“How long?” Dervish screams again, blood flowing from a chunk that’s been bitten out of the left side of his chest—I see snapped white bones poking through the streams of red.
“Maybe a minute,” I gasp, hands blurring.
I glance around as I’m putting the window together. Grubbs is back on his feet, supported by his retinue of werewolves, who’ve torn into the demons around him, attacking rabidly, tearing strips out of their foes. Bec is still fighting with the winged demon and has forced it towards the ground. Meera’s close by, doggedly working her way back to us. Her left arm’s been severed at the shoulder. Half her face is a clawed-up, blood-soaked mess—her beauty’s been spoiled forever. But more worrying than that are the guts dangling from a hole in her stomach, and the small demon wrapped around her waist, tugging at the intestines, reeling them out like a cat unraveling a ball of string.
“Meera!” I scream, desperate to help but needing to stay focused on the window. It’s our only hope of escape. If I abandon it, we’re all doomed.
Dervish has spotted Meera too. He begins to dart to her rescue, then swears and drives back a multi-eyed monster that was about to snap off my hands. He has to stand guard. I can’t protect myself while I’m working on the window. He’s tied to his post, as I am. He weeps with frustration as he fights off the hordes clustered around us, muttering Meera’s name over and over.
The demon working on Meera’s guts stick its head into the hole in her stomach. It’s giggling sickeningly, like a child tucking into a box of treats. But then its head explodes and it topples to the ground. A figure breaks through the demons around Meera and hauls her forward, towards us. I think my eyes are playing tricks, but when I blink and see the same thing, I realize I’m not dreaming.
Kirilli Kovacs is plowing through the ranks of demons. One of his hands has turned into a steel scythe and he’s mowing down all who come too close. He’s the one who rescued Meera.
“Kovacs, you lunatic!” Dervish yells with delight. “You’re supposed to be a coward!”
“I am!” Kirilli screeches.
“Then what the hell are you doing?”
“I don’t know! I think I’m saving the day! It feels—”
A demon sweeps Kirilli’s legs from under him. He flies into the air with a yelp, then is knocked sideways by a bellowing, half-human beast intent on getting her hands on us before any of the others finish us off. Juni Swan is back in the thick of the action.
She angles for Dervish, dripping flesh as she charges, swiping demons out of her way, teeth bared, eyes rolling madly. With a welcoming grunt, Dervish sets his feet firmly and snarls, losing interest in all the other monsters, forgetting his duty to protect me. As Juni rushes him, he grabs hold of her arms and swings her around like an adult whirling a baby. Juni spits acid into his face. He neutralizes it swiftly but not before a wide swathe of his flesh bubbles away. The pair fall to the ground, wrestling savagely, stabbing, biting, punching, and spitting, each hellbent on murdering the other.
The window’s almost fully formed, but there’s no one to watch my back now. Several hound-like demons press tight around me, snapping at my face, digging channels in my flesh with their jagged claws. “Grubbs! Bec!” I scream, turning from the window to drive back the demons. “I need help!”
Grubbs roars at his werewolves. Slipping free of the giants, they struggle towards me, blasting and chewing a path through the packed ranks of monsters.
In the air, Bec’s seen off the challenge of the winged demon, but Lord Loss has hit the scene. The pair tumble and roll around overhead. Half his arms are holding her rigidly against his rancid flesh. The other half are lashing her, pulling her hair, trying to gouge out her eyes, digging into her soft flesh.
Meera’s in bad shape, but she shoves fistfuls of guts back into the hole in her stomach and dives to Dervish’s rescue, pulls Juni Swan off of him, and scratches at the traitor’s eyes. Juni screeches and tries to knock her away but Meera’s stronger than she looks, and she loves Dervish as much as Juni hates him. Grabbing hold of Juni’s bloated, rotten head, she jerks her hard and they spin away. Dervish tries to follow but gets tangled up with another demon.
Grubbs and the few surviving werewolves make it to my side. They’re all badly wounded but they fight as viciously as ever. As they form a half-wall around me, Grubbs yells at me to finish the window and I hurry to obey. The fingers of my left hand have been crushed but I can still manipulate the patches. Sobbing with pain and fear, I slot one after another into place, praying for the lights to gel and the window to open before it’s too late.
Juni’s laughing. She’s got both hands inside the hole in Meera’s stomach and is forcing them up through the layers of guts that still remain, seeking to crush lungs, the heart… whatever she can find.
“Meera!” Dervish howls, trying to force his way through to her but failing.
Meera smiles painfully. She’s got her arms wrapped around Juni, holding tight. As Juni tears at Meera’s insides, the Disciple catches our gaze and winks wearily. “No… Shadow,” she wheezes.
“What’s that?” Juni roars.
“No… Shadow,” Meera repeats. “When I die… I’m finished… and so… are you.”
Juni’s face freezes. She catches on to Meera’s plan a second too late. Her eyes widen with alarm as she tries to detach herself and dart to safety. But before she can, Meera explodes. She must have been working on the ball of energy since she realized she was beyond help. It bursts from her in a blazing flash of light, shatters her bones, incinerates her flesh—and rips through the mutated, twisted form that Juni built for herself when Death restored her soul to life.
Juni’s final howl is lost in the noise of the explosion. She’s torn to shreds along with Meera, and both women fall to the ground in ragged, bloody, lifeless chunks, their souls freed or lost, however you choose to look at it. Meera has gone to the great beyond, which is a sickening blow. But I experience a burst of joy as well as sorrow, because Juni Swan has perished too, and this time no power in the universe can bring the vindictive harpy back. We’re rid of her at last!
CASUALTIES OF WAR
It sounds like the entire universe is screaming. Dervish and Grubbs wail for Meera. In the air, Lord Loss bellows Juni’s name and reaches out to her with a couple of his arms, offering Bec a brief respite. The demon hordes screech with delight, the scent of human death like a red rag to a bull. They press even tighter around us, each wanting to be next to claim a soul.
I drown out the screams and focus on the window. It’s all that matters now. We have seconds to get the hell out of here, or we’ll wind up like Meera. No time for misery or joy. Just focus, work fast, and pray.
A werewolf is slaughtered and collides with me as it thrashes in its death throes, opening a new, deep cut down the side of my head, just behind my left ear. I shrug it off and concentrate.
Kirilli leaps high into the air, raining handfuls of bones down upon the demons. He must have picked them up from the floor of the battlefield. They strike like shrapnel, blinding, wounding, killing. He roars with delight— then shrieks as a demon’s jaws flash and his right foot is bitten off at the ankle. Kirilli collapses. His foot drops on top of me and I head it away like a football, never pausing, right hand moving mechanically, fending off demons with my damaged left hand.
Grubbs head-butts a demon and smashes its skull to pieces. His forehead comes out drenched in brains and foul-smelling fluid. Extending his tongue, he licks his eyes clean and fights on, laughing through his tears.
Lord Loss and Bec crash to earth, then rise again. They’re still struggling with each other, but he doesn’t seem to be inflicting as much damage. His hands move lazily, more like they’re caressing Bec than savaging her. And she doesn’t react as violently as before. She wriggles less frantically in his embrace, almost as if…
Before I can complete the thought, a window of pale blue light blinks into existence. I stare at it stupidly. Then exhilaration sweeps through me and I yell at the top of my voice.
The Demonata scream hatefully and lash at us frantically. The smarter beasts try to crowd around the window, to block our path, but they’re hampered by the mass of demons. There are too many of the monsters. They get in one another’s way.
Kirilli hops to the window, grabs Dervish’s right arm—he’s still staring at the spot where Meera fell—and
