Bloodline Contingency: An Urban Fantasy Academy Novel (Bloodline Academy Book 12), page 45
I wondered how Pestilence would feel about the callous way his so-called father tossed him aside. Lucifer couldn’t take his eyes off his vessel. Come to think of it, now that I really allowed myself time to look at it, there was something totally off about it too. The aura coming off Lucifer’s vessel was still as bright, but it didn’t appear whole.
Squinting, I couldn’t really make out what was wrong with it. Lucifer reached out and caught my arm. His superior vision covered mine, and I gasped. Threaded throughout Lucifer’s vessel were a million tiny little cracks. Like the scions, Lucifer’s vessel was whole, but it was only intact by a margin.
“What did you do?” Lucifer snarled.
I thought of my inability to create another vessel for him. Regret was a pain in the ass. Astaroth raised his bald head and most of the shifters lowered their heads. Not because he dominated them as such, but because he was so hideous it was difficult to look at him. Lucifer valued beauty above all else. Astaroth was the opposite.
“I didn’t think you wanted this vessel anymore,” Astaroth commented. “After all, were you not thinking of creating a new one?”
How the hell did he know that?
Somewhere amongst us, there was a leak. My suspicions landed squarely on Kai. Lucifer had the same thought. Astaroth inspected Kai like an ant under his boot. When his filthy gaze slid to Leia, Kai pushed her behind him. Instinctively, I grabbed her hand and pulled her towards me, throwing an invisibility circle around her. There were levels of hatred and some hatred that could be put aside.
Look at that, I was growing too.
Astaroth’s assessment of Leia was only marginally better than mine. He smiled at me, causing all the air to suck out of my lungs.
“How similar you are,” Astaroth said. “Some might even think–”
“Nobody cares what you think!” Lucifer spat quickly.
Astaroth laughed aloud. This time, I shuddered with the supernaturals. My limbs had gone cold, and I took a few seconds to notice that the air in general was steadily cooling. Ice gathered around the altars that held Cassie and Aurelia’s bodies.
“Care?” Astaroth asked. “This is the price of caring. You are a weak, pale version of the seraph I knew.”
Without warning, his snake whipped out and struck Lucifer’s vessel. It latched onto the vessel’s neck. Inside, I felt something funnelling through the bond. Glancing inside, I gaped. My bone and hedge magic raced towards Lucifer’s side of the bond. It disappeared where I couldn’t see. Throwing off my inner sight, I looked to Astaroth’s portal to find Lucifer’s vessel sheathed in midnight blue and black. Flowers grew around the altar, withering almost as soon as they were given life. It wasn’t long, but it seemed to be enough to hold off the effects of the snake’s venom. At least partially. There were all those cracks forming still.
Knowledge slugged me in the chest.
All this time my pools had been draining, and it was because of this. Protecting Lucifer’s vessel from being destroyed.
“How?” was all I could ask. I didn’t really hope for a response.
Astaroth’s lips pulled over his pointed teeth. I swore I peed a little. “How?” Astaroth asked. “A perversion of all that should be. You should not be, Alessia. And I will make sure Lucifer understands that.”
He nodded at Death. I wasn’t ever going to be as quick as a supernatural. Before I could even blink, Death raised a blade and brought it down on Aurelia’s neck. Andrei shouted with such fury I felt it cascading over me in the phantom remnants of his compulsion.
Aurelia’s head came clean off. We knew this was a possibility. A very likely one. I couldn’t waste time wondering if Leia had jumped into action to keep Aurelia’s body alive. My bone magic was already flying across the barren earth to try and snatch Aurelia’s soul from Death’s clutches.
What I would do when Aurelia’s soul wanted to go to Astaroth was beyond me. And then, that was pushed to the background as the demons swarmed us.
53
They came from every direction. Thankfully, the protection circles were still up. Sadly, there were so many demons that even protection circles wouldn’t last long. Lucifer snatched Percy who had regained consciousness. The para-human groaned and cried.
“Keep your mouth shut!” Lucifer shouted. Percy’s quivering lips bit together. Everything else became background noise as Death and I grappled with Aurelia’s soul. The Sisterhood piled on with me, and we managed to at least hold Aurelia in place.
It was too bad that Aurelia’s wasn’t the only soul up for grabs today. One of the scions scampered out amongst the altars. Andrei was already there trying to get to Aurelia’s body. I had a sneaking suspicion he was going to try and turn her into a vampire for sure this time. The vampire leaped onto the scion, only for an army of demons to peel him off. Shifters and Nephilim charged at the demons, all of them going for Cassie’s body.
In the heat of the moment, the supernaturals forgot themselves. A bone-shattering roar of a lion shifter filled the air. It encouraged the other shifters to raise their heads in the air too. A swarm of something black filled my peripheral vision.
Their strength was being drained from them and going to help the demons push them back from getting to Cassie. I would have shouted out to them, but Sophie was all over it.
Pink fire circled all around the supernaturals, pulling them back from the edge.
Noah jumped over the back of the demons in his human form. He would have landed on the edge of the altar if one of the winged demons hadn’t leaped from the ground and caught him just as his feet touched down. Unable to shift, Noah didn’t have the added durability of his wolf. The demon sliced upwards with his claws as Noah landed. If there weren’t so many bodies in his way, Noah might have been able to evade. Instead, he caught demon claws right in his gut.
Noah roared as the demon eviscerated him, pushing him over the horde. Noah rolled along the dry earth.
Angelfire shot out from where Leia stood.
“Forget about him!” Lucifer commanded. I wasn’t sure why. Leia was keeping Aurelia alive, but that didn’t need to happen for Lucifer to regain the pieces of his blade.
As usual, Lucifer saw many things I didn’t see. Noah wasn’t the only supernatural Leia was healing. All over the field, any time someone got hurt at all, Leia was there. It would have been noble under other circumstances.
I was hit again by what Kai has said to me. The terrible choices he had to make when he decided who should live and who should die. Leia hadn’t yet learned that hard lesson. I doubted she ever could, given she was frantically swirling all around, making sure she caught everybody.
It was probably smarter to let off an angelfire bomb. The thing was, that kind of required concentration, and Leia’s was running rapidly thin. Even amid everything that was happening, Kai was still perfectly attuned to her.
“Leia!” he shouted. “You can’t keep them all. Let go, darling!”
My hold on Aurelia’s soul slipped. Giselle screamed at me, and I righted myself just in time to stop her and the Evil Three from being dragged six feet closer to Astaroth’s portal.
Leia curled into a ball inside my invisibility circle. Angelfire floated all around her like armour. Her aura was so bright and green, I thought it was going to ignite the ground.
Groans and screams went up all around us. The supernaturals were clambering over each other and the demons to be the first ones to get anywhere near Cassie.
Lucifer held tightly to Percy, standing unperturbed inside my soul circle. His contribution to the fight was to push as much of his power into the bond as possible. That allowed me to expand the circle so that the demons were forced back far enough that I encompassed Sophie’s circle and that of the Sisterhood as well. It gave us a tiny fraction of breathing space.
Breath came out of me thick and hot. My focus was being pulled in too many directions. Green angelfire flared in my peripheral vision as Kai spiralled through the air, going straight for Death. It was odd to watch the sweep of his angelfire because it was actually moving towards Cassie. He was at war with himself. With his instinct to get to his cousin when he knew logically that the threat was from Death.
Anyone else might have cracked, but Kai held his line, even though he wanted to teleport and get her. And as always, there was a part of his awareness inside the circle with us. Watching over Leia.
Death was surrounded by as many demons as Cassie. Kai had every intention of cutting through them one by one. Instead, I snapped bone magic around him, and he phased right through them. Death lifted his head and smiled. He teleported out of the way at the last second, only for Kai to chase him, like a cat playing with a mouse.
Or maybe it was a rat. A really disgusting, hairy sewer rat that was used to doing anything to survive. Death teleported away across the field. He flicked his hands. A scream permeated the night. Leia’s scream. Except she was still kneeling and throwing off angelfire.
Thankfully, Kai didn’t fall for it. “My, my,” Death said. “Somebody has been learning.”
I wasn’t surprised. Kai understood what his weaknesses were. He wasn’t so lovestruck that he didn’t know Leia would be used against him in battle. I’d proven that to him. So, he’d come up with a way to fight it.
What he didn’t count on was me being used against him. He didn’t remember me, after all. At least, he didn’t remember me until Death shouted, “Father!”
Astaroth pulled his wolf-dragon beast thing up short. He raised his blade towards Kai and whispered something in a language that made my nose bleed. Kai stuttered in the middle of his teleport.
“No!” Leia shouted. Unlike Kai, she wasn’t any kind of fighter. All she knew was emotions and instincts. Andrei roared as Leia let go of Aurelia’s body and tried to run out of my circle.
Lucifer caught her and dragged her back. “No!” Leia cried again. “Let him go! Stop! Stop it, please!”
Kai’s eyes turned black. And then white. His angel blade dropped from his hands and all the strength in his body left him. Skin sagged and age spots peppered his body. His knees gave out. I phased him again before any of the demons could get to him in this state. Leia’s angelfire lashed all around him, trying to forestall the damage Astaroth was doing.
Max leaped from the huddle of shifters. He tore the head off a demon while still in human form. I phased Max too, just as he skidded to his knees beside Kai. Max picked Kai up and bolted with him back into our circle. It was the wrong thing to do at the moment. Thankfully, Sophie compensated by jumping into our circle too.
Her blood alchemy laced around her, throwing off pink light like cotton candy. Kai rasped as Max laid him down. Leia was all over him. Never mind the fact that Aurelia’s body was decaying. We had a contingency plan for that as well.
Rebecca had stepped in to help, but unfortunately, Rebecca’s angelfire was nowhere near as strong as Leia’s.
“I gave you one job!” I hissed at Leia.
Kai’s mouth opened. I thought for a second that he would yell at me for shouting at her, when he rasped, “Blue! I…”
Sophie faltered only for a second before she screamed the word of light. It spiralled through Kai and dragged him into unconsciousness where Leia would then be able to heal him.
My dead heart ached inside me even as Leia’s angelfire made Kai whole again. He transformed from a decrepit half corpse into his usual healthy masculinity. This version of Kai was bonded to Leia. The side of him that was given over to Death still knew who I was.
Bone and hedge magic were a turbulent ocean inside of me.
Astaroth laughed. “Tragic,” he said. “Don’t their worthless emotions grate on you, brother? All it would take is for Alessia to speak a single word. All she needs is to want it and I will be free. And you will be whole again to rule over the only place you have ever wanted to call home.”
The bond groaned with a celestial longing that was difficult for me to even understand. It was like deja vu mixed with that feeling of sadness at the end of summer when hope and possibility seemed to fade with the sunset.
It was a good thing I despised summer. It was too flipping hot on the streets, and sleeping was a nightmare. I snapped the bond back at Lucifer, yelling at him to get a grip.
He sneered at me in real life. “Did you think that would be all it took, scion of mine?”
At this point, I didn’t know anything anymore. Except for the loud whine that went up in the air from the shifters. Dear Gaia.
The snap of Cassie’s soul was audible even amongst the gnashing of demon teeth and the stomping of their feet. My attention split in two as I lashed out and grabbed Cassie’s soul. Death was closer to her physically. He had the advantage, and he used it. Cassie’s soul moved so close to Astaroth’s portal that I felt his essence scraping the side of my head, as though he had stuck his tongue out and licked me.
The metaphysical touch transferred a lifetime of memories at me. No, they weren’t memories. They were impressions taken from all the souls Astaroth had consumed. They weren’t indiscriminate memories either. It was just the bad ones.
I cried out as everything terrible about the creatures in this dimension washed over me. Vampires compelled to feed on humans. The women—they were mostly women—were blindsided by the euphoria until it was too late to break away.
Humans cried and screamed as rogue shifters hunted them and ran them down, doing awful things to their bodies and then their lifeless corpses. Rogue shifters only knew two things: eat and procreate.
And worst of all, I saw Kai and Leia together. Writhing beneath sweat-soaked sheets. He cupped her cheek with a tenderness that stabbed me through the chest.
Bile slathered over my tongue as I tried to force my eyes closed and pressed my hands over my ears. “Lex!” Matilda shouted.
An arm wound around me. A voice so gentle and soothing spoke in my ear. “This is not all that you are, Alessia,” Haniel urged me. He pulled me in closer as my breath came in shallow, hot bursts. “Listen to me.”
My mind flooded with new images. Of everything and everyone I cared about who were rooting for me here and back at home. I saw Nanna waiting for me after school to soothe away the injustices of the world. I saw Charles and Rune at each other’s throats where they had been forced to stay behind with Jacqueline and the other students to keep them safe. They bumped chests and went at each other, but underneath it, they were tied by a thread that led to me.
I saw that circle I had drawn with angelfire flowers in the Grove at Bloodline. That circle pulsing with life. With the power of the Morning Star. Light burst inside me the second I laid eyes on the symbol.
It ate away all the filth that had touched my soul until I could breathe again. Haniel kept his arm around me as I regained my footing and snagged Aurelia and Cassie’s souls away from Astaroth’s portal.
“Another abomination!” Astaroth spat. His eyes slitted at where Haniel stood. The former malachim ignored him completely. Haniel pressed me closer to his side. He brushed away the damp hair at the nape of my neck.
“You will not break, Alessia,” Haniel reminded me. “You have done many harder things before.”
Lucifer’s consternation was a lashing inside the bond. Even though he was preoccupied, he still didn’t like Haniel being around me. My temper was razor-sharp from all the pain I had just experienced.
“How about instead of standing there waiting for somebody to bring you the pieces of your blade, you go and get it!” I hissed at him.
It was like Lucifer hadn’t even thought about it before now. He was so used to having everything handed to him. It hadn’t even been that long since he’d left Percy’s body behind, but he had literally forgotten he didn’t need to allow minions to do everything for him.
Lucifer pushed Percy back at me. I didn’t have the brain space to hold the para-human. Luckily, Haniel reached out a hand. Percy’s tear-soaked eyes blinked at Haniel. The former malachim smiled. Percy sniffed and took Haniel’s hand.
What do you know? Malachim charm worked on para-humans too.
My attention tracked Lucifer across the field. So close to the essences of his angel blade, it was like he was super charged. Astaroth must have known it. For some reason, the archdemon paused. He leaned over his beast and let the snake coil around his throat.
“Alright,” Astaroth said, “if you’re so desperate to have it, then I will restore your angel blade as a gesture of good will.”
All the demons swarmed around my circle. They punched and kicked, bit and scratched to get inside. Astaroth’s snake whipped out once again and sank its teeth into his vessel. The drain in the bond leached my magic from me, causing me to lose grip of Aurelia’s soul.
“No!” I cried out. The Sisterhood couldn’t hold on to both souls on their own. They made a mercenary choice and kept hold of Cassie. Death laughed at his prize.
To my utter astonishment, Death laid out his demon blade. The blade shifted in the air, shaping itself into the form of Lucifer’s broadsword. The devil paused in his progression towards Death. He wasn’t a scion, he wasn’t me, but he was close enough. With all the pieces of Lucifer’s blade in one place, Death was not able to force them to comply.
It didn’t take long for Aurelia’s soul to be deposited into the sword. Like last time, there was a burst of bright blue and a sapphire appeared on the sword’s hilt.
Lucifer grew three feet taller. The demons around him cringed away. He couldn’t help the smile that split his face. “There now,” Astaroth said. “That’s more like it. Shall we continue?”
To my dismay, Lucifer turned towards me. He used the bond to weaken me further and then tore my circle to smithereens.
