Page 36 of Wrath of One
Saint
I don’t want to contemplate how hopeless this fight is. My mouth and teeth are coated with blood, and I’ve never tasted anything more disgusting than a demon. My stomach rolls, but I push that sensation aside, tearing through the creatures with my hands and teeth.
And when the world explodes, I know how truly fucked we are.
It’s hopeless.
Even with Azazel and his pixies blasting through the ranks of hell, we are outnumbered. Where the fuck are Phoenix and Izara? We need them. Fuck, we need an entire fucking army.
Claws jab through my flesh, and I scream just before I grab for the hand that lashed out at me and snap it in half.
I lost Syko in the fray. I have no idea if he’s alive or dead. My heart feels heavier than my soul right now. My knees shake, but I force the determination out even when everything in me tells me to give in.
I’m pushed back to the ground. I don’t know where one creature ends and another begins. There are too many, too close together. My whole body screams in pain, and I can’t seem to move. Shadows flicker around the corners of my vision and slither up my legs. The darkness pins me down to the blackened earth. I struggle against the bindings, but it’s futile. A shadow looms over me and molds into the form of a man with a top hat. Black, depthless holes become eyes and a gaping mouth.
The figure takes off its top hat and bows. When it speaks, it’s with the voice of a man with a perfectly purring tone. “Good evening, Saint Von Hunter.”
My eyes widen. “Who the fuck are you?”
“Osmodeus, pleased to meet you.” He twirls his hat over his shoulder and flicks it back up onto his head.
Osmodeus.
This is the motherfucker that hurt Izzy with vision after vision of our deaths. I thought he was dead. Apparently the fuck not.
“I wish I could say the same,” I grit out.
His hole of a mouth opens and laughter flitters out. “Don’t like this form? What about this one?” His body shifts and transforms into the perfect twin image of Phoenix, with consuming black eyes.
My heart almost stops.
“Or would you prefer this?” His image changes again, and he’s Syko now, wings intact and fluttering against his broad back.
“Fuck. You.”
He smiles with Syko’s lips and it’s a twisted, grotesque thing. “Don’t mind if I do.” He changes again, but now, he’s Izzy. Long, dark hair flows down bare shoulders, and the twin dark eyes lookwrong. “How about now, baby?” he purrs in Izzy’s voice. And it sounds like her, if Izara’s tone had been dripped in poison, like an apple laced with a curse.
I struggle against those dark bindings. I can’t stand to see him wearing Izara like a mask. It’s cruel. I’ll gladly rip through him. I’ll gladlyendhim for this offense and all others. But his power is strong; after all, he is a higher demon of hell, even if he seems to be composed entirely of shadows.
Those shadows tighten around my body and squeeze. The breath escapes my lungs on a shouting curse, and the pressure pushes against me, tighter and tighter until I hear my bones beginning to snap.
“She killed you a thousand times in a thousand ways.” Osmodeus smiles with Izara’s lips, but it’s not brilliant or beautiful. “I let her kill you over and over again. I should let you suffer the same fate.”
The shadows grip me, and I gasp. My vision flickers in and out of consciousness, but he leaves me awake enough to hear his every vile word.
“Do you know what happens when a higher demon is killed?” He presses Izara’s face so close to mine. “We don’t die. We can’t be killed in our own domain, but we do get shoved into the earth and are forced to claw our way out again.” His words drip with venom and hatred. “It would have been fun to break you as you killed your loved ones.” The shadows’ grip is crushing now, and I scream. “But it’s easier to kill you now and throw your body at that bitch’s feet—”
The word ends on a strangle, and the illusion he wears of Izara suddenly fragments into a thousand pieces. It explodes in a shower of dark particles until he assumes his shadowy form again and looks down to find a sword shoved straight through his chest.
He gasps as liquid night pours out of the wound. The darkness holding me down slackens, and Osmodeus doesn’t have time to utter a single word before he explodes into a shower of ash and shadows.
I gasp for breath, and as the shower of darkness ebbs, I catch sight of the figure behind where Osmodeus had been standing.
A smile pulls at my lips.
“Since he’s not in his domain, I bet he stays dead this time.” Heaven lowers the sword and flicks her hair over her shoulder. “No one fucks with a Von Hunter.Ever.”
My sister is… fucking terrifying, if I do say so myself.
