Death lingered here.
“Hannah—wait!”
But she sped up, my call spurring her on rather than holding her back. She pushed the front door open and screamed.
I was with her within moments. Two of our guards lay dead on the hardwood floor, their bodies lying there peacefully, as if they'd gone to sleep and never woken up. There was no sign of a struggle. An unnatural quiet blanketed the house, and the air was too still.
“Aurora! Zel! Cerberus!” Hannah ran from room to room, her voice going shrill as she screamed the names over and over. I searched too, my heart in my throat, my fear so strong I couldn't say anything at all. We checked everywhere. The bedrooms. The office. The kitchen. The pool.
The nursery.
The house was empty aside from dozens of dead guards. There was not one single living person on the estate, as far as I could tell, though nothing else had been touched.
Hannah was in a complete panic, her eyes wild. "Where is Aurora?"
I shook my head and drew her into my arms, partly to keep myself from falling apart. “I don’t know.”
"Or Zel? Or Cerberus?"
I had no answer to that either. As I'd searched the house, I'd been terrified that I might find one—or all—of them dead, just like the guards. It was a small relief—very small—that they weren't here. They could still be alive. Taken by whoever had done this.
Oh, who was I kidding? I knew who'd done this. Of course I did. The presence was unmistakable, even after thousands of years apart. I smelled it lingering in the air, heard the ghostly whispers on the breeze, and felt the eerie chill trailing down my spine.
Death.
My father.
Somehow he was free—and he’d taken my daughter.
30
Hannah
Everything inside me screamed and sobbed. It was a miracle I wasn't doing both of those on the outside too, but I was using every ounce of control I had to keep it together. Falling apart wouldn't save Aurora, and I had to act quickly. I had to do everything I could to find her, even if all I wanted to do was break into a million pieces.
Lucifer threw his arms out to the side and let out a guttural roar that made the windows of the house shake. His eyes were red, and fury radiated off of him in menacing waves. The part of him that was War was emerging. I considered stopping it and trying to calm him down, but then said fuck it. If there was ever a time to be Famine and War, it was now.
"We'll get her back," I told him, as my own desperation brought out my endless hunger and thirst. This time, it was an all-consuming yearning to save her. A mirror across from me showed that my eyes were glowing green too, and I embraced the power. To save my daughter I would become a force to be reckoned with. I would tear apart the entire world if I had to, if that's what it took to find her.
Yes. I could do this. I’d rescued Lucifer from War, for fuck’s sake. I could find my daughter, a three-headed dog, and my demon bodyguard. It wasn’t like they’d be easy to hide, and it must have been Fenrir who'd taken them. This didn't look like a shifter attack, but who else could it have been?
A noise stirred behind us, like the sound of people moving and the rustle of fabric. Lucifer and I shared a "what now?" look, before we turned to face whatever this was from our spot in the middle of the living room. But what I saw made my stomach drop.
The dead guards around us rose to their feet, their completely black eyes staring at us. As they stepped forward, their movements were jerky, unnatural, and they raised their weapons in threat. From the corner of my eye I saw more coming down the staircase, and others in the garden and by the pool heading toward us. They said nothing, but their intent was clear, and Lucifer and I summoned our magic to defend ourselves.
The undead guards threw themselves at us with abandon, slashing their weapons and shooting their guns, even though there was no chance they could win against us. A cocktail of terror and grief mixed inside me as we fought them off with blasts of light and darkness. But every time we knocked them down, they got back up again.
All right then. I'd seen enough zombie movies in my time as a human, and I knew there was one surefire way to stop the undead. I created twin swords of twisting light and darkness for myself and for Lucifer, which easily sliced off the heads of our former guards. I felt sick to my stomach as I took them down, these men and women who had once worked to protect us, but were now being used against us. I knew they were already dead, but I hated it anyway. I remembered all of their names. Every single one of them. And they'd died because of us.
One of the guards suddenly stopped before us and croaked out with a rasping voice, "Death awaits you in Hell."
"What did you just say?" I asked, as a chill ran through me.
"If you want your daughter back, come find him," the undead continued.
Lucifer sprang forward and sliced his sword through the guard’s neck. The head tumbled to the floor and rolled across the hardwood, scattering small droplets of blood everywhere.
That was the last of them. I vanished our swords, my hands shaking as the horrible truth of the guard's words sank into me. I turned to Lucifer and met his angry gaze, my eyes wide. "Death took Aurora?"
"Yes, it must be him." Lucifer spoke through gritted teeth. "He's been freed somehow."
Another horrible realization hit me, and my panic spiked again. "Kassiel!"
Lucifer reached
