Page 25 of From the Shadows
He didn’t even deserve the happiness he’d felt at lunch with everyone. The only thing he was due would be a coffin buried six feet deep. He only?—
The fist that slammed into the side of his face and knocked himinto the wall shocked Diego out of his thoughts. He snapped his head up to find Ranna in her wendigo form: a giantess of muscle and sinew covered by shaggy snow-white hair. Her claws were frighteningly impressive, with nails that were nothing like the ones Ranna pampered and spent a ton of money to keep looking buffed and polished. Diego had seen Ranna in action. Her fingertips could rend bone as easily as flesh. Even stone crumbled under her assault. Four inches of razor-sharp death came at the end of each finger.
“What are you doing?” Diego demanded.
“Stop being the person who beats themselves up. Fucking grow a spine,” she snarled, showing off fangs that were even more horrifying than Diego’s. “You’re so desperate to beat someone up, then try it with me!”
And she launched herself again, claws bared, and Diego knew she was seriously trying to gut him. He rolled when she landed the first punch, barely escaping the damage she could have done to him.
“Back the fuck off, Ranna,” he warned, trying to keep out of her way.
She was insanely fast, though. Having grown up in the harshest of climates—snow, storms, ice—she had to be. Her people knew it was move quickly or perish. She was able to close the gap between them in the blink of an eye. She wrapped her claw around his wrist and pulled him closer, where she proceeded to sink her teeth into his shoulder, slicing through the flesh and muscle like they were butter. He was certain she’d bitten clear through to the bone. Diego heard the crack a second before the pain shot through his body. She wasn’t letting up. She could kill Diego… if he let her.
Unlike Ranna, Diego had no alternate form. Though his skin was a whiter shade of pale, he could still pass as human if no one looked too closely. Ranna needed the magicks passed down by her ancestors to accomplish it. Diego flicked his claws open, and the next time she reached for him, he raked them over her face. Her howl and the way she desperately pawed at the ripped-open skin scared the shit out of Diego. He’d done this to someone he considered a friend.
Empatia, I need a doctor right away.
Sending a medical team to your location.
He was grateful she didn’t ask why, because he wasn’t sure he could explain what had happened. How he’d lost control. How it was more blood on his hands—literally.
Team is a few minutes out.
Ignore that, Em.Ranna stood to her full height of nearly nine feet, the crimson staining her fur. She turned to Diego and gave a blood-smeared smile that would have lesser beings cowering in fear or making them seek therapy for life. “Do you see the difference now, dumbass?” She lumbered toward him, her muscles straining. As Diego watched, the scores on her face vanished as if they’d never existed. “Any predator would take advantage of his prey’s weakness and finish the job. You worried for my safety. Those pictures? You were angry on behalf of the humans who’d been killed, instead of saying the weak died so the strong could live. Tell me, in what world could that be considered a monster?”
“She’s right, you know,” Shay chimed in as he stepped around the corner. “You could have killed me easily enough.” He shrugged. “You’re smart. You could have found a way to get rid of the body, made it look like I’d simply left. Did you do that? No. You were so afraid of hurting me, you locked yourself away. I told you Diego, I know monsters, and you’re not one of them.”
“How long were you there?” Diego snapped.
“Long enough.” He nodded at Ranna. “Could you excuse us?”
She snorted, then turned and loped away, returning to human form before she reached the end of the hallway, seemingly not caring that she was naked.
“Come with me,” Shay insisted. Without waiting, he grabbed Diego’s hand and dragged him along. “I get that you’re dealing with several literal lifetimes of pain from what happened to you. You fully expected that the team or Jeremy would reject you and you’d be alone again. Am I right?”
The screams. The pleading. The wheeze of the last breath as someone died. The prayers for protection that went unheeded. Diego was no better than those who’d massacred the wedding party.
“They killed children,” he snarled, unable to keep the anger from his voice.
“They did, but there’s one thing you have to remember. Because one of any species kills, doesn’t mean the entire group is the same. After what happened to me, I could have become angry and bitter, but instead, I tried to make myself a better person. One who wasn’t so trusting or stupid. Someone who’s worthy of being smiled at. Sure, it might take time for you to come to terms with this, but you will, I promise. And finding out who killed those people and stopping them will be an act of redemption for you.”
Could it be as simple as that? “I’ve done good things over the years, but….”
Shay squeezed Diego’s hand, forcing him to look up. “You have. Ranna and the guys were telling me about some of the things you’ve done. The people you’ve saved, even if they never knew it. Borne says you guys went toe to toe with a literal prince of Hell. Kicked his ass pretty badly, from what I heard.”
If only it had been that simple. Zzaran gathered up virgins to sacrifice them to acquire greater power. The sad thing was, in the current world, that led him to take preteens or younger. He’d put them in a summoning circle and had been in the process of speaking the chant when the hunters burst into the room. Diego ordered the team to get the kids out, while he went after Zzaran.
He told them to get out because he hadn’t expected to survive.
It had been a pitched battle. Diego was fast, using his powers to fade in and out of shadows while striking from behind. The demon lord, however, was insanely powerful, and Diego had to keep moving to stay out of his reach, because if he got a grip on him, this fight—this world—would be over. Every few minutes, Zzaran would summon a horde of smaller demons, which Diego had to kill before he could get back to the demon lord. The biggest problem was the fact that while Diego was battling the minions, their master continued to cast his incantation. If he didn’t do something, if he didn’t find a way, Zzaran would get the children again, drag them back into the circle, and complete the ritual. The kids would die,which meant his team would follow, and after that, demons would rule the world.
It was a nearly impossible choice.
Someone would die, and Diego didn’t want to choose between his team and humans, because that wouldn’t end well for anyone.
He was able to hold Zzaran off until the team finally had the kids out of the building, and then they rushed to help Diego. Ranna, her snow-white fur blackened and charred from the hellfire that the demon imps cast, surged forward, jamming her claw into Zzaran’s chest, opening a gaping hole. The demon lord laughed as the wound began closing. Diego knew they’d never be able to beat Zzaran by going toe to toe, so he tried something he’d never done before.
He flashed between shadow and light, until he was close enough to strike. He turned his hand into mist and thrust it into the hole Ranna had put in Zzaran’s chest. The demon lord’s eyes widened as Diego solidified his hand around the pulsing heart and ripped it from the hulking body. For several long moments, it continued to beat, and Diego feared that wouldn’t stop Zzaran. Then Borne jumped from the stairs above them and landed on Zzaran, his hands locked around the monster’s head. His screams reverberated through the room, filled with pain and rage over a life denied him, as he twisted and yanked, separating Zzaran’s head from his body.
