Creed nodded and spit out dirt. His right hand throbbed from hitting what had to be an Asmodai. He felt like his friggin’ fingers were going to burst into flames and burn right off the end of his wrist. Worse, he couldn’t stop snarling, because the
other
was snarling so powerfully in his chest. His skin seemed to be tearing off his ribs each time the beast thrashed inside his gut.
Andy scrambled up and waited for him to get to his feet.
It sounded like the world was coming down around their ears.
The Sibyls shouted to each other and roared frustration as they waded in closer and closer to the small army of powerful demon-things. More blasts of fire and wind roared through the night. Creed’s eyes watered from the stench of burned clothes, burned hair, scorched dirt, and sulfur. Dark curtains of earth swelled from the ground, then crashed back to the forest floor.
Andy’s flashlight revealed five Sibyls. No, wait, more. Eleven women in those tight black bodysuits. Some had swords. Some knives. Some bows. And one was throwing what looked like small silver disks. They were battling five men. Only not men. Things. Asmodai.
Creed narrowed his eyes. The Asmodai kept…changing. Two of them threw fire out of their palms. One was pushing up chunks of earth and rock and hurling them like baseballs. The other two kept opening their mouths—mouths too big to be human—letting wind roar out and buffet the women fighting them.
“I’ve seen enough,” Andy whispered.
Creed noticed her flashlight beam was shaking.
They should leave. They had to leave. But how could he just walk away from a fight—a horrible fight he wasn’t sure the good guys—uh, girls—would win?
“Gotta do something,” he muttered. “Keep the light trained, okay?”
Andy grabbed his arm. “No way! That thing threw you halfway back to Manhattan!”
“I punched it, didn’t I?” Creed started forward, saw what was coming, and barely managed to whirl and tackle Andy before a jet of flames roasted the air where she had been standing. The flames sizzled against trees and leaves and vines, filling the path with a swath of gray smoke.
“Stay down!” someone shouted, but the voice brought Creed immediately to his feet.
Riana.
Somewhere in the middle of all those killing machines.
“They’re coming out of the stone building!” another woman yelled, and Creed thought it was Cynda. “It’s full of holes. Look!”
Andy recovered her flashlight, and the two of them ran forward, shining a blistering white light on the mayhem.
Three to one, the Sibyls started taking the bastards out. First, one of the monsters took an arrow between the eyes and just seemed to evaporate. Turned to air and blew away, clothes and all. Little bits of metal and glass streamed to the ground where it had been standing. Before they reached the cleared spot in front of the aqueduct building, a wall of earth buried another Asmodai not five steps away from Andy. Two women charged up the mound, dug its head out to the neck, then stepped aside as a third used her sword and sent the head flying. The Asmodai burst into flames even as the women who killed it tried to grab a piece of its clothing, something, anything. Creed and Andy reached the mound and glanced down. Nothing left except a metal tin that might have once held tuna or canned chicken, a bottle, a can, and other pieces of junk he couldn’t make out.
“Pieces of trash, just like with Riana’s triad?” Andy sounded incredulous, but Creed thought it made sense. If it worked once, why not again? By the time the Sibyls stopped putting out trash, the bad guys—the Legion—had already collected what they needed. And they cranked these demons up with multiple targets. Maybe all the Sibyls in New York, wherever they might be, whenever the demons might run across them.
The three Sibyls who had killed the first Asmodai had already joined their fellow warriors, hacking and slashing and firing arrows at the three remaining monsters. The Asmodai used fire, earth, and wind to deflect the attacks.
Creed tried to figure out which Sibyl was Riana. There were four women fighting with daggers.
The stone building shuddered. Part of the wall gave way, and another Asmodai staggered out, this one bigger than the rest and dressed in a long brown trench coat. Fire blazed off its shoulders.
“More,” Merilee shouted from somewhere. “Did they have a demon-building party?”
An arrow struck the new Asmodai in the neck. The shaft caught fire and burned to nothing. It hesitated, nailed a Sibyl with a wicked stream of blue-hot flame, then swung toward Creed and Andy.
13
Riana ripped a sheet of earth from the forest ground and doused the flames, but too late. Goddess! Woman down. And the way she fell, she looked to be down for good.
Riana pulled away from the side of the stone building and ran toward the fallen Sibyl, Cynda and Merilee right behind her. The injured woman’s fighting partner let out a howl of rage and jumped to protect her triad sister, curved blade blazing against the dark backdrop of trees and sky. Riana recognized Camille’s blade. Camille from Alisa’s triad. The fallen woman must be Bette. They had been fighting without their mortar, without their strength—and fighting like hell, too, but now they were paying the price. Even though Riana knew Bette was most probably already dead, they couldn’t let Camille face that reality on her own. She would likely die defending Bette’s body.
“Riana!” Creed’s worried shout rose over the cursing and roaring and gouts of flame.
Riana had no time for Creed, no time for Andy, though her belly burned at the thought of any harm coming to them. She knew where they were, right below the stone building. She could track them because of the flashlight beam, which was more hindrance than help to the Sibyls, who saw fairly well in the darkness. For now, they would have to fend for themselves.
Goddess help them.
Riana’s triad formed a triangle around the fallen Sibyl and her half-crazed defender, intent on preventing any Asmodai from getting near to what was left of Alisa’s group. The other three triads would have to do the fighting. Damn, but that last Asmodai had been huge. And the demons seemed to be targeting
all
the Sibyls, not just one group.
How was that possible?
She didn’t have time to wonder.
A rotten, earthy scent filled her nose, and she spun to face a tall, slimy-looking monster with mossy teeth and lichen-covered skin. Earth Asmodai. Its eyes blazed a sickening, dead-looking brown, and ripples of energy made the ground rumble with each step it took. Rocks pelted Riana’s head, and she barely got her dagger locked with earth energy and directed her own power to shielding Camille, Bette, and her group before a steady stream of dirt poured down on top of them.
Deflected by her answering earth energy, the dirt piled all around them like extra fortification.
Riana tried to open a rent below the charging demon’s feet, but it leaped toward her and grabbed her by the shoulder. She slashed at it with her earth-locked dagger and the thing’s arm fell off and crumbled into mushrooms, snails, and black dirt. Before Riana could get in a clean stroke to the heart, Merilee fired over Camille’s head and caught the thing with an arrow in the cheek—but that only enraged it. It swung its remaining arm like a club and caught Riana in the side.
She went down hard, gasping for breath.
Did it break my rib?
It was on her again, and she slashed its ankle off.
It roared and hobbled back.
The ground shook a little as Riana got to her feet, side aching. Earth Asmodai could do a little rattle-and-roll, but nothing like a Sibyl. Riana taught the creature that lesson, buckling the earth beneath its maimed leg and foot. It crashed to the ground. Riana ran forward and planted her earth-locked dagger deep in its chest, which caved into bracken and sour dirt. Its clothes writhed with what looked like insects and maggots, which consumed every thread in an instant before burrowing into the newly turned earth.
“That thing smells like shit,” Cynda called. She had her hand on Camille’s shoulder.
Camille still had hold of Bette, and she wouldn’t look up.
“Riana, I think our favorite idiots are in serious trouble.” Merilee’s shout barely blocked the ragged sound of Camille’s sobs.
Riana turned toward Creed and Andy’s flashlight, winced from the pain of moving her body—and realized the flashlight beam was shining up at her from the ground.
She squinted against the light as the other three triads swarmed two of the remaining Asmodai and worked to shore up the stone building so no more monsters could break out of it.
The third Asmodai, the big fire demon, was moving away from the clearing.
Chasing Andy and Creed.
“No. No way it’s targeting humans.” Cynda’s movements gave the lie to her words, because she was already leaving her protective position, pelting down the trail toward the Asmodai.
Merilee ran, too, and Riana didn’t call them back.
“Camille!” she shouted over her shoulder as she pressed her hand against her throbbing side and ran after her triad. “Get a grip and pay attention! We have to leave you to make this kill.”
Behind her, the sobbing stopped abruptly. Riana hoped the woman was alert again, ready to protect herself in the name of protecting Bette until they got back.
“Son of a bitch!” Cynda yelled as the fire Asmodai knocked Andy into a tree, caught Creed, and lifted him off the ground by his throat.
Merilee hit the demon with three arrows in his back, all a little off, all already burning to nothing. Riana reversed the earth-lock on her dagger, locked it with fire, almost dropped it in her desperation and pain, but got it thrown to the left of Cynda, at just the right angle. It struck the Asmodai in its head.
Damnit.
Not deep enough! It would burn Creed to ashes and Andy, too. They couldn’t get there in time!
Creed’s clothing caught fire.
Then his hair seemed to blaze.
Only it wasn’t his hair. It was his whole body.
His unearthly bass rumble of surrender echoed through the trees as his body armor blew apart and the
other
emerged.
Cynda stopped so hard and fast she actually kicked up a spray of dirt. She jumped off the path, taking shelter behind a mound of dirt stirred up by the battle. Merilee didn’t reverse course. She plunged forward, jumped around the battling demons, and threw herself over Andy’s prone form. Riana stopped running, too, and dodged behind the nearest tree.
They couldn’t attack now, not without risking killing Creed instead of the demon. And if they killed the demon, what then? She didn’t have Creed’s ring. She couldn’t command the
other
at all.
Sulfur stung her eyes and nose, and she coughed. Murmurs and shouts from back around the stone house told Riana the Sibyls had noticed what was happening. She glanced back to be sure no other Asmodai had emerged from the building, and felt the briefest relief for that shred of good luck.
A shriek brought her attention back to Creed-as-
other
and the Asmodai, who appeared to be locked in a combat to the death. As Creed finished taking on his alternate form, Riana saw that he towered over the big fire Asmodai.
Another shriek made Riana look down near the smoking feet of the Asmodai, where she saw Merilee had dragged Andy out of immediate danger, behind a big oak near the trail. Merilee was standing and waving crazily.
Creed-as-
other
crushed the Asmodai’s head between his big golden palms, tore the smashed head right off the demon’s neck, and flung it into the brush even as it caught fire and burned away to nothing. At the same moment, Merilee hurled something small and shiny directly at Riana’s head.
She snatched the object out of the air on reflex, then opened her palm to discover Creed’s signet ring.
The towering golden god-shaped creature turned on the dirt mound protecting Cynda, thrust out his hand, and swept the pile of earth back toward the stone house in one fluid motion. Riana covered her head to keep from being pelted by rocks and sticks.
Cynda jumped into battle stance, sword blazing. “Don’t make me,” she shouted. “I swear I’ll do it!”
She pulled back to swing.
The other nine Sibyls who had been fighting Asmodai burst back onto the path. They charged forward, a blur of black leather, raised swords, sailing daggers, flying arrows, and deadly, whirling
shuriken
—“ninja stars” to people who watched too many movies.
“No!” Riana drew deep on her earth energy, reached into the ground with her power, and yanked a thick, long wall of dirt and rock skyward. The dirt wall blocked flying daggers and arrows.
Shuriken
struck rocks and dirt clods, knocking them to the ground. The earth itself rumbled and groaned in protest, but Riana’s dirt wall did its job. The charging throng of Sibyls stopped, shocked.
“I’ve got the ring, Cynda! Don’t kill him!” Riana ignored the nine pairs of eyes glaring at her. She sank to the ground holding her side, her muscles little more than weak rubber after expending so much effort creating the earthen shield between Creed and the triads.
Cynda dropped to one knee to dodge the
other
’s first roundhouse punch. “Well use the fucking thing already!”
Riana propped herself against the trunk of a hickory tree, held up the ring in both shaking hands, and yelled, “Creed, stop! Be still!”
The
other
let out a jaw-clenching roar of anger. It wheeled on her, then went still, glaring across the path, its eyes flashing wild, furious gold.
Riana kept the ring in one hand and used the other to brace herself against the hickory tree and stand. “Kneel,” she commanded, trying to sound stronger than she felt.
The
other
radiated hatred and refusal, but after a few seconds, it complied, dropping to the ground on both knees.
The three other earth Sibyls temporarily held back by Riana’s dirt wall managed to open the ground and return the curtain of earth to its origins. As a result, three other triads watched Riana instruct the
other
to put out its right hand and spread five fingers. They were still watching when she jammed the ring onto the creature’s right third finger and stepped back.