Page 93 of Strike It Witch

He laughed. “Brittle and frail. You witches always think you’re so much better than my kind.” With fingers like the gnarled roots of a swamp cypress tree he lifted me by the waistband of my jeans and shoved me through the portal again, this time from the waist up.

Oxygen didn’t exist here. My lungs crumpled and my heart caught mid-thump and flopped around in my chest, trying to find a rhythm. Hot pain streaked into my upper arms, shoulders, and jaw.

Heart attack.

Joon’s glowing soil skittered from my throat to the spot above my heart. It punched into my chest wall. Was it performingchest compressions?

Belial dragged me over grass like razorblades, back through the portal opening, and tossed me to the dirt.

His terrible face loomed over me. “Impressive, witch. You’ve lived through Hell twice.”

My shaking fingers prodded my face, prepared for blood, prepared for flesh in ribbons.

There was no damage. Not a single cut. It seemed injuries that happened in Hell stayed in Hell.

“Kind of like Las Vegas,” I murmured, and choked out a laugh.

“What do you have to be happy about?” The demon lifted his foot, which was roughly the size of Alpha Floyd’s SUV tire, and raised it over my head.

This was going to suck—for the half-second I lived before he crushed my skull into the dirt, which seemed appropriate considering how far I was in over my head.

I chirped a laugh again.

Wasn’t it just my luck to be killed in the absolute best location an elemental earth witch could possibly ask for, while also being the absolute worst location this particular elemental earth witch could possibly ask for?

I let my head slump to the side. I stared at my friends and enemies with a disconnected air. Joon’s eyes were pressed shut and his mouth was moving. Chanting for me. I wished I could’ve gotten to know the mage better. I think we might’ve been friends.

Bronwyn and Margaux both wore the look of a person who could see the train coming but weren’t close enough to warn the car stuck on the tracks. Alpha Floyd appeared annoyed. The bookseller was still in her car—most likely with her hand on the gearshift and one Dior pump hovering above the gas, and Mason Hartman hadn’t stepped one foot out of the SUV.

Cobarde. Coward.

Ida stood outside the salt line, her hands palm up on the barrier, peering at me like a kid through a rain-streaked window. Horror was written in every line of her sweet face. I wouldn’t miss much from this life, but, by the gods, I’d miss my best friend.

Maybe she’d get to walk with me after I died the way she hadn’t been able to walk with her beloved Anita. Maybe I could even find Anita and tell her how much Ida had loved her.

Ronan's densely muscled, eight-foot wolf clawed the barrier a few feet down from her. Rags hung from his haunches—remnants of clothing. His fur was a mix of yellow, red, gray, and black. His teeth were twice as long as any wolf I’d ever seen, and right now, they were smeared with his own blood.

Golden eyes locked on mine.

He was beautiful in his ferocity, and I felt lucky that his wolf was the last thing I’d lay eyes on in this world.

Chapter

Twenty-Three

Ilay in the dirt and awaited death.

Except… I squinted up at Belial’s giant foot.

It was … gone.

To be precise, it was on the ground a few yards away with the other one, pointed toward the parking lot driveway.

“Identify yourself, creature of darkness,” he thundered.

Alpha Floyd ran into the SUV and jumped in. The witches peeled away from the circle, following the wolf alpha at a wary, slow pace. Joon sidled back, still chanting, though his eyes were open and watchful.

Ronan didn’t notice—he was furiously digging around the edge of the outer circle. It appeared he was now trying to burrow under. If I’d had the ability to shout, I’d have told him it was pointless.

---