Wanda was coming my way when she stopped mid-step. A wash of horror crept across her face. Her mouth opened but no sound came out. Her expression caused a fist of terror to reach into my chest and squeeze my heart.
Astrid screamed in such terrible agony my knees buckled. The sound of her voice kickstarted Wanda who made a circular gesture with her hand as though reinforcing her circle. A moment later, Astrid thudded to the ground. The circle around her was covered in what looked like sewage. It gurgled and bubbled, ingesting the magic around her. Wanda howled and fell to her knees. I took a step toward them at the same time a thousand knives sank their blades into my mind. My circle disintegrated as the substance around Astrid ate it away. I cradled my head as the world went dark around me.
2
My shoulder hit one of the tower’s legs. The pain was minuscule compared to the thundering stabbing in my head. Something wet trickled down from my nostril. Red bloomed in the sandy dirt where I was curled. My blood pooled in a small crevice. I grit my teeth against the pain and tried to block out the sound of Wanda’s agonised keening.
In my thoughts, something dark and insidious was trying to break the barrier that held my sanity intact. Deep inside my mind, the pool of dark power rose up. It braced against the foreign entity and pushed back.
My eyes flickered open. I reached out for the tuft of grass that had the tenacity to grow amidst the parched desert conditions. That was the exact sentiment I was going for. I might not be all that pretty, but I would damn well survive when everything else died. Knives dug into me once more. I smashed my fist against the side of my head hoping that the physical pain would bring me clarity.
What it did was tell me I was this close to passing out. Before that could happen, I reached out and drew circles around the heads of the four men on the tower. For all its emphasis on warfare, Bloodline’s imperative was not to hurt humans. They were well aware they were trespassers in this dimension.
I didn’t give a damn about humanity as I constricted the circles around the four men and cut off their oxygen. My ears picked up their laboured breath as one by one they passed out. One of them keeled over the railing. His body crunched just to the side of where Astrid lay prone.
I sensed it the moment they all lost consciousness. It didn’t stop the pain. Grasping the leg of the tower as a crutch, I dragged myself to my feet. The urge to throw up churned in my gut. I entertained it all the way up the metal staircase. When my foot hit the lip of the platform, my legs almost gave way again. The bile that had been steadily rising in my throat won. Leaning over the edge, I emptied my stomach.
My throat continued to spasm as I took in the picture before me. One of those bastards had drawn a summoning circle on the metal platform. It had been done in blood. The stupid idiot was now slumped inside. His body and hands were covered in crimson. What made me enraged was that the blood wasn’t his. My eyes pricked with tears. The dingo sat curled in on itself. As though it had cowered to try and get away, but its legs had atrophied from either pain or blood loss. I couldn’t tell if it was breathing. Forcing myself to step closer, I reached out to lay my palm on its side. The dark power inside of me fluctuated. A tendril of black and gold spiralled around my fingers. I felt a tiny shock of electricity jump between us. The sudden spike of power made me woozy. For some reason my mind cast out images of that moment when the Soul Sisterhood tried to tear Kai’s soul from his body. My head spun. I almost had a heart attack when the red-and-tan creature twitched.
Without thinking, I turned to drag the man off the poor dingo he had blooded. Thankfully, he wasn’t anywhere near as solid as his friends. My clumsy manoeuvring smeared the outline of the circle and knocked over a couple of the candles. The air around me popped as the spell broke.
I gasped for breath when the pain subsided. The aura of it still made black-and-white spots dance across my vision. Blood made the surface of the metal slick. My foot slipped as I dragged the man to the side. I braced my arms out as I fell with him. When my palm touched down on the metal, the blood smeared on my skin.
A howl of something arcane filled my ears. The light around me bled from the world. Everything that had been solid blurred into the background. I pushed up on my elbow as the world became a cavern of intense cold. Not this again!
My heart clenched. I shrank back from the darkness, but there was nowhere to go. Despite trying not to look, my gaze landed on the indomitable figure standing by the mouth of the cavern. A dim glow emanated from outside, but it was hardly enough to see. I didn’t need light. The subtle golden aura around Lucifer was more than enough.
He turned around slowly. It was just as well. It gave me time to brace myself against the horrifying beauty of him. It was a beauty humans were never meant to behold. We didn’t have the presence of mind to witness it. I had a feeling it was the same with Raphael and the other seraphim. The only difference was that Lucifer made no concessions in order to ease the humans around him.
“Alessia.”
I
