Faith (Soul Savers Book 7) (7 page)

I nodded. “I
won’t. I do it for you.”

“And me for you.”

He gripped my hand and
began climbing again. We moved slower, avoiding the monsters in the
walls as they pushed out at us, teeth clacking. As though they also
feared the tunnel of beasts, the Demons didn’t follow, except
one. It flew behind us, quickly closing in, and a hoof rammed into my
head, knocking me to the side. Large, bear-like paws stretched the
membrane of the wall as they tried to grab at me. I sprang away and
crashed into the solid body of Tristan, who had the Demon by its
tail.

The creature’s
deafening screeches echoed down the tunnel as its wings flapped
desperately. When it began to lift Tristan, I jumped up and latched
onto its tail, too, and between the two of us, we were able to tug it
back down. Then we whipped it to the side, slamming its body into the
wall. The things inside the barrier roared and came for the Demon. It
tried to fly out of our grip again, but when we let it go, it swung
around with its blazing sword.

“AHH!”
Tristan’s shout of pain silenced the Demon’s screeches.

It then began to
laugh—if the sound of rocks sliding was a laugh—before
diving down for Tristan. When I saw what it went for, I lunged for my
husband and the fiery blade that had been lodged into his back. The
Demon beat me to it, and Tristan yelled again when it jerked the
sword free. But I was close enough to grab the end of the blade
before it swung out of reach. Biting against the pain as the flames
both seared and froze, I jerked it out of the Demon’s hand. I
flipped it in the air to catch the hilt and swung the blade out,
decapitating the flying beast. Its head fell and rolled down the
slope, and the body chased after it. Demons couldn’t be killed,
but they could certainly be inconvenienced.

As the walls of the
tunnel disappeared, the tilt of the floor grew steeper, causing us to
use our hands as well as our feet to climb, yet I still held onto the
sword. The higher we clambered, though, the sharper the incline
became until we were scaling the vertical face of a cliff. Darkness
swallowed everything below, and although we’d been on the
ground only minutes ago—I thought, anyway—we were in
Hell. Everything could change at Satan’s whim, and I had a
feeling a fall now might never end. Too bad my stupid wings were
useless.

Carrying the sword made
it difficult to climb, but the flames lapping off the blade provided
our only light to find hand and footholds. So, I held onto the weapon
as I followed Tristan upward, and when I felt the warmth, I thought
at first the Hellfire from the sword put it off, but then realized
the wall itself was warming. I craned my head back to see up ahead,
and a wave of heat blew my hair and blasted my skin, feeling like a
bad sunburn.

Then we suddenly hit
the top and passed from hanging onto a frozen, icy wall to stumbling
toward a low, swinging bridge of fire that crossed a flaming lake.
And this fire was
hot
. I couldn’t tell if we were in a
high-ceilinged cave or not—the light of the fire surrounding us
did nothing to illuminate the blackness above. To our right and left,
fire and molten rock covered the banks that sloped down to the lake.
We had no choice but to cross.

“Keep going,”
Tristan ordered, and still holding my hand, he sprinted across the
bridge.

We ran as fast as our
legs could push us, hurdling flames that leapt up in front of us and
swinging at the Demons swooping down, knocking some into the flaming
lake and others into the darkness beyond. The harder and faster we
ran, though, the farther away the shore became. Hands reached up
through the fiery surface of the lake, grabbing at the low bridge and
our ankles. New cries and howls, moans and whimpers filled the air.
Heat singed my nose and throat raw, along with the souls’ agony
I breathed in, tearing me apart further from the inside out. I
stumbled several times, and so did Tristan, but we kept running. And
the distant shore kept stretching farther and farther away.

A large group of Demons
gathered at the far end and charged at us. We stopped, and I looked
over my shoulder, really not wanting to return the way we’d
come, and another group chased us from that direction. We had one
flaming sword and powers that were useless against them. The cries of
the tortured souls around us grew louder, the number of hands
reaching out of the lake at us multiplied, grasping with more
desperation than ever. But we couldn’t help ourselves, let
alone anyone else. As my body began to sink from the weight of our
seemingly hopeless situation, the flames licking at my legs forced me
back up.

Tristan turned toward
me, his face twisted with the same agony I felt, more on the inside
than the physical outside.

“We need to get
out of here,” he yelled.

The Demons behind him
closed in on us, and I felt the ones behind me quickly approaching,
too. The lake of fire surrounded us. Up seemed to be the only way
out—although I couldn’t be certain if there was anything
that way either.

“How the hell do
we get out of Hell?” I shouted above the wails filling my ears
and mind, not sure if I sounded any differently than them.

And I wondered if the
souls in the lake, crying for help and reaching out for us, had been
others who’d tried to escape. Had they been like us, souls that
didn’t belong in Hell, but couldn’t find their way out?
Had they eventually succumbed to the inevitable and let the fire
consume them? Would that be us in the future? If so, it would be the
very near future—the Demons swarmed in.

“I love you,
Tristan,” I said before I never had another chance to tell him,
and I closed my mind to his to give me the element of surprise. I
grabbed his waist, and his arms came up to wrap around me in an
embrace. I ducked under his reach, and with all the strength I could
muster, which was a hell of a lot for my size, I thrust my legs up
and launched him into the air. “Go! Save yourself!”

His legs shot out into
Aikido form as he soared over the Demons’ heads, kicking
several out of his way. He landed on the far side of the group, but
instead of running toward the shore, as I meant for him to do, he
charged back toward them and me.

His voice thundered
angrily in my head. “
No way in hell am I leaving you …
in Hell
.”

Shit.
I should
have known. But I’d had to try.

The Demons’
attention split between the two of us, their heads swerving side to
side as though they tried to decide which one of us to attack first.
Tristan glanced at the fiery blade in my hand and looked back to my
eyes. I gave him a small nod. He distracted those closest to him by
attacking with his fists and feet. While he fought them hand-to-hand,
I sliced and stabbed the fiery blade at those in front of me, cutting
my way toward him, severing a head here and an arm there. They
returned my blows with their own weapons, but they must have been
blind as bats, because their blades and spikes barely grazed me, if
reaching me at all.

But that thought came
too soon. The moment Tristan and I shoved the last Demon between us
into the lake, a stabbing pain pierced throughout my lower back. I’d
ignored the group coming from the other direction for too long, and
one of the Demons had nailed me. I lurched forward and fell downward,
my face only inches from the flames when Tristan’s arms swept
around me. He lifted me, but I could barely hold my weight, leaning
on him as I tried to swing at the Demons.

They bared their
yellow, jagged teeth in grins wide enough to expose their black gums.
They knew they had us. I looked down at the lake of fire, wondering
if it’d be better just to dive in rather than fight these
beasts anymore. We’d die quick, at least … except, we
wouldn’t. We’d be like those other souls baying for our
help. Dismissing that idea, I returned my focus to the Demons just as
one’s claws reached out for my throat. I batted at them with
the sword and sliced them off. The Demon flew up and out of sight in
the blackness. As my eyes followed it upwards, I automatically prayed
for a miracle, although I knew prayers didn’t work down here.
They didn’t work anywhere. And miracles would never come.

A bright light shot
down toward us, followed by another, and I knew I’d been
fooling myself that up was a way out. I envisioned dozens of Demons
sitting on ledges on the sides of cliffs that reached high above us,
reinforcements waiting impatiently to have their turn at attacking
us. Then I realized how stupid that idea was. Why would they wait to
take turns?

These had to have been
some new kind of monstrosity sent to finish us off.

The Demons on the
bridge screeched a horrible sound and lost interest in us. They
sprang into the air, flying toward the white lights. Others came from
seemingly nowhere, and they swarmed the white beings, swirling around
them as though trying to snuff them out.

“
We have to
go
,” Tristan ordered in my head, not to hide his plans
because our thoughts could not be hidden from those in this realm,
but so he could be heard over the cacophony of shrieking Demons and
howling souls.

He took my hand, and we
ran again for the far side of the lake. Both of us constantly looked
over our shoulders to ensure the Demons remained distracted by the
lights twisting and swerving around them. When they came closer and
began to take shape, I stumbled and stopped, pulling Tristan to a
halt.

These were not Demons.
They weren’t Hellish at all. They put off a white light, a pure
light, glowing from the inside out. Their wings were not black or
brown and leathery, but white and feathery, pulled back behind them
for the best aerodynamics as they shot like rockets in an extreme
nosedive toward the lake of fire.

At the last second,
they swooped over and hovered above us.

“You don’t
belong here,” a male voice said, and the Angel who it belonged
to grabbed my wrist and bulleted straight upward.

“Tristan!”
I yelled, but the other Angel grabbed his upper arm and followed us.

A great rumbling
sounded from below, and the fire lake churned like a sea, the flames
growing and licking higher and higher. Some of the flames came
together and took the shape of a hand the size of a bus. It reached
for us, along with another hand, and then a horned head as big as a
house. Lava poured off the colossal beast as its muscular torso rose
from the lake.

Satan’s voice
boomed across the surface like thunder. “Bring them to me!”

The sound came from the
behemoth, and I realized the monster was the true embodiment of
Satan. But as hard as he tried to reach for us, he apparently
couldn’t break free of his own Hell. The rumbling turned into a
furious roar that shook the very air and reverberated into my heart,
making my breath catch.

Dozens of Demons
screeched in response and chased after us. The Angels flew faster,
but the Demons did, too. Talons groped for our arms and legs, trying
to pull us back down. I kicked one off, and it tumbled in the air,
only to latch on to Tristan. Another grabbed him, too, while two more
attacked Tristan’s ride. The fire below glinted off the Angel’s
sword as it lashed out, decapitating both Hellions with one powerful
swing. But additional beasts swarmed onto Tristan, and the more he
and the Angel fought back, the harder they twisted and pulled, until
eventually they yanked him out of the Angel’s grip.

“No!” I
screamed as I hit at the forearm holding onto me, but my Angel
ignored me, seemingly oblivious to what happened below us. My eyes
blurred as tears filled them while I watched my husband fall away
from me. “
Tristan!
”

His hands reached up
for me and for his Angel, as the Demons pulled him down, down, down.
His Angel flew after him. Tristan and the Demons crash-landed on some
kind of land bridge that stretched across the abyss, far below me
now. Hoping it would help, I threw the fiery sword to him.

“We have to go
back,” I yelled at the Angel carrying me away, but he ignored
me and everything else, even his fellow Angel who’d gone back
for Tristan.

We continued up, up,
up. Up and away from Hell … away from my husband. Tears
streamed down my cheeks as I kicked and twisted my body, trying to
yank myself free, but the Angel’s grip was too strong. I swiped
the tears away with my free hand and watched in horror as my big,
powerful warrior grew smaller and smaller below me, using the sword
he’d caught to fight the Demons with the Angel by his side.

Don’t give up
,
I silently called to him.
I’ll come back for you.

The promise echoed in
my head as I watched helplessly while being pulled away from my love,
my heart, my soul, leaving him in Hell.