Focus, Savanna.
The hard pavement scratched her legs as she sat down to start drawing. Her wards had to be perfect. Any flaw or forgotten symbol meant the demon would be free to drag her to the lower planes . . . or worse. She shuddered at the thought. A veritable eternity of torment wasn’t her idea of a good time.
***
Something wasn’t quite right. Alexi glanced over her shoulder, looking for the others. Connor was hidden behind a two-door sports car across the empty side street. She couldn’t see Sing anywhere, but she knew he wasn’t far. Nearby, the main street flowed with late-evening traffic and the occasional pedestrian. Streetlights gleamed against the windshields of parked cars.
The whole situation just seemed . . . off. Sure, Illyana was cruel and soulless—definitely not above killing innocent people. But why now? Why here in Seattle? Having seen what Savanna was capable of, Alexi knew that if Illyana had wanted to find her in Tacoma, she could have.
Add to that the fact that all the victims had looked so much like Alexi, and . . . it was hard not to feel like they weren’t waltzing into some kind of elaborate trap. Even if it was though, what else could they do? They couldn’t allow the demon to continue its rampage, and Alexi knew the Arcanum didn’t stand half a chance without Savanna.
For the millionth time, she wished Victor were there. It seemed wrong to be without him. She’d argued with Connor and Sing about it at length—Victor was incredibly handy in a fight, and they needed all the strength they could muster. But it was no use.
“We’ve called in all our favors and used up all the leeway our boss is willing to give us on this one, Alexi,” Connor had told her. Even though a witch and a vampire were decidedly more on the Arcanum blacklist than a werewolf—the wolves tended not to be quite so careless toward human life—Victor was an unknown quantity, and the two agents seemed to have cashed in all their coupons just bringing Savanna and Alexi along.
“Where are we at?” she murmured into the comm link the Arcanum had loaned her, trying to catch a glimpse of Sing down the street. The comm’s earpiece fit snugly in her right ear, and a thin strap fit around her neck like a choker, the sensor pressing against her throat. The sensor’s technology allowed it to pick up the vibrations of her speech, even if she was mumbling, and voice activation let her keep her hands free. She could get used to all these cool toys, even if most of the Arcanum regarded her as public enemy number one.
“A few seconds out,” Connor’s voice came through her earpiece. A pause and then, “Time.”
The temperature plummeted. Frost formed on the sidewalk, and she could see Connor’s breath turning to mist. While Alexi could sense the cold on her skin, it didn’t hold the edge of discomfort that she somehow knew a frigid breeze should cause her. This was surface cold—not like the hollow, empty, internal cold she had almost become accustomed to.
The demon was close. Savanna said it would happen like this—with an extreme temperature drop first. Any moment now, it would manifest.
Stiletto heels clicked on the pavement. Alexi turned her head, honing in on the sound. A woman came into view, busily speaking on her phone as she walked. She wore a leather skirt and a sequined tank top under a midlength trench coat. A dinner-and-drinks outfit. Her face was the most remarkable, though—she and Alexi could have been sisters. Same hair, same eyes. Even their features were similar.
“That has to be her,” Connor said. “Sing, you ready?”
“Ready,” Sing replied.
“Alexi?”
How could she look so much like Alexi? Were they related?
“Alexi?” Connor’s voice echoed in her ear again.
“Ready,” she managed, trying to keep her focus. She and Connor were supposed to keep the demon busy while Savanna worked on banishing it. Sing’s priority was to protect the target.
The temperature dropped even further. Alexi’s doppelgänger shivered, pulling her coat closer around her. Suddenly, she stopped to look around. Alexi understood why. The hair on the back of her neck stood on end, and every instinct told her to run.
Alexi bolted from her hiding spot, ignoring Connor’s shout to fall back. The demon emerged from the night sky, inky black with wide, leathery wings folded against its back. It swooped down toward the girl, massive talons outstretched, and spread its wings wide to slow its approach. The girl stumbled back, screaming.
Alexi dove for the girl. Cold, foul air swept past, and the demon’s putrid scent was beat into the air by the thud of leathery wings. Alexi collided with the girl, knocking her out of the way. Pain sliced through Alexi’s side, and she heard the demon emit a guttural, inhuman sound.
“What the hell?” the woman shrieked, scrambling backward on the sidewalk. Sing popped out from behind a car.
“Go with him!” Alexi commanded the woman. “He’ll keep you safe.”
Too stunned to struggle, the woman allowed Sing to pull her upright.
Alexi pulled herself to her feet and scanned the sky. “Connor, do you have eyes on it?” Her side hurt. She couldn’t see the demon.
***
“No! Negative!” Connor shouted into his comm. “Behind you! Alexi—”
His warning came too late. The massive creature materialized out of the shadows behind Alexi, and its claws descending on her with frightful alacrity.
Connor raised his MP5, his night sights easily bracketing the nine-foot-tall demon. He depressed the trigger three quick times. The bullets weren’t large—no bigger than a small handgun—but each one had been blessed by the archdiocese of Seattle. Gouts of black blood sprayed from the creature, and it tossed Alexi aside like a doll. She flew end over end into the brick building across the street with a force that would kill any human.
The demon turned on him and roared. He fired again and fell back. Each bullet splattered more blood than the last.
This is going to work!
The demon opened its maw wide and spewed forth a cone of icy flame. The street froze, windows shattered, and the temperature dropped below zero. Connor flung himself hard to the right. His left arm didn’t make it behind his cover in time. He screamed as it burned. The top layer of his skin blackened and burst. Hot blood oozed out of the cracks. He couldn’t even move his fingers.
“Savanna!” he croaked. “We can’t hold this thing!”
***
Savanna heard Connor scream her name, and she ignored him, focusing on her ward. She had to. If she broke concentration, even for a second, her ward would fail. With the last line formed on the ground, she discarded the chalk for her dagger. She couldn’t risk bleeding out, so she went for her stomach. She yanked her shirt up and cut herself across the middle. Razor-sharp steel burned across her skin, as it had so many times before. The familiar pain, amid the raging chaos, comforted her.
She felt the enormous pressure on her skull from the magic she cast. It welled up in her and seeped out with her blood, ignited by the words of power she recited from memory. The wards glowed, casting a pale white light on everything. A few more seconds and they would shine like the moon and protect her from—
The SUV she was crouched behind rocked, and then it vanished, hurtling into the sky. The Alatum raged before her. Twenty-centimeter claws grasped at the air while its mouth opened and closed as if eating something that wasn’t there.
“Little witch,” he growled, his voice seeming almost too inhuman to form the words. “You smell familiar. Come closer.”
Its fetid breath choked her. She could barely hear over the pounding of her heart. She needed only a few more seconds. Cold rolled off the demon, and the ground around it froze. Her skin prickled. She could see her breath clouding the air in front of her, and frost formed on her face as she raced through what remained of her incantation. And then she stumbled over the last few words.
The light faded, and the wards became just chalk on the pavement.
The demon laughed. Claws closed around her waist in a cruel grip, and she heard herself scream.
She screamed again. Her skin froze where it touched her. The cold seeped into her, clouding her vision and robbing her of consciousness. The demon roared with laughter as she faded.
***
Alexi pulled herself from the brick rubble. Savanna screamed again. No! The ward had failed.
The street was covered in a layer of thick ice, spreading outward from the demon. Savanna dangled limply from the thing’s massive claws.
Don’t be dead, don’t be dead, don’t be dead.
Alexi scrambled across the pavement, sliding across the ice. She passed Connor, who knelt against a car cradling his left arm. She couldn’t worry about him right now. She sprinted the last few feet and roared as she jumped onto the demon’s back. She wrapped an arm around its throat and squeezed. It was like trying to choke out a tree. Her strength, impressive as it was, was nothing to this creature. Ice spread over her arms and legs.
“Hold on, leech. You can come with us,” the demon muttered.
Alexi felt him spread his wings and flex his knees. She couldn’t let him take off. With nothing left to do, she bit into the throbbing veins along his neck. Pain shot through her face as she felt one of her fangs break. Black ichor flooded her mouth, tasting of sulfur and ash.
The demon screamed, shattering glass for a block. Its roar reverberated through the nearby buildings, sending fragments of their facades crashing to the pavement. The demon cast Savanna aside, and her limp body rolled to a stop in the middle of the street. Alexi bore down, sucking at the demon’s essence. Each time she fed, she became more convinced that it wasn’t the actual blood that gave her sustenance—that was just an incidental part of the transaction. The demon’s essence tasted bitter. Power surged through her, but it wasn’t the pure power she got from a human or even the boundless energy she took from Victor. It was chaos. Her body twitched as it fought to contain the demonic energy within.
The Alatum flexed his giant shoulders, and its wings stretched out to touch the buildings on either side of the street. He writhed, trying to tear her from its back.
Alexi’s fingers dug into flesh, and she drank more deeply. The monster roared again. A giant, clawed hand reached over its shoulder and raked her back. Pain tore up her spine, and the blood in her mouth gurgled as a scream broke loose—but she refused to let go. Long, razor-sharp claws sliced into her shoulders again and again, tearing her skin to ribbons. Alexi clung to him, blinded by pain. Her fingers burned as they froze to blackened stumps. Every part of her body that touched him was frozen stiff.
A claw punctured her side and hooked around a rib. Bone shattered, and Alexi screamed. He flung her aside. A wall stopped her flight, and she slid to the ground. Exposed ribs poked through torn skin. Her arms and legs refused to move. The energy she absorbed from the demon churned inside her, and her vision failed.
***
Everything hurt. Savanna dragged her broken hand across the pavement. Pain she could handle, but this was agony. She managed to roll over to a car and push herself up to sit. The demon turned to stomp after Alexi but stumbled as though he were weak. He attempted to stand and then buckled back to the ground.
“Savanna!” Connor knelt beside her, his left arm tucked under his coat. His other held a pistol. “Can you still banish it?”
“Not without . . . my circle.” It hurt to speak. Her blood spattered to the ground as she coughed.
The beast spat demonic curses at Alexi. “I will feast on your soul in hell!” Its words sounded sluggish, almost weak.
“Can you do anything? Control it, send it away, make it do a dance, anything?”
Savanna looked around. She still had her dagger at least. It lay beside her, a beacon of her failure. “I . . . I don’t have the strength.” A dozen open wounds on her body bled freely. If she tapped into her own blood now, she might not have enough strength left over to keep her own heart beating. Her mother must have spent a week preparing to summon and probably spilled the blood of two people just to bind it to this plane. The demon bore no sign of her mother’s presence. The demon wasn’t bound to anyone or anything. Illyana had simply released the creature upon the world.
The demon struggled to one knee, sucking in heavy breaths as it tried to regain its strength. Steam rolled off its body in sheets.
Connor looked to the demon and then back to Savanna. He pushed up the sleeve on his good arm and held it in front of her. “Use my blood.”
An image of her father flashed through her mind. Blood coated his lips as he whispered his love for her.
“No!” She pushed away his hand. “You don’t understand. I can’t stop once I start. It could kill you.”
“Savanna, that thing is going to kill us all and drag us to hell. I can’t stop it, but you can. Please.”
The demon let out a weak roar and struggled to its feet.
“Savanna, now!” Connor grabbed her hand and pushed the blade of the dagger against his own skin.
Savanna trembled. She couldn’t banish it, but if she tried to bind it to her . . . maybe that would scare it enough to go home on its own. A shiver ran through her at the thought. Whatever she did, it would certainly draw his attention.
The demon lurched forward, one claw out. She saw what it reached for. Alexi lay crumpled and broken against the wall. Her bones stuck out at odd angles, and her beautiful face was hidden behind blood and grime.
Savanna jammed the dagger into Connor’s arm without warning. He cried out in pain. Savanna gathered the eldritch power his blood provided. Energy crackled around her, filling her with his essence. Connor grunted and collapsed to the ground. Savanna’s skin tingled with the energy as she chanted, her black hair sparkled, and her violet eyes flared.
***
In two thousand years, Alatum had never felt such pain. What vampire could do this to him? None of the cursed leeches had ever been able to weaken him in this way. His mind was still foggy, and his limbs ached. With each moment that passed, however, his strength waxed again.
She lay just outside his reach, crumpled against the wall he had flung her against. He groaned as his legs supported his weight. What a prize she would make when he dragged her home. First, he would break her soul—what was left of it—with pain that would make her present wounds seem like bliss. And then, with her as his slave, he could challenge the very gates of the Abyss. Not since the sundering had such a thing been possible.
Alatum took one step closer to his prize, looking at her with his otherworldly eyes. The others of her kind flickered like pitiful tallow candles, but her soul glowed with the fire of the sun and the Abyss below. He cared little for why she was so unlike the others—he only knew that the power that burned in her would make up for the indignity she had inflicted on him. How he would enjoy breaking her. No mortal could last long enough to satisfy him, but her—he felt she might go the distance.
He chuckled as he took another step. He reached his clawed fingers down to her. Her eyes burned up at him with anger, but her body wouldn’t move.
“Leave her alone!”
Alatum jerked his claws back and turned to rend the gnat that pestered him. He took a step back in surprise. The witch that stood before him radiated with power that far surpassed her size. No, this was not possible. Only one witch in this mortal realm could have the power to command him.
The witch reached out to him, and a brilliant light of purest white struck him like an anvil. Pain arced through his breast, unlike anything he had felt in millennia.
“Stop!” he roared.
Another line of light encircled his neck.
No! He would not be a servant. Not now, not ever. The witch’s energy bound him, pulling him toward her. He felt his essence dematerialize to reside on the ethereal. Light encircled his wrists, enslaving him, to power her like so many of his lesser brethren.
“I will not be your slave, witch!” He flexed his mighty wings. A massive gust of wind sent debris flying at lethal speeds. Small, ble
eding cuts appeared on the witch’s skin, but she did not flinch.
“You will spend an eternity powering my magic. I will drain you to the last drop!” Her voice burned to his core.
“No,” he whispered. At least in the Abyss he was free. On earth there was no true death, only banishment. But to spend an eternity as a slave to a mortal, drained of all power and life—he could not.
Alatum roared. Gathering every last mote of his strength, he leaped into the sky. He banked hard to come back down at the ground. With each second, the magic pulled him in. He had only moments left. He summoned his power before him. It was enough. The portal to Hades swallowed him whole, and the bonds she had tied him with shattered. He was home.
SIXTEEN
Alexi blinked up at Savanna. The energy filling the witch had healed her wounds—even the tiny cuts on her face inflicted by the demon. Alexi was a different matter. The agony of her injuries bled into a dull roar that made it hard to see and think.
“Why . . . won’t I . . . heal?” It hurt to speak.
“The demon’s essence—it is chaos. It causes only pain. It won’t heal you.” Savanna knelt beside her. “Let me help.”
Alexi tried to nod, but her neck wouldn’t respond. Savanna put one hand on her face. Her palm felt cool against Alexi’s burning skin. The demon’s essence still roiled inside her, burning from the inside out. Savanna’s chant was more of a song, a soft melody that soothed Alexi’s frayed nerves and filled her with hope. The spot where Savanna touched burned for a moment, then Alexi’s whole body quivered with relief as the burning stopped.
Savanna opened her mouth to speak and then choked on her words. Falling to the ground, she vomited up a mass of black ichor that smelled of sulfur and bile. After a moment, she wiped her mouth clean. Her sleeve hissed and melted where it had touched the demon’s blood.
“Better?” asked Savanna.
With the Dawn (Faith of the Fallen) Page 13