Her Angel: Eternal Warriors Complete Series Box Set

by Heaton, Felicity

  The dragon gave a frustrated shriek and charged.

  Asmodeus picked himself up, beat his wings and ran up the curved wall. The dragon shifted course, coming for him, tracking his movements. He reached as far as he could run without flying, pushed off from the wall and flipped backwards. He spread his wings above the dragon’s head and roared as he sent one blade away and clutched the other with both hands, bringing it down hard and pointed straight at his target between the dragon’s horns.

  It snarled and rose onto its hind legs, and Asmodeus growled as he overshot, ending up right in front of the dragon’s head.

  The dragon snapped at him, huge jaws coming close to claiming their prize. Liora’s pentagram might protect him from injury but he wasn’t sure whether it protected from death, and he was certain that being eaten whole by a dragon would result in that.

  The beast’s fangs caught his left wing and sent him spinning out of control. Asmodeus focused on his shadows, calling them to him, gathering them around him and twisting to face the dragon at the same time. He threw his hand towards it, sending the shadows streaming at the dragon, and then quickly cast a portal behind him and fell into it.

  He came out above the dragon again and grinned as it swiped at the shadows, trying to clear them from its head so it could see where he had gone.

  Asmodeus called his other blade to him, crossed them and snarled as he unleashed their power on the dragon. A shaft of red light shot down, blazing so brightly it almost blinded him. The dragon lumbered right, still swiping at the shadows mercilessly attacking it. Asmodeus huffed as the light tore through the dragon’s left wing rather than its neck and cracked the ground, sending lava spewing upwards like a fountain.

  The black dragon shrieked and lashed out blindly with its tail. Asmodeus beat his wings hard, trying to rise above the deadly obsidian barb on the end that was bigger than he was. It caught him across his shin, cutting into his gold-edged black greave but not his flesh beneath. One of the hooked spikes of the barb wedged into the metal and Asmodeus cried out as the dragon brought its tail down, dragging him with it. He tried to get his armour free but the ground came at him too quickly and he grunted as he hit it hard enough to fracture the pavement.

  His ears rang. Not good.

  He shook his head to stop it from spinning and then yelled as the dragon moved its tail again, pulling him back up into the air, leaving him dangling upside down.

  Cursed beast.

  It turned on him and growled, smoke curling from the nostrils in its beak and its red eyes glittering with victory.

  Asmodeus stared death in the face.

  He looked up at his snagged leg.

  He really did hate losing pieces of his armour but desperate times meant desperate measures.

  He just hoped that he couldn’t injure himself while wearing Liora’s pentagram.

  The dragon’s clawed right front paw shot towards him.

  Asmodeus cried out and swung his blade at his own leg. It hit hard, easily cutting through the leather straps holding his greave in place, and he grimaced, expecting it to slice into his leg too. It didn’t. His leg came free of his armour and he dropped.

  Hard.

  The dragon’s paw shifted course, lowering to meet him. Asmodeus struggled to press his two blades together in front of him and focused everything he had on them. They glowed bright gold and red light blasted from where they crossed, shooting straight towards the dragon’s paw.

  It bellowed as the fiery light struck it, incinerating its claws, turning them into ash.

  The beast lashed out with its tail, slamming it hard into the pavement below him. Asmodeus’s greave came loose from the barbs and skittered across the black slabs.

  Asmodeus hit the ground at an awkward angle, rolled and was on his feet a heartbeat later, racing towards the castle. He snagged his fallen greave on the way past and used a mental command to send it back to his castle in the wasteland. He didn’t have time to repair it now.

  The dragon beat its wings and came up beside him. Asmodeus sent another blast of light towards it. The beast rose above it and the beam hit the wall, blasting a huge hole in it and sending everything above it crashing down. He unleashed another beam at the dragon and it ducked, spiralling downwards. The light struck the spires of black rock nearest the right side of the fortress and clipped one of the towers. It crumbled and collapsed, sending a plume of black ash into the air.

  His heart stopped.

  The dragon landed between him and the fortress, its red eyes gleaming with victory again.

  Bastard.

  Asmodeus couldn’t risk unleashing the power of his swords on the dragon while it stood between him and the fortress. Liora was in there. Even if the dragon failed to dodge the blast, it would cut straight through it into the building, destroying both of them.

  He sent one of his blades away and curled his hand around the pentagram, searching for Liora, desperate to feel her and know she was still safe.

  The dragon reared up, red shimmering across its scales. It was charging up, preparing to bake the entire courtyard with the inferno it held within. He couldn’t let that happen.

  Asmodeus furled his wings against his back and closed his eyes, drawing on all of his strength, channelling it into the shadows regrouping around his feet. Shadows that came from the Devil’s blood in his veins. Darkness incarnate.

  They would swallow the dragon whole given the chance.

  He coaxed them, drawing them up to his hands, so they floated and danced around his clawed fingers and settled into his skin, rendering it black. The darkness flowed up his arms, cold and numbing, increasing his strength as it joined with him.

  His blade turned black.

  The gold on the remaining pieces of his armour melted into pure obsidian and then blazed purple.

  The black feathers of his wings gained a violet shimmer.

  Asmodeus embraced the darkness within him, pushing out the good, expelling it. It was the only way to stop the dragon. It was the only way to save Liora.

  Good was his weakness.

  Evil was his strength.

  His black hair fluttered and shifted backwards, and black horns curled from behind his ears.

  He opened his eyes, fixing his swirling purple gaze on the dragon, and bared his fangs as his teeth all sharpened and the darkness reached his chest and exploded outwards, turning all of his skin into the colour of the night.

  The dragon hesitated.

  Asmodeus couldn’t blame it.

  None saw the King of Demons in his true form and lived to tell others of his appearance.

  Liora’s pentagram burned into his chest and he growled as the power in it tried to repel him.

  He called his other black blade, pressed his bare foot into the ground, and kicked off. He shot through the air towards the dragon and it threw its head back and unleashed hell on him. Fire as hot as the sun rocketed towards him.

  Asmodeus grinned, pinned his wings back and locked his blades together before him, not slowing his ascent.

  The inferno struck his black blades and they blazed violet. The fire bent around him, singeing his wings, and he endured it, gritting his teeth and growling as he thrust forwards. He burst through the other side and stared into the dragon’s huge red eyes.

  It lunged for him with its teeth.

  Asmodeus launched the blade in his left hand, sending it spinning rapidly towards the dragon’s neck. The beast reared back and shrieked as the black sword lodged deep between two of the thick bands of armour around the front of its throat.

  Asmodeus’s grin widened. He laughed as his boots hit the dragon’s neck, he caught the blade and ran right, dragging it behind him, slicing across its throat. It desperately slashed at him and he swung his other blade, severing one of its claws, and then hacked at its throat. Black blood and red fire flowed from the ragged cuts, and the dragon lumbered forwards, trying to shake him. He dug his other black blade into the back of its neck and held on to it, ridi
ng each attempt to remove him.

  He stabbed and slashed with his other blade, cutting through meat and bone, grinning the whole time as the beast began to weaken. Pathetic creature. It crashed into the ground and Asmodeus pulled his other blade out, brought them both back above his head and roared as he swung them down with all of his strength.

  They sliced straight through the dragon’s neck. Its head rolled across the courtyard and its body lurched, convulsing violently, its wings flapping. Blood and molten fire pumped from the ragged end of its neck, melting the black pavement beneath the dragon.

  The dragon’s body stumbled and crashed into the ground.

  Asmodeus straightened to his full height on its shoulders and smiled as the dragon stilled.

  Victory to the King of Demons.

  He had told Liora that a dragon was no match for him.

  The doors in the fortress behind him creaked open.

  Asmodeus huffed as he sensed his master’s gaze on him, feeling the full depth of his fury, and slowly turned to face him.

  Standing on the dragon’s corpse, he towered above the Devil, and for the first time in his life, his master had to look up at him.

  Asmodeus grinned.

  “Give her to me.” He sent one sword away and held his black clawed hand out to the Devil. “You have what is mine.”

  “No, Asmodeus.” The Devil rolled the sleeves of his black shirt down and buttoned them. “I cannot hand her over to you. She is safe. There is no need for us to quarrel.”

  “You speak so because you fear I will slay you as I slayed your dragon.” Asmodeus beat his aching black wings and furled them against his back. He could feel cuts on his body. Wounds. It seemed Liora’s pentagram refused to protect him when he was in this form.

  The Devil flicked him a bored look. “I admit, I was surprised to discover this power in you… my power. It will not change anything, Asmodeus. Leave.”

  He felt the familiar tug behind his breastbone and growled. “No. I will not heed your commands. Give me Liora.”

  “Again… I cannot hand her over to you. She is safe and that is all you need to know.”

  “I want her back.” The shadows slipped from his fingers, draining down from his chest to curl around them, eager for blood. He would give it to them if the Devil thought to keep refusing him. “She belongs to me. I demand to see her.”

  He needed to see her. His life and his sanity depended upon it. If he didn’t see her in the next five minutes, he was going to go out of his mind and wreak havoc upon this entire realm until the Devil gave him what he wanted.

  Liora.

  “I cannot allow that.” The Devil calmly moved forwards, to the edge of the curved steps. He frowned down at the courtyard as it bubbled and hissed, little more than a lake of lava and dragon’s blood, and curled his lip. The fury Asmodeus could sense in him grew and shadows fluttered around the Devil’s shoulders.

  Asmodeus growled and tipped his chin up, the darkness flowing around his claws growing agitated, striking at the air in the Devil’s direction.

  “Give her to me,” Asmodeus snarled and the pentagram burned him again, blistering his black flesh. It despised the evil in him. He could feel it. It wanted to be away from him and would burn through his body to achieve it. “I will not ask you again.”

  The Devil’s eyes flashed red. “And I will not tell you again. She is safe with me.”

  “Let me see her.”

  “No.”

  He growled in frustration. “Why not? Why have you taken her from me?”

  “It is for the good of the world, Asmodeus. I cannot let you have her. She is dangerous in your hands.”

  “She belongs in these hands.” He held them out to the Devil and then frowned at them, seeing what they had become.

  Black.

  Clawed.

  Evil.

  He flexed his fingers and curled them into fists. Liora would hate to see him as he was now. She wouldn’t want to be in these arms that longed to hold her close to him, to shield her from the violence of the three realms and keep her safe.

  She would see him as a monster.

  Pure evil.

  A true king of demons.

  Just like his master.

  The Devil straightened and tipped his chin up, holding Asmodeus’s gaze. The shadows fluttering around his master’s shoulders spread and grew, until they streamed from the back of his black shirt and flickered over his hands. Darkness shifted beneath his skin and his red eyes bore into Asmodeus, challenging him as his power flowed over him, pressing down despite the magnitude of Asmodeus’s own power.

  “I warn you… do not try to reach her, Asmodeus. Do not be a fool. I swear she is safe, unharmed, and she will remain that way. I do this for the good of the world.”

  “Good?” Asmodeus readied his blades and flashed his fangs. “You know nothing of good. What you do is evil… you seek to separate us… you seek to keep my Liora from me and I will not allow it. She is mine!”

  The Devil’s eyes blazed crimson and he growled, revealing his own vicious fangs.

  “Try, Maggot. Only I can access the place where she resides and any who attempt to reach it will die.”

  His master cast his left hand out and Asmodeus roared at him as black tendrils shot around him, snaring his wrists and throat, choking him.

  “For the good of the three realms, Asmodeus, do not be a fool.”

  Darkness swallowed him and then black slammed into him. He pressed his hands against the charred slabs, pushed himself onto his knees, and threw his head back and roared at the cavernous ceiling of Hell and the ruined castle before him.

  His master would pay for daring to send him here, back to a place that only worsened his pain, heightening it until it ate away at him.

  He lumbered onto his feet and breathed hard, trying to rein his anger in and subdue the darkness. The shadows slipped from his skin and his armour, and his horns shrank back into his head.

  He had to look normal. He couldn’t let them see him like this.

  He couldn’t let them see what was going to happen before it was too late.

  He clutched the pentagram around his neck and grinned.

  He needed to borrow something from his twin.

  He needed to locate Liora within the fortress.

  He needed a witch.

  CHAPTER 22

  Apollyon was growing tired of Asmodeus’s behaviour. He checked his swords over and sheathed them at his waist, settling the curved golden blades against the pointed strips of armour that protected his hips. Everyone else on the island had already armoured up and were ready to leave as soon as he had retrieved Serenity from the other side of the island. She was trying to communicate with the idiot’s two hellhounds, hoping to discover what he had told them about his plans, if anything.

  He looked around him at the others, glad that they had agreed to come with him to Hell in search of Liora and Asmodeus. God only knew his twin didn’t deserve their help after heading off alone like that, leaving Erin with his rabid dogs.

  Erin paced near the fire, muttering dark things beneath her breath. The Devil had refused to respond when she had opened a line of communication with him and demanded to know whether he had sent his Hell’s angels to snatch Liora, breaking the tentative truce between them. Since then, she had been detailing all the ways she was going to rip into her father and make him pay.

  Veiron remained close to her, barely holding on to his more angelic form. Darkness ruled around his red eyes though, a warning that he could turn demonic at any moment. His gaze followed his female and from time to time he reached out and she would touch his hand as she passed. The act seemed to ground Erin, causing the shadows that constantly flickered around her hands to abate for a few minutes.

  Amelia and Marcus were deep in conversation, strategizing and discussing how they were going to keep Erin from launching a dark unholy war on her father. She was in no state to fight, not without harming the baby. Everyone had silently
agreed on that, exchanging looks that had created a pact. No matter what went down when they were in Hell, Erin was going to be surrounded at all times, held back from the fight and safe from danger. She would hate them for it, but she wasn’t thinking straight. She was angry and wanted the Devil to pay, and everyone here knew where that would lead.

  They were in no position to declare war on the Devil.

  At least not while he had Liora.

  Apollyon looked at the endless blue sky, charting the position of the sun. It had been hours since Asmodeus had gone off on a suicide mission. In a handful of minutes, he and the others would do the same, throwing themselves into Hell in order to take Liora back from the Devil.

  How many times had he told Asmodeus to guard Liora more carefully, ensuring she was safe? The fool had let her go off alone and something had snatched her. He would be having words with the idiot when he reached him in Hell.

  As soon as Serenity returned.

  What was taking her so long?

  Erin cast him a glance and then lingered, frowning at him. She ground to a halt on the white sand and brushed her jaw-length black hair back from her face.

  “Holy fuck.” Her amber eyes shot wide. “How long have the puppies been gone?”

  “What do you mean?” Apollyon turned and stalked towards her. “The hellhounds are gone?”

  She nodded. “I could feel them a minute ago… and now I can’t. Veiron?”

  The tall scarlet-haired Hell’s angel shrugged his crimson wings. “Nope. You’re right. They’ve popped off my radar. I could sort of sense them before.”

  “Serenity,” Apollyon breathed and turned his focus to her, seeking her.

  Normally there was a connection between them, a link between him and the witch who was his master. Now, there was nothing. He pressed his hands to his chest and closed his eyes, focusing harder and searching for her. A familiar tug behind his gold-edged black breastplate pulled him downwards, towards the sand.

  Towards Hell.

  Apollyon growled. “Asmodeus.”