They followed a similar pattern repeatedly. Andrei struck and Astrid finished them off. There was a quiet symmetry in it that made me think they weren’t a lost cause.
All of that was shunted to the side when I heard a furious roar from farther afield. Charles was grappling with a malachim. When he was down, a dozen undead swarmed him. Without the demon blade, he had to rely on his as-yet-unascended magic and his fists. He was doing very well for himself until another malachim floated up and swiped its claws all the way through his chest.
It got halfway through before Max nabbed the malachim and yanked it away, allowing Charles a second to breathe and shake the undead off him. The world fell to pieces around me but all I could see was Max holding the malachim by the throat. His eyes were a tear-inducing white. I wasn’t quite sure what was happening, but the lion was no longer in control.
Max’s face contorted a second before he flexed his grip and snapped the malachim’s neck. A jerk with his other hand and he tore the malachim’s head right off its neck. In the second before the malachim was completely ripped apart, Max’s face softened into an expression of sorrow. Haniel grieved for his fallen friends.
Through the mating link, I felt Max’s understanding. Haniel had tried to reach out but the malachim was too far gone. Too twisted to be saved. The sorrow that sliced through me didn’t know where to go. On the one hand, the malachim were hurting the supernaturals. I sat shuddering as angel blades winked out one after another as their wielders died. On the other hand, the malachim were monstrous echoes of their true selves. It was a hard one to call.
On and on again, Max sliced through the ranks of the malachim. With Haniel’s presence inside him, he gave each malachim a second of mercy before breaking them apart. Every time he did it, a flash of regret stabbed him in the heart.
But he kept going.
As they all did. Fear was the only thing holding me together at this point. I felt ill sitting here protected while Harris and Jeremiah, Noah and Amy threw themselves at the undead, even though they were too well trained not to know the inevitable outcome of this fight. It didn’t hold them back one bit.
While adult mages were still feeling the effects of the soul bomb, the younger ones were substituting for them. Luther levitated in the air enclosed in a ball of fire that burned blue in the core and flickered out in licks of red and orange. He snapped his fingers and fire engulfed a group of undead. They screamed through broken and decomposed throats before crumbling to ash.
The first moment I got an inkling that something was wrong was when the goblin guard closest to me squeezed his puce buttcheeks tight. A murmur rippled through the battlefield. Standing to get a better look, my whole body locked. Beyond the buildings in the entertainment area, the spires of Seraphina rose into the air. To the left of that were a huddle of beautiful marble buildings surrounded by evergreen garden beds that were always blooming with spring flowers. Sanctuary.
That was where the sound was coming from. I raised myself on my toes but couldn’t see over much. “What’s going on?” Jacqueline shouted. The Nephilim were too far away but one of the winged para-humans took flight. He levitated above us. The longer he hung there, the more speckled with brown his mint-green skin became.
“The necromancers,” he said. “They’re gathered at the front of Sanctuary.”
“Why?” Basil asked.
Almost as if in response, the building exploded.
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Every Nephilim in sight teleported from the field of battle. They had been conditioned from birth to protect Sanctuary at all cost. Basil let forth with the string of curses.
Professor Mortimer turned to him. “You don’t think?”
Before Basil could voice the thing that was making my whole body wrack with fear, the flying para-human shouted. “Black light is coiling around the necromancers! They’re doing some sort of ritual and –”
His voice cut out as a wave of sinister magic ripped through Seraphina. I heard Astrid screaming so loudly it was like she was right beside my ear. The Nephilim that had been floating high up enough in the sky for me to view went crashing down to earth. All around us, every single one of the Nephilim lost consciousness.
All except Kai who was still groaning and snapping his teeth trying to get out of the hold of the magic circle.
All the other supernaturals raced forward. Max was a golden streak across the courtyard. He dove to catch Astrid. Other shifters changed and caught hold of more Nephilim. The Fae sprouted wings and held on to as many Nephilim as they could.
I ran behind all of them, too slow to help but unable to stop myself all the same.
“Why?” Professor McKenna asked. She was inspecting the field. “Why just the Nephilim?”
All bombs that had been set off thus far did not discern between the species. You would think that would have been a blessing, but the more she saw, the tighter her brow furrowed.
The first howl that went up was a warning. It cut out mid-way as though caught by surprise. Over the heads of all the supernaturals, I saw a figure throw off the rubble of Sanctuary and walk forward. Raphael.
For a second, my heart soared. And then I took in his less-than-graceful gait. His cloak that hung around him in tatters that didn’t move with an ethereal breeze. But worst of all, I saw his eyes that had always looked at me and been so soft and gentle. They were now soaked in the darkness of the Abyss. Apollyon.
The air was a taut bubble unable to burst. More than one howl became lodged in the throat of the shifters as they tried to make sense of what they were seeing. When three
