Whispering a spell, I pull my arms together; the sky knits and seals in a section, closing a small part of Sheol. I’m making headway, cutting off a procession of mothmen driven chariots and blocking them from entering. They pull up, reaching the edge of the world that has become too tight to get through.
A sigh escapes me at my small victory, but it’s short-lived. My magic is only a bandage on the wound. It unravels and opens again. A golden armor-clad angel with bright red Seraphim wings flies along the divide, scoring his dagger over the fabric between our worlds. It rends and frays growing larger than it was before.
I recognize the angel. It’s Emil. My heart pounds; I had almost no hope of finding him among the damned, yet, there he is. I glance beside me. Reed hovers in the sky to my right. His dark wings beat with a graceful rhythm. His attention is on the masses of Fallen engaging in battle around us. I’ve been so focused on my spells; I hadn’t questioned their proximity to me. Now I see I’m at the center of the conflict. Reed swoops in front of me, slicing off the arm of an angel who would’ve tackled me from above. The carnage falls to the ground where Gancanagh are tearing apart possessed souls.
Buns is just a small distance from me, her golden butterfly wings flying her in zigzag patterns. She clutches the neck of the cham-pain bottle. Using it like a bat, she smashes it into an angel, yelling, “Take my pain!” The brutal Power cramps up, yellow lightning bolts of suffering charging through him as he falls from the sky. At her side, Zephyr stabs his sword through the belly of an albino mothman, its mouth opens wide like a dying fish, showing rows of pointy rotten teeth.
It’s not enough, though. The pathway into our world from Sheol is widening with every slice Emil makes with his soul shredder. Soon, there won’t be just a hole; Sheol will be the horizon. I need to get to Emil to stop him. I try to catch Reed’s attention, but as I do, I hear a scream that nearly stops my heart. Glancing over my shoulder, I see Buns’ golden wing fold in. Blood sprays from her chest and mouth as she’s impaled on the end of a spear of a dark-haired fallen Seraph. My response is automatic. I reach over my left shoulder and grasp the handle of my battle hammer. Wielding it like a shot putter, I let it fly. The silver hammer tumbles through the air. The flat side of it connects with the depraved Seraph, knocking his head clear off his shoulders, casting it down to the ground below. The angel’s body goes limp and chases his head to the ground. I whisper the command, “Come back to me.” The hammer twists and returns, striking my palm.
Zephyr catches Buns in his arms, refusing to let her fall. His face is one of devastation as he yanks the spear from her chest, letting the blood-covered metal shaft drop from his fist. Zee’s hand smoothes her hair back from her forehead, smearing red in her flaxen strands. Before I can move, Russell flies up to them and hovers in the air, his red wings beating behind him. He holds out his hand and uses a spell to encase Buns, Zephyr, and himself in a bubble. It’s like the kind of bubble little children blow with soap and plastic sticks in their back yards, only his bubble is huge. Fallen beat on the curve of the bubble, trying to get to them. The wall bows in, but it doesn’t pop; the spell holds. Russell’s hand begins to glow with golden light. He presses it to Buns’ wound while he punches his other fist through the wall of the bubble. Again, it doesn’t pop, but closes in around his wrist. He palms the froglike face of a Sheol demon. The grotesque flying frogman’s chest breaks open and orange-colored blood projects out of him to cover the side of the iridescent bubble with evil frogman guts. Buns’ arms flail as the wound in her chest closes.
I feel numb with fear. I glance at Reed, he’s a windstorm blowing through straw men, scattering and killing everything that gets close to me. A knicker beside me jolts me out of my shock. My waist is seized and I swing up behind Brennus on the back of a black-winged horse. My hair streams behind me as Brennus drives the steed forward, aiming at the expanding red sky and the evil freak who’s cutting my world to pieces. Holding onto Brennus’ waist and looking behind me, Finn is right there on the back of another winged-horse whose nostrils breathe fire with each powerful stride and flap of its beautiful feathered wings. I wonder where they got the mythical creatures, but because the equines seems real enough, I’m going to go with them being from Hell.
“Clear a path for us, mo chroí!” Brennus orders over his shoulder.