The demon grabbed me by the throat and tossed me across the room. I smashed into the coffee table, my body landing on top of the quill’s glass case. It shattered beneath me, and dozens of different shards dug into my back.
I rolled away just as a meaty fist came crashing down, splintering the coffee table where I’d laid not a moment before. I stumbled to my feet, my eyes frantically searching for a weapon. Blood dripped from the nicks on my back. I heard a hiss as at least one drop hit the ground.
Seriously? Can’t a girl catch a break? I thought as another demon began to take shape. This was like fighting a freaking hydra.
Spotting a walking stick in the corner of the room, I called it to me. And then I went Gandalf the Grey on the monster’s ass. I smashed the cane across the demon’s face, whacking him again and again until the staff broke and he collapsed to the ground.
A growl came from behind him as the other demon finished forming. Dropping the remnants of the cane, I ran down an aisle of shelves. I needed a better weapon than a walking stick. Feet pounded at my heels as the demon bore down on me. A hard body slammed into my back, tackling me to the floor.
I fell to all fours, pinned in place by a hulking piece of demonic flesh. If I died now, the world was—pardon my French—so fucked.
Ahead of me, my eyes caught sight of a chest tucked away in a forgotten corner.
Lifting a hand, I levitated it off the ground and catapulted it at the demon holding me down, the one who was giving an evil little laugh now that he had me where he wanted me. The chest beaned him, wood and metal exploding against his flesh. He slumped to the side, half on, half off me.
Praise Jesus and all the baby angels in heaven, a dozen different weapons scattered out of the remains.
Sliding out from under the demon’s deadweight, I lunged for the sword closest to me. In one smooth movement I’d unsheathed it, and in the next I brought it down upon the demon’s neck. His head didn’t have time to roll before he turned to smoke and ash.
I was stalking towards demon number two when I heard the clash of swords in the distance.
And they were getting closer.
Andre
“Doesn’t this feel familiar?” the devil said. He and Andre began circling each other. “Only then you had a pitchfork.”
The devil disappeared. In the next instant Andre felt a boot at his back. It had been a long time since anyone had caught him off-guard. The devil shoved him forward.
Andre didn’t fall, but as he caught himself, the devil twisted his wrist and snatched one of the swords right out from under him.
“Like taking candy from a baby,” the devil said, testing the weapon out in his hand. “And I’d heard so many tales of your skill with a sword.” He backed towards the door, sheathing the sword he’d come with now that he had Andre’s.
Andre followed him, chafing at how easily the devil divested him of one of his weapons. “Wrong sword, Lucifer,” Andre said. “Ask Gabrielle. She can tell you all about my skill with my sword.”
The devil gave a wordless shout, swinging Andre’s stolen weapon at him. Andre smiled as he parried the blow. He’d wanted to get under the devil’s skin, and he’d succeeded.
They fought their way out of Andre’s study. Steel clinked and sparked as their weapons collided with unnatural force. They were blurs, moving down the hall as they traded blows. There was no mistaking where the devil was leading him. Andre’s room got closer and closer, until they were passing through the door. His heart skittered as he caught a whiff of sulfur and the remnants of his soulmate’s blood.
The distraction nearly cost him.
The devil’s stolen sword arced over Andre’s head, ready to split him right down the middle. At the last second he blocked the blow.
Their swords locked. “What a disappointment you would’ve been to your father,” the devil said, “whoring and killing your way through the centuries. Tell me, do you think he would’ve traded his soul for your life if he’d known what you’d do with it?”
Andre slid the devil’s blade away and kicked him in the chest, sending the dark god sliding to the entrance of Andre’s secret library. “You’re going to have to do better than that, Lucifer,” Andre said.
“Andre?”
His blood froze as he heard his soulmate’s call. The devil was between them. Andre wasn’t fool enough to think that she’d already used the quill. If she had, it would be unlikely that he and the devil would still be fighting. And positioned as they all were, Satan could kill her now and their one chance at salvation would evanesce.
The devil seemed to realize this. He smiled at Andre and disappeared.
Andre ran for the doorway, his body doused in fear. It had all been one elaborate trap. The devil wanted Andre to watch his soulmate die, along with the last of his hope and that of the world’s.
Andre stood at the top of the stairs when the devil appeared in front of him, dropping the sword he stole to wrap a hand around the back of Andre’s neck. And then the devil’s other sword was in his hand.
With a hard thrust, he shoved it into Andre’s chest. The blade parted skin and pierced Andre’s heart, exiting through his back.