Incendiary (The Premonition Series (Volume 4)) (35 page)

“
You
’
ve heard of me,”
Valer
ius’
cruel
s
mile shows
some of his
per
fectly s
traight teeth. “
Did my brother, Valentine, mention me perhaps?
”
He’
s billboard-
si
ze now, looking like he could’
ve just stepped off an ad
in Time S
quare. I’
ve seen their
ability to shape
shi
ft before,
but it still makes me shiver in fear.

Ducking his head
, Valerius
reaches
out and
swipes
me
off my feet, crushing
me in his fist like a paper doll
. Reed, flying to my side, tries
to pry the fingers of the Ifrit open to dislodge me from his grasp. Using h
is other hand,
Valerius
plucks
Reed off his thu
mb
, flinging him away so that Reed crashes
into the wall by the bar
.

Beginning to grow again
, Valerius
and I
immediately clear
t
he basement, breaking the plane
of the first floor that is
completely torn apart. The crushing pressure from the
Ifrit’s fist eases
, probably because his hand is expanding rapidly.
As he opens his fist
, I
rest against his palm and
see that we’
re level with the snow-covered rooftop
s. Fallen angels cover the sloping roofs, watching and waiting for events to unfold. Gancanagh have blocked
off the entrances
to this
street
with military vehicles. There are no cars
or humans about that I can see, maybe because there is at least three feet of snow covering everything
.

The swirl of scorching breath burns the snow from the sky as Valerius snarls, “YOU ARE THE HALF-BREED WHO
BARGAINED FOR
VALENT
INE’
S
DEATH.”

My wing lifts up to shield my skin from the burning fire that passes from his lips. I smell the scent of my singed feathers as they smolder.
“HE TORTURED MY FRIENDS
!” I retort, lowering my wing a few inches to see his reaction.

“HE W
AS A PRINCE!” Valerius re
p
lies in outrage
. My wing again takes the brunt of the heat
.

“HE
WAS AN EVIL A-HOLE!” I shout
,
trying with no success to match his abrasive tone.

Somewhere in the distance,
the high-pitch
ed
trumpet
ing
of
horn
s sound
. I
n the next instant, like crows on a wire, the Fallen that have been crouching on the pitched rooftops take flight. Their wings flap in panic, scattering them in confusion. When the
horns
sound again it’
s
like a signal for a
ttention;
the Fallen all hover
in stasis, looking around at the skies above them with grim expressions.

Peeking from b
eneath my wing, I look
above me
at Valerius’
face
as he silently scans
the skies above his head
, too
.

Thunk
—
the sound
comes from
an
arrow piercing the chest of a
f
all
en angel flying near us. B
ristling, red f
eathers of the arrow’s shaft protrude from him like a declaration of war
.
Then,
thunk, thunk, thunk, thunk, thunk
, several more arrows pepper
his chest, causing blood to s
p
ew from his mouth while he freefalls
thr
ough the air toward the ground.

Pulling my wing ba
ck from my face, I straighten
just enoug
h to feel the full impact of strong
arms going around me, plucking me from the palm of
the giant Ifrit with a bone-crunching
jolt.

“UGHH,” my breath co
me
s
out in a rush as all the wind is knock
ed
out of my lungs.

“Sorry,
love,” Reed says
, gritting his teeth and d
odging through the arms of f
allen
angels
who have zeroed in on us as their target
s
.

Missing us by centimeters
, the
streaming
black
hair of a beautiful f
allen angel touches
my skin
. His strong hands reach
out to try t
o pluck me from Reed’s arms, but his hands fall
away
as another angel pounces onto his back. This
blond-haired
divine angel slips a dagger beneath the fallen one’s throat and slits
it
with a grim expression while blood spatters
back onto his chest from the velocity of flight.

“Who was that?
” I breathe
, watching the blond angel fling himself off the dead angel and onto th
e
back of another f
allen angel.

“One of Tau’s army,” Reed says
, diving lower to avoid the broadsword that just about cut us both in half.
Chaos has
erupted in the air as both fallen and d
ivine angels
are
flying around, engaging
in a fierce battle.

Glancing behind us
, I watch as Valerius
shape
shifts
again, growing wings from his arms that resemble a pterodactyl’s while he has reduced in size to roughly fifteen feet in length.

“
HE’
S
BEHIND US
!
” I s
hout
a w
arning to Reed, but Valerius
di
ve
s
at us, s
triking Reed in the back with his
fists and forcing us to spiral toward the ground below.
Managing to gain
control from the spin
, Reed spread
s
his wings wide, gliding between buildings in a zig
zag pattern as we near the snow-
covered street below.

Valerius
swipes
at Reed’s legs, causin
g him to lose balance. We plow
into the ground, tumbling and skidding on the snow and ice. Landing s
oftly beside me, the Ifrit hauls
me to my feet by the scruff of my sweater, pulling me up to his eye level.

Reed picks up a parked car and swi
ng
s
it into Valerius’
back. The roof of the car caves
in around
the Ifrit, but the monster barely
notice
s
the impact. Shrugging
off the car, the Ifrit turns and breathes
a stream of scorching breath at Reed, bu
rning his chest
and searing
his left forearm as he brings it up to shield his face. Reed does
n’t make a sound, even when I know h
e’s in agony. Instead, he rushes
the Ifrit, skewering it with a steal rod from the smashed car.

Valerius
merely looks annoy
ed
but little else. The monster
ignores Reed
,
instead
turning back
to me. “Did you enjoy Valentines death?
” he
hisses
,
while
holding me up a little higher
with
his
arm extended
in front of him
.
Reaching back
with his other hand
, he plucks
Reed from his back, dangling Reed
by his neck next to me.

“Is this your
aspire
?” h
e asks
me
of Reed
, his
eye
bro
ws drawing together in a sneer.
Desperately trying to pull
energy to me
,
I
feel it
b
urn
. “Answer me!” Valerius
demands
between gritted teeth, while shaking me roughly.

“YES!” I shout
at him.
“He’s my
aspire
!”

Scowling at me, he growls
, “Then he will be payment for Valentine
.”

Releasing
pent-up energy, I whisper
, “Ice like fire, cold and true, Freeze him quickly, through and through…
”

Crac
king ice streams
up Valeriu
s
’
forearm, stiffening him and covering him
,
so
that in seconds, he resembles
a
fifteen-f
oot
ice sculpture.
Reed smashes
his fists int
o Valerius’
hand, cracking the ifrit
’s
limb off.
He
drops
to the g
r
ound, landing on his feet. Using h
is fist, Reed shatters Valerius’
snowy hand
that still has
me suspend
ed in air, breaking it off. When h
e
catches
me in his arms, h
e holds
me to him in a death grip.

“You can kill Ifrits, Evie,” Reed whisper
s
in my ear, sounding like he’s in awe.
“
That was a test
. The Fallen want
ed to see if you could kill it.”

“You don’
t think the Ifrit was sent by Brennus?
” I reply
, feeling like I might go into shock
at any second. Pulling
back fr
om
me
gently, Reed
let
s
me go.

“
I think Brennus is losing control. The Fallen want you, too
, and he’
s not here
to stop t
hem. Larken and Hail
, the two Fallen back at the bar
,
were attempting to capture
you before Brennus
arrives. They may also be
preventing
him from
getting here,”
Reed says as he looks around, surveying the area.

He trudges through the snow
to the smashed car and plucks
a
steel bar from it. Reed uses the bar like a bat, swinging it at the icy statue
of Valerius
and
shattering him into
a thousand
pieces of
ice.

“Brennus does
want ye, Genevieve, a
nd
we’
re
right:
da
only ting ye can trust about
aingeal
s
is dat dey’
ll turn on ye
whenever it suits dem.
” Lonan says
from near the st
reet lamp twenty yards away. “Brennus is
obsess
ed wi’ ye
. He was willing ta
take dis
risk ta
get ye away from yer
aingeal
—ta kill h
im and erase him from yer heart
.
” Turning to Reed, Lonan says, “He wants ye dead,”
his gaze shifts back to me, “
and he wants his queen. W
e’re ready ta see whah all da fuss is about…give us a taste of ye and we’ll let ye be one of us again.
”

Stepping in front of me, Reed
block
s
me with his
body from Lonan, Cavan,
and Alastar.
C
lick, click, click
, Lonan and the fellas
engage
their fangs.