Page 65 of Blood and Hexes

It didn’t take long to understand that they were losing. And losing meant dying.

Her heart slowed, her ears rang. She couldn’t hear anything above the thunder raging inside her. This couldn’t be how she went. She had existed for nine hundred and twenty-two years, but she’d never lived, never had a home, an anchor. The moment she found it, it was wrenched out of her grasp.

No.

This couldn’t be the end.

She refused to die like this.

Diana stilled, remembering something. Something that should have entered her mind hours ago. She felt utterly stupid for not having thought of it before.

“Cover me!” she yelled.

Without checking whether anyone had heard her—whether anyone could help—she fell to her knees. Staining her fingers with the blood flowing from her arms and flanks, she drew a circle on the paved ground and deftly added a pentagram at its center. Then she closed her eyes, and she did the only thing that was left to do in times of utter despair.

She prayed. She prayed, hoping her voice could reach the deepest, darkest circles of hell.

“Belial, if you can hear me. You owe me, and I need to collect.”

She kept every word clear in her mind, repeating them again and again, as though they were a spell.

Past her, she could see blades clashing, blood flowing, black and red, friends and foes.

Then there wasn’t any noise at all. She wasn’t on the hill anymore. She was in darkness, wrapped by a void. Again, she repeated her mantra.

The next moment, she was back in front of Skyhall.

A hulking bronze redheaded man hovered over her. Standing next to her was a young woman. She must have been somewhere around her twenties. Her pink hair had dark tips at the ends.

She blinked at Belial. “This isn’t what I pictured, when you described this place.”

Belial looked around with a grimace. “It’s a bit of a mess, all right.” He extended a hand toward Diana. Numbly, she took it.

“You came.” Part of her couldn’t believe it.

“Well, I couldn’t very well ignore you, with all the shouting.” Belial clapped his hands together once and everything, and everyone, froze in place. “Besides, I was on my way. Meet Cee, hellwitch extraordinaire. She needs a place to crash for half a dozen years or so.”

“This doesn’t really qualify as a safe place.” The witch rolled her eyes. “How about somewhere that’s not on fire?”

“They’ll straighten the place out shortly. In fact, I have a marvelous idea, Cee. You can help with that.”

The witch grimaced. “Fine.”

“Great thing. Now…” Belial turned to Diana. “Now, about that little favor I owe you. Name it.”

That seemed obvious enough. “Can you get rid of these people? Everyone who invaded,” she quickly quantified. “Down at the borders, too.”

She was owed a favor from a king of the underworld, she might as well make it count.

“Hm. What would you have me do with them? Send them to hell?”

That didn’t sound like the worst of ideas.

Diana looked downhill, to the plain that had become a blood-soaked battlefield.

There were countless vampires. Many more had already perished. The bulk of their race was right here in Oldcrest. If she had them killed, there would be almost no one left, leaving their kind weak, in danger of extinction.

And she’d be the villain who had destroyed so many existences, so many families, with a carless word. A monster.

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