Frustrated and screaming for vengeance, Hargastor started forward. He managed two steps before the pustules began bursting and unleashed small salamander-looking creatures that immediately attacked their host.
The strength went out of the demon and he dropped to his knees. His face screwed up in disbelief and agony. “No! This can’t be happening! Fulaghar!” Heheld his hands up to the ceiling in supplication as more pustules burst and more salamander-things chewed on him. “Fulaghar! Save me!”
No one came, though.
As Warren watched, all semblance of life drained from Hargastor’s face. Hisbeseeching arms dropped to his sides and his eyes rolled back up into his head. He fell forward and hit the ground without trying to stop himself.
The salamander-things started feasting in earnest.
You can go, Merihim said. Find the remaining two. Then we will destroy Fulaghar.
“We?” Warren thought weakly as he started at the demon corpse thesalamander-things had been born in and now devoured. Merihim didn’t hear histhought, though, or chose not to react to it. Warren felt the demon draw away from him.
“It’s over,” the voice said. “Go while you’re still able.”
But Warren couldn’t. Too much remained yet to be explored. He stared at theTemplar in dark blue and silver standing on the other side of Hargastor’scorpse.
“Warren, let me bring you back,” Naomi pleaded. “You’ve got to hurry. I feelyou getting weaker.”
Listening to his own heart, Warren knew that he was dyingthat he would dieif he didn’t return to his body where Naomi watched over it. But he stared atthe blank face of the Templar’s helm.
“You owe me,” Warren told the Templar. “You took my hand and bound me to ademon.” He tried to find additional energy within himself, anything to strikeagainst the Templar. The man inside the armor was barely standing as well. “Iwill kill you.”
Without a word, the Templar lifted his sword in his left hand. Energy crackled across the blank faceplate.
“You’re in league with the demons,” the Templar accused.
Warren couldn’t believe it. “I just killed a demon about to slaughter you.”
“That’s your interpretation, mate.” The other male Templar had his pistolleveled at Warren. “We had him right where we bloody wanted him. And you’re notin a good place to be making threats.”
The slim black-clad woman pointed her rifle at him.
“Another time, Templar,” Warren said. He couldn’t help feeling the threat waslame, like it was ripped right out of a comic book that he’d read. But what elsecould he say that would get the point across?
He felt frustrated that his rage and hate could feel so strong and so sure, and that he couldn’t articulate it any better than that. But then he thoughtthat maybe emotions felt so much could only be spoken of in simple terms. There was nothing complex about revenge.
“Another time,” the Templar agreed. He saluted Warren with his blade.
At first Warren believed the response was grandiose, driven by ego. But when he searched for the man behind the metal face, he sensed none of that. The gesture was eloquent and meant without hypocrisy or cheap theatrics.
“Warren.” Naomi sounded far away.
Silently, Warren let down his defenses and let her call him back across the yawning blackness that separated his sanctuary from the sanitarium. He felt as if he’d taken a step to the side and turned inside out.
THIRTY-TWO
Simon watched the man with the demon hand fade from view. In seconds, there was nothing left of him to show that he’d ever been there.
Except the dead demon stretched out on the floor. The body jiggled and jerked as the salamander-things tore chunks of flesh from it and devoured them in gulps.
Simon crossed the room and recovered his Spike Bolter. Lifting the pistol, he took aim and killed the salamander-things with quick bursts. Danielle and Nathan joined his efforts. No one wanted the things turning on them in case their armor offered no more protection than the demon’s hide.
He stepped to the fallen Templar. His name was Mathias Birch. He was a year or two younger than Simon.
“Are you still with me, Mathias?” Simon asked. He dropped a hand onthe Templar’s armor and got a medical readout. Mathias was in shock andstruggling to breathe. A broken rib had punctured his lung. There were other broken bones as well, but the lung was the worst of it.
“I am,” the Templar whispered weakly.
“I’m going to put you into stasis to get you out of pain,” Simon said.
“I can handle it, Simon.” Mathias lifted a quivering hand. “Just give me ahand up and I’ll be right as rain. You’ll see.”
Simon didn’t want to argue. If the younger man tried moving around too much,the lung could completely collapse or the rib might move farther and damage his heart. He took Mathias’s hand.
“Thanks, Simon. You’ll see. I’m not going to fall behind. And you’re notgoing to have to lose another warrior because I’ve let myself get bollixed up.”
“This isn’t your fault, Mathias.” Simon interfaced his suit’s AI with that ofthe younger man and overrode the other AI’s system. He triggered the stasisfunction and Mathias went limp inside the suit.
Gently, Simon laid the young Templar on the ground. He ran his hands over Mathias’s torso and locked sections of the armor into place so they wouldn’tmove. They would also provide better support during transport.
“Stasis effective,” the suit’s AI said. “Mathias is resting. Life-supportsystems control subject’s autonomous system.”
“Good,” Simon said. “Take care of him.”
“I will.”
“Christopher,” Simon said.
The other young Templar standing nearby came forward. “Yes.”
“I need you to get Mathias out of here,” Simon said. “In case we run into anymore trouble.”
“All right.”
“Nathan. I’ll need a hand.”
Together, Simon and Nathan lifted the unconscious Templar and strapped him to Christopher’s back. Once they had him in place, the Templar walked back down thepassageway.
Simon hoped that both of them would arrive safely. Then he freed his Spike Bolter and continued down the corridor to find the Goetia manuscript.
*
“Did you know him?” Nathan asked as he and Simon checked another pair ofcells. “The
