Sin Undone

Fuck. Reseph had fallen victim to a paralyzing bite. The beast swung its shaggy head toward Ares. Red eyes glowed with bloodlust as it gathered its hind legs under it. Ares calculated the distance to the target in a millisecond, and in one quick motion launched a dagger that impaled the hellhound in the eye. Ares pressed his advantage, heaving his sword in a side swing that caught the creature in the mouth, slicing its bottom jaw clean off. The hound howled in agony and fury, but Reseph had already injured it and, weakened, it stumbled and fell, allowing Ares an opportunity to run his blade straight through its black heart.

“Reseph!” Leaving the sword impaled in the animal, Ares ran to his brother, whose blue eyes were wild, glazed with pain. “How did they get in?”

“Someone,” Reseph groaned, “had to have… sent them.” That much was becoming clear. But very few beings could handle or control a hellhound. So if someone sent the beasts, that person was serious about putting Ares and his brothers—and maybe Limos, too—out of commission.

“You should feel special,” Ares said, with a lightness he didn’t feel. “You got two hellhounds, and I got only one. Who’d you piss off?” Gently, Ares wrapped his arms around Reseph’s chest and lowered him to the ground.

Reseph sucked in a gurgling breath. “Seal. My… Seal.” Ares went cold to the core, and with trembling hands, he tore away Reseph’s T-shirt to expose the chain around his neck. The Seal hanging from it was whole, but when he palmed the gold coin, a vibration, dense with malevolence, shot up his arm.

“This…” Reseph spoke between gritted teeth and rattling breaths. “This isn’t… good.”

No, it wasn’t.

The countdown to Armageddon had begun.