Uriel’s face was washed with rage and fear as he flew fast and hard over the arena, getting side-swiped by a demon being thrown through the air. Then Vladek spun me around and threw me over his shoulder.
“Kill that fucking archangel,” he barked at what appeared to be dozens of his men at his back, circling around us toward the arena like ants off a hill.
“No!” I screamed, realizing where he was headed in long strides.
He chuckled, slapping a clawed hand over the back of my thigh.
“Oh, baby.” His voice was guttural and monstrous. “I’ve missed that sound.”
“Please, Vladek. Don’t!” I begged like a crazy woman, knowing full well there was no way I could talk him out of this.
His hand slid up my thigh and grasped my ass, pinching his claws through my pants. “That’s right. Keep begging. You’ll be doing a lot of begging before the night is over.”
I screamed and scratched my nails across his bare back, sinking them into his skin. He hissed, but then let out a maniacal laugh that sounded so familiar, I choked on my own terror.
“My hellcat wants to play,” he growled, stalking faster down the dark corridor. “Perfect, baby. Because I want it rough tonight, too.”
“I don’t want you. I never wanted you. I fucking hate you!”
He just gripped me harder and laughed louder. “You’ll love me before it’s all over. When you learn who your master is again.”
Then he was in the narrowing, cold corridors close to the tower steps, marching away fast. Toward the Vorotnaya Tower. His bedchamber and his escape route. And my doom.
…
Uriel
My focus bled to a fine point on the archway where Vladek had disappeared with Nadya. While my brain checked out, my body took over, slicing through the horde of demon guards at the entrance. Vaguely aware of someone at my back fighting with me, I kept cutting through the fuckers blocking me from getting to her.
Fear had sunk deep down into my bones as I watched him carry her away. A primal instinct clicked, guiding my sword, releasing my power in bolts of electricity which sparked through the air and exploded on impact. A dozen demons squealed and blasted into embers.
The rain poured as I sliced through a red-eyed demon with black horns like his master, the ground turning to mud as we stomped and twisted in combat. The creature clawed across my bicep, but I felt nothing, my blood coursing with adrenaline and fury and fierce determination. Another rake of claws across my neck brought him close enough to clamp my hand over his skull and whisper, “Ad infernum.”
With a crackle of red flames, he vanished into dust, going to hell like I’d told him to.
Suddenly flanked by Xander and Carowyn who were demolishing the line in front of me, I clamored through, stomping on the face of a fallen demon who Carowyn had just kicked to the ground.
Finally in the corridor, I sprinted with harrowing dread squeezing my insides into dust. My boots echoed off the medieval stone walls as did those coming up behind me.
“Carowyn and I will take the lower levels,” said Xander, panting, “you keep going up.”
We’d mapped out the layout of the tower, knowing there were several landings and niches. Nadya had told us which one was his bedroom, but he could’ve had another escape route, an unwarded chamber, somewhere else in his tower. The problem was, if we didn’t stop him before he entered the tower, it was over. I’d never see her again if he was able to sift through the Void. No telling where he’d hide her. Somewhere I could never find her. A dark memory of George telling me about the black castle in hell where Vladek’s brother had taken Katherine and hidden her away for decades choked me with new fear.
“I’ll take the third level,” said Dommiel, suddenly right behind me on the other side.
I wished their presence could quell the fear that we weren’t going to make it. But it didn’t. He had her.
That fucker had her.
Then we were launching through the doorway into the tower. Carowyn and Xander broke off toward the small niches, while Dommiel and I continued on up the winding stone stairs. Dommiel fled down the corridor of the third floor, but I kept going toward the top, skipping three steps at a time, legs burning as I pushed myself to top speed.
If he harmed her in any way, I wasn’t sure I could come back from the brink. Madness already etched the edges of my mind, a black pall creeping forward, pushing me toward a chilling abyss. The cold seeped through me, solidifying with the marrow in my bones, hardening me into more than stone, into an unbreakable creature who sought justice for his beloved. Sought bloody, violent revenge for us both.
One thing I knew for certain: there was nothing on this earth, in heaven, or in hell that could stop me from crushing Vladek into nonexistence once I caught him. If I caught him.
…
Nadya
We were nearly to the bedchamber door. I’d kicked and clawed at his back all the way there, which had only made him laugh. But he’d shifted my body enough that I was higher up and could twist around. Right when he stepped onto the landing of his bedroom, I leveraged my torso up off his shoulder and grabbed hold of his devil’s horns, then twisted and slammed his head into the wall.
He growled and dropped me, reaching up to the blood dripping on his forehead. I didn’t even think, but scrambled down the steps, falling more than running. I’d rounded the first curve when he caught me by the arm and jerked me hard, nearly pulling my arm out of its socket. Grabbing me by the throat, he pressed me into the stairwell wall, pinning me with his body, my feet dangling off the ground. I thrashed at his arms, trying and failing to beat him off. He was far too strong. I closed my eyes, not wanting his face so close to mine, to be reminded of what he’d done to me. What he planned to do again. He let his hand slide up my neck where he cradled my jaw with a hand underneath and tilted my head up.
“Open your eyes and look at me, kroshka.” His voice was gravel-deep, scraping along my skin. He squeezed harder till I was afraid he’d break my jaw. “Open.”
So I did.
“There they are. Those pretty eyes.” He grinned. His eyes washed entirely with jet black. “Once the punishment is done, I’m going to make it all better, baby. I promise.”
I panted, gasping for air, mortal terror having stolen my breath. Even so, I wouldn’t let him win this time. Not without a fight.
“You won’t get it from me this time,” I spat out, anger pushing out the fear.
His mouth cracked into a tilted smile, his canines extending sharp and long. “What is it I won’t get from you?”
With my nails embedded in his wrist, I held his obsidian gaze. “My screams. My fear. My submission. None of it!”
He chuckled, the sound vibrating from his chest to mine where he pressed even closer. “Oh, I’m going to get it all. Every beautiful drop.”
Viper-swift, he bit my bottom lip, piercing one fang into the soft underside. But I didn’t make a whimper, even when I tasted the metallic tang of my own blood. He licked the spot before he pulled away on a deep groan. I hauled back as best I could and punched him across the cheek with the heel of my hand, knocking his face to the side.
He slowly turned toward me, hissing out a breath before licking his lips and the spot of my blood that was there.
“Fuck, baby.” He dropped me to the ground and lifted me with both arms around my waist. “This is going to be better than our first time.”
“No!” I struggled as he banged open the door with his boot and then froze.
Realizing someone was in the room behind us, I twisted my head around to see George and Kat standing there. Both armed and ready, blocking the entrance through the small sitting room to his bedroom and the locked and private door where his unwarded escape room was just beyond.
He dropped me in front of him, twisted me around to face them and locked one arm around m
y neck, the other pulling out the curved blade in a sheath hanging at his belt.
“Best move out of the way, hunter. I’m going to cut through you and your woman in five seconds.”
“Seems to me,” said George casually, angling his head and flashing a charming smile, “that if you believed you could truly do that then you’d have done it already.” He glanced at me before clenching his jaw. “I see. You’re afraid to damage your property.” Ice leaked into George’s voice. He sounded frighteningly like Uriel the first night he came to my cottage. “Why don’t you set Nadya aside and fight me man to man?”
“Or man to woman,” added Kat, sweeping her katana to the side with a sharp flick of her wrist. “More like scum-of-hell to woman, but I’m ready all the same.” She sliced her katana in front of her, demonstrating her lethal swiftness.
Vladek squeezed his arm tighter, my chin resting on top of the crease of his elbow. “I’m not letting her go. I’ll handle you both one-armed, and if she dies? Well then, she dies. Alive or dead, she’s mine.”
A streak of fury shot through George, the rage reddening his face. He clenched his jaw tight, taking a step closer. “Why are all demons such unbelievable bastards?”
Vladek shrugged the arm holding me by the throat. “Because we’re demons, asshole.”
He whipped out his sword and swung it high.
I’d only ever used my own magic for good, for healing, for helping others. Except that one time. Vladek had forced me to drink his cocktail of melted drakul and a drop of his own blood. He’d laughed at forcing evil into my body. It had stirred so much rage inside me that I’d slapped him across the face along with a blast of my magic. The welt it had raised wouldn’t heal for weeks. Every time I’d looked at it, even when he was doing heinous things to my body, I smiled.
I’d almost forgotten what I was capable of. Yes, he was more powerful, stronger than me. But I wasn’t powerless. I’d found a way and escaped him once. I’d found myself again. And I sure as hell wasn’t going to sit back and let him kill my friends and me in the process.
With a screech of fury, I flew my open palm over my head and hit him while punching the centuries’ old magic from my spirit into him. It was enough to jar him and loosen his hold on me. I started to struggle free then…
A sharp, fleshy crack then a spray of hot, black blood sprayed across my cheek as I pulled away. I gasped as Vladek’s arm with a black-clawed hand still clutching his blade thudded across the floor. He staggered, but not from shock. It was because someone was manhandling him from behind.
I leaped out of Vladek’s hold. Kat was there, pulling me free to the other side of the room. I spun around, holding onto Kat. Uriel gripped Vladek’s head between both his hands, Vladek on his knees, punching out uselessly with the one arm he had left.
Uriel’s entire body, his exposed skin, was wreathed in a white-gold aura. Not the pretty, heavenly kind, but a halo of burning flames, singeing from his fingertips straight into the demon lord in his clutches. Sulfuric smoke wisped up from Vladek’s head, his hate-filled eyes piercing Uriel, bleeding black blood. I couldn’t see Uriel’s eyes.
Then he spoke, his voice resonating with fearsome power, vibrating with the force of the avenging angel he was. “You might think that this pain is payback for what you did to me, for what you did to every innocent in your keep.”
Vladek’s face purpled over. He foamed at the mouth through clenched fangs. His one arm sagged at his side, twitching from whatever Uriel was doing to him.
“You’d be right about the pain. It is. But your death?” Uriel shook his head, a new vibration humming from him shaking the whole room. The rock walls trembled, loose stone falling from above. “It’s all for her.” The omnipotent power reverberating from his voice echoed straight through my body, like the tremors of an earthquake, rattling through bones. “You’ll feel this pain for the millennia your soul is rotting in Erebus. Remember me.”
With a violent shake, Uriel threw Vladek’s smoking body to the ground. Vladek crumpled to the floor, breathing, but unable to move. Uriel pressed his palms to the stone wall, whispering a guttural chant. The wall shook then blasted open, stones flying outward in a six by six-foot radius. The downpour continued outside, the gusting wind slanting the cold rain through the hole Uriel had just created. The arena below was a slosh of mud and blood where the fighting continued, more angels standing and circling overhead than demons.
“Veni, Circe,” said Uriel before turning back to grab Vladek by his horns.
A shattering roar echoed through the storming rain. A heavy gust of wind blew against us from the dragon flapping her wings, then she was moving in sight. A giant shadow drawing closer.
Uriel dragged Vladek’s body closer to the open hole. George, Xander, and Dommiel were all there—I hadn’t even noticed the others had come into the room—helping Uriel lift his body. Without saying a word, they swung the demon king’s body back for momentum and then flung him through the opening. Circe swooped by at that exact moment and locked jaws on Vladek, flying off as she chewed him up and swallowed.
I stood there, still clinging to Kat, trembling, unable to quite fathom the last few minutes. It had all happened so fast.
“You’re safe,” whispered Kat, smiling at me. “Let that nightmare go.” She said it with the kindest expression, from a woman who seemed to have understood, who had been there and learned the cost of allowing evil to seep in and take over.
I shook my head and assured her. “He never had me.” And it was true. “Not this time. Not anymore. Not since—”
Suddenly, I was in Uriel’s arms, his head buried in the crook of my neck. Wrapping my arms around his neck, I held on tight, breathing him in. His body, still shimmering with his inner light, radiated with heat. I shivered from the cold and the rain and the fear, but his nearness, his unwavering strength, his utter devotion to my safety warmed me from the outside in. He seeped into me, this beautiful, darling man.
I pulled back and wiped back the slick hair sticking to his face. I couldn’t speak, but I needed to look at him, to see that he was all right. His ardent expression promised me he was more than all right. He dipped low and pressed the softest kiss to my lips, unmoving, simply feeling the sensation of my lips against his.
“Icarus was right,” he whispered.
“He was?”
He cradled my head with a firm, gentle hand and pressed a searing kiss to my lips before pulling away. “I’d die in the flames and fall from the sky—happily, joyfully—if it gave me one more second in your arms. For there’s no question now, Nadya. My heart. My love. You are my greatest dream, and I’d burn my wings to ash if only to have you as mine.”
I choked back a sob and swallowed hard, blinking the tears back. “That won’t be necessary.” I looked at the beautiful arch of his white wings, soaking wet from the rain. “As a matter of fact, I’ve grown rather partial to them.” Moving back to his piercing blue gaze, midnight dark like the storm raging around us, I added, “And right now, I want you to take me home. To our home. For now, it’s all done. He’s gone. She’s gone.” I didn’t have to tell him I meant my sister. He saw it in my eyes. There was no one left to haunt us. “And I’m yours.”
“You’re mine.” He stared down at me with heavy emotion, clinging to me, brushing his thumb across my cheek. “And I’m yours.”
“I’d leave you two alone, but I’d say this isn’t the place for an amorous liaison,” said George.
Uriel turned so that I could see our friends, blood-stained and worn out, weapons still in their hands. “No,” he said with finality. “No, it is not.”
“Speaking of amorous liaisons, I’m going to find Anya.” Dommiel saluted us with his knife-hand. “Glad to help you kill that fucker. That’s one more off my list.”
“You have a list?” asked Kat, following behind him.
“Hmph.” Dommiel stopped a
t the door. “I think we’ve killed them all. What will I do now?”
Kat grinned. “I think you and Anya can figure something out.”
He winked at her with his one good eye. “Damn right, we can.”
Then they were gone. Carowyn stepped forward and physically pushed Uriel out of the way to give me a hug. “I’m glad you’re okay. I was scared for a bit there.”
“So was I,” I muffled into her hair.
She squeezed me tight. “Come visit us anytime when you two are in London.”
Xander was saying something to Uriel who smiled back at him with a nod. Then he turned to Carowyn. “Come on, darling. Let’s go kill any demons still left. Maximus is probably basking in the glory of having the most kills.”
Xander took her hand and they walked out together. George was left watching us with his arms crossed. Uriel walked to him and handed over the sword Silversong.
“Thank you, my friend. It came in handy. I wish I could say it soaked in the blood of a demon prince. Or demon king, as Vladek had liked to call himself.”
“No worries.” George smiled, taking the sword back from him. He smiled with an arched brow in his cavalier way. “I think feeding him to your pet dragon was much more dramatic. And deserving.” He patted Uriel on the shoulder and gave me a small bow. “Till we meet again, sweet lady. Now I have to go find his dungeons.” Then he was gone back down the stairwell.
I smiled up at Uriel. “We did it. They’re going to free them.”
“Yes. They are. But we are going home.” He scooped me up into his arms.
“I can walk down the stairs. I’m not injured,” I assured him.
“We’re not going down the stairs. We’re not going back ever again. Only forward and up.”
“Up?”
He took three long strides and leaped out of the open wall. I gasped and clung tightly around his neck.
“Some warning next time.” I nuzzled against his chest.
“Sorry, love. Just a little impatient.”
Coldest Fire (Dominion series) Page 23
