Better off Dead Book Four

by Odette C. Bell

  He smashed through another one. But while he was punching it, a large chunk fell from the ceiling and dashed across his back.

  He grunted. He broke through it. He spun just in time to punch one that had been heading for his shoulder.

  But he couldn’t fight on all fronts at once.

  The more magic he used, the more he was attacked.

  I watched as he went to jerk a hand back into his sleeve to grab out another one of those syringes. I could see it glinting there. But he never got the chance.

  He fought with the one thing he couldn’t afford to fight with, and it sank him. Literally. The floor below him began to liquefy. It vibrated as the ore within danced and shook at the proximity of his force. As he began to disappear through it, more and more magical stones struck him from above.

  I had a chance to stare into his eyes. He thrust a hand toward me, but before he could try to kill me one last time, the magical ore killed him instead. A massive chunk fell down from the ceiling and dashed into his head.

  He didn’t have a chance.

  He died. Long before I could see his body, he was absorbed right through the floor.

  I remained exactly where I was. I didn’t move a centimeter. It wasn’t because I was so shocked by what I’d seen. It was because I had to control my damn breath lest a little magic escape me. The magical ore was now so primed, it would react to even the smallest display. I remained exactly like that until it finally calmed down and the floor and ceiling stopped shaking.

  As slowly as I could, I pushed to my feet.

  I checked my neck. I thought I had imprints from his fingers around my throat, but they weren’t enough to do any damage.

  I... had two lives left.

  Though the Banished’s presence had increased in the room, now there was no one left to kill me, it was sinking away once more. I considered it for a few seconds before I turned around and threw myself away.

  The Banished was cold. I shouldn’t have to tell you that. I shouldn’t have to remind you that it was completely at odds with everything that it was to be alive. While life seemed to move forever, engaged in this never-ending dance, the Banished was like inertia. I could feel how stifling it was as it slipped away. If it spilled into this realm, there would be no heat, no light, no movement. All there would be was this still, stifling chaos. If you thought chaos would be completely at odds with the capacity to move, then your imagination wasn’t large enough.

  If there was one thing the last week had taught me, it was to have a vivid, violent imagination when the end of the world was involved.

  I didn’t even dare glance down at my watch. The countdown it gave would be irrelevant now, anyway. I had been killed three times. I had two lives left. That energy would’ve filled Hilliker. For all I knew, he could be on his way right now.

  There would’ve been a time when such a promise would’ve stopped me. There would’ve been a time when I would’ve just given up. But I knew that was the one thing I could not do. As I clutched my cross, I kept trying to listen for Sonos’s voice. I didn’t know if I’d really heard it. And to be honest, that didn’t matter. The fact of the matter was that searching for it and having a hope that he was alive was keeping me alive at the same time.

  “Sonos? Sonos?” I began to call in a frightened, shaking voice I could barely push from my lips. “Sonos, just hold on. I’ll find you.”

  I didn’t care that I was now using my voice and was probably drawing more of Hilliker’s men to me. If I held onto my cross and I held onto Sonos, they wouldn’t be able to kill me. I promised myself that, repeating it over and over again until it was more than a mantra – until it was my entire world.

  Predictably, I did come across more of Sonos’s priests. None of them were as powerful as the last guy. One or two of them did try to attack me, but I just took it. I let their every attack sink home, and I never replied with one of my own. It turned out to be the best possible policy, because this mine was so full of magical ore, any idiot stupid enough to use magic was soon completely consumed.

  “Sonos, please. I know you’re out there. I know you didn’t want me to come find you. But I’m here. Please.”

  I did nothing to stem the tears that continued to rain down my cheeks. There was practically a monsoon of them.

  As they continued to pour out of me, I staggered along.

  The more time passed where I could not find him, the harder it became to hold on to my hope. But that was the last thing I could give up. Even... even if I could never find Sonos, I would not be able to relinquish hope in him. Because the second I did, would be the second the Banished would flood in.

  I... if I really pried into my mind, I could understand the pure irony of that. This wasn’t hope. Surely this was irrational wishful thinking?

  Hope is all very good, but unless it is tempered by reality, it is nothing but fantasy.

  Yet I had to wrap myself up in that fantasy right now, because the second I dropped it would be the second I died.

  Tears continued to stream down my cheeks. I didn’t think I had cried more in my entire life. If someone had been catching all of these tears, they would’ve been able to replenish an ocean.

  “Sonos, please.” Those words had a chance to escape my mouth, then I turned around a corner.

  I faced a cavern. On the other side was a wall and a small lip of rock that led around it. There was a deep pit between me and it, and it was completely impossible to pass. It was massive. It didn’t have a bottom. I was confident in concluding that, not just because I couldn’t see one, but because of the endless sense I felt as I stood on the edge of it. My eyes widened, even in the darkness, and I peered down into its murky depths as my heart bottomed out.

  I jerked my head up, and I stared across to what I could see on the opposite wall. “Sonos, I know—” I stopped.

  My hand tightened around my cross. I thought I could see something tied up on the wall halfway up toward the ceiling.

  It was too dark for me to get a good look at it. I could use magic, but this entire area was completely filled with ore. Hell, there was a massive chunk right underneath my feet.

  I could hear footfall behind me. The priests were coming to get me.

  I peered and peered through the darkness with all my strength. I kept my hand around my cross, squeezing it so tightly, I could’ve melted the metal. Finally I saw what was really there. It was Sonos. He was chained to the wall, his arms open, his legs spread, his head tied down to his chest.

  “Sonos,” I shrieked, giving the cry everything I had.

  I thought I heard the rattle of a chain. “Eve. You shouldn’t have come here.”

  I took a jolting step forward, but there was nowhere to go. My feet pressed over the lip of rock that led down to that impossible, never-ending pit. “Sonos. There has to be some way to get you down from there. Just tell me what it is. I’ll do anything—”

  “If you will do anything, get out of here. Use the last of your magic to run.”

  “Anything but that,” I said in a tortured whisper.

  That footfall was getting faster. As it rushed up from behind me, I knew that there would be more of the strong priests. I wondered how long my hope would last. Surely if they all gathered around me and wrapped their hands around my throat, there would be an end to the power wishing had given me?

  “Sonos, I can’t do this without you.”

  “And you cannot help me escape. Leave – leave while you still can. Buy everyone a chance. Don’t waste it on me.”

  “It’s not a waste,” I screamed. “Lilly told me I need you. When they take away one more of my lives, it’ll be it. I will be on my last life. The only way I’ll be able to fight them is through hope. She told me I need you for that.” I was pouring my heart out to Sonos. There would’ve been a time, not long ago, when that would never have happened. I had always been the strong one. I’d always been the one who’d laughed at her emotions. Now they owned me. As they swelled through my hear
t, as chaotic as a tornado, all I could do was hold on. “Please, Sonos, there has to be some way—”

  “You only have two lives left?” he whispered, true regret echoing through his voice.

  I closed my eyes and squeezed them shut as a few tears trailed down my cheeks. “Yes. I couldn’t stop them from taking the others. It doesn’t matter. I believe Lilly now. I have to get back down to my last life—”

  “Leave,” he commanded, his voice arcing up high. “Get out of here while you still—”

  If he’d been about to say get out of here while I still had the chance, there was no damn point, because a blast of magic suddenly sailed into the rock beside me. I screamed and ducked to the side as stone shards blasted up around me like a halo.

  Twisting my head over my shoulder, it was to the sight of priests spilling over the small section of floor I was on. There were only 10 meters between them and me.

  I instinctively staggered back, but that just brought me over the pit.

  “Eve, get out of here. Get out of here,” Sonos roared.

  There was nowhere to go.

  The priests walked toward me casually. None of them were showing their faces. They wore their hoods. They covered everything but their sardonic smiles. As they curled up, cruelty infused them like someone injecting nuclear fuel into flesh.

  “Get out of here, Eve,” Sonos screamed with all his might. His voice picked up and shook through the room. It didn’t matter. He could do nothing.

  As I staggered back, I clutched my cross, turned over my shoulder, and stared at him. Even though I could only just see him, I hoped he could see my expression in full. I was sorry I couldn’t save him. Sorry I couldn’t save the world. Sorry I couldn’t save anyone.

  I closed my eyes.

  “Get out of here, Eve. There’s no hope,” Sonos said.

  The priests were right on top of me now. All I should’ve been doing was screaming, but I opened my eyes. I stared right at them then turned over my shoulder and stared at Sonos. “There’s always hope.”

  Chapter 10

  For there always to be hope, there has to be a chance. Anyone who’d had enough experience with magic would know that was not the case. When you were fighting somebody more powerful than yourself, they held all the cards, not you. The chances were theirs, not yours. And when you were fighting someone exceptionally more powerful than yourself, the equation only shifted more in their favor.

  If anything, hope was a blind misunderstanding of facts and probability. It was an ignorance you held onto when you were cold in the hope that it could warm you – a rope you desperately clutched at in a blinding blizzard when you could not see a way to safety, despite the fact it was tied to nothing.

  But I still held onto it. I still believed – even in my final frigging moment.

  The crowd parted, and I watched a priest tall and clearly more powerful than the rest stride toward me. He was in purple robes. They were trimmed with real gold.

  Magic blasted off his skin. It rose high like flames then crackled down. It danced around his form, dense and powerful. It seemed to be fundamental, too. It was as if he had tapped into some basic force in reality. One that he would be able to exploit forever while I withered away in his mere presence.

  If I hoped the ore would help me, I was fresh out of luck. It didn’t react to him.

  “No, Eve,” Sonos screamed. I heard this rattling as he fought against his chains. It didn’t sound like he would ever break them, but he didn’t stop fighting.

  And wasn’t that hope?

  Wasn’t it hope when I managed to stare up into the eyes of that priest, even as he wrapped his hands around my throat? Wasn’t it hope even as I watched the other priests in the room remove green syringes from their sleeves and inject themselves? Wasn’t it hope even as I stood there and stared at the inevitable as it lined up to kill me? Wasn’t it hope even as I closed my eyes and got ready to hold on to the sound of Sonos’s voice?

  Yeah, it was.

  “Eve,” Sonos cried.

  His voice shook with this power I’d never heard before. It wasn’t a force I was used to. It wasn’t like it was some mandala or a Santini charm or an angel spell. It wasn’t something tangible I had any experience with. But its intangibility was its point. I could not predict what it would do.

  Sonos was no ordinary denizen of Hell. He was the Seventh General of the Damned. The only person more powerful than him was the Devil. He was very much meant to be Hilliker’s match. It didn’t matter that these priests were calling on the power of the Banished. It was irrelevant that Hilliker had managed to illegally gather together the forces of the church to feed them. It was frigging non-consequential that they were all jacked up on those green syringes. Sonos was the Seventh damn General of the Damned.

  There was meant to be no one like him.

  Yeah. He’d been beaten. He’d been bruised and bloodied. He’d been tied to a wall. His magic had been broken from him when I’d destroyed that snow globe. He had undergone attack after attack. But he was still the Seventh General of Hell.

  It’s easy enough to hope when you hold all the cards. It’s even easier when your enemy is weak. It is hard as hell when you face and opposition more powerful than you. They will make you question the one thing you can never assail – your own strength.

  I had been questioning Sonos’s power from the beginning. As I’d seen him weaken, I’d concluded there was nothing he could do. But what if, in doing that, I’d robbed him of the one thing most important?

  My hope. Yeah, I got that that was arrogant. Despite our history, Sonos was his own person. His strength was not somehow dependent on how much or how little I believed in him. But right now, I had to rewrite the rules. The only strength I had left was hope. And I would use it.

  I managed a smile, even as Sonos’s scream split through the air. I managed to keep that smile on my mouth even as that massive priest wrapped his hands around my throat and began to chant. That smile stayed on my lips even as dark energy swirled around my legs and rose up my body like choking vines.

  Sonos could do this. Sonos could do anything.

  Sonos screamed. There was anger, there was fear – but there was power. This power that shook right down to some point I’d never traveled to and never even imagined. It was a point these priests could not travel too, either, because there was nothing they could do even as the floor shook violently.

  I finally heard a crack. It was the chains holding Sonos in place.

  He shot forward. I could only see him out of the corner of my eye, but that was enough. His black wings unfurled. Did it matter that they weren’t complete? That there were holes in them? That the lace-like spiderwebs substance looked as if someone had been plucking away at it with a knife? No. None of that counted. The only thing that mattered was that Sonos was finally remembering he was powerful.

  The massive priest who was holding me jerked to the side. His eyes widened so much, it looked as if they would swallow the entire cavern. While he didn’t move away from me and continued to try to snap my throat, the other priests tried to perform a protective chant in front of him. They looped their hands together in snapped movements before Sonos could fly across the distance separating them. But even as they began to chant, I heard the voices wavering in total gut-wrenching fear.

  I could still only see Sonos out of the corner of my eye. I couldn’t turn my head. The major priest would not permit me. I saw desperation building within him. It shook his fingers and made his hands slick with sweat. He tightened them around my throat. When that didn’t work, he started to chant, the words low and truly desperate. They didn’t just shake through this cavern. I swore they were perfectly designed to blast through reality. But Sonos had other ideas.

  I kept hold of my cross throughout the entire ordeal. I couldn’t do it with my hand. Every time I went to clutch it, that priest just wrenched my hand back. While he couldn’t remove the cross from me, he could stop me from touching it. But I didn
’t need to grab it with my fingers. Even though I barely had any magic left on my second last life, I was finding it easier than ever to hold things with my mind. Which is what I did now. Simultaneously, I held both Sonos and that cross until it felt as if I was voluntarily embracing all the weight of the world at once.

  The priests chanted louder, but Sonos reached them. He didn’t pluck up his damnation sword from his subspace pocket. He simply launched forward, his whole body vibrating with anger and power. Hell flame was circling him. It arced up high. As it traveled around his form, he landed in front of the first priest. The poor guy didn’t have a chance. While his chaos flame tried to match Sonos’s hellfire, Sonos’s rage more than made up for the Banished’s force. The priest was thrust back. He was thrown to the side. His feet scrambled on the edge of the ledge, but he couldn’t pull himself up, and his buddies sure as hell didn’t offer him a hand. He fell down with an earsplitting scream that cut out half way through.

  Sonos launched himself at the other priests. Now he’d found an inroad to their line, he kept smashing it up. It didn’t matter how loudly they chanted and how much magic they let blast over themselves, Sonos was relentless. As he thrust forward again, he pushed one priest high into the air. Something happened to the poor bastard before he could fall back down. He was consumed by his own chaos flame. It ripped right through him as easily as someone placing a piece of paper in front of a raging bull.

  Meanwhile that priest continued to wrap his fingers harder and harder around my throat. I was just holding on. As he chanted, this pernicious black energy shifted out from him. It pulsed around my neck. It circled and circled and circled me, looking for a way in. It reminded me of the moment I’d seen my mother giving birth. For this energy was a lot like Hilliker’s gaze as he’d stared at her. In other words, it was the force of pure greed. An attitude that would rip right through any defense in its way to poison everything in its sights.

  Tears streamed down my cheeks, even though I wasn’t aware of them. Every time they splashed against the priest’s wrists, steam and this dark black smoke erupted out everywhere. They were cloying, and they would’ve choked me to death if I weren’t holding onto my cross with all my mind.