Like Zarion. Just a few hours ago, Faris had threatened to expose his indiscretion. That meant exposing me. I was connected to the weapons of heaven and hell. Somehow. They’d spoken to me, shown me lost memories. And I’d been able to control them without even touching them. But what was my connection to the weapons?
“Whose secret lies at the end of this challenge?” I asked Faris.
“You are more skilled than you appear,” he replied coolly. “It’s a shame that your lack of civility and discipline has confined you to this sad, purposeless existence.”
Colonel Fireswift nodded in agreement. He’d been saying the same thing—for basically forever.
Faris was certainly one to lecture me about my apparent lack of civility. I wasn’t the one who’d exposed the gods’ secrets for the sole purpose of sowing discord. I didn’t push everyone down, so I could rise to the top.
That was all this training had been about: Faris’s proxy war against the other gods. He’d used it to strike out at them, to turn them against one another.
And Colonel Fireswift was helping him. I had to wonder what Faris had promised him as a reward. Colonel Fireswift was loyal—to the gods. To entice him to throw his lot in with Faris specifically, the god would have had to offer him a tantalizing prize. Colonel Fireswift wasn’t stupid; he’d negotiate a good deal for himself to counter the very real risk of incurring the other gods’ wrath.
Admittedly, right now it looked like there wasn’t much risk. Colonel Fireswift had apparently picked the winning team. Faris was on a roll, weakening one god after another by exposing their most guarded secrets.
But to what end? I had to figure out what Faris’s end game was. What was his grand finale?
If I’d thought Faris would answer the question outright, I’d have asked him. From what I knew of him, a straight answer was a very unlikely outcome to that conversation. Rather than answering my question, he’d probably just kill me.
“Where will the other teams appear on this world?” I asked instead. I had to concentrate on the task at hand—and not the possibility that this challenge would expose me. Maybe this wasn’t even about me. “Will the Legion teams appear inside the castle or out there?” I pointed down at the massive forest and open red prairie which surrounded the castle.
“I can’t tell you that,” replied Faris.
“Because you don’t know, or because you don’t want to tell us?”
Faris smiled. It was the smile of a hawk who’d spotted its prey.
I sighed. This was just awesome.
“How many of your soldiers protect the castle?” Colonel Fireswift asked him.
“A dozen.”
“Only a dozen?” Colonel Fireswift’s eyes widened. “For a castle of this size?”
“Most of the soldiers stationed at this castle are currently otherwise occupied with important matters. I reassigned them for the time being.”
“At the exact moment your most prized possession is in danger,” I said. “Very clever.”
It was then, as I met Faris’s unconcerned eyes, that I realized he fully intended for us to fail in our task. He was setting us up. I wanted to scream at him for putting me in danger so he could expose another god’s deepest secrets, but I said nothing.
“You’re catching on,” Faris commented.
I didn’t know if he’d read my thoughts and realized that I’d figured out his plan, or if he was commending me for finally shutting up. From the look Colonel Fireswift was giving me, the angel was clearly in the latter camp.
When I turned back to Faris, he was gone. He’d simply vanished. As if it weren’t already abundantly clear, the God of Heaven’s Army wasn’t going to help us any further. Not that he’d been of any real help so far. Quite the contrary. He’d only doomed us to fail.
“We need to set up the defenses,” Colonel Fireswift told me.
“How are the two of us supposed to defend a whole castle?”
“We have twelve of Faris’s soldiers.”
“Who have probably been instructed to stand by and do nothing,” I pointed out.
After all, Faris wanted the secret inside the weapons of heaven and hell to be revealed. He was making it all too easy for the invaders.
“We can’t depend on Faris’s soldiers,” I said.
“So that leaves just the two of us.”
Colonel Fireswift looked determined and ready to defend Faris’s possessions. That made me wonder how much in the loop about everything the god was actually keeping him. Faris probably had to make this farce of a challenge appear convincing to the other gods. He had to convince them that he really was trying to defend his possession, that he was afraid the memories inside of it would expose him. That was his game: to attack the other gods without them ever realizing he was behind it all.
I stepped out onto the balcony after Colonel Fireswift. He was visually scanning the castle’s exterior defenses.
“The other teams could very well pop up right inside the castle,” I said.
In fact, they probably would. Anything to make it easier for them to get to the weapons of heaven and hell.
“The odds are stacked against us,” I added.
Purposefully and by our own patron god, I added silently to myself.
“But you have an idea.”
“What makes you think that?” I asked him.
“You always have an idea.” He crinkled his nose. “Something underhanded. Something dirty.”
“Well, you know how we cockroaches are, all dirty and underhanded. So unbecoming of a Legion soldier,” I said. “So the question is: how badly do you want to win?”
“We must not fail,” he declared, answering my earlier question. Ok, so Faris hadn’t told him he intended us to fail at defending his artifacts.
I nodded. “And we won’t fail.”
He waited. I didn’t say anything more.
“You certainly do like to put on a show,” he said with a steely glare.
I snorted. “Hello, pot. Meet kettle.”
He narrowed his eyes at me.
“You are an angel. You live and breathe drama,” I told him.
“I will never understand you, Leda Pierce,” he grumbled. “Never. Not even if you defy all odds, surviving your own foolishness to live a long, immortal life. I will still fail to piece together some semblance of sense to your existence.”
“Good. If you don’t understand me, that makes it harder for you to defeat me.”
He glowered at me. “We are on the same team.”
“You might want to remind yourself of that little fact time and again, Colonel.”
He scowled at me. Obviously, my critique was unwelcome. “Do you even have a plan?” he demanded.
“That depends.”
“On?”
“On whether your unique angel powers allow you to be in multiple places at once. Preferably a few hundred places at once.”
“No.”
“Hmm.”
“Hmm? That’s it?” he demanded. “See how easily your plans crumble when they are built on hot air?”
“Hey, it’s not my fault your magic is lacking,” I shot back.
Fire burned in his eyes. He looked like he was going to explode.
“Well, what is your ingenious plan?” I asked him.
His scowl deepened.
“I thought so,” I said. “You don’t have one. You’re so used to fighting when you have all the magic and power and numbers in your favor. You don’t know what to do when everything goes to shit.”
Magic flashed behind me, then Jace and Leila were standing with us on the balcony. Damn that Faris. He was making this all too easy for the other teams.
“Well, it looks like our time just ran out,” I told Colonel Fireswift.
“Truer words have never been spoken,” said Jace.
“I’m sure we can handle the two of you,” I countered, smirking.
I was less confident about warding off all the other teams at once. Magic
flashed again. And again. And again. One by one, the other teams popped up all around us. The gigantic balcony suddenly felt very tiny.
I considered the situation. The other teams had to get through us to win Faris’s artifacts. But they had to get through one another as well. They were all competitors in this. That would divide their attention. I wasn’t sure how much that would help, but maybe I could do something with it.
I was thinking up a way to use my siren magic to make all the teams focus on fighting one another, when a ripple of magic shook the ground below, rustling the grass and leaves. I glanced down in horror as an army of dark deities emerged from the forest. Hell had belched and spat out a demonic army. There were so many of them, a seemingly endless sea of demons swarming the grounds around the castle, preparing to strike.
“I don’t think this was part of Faris’s plan,” I muttered.
24
Weapons of Heaven and Hell
Faris had sent away his soldiers, leaving his castle exposed. And he’d done it all to lay a trap, to make it easy for the other gods’ teams to steal the weapons of heaven and hell from him.
Well, that ingenious plan had backfired big time. The demons had seen his castle was vulnerable and moved in to attack. Faris hadn’t just made this challenge too easy for our competing Legion teams; he’d made it too easy for the demons too.
Down below, the demons were hurling spells at the castle. The castle’s magic was holding them off—for now—but without Faris’s soldiers to fortify the defenses, this wouldn’t last long. The magic shield would fall, and the demonic army would swarm the castle. They’d claim the weapons of heaven and hell, and that might finally give them the power they needed to return to Earth. The resulting war between gods and demons would tear my world apart.
“The demons are trying to break through the castle’s defenses,” I said to the other Legion teams on the balcony. “We need to stop them.”
“This is merely part of the challenge,” Colonel Silvertongue argued. “We must stay on target.”
“You can stay on target to your own destruction,” I told her. “I am going to force out the demons’ army.”
“By yourself?” General Spellsmiter scoffed.
“Of course not.” I grinned. “You are all going to assist me.”
“Assist,” Colonel Silvertongue hissed, her nostrils flaring in agitation. “You forget your place.”
“The gods will send soldiers to defend this world,” General Spellsmiter said. “They will not allow it to fall to the demons.”
“Wake up.” I snapped my fingers. “The gods are watching. If they were going to send in soldiers, they would have done it as soon as the demons crossed into this world.”
“The demons have disrupted the magic of the mirrors that allow the gods to gaze into this world.” Nyx pointed out the windows between the balcony and chamber inside.
The glass was clouded over, milky and foggy, not clear. If the gods really used those mirrors to gaze into other worlds, right now they’d see nothing of this one.
“But if the gods can’t see into this world, they will know something is wrong and come here.” I looked to Nyx for confirmation. “Right?”
“The members of the gods’ council will not come here themselves,” the First Angel said. “They won’t risk their own lives by stepping into an unknown, dangerous situation. Not without some idea of what’s going on here. They will send in Heaven’s Army first.”
Heaven’s Army. That meant Faris’s very well-dressed soldiers.
“How long will that take?” I asked.
“Ronan has been keeping an eye on Faris’s soldiers’ movements,” Nyx said. “He told me the soldiers departed this world yesterday. Faris sent them into battle against the demons’ forces on Samaran. There is a terrible battle waging there. At the moment, Faris has the upper hand. He cannot afford to divert those soldiers back here just yet, or the battle will be lost.”
So that was where Faris’s soldiers had gone. He hadn’t sent them away to make this challenge easy for the other gods’ teams—or at least not only to make it easy.
“How much longer will the battle on Samaran continue?” I asked.
“At least the rest of the day,” Nyx told me. “Last I heard, Faris’s forces were nearly through the demons’ stronghold, but many demon soldiers remain.”
“In other words, we are on our own here,” I sighed. “It’s up to us to drive back the demons’ army.”
“Yes.”
I tallied up what we had: seven angels, seven other Legion soldiers, and twelve godly soldiers. That wasn’t a lot, not against a few hundred demons. Hopeless wasn’t a word in my vocabulary, but if it had been, I’d have been lathering the word generously into my sentences right now.
Instead, I said, “We need to reinforce the castle’s defenses.”
Nyx’s gaze slid over the fading spell barrier that protected the castle. The demon’s magic barrage had already punched more than a few holes in it. Their dark magic was eating the barrier alive. I didn’t think it would last much longer than a few more minutes. It needed Faris’s soldiers to reinforce its magic.
“I will gather the soldiers still here and have them fortify the magic defenses,” Nyx decided. “Many of them know me from my days of training with the gods.”
Most of the other Legion soldiers joined her. Only Nero, Harker, Jace, and I remained on the balcony.
“I bet when you came here, you didn’t expect to be facing a demon army,” I said to Jace.
“No,” he replied. “When I came here, I expected to kick your ass and make off with the artifacts you’ve collected.”
“Don’t flirt with Leda,” Harker told him.
“But I wasn’t…” Jace’s gaze shifted between Harker’s amused eyes and Nero’s cold glare. He took a step away from me. “What do you want to bet that the demons are carrying those Venom weapons?” His voice was serious, all banter and fun drained from his tone.
“Likely,” Nero agreed. “After they proved so effective in Memphis, they would want to try them on a larger scale.”
The defense barrier broke like a mirror dropped off a high tower. The dark army rushed toward the castle. Some of the soldiers were demons or dark angels, which meant that with the magic shield down, they could fly right into the castle. We didn’t have much time.
I ran inside and rushed over to the weapons’ wardrobe. I reached for the handle, drawing back when Faris’s protection spell snapped at my hand.
“What are you doing?”
I looked back to find Jace standing behind me. “I’m using the best weapons at our disposal to push back the demons.”
I caught the threads of Faris’s spell around my fingers and pulled them apart like I was unraveling a ball of yarn. The spell popped like a birthday balloon.
“You broke a god’s spell,” Jace said, his eyes wide.
“I’ll apologize to Faris later,” I promised. “After we’ve saved his castle.”
Jace was shaking his head. “This is impossible.”
“No, not impossible. Apologizing is easy. Gaining Faris’s forgiveness is…well, I’ll worry about that later.”
“No, I mean, it’s impossible that you could break a god’s spell. And impossible that you can wield those weapons,” he added as I grabbed the armor from the cabinet.
The silver armor pieces shifted shape to match my size, just as they’d changed in the Lost City to alternately fit me and fit Valiant the Pilgrim. I secured the sword and gun to my armored body. This was how I would protect the weapons of heaven and hell from the demons—by wearing them. And with their immortal power, I would push back the dark force attacking us.
I tried not to dwell on the fact that the last person to wield these armor pieces had been crushed by them. I had done that. Somehow, I’d controlled the armor, manipulating them into killing the man who’d tried to use them to kill Nero and Damiel and me.
It had been an impressive trick, but I hadn’t b
een able to repeat the feat since. Controlling the weapons of heaven and hell was not as easy as it looked. Valiant had tried to wield them, but he hadn’t been able to tap into their true magic, the power to kill an immortal.
I had. With the armor’s power, I’d killed Valiant, a Pilgrim the gods had made immortal.
And now I had to wield them again to push back the demons’ army. There was no room for doubt. I just had to do it.
“Ok,” I said, gripping my shield as the castle walls quaked. “Let’s greet the demons’ army.”
Nero and Harker were fighting back the group of demons who’d flown up to the castle. Jace and I ran onto the balcony. I aimed my gun and fired three shots, hitting three demons. They went down, but they didn’t die. The gun wasn’t killing them like an immortal weapon should.
A demon fired at Nero. I jumped in front of him. The dark bullet, swirling with Venom magic, hit my silver armor and dissolved into harmless smoke. At least the magic-nullifying power of the armor was working.
I fired at the demons until I ran out of bullets, then I drew my sword. The flaming blade hurt the dark soldiers, but it didn’t kill them either. Why weren’t the weapons of heaven and hell working for me? Why couldn’t I tap into their full power?
A demon leapt onto my back, pulling me down. I jumped up, but the demon was faster. Much faster. Even before my feet hit the ground, his blade slashed across my cheek. He struck again, plunging his sword through my boot. Piercing, burning pain exploded inside my foot, shooting up my leg.
Jace caught me as I fell. “Heal yourself,” he said. “I’ll cover you.”
The demons had the two of us surrounded, and they were closing in. Jace couldn’t hold them off alone, and I wasn’t much help in this condition. It was a matter of life or death. There was no time for games. I reached into my potions pouch, pulled out a slim vial, and drank it. Instantly, a comforting warmth washed over me, mending my wounds.
“Fairy’s Touch is quicker,” Jace said. “Why didn’t you use it?”
“I can’t,” I admitted.
Understanding flashed in his eyes. “You don’t have that power.”
Fairy’s Touch: Legion of Angels: Book 7 Page 22
