Soren’s tensed muscles, preparing for flight, softened as he gave in to her words. He sank to the ground, dropping his sword.
Forty-Three
CHORD
Halos approached their ships in hordes. Like baby ducklings returning to their mother. Tons and tons of baby ducklings. And twelve big ass momma ducks. Maybe Etheria, the largest of all the ships, was more like the daddy duck.
Chord spoke this analogy aloud to Sev, who chuckled and shook his head at him. “Sometimes I feel as though I’m dating a teenager.”
“In more ways than one, am-I-right?” Chord wagged his eyebrows up and down.
“Honestly, boys,” Logan said in a mock airy tone. “Such things aren’t appropriate in such dire times as these.” Then she planted a kiss on Brielle’s lips.
“What’s gotten into you guys?” Brielle laughed, her cheeks turning rosier. Though that might have been from standing on the deck of Lady Lionheart as it approached Etheria at breakneck speed. The winter air cut through their thick Halo armor.
“Our impending deaths, probably.” Chord tried to make his statement seem like a joke, but it ended up sounding exactly as he felt.
Fucking terrified.
Sev didn’t say anything, but reached out a hand, folding his long fingers through Chord’s. It was meant to be reassuring. But, instead, it made a lump form in Chord’s throat.
Lady Lionheart sailed right for the base of Etheria. For a brief moment, Chord feared they would crash, but then a half-moon circle opened at the waterline, sucking in their vessel. Within the base of Etheria was a loading dock of sorts. Like a water ride at Disney World.
And standing on the side of the receiving dock was Michael. His face came into view as they came to a stop. Chord thought it looked almost nostalgic.
Michael smiled as their boat lowered its ramp and the seven of them made their way down. “Welcome home, Halos.”
BRIELLE
Etheria had been wiped clean.
No carousel. No Ferris wheel. No candy shop or sugarcloud stands.
It had truly transformed into a battleship. Halos dressed in dark red armor milled about the top deck, but no one spoke.
Once, Brielle had visited an old church in Spain when she’d gone with her church on a mission trip there. There wasn’t a service or anything going on, but it was dead silent. This was how it was now. It was as if everyone knew they might be attending their own funeral.
Tents filled with weapons now covered the center of the ship, previously taken up by the largest attractions. Their group of Halos replenished their stock, leaving behind the bloodied daggers and swords strung through their belts.
Somehow Brielle had managed to keep the same crux she’d acquired what felt like decades ago on Etheria. It was still just as crystalline and clean as ever, the hilt filled with a bright pink glow each time she held it. With the number of Horns and beasts she’d killed with it, it should've been caked in grime. Maybe the salt-imbued blade repelled all demon matter, like water running off a duck’s back.
Their group walked as a single force, no one leading the pack. Yet, somehow, they directed themselves toward the back of the ship.
“Hey, look at that,” Chord said in a quiet voice as they approached the stern. “They kept Aurora’s swing set.”
“Aurora’s?” Danni Jo asked. “The Stellar girl?”
“Yeah,” Chord said tightly, seemingly unhappy with this description. “The girl who saved everyone’s ass. More than once.”
Brielle moved to sit on one of the swings. “Wonder where she is now.”
Chord followed her lead, taking the swing beside Brielle. “Probably slicing the head off of Caducus. Either that, or she and Gray are destroying all the demons by banging again.”
“Banging?” Danni Jo snorted.
“Yeah, Sev doesn’t like that word either,” Chord mused.
Suddenly, a shudder ran through the ship. Brielle hopped off her swing and rushed to stand beside Logan, who’d been leaning back against the railing.
The ship was moving.
The others left the swing set and stood in a line, looking out at the water. Etheria wasn’t the only ship traveling now. The other eleven advanced on either side of them at a steady pace toward land. And then, Etheria sped up, leaving the others behind. They were the battleship, after all.
Brielle assumed the other choirs were likely given similar assignments to those they’d had when they locked the cities. What were the little Virtues doing to save the world? The towering Dominions? Though they were all angels, the other choirs were still so foreign to Brielle.
All she knew was that she was a Power Halo. And her job was to fight. Until the end.
Whatever end that may be.
As Etheria approached the looming cliffs, the tension along their line of Halos tightened like a rope pulled tautly.
Brielle peered down into the fast-moving water below, frothy waves of white being pumped out the back of the ship. “Why aren’t we slowing down?”
Logan spoke in a dark voice. “We’re speeding up, I think.”
All along their line, hands tightened on the railing, bracing for impact. They couldn’t see the front of the ship, but they could see land on either side of them.
Then, suddenly, land was beneath them.
“Holy-fuckballs-we’re-flying,” Chord exclaimed in one long string of words.
Sev sounded completely unconcerned as he said, “You didn’t know the ship could fly?”
“You did?” Chord said.
Sev shrugged. “Given the murals on their walls and in the elevators, I merely assumed.”
“Yeah,” Logan cut in. “The only problem is…the demons have flying ships too.
And as she said this, the gray sky darkened considerably, black ships dropping out of the ether, surrounding them on all sides.
Suddenly, Anna, who’d been leaning over the railing to look beneath them, was pulled overboard by a pair of talons.
Danni Jo screamed.
A string of curses made its way down the line of Halos as they unsheathed their weapons and cruxes, backing hastily away from the edge of the ship.
Then came the rest of the airborne demons. Landing heavily on the flat expanse at the stern of the ship, squawking and hissing like a terrifying mix between a pterodactyl and a massive scorpion.
Brielle leapt over one of the swings to reach a winged demon that’d pinned a petrified Danni Jo to the ground. Bringing her crux down into the back of the creature’s skull, a burning flame spread from the point of contact until it consumed the demon in a ball of fire.
Danni Jo squeaked in fear as another demon crashed into the swing set, tangling in the dangling ropes.
Brielle realized she’d been just like the wide-eyed blonde in the beginning. Afraid of everything. Unsure of herself and her ability to fight the Darkness. Who was she, after all?
A Super Halo, that’s who.
CHORD
Explosions sounded from all sides of the ship as the Power Angels lit the cannons. Chord and Sev battled back-to-back, in an attempt to avoid being taken from behind by the flying demons dive-bombing the back of Etheria like seagulls picking at a whale carcass.
Slicing his sword through the abdomen of an oncoming demon, Chord stumbled sideways as his weapon caught on the creature’s rib cage. The demon—burning from the inside out—pulled him toward the edge of the ship as it attempted to escape.
Letting out a curse, Chord released his hold on the sword and watched as the demon dove to its death over the side of the ship.
Peering through the space in the railing, Chord realized Etheria had soared well over the land, now hovering above what looked like a city.
It looked familiar. Like something he’d seen in a textbook or on the History channel.
“Edinburgh,” Sev said from beside him, wiping black demon blood on the railing. “Beautiful city. What a shame to have a battle here.”
Chord shook his head at his boyfr
iend, who spoke as if he were an old man who’d just found out the World Cup would take place in a country he wasn’t particularly keen on.
A demon ship approached the side of Etheria. The nearest cannon, manned by the Power Angel Chord recognized as Aella, let out a blast of what looked like murky water.
“What are they—?”
“It’s salt water,” Sev said. “They’re shooting salt water at the demon ships.”
As the water covered the side of the Horns’ ship, a burning hole, like a cigarette being pressed to thin paper, broke open, sending the vessel plunging out of the sky, crashing in what was once a beautiful park.
“Wish Gray was here to see this,” Chord mused. “We look like a ship full of angel firefighters.”
Sev's voice grew suddenly sober. “Gray is here.”
“Where?” Chord asked.
Sev didn’t answer aloud but merely pointed in the direction of a towering gray castle. Squinting, Chord could make out what looked like a large metal platform and a beam from which hung a long chain.
“Is that…?” Chord trailed off, craning his head forward as Etheria grew nearer. “Is that a gallows?”
“I’m afraid that’s precisely what it is,” Sev answered.
As the angel ships closed in on the castle, a hush fell over the surrounding land.
The fighting momentarily ceased as Gray and Aurora made their way across the gallows, towards the hanging metal chain. Even from this distance, Chord could tell something was off about the way Gray was behaving. There was something mechanical and forced about his movements.
“Sev,” Chord whispered. “Please tell me I’m wrong, but…is Gray walking Aurora to that metal noose?”
“Yes,” Sev answered darkly. “That’s precisely what he’s doing.”
“Why?” Chord breathed.
“I fear she’s about to be hanged…by her Stellar.”
Forty-Four
AURORA
Airborne ships, both light and dark, surrounded them on all sides.
Winged demons dove at Etheria—which had transformed into a massive, pearlescent battleship—as it approached the castle. The sky was a thick, foggy gray, nearly cold enough to produce snow.
Aurora tried to pay attention to the surrounding battle. But as Gray led her forcibly up the steps of the recently erected metal gallows, she couldn’t focus on anything but him.
At first, she’d been surprised when Lilith let Gray take charge of his Stellar. It was a risky move, Aurora had thought as she’d watched Lilith whisper in Gray’s ear before disappearing into the shadows, leaving the two of them alone.
But now Aurora’s eyes zeroed in on the flying demon ship, unlike all the others. Its base was clear as glass, and inside, sitting upon three thrones of dark purple were Samuel, Lilith, and Caducus.
The trio watched the pair of Stellars like it was a show. Like a family of tourists in a glass-bottomed boat perched over a scene between a shark and its prey. They might as well have been munching on popcorn.
The fact that Etheria loomed in the distance seemed of little concern to the dark leaders. The Halo’s saviors were about to self-destruct. And they wanted front-row seats.
“Gray,” Aurora whispered as he kept a tight hold on her arms, guiding her across the steel platform. Bitter wind raked through her hair, making her shiver. “Now would be a great time snap out of this trance you’re in.”
Gray ignored Aurora, though she knew he’d heard her as his hands clutched her even more tightly.
“You know you’ll die too, right?” she said, changing tactics. “If I die. You die.”
“If that’s what Lilith wants, then so it shall be,” he said in a monotonic voice.
Aurora wanted to kick him or punch him or push him off the edge of the metal platform, which stuck far out over the castle's cliff. She wanted to physically knock some sense into her Stellar.
And at the same time, she had the ridiculous urge to kiss him. To pull him to her and let their hearts beat together as they had in Hell.
He stood right there, right beside her, yet she missed him. Because this shell—beautiful as ever—wasn’t Gray. It wasn’t her Gray.
She wondered if her Gray was even still in there.
Turning away from him, Aurora’s eyes focused on the long chain hanging from the beam mounted high above them. At the end of the chain hung a metal collar, waiting to be filled. Steadily building panic gripped Aurora as she realized this device was meant to be fastened around her neck.
“Try to run, and I’ll kill you much faster than this will,” Gray spoke in a sinister whisper.
Then he let her go, reaching for the torture device. With the three dark rulers watching, she wasn’t about to run anywhere. Aurora shifted uncomfortably, the ties around her wrist cutting into the delicate skin. Gray still hadn’t made eye contact with her. Not once since his body had been taken over.
What would happen if he did?
Gray pulled at the metal loop, opening the clasp with a key he procured from his pocket. The inside of the collar was lined with metal teeth, like a shark’s mouth.
“Am I supposed to wear that?” Aurora asked, trying to sound much braver than she felt.
Gray ignored her question, letting the collar hang and pulling her towards him by her bound wrist. To her surprise, he began to remove the tie. Gray’s forehead bent towards hers as he kept a steady eye on his work.
Aurora breathed him in. His scent was there—the woods after it's rained—but it was mingled with the slight sulfurous smell she associated with evil things.
Aurora spoke one final sentence to her Stellar as the ties around her wrist loosened.
“You love me,” she murmured. “Somewhere inside you—beneath whatever Lilith has done to your heart—I know you love me.”
He paused, the ties coming away from her wrists in his hands. “That part of your Stellar is dead now. Grayson Cross is dead.”
“Then why am I still alive,” she whispered.
Gray pulled away from her, grasping the open metal collar in his hands. “Don’t worry. You soon won’t be.”
Teeth clenched tightly together, Aurora let Gray fit the collar around her neck, the sharp hooks inside only millimeters from her skin.
It snapped shut with a metallic click, and Gray stepped away from his Stellar, moving to what looked like a crank. Holding onto the collar with her shaking hands, Aurora's eyes darted from the loose chain attached to her noose to the crank Gray grasped like the handle of an oar.
A sinking realization crept down into Aurora’s gut. Looking sideways at the glass-bottomed demon ship, she understood now what was meant to happen. The angels and demons would be getting a drawn-out show. No snapping neck as Aurora was dropped from a hole in the gallows.
This was meant to be a slow and agonizing death.
LILITH
Lilith sat on the right-hand side of Adam, Samuel on his left. Adam, who she couldn’t possibly think of as Caducus. Not now or ever. His name was nearly as familiar to her as her own, having thought it so many times over the years.
Adam sat comfortably on his throne, watching as Grayson Cross attached his daughter to the metal noose Samuel had created.
“Is the Stellar girl your only Halo offspring?” Lilith asked mildly.
“One and only.” Adam kept his eyes on the view below. “Seems you’ve perfected your possession technique. The boy hasn’t slipped out of it once. I expected more trouble from him.”
“I've had a reasonable amount of time to practice.”
“You needed it,” Adam mused. “The amount of times you attempted to possess Eve outnumbers my children. And that is a vast number, as I’m sure you know.”
Lilith felt the jab thrown ever so casually by her once-lover. “Children are highly overrated. I have always been of this opinion.”
Adam clicked his tongue three times. “Is it perhaps because you are unable to produce any of your own?”
The knife had been twist
ed.
“Even if I had been able, I would not have wished for any. I prefer to create my own subjugates. With my hands. My power.”
“Oh, I am quite aware of your feelings towards children. Why do you think the Light created me a new partner?”
Lilith’s lavender stare flicked from the pair of Stellars to Adam. His sharp words had already returned. That hadn’t taken long. But he had known, once she’d felt his kiss, felt their souls stitching back together, she would be unable to pull away again. An all-consuming resentment filled her core as Adam’s gaze remained forward, fixed on his daughter now being strung up by her own Stellar.
This was what Lilith had known would happen between the two Halos. It was what always happened. From the beginning of time. Stellars couldn’t function in such close proximity to one another. Eventually, they were sure to self-destruct. Or one would destruct the other.
Lilith knew this all too well.
“Etheria draws near,” Lilith spoke coolly. “They better get along with things.”
“They will,” Adam answered. “Quiet now, love. Just enjoy the show.”
AURORA
The chain attached to the metal noose gradually tightened as Gray wound the crank.
Aurora kept a vice grip on the collar, determined to fight as long as she possibly could. She would not give up so easily, though part of her—a considerable part now—wanted to.
Back when Samuel had told her of her duty as a Stellar, she’d imagined this unlikely scenario where she charged forward with golden wings and a sword held high. She'd envisioned saving the lives of her brother and mom. She'd visualized winning the battle and saving the world.
None of these things had come to pass. She’d failed on every count. She was a terrible savior. After all, you had to actually save someone to be considered a savior.
The chain pulled more tightly. Aurora’s hands clamped down as she was slowly dragged upwards.
First onto her tiptoes. Then all her weight left the ground, supported only by the muscles in her arms.
Stellar (The Halo Series Book 3) Page 24