Avenging Amethyst (Immortal Eyes) (25 page)

"You're
right, I don't, but I can't wait to see. Kamila, let her go."

The demon
hesitated only long enough for me to take a deep breath and focus all of my
concentration on my power. Once the smoke restraints were off of me I lunged at
Lucas. I still had my stake in my hand and I aimed for his heart.

Unfortunately, I
was blocked by Kamila. Apparently, we weren't going to play these
"games" very fairly and Kamila was going to assist Lucas in this
fight. I had an excellent power but I didn't know if it was good enough to
defeat both of them.

After a few
minutes of sparring back and forth, I discovered that Kamila was actually the
weaker of the two. Thorkell had been right about her lack of fighting skills
and being distracted while using magic.

I tried to take
advantage of her distraction but as I leaped for her, Lucas shoved me out of
the way. I fell backwards down the long staircase and landed with a loud thud
at the bottom. The impact had been so hard, it knocked the wind out of me.

I was frozen on
the ground in front of the stair case, gasping for air, when someone knelt
beside me and shook my arm.          

"Avery,"
I heard a male voice say. "Avery, you have to get up. They're coming this
way. We can take them down together."

After a second
of trying to clear my head and catch my breath, I realized it was Felix that
was talking to me. When I started to move and tried to get up, he literally
pulled me to my feet. I was still woozy and I almost fell back to the ground
but Felix held me in place until the worst of the dizziness passed.

By this time,
Kamila and Lucas were nearly on top of us. I only had seconds to try to relay
my plan to Felix.

"The demon
is the weaker one. We need to go after her when she starts to use her power.
Once she's taken care of, Lucas shouldn't be too hard for the both of us to
handle."

Felix nodded in
response; that was all he had time for. Kamila and Lucas were in full attack
mode and heading towards us. I didn't hesitate to start attacking back and soon
the four of us were a blur of motion.

Lucas was so
much faster than the Zhulik I had attacked the night before. My energy was also
weakening faster, despite the help from the fairy elixir and the blood. Felix
had immediately gone after Kamila, which distracted her from using her magic.
Once Felix realized our plan wouldn’t work if Kamila was fighting, he
knocked her down and turned his attention towards Lucas. 

Kamila shrieked
when we both tried to tackle Lucas to the ground and froze to concentrate on a
trail of smoke to attack us. Felix and I almost missed our opportunity to kill
her when Lucas tried to drag us to the ground with him. I punched Lucas in the
side of the head with as much force as I could to try to keep him down while we
went after Kamila. Once he hit the ground, Felix and I both lunged at the demon
and we all went crashing into the ground.

Kamila struggled
with more force than I knew she had. We almost lost our grip on her but she
suddenly went very still. I thought we had killed her just by holding her down
but the vacant look in her eyes wasn't that of death but of concentration. She
was casting some sort of spell.

"Now,"
Felix yelled at me to snap me out of my thoughts.

I chastised
myself for hesitating to consider why she had frozen, instead of taking
advantage of the situation and killing her. I made sure I had a firm grip on my
stake and quickly plunged it into her chest before she could complete her
magic.

She screamed. It
was so loud that Felix and I both had to cover our ears. I looked around the
room and all of the fighting stopped for a brief moment. The scream was just
long enough to distract everyone. Both sides tried to take advantage and in the
next moment I witnessed over a dozen bodies, Lovac and Zhulik alike, fall to
the ground.

I didn’t
know if they were all dead but I was so stunned, I almost didn't feel the tingling
of my power increase immensely. I spun around just in time to see Lucas jump
back on his feet. He had been down on the ground for mere seconds but it felt
like hours had just past.

Lucas didn't
come after us immediately. Instead, he glared at the spot on the ground where
Kamila had been. I glanced down and saw that she had disintegrated into a pile
of ash and red smoke. I expected the smoke to disappear quickly but instead it
grew before my eyes.

Felix and I both
jumped back from the growing smoke and watched as it formed what looked like a
door. I kept one eye on Lucas the whole time and saw a dark smile grow on his
face. It looked like Kamila actually did have time to complete her magic and I
knew that whatever was behind this door was not good.

"Felix, we
have to kill Lucas now and get out of here. Something is coming out of that
door that I don't think we'll be able to handle."

Felix looked at
me and nodded. We turned to Lucas but he had stopped staring at the door and
was now glaring at us. His teeth were bared and he was quietly growling.
Killing Kamila had brought out the animal in him.

I was terrified
of this monster. If I had thought I was afraid of him before, this was no
comparison. I wanted to turn around right now and run out of this cavern and
back home. I wanted to go back to Wyoming and live in my little house with my
mom for the rest of my life.

Thinking of my
mom was the only reason I didn't run way. There was no going back to my old
life. I may have killed Kamila for her but I needed to kill Lucas for her, too.
If it wasn't for him, she would still be alive. She wouldn't have had me but
she would have been able to live a happier, fuller life.

I let my power
take over completely then. My only influence was willing myself to drive my stake
through his heart. I ran for Lucas and we slammed into each other. We were
trying to take each other down to the ground but at this moment we were evenly
matched.

I wondered why
Felix wasn't helping me when I glanced over to see him gaping at the door of
smoke. I tried to turn just enough to see the door but Lucas kept pulling my
attention away from it.

Every punch he
threw I was able to dodge and every attempt I made at trying to kick his feet
out from underneath him failed. We were both in a fight to the death and
neither one of us wanted to give up. I could feel us both weakening and I knew
the end was coming soon for one of us.

Just when I
thought I was going to be the one who ended up dead he glanced over my shoulder
to look at the demon door. I took advantage of his distraction and slammed my
foot into his right knee. I heard a loud snap and he roared in agony.

He fell backward
onto the ground and glared up at me. I could see the pain in his features but I
could also see his hatred for me in them. I took one step towards him to try to
finish the job when he started to laugh. It was the kind of laugh that only
insane people made.

"You may
think you've won but the battle has only just begun," he said as he
pointed to the door behind me.

I hesitated to
turn around, not wanting to take my eyes off of the Zhulik but I decided he
wouldn't be able to move very fast with a broken knee. I slowly turned around
and froze. My mouth slowly opened and my stunned expression matched Felix's.

The door had
opened up and on the other side was a world full of red. The ground was an
orange-red, the sky was darker red. There were no plants or water to be seen.
There were pools of flames and lava all around. And heading in our direction
was a group of hundreds of demons. In fact, they were only a few yards from
walking through the door into our world.

They all had
armor on and a weapon in hand. Their expressions were excited. They wanted a
battle. The only thing that snapped me out of my stunned state was a tiny drop
of sweat dripping into my eyes. I blinked the stinging away and that's when I
jumped into action.

I ran up to
Felix, shaking him a few times to pull him out of his shock. When he finally
realized where he was we rushed over to the door to try to figure out how to
close it.

"What are
we supposed to do?" I asked, panic filling my voice.

"I have no
idea. I rarely deal with demons and I don't understand how their magic
works."

I looked around
for something to throw at the door and found a sword from a fallen Zhulik a few
feet away. I picked it up and started swinging at the smoke that formed the
door. The image on the other side faltered slightly but wouldn't disappear.

The demons were
nearly at the door now and my panic was rising. That's when I looked down at
the pile of ashes where the smoke was coming out of. Some of the demons on the
other side were smart and lunged through the portal seconds before I kicked the
pile of ashes to break apart the spell.

The smoky door
closed and we were left with five demons who had managed to get through. I took
a second to look around the cavern to see if there were any Lovac available to
help. It looked like a good majority of the Zhulik were dead and most of the
Lovac were fighting in pairs now to take out the rest. I met eyes with a few of
them and motioned for them to come help with our newest problem. The ones that
could break away made their way towards us.

During my
assessment of the cavern I noticed that all of the blood from the fallen Zhulik
and Lovac was trailing down to the center of the cavern where it was slightly
sunken in. The pool of blood from my nightmare was forming. I also noticed that
the group of Dimidiums that had been kneeling there were gone now.

I panicked and
looked around the cavern to make sure they weren't being kidnapped by some of
the remaining Zhulik, when I saw the group of Lovac in charge of protecting
them moving slowly toward the door of the cavern, with all of the Dimidiums
trailing behind them.

Then the world
froze. I hadn't meant to take such a long time gazing around the cavern before
focusing on the demons but I had to make sure the Dimidiums were okay. I had
paused to count them and that's when my eyes landed on a male Nesmyr around my
age. He was muscular and tall, with wavy blonde hair tied into a ponytail
behind his head. He was trying not to look frightened but there was panic in
his crystal blue eyes. Despite his dirty appearance from being locked up, he
was the most gorgeous man I had ever seen. I had thought Felix was handsome but
at that moment, this Nesmyr made Felix look average.

The second I
spotted him, the world around me completely disappeared. My heart beat
increased and I felt an over-whelming feeling of happiness. I wanted to run
into the arms of this mystery Nesmyr and run away with him. I felt like I was
high on happiness, just from looking at him.

I didn't want
reality to interrupt this joy but it did. I heard someone screaming my name
from behind me and after a few moments of trying to ignore it, I pulled my
attention away from the Nesmyr. Reality started moving again and this time it
felt like it was in fast-forward.

Once I turned my
attention back to the battle that was happening between a few Lovac and the
demons, I was tackled to the ground. I was so dazed from the feeling the Nesmyr
had given me that I couldn't understand what was happening.

Where was I?
What was I supposed to be doing?

Then I heard
Felix scream and it all came rushing back to me. I snapped out of my daze and
looked around me. Lucas had tackled me to the ground but had crawled off of me
and was walking in Felix's direction. Felix screamed when a demon cut through
his arm with a small sword.

I could see
blood gushing from the wound and see Felix getting dizzy from the blood loss.
The demon that had attacked him was now lying dead on the ground thanks to
Riley.

I brought my
attention back to Lucas, who was slowly limping towards Felix. Lucas wanted to
hurt me emotionally before he hurt me physically. I was still sitting on the ground
when I figured out what was about to happen. By the time I stood up and started
sprinting towards Felix, I feared I was too late.

Lucas was
already in front of Felix. Felix tried to take Lucas down but he was too weak
from the blood loss. He was holding the wound on his arm to try to stop the
bleeding, which allowed Lucas to have the advantage of both of his arms.

Lucas grabbed
onto Felix's shoulders, making it impossible for him to escape, and went for
his neck. Everything went in slow motion as I jumped to tackle Lucas to the
ground and he went to rip out Felix's throat. I hit him just as his teeth
scraped Felix's neck. Lucas and I went tumbling down in one direction and Felix
fell to the ground in the other direction.

I landed on top
of Lucas and tried my best to keep him from moving when I glanced back to see
if Felix was okay. He was crumpled on the ground, with blood leaking out of the
wound on his arm but his neck hadn't been hurt. Tears burned my eyes and I
prayed that Felix was still alive. I had to kill Lucas quickly and get Felix
out of here.

I turned back to
Lucas, raised my stake above his heart and was kicked in the head by a demon,
throwing me a few feet across the ground. My anger was increasing by being
interrupted again from killing Lucas. I stood up, breathing heavy and ran at
the demon, who was helping Lucas up.