Chapter 19 #2
“Before we walk forward,” Blackwell said, looking down at Arabella, “We have no idea what the humans will do when we step into their territory. They may attack us. We’re going to do our best to not kill them, but—”
“I know it may happen,” Arabella said, steeling herself. “Let’s just try to get there and push through the best we can—the sooner we stop him, the less deaths have to occur.”
Looking towards the humans, I narrowed my gaze at their posture, watching for tension and the will to attack. I didn’t see any right now, but that meant nothing.
“Arabella, stand in the center,” I instructed. “We’ll surround you.”
She nodded and moved between the six of us, Blackwell and I still leading the group. As we reached the bottom of the stairs, I let my magic out to wrap around her protectively, the others doing the same.
I took the last step from the staircase to the ground.
I wasn’t positive what I expected…maybe a massive attack all at once? Instead the humans silently watched us as we continued to move in a unified effort until we were all off the stairs, the entire base absolutely silent. Not even nature was speaking right now.
“Let’s keep going,” Arabella suggested softly. The path to the opening in the wall stretched for about a hundred feet or so—not that far of a distance, but enough that we wouldn’t be able to get back to the stairs with ease if something happened.
At first, nothing happened. In fact, we made it halfway to the wall before an odd shuffling had all of us looking back.
“Fuck that’s creepy,” I growled. Every single human had turned to watch our progress, some even having shifted to block the opening Ashur had created.
“Just keep going—”
A high-pitched whistle sounded.
A sonic blast of power had me tugging Arabella underneath me as heat scorched my skin in a flash.
Then the humans attacked.
“Shit,” I snarled and immediately shifted into my large form as the hundreds of humans began to converge upon us.
I lifted Arabella above the melee as we pushed past the humans, their expressions rabid as they released almost feral noises and laughs.
I knew the others weren’t trying to kill them, and Ashur was even creating small half-walls on our path just to stop them, but the humans just climbed over them.
“Damian!” Arabella squeaked as a human appeared out of nowhere, launching itself through the air from the wall we’d finally reached. I used one hand to bat the fucker out of the way, wincing as he slammed right back into the wall.
A shrill shrieking added to the chaos as we passed into the second tier of the base and neared the building.
The humans began to fight more violently, and while we were holding them off fairly easily, their mass of numbers was draining as they began to climb on top of one another, blood spewing from injuries but no one even noticing, let alone stopping to deal with it.
War clearly had a heightened level of control that he hadn’t been using before.
“War!” Arabella’s voice surprised me as I looked at the delicate woman in my arms, her face filled with fury. “Come out here now! STOP THIS!”
I assumed he would ignore her or increase the attacks, but instead, they stopped. Completely. The humans froze, and a dark laugh echoed through the air, causing my ears to feel pressure like they were going to explode.
The doors to the main building swung open, the glass shattering to reveal…War?
This wasn’t the same War I had seen before—this War looked old.
Saint stepped forward, looking equally confused at the silver hair and fine lines on the man’s face.
He was wearing battle fatigues, and he was as tall as before, but somehow he looked more…
fragile? That wasn’t a word I’d normally use to describe the bastard, but he looked breakable, even if his magic said the exact opposite.
“Just the sis meta I was looking for!” War exclaimed happily. “And you came right to me—like a present.”
I nearly snarled at that, but Arabella tapped my tail, so I lowered her down so that she was standing on her own. I could snatch her back up in a moment’s notice, but I still didn’t like this shit.
After giving War a clinical once-over, she offered a smug smile. “You’re sick. My magic made you sick.”
“Physically,” he spit, “but not my magic. Now that you’re here, though, you can fix it. I just have to spill your blood.”
Razar chuckled maliciously, and War briefly looked over us before narrowing his eyes on Saint. “And you—you couldn’t just stay out of this and reap the benefits of my magic? You would have been fueled with death for centuries; instead you want to stop it because she’s your fucking mate.”
“And because despite being Death, I don’t take pleasure in killing those that don’t deserve it.” Saint’s voice was serious, but it quickly turned amused. “A category you aren’t part of.”
“You wouldn’t kill me,” War scoffed, but I could feel the fear there.
Saint would kill him. Saint wanted to kill him.
Arabella drew the conversation back on topic. “War, I am giving you one chance—one chance to release every single human from your compulsion and to allow everything to go back to its natural order.”
“No,” he snarled. “There will always be war, and where there is war, I will be there.”
Arabella shook her head. “I won’t allow you to keep hurting humans. Hurting nightmares. You don’t belong here anymore—this is a war you’re going to lose.”
Power trickled through the air, and I fought the urge to look behind me, knowing that our backup had arrived on that cliffside.
War didn’t see them, though. I knew he said his magic wasn’t injured from Arabella, but I didn’t think that was true—especially because he showed no sign of noticing the sis metas.
Every ounce of his energy was on Arabella right now.
And in a violent effort, he surged forward to hurt Arabella. Saint blocked him with a pulse of power that sent the god terror tumbling back into the door of the building. He stood up almost immediately, his magic growing and trembling the space around us.
“You will pay for that. All of you will.”
“The only one paying today, War, is you.” Arabella’s voice was light and almost mesmerizing…
All at once her power exploded out—their power exploded out—and all of it was directly aimed at War.