Page 78 of Lourdes & the Mafia
My name means death.
My hands wreak torture and agony.
I am the Lord of Pain.
King of The Pit.
And I will fucking kill them.
We meet in a clash of destructive magic. We fight, parrying back and forth. The jarring pain of being hit by something unknown makes my teeth rattle, yet I give as good as I get.
This is new. This is unknown. I should be able to take them down easily, but they make me work for it.
Pain, I order, summoning my demons from The Pit.
Inflict pain.
They appear from the ground, cackling at the prospect of torture. They charge, tearing through the shadowy flesh of our enemies, taking them down.
There’s an opening between the bodies and I rush through in time to see Lourdes fighting them off.
She shrieks as they touch her and I speed up, hitting them and blasting them away from her.
“Lourdes!”
She holds her hand out and on instinct, I grab it to yank her towards me. To use my body as a shield. To protect like I’ve never protected anything before.
But the moment our skin comes into contact with each other, I’m blasted backwards, far away from her.
My back hits the asphalt, knocking the wind from me.
“Kane!” Her scream of pain echoes through the sky.
No.
No!
“Protect her!” I order the demons.
They obey; even as they’re decimated one by one, they give their lives to obey me.
“Ramiel!” I scream down the bond as I jump to my feet. “Lorenzo!”
I need them. I cannot protect her. Not like this.
I rush towards her, only to come face to face to one of those creatures. A creature with no face, but somehow with a cruel expression of glee.
A sharp twist of pain presses against my skin and I look down to see the shadowy protrusion of a weapon stabbed through my stomach.
My eyes narrow.
Pain.
The creature shrieks and backs away from me, writhing as my magic consumes its body.
There’s a flash of bright light that snaps against his chest. It threads through, consuming him whole.
Each shadowy enemy is enveloped by the same thing, bursting like ash in the wind. The ones hauling Lourdes disappear and she falls to the ground with a cry and a thud.
