Shadows in the Silence (33 page)

I didn’t wait for the flames to disperse before I burst through, looking for Sammael once more. But instead of him, I saw his army of demonic crawling toward the bottom of the hill.

“Madeleine!” I screamed, praying she would hear me. “Engage!”

Almost immediately, our army rushed forward. The demonic front line, confused as I’d hoped, halted their march. They lifted their swords, turning their offensive strike to defensive, as the angelic forces cascaded down the hill and collided with the demonic. There was a tremendous sound, almost unidentifiable. voices grunting and bodies thudding and sword strikes and dying…There was so much of everything that it was like a relentless white noise. The overwhelming numbers of demonic reapers began to pour around the edges of our center and I glimpsed a few attempting to climb the hill.

I pointed at them and called to Will, “Take care of them! Don’t let them find Cadan’s forces!”

Will nodded and took off like a shot, cutting through the overflowing demonic reapers. As the enemy force began to weaken and thin its front, I looked for Ava and Marcus, who waited with their troops, watching the battle intently.

I hopped onto a rock ledge so that I could be seen and heard by my army. “Left and right flanks, engage!”

The answering battle cries were deafening; boots thudded the earth as the remainder of my front line swept both sides of the demonic forces and closed in. Amidst the metallic shrieks of clashing swords, the guns belong to Ethan Stone’s mercenaries flashed and popped like hundreds of small fireworks. Bodies were cut down as the angelic reapers pushed and carved into the demonic troops, squeezing them tighter into one another.

With a manic grin, I turned around to signal for our sky infantry. “Cadan!” I called, letting the wind carry my cry. “Engage!”

My voice echoed into oblivion. There was no response of battle cries and rushing of soldiers. There was nothing. He didn’t come.

Oh, God. Oh my God
. Where was he? Where was Cadan?

My heart pounded faster and heavier, like a train rocketing toward me. I didn’t want to believe that he’d abandoned me,
betrayed
me. Cadan, my friend. He told me that he loved me. I’d even…I’d even
what
? Had feelings for him? Loved him, maybe?

“Cadan!” I screamed.
“Cadan!”

The demonic reapers I believed came to fight for me, believed could help us win this battle….

They were gone.

I was wild with fear, spinning, looking in every direction,
staring up at the sky, hoping to see them diving down to engulf the enemy and finish them off.

My eyes returned to the battlefield. I could no longer see Marcus. I watched Berengar fall, crumbling to stone. Madeleine was taken down by an ursid reaper and then I lost her position. And Ava. oh, Ava. A demonic reaper opened her throat and slashed again, taking her head with the second strike. I felt my human soul wither and tears came through my eyes, running into the blood on my cheeks. I looked for Will, but I couldn’t see him. There were too many bodies struggling above more bodies on the ground.

I turned, unable to bear the sight of the carnage, and I turned right into Lilith. I took in a sharp, painful gasp.

“Oh, did someone leave you high and dry?” she asked as if speaking to a child with a skinned knee. Then she punched me right in the face, making my head snap back. “That can’t possibly help your abandonment issues, can it?”

I snarled and sliced my fiery swords toward her. She flicked a wrist and my body went soaring through the air. My back slammed into a stone wall between a row of crumbling ruins. With another wave of her hand, I zipped through space again and the front of my body hit the wall opposite the narrow path. I moaned in pain as her power smashed my body into the rock and mortar. She flung me across the road again and this time
through
a wall. I landed in a heap of crumbling stone, dirt, and earth crushing my body. Lilith lifted me, every part of me shrieking in agony, through the mountain of
debris covering me and I didn’t realize my swords were missing until I was high in the air and frozen by her power coiling around my limbs. I thrashed as much as I could, but she held me too tightly. Then she hurled me over a rock ledge and into a pit. My body slammed into the enormous sacrificial altar so powerfully that the stone foundation erupted, leaving me in a crater of my own making and my broken wings sprawled out beneath me. It was all too much for me to even stop and notice the irony of my situation.

I was unarmed, beaten to a pulp, and abandoned by Azrael and Cadan. As I stared up into the black, starless sky, catching Lilith’s silhouette at the top of the ledge she’d thrown me from, a tear slid down my cheek.

No
. I couldn’t feel defeated already. I’d come so far, through thousands of years of torment and war to get here. I couldn’t give up, but I needed help.

“Azrael,” I whispered as I slowly pushed myself off the ground, closing my fist around a handful of pebbles. Blood ran down my arm and dirt clung to my hair and clothing. “Azrael,
please
. I need you, Brother.”

Lightning cracked across the sky, over and over, crisscrossing each strike and never fading. The atmosphere grew heavy and low, pulsing, hammering with thunder. I stared, perplexed, as the clouds parted as if a knife were being drawn through them, carving a gash a million miles long.

And then the angels poured in through the hole in the sky.

THEY WERE SO BEAUTIFUL, THE ANGELS, AS THEY dropped from the sky like pearls swinging off a broken necklace, bright and gleaming and tumbling through the air. The angels descended on the demonic reapers as Cadan’s forces had been meant to do. one of them came straight toward me, shooting like a fireball. He slowed and I recognized him. His silvery wings reflected light off his armor and his dark skin was luminescent, russet eyes streaked with gold. I had to blink. He seemed a little human in his corporeal form.

“I apologize for my poor punctuality, Sister,” Azrael said, smiling ear to ear, “but I brought some friends.”

He offered me a hand and as soon as I took it, heat rocketed through my body to the tips of my wings, healing me instantly. “You came,” I breathed, having to force the words out past my utter shock.

“We were at last given the orders to descend to Earth,” he said happily. “Michael leads the legion. We will devastate the demonic Hellspawn. It’s up to you to defeat Sammael.”

“But not alone,” came another voice. Antares settled to the ground beside Azrael, her gleaming auburn hair settling around shoulders and wings. She had returned to her former glory and was even more achingly beautiful than before. “I don’t believe our bargain was entirely even,” she said. “I’d like to amend that tonight, if you’ll accept my assistance.”

I held out a hand for her to shake. “Thank you.”

Antares watched my hand curiously, and then I realized how human the gesture was. But she surprised me when she took my hand in both of hers and held it tight. “I’m honored to fight with you,” she said.

“And I with you, but—” I turned to Azrael. “I lost my swords.”

“You don’t need them anymore.” Azrael held out his arm and the hallowed glaive shimmered into existence. I stared at it, bathed in the beauty of the weapon, and I took the staff tenderly in both my hands. I closed my fingers around it, feeling the heat from its energy course into me and meld with my own, as if it were merely an extension of me—a fifth limb.

“Remember what I told you,” Azrael said, voice grave, “about summoning the power to use the hallowed glaive.”

I looked up to meet his gaze. “I know. I’m ready. Thank you, Brother.”

Antares called a long, elegantly curved sword. “I will meet you on the battlefield. Good luck to you.” Her wings carried her into the air, and she was gone.

“I must return to Michael now,” Azrael said. “All of our brothers and sisters have come to fight and to bid you farewell.”

I smiled at him. “I’m happy that I won’t be alone when I lie down for the last time.”

Azrael jumped into the sky, beat his wings once, and shot toward the battlefield so fast that he became a ball of fire once again. I squeezed the staff of the hallowed glaive again, testing its center of balance. I wasn’t nearly as tall as Azrael, but the glaive, behaving like a sentient thing, seemed to adjust to exactly where I needed it.

“Gabriel!”
Lilith screamed in rage from above.

I answered her call, leaping into the air, feeling rejuvenated by my healed body and new hope. The black eyes of the Demon Queen fixed on me as I dived for her, and the hallowed glaive lit up with angelfire from blade to pommel. She drew her own weapon, a thin blade nearly as long as she was tall. From above, I struck, swiping left and right with the glaive. Her sword glanced off each blow and she whipped her body out of the glaive’s path when I thrust it right at her chest. This was my vulnerable point, I realized, when she sliced open my arm. I left myself open with every attack. I hissed in pain and spun my body, smashing the pole of my weapon into her back. She hit the dirt with a
grunt and my boots found the earth.

“I hate you,” she snarled. “You, and everything you stand for.”

“The feeling is mutual, I assure you,” I said in return.

We circled each other, searching for any sign of weakness. She wore no armor, so all I needed to do was get past her sword. The length of the glaive would help me do that, but I still felt a little clumsy and unused to such a small blade in proportion to the long helve. I charged at her again and her blade met my strike; left and right I sliced, cutting fabric and flesh as she cut mine. I launched off the ground and kicked her in the chest. As she staggered away, I flipped the glaive over my head and thrust. The blade plunged into her belly, just shy of her heart.

She bared her teeth at me, grabbed the helve, and yanked the blade from her body. She held fast and I refused to let go of my weapon. She dragged me toward her and slashed with her sword. When I ducked to avoid losing my head, she kicked me in the ribs and then again right under the chin. I flipped end over end through the air and hit the ground with a grunt, feeling my cracked ribs and jaw twisting and snapping back into place. The healing was even more agonizing than when they first broke. Lilith came toward me and I struggled to rise, flailing, and every muscle in my torso shrieked as the ribs healed. I reached for the glaive, but she crushed her boot into my wrist, shattering it as well. I screamed in pain, writhing.

“My favorite song!” Lilith said joyfully. “Though I do prefer the chorus to the verses. What shall I break next to get you to sing the bridge?”

“Ellie!”

My head fell to the side just in time to spot Cadan jetting toward us. Lilith snarled, having noticed him too. She cast a hand out, her power grabbing his body and hurling him over her head through the air. He hit the rocky ground with a thud and an earsplitting crack and then lay still.

With my good hand, I grabbed a fistful of dirt and pebbles, and just as Lilith looked back at me, I chucked the debris into her face. She screeched and clawed at her eyes, but she lost enough of her focus for me to roll free. I grabbed the pole on my way to my feet and shoved the blade with all of my strength right through her chest, punching through her body cavity, stopping her cold.

Lilith dropped to her knees and the glaive’s magic killed her, sending lightning through her veins and crackling in her open mouth and eyes. I ripped the blade back out and she began to shudder violently, collapsing onto her back. Her death throes finally faded when her life did, and the lightning consumed her in angelfire flames. As the power of the hallowed glaive took the Demon Queen’s life, I could feel it slowly taking mine with her. I’d used so much of my angelic energy to destroy her that I wasn’t sure if I had enough left in me to battle Sammael. It was suddenly harder for me to breathe. My limbs felt heavier and a bit
numb, as if they were full of sand.

I darted toward where Cadan had fallen, and I crumpled to the ground by his side. I checked him for injuries, which healed quickly, and I held his face, searching his opal eyes.

“Cadan,” I said to him, turning his face to mine.

He grimaced with pain as he sat upright. “Did you get her?”

I nodded. “What happened?” I asked him. “Why didn’t you move the forces? Where are Adara and Anders?”

“Anders killed Adara,” he answered with a grunt of discomfort as bones cracked into their rightful positions. “The traitor tried to stop us from engaging.”

Rage boiled through me. “Where is Anders?”

“Over there,” he said with a gesture of his head in one direction and then in the other. “And over there. He’s in a few pieces after he tried to kill me too. The
stupid
traitor.”

I smiled at that, overjoyed that what I feared had happened wasn’t the truth. “I worried that you had betrayed me.”

His expression crushed with hurt. “No. Never.”

“Thank God,” I said, and hugged him close.

When I released him, he smiled up at me a little deliriously. “You’re a beautiful angel. You glow. And you’re badass. Just as I thought you’d be. You never disappoint.”

“Hit on me later,” I said with a grin. “We’ve got a war to win.”

I took his hand and helped him to his feet. “Where are the demonic troops?”

“Still waiting,” he said. “Anders distracted me from hearing your signal and I never sent them.”

“That’s okay. Heaven sent reinforcements. I give you my signal now to engage. Clean up what’s left of Sammael’s forces and I will find him and destroy him. My body is growing tired and I have to do this now before I’m too weak. I want to say good—”

Cadan took my hand and pulled me to his chest, making me gasp. He touched my cheek, thumb brushing my bottom lip. “No,” he said gently. “That will not be the last thing you say to me.”

His fire-opal eyes, hardened, impassioned, moved over my face, my throat, my shoulder, my wings. He opened his mouth and inhaled, but he said nothing. He just gave a nearly imperceptible shake of his head and gazed at me.

“I have no words,” he told me.

I stared at him and swallowed, feeling my heart whirring in my chest. “That’s a first.”

He grinned sideways and drew my face to his. He kissed my cheek, pausing, lingering as if we had all the time in the world to just stay like that. He held me close, as if we’d just been dancing and I couldn’t help closing my eyes and leaning into him. This kind of comfort was something I’d never experienced as an angel before, this human sort of love, a friendship.

He pulled away and I opened my eyes to his face. “Thank you,” he said, all the humor gone from his expression. “For fixing me.”

“You never needed redemption,” I told him. I put my hand to his chest. “You had it in your soul all this time. I never would’ve made it this far without you.”

“You’ll make it farther,” he promised. “Don’t give up hope. Now go. Kill the Lord of Souls.”

I didn’t have it in me to tell him that I was already dying, but I understood that he knew. I just needed to find my strength and keep fighting. I squeezed the helve of the hallowed glaive in my hand. The staff was so solid that it gave not even a gasp under my strength.

Cadan turned and jogged toward the back of the hill where his forces waited. I stood, strung so tight I felt like I was about to snap, as I listened to the assembly of the legion of demonic reapers who’d pledged their loyalty to Heaven. There was a great rushing of wind as wings and talons took flight, blackening the crest of Armageddon with their shadows as they descended on the armies of Hell.

I raced through a path between crumbling buildings toward the top of a rock ledge to watch the demonic reapers descend on their kin. I searched for Sammael, but I couldn’t see him. Where he had gone when his leonine reapers had distracted me was a mystery.

“Sammael!”
I screamed. “Come and show your face, you coward! Sammael!”

A hand clasped around my throat from behind me, tightening around my windpipe until it creaked. “Here I am, Sister,” he hissed, his ice-cold lips brushing my ear.

I cracked the back of my skull into his nose. He roared in anger and I twisted away, swiping the glaive through the air between us. The blade shrieked across his chest plate.

The Lord of Souls glanced down at the gleaming streak I’d put in his armor and frowned. “Azrael’s glaive.”

“Look familiar?” I taunted, circling him.

“When he and I last met,” Sammael said, “Azrael fought me with that blade.”

“He should have killed you with it,” I growled. “But I supposed he’s left that up to me.”

I charged at him, slashing and thrusting the blade, forcing him to move backward. The staff of his scythe clanged off the staff of mine, the angelfire lighting the space between us, and his demonfire exploded, the flames dancing obsidian and midnight. I caught the scythe in the hook blades of the partisan. The demonfire blazing against my skin felt more like acid than flames. My wings beat once to launch my body into the air, dragging the scythe with me as I spiraled over Sammael’s head. I forced his weapon to the ground and released it to thrust my blade toward his face. The metal ripped through his corpse-gray cheek, flinging blood. He stepped aside, scowling and wiping his cheek with the back of the obsidian gauntlet covering his hand.

I thrust with the blade again and he whirled out of its path, smashing his elbow into my face as he came around. I hit the ground on my back and I kicked him in the knee. He grunted and collapsed forward and I kicked him in the
chin. His head snapped back and he staggered, falling to his knees. I scrambled away, jumped to my feet, and returned to my ward just as Madeleine had taught me. I tried not to think about her, for fear that she was dead along with Ava.

I gasped for breath. My body was buckling. This power—it was all too much for me. I’d remained in Heaven for decades to gain power, and now it was killing me. I had to call all of it in order to use the hallowed glaive and it was slowly destroying me.

Sammael was angry. With blood smeared across his face and golden eyes blazing, he launched himself at me, charred wings wide. He swung the burning scythe up high, towering over me, dangling bones and teeth clinking against each other, and he brought it down in a sweeping arc as I threw my weapon to parry his. The scythe hooked through one of the outer partisan blades and completely around the staff, and he pulled the glaive right out of my hands. It went soaring through the air behind him, landing nearly two dozen feet away from me, and my angelfire went out like a candle flame. Before I could dart around him to retrieve the weapon, his form vanished and reappeared in front of me, blocking my path. I ran the other way, but he blocked me again. I needed the glaive. Without a weapon I would die immediately. I raced directly for him, to his surprise, but instead of colliding with him, I hit the ground and slid across the pebbles and dirt and right through his legs. I stopped sliding and rolled to maintain my momentum, and I collected the
glaive. My heart pounded. I felt my strength slipping.