Darkness Eternal (Guardians of Eternity)

He swung the sword, cursing as Marika dodged the blow and struck him across the face. She wasn’t as strong as Uriel, but she still packed a hell of a punch. And worse, it seemed as if nothing could hurt her.

Uriel’s head snapped back, and Marika was once again at his throat, almost as if she intended to gnaw through his neck.

And maybe she did.

Evil bitch.

Tightening her grip on the branch, Kata grimly marched forward. She wasn’t stupid enough to believe she could hurt a vampire with a stick, not unless she managed to stab it through the cold-blooded leech’s heart, and with her luck she was more likely to stick it through her own. But she was feeling like the last gazelle at the watering hole and the weight of the branch in her hand gave the impression she wasn’t completely helpless.

Stupid, but necessary if she was going to be able to concentrate enough to conjure a curse.

Fiercely she blocked out Uriel’s terrible wounds and his losing effort to hold off Marika, who was not only weirdly immune to her injuries, but clearly in the throes of a crazed bout of bloodlust.

Instead she turned her mind inward, focusing on the small spark of power that smoldered in her soul.

It was the same power that she used to heal, but instead of allowing the energy to flow from her in a soothing, fixed stream, she instead twisted it with the dark impulses that lurked in every creature, and held it in a tight knot until she unleashed it with a savage burst.

Muttering the words her grandmother had taught her as they had sat beside the campfire, Kata pointed her hand in Marika’s direction, releasing her power in a torrential blast.

The air sizzled with the force of her curse and for a moment Marika faltered, her crazed gaze shifting toward Kata with an expression of blatant panic.

“That’s right, you vicious whore, die,” Kata hissed.

There was a gurgling sound as a disgusting foam began to spew from Marika’s mouth. The curse was a particularly nasty one that Kata had never used before. Then, obviously the sort of vampire who was swift to take advantage, Uriel rushed forward to swing his sword directly at her exposed neck.

That should have been the end of it.

Shut-the-door-turn-out-the-lights-fat-lady-singing end.

Marika, however, was already shrugging off the potent curse and with a shocking display of power she was springing in the air and vaulting over the swinging blade.

Holy . . . shit.

Kata gripped her stick, her mouth dry and her heart lodged somewhere near her tonsils.

Trapped in a sense of nightmarish disbelief, Kata watched Uriel deliberately place himself between her and the gruesome freak that had once been her sister.

“Kata, find a way out of here,” he growled.

“No.” She shook her head. “I won’t leave you.”

With a low growl, Uriel turned to stab her with a savage glare, his T-shirt drenched in blood and throat still mangled from Marika’s attacks.

“Then we both die.”

She bit her bottom lip. She wasn’t stupid. She knew their only hope of survival was to somehow find the means to escape from the bubble of illusion.

But every fiber of her being rebelled at the thought of abandoning Uriel.

“What the hell is she?” she muttered.

“Invincible,” Marika taunted, her spooky laugh once again filling the glade. “Don’t be wandering too far, sister dearest. Once I’ve disposed of your lover we can start enjoying our special time together.”

Uriel stroked a hand down her cheek, his expression pleading.

“Go.”

Briefly pressing his fingers to her cheek, Kata abruptly turned and charged across the glade.

She heard her sister’s screech of fury and the answering roar of Uriel, but she kept her gaze grimly trained on the low hills that swelled before her. Without her curses she had nothing that could help Uriel defeat Marika.

All she could do now was pray for a miracle . . .

No, that wasn’t all she could do, she belatedly realized.

Kata slowed as she reached the foot of one low hill.

Why was she running as if she could find some magical doorway?

There was only one way out of the illusion.

Stepping behind a large rock, Kata shoved her hair out of her face with a shaking hand and sucked in a ragged breath.

“Yannah,” she called, her voice echoing eerily through the still air. “Yannah?”

Distantly she could hear the sounds of Uriel’s battle with Marika and closer at hand the rustle of a squirrel scurrying through the undergrowth, but from the demon who’d trapped them here . . . nothing. Nada. Jack squat.

“Yannah, dammit, where are you?”

There was no warning.

One minute she was alone, frustration boiling through her like acid, and the next Yannah was standing before her.

“No need to screech, Kata,” the tiny demon complained, smoothing her hands down her pristine white gown. “There’s nothing wrong with my hearing.”

Kata clenched her hands together. It was that or wringing Yannah’s slender neck.

“Really?” she said between gritted teeth. “Then you knew we were being attacked by Marika and you just decided to leave us trapped here?”