“I don’t know—this is all wrong,” I reply, looking around. “There’s nobody here at all.”
Lachlan shakes his head. “The guards should ha’ been ordered to patrol.” He pauses. “It should ha’ never gotten this bad. I’m going to shift and fly ahead to check our path. Stay here,” he orders.
But nothing happens. His wings stay tattoos, and his brow creases in concentration.
“What’s happening?” I whisper.
He puffs his cheeks out with the effort before grunting. “I canna shift. There’s something blocking my power.” His breath comes out in a long whoosh.
“Has that ever happened before?” I ask barely above a whisper.
“Nae, I’ve never had issues performing before,” he says, rolling his eyes.
I snort loudly at his obvious joke and then freeze, clapping my hands over my mouth before shooting a glare at him.
“This is not the time.”
But Lachlan winks at me. “You needed a second to breathe.”
He is right, and his joke eases some of the tension that had begun tightening my shoulders.
Growling rumbles from up the street, and my stomach bottoms out. As the tallest, Tane has the vantage point we need to see over the building debris. “It’s—holy gods,” Tane swears. His skin goes a sickly pale color, and his eyes widen with fear before narrowing into slits. “We’re under attack.”
My blood stills in my veins as I make eye contact with Lachlan.
“It’s demons,” Tane breathes, his face frozen in horror.
“Change of plans,” I order. “We stick together and we work as a team. Mathilda and Tane, you guys take the right side of the street, Elowen, Evander, and Mina will take the left, and Lachlan and I will take the middle.”
I’ve never faced anything remotely this terrifying in my life, but I force myself to stay calm and rely on my training.
Slipping out of our cover, we fan out on the street.
One heartbeat.
We’re trampling through debris.
Another heartbeat.
We’re hurtling towards the demons that have spotted us.
I want to scream. On the page, they were scary, but in real life, nothing compares to the horror right in front of us. Their skin is the mottled gray of corpses with blackened veins visible beneath the lifeless flesh.
Their lipless mouths are stretched grotesquely wide, and their pointed teeth gleam in the firelight as they hurtle over the flames. But their most petrifying feature by far is the hollow black pits of their eyes. No light reflects back from the depths of hellish darkness.
Like a wave crashing on the tide, our forces collide.
With a mighty scream, I slice my ax through the neck of the first demon I encounter. It’s black blood sprays my face as it collapses to my feet. The warmth and odor are enough to make me gag, but the next demon is already racing for me.
It manages to slash at me with its elongated claws. The sharpened talons screech across my breastplate, gouging deep scars into the metal before my sword thrusts through its belly.
Its death scream pierces my ears and has me grinding my teeth as I push harder through its muscles and bones before withdrawing my sword.
The metal of my blade makes a grisly sound as it comes free. Its body crumbles to the ground before me, and I whirl around, ready for the next, but there is none.
With a final savage swing, Lachlan decapitates the last demon of the pack. Its head squelches against the cobblestones. The smell is so putrid that I resort to inhaling through my teethto avoid the stench. I scan my friends to make sure we’ve all remained unscathed.
Mathilda kicks at the lifeless demon in front of her. Her face twisted with disgust. Tane’s eyes are on her. Relief coats his features when he’s satisfied she’s uninjured, and he steps over a corpse and towards her. There are three demon bodies littered around him. Mina wipes her throwing blades off on her leather-clad legs, smearing the black blood.
