by Larissa Ione
“Touch him with the intent of passing it. It should be automatic.”
She shivered, suddenly chilled to the bone. “I can’t.”
“You can.” Ares’s hands clamped down on her shoulders, and he dipped his head to look her straight in the eye. “You have to.”
“I won’t do to him what was done to me.” She took a bracing breath, steeling herself against what was probably a terrible decision. “I can’t do this against his will.”
Thanatos opened his mouth to say something—going by his thunderous expression, Cara could guess what—but Ares held up his hand to stay his brother. “Give us a minute.”
She allowed Ares to lead her to a quiet corner. “Listen to me, Cara,” he said slowly as if speaking to a child. “You’re dying.”
“Well aware of that.”
“If you give it to him, you’ll live. I can’t—” He cut himself off with a curse.
“You can’t what?” When he said nothing, she grabbed his chin and forced his eyes to meet hers. They were angry, but at the same time, sad.
“I can’t lose you,” he bit out. “I can’t be with you, not with Pestilence around, but I can’t lose you.”
She didn’t know what to say, but Ares did.
“Please.”
She knew how much it cost him to beg. “I wish I could,” she said softly, and he stepped back as if she’d slapped him.
“Dammit, Cara.” He thrust his fingers through his hair and paced for a dozen strides before returning to her. “We’re in a war where there are no rules, no room for pity or kindness. The loser forfeits not just life, but the entire fucking Earth. Transfer the agimortus. Now.”
“There is always room for kindness,” she said. “Forcing this on Zhreziel would be an epic violation. I know this for a fact. This would be as bad as killing him. If I did it, I’d feel stained, Ares. Ruined.”
Ares slammed his fist into the wall. “Do it, dammit!”
“No.”
Ares regarded her with shuttered eyes, his calm more frightening than his rage. “Fine. Die. Bring about the end of the world. What’s it matter to me? I’ll be evil and won’t give a shit.”
“There’s got to be another way.”
“There’s not,” he roared.
She jammed her finger into his chest. “Yelling at me isn’t going to do anything but make me dig my heels in deeper. You haven’t learned a lot about women in your thousands of years, have you?” In the background, Limos snorted, and Ares pegged his sister with a glare. Cara snapped her fingers, bringing his head back around. The stunned expression on his face, the you-dared-to-snap-at-me look, might have made her laugh if the situation wasn’t so we’re-all-going-to-die. “You said you were some sort of military commander or general or something, and you have a kind of innate strategic knowledge. Well, use it and find another way out of this. Because I’m not transferring the agimortus to that fallen angel.”
Twenty
Ares needed a minute. No way could he stand in that room and look at Cara for another second. Too much emotion was tripping through him—anger, fear, hurt. It was all so unfamiliar, hitting him hard and all at once, that it was clouding his ability to think straight. His brain was working on ways to force her to transfer the agimortus, ranging from pleasant things like fucking her into capitulation, to dark, sinister ideas like blackmail or torture. Not her torture, but he’d bet he could get that fallen angel to beg her to transfer it.
She’d hate him forever for that. But she’d be alive. And the world would be whole.
He stepped outside, inhaled a lungful of sea air that was tinged with a smoky hint of hellhound. Hal was nearby. Maybe his sire would show up and give Ares the satisfaction of carving his heart out.
“Ares.” Limos gripped his elbow just as he was about to punch through the side of the building. “She isn’t a warrior.”
He ground his molars so viciously they hurt. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means she doesn’t have your ‘win at all costs’ mindset.” The white flower in her hair slid out of place, and Limos grabbed it, tossed it to the ground in an uncharacteristic display of annoyance. “She wants to do the humane thing, and she isn’t thinking beyond that.”
“She should. She could bring about the end of the fucking world.”
“I’m not happy about that, either,” Limos said. “But we’ve got to give her time.”
Frustration and anger hummed in his skull, spreading down his spine, into his organs, and all the way to his toes. “Time is a luxury we don’t have.”
“Well, duh. But we can’t force her.”
“Yeah, I can,” he ground out.
“You are so stubborn.” Limos stomped on the flower, smashing the thing flat in the sand. “Let me talk to her.”
The hum became a buzz as dark energy coiled inside him. On his arm, Battle thrashed hard enough for him to feel a pinch. Odd. He snapped his gaze to Li’s arm, and damn if Bones wasn’t doing the same thing on his sister’s skin.
“What the—” He broke off as a shock wave of energy hit him like a nuclear blast. He stumbled back a step, knocked off balance. “Limos…”
“I feel it,” she gasped. “Oh, shit, what has Pestilence done?”
The tug of battle was like a million ropes attached to his organs, stretching tighter and tighter, until he wanted to blow apart. “War,” he breathed. “A war just started.”
The pound of Thanatos’s footsteps turned to thunder as he burst from the doorway. “I—” Shadows swirled around him, and he groaned. A gate opened, sucked Than into it, and he was gone.
“No!” Limos grimaced, and then she was sucked through a similar portal.
Cara. This was a trick of Pestilence’s and he knew it. The tug grew more powerful with each dragging step toward the house. His feet were leaden even though his body sang with the need to fight, the need to be engaged in whatever battle was going on.
As he went through the doorway, he felt as if claws had grabbed him, were spreading his rib cage, and agony clouded his senses. Laughter erupted, a hellhound snarled, and then Ares was sucked into the vortex that would drop him in the middle of a conflict and leave him powerless to leave until the worst of the blood had been shed.
* * *
Hal’s pained cry rang in Cara’s ears and vibrated through her entire body. A rapid drain of energy forced her to catch herself on the wall. She’d been standing in the great room, waiting for Ares and Limos to come back inside, while trying to avoid Thanatos’s disapproving gaze. When he suddenly tore out of there, she hadn’t been too concerned… not until Ares shouted for her and Hal yelped.
Legs trembling from the sudden weakness, she hurried outside and was instantly surrounded by Ares’s demon guards. She couldn’t tell most of them apart, but she knew Vulgrim by the silver ring that pierced his left horn, and Torrent by the slash of white on his broad snout.
Torrent backed her toward the entrance as Vulgrim barked orders that had the other Ramreels shifting into various fighting stances.
“You need to get inside,” Vulgrim shouted. “Now.”
“But Hal—”
Torrent gripped her arm and dragged her toward the patio. “If your beast hasn’t dematerialized to Sheoul already, our men will find him. You have to—” A spray of blood erupted from Torrent’s mouth, splattering Cara’s neck and chest. Horrified, she lurched back, her gaze glued to the arrowhead that jutted from his breastbone. Dear God, the weapon had punched through two layers of chain mail and his thick body. “Go… now…” He crashed to his knees.
“Torr!” Vulgrim’s agonized bleat turned the warm night air into a chill shroud. He spun around and caught his son before he fell over, but even in the dark, Cara saw the death cloud that glazed over Torr’s eyes.
The other Ramreels charged in the direction the arrow had come from, heading straight toward the glowing red eyes of a snowy demon horse and its unholy master perched on top. An arrow sailed out of the pitch bla
ck, nailing another of the Ramreels between the eyes. Strange demons charged from out of the dark. Humans… at least, they looked like humans… ran with them, their hands clutching wicked, bloodstained weapons.
The agimortus seared her chest, becoming a red-hot brand. The oily, slick feeling boiled up, feeding her terror as a hideous skeletal thing snared her by the hair and yanked her backward. She swung wildly, missing the creature. Remembering her self-defense training, she slowed. Concentrated. She swung again, this time landing a punch in the demon’s hollowed-out belly.
Vulgrim was suddenly there, head bowed, ramming his great horns into the demon. The crack of bones and a pained screech rang out, and the force of Vulgrim’s hit knocked her down. The silver flash of a blade glinted in the lights from the patio, and the demon’s head rolled past her.
“Get inside.” Vulgrim lifted her to her feet. “My tesmon cannot lose you.”
“Tesmon?”
“Herd father.” He tugged her toward the door. “Ares.”
His furred arms closed around her protectively, and they stumbled onto the porch. A blade came from out of nowhere, slashing at Vulgrim’s face. He deflected it with his horn, which sheared off like a carrot under a cleaver. The blond man who’d swung the weapon dove for Vulgrim, taking him down to the ground. Another man came from nowhere with an ax, and in horrible slow motion, Cara saw it coming down in an arc over Vulgrim’s neck.
A million images flashed in her head, and she saw the face of the man she’d killed at her house in the expressions of the guys attacking Vulgrim.
If you want to survive, if you want those you care about to survive, you may need to make sacrifices and do things you never thought you’d do. Things you might find distasteful, that go against everything you’ve ever believed. Reaver’s prophetic words were like a soundtrack that went along with the images, and without hesitating, Cara allowed her gift a full charge, nothing held back.
With a battle cry, she lunged, gripping one man on the shoulder and the other by the waist. Energy sizzled down her arm and through her fingers. The effect on the men was instantaneous; blood and tissue spurted from their eyes, noses, mouths, and ears. Their bodies swelled like balloons, and as they hit the ground, they broke open into steaming piles of gore.
There was no regret. Not. A. Bit. Ares had been right. It felt good to get rid of monsters, and hell if she was going to waste her life feeling bad about it.
Vulgrim, whose eyes had always seemed so tiny for his big head, stared at her, his eyes now the size of saucers. “That,” he rumbled, “is one scary ability.” He grunted. “I like it.” He leaped to his feet. “Now go inside. Hide yourself!”
Cara careened off the doorjamb and the walls as she bolted toward the fallen angel. He’d somehow managed to roll under the coffee table, where he was working his bound wrists against the leg in a desperate attempt to fray the ropes. He saw her coming, and he hissed like a correred lion.
“Behind you!”
Instinctively, Cara dove to the side, barely avoiding the swipe of a massive, clawed hand. Whatever was chasing her let out a pissed-off snarl. Hot breath blasted the back of her head, and she nearly gagged at the fumes. The door to the bedroom was just ahead—
“Don’t touch her! She’s mine.” The voice froze her marrow. Pestilence. “And someone drag that angel to Sheoul.”
The scaly thing chasing her ignored Ares’s brother, and even as she stumbled through the bedroom door, she turned, saw the monster go down beneath the hooves of Pestilence’s evil stallion. She slammed the door and locked it, but two seconds later, it crashed inward, and thousands of pounds of horse and warrior filled the room. Somewhere in the house, Zhreziel screamed. Inside her head, Cara screamed, too. She should have transferred the agimortus, because the fallen angel was being dragged to Sheoul, where his soul was going to be ruined anyway.
The fear Cara had experienced at the hands of men who had robbed her house and the Guardians who had believed she was a demon paled in comparison to the sheer, icy terror that wracked her body now. She trembled as Pestilence swung down off the horse, his armor clanking and dripping a disgusting black substance as well as fresh Ramreel blood.
“Seems you’re bonded to a hellhound,” he said, his deep voice rumbling right through her soul. “That means that killing you isn’t going to be as easy as running you through with a sword or slitting your delicate throat.”
“Shame, that,” she said, surprised at how she didn’t sound nearly as afraid as she felt.
“I have him, you know. Your hellhound. He fought me and my men, but even now, he’s being transferred to my lair.”
She shook with fury so intense her teeth rattled. “Let him go, you soulless bastard.”
Pestilence struck out, nailing her across the face with the back of his hand. “Do you kiss Ares with that mouth?” He smiled. “How does he feel about you being bonded to a hellhound, anyway?”
“That hellhound is keeping me alive.”
“Stupid bitch. You’re dying. All I need to do is chain you up and wait for it. But that’s not nearly as satisfying as torturing you. And see, the strange thing about these pain-in-the-ass hellhound bonds is that I can’t just chop off either your head or his. For some reason, you end up with the same protection we Horsemen have. No weapon can go through the spinal cord. Weird.” He frowned. “I tried to chop off your hellhound’s head, anyway. It’s not fatal. But it hurts like a mother.”
“You sick, twisted asshole,” she rasped.
“Sticks and stones.” He reached out and wrapped his gauntleted fingers around her throat, and even though her gift was still engaged and pumping enough power to light up a grid the size of New York City, Pestilence didn’t even flinch as he lifted her off the ground. Her breath became searing whips of fire in her throat as she grabbed his wrists and tried furiously to fry him with her power. Nothing. The bastard was immune.
“Let’s head to my place.” His fangs flashed as he looked her up and down. “And then, little human, I’m going to see how sweet you are.”
Twenty-one
Ares, Limos, and Thanatos had fallen into a trap. One designed not to catch them, but to keep them busy.
Ares had known the moment he materialized in the war zone—the very place where the most recent plague had drawn Thanatos. Turned out that Pestilence and his demons had manipulated the governments of Croatia and Slovenia into war after convincing Slovenian leaders that the Croatian military had manufactured and distributed the disease that killed thousands of Slovenians.
Demons, all ter’taceo in positions of prominence, had incited things further by gathering thousands of Croatians and Slovenians into camps deep inside Hungary and taking away everything from clothes and water to food. They’d created a famine of everything. Their actions were an attempt not only to spark international war, but also to distract Limos.
It worked, and the thing that sucked was that large-scale tragedies were like evil power plants for Ares and his siblings. As long as they remained on site, the juiced-up high rocked them like an orgasm mixed with cocaine, and no one could—or wanted to—unplug from that.
But Ares had to. Which meant taking out the people in charge of each side of the conflict.
Now, a day after Ares had been sucked to the bloody battlefields, he stood over the body of the Croatian general he’d killed and wondered how long it would be before he had to return to put down the guy’s replacement. He’d already taken out Slovenian military leaders—both had been demons in human suits. Made him wonder how many of the military’s upper echelon were Pestilence’s bitches.
The tent flap peeled back, and speak of the asshole…
Pestilence sauntered inside, bloody fangs exposed in his creepy smile, Harvester on his heels. “Bet you were just thinking about me.”
“Evil doesn’t agree with you, brother.”
“It absolutely agrees with me. You know what else agrees with me? Cara.” He flicked his tongue over one fang. “Tapping that
? Sweet.”
Ares lunged, prepared to rip his brother’s throat out. It wouldn’t kill him, but it would hurt like fuck. He slammed his fist into Pestilence’s neck, and his brother fell back, but he kept his feet under him. “If you hurt her—”
“Oh, I hurt her.” Pestilence fired back with an industrial-strength slug to Ares’s temple. Stars twinkled, birds tweeted, and bells rang to the tune of I’m Getting My Ass Kicked.
Pestilence was definitely drawing on the power of evil, was far stronger than he’d been before his Seal broke. Head still spinning, Ares grabbed the metal chair in the corner, spun, and brought it down on Pestilence’s skull. The chair crumpled like a tin can, tearing one of the legs, and without missing a beat, Ares snapped off the hollow leg and jammed it into his brother’s throat, taking a core sample out of Pestilence’s flesh. Blood spewed out of the pipe, splashing the inside of the tent in gore, and Ares swore he saw Harvester smile.
A crimson tide bloomed in Pestilence’s eyes, and he swept his arm in an arc, connecting with Ares’s shoulder and sending him crashing through the side of the tent. Before Ares could get to his feet, Pestilence was there, kneeling on Ares’s chest and digging his fingers into his throat. Agonizing pressure on his windpipe closed it off.
“You’re coming with me, brother,” Pestilence said, his voice a nasty snarl. “You’re going to watch me break your Seal, but first, I’m going to make you very sorry that you tried to get in my way.”
Pain shattered Ares’s skull, and all went black.
* * *
Man, Reseph loved a good party.
Jimmy Buffett was singing praises to the almighty margarita, the sun was hot, the ocean blue, a pig was roasting in a pit, and women were swinging their bikini-covered hips in an invitation that would give a blind man his sight back.
Limos worked the portable bar she brought out for the bashes she held at her Hawaiian beach house. She always invited the locals, who thought she was a Paris Hilton type, a young heiress living off her wealthy parents’ money. Which explained why she was rarely at the beach house; Limos claimed she had a dozen homes all over the world and spent her time between them.
