Blood Sacrifice (Faith of the Fallen Book 2)

by West,Cassandra Sky

  In her mind she smiled wickedly. She couldn’t smile in the flesh as nearly all the skin had fallen from her head. Wisps of hair and a few flaps of skin were all that remained. She could sense the thousands of dead at her command. Spread throughout the city and beyond. She could see through all their eyes if she willed it. The time of the meat bags was almost over. Little did the humans outside of Seattle suspect that this was the end of days. She chuckled out loud. The closest walker turned to the noise and shuffled in her direction.

  She pushed herself off the thrown and strode toward it. The thing had been pretty once, a blonde with long hair. Now she was a bloated corpse with black bile seeping between her yellow teeth.

  Fury built inside the queen with each step. Flashes of her former life, glimpses of beauty, pleasure, and joy creeped on the edges of her mind. She couldn’t recall it exactly but she remembered sometimes. With one last step she brought an arm down on the poor thing smashing its face. The Queen kicked it sending it flying into the dirt. She leaped the twenty feet to land on it slamming its skull into the ground. She stomped a bony heel down on its back over and over until the dead walker was nothing more than a bloody mess on the field. Oh how she hated blonde’s. Her rage rolled around her. The nearest zombies moaned in agitation, unable to satiate their masters mood.

  A crack of thunder in the distance caught her attention. Rain was coming. It slowed them down and forced the humans to shelter. All the better. By the time the first few drops began to fall she ordered her minions around the city to seek out the buildings and dark places. They were slow and clumsy, but with so many at her command no one would hide for long. Soon her army of thousands would be millions and—

  An explosion rippled through the far end of the stadium near the concessions. Bodies and bits cascaded through the air. Another explosion wiped out a handful more of her minions. Anger swelled in her and overwhelmed her like a wave. She swept her arms toward the fighting. She gathered all the dead in the far end and sent them shuffling toward the noise. On the off chance her swarm of dead couldn’t handle whatever attacked, she followed behind. Her rage tempered by curiosity.

  Once these humans were properly indoctrinated she could explain to them the folly of their ways. Something was wrong. She lost contact with whole swaths of her subjects. The dead fell in waves a precise shots split skulls and shattered foreheads. Her anger welled building as she marched forth. There was something else behind it though, a fear. Fear that it was her come to finish the job. It couldn’t be. She was dead, she was sure of it. In the back of her mind she knew the truth. Alexi had come for her.

  The line of zombies in front of her acting as her guard, shuddered as automatic fire shredded them. The last two fell as a three feet of sword cut their heads off.

  She halted her steps as the object of her spite stepped between the falling bodies.

  “Bella?” Alexi asked in surprise.

  That had been her name once, before the bitch had stolen it from her. She roared in rage. She would have her vengeance. She ignored the little voice that told her she couldn’t win, that she should run.

  ***

  “Bella,” Alexi pointed at the petite zombie in the ruined dress. Alexi sprang into action slicing her way through a slew of undead and making herself the target.

  The agents formed a protective circle around Savanna as the followed the vampire. Their weapons spat fire as zombie after zombie fell to their precise wrath. Each agent downed a zombie with every pull of the trigger, but there were hundred of them.

  Savanna gulped in her air in a desperate attempt to stay calm. With her dagger in one hand, she held out the other. The blade sliced cleanly through her wrist. Blood poured from the wound. She had miscalculated and cut to deep, but it didn’t matter. She only needed a few minutes. In her mind the incantation for repelling the dead sprang forth. It was a hazardous spell and required all her concentration. She began her chant, her voice carrying over the din of weapons and bodies. A crack of thunder rattle has as the rain swept down on them in sheets. Her body shivered form the cold and she had trouble forming the words.

  How could it be Bella? She had been a vampire? Alexi had destroyed her glamour, and from what she said it sent her into a fit of madness. Savanna hadn’t really thought about it and assumed Dupree had killed her.

  All the dead people, the horror, it was all their fault. Her focus wavered with her realization, her lips stuttering over a key word. Jet screamed as dead hands breached the field and dragged her out.

  “Help me!” she screamed as she was pulled twenty feet away. She fired her sub-machine gun until the bolt slid back empty. A dozen zombies descended on her before she could reload. Her screams lasted only a few seconds as they tore her apart. Savanna closed her eyes and refocused on the spell. She couldn’t feel the tears on her face through the rain but she knew they were there. The team all opened fire in the direction she had been taken, dropping to their knees as one. The hail of bullets, both to kill the zombies and hopefully put the poor woman out of her misery, exploded through flesh and bone. Dozens dropped like flies under the withering hail of fire.

  “Jesus, protect us,” Sing whispered.

  “Savanna?” Osei put a hand on her shoulder, “Are you good?”

  She nodded, not trusting her self to stop chanting long enough to speak. They moved forward again, slower this time. They fired in waves, not randomly or as fast as their guns could. They spaced out their firing with two of them reloading while the other two fired. The firing stopped suddenly.

  Savanna opened her eyes. A wall of flesh pressed up against her barrier, dirty fingers and yellow teeth slashing and gnashing at them. They didn’t have enough ammo to shoot ever last one.

  “Conserve for if we need it,” Osei shouted over the rain.

  Savanna couldn’t see over the zombies, she didn’t even know if she was going in the right decision. Her head swam and her mouth grew fuzzy. She was so very thirsty, she couldn’t keep the spell up much longer. Alexi sword bit through the three zombies immediately in front of the group, then dropped two more in a blur. Now Savanna could see. Bella, the former vampire stood with her feet planted in the mud raging at them.

  “Th—” a wave of dizzyness washed over her and she stumbled. “That’s her,” she said recovering. The shield held but it had shrunk a few inches. The agents back up to press against her.

  “Are you sure?” Osei asked. He held his finger on the trigger ready to rain destruction again if need be.

  “Savanna?” Alexi asked, “Are you ready?” She nodded.

  In a blur of motion Alexi sliced three more in half and kicked a forth into a crowd knocking them all down.

  “Osei…” Savanna wanted to say something, anything to make it better. She couldn’t keep the spell up and use her borrowed Fae magic. The big black man shook his head, his eyes were calm as the sea. “We knew this was a one way trip. End this, for us, for the world—”

  “For Connor,” Sing said. “You can do it, Savanna. He believed in you so do we.”

  “Send her to hell,” Mercedes added.

  She wanted to run, to be the one to die and not them. As if it knew her proximity to the source the magic of the Well sprang to life inside of her. The Fae fire ignited her hand casting blue light around her. She girded herself, and ran. Gunfire erupted behind her immediately as the shield of protection fell. If she were fast enough, perhaps she could save them.

  Her legs carried her through the muddy field. The rain made it slick and deep. The hundreds of dead walking on it for the last three weeks didn’t help. She dodged a fat man that was missing an arm and skidded in the mud sliding under another’s outstretched arm. She caught a glimpse of Alexi struggling with Bella. Alexi had one arm around her throat, the other held Bella’s free arm. Alexi savagely kicked the former vampire in the back of the knee forcing her to the ground. Bella roared in raged and clawed at the arm holding her throat. Strips of Alexi’s flesh tore off in chunks.

  Sava
nna shook her head, she slipped in the mud trying to get up. She rolled onto her back, kicked the thing reaching for her, then rolled over again to push herself up.

  “Do it!” Alexi screamed. She held managed to pin Bella’s arm to her side, but the zombies strength was great and she was slowly forcing herself back to her feet.

  The Fae fire in her hand errupted in a gout of flame casting blue shadows for hundred of feet. Savanna ran toward Bell with her arm out. The zombie queen screamed an unearthly sound. The fire leaped out of her hand as her fingers touched Bella’s head. Alexi flew backward as the energy blasted the area around her. Fire tore through Bella burning her down to ash.

  Savanna could feel the flame, not the ones destroying bone and flesh, but the flame purging the Earth of the mutated vampiric curse. The fire ripped out of her and spread to every zombie. From Canada to Portland she felt every zombie die. The Fae magic threatened to consume her as it did Bella. There was more. Bella’s soul, freed from her body, burned in the flame as well. The evil of her life, of her misdeeds caused by her curse, burned away from her as well. When it was gone, the beautiful Italian girl who was turned at a young age was left. Savanna watched as her spirit ascended up into the clouds riding in the column of Fae fire.

  It was done. The fire waned, but Savanna wasn’t through. She pushed the fire, willing herself into it. Urging it to consume her to keep her from an eternity in hell by burning her up.

  “Savanna?” Alexi voice came from far away. The roar in her ears drowned out almost everything. She was so close now.

  “Stay with me, please! Savanna!” she screamed.

  This is what she wanted, her soul would be absorbed into the Well and she would be one with it for all eternity. Alexi struggled forward, pushing herself closer. “Savanna, I need you, please don’t leave me alone.”

  Savanna shifted her focus to Alexi. The power rushed around her into the sky. The clouds burned with the energy she released. Each moment it flowed through her brought her closer to absolution. Alexi dropped to her knees in the mud beside her, blue eyes brimming with tears while she held out her hands.

  “Please,” she whispered.

  Savanna looked to the heavens and wept. She relinquished her hold and the power of the Well vanished. She collapsed. Alexi caught her in one smooth motion. Savanna’s consciousness faded quickly, the sky around her turning black, “I don’t want to go to hell,” she managed to say before passing out.

  ***

  Alexi held her breath as she cradled the witch in her arms. She brushed aside her black hair away from her face. “I don’t want to go to hell,” the witch mumbled before passing out. Alexi held her close, listening for a heartbeat.

  “Is she alive?” Osei asked as he limped over.

  “Oh thank God, you made it!” A wave of relief washed over her. Osei, Sing, and Mercedes were still alive. Though each of them nursed terrible wounds. Osei bore the worst of it. Alexi doubted he would ever use his right arm again.

  “I don’t know,” she said. She strained to hear the witches heart or feel her take a breath. Alexi’s own heart pounded in her ears. She closed her eyes and begged for her friend to live.

  Savanna spasmed as she inhaled a huge breath. Alexi snatched her up in a bear hug.

  “I thought you were dead,” she said, “I thought you were dead.” She cried as her friend coughed to life.

  “So did I,” she replied. “Alexi—

  “Come on, let's get you out of here and them to a hospital,” she nodded to the agents to move out. Alexi cradled her like a child as she stood, lifting Savanna easily. The witch tried to resist but was barely strong enough to raise her head.

  “What happened in there?”

  “I’m not sure, I saw things—I can’t explain,” Savanna whispered. Alexi adjusted her weight and looked for the way out. She froze. The rain had turned the field into a muddy mess. The rain had swept away the blood, but the bodies. They were in mounds. No amount of rain would clean them,

  “I don’t think they’re going to want to play football here anymore,” Sing said as they walked to the sideline tunnels.

  Alexi shrieked as her head burned with a fiery pain. Intense magic flared to life and she dropped to her knees from the agony. She didn’t drop Savanna, however.

  The air in the middle of the field rippled. A gale of hot, dry wind roared through the stadium evaporating water and wilting what little grass was left. A circle of flame cut through the air in a perfect whole leading to hell. Fire and brimstone blasted out of the portal. Alexi could hear the wails of the damned as the breach between worlds solidified.

  I’ve come to collect my prize, the Alatum said in his telepathic voice which left her feeling the need to bathe her mind. He stepped through the portal, backward knees flexing as they pressed down in the mud. Suddenly, Savanna’s body flung into the air pulled by some invisible force. Alexi leaped after her but fell far short to land in the mud. Savanna shot into the Alatum’s hand and he clasped her in his scaly fist.

  Alexi looked around for her sword, it was on the ground where she dropped it in the fight with Bella. She tensed her muscles in preparation.

  I will kill her if you try to stop me, it growled in her mind. The demonic thoughts left her with a queasy feeling in her stomach.

  Alexi growled. As much as she wanted to save Savanna, she knew what the witch wanted. Burning forever in Hades wasn’t on her bucket list. If she had to die, then at least she would die on Earth.

  “If you hurt her I will kill the hell out of you,” Alexi growled. She leaped to the side. She rolled past her sword scooping it up in one hand and landing on her feet, rolling at the end of her jump to scoop up her sword. She focused her mind and pushed herself. Her limbs flashed in a blur as she poured on the speed and charged straight at the demon's legs.

  Lizard-like claws ripped through her. Agony blossomed in her ribs as she felt at least one of them break as his fist smashed into her. She flew through the air to crash into the ground fifty feet away. She flopped herself over, wearily returning to her feet. Small fires burned on her clothes. She patted them out absently as she swayed in the mud. She had thought the troll had hit her hard…

  Do not challenge me Vampire, you may think yourself powerful, but your puny mind cannot conceive of what I wield. Those you faced before me were but children, I am the one true lord of my domain! Ten thousand years of the damned flow through me. I am Hades incarnate and I shall damn who I chose.

  Alexi wiped the blood from her mouth. Maybe she couldn’t beat this thing, but she wouldn’t stand aside and let it take Savanna, he would have to kill them both.

  “You’re not the first demon to say that to me.” She charged, her feet fought for purchase in the mud. She held her sword behind her with the blade stretching away from her. She was ready for his speed. She didn’t so much as see him move as she knew the point at which he would move. She threw herself on the ground, sliding through the mud as his fiery claws swept the air above her. She hefted her sword with both hands and struck the silver blade down against the demons backward knee joint. The blade bit deep. A black bile like substance exploded from the wound. The demon roared and jerked his leg away from her. The blade stuck in the leathery skin, ripped out of her hands.

  Alexi followed after him, her eyes focused on her blade. The demon was easily twelve feet tall, she would have to leap to do more than hurt his legs.

  Alatum reached down and pulled the sword from his calf. Mortal weapons cannot kill me, they are nothing more than an insect bite. Te blade she had used to dispatch countless vampires, burst into flames. The metal ran like water to drip between his fingers and splash on the ground with an audible hiss.

  He held his hand out, palm pointed toward Alexi. She didn’t need demonic knowledge to know this was bad. Physically he was faster than her, but she still had sharp reactions. She dived to the right as Hellfire leaped from his hand in a column. The ground blackened and bubbled as the flame blasted the mud. Where ever it t
ouched, molten lava appeared. The field burned with an unnatural flame casting a bright orange light on the stands.

  She struggled to her feet and ran. He swung his hand around him, following her path with his fire. Alexi glanced to the far side of the stadium, she caught a glimpse of the Arcanum agents hiding behind a barricade. Good, she thought. She didn’t want them to be accidentally caught in the blast.

  Alexi spied a patch of beaten down earth. With the field a mess of mud and flame, her footing was precarious enough. She needed to maneuver and the hardened ground offered the perfect spot to spin on. Her foot hit it and she threw herself in the opposite direction. Vampiric powers violated the laws of physics as her strength moved her in an almost one-eighty back toward the demon. His hand swung toward her. She flexed her legs and jumped with everything she had. The blast of hellfire passed underneath her. Her foot collided with his face just below his eye.

  He roared in pain. He snatched her out of the air before she could land. He held her in one hand, Savanna in the other. Foolish creature, you have just damned yourself to hell. I shall have to playthings and take great pleasure in having you torment each other.

  Visions filled her mind. Visions of what the demon had in store for them. Unspeakable torments would befall them as they spent their days being assaulted by lesser demons, and their nights being tormented by him. Only to be killed and have the whole thing start again the next day.

  Alexi screamed as he squeezed. She struggled to push his fingers aside. She heard her ribs pop, then crack and she howled in pain as one of his claws pierced her back. He lifted her up to his face, shaking her until blood flew from her mouth.

  Feel my power!

  Fire burned around her, consuming her clothes, hair, and skin. Her flesh blackened and peeled away from her. She screamed until her vocal cords burned. The visions continued, assaulting her mind with demons ripping at her flesh, burning her, raping her, over and over again stretching on for eternity. In those few seconds, she experienced it as if it happened. Her will would be broken until she craved the depravity of the demons court.