodeus threw back his head and roared. His face elongated, his mouth filling with jagged teeth. That scaly form that had superimposed itself over his human body in the void of illusion became reality as I watched. Black shit oozed from beneath his scales and additional heads erupted from his massive shoulders.
I whirled and sprinted for Father O’Cleary and Zerachiel. Micah had finally appeared, but I paid him no attention. “Now, Father! Do it!”
“Do what?” he shouted.
“Exorcise him.” I raced up to him. “Faith. Please.”
Father O’Cleary turned on the beast that bore down on us. “Ecce crucem Domini. Asmodeus, spawn of Hell’s Ninth Realm, I command you return from whence you came, that you might be bound, lash upon lash, for the remainder of your days. In the name of the Holy Mother, by the power of Christ, and with the spirit of St. Peter, I cast you out. I cast you out. I cast you out.”
I picked up a handful of mud created with the blood of good men and the holy water Father O’Cleary had blessed, and flung it at Asmodeus. “Again, priest.”
Father O’Cleary repeated the exorcism.
And then his voice was joined by Zerachiel’s.
It all happened behind the priest who continued to cast the exorcism with increasing vigor. His hand was steady as he held the crucifix high.
In that moment, when faith was all he had to call on, the Nephilim was transformed. He nearly exploded from his skin, taking on an enormous form. His hair grew longer, arms more heavily muscled, eyes more brilliant. Wings unfurled from his back, their span each an easy eight feet from center. A sword that had to be six feet long appeared in his free hand.
Asmodeus staggered to a stop, looking up at Zerachiel. “No.” His hoarse whisper was immediately followed by a pained cough. “What have you done?”
“You consumed ash from the cross of St. Peter when you kissed Maddy,” Zerachiel answered.
Asmodeus’s mouth began to bleed. “No,” he repeated, swiping at his mouth. Then the slow burn began.
Before Asmodeus’s ash took to the air, the remaining demons began scrambling, knocking each other down in their rush for the gate. Zerachiel was a literal holy terror, striking them down, vengeance personified.
Dragons converged on Bahlin, backing toward him until they bumped. No doubt he was safe as they snapped and flamed, taking down anything that came too close to their fallen Glaaca.
But none of it mattered in that moment. I fought my way through the madness to Hellion’s still form. He was cooler still. Tears dripped off my nose as I bent over him. I wanted to cradle him, to curl up next to his body, to die in his place. The world, my world, without his brilliance and passion was so wrong.
“Please,” I pleaded, grabbing his hand and twining our fingers together. “Please. You promised to survive. Oh, God!” I screamed to the heavens, pleading for someone to hear me.
Micah knelt next to me, his filthy hands reaching out to draw me into his arms.
I lashed out with my fists. “Don’t touch me.” Then I realized. He still had his one Act of Glory. I rounded on him like a feral animal. “Save him.”
“I will not bring him back from the dead, Maddy.”
“You have to. You do this for me, damn you.” I sobbed, blindly reaching for Micah’s hand, determined to lay it on Hellion myself and force his Act of Glory at knifepoint if I had to. The hand that found mine was smaller, warmer, softer.
Father O’Cleary’s head was bent so low it took me a moment to realize he was crying. “I’ve failed you both. Father, forgive me.” He suddenly seemed frail, overwhelmed by so much in so little time.
“No,” I choked out. “I failed Hellion, not you. Me. Me!” I shouted, pounding the ground with my free hand. “I failed.”
“You did not, Niteclif.” Zerachiel’s deep voice rang over the muddied turf. “You fought brilliantly, found faith when you needed it and thought through the influences of Hell.”
“It doesn’t matter. None of it matters.” I looked over Hellion’s broken form and stroked his hair.
“You dismiss my words?”
“No.” I looked back at the angel. “But I’ve just had my heart carved out of my chest. You know how much you wanted Shamayim back? Well, you got it. Bully for you. I lost the thing that mattered most to me.”
He came to kneel beside me, shoving Micah out of the way none too gently. Cupping my head in one hand, he reached for Hellion with the other. “I found faith stronger than any I’ve ever possessed through this test. I’ve been granted a return home. I owe you for that.” He bent forward and kissed me softly on the lips. “Ashes to ashes,” he said, a soft smile playing on his lips.
“Dust to dust,” I repeated, turning to kiss Hellion.
I have no idea what I expected, but the long, shallow exhale that escaped him wasn’t it.
Zerachiel leaned around me and gently closed Hellion’s eyes. “Do you believe in mira
cles, Maddy?”
I fisted my belly and bent forward. “I don’t know.”
“I do.” Father O’Cleary’s voice was far reedier than it had been in his office only yesterday. “I believe.”
“You found the faith to believe in me once, Maddy. Father O’Cleary believes on your behalf now. You’ll keep him close, take his counsel.”
“Sure.” The word was an automated response devoid of any conviction.
“Look at me,” Zerachiel commanded.
I looked up, knowing what he saw. The brokenness of spirit that left me shattered like tempered glass—physically whole yet completely unstable—had to be reflected in my eyes.
“Faith.” He laid his hand on Hellion’s head and bowed his own. His wings folded in tight. Then he began to pray. A soft glow from his palm grew brighter, outlining his hand against Hellion’s skin.
My heart stuttered in my chest only to take up a rabbit-y rhythm. I reached out a shaking hand, laying it over Zerachiel’s.
Hellion shuddered.
“Oh, God, please,” I murmured.
Zerachiel turned his head toward me with preternatural slowness. When he opened his eyes, they were fathomless depths of knowledge, ancient wisdom, hearts broken and mended, souls won and lost, faith lost and then found. His voice was otherworldly when he finally spoke.
“I return him to you one time. It is all I can offer. Cherish him, Madeline Niteclif.”
Tears formed twin tributaries that tracked down my cheeks as I wordlessly nodded and clutched Hellion’s hand.
“Be well, Maddy.” Zerachiel leaned forward and kissed my forehead. “Love well.”
Then he was gone. Not “poof,” just gone between the tic and tock of the second hand.
Hellion turned his head toward me. “Maddy?” His hoarse whisper was the most beautiful sound I’d ever heard.
“Here. Right here.” I stroked his face, unable to stop touching him.
Vampires flooded out of the house, moving like shadows across the grounds as night finally fell. The crescent moon provided just enough light for me to see Hellion staring at me with those beautiful, expressive black eyes.
Stearns limped over with his medic’s bag, unzipping it with trembling hands. “I saw what happened.” He looked at me with wide eyes.
Vengeance: The Niteclif Evolutions, Book 3 Page 29