20
“Shit!” He cried out and clapped hands over his ears.
The vibrations in here were sonorous, moving through us with such force that I felt my insides quiver like jelly. Blood rushed immediately to my head.
The smell of death was bad enough, but the thick crush of bodies rapidly running our way was even worse.
The entrance of the cave wasn’t very wide. If he and I stood side by side, we’d easily be able to defend ourselves.
“Nothing passes, you hear me,” he barked out.
Those were the last words spoken before we were set upon. My fan wasn’t the greatest in such an enclosed space. Not the most practical of weapons—you needed room to flourish and brandish such a romantic piece of equipment. But with such limited space to move in, this job would require I get down and dirty.
Pestilence pulsed through my body in waves, oozing through my pores in a green rolling mist. I was bone-deep cold as his power rushed through me, but each time I used him, I was better able to control my reaction to that violent level of freeze. Curving my fingers, I flexed my elongated black claws and puffed out a jet of white fog from my mouth. The thrum of the fight filled me, and with a final leer I got to work.
It was easy enough to rip off their heads since most of their skin and muscle was already gone. What wasn’t easy was avoiding the bites.
One of the cannibals latched onto my elbow as I was yanking its comrade’s head off.
“Damn. It.” I growled when it ripped a chunk of meat out and swallowed my flesh with a slurpy sigh, then headed back in for more.
This zombie was missing all the flesh on its jaw so that it looked like it was giving me a perpetual bloody smile. I was just reaching for it to rip its head off when another one—a teenage female wearing torn fishnet stockings and black Doc Martens—crawled over the body of an emaciated old man before wrapping its legs around my middle, forcing me back into the wall as it hooked its rotten arm across my throat. Smiling zombie licked its teeth with a tongue that flickered around like a serpent’s. The thing that struck me most about these undead wasn’t actually the smell or putrescent flesh, it was the cloudy blue eyes that hinted at no soul within.
They were mindless killing machines; that more than anything bothered me. These zombies were so stereotypical as to be a cliché. But I had no more time to ponder it when Smiler wrapped his fingers around my wrist and jerked up. Shuddering, I jabbed my good elbow into chubby fishnet girl who was cutting off my air supply.
Zombies were immune to pain—they were dead, they felt nothing. But the law of physics worked just as well on them as it did on the living. My jab was enough to force her to crawl higher up, giving me the leverage I needed to flip her over my shoulder.
Gasping, I briefly touched my aching windpipe. Luc was dealing with his own horde while trying to maneuver his way back to me.
“Dora, I’m coming.”
“Just fight!” I huffed, sinking my claws into the neck of the smiler so that his teeth could no longer reach me. “I’m fine.” I yanked hard and it was nothing to separate the bottom jaw from the top; without the flesh and very little muscle left, even a human could have decapitated him.
Luc spun around, slamming his palm down on the back of a zombie wearing a moth-riddled blue-jean jacket. The zombie fell hard to the ground. Planting his boot on the zombie’s neck to keep him immobile, Luc whipped a flip knife out of his pocket, and in one swift move, he severed the head of the female who was now suddenly on him.
Ichor splashed everywhere and I swear, that smell is so much worse than the rest of the bodily fluids. A sharp burst of pain flared up the nerves of my arm. Grimacing, I flexed my fingers, and even while Luc should be focusing solely on the mass surrounding us, he kept flicking glances at me.
I shook my head at him, knowing what he was thinking. I had this and I wasn’t going to let a bite stop me, even if my arm was currently tingling and the tips of my fingers were going numb from the toxin of that bite as it spread its way through my bloodstream. Sweating, I knew if I didn’t shift focus from my pain to the fight, I’d go into zombie shock again. Growling, I pushed off the wall. Barreling my body into a duo of them, I pinned one claw into a short brunette girl’s neck and the other into a man who looked sort of like a heavier version of Antonio Banderas.
He especially was frantic with his need to get at me, snapping and hissing. His eyes weren’t nearly as cloudy or opaque as some of the others, and based off the faint odor of male cologne still on him, he was much fresher than the rest of them.
Lust slithered inside me for a second when his head rolled; the demon obviously had a thing for Antonio. Who knew?
As soon as I kicked him away from me, another took its place. This was really starting to feel like fighting an uphill, losing battle.
“Asher!” I cried, wishing I knew where he was, if he was okay. We’d barely made any forward progress and if he wasn’t even in here, then maybe it was time to get the hell out of Dodge.
I could have sworn I heard my name echo faintly in return. Heart racing with a sudden rush of adrenaline, I realized he was definitely still in here somewhere. I was a female Wolverine, slashing and clawing my way through zombie after zombie, almost on autopilot with my need to find the priest.
I was at the point in the pain process where it was so unbearable that I was completely in shock about it. Finally Luc managed to work his way to me and we were once again side by side, moving slowly but inexorably farther in.
He was breathing just as hard as I was, but we’d developed a system that was working. Luc, whether I wanted him to be or not, was definitely aware of the struggle my painfully shredded left arm was going through, so anything that came at us from the left, he managed. I felt bad that he was usually battling two or three to my one, but we were definitely moving faster.
His blade was a constant swirling motion of deadly precision, and it made me proud to fight with him by my side. Luc hadn’t been in the field for so long that I’d always worried he might have gone soft, but the way he separated head after head after head from zombie bodies let me know the man had never stopped his training.
My claws dripped with blood as I sank them in one neck after another, figuring out that because most of the bodies were so badly decomposed all I really had to do was make sure I got my nails in under the hyoid bone and pull up. Heads rolled in succession.
We were almost at the end of the tunnel, which was now littered with bodies. The horde had definitely thinned out at this point and the ultrasonic vibrations were growing worse, setting my teeth on edge.
“Shit,” Luc murmured, and I knew immediately he referred to the group of about ten zombies that were coming from around the bend. He looked at me, his breathing heavy and his clothing ripped and torn, hanging on him by threads. The hair he’d had pulled back earlier was now hanging free and loose around his face, the rubber band lost in the struggle back there somewhere.
He stopped, hanging on to my elbow, and I’d die before I ever told him that the room was definitely spinning, my stomach was sour from all the smells around me, and I wasn’t too sure I could take another step without dumping Pestilence off into something.
“I think they’re the last big bunch we’ll have to wade through—you think you can hang on?” His eyes looked worried and I shrugged, giving him a thumbs-up with my good hand.
“I’ve got this, boss.”
His raised brow told me he knew a bluff when he saw it, but at least he gave me my dignity and didn’t mention it.
“One.” He started the count.
The shuffle-step of the undead was practically upon us now.
“Two.” I squeezed his fingers one final time before letting go.
We never got to count to three—the group was upon us and they were hungry. Luc wrapped his arms around one and violently shoved it into three more, using it as a wall of sorts to push them back. That act helped me pull one toward me, giving me the element of surprise so that I could quickly and efficiently dispatch it.
But though we’re strong, we’re not invincible. I stumbled when I took that man’s head off, landing on my butt in the very center of the killing ring. My body felt like a jagged block of ice, my vision was swimming, and I was definitely not doing good.
With a roar, Luc slapped at a body bearing down on me. His skin was a dusky shade of gray as his demon surged violently to the surface—it was frothing and angry and all I could do was sit and stare as he twisted head after head off. Finally there was just one blond-haired female left. She was dressed in a green blouse and tan slacks and wearing only one shoe, and half her head was caved in. Attached to the lapel of her shirt was a wilted red mum. Luc sank his blade into her neck. She never gasped or muttered a grunt as he sawed off her head. The sound was sickening, the sight even more so—a wet tear that squished putrid blood under his claw tips.
When he turned, I quickly shot my eyes to the ground and vibrated with the tension of knowing he was in full demon mode and I couldn’t have fought him right now if my life depended on it.
My breathing and his were the only things I heard for several long minutes until finally I sensed his change, sensed he’d gotten himself under control once more.
Luc’s hand was on my shoulder. “Dora?”
“I’m good.” I sucked in two sharp breaths, not wanting to let him know just how bad I was hurting. We were close to the source of the vibration now. The frequency was so strong that my stomach revolted.
He helped me to my feet, peering at me with a frown. “You’re bleeding.” He touched my arm where the bite wound was now bleeding profusely.
“Just a scratch. Don’t worry about it.” I shrugged it from his grasp. Last thing he needed was to worry about me. Besides, we both knew I could heal myself if I could just dump out Pestilence. Thing was, I was hesitant to touch Luc right now because his skin was definitely sweaty and ashen-looking.
“Well,” his deep voice said, “we’re here. Wherever here is anyway.” Ahead was a large room that glowed a muted yellowish color from the walls themselves. Black shadows danced on the walls—there were definitely more zombies back there.
But I could also now hear the grunts of a man, my man, fighting by himself inside. I couldn’t see him, but I knew Asher was here. I wasn’t going to leave him, not now.
“Dora, we need to get out of here, this place is overrun.”
“We cleared this area, Luc.”
“Yeah, for now. How many more do you think we can handle though?”
I narrowed my eyes as I watched the shadows grow larger and larger upon the walls as the bodies drew closer. And just as I opened my mouth to respond to his question, I saw Ash.
My priest was surrounded by a circle of twenty, if not thirty, zombies. The Gray Man stood beside him. The fiery blade was in Asher’s hand and he looked like a god of war the way he wielded it, snicking it through one neck after another after another.
He must have sensed my presence, because he looked up for a split second and I saw a flash of anger and then resignation. “There’s a generator that’s making them go berserk. It’s in the second”—his blade arced over his head, leaving a trail of brilliant sparks in its wake as he sliced through two necks at once—“room to the left. Shut it down!”
As if sensing my energy reserves were running on empty, Pestilence pumped just enough of his energy into me that I was able to shake off most of the malaise. It was odd to me that the demon I’d never wanted in the first place was becoming the one I depended on almost entirely now. Ever since Lust had come up against Wrath, she’d grown silent and dormant. In a strange juxtaposition, if it weren’t for Pestilence now, I’d likely have never survived the Order’s latest attempt to off me.
Running, I made for the dark room that was a good twenty degrees cooler than the entry had been, ramming my claws through a nearly scalped female zombie as she came at me.
Luc finished her off, twisting her head off right as I pulled my claws out. Another stream was headed our way.
“Go.” Luc pointed to a darkened cove ahead of us. “I’ll hold them off. Shut that damn thing off.”
I nodded just as the first zombie latched on to him, then more came and he was completely obscured form my sight. His grunts were the only thing letting me know he was still alive. I only hoped that whatever this generator was, shutting it off would also flip the off switch on the undead freaks.
The cove wasn’t much of a room so much as a small carved-out section of rock. The buzzing was the worst here.
Wincing, I grabbed my skull as every cell in my body rioted, crashing and sliding in chaotic movement against one another, threatening to rip my body apart. I must have stood there longer than I’d thought, because somehow Luc was now beside me. He was covered in so much ichor and gore that he was barely recognizable. I really hoped that blood wasn’t his.
He was panting, but looking not much worse for wear. I grimaced as the sound waves pounded me over and over, battering my already bruised body so that I felt like whimpering like a whipped puppy.
“Shut it off. We got to shut it off.” Luc slammed his hands on his ears. Blood slid down his nose as his eyes manically searched for the generator. “There.” He pointed just as I spotted it too.
For a weapon of mass destruction, the thing was ridiculously small. It was round and black and no bigger than a marble.
“How do I stop it?” I stepped inside the room, clinging to the rock with my claws as my body froze up, not wanting to take another step inside. The closer I got to it, the worse the pain was becoming. Grinding my molars, I swallowed my immediate gag reflex.
Luc shook his head, then looking around, he yanked a jagged chunk of rock out of the wall and ran to the marble, where he slammed the rock over it. It fractured, and now the low-wave sound grew exponentially.
I screamed. “We gotta destroy it. I’m ripping apart.”
I wasn’t lying. My body was literally buzzing, my molecules threatening to burst apart at the seams.
Wiping the blood off his upper lip, Luc lifted the rock, but I noticed his hands were shaking now. The power was getting to him too. The buzz kept growing louder and louder.
Why was it growing louder? It shouldn’t be... it should be...
“Luc, wait!” I yelled, trying to get my thoughts out. “It’s a sonic bomb, Luc. We need to make sure when we rupture it that the final pitch emitted is contained, otherwise we’ll blow apart.”
Nodding, looking as bad as I felt, he pointed to the stack of bodies behind us. “Bring in as many as you can.”
Running back out of the room, I picked up one of the nearest heads and ran back, repeating the process about five times until I had a circle of heads around the device. Tongues drew out of mouths as the zombies searched frantically for some way to get to us. Hanging on to the hair of one zombie as it chomped and groaned, I immediately got an idea to place the rheumy-eyed brunette directly on top of the device.
“Give me your stone,” I demanded of Luc, holding the head as far from my body as possible.
Blood was oozing thick and black from both his ears now. Grimacing, he tossed the rock at me. Walking to the generator, I slapped the zombie head with the rock.
“Open your mouth, freak!”
It snapped open, and I shoved its face forward so that its mouth was over the power source. It bit down. Then it started gasping and grunting as if trying to shove the foreign object out.
“Hold on,” Luc murmured and then ran back out, bringing two zombie bodies with him a moment later. He dumped them on top of the head. The ring of zombies did help to mute the high-pitch frequency some. “Do it.” He leaned against the rock and gave me the thumbs-up.
With any luck, this would be sufficient.
I stepped on the back of one of the prone zombies and knew that I had a very narrow margin to swing with. There was just enough space between our puzzle pieces of bodies to get in a true hit on the head biting down on the bomb.
Clamping down on my lips, I used every last dreg of energy I possessed to slam the rock down. It was a dead-on strike that smashed in the soft bones so that that final bit of inertia did the job for me.
I heard the crack of the generator a split second before the explosion threw me against the wall. Air knocked out of me, I dropped to the ground like a stone and slammed my eyes shut as the blessed silence covered me.
I came to a second later from the snap of a palm against my cheek.
“Wake up!”
Luc’s hard face swam in and out of focus. His face was smeared with blood and his fingers were digging into my shoulders.
“What did I do?” I blinked, confused, trying to catch my bearings. I felt like someone had just plowed me over with a tank, making mincemeat of my insides. Every inch of me ached and my stomach was twisting.
“Dora, damn you,” he snarled and then pulled me tight to his chest, hugging me so hard that I couldn’t breathe.
I gasped and he quickly released me.
“Pandora!” Asher’s deep voice washed through me like healing water, and I laughed when he tore me from Luc’s hands, then groaned as my insides spasmed. “You were supposed to go, little demon.”
He smelled of blood and gore and his peppery warmth, and I shook my head, nuzzling his neck as his gentle fingers splayed against my back. “You knew I’d never leave you.” I traced his cheek, smiling when his dimple poked out.
Asher turned to Luc. “You just destroyed the device the Triad developed to incite the zombies to a manic, frothing rage.”
Luc shook his head. “Wasn’t me. Dora used a zombie head to detonate the explosion. And are you sure it was the Triad?”
“There can be no doubt. The technology is too advanced for even the Order to dream up. And...” My priest’s lips twitched. “Of course she did.” His fingers were a gentle flutter moving against me. His eyes were tender as he turned to me.
“I got bit,” I confessed, grimacing as the sickness swept through me like a frothy witch’s brew. At least I wasn’t so overwhelmed this time—only one bite. I was a walking venom lab. “I gotta dump it out.” I hissed when I shifted and bumped my elbow on his knee.
“How do you do that?” His voice was strained with worry.
“She’s got to pour Pestilence into someone to neutralize it.” Luc’s scratchy rasp drew Asher’s gaze. Resting against the rock face, he looked like a zombie himself, caked in blood and covered in bites and scrapes. But unlike mine, I could already see his wounds were healing.
Asher grunted when I made to grab his hand. “Pandora...” Disheartened, he shook his head. “Unlike your Lust, Pestilence can...” His gaze moved toward Luc, and I could clearly read his indecision to say it out loud.
Understanding immediately, I tipped my head at Luc. “Can you give us a second please?”
Not looking happy about it, he pushed off the wall. “I’ll be out there gathering up the dead if you need me.”
With one final glare in Ash’s direction, he walked out. Keeping my voice low so that Luc wouldn’t be tempted to eavesdrop, I said, “Lust doesn’t bother you. Why this?”
Not wanting to leak an ounce of the poison into him, I kept the pest under firm lock and key, even though letting the venom stay in me was setting my teeth on edge. My bones ached, my tendons felt stretched to their max. I had to dump this or I’d be right back to where I’d been the night before, vomiting up bile and useless for the next few hours.
The sharp angles of his face were set in harsh lines when he said, “Priests are immune to Nephilim dark arts, but we are not immune to either LCD or HCD. Caste powers can kill us.”
Pestilence had been a lower caste demon when I’d killed him, instantly absorbing his powers as my own. It also explained why his powers seemed infinitely stronger than Lust’s.
“Why can Luc handle it?” I asked.
His thumb rubbed my cheek. I loved when he touched me. I loved that he not only wanted to but seemed to enjoy it as much as I did.
He shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe because he’s possessed by more than one demon, just like you.”
While that might be true, I wasn’t entirely convinced. When Wrath had called to me, I’d felt like my soul was going to explode from my chest if I didn’t do as he said. And when Vyxen had grabbed me, I’d tossed her through a wall. She’d been shaky for a day afterward.
It seemed to bother Luc, but not with the same force. Luc could take it—no one else could.
“I hate that I can’t help you.” Hard lines formed around his eyes.
Smoothing my fingers down them, I shook my head. “I know.”
“Luc!” Asher snapped, still cradling me tight to his chest.
The bite marks and scrapes on his body were gone by the time Luc reappeared. Lifting a brow, he glanced between us.
“Luc.” I didn’t need to ask him to help me, he understood.
Walking up to us, he pointed at the wall. “Give her to me, and you stand over there.”
A fierce growl tore from Asher’s lips and his fingers dug into me as if he didn’t want to let me go, especially not to Luc.
Patting his hand, I nodded. “He’s right, Ash. I don’t want any part of it touching you.”
With an air of superiority, Luc snatched me from Ash’s arms and tucked me into his chest. His musk of Nephilim (a mix of sex and man) intoxicated me. He was pumping out a flood of pheromones.
“Luc, turn it down.” I shuddered, feeling Lust begin to stir in response.
That’s just what we needed, for Luc to get her primed and ready in front of Asher.
“Now!” I snapped when he didn’t obey right away.
Immediately the smell ratcheted down. Asher was glaring daggers at Luc and the prickle of his own energy washed through the small confines of the room.
Deciding to just ignore the power play, I closed my eyes and called to Pestilence. The demon surged forward like a well-trained dog. It seemed the more I used his powers, the easier it was to contain and control him.
Visualizing his power not as a metaphorical presence but a tangible one, I gathered the green fog to me like a cloak, wrapping myself up in it tighter and tighter. I felt the pulses of it building and gathering, condensing into a taut helix.
Opening my eyes, I caught Asher’s hot gaze on me.
“One.” Luc’s chest expanded. “Two.”
“Three,” we cried in unison, then his hand clamped down on mine and I screamed as the magma heat of so much power drained from me into him.
Head dropping to his chest, Luc sucked air through his nose. Skin turning gray and clammy, he still hung on until I’d drained the last drop of it.
Free of the fire, I inhaled a sweet breath of air. Luc was on his hands and knees and gasping. Rubbing his back, I dropped my head to his shoulders.
“Was it too much?”
His lashes fluttered, but not before I noticed the unmistakable glow of lavender eyes. And now that I saw that, I realized his thigh muscles were quivering, his arm muscles flexing.
Luc wasn’t in pain.
Asher must have realized that at the same moment I did, because he ran to me and snatched me into his arms, clinging tight.
A moaning chuckle echoed through the cave as Luc slowly unfurled to a standing position. “What’s the matter, Priest?”
“Stay away from Pandora.” His hands curled into my biceps.
“Sucks to share her, doesn’t it?” Luc snarled. “And you know I can’t stay away, because you’re not man enough to take it.”
Asher punched him. Hard. And even though Luc’s jaw was now a fiery shade of ruby red, I knew my priest had held back. I felt it in the tenseness of his muscles, in the way he bristled beside me like a rattler coiled to strike. His jaw was clenched so tight his molars were grinding.
Luc just laughed and rubbed his jaw. His eyes were a frosty glacial blue. “No matter what you do, or who you do, you’ll never be rid of me, Dora.” He was talking to me but looking at Asher. “I vow it.”
And then turning, Luc traced out of there.