Chapter Fourteen #2
Groaning, he rolled to his feet as Darlah swung a sword so
close to his head that he felt the gentle kiss of the blade passing next to his
ear. Sweeping his legs out, he caught her at the knees, bringing her down in a
clumsy sprawl. But she was quick, and she was on her feet before he made it
halfway to Jedda, who hadn’t moved since the initial blast. Blood and gemstones
formed in a puddle around her, expanding with alarming speed.
Be okay. Please be okay––
Something hit him from behind, knocking him to his knees
with the force of the blow and the intensity of the pain. Warm blood splashed
down his back and hips, and holy fucking shit, he might have lost an organ or
two as well. As he hit the floor, realization clobbered him as hard as the blow
had.
He’d taken a strike from a halberd, its sharp, foot-long
head buried deep between his shoulder blades.
His ears rang, and he wasn’t sure which was louder: his
pounding pulse or Shrike’s maniacal laughter. He was going to die like this.
And so was Jedda, if he couldn’t rouse her to consciousness.
Desperately, he dragged himself toward her, the halberd’s
heavy pole-handle scraping the floor and sending fresh rounds of agony clawing
through him with every inch of progress he made.
Almost there...almost there...
“Jedda,” he rasped. Her eyes opened, dazed and lacking the
brilliance he loved to see. “I need your power, baby. You can do it.”
All around her, the ice-blue glow of the gem’s power
flickered to life. But “flickered” was the key word. Her power was fluctuating,
weak, and they were in some serious trouble.
Jedda wasn’t afraid of dying. Especially not if dying
meant Razr could return to Heaven and would no longer suffer the horrific
torture he’d been subjected to for years.
But dying for any other reason was bullshit, and the sight
of him trying to drag himself to her, a weapon impaled in his back, misery
etched on his handsome face...it made her angry and heartbroken and dammit, her
will to live was stronger than this.
Even as her mind rallied, her body failed. Gemstones formed
all around her, large ones, powerful ones. She wasn’t just bleeding; her organs
were failing.
A smile twisted Shrike’s lips as he threw out his hand, and
a sizzling strike of lightning hit Razr in the neck. He tried to scream, but
the only thing that came from his ruined throat was smoke.
“No,” she croaked. “No!”
Gritting her teeth, she found one last surge of energy. One
last chance to end this. With a shout of agony, she lunged at Razr, sliding
through her own slippery blood. Somehow, her hand found his, her fingers
closing around the glowing gemstone in his ring.
It was enough. As if she’d plugged them into an electrical
socket, they both lit up with an ice-blue aura of energy.
“Stop them!” Darlah shouted.
Frantic, Razr’s bitch of an ex reached for the nearest
weapon, a dart, and hurled it at Jedda. But, just like
in the mines, her body sensed danger and her skin hardened into a diamond
shield.
The dart bounced harmlessly to the floor.
Oh, that necrocrotch
skank had to die. And if Jedda survived this, she was going to give
Suzanne a huge high-five for turning Jedda on to such a
perfect term.
Shrike produced a ball of fire at his fingertips, but he
wasn’t fast enough. Razr, energized by the gem connection he shared with Jedda,
triggered an atomic shockwave of death in an expanding circular wave. The
entire building shook, and a chorus of screams filled the air. Blood and body
parts rained down in a gruesome tempest of obliteration, and when it was over,
nothing was left standing.
Not even the necrocrotch skank.
Pain throbbed through every cell, but it was the exquisite
pain of regeneration, and Jedda welcomed it. Groaning, she swept her arm
through the gemstones on the floor, absorbing them back into her body to
accelerate the process.
“Razr?” Weakly, she lifted her head, expecting to see him
picking up his own pieces.
Instead, she saw him lying in a pool of blood, his eyes open
and glazed with pain. Sure, the halberd impaled in his back probably had
something to do with that, but worse, so did the fact that his damned Azdai glyph was lit up.
“Fucking angels.” Emotion choked her, leaving her voice
completely wrecked. “How can they do this to you? How?”
Tears streamed down her face, and the gems that formed from
them clinked on the floor, creating a heart-wrenching score for what had turned
out to be both a victory and a defeat. She’d survived, they’d both
survived, but Razr’s life hadn’t changed.
Sobbing, she crawled over to him and wrenched the halberd
from his body. He didn’t make a sound, and for a moment afterward, she thought
he was dead. Diamond dust poofed in a massive cloud
as she gathered him in her arms, but when he took a deep, ragged breath, she
cried out in relief.
“What can I do?” she asked. Begged, really. “I won’t hurt
you again. Anything but that.”
Blood dripped from the corner of his mouth.
“Stop,” he wheezed. “Let it happen.”
Let what happen? “I don’t understand. Razr?
Please...”
“Shh.” His hand shook as he reached up and traced a finger
over her lips. “You need...to go.”
“No––”
“You...” He swallowed. “You said...you’d do anything. I want
you to go.”
“Why?”
“Angels.” He shivered violently. “They’re coming.”
Terror turned her blood to ice. They’d kill her. They’d kill
her to release the Enoch gem from storage. Panic threatened to swamp her, but
before the diamond dust made another glittery show, she pulled it back. No. She
would not give in to fear. And she would not give in to Razr.
If angels were coming, she’d stay.
One way or another, Razr’s nightmare was coming to an end.