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“You’ve got an hour to get through your morning chores, and then we’ll be exercising the horses out in the pasture.”
I blinked. He didn’t normally have anything to do with the horses. “Oh, um... it’s fine, Father, I can—” He glared at me, and I stopped talking immediately.
“Spoke to Ted and Jimmy last night. They saw some of those hellion demon things not too far from here. Old George up at Northpoint lost sheep the other night. Ripped to shreds.”
I stared at him in shock. “Hellions? So close to here? They normally gravitate toward the cities...”
He shrugged. “Whatever they normally do, there’s a load of them in the area, so I’ll be coming with you with the Remington. Those horses are worth good money, and I will not give them up to hell spawn.”
I nodded and turned back to the door. It was only as I closed it quietly behind me that I realized he’d only decided to come to protect the horses.
TWO
DYLAN
A boom of thunder startled me awake, and I flinched at the flash of lightning that flooded my room with bright white light. A second flare of light followed, and then a third. I frowned. I thought thunder came after lightning. There were more flashes, and then a crashing noise from inside the house.
My father burst through my bedroom door, a dark hulking shadow in the night. “Get up now!” he demanded, throwing something heavy down on the bed—the Remington. I looked up to see his heavier Beretta in his hand. “Get up,” he repeated, dragging the covers away. I swung my legs over the side of the bed as the lightning flashed again.
“What...”
“The hellions, they are here. Get your shoes on and follow me.” He backed out of the room, so I took a deep breath and rolled out of bed. I’d only gone to bed a few hours ago, or so it seemed, and my body was still aching from the work of the day before. My father wouldn’t stand for complaints though, and the hellions certainly wouldn’t give a damn, so I found my leather work boots, slipped my bare feet into them, and grabbed my battered brown leather jacket off the door. I followed my father down the hall, gripping the sleek shotgun tightly. As we got downstairs, a scream rang out. I gasped, and my father swore.
“Fuckers got to the pigs! Come on, girl!” He tossed a bag of cartridges at me, and I slipped the strap around my waist. He moved through the hallway in the dark, pausing to listen before he reached out and slowly turned the key. More screams sounded, and I cringed, but I took a deep breath as he turned the handle and then followed him silently outside. I hated the thought of those things being anywhere near our animals.
I gasped as we stepped out onto the veranda. The ground in front of the house was empty, but dark shapes swarmed past the first barn. I could hear Jess barking somewhere nearby, and I sent a silent prayer skywards for her safety. Fear twisted like snakes in my stomach as I thought back to the dark, animalistic, distorted beings I’d seen on TV, captured by people’s phone cameras.
“Keep close, shoot anything that moves,” my father whispered. I nodded, even though he couldn’t see me, and we moved quietly through the gap between the barns. As we stepped out in the open, my father opened fire. He brought down two almost immediately, and I raised my gun, aimed at the nearest dark shape, and fired. It went down.
“Good girl,” my father said, and my chest warmed. Praise from him was rare.
We made our way toward the pig shed, taking out another three hellions before we reached it. I stepped past the bodies, grimacing at the twisted, deformed black figures that lay smoking on the ground, their black blood sinking into the mud. As I rounded the corner where the ground sloped toward the pastures, I stopped in my tracks. The field beyond was crawling with hellions. There must have been at least twenty of them, though it was hard to tell in the faint moonlight. They weren’t what made me freeze or my father stop dead in his tracks, however.
“God in heaven,” he muttered.
There, in the fields in front of us, stood four actual angels, their flaming white swords ablaze and their glorious wings spread as they fought off the hellions. The creatures attacked in groups, making it hard for the angels to hold them off, even with their fiery swords. White flames ran along the blades, and they hissed as they sliced through the hellions like butter. More kept coming, and I saw one go down with a yell of pain. The angel nearest him backed up, slashing at the creatures that tore at his friend. More creatures streamed out from the shadows in the nearby trees, and the blond angel nearest us turned and saw them. His blade dipped slightly, and I realized he was exhausted. I stepped forward, past my father, and brought the gun to my shoulder. As one of the creatures leapt for the blond angel, I fired. It hit the thing dead on, and it yelped before hitting the ground heavily. The blond turned toward us, his golden eyes traveling over us briefly, and I felt the tiny hair on the back of my neck stand up as those eyes met mine. He turned away with a nod of thanks, diving back into the fray.
I heard my father’s gun go off, and I joined him, moving closer to the ruckus to get a better shot. I noticed the bodies of several of our pigs on the ground. They’d been ripped apart, their blood and guts spread over the ground. Bile rose in my throat, but I swallowed it down and carried on firing and reloading as needed.
“Dylan!” my father called out suddenly from behind me, and I turned, lowering the gun for a fraction of a second. A hellion leapt out of nowhere, and I went crashing to the ground, my gun spinning out of my hand. I felt its sharp claws piercing my skin, and the pain shocked me into action. I brought my knees up between us and kicked as its sharp teeth aimed for my throat. Its jaw snapped shut an inch away, and I shoved harder, but the creature was strong and I was losing ground. Suddenly, the teeth retreated, and I looked up to see the blond angel standing over me. The hellion lay dead at my side, smoking from the deep, charred slash across its belly.
I managed to rise on my elbows as I stared up at the angel who saved me. He breathed hard as his golden eyes traveled up my body. My boots were covered in mud, and my nightdress, no longer white, had ridden up and was baring a good deal of my thigh to his golden gaze. His eyes finally met mine, and he offered me his hand. He pulled me up and wrapped his arm around my waist, holding me tightly against him as he turned, sword in hand, as another hellion lunged toward us. With one slash of his white blade, the thing went down, only to be replaced by another.
“Dylan!” my father shouted, and I realized he hadn’t been trying to warn me but to call for help. He was down on his knees with his gun gripped in both hands and several cartridges spilled on the ground at his side. He’d been trying to reload. A hellion circled him and lurched forward.
I cried out as my father held the gun up, wedging the long barrel between the thing’s jaws. The angel at my side moved forward, taking out another hellion and gripping me tightly so I couldn’t move away from him—not that my father seemed to need help. I watched as his expression changed from panicked to furious. He got back on his feet, slid the gun out of the creature’s mouth, and swung it hard, hitting the creature across the head with the stock. The hellion stepped back, slightly dazed, and my father moved forward, swinging the gun again and again, beating its head until it went down. Even then he didn’t stop. He screamed as he beat it over and over until there was nothing recognizable on the ground, just a bloody mess.
I watched in horror, though not in surprise. My father had lost his temper, and it wasn’t the first time. The angel at my side lowered his sword, and the white flames faded. I looked around and saw that the remaining hellions had made a run for it, retreating into the trees, though plenty of bodies littered the ground around us. I looked up at the being who still held me close. His dark blond hair was trimmed quite short, though I could see it would have a strong curl if it were left to grow, and his skin was golden, marred only by splashes of black blood from the hellions he’d killed. His nose was narrow, his cheekbones were high, and his jawline was strong. He looked every inch an angel.
He pulled me closer against his chest, and I could feel the warmth of his arm around me through the thin cotton of my nightdress.
“Are you hurt?” he asked.
I stared up at him. Was I hurt? I honestly wasn’t sure. I couldn’t feel anything except the hammering of my heart in my chest.
“Let go of her,” a rough voice commanded, and the gentle expression on the angel’s face faded as a dark, sleek gun barrel came into contact with his temple.
My heart sank.
