by Swart, Karen
But just as my hands grabbed hold of one, we were all sent into the air, a furious roar sounding our flight. We landed together, and some on top of each other, dust kicking up around us. Dazed I looked up at her, and saw that she was even freaking bigger. That’s impossible! How the hell can she grow larger than what she already was?
She moved forward and stopped, her head turning to the cave. The others were still down trying to recompose themselves or get off each other. I followed her vision and my heart stopped dead. Kali just exited the cave, holding a bundle of something in her arms. She was standing there looking at us. I told her to shift away! I got up just as the hellhound roared, “Demon.”
She stormed forward and ran towards her. My eyes were on Kali, standing there looking at us. And then I saw a smile I have never seen Kali do before, just before she shifted out with the relics. Confused at what I had just seen, I ran smack into the hellhound, and she grabbed me around the neck, her thick arm enveloping me.
In a death choke, I strained my muscles to try and prevent my own neck from breaking. I looked up and saw Max flying through the air, his swords turned towards the hellhound holding me. He slammed them into her and she released me, grabbing at them while roaring. I crawled away from her catching my breath. Crap that was close. Getting up I saw her punch Max with so much force he flew into the wall of the mountain and landed with a hard thud.
“Kas, we can’t win this one!” Caim yelled at me. I looked around trying to find a solution. She was way too strong for us, and leaving her wasn’t an option. She would hunt and she would kill, and then I would be in even more trouble. “We need to fetch Chax!” Arianna yelled. I knew she was right, but I couldn’t watch another hellhound die like that.
“No!” I roared at her. “We can subdue her!” Unfortunately, I had no idea how. I watched as the hellhound pulled the swords out of her and looked down at them. Oh my freaking soul, we just gave her weapons!
Chapter 19
The hellhound swung the swords testing them out, and then looked up at us, now crowded together. “Now we go get Chax,” Seth breathed next to me. I so agreed with him on that one. Now that she was armed, she would be impossible to stop. She started walking towards us and we backed up, her eyes roamed over us, watching us and calculating at the same time. And then she vanished.
“Crap, where did she go!” I yelled, my heart slamming into my ribs. I only hope that she didn’t just shift out of Exsilium. Chaos from her path of destruction flashed briefly in my mind. Dear Lord Almighty, hundreds would die if not thousands.
Earth was crawling with demons, and she was going straight for them. How did this day turn out so bad, and where the hell was Kali! Crap, I hope she went to a safe place and doesn’t even think about coming back here. That’s if the female didn’t go looking for her in Exsilium. Oh double crap, that would be so bad.
I felt the air move behind me and knew the answer before I even had to look. I ducked and rolled, jumping back up again. The others must have felt it too because they were all standing away from her, except for Ryan. His eyes were facing forward, looking at no one, and I watched as she held the swords next to her. Blood dripping from them, shocked I looked back at Ryan to see his head sliding off his body and falling to the ground.
Without thinking, I rushed forward and attacked her, our swords clashing into each other’s. Someone was screaming their head off around me, but I couldn’t help it. Now I had to kill her. Heartache crashed over me, and I stumbled on a rock. I was smacked into the rock, my back hitting it at an awkward angle. I heard more than felt the awful noise with the impact, like a twig being snapped behind me. I fell to the ground. Only when I tried to get back up again did I realize that sound was my back breaking.
“No!” a male voice roared and I looked up to see the full power of that roar. It was Max yelling, and transforming into the very thing that just killed our friend. His wings spread open, and with his head hanging back, he stretched his arms wide. Slowly he grew in size, the bones in his wings piercing the skin. His horns grew to almost reach above his head, and his wings spread wider and more open. Bringing his head down, he stood still for a moment. He opened his eyes, and looked at her. Blood red eyes met blood red eyes, and I knew that this day just got worse.
Nanini moved towards the female hellhound. “Stop! Stay back!” I yelled at her and she stopped, looking at me in confusion. “Max is born!” I yelled again. She shifted out of there so fast she slammed into the rock she shifted to, ending up on her knees. The others also retreated, and so we all stood watching the two borns standing off against each other. Max was bigger than the female, but for some reason I knew she was older … much older.
Max was moving his muscles, rolling his shoulders, but his eyes remained on her. His swords were moving through the air as he untwined his new form to find the right footing to accommodate the increase of mass and muscles. I looked at the female; she stood ready and waiting for him. Her eyes spoke of many battles won long before this one; she might be smaller, but she was more lethal. Oh my God, they were going to kill each other. “Max, please don’t!” I yelled at him. But he didn’t even look at me. Calm him; I have to put calm emotions into him.
I closed my eyes and tried to generate a calm feeling, but I was failing epically. Instead of generating a calm emotion to feed him, I received both their emotions into me. I felt anger, fury, death, heartache, and fear … but most of all hatred. I sucked in a breath, the overload of their emotions draining my own strength. In horror I watched as the two engaged each other. They stormed forward, deafening roars coming from both of them, and when they met the sound was sickening. Bones met bones as their wings hit each other. Blood sprayed everywhere as they sliced at each other.
Max sliced off a piece of her wing, the female roaring from pain, and that pain shot straight into me. I cried out, as if it were my wing just sliced. She sliced at his leg, almost cutting it clean off. Again his pain slammed into me. Unable to move I was mere feet away from them, their fighting coming straight at me. “Kas!” Nanini yelled from the other side. Looking up, with the new pain slicing through me from a wound to the female’s torso, I watched as Nanini and Ben flew up in the air throwing light bombs the size of busses at them. Each bomb that hit them had me crying out from the pain.
Someone grabbed me and dragged me away from the fight, which now was joined by my remaining team except for Seth. I screamed when I was placed on the ground a few feet away, Seth’s face coming into view. “Kas, look at me! Is it your back?” he asked in concern.
“I … I feel their … pain,” I stuttered. He looked at me confused and just then Lotan got a hit on Max’s wing and I yelled out again, the pain running down my own back.
“Stop!” Seth yelled at the others, they backed off slowly, their eyes wild with the fight. “Kas is receiving their pain!”
Lada shifted over to me. “Kas, are you okay?” she asked, concern and fear mixed in her voice. The female ripped a horn off Max, his pain again slamming into me. I felt liquid run down my head, and over my eye, Lada’s face going into shock. “She is connected to them,” I heard her say but screamed again when the female was cut open over her stomach.
“We need to stop them now!” Seth yelled.
“Calm them,” I spoke softly, bearing the new pain.
Lada looked at me questioningly and then turned around, yelling at Nanini, “Nanini and Arianna, try and charm Max. Caim, you and Ben try the female,” she ordered. She looked back at Seth. “Get Chax here now!” she yelled at him.
Lotan came to join us, trying to pick me up but it was too much, I had pain all over me. I watched as Nanini and Arianna fought Max away from the female, then as Caim and Ben pushed the female away from Max. Then astoundingly Nanini dived for Max while throwing a huge bomb at him. At the precise moment the bomb hit him and sent him back, she kicked him to take him to the ground.
Ben saw what she did and now did the same to the female, Caim joining him with the kick. Nan
ini jumped on Max’s neck, her legs wrapping around it. She rolled to the side making sure he only looked at her. Caim was on the female, using daggers to pin her down. “Godzilla, I swear if you don’t stop now, I am going to rip off your neck!” Nanini yelled at him, and for a brief second he stopped and looked at her. By the heaven above …
“Nanini, charm him!” I yelled with everything I had in me.
On her side she looked up at me confused. “Say what?”
“You are his charm, you must feed his emotions with yours, you must calm him,” Lada explained for me. Never did I expect this to unfold before me. I was stressing so hard about my charm, that I never considered who would be Max’s charm.
My parents’ words came crashing over me, they hated each other just like them, and now I watched as Nanini drew in deep breaths and placed her hands over his eyes. Slowly but surely Max started to calm down, Nanini holding on for dear life, while feeding him with her emotions. Those bones sticking out of his wings started to retreat back inside. His size started to shrink, until he was just normal. And finally, after what seemed like hours, he was back in human form looking at Nanini still wrapped around his neck. “Gah!” Nanini yelled, releasing him and jumping up away from him.
Still in utter shock I realized that it was very quiet around us. I looked at the guys with the female hellhound and found Caim and the female now also normal sprawled out just looking at each other. Chax chose that moment to shift in, followed by the other Dominus Custos and Seth. Serious he looked around at the scene before him. Nanini was jumping around yelling, “Eeeew!” and rubbing at her arms and legs. Max was still on the ground looking at her in shock.
Caim and the female were not moving either. “Kasadya Levourne, what in Heaven’s name have you done!” Chax yelled at me. I looked at him and found him standing over a headless Ryan. My heart hitched in my throat as the first real heartache broke out of me. Tears streamed down my face as the vision of my friend was covered with them. Lada embraced me and I cried into her, Ryan is dead because of me.
“Move away from her!” Chax yelled.
“Chax, wait! We can explain,” Lada tried to tell him.
“I said move!” The fury in his voice sent a shockwave through me. Lada backed away as he stalked over. Tears still streamed down my face and I didn’t look at him, I knew what was waiting for me. “You will look at me,” he growled out. But I didn’t, I couldn’t. Everything ever said about me just came true. “Look at me!” he yelled again.
Finding some strength, I looked up at him. “You killed him,” he said, standing over me. “You are the reason we lost a team member today.” I have never seen him this mad, his eyes spoke of death. “You will carry this failure alone,” he condemned me. “And I will make sure that you never try anything like this again.” He turned around to look at the others.
His eyes landed on Caim and the female. “Zurita, I am so sorry,” he said, walking over to her. Caim had removed himself from her and stood there, unable to take his eyes of her. She in return was looking at the cave, her eyes about to shed tears.
“She took them,” she said, turning around to look at Chax. “The demon consort took the relics.” Tears were falling from her eyes.
Demon consort? The thought ran through my mind. Kali took them, not a demon. Chax’s head whipped around at me. “Two thousand years we have guarded the relics, two thousand years. Zurita offer up her life to protect them,” Chax snapped. I was confused and didn’t understand why she would say something like that. “You just gave away the only weapons, that if combined, can bring down the wall around Hell and set loose every demon inside it,” Chax finished, disgust all over his face.
“What? Why?” I staggered, unable to understand his words. He walked to tower over me again.
“I could never reach her mind because it belonged to a prince,” he confessed. My heart slammed into me with a furious thump. I tried to breathe but couldn’t. No, that can’t be right. No, they are making a mistake.
“No, she had a death charm placed on her, she wasn’t his consort,” I tried to explain.
“Who told you it was a death charm. Me? Another fallen? Or the very creature that played you from the start?” he asked. Everything slammed into me at once. The day she shifted us to Hell, the day he returned her to me. All of it! I shook my head, unable to believe it. “Caim, take Zurita to our home and ensure that she is taken care of,” Chax started to instruct. He turned to the rest. “You will all report back to my home. If you so much as step outside of it, I will bestow a punishment upon you that you will never forget.”
In shock I sat there against a rock and watched as they all shifted out. Ben and Max wanted to retrieve Ryan but Chax stopped them. They all left, leaving me alone with Chax and the other Custos, who still stood there not saying a word. Seth and Arianna stood waiting for their orders. “Seth, seeing that you and Arianna had a part in this, you two will ensure that he finds his resting place,” he said, indicating Ryan’s body. Seth and Arianna walked over to Ryan and without uttering a word collected him and shifted out.
“What will we do with her?” Thonyn asked.
“I say we destroy her now before she destroys all of us,” Jules said, pleasure on her face.
“Will you condemn her to death so easily?” Vulcan asked, looking at Jules.
They all stood and waited for Chax, who had his back to everyone, to say something. He stood there not uttering a word.
“Chax, we must decide,” Thonyn pushed on. I watched as Chax turned around and looked at them.
“I will punish her,” he declared, his face still furious.
“And how would we know if the punishment was befitting the crime?” Jules asked, her poisonous eyes on me. Vulcan looked at me as well, his face told me how disappointed he was, and how in trouble I am.
“Her punishment will be spoken of for centuries to come,” Chax declared, my shocked eyes watching his.
“And how could you keep her under control, now with her born so close?” Thonyn asked.
“She won’t be able to move without my consent, she won’t be able to speak without my consent but most of all her mind will not think without my consent,” Chax declared and I heard my breathing hitch with those words. Those eyes he had with the hellhound’s murder were back and looking straight at me, no mercy showed in them. He was really going to punish me! Oh my God! My heart slammed into my chest over and over. “And when I am done with her,” those eyes looked at me, “it will be the perfection I choose, and no other.”
“Then we will leave it to you. But be warned, Chax, one more failure and we will destroy her ourselves,” Thonyn warned him.
Chax nodded at him, then turned to face me again. “If she fails, I will destroy her myself,” he declared.
“Chax,” Vulcan interrupted, but Chax held up his hand to him.
“No, I have stepped aside and let fate take control, knowing full well that it cannot be. I am sorry, but this time I will do as I see fit,” Chax dismissed him.
“But what about—” Vulcan asked, stepping closer to Chax.
“We cannot continue on like this!” Chax cut him off, furious with him.
Vulcan shook his head. “Something like that, Chax, can never be found again,” he finished and shifted out.
I witnessed my own trial, never once speaking up to try and defend myself. Thonyn and Jules shifted out a few seconds after Vulcan. And I was left with Chax, who stood with his back to me again.
“Know this, Kasadya. Not even the archangels will be able to save you if you even think about crossing me again,” he finally said, and with that last word he force shifted me out. My final thought before the shift was simple, “Death can claim me now.”
Chapter 20
I was shifted into an unfamiliar room. Chax walked away, leaving me on the floor. My back was still broken, it would take maybe a day or two before it would be healed, so I had nowhere to go. I couldn’t even go sit on the chair I saw to my left. I brac
ed myself on my arms, and when I pushed up, they were shaking like mad. I bit down, trying to bite down the pain shooting into my body.
Only then did I notice that my wings laid spread out at my side. This is going to hurt like hell. Closing my eyes, I prepared for the pain and returned to human form, the pain ripping through my entire body. I dropped to the floor again, my breath puffing over the cold tiled floor. I heard footsteps, but didn’t try to look up.
What would be the use? I was a walking corpse, just waiting for the expire button to be pushed, but I was now certain that Chax would be the one to kill me. Any other options were nonexistent now. I felt him at my side and moved my eyes to look at his feet, his boots coming into view. He stood there, breathing hard but not doing anything.
My heart rate picked up again, a lot of possibilities ran through my mind. What was he waiting for? Finally he crouched and grabbed my arm, yanking it up towards him. I screamed from the pain, and looking up at him tears ran down my face. His face cold and hard as he held my arm out, and I watched as a cuff was slammed over my wrist.