“Another present from Lucifer,” Levi growled as he readied his sword.
“Korrak, Rathgor, Drek’thar—get ready!” I shouted, my voice cracking like a whip. “Prepare yourselves!”
The three generals barked their own orders, and their platoons responded, immediately snapping into formation. A heartbeat later, they surged forward to meet the threat, without any hesitation. They lived for carnage, and I saw the excitement light up their faces as they attacked these new creatures.
The first beast crashed into the front ranks with the force of a wrecking ball. It snapped a soldier in half before anyone could stop it, then swatted another aside like a rag-doll. The line buckled but didn’t break. Instead, they tightened their approach and began their own assault.
I lifted my arm, signalling Mephisar and Dragon, then swung it down, silently ordering their attack. The two dove from above with matching roars, fire spewing from between their lips. Vol cackled with glee as he clung to one of Dragon’s horns, his legs flailing comically behind him as the beast plummeted. He looked like a deranged gremlin strapped to the wing of a crashing airplane and loving every second of it. Because of course he was. He was insane.
Dragon and Mephisar were careful not to hit my ranks, and one of the attacking creatures shrieked as Dragon’s flames ate through its plated hide. Another barrelled right through, as though it didn’t care a lick about the fire.
“Varz, Calder, Gorr,” I ordered, pointing at the closest creature.
Levi took off with them, his blazing gold hair practically lighting the way. Together, the four of them dove beneath one of the monsters’ legs, severing it at the knee. Without a word from me, Eliza darted in at Levi’s side, slicing at the creature’s undercarriage with her daggers.
Rathiel, Calyx, and I were next. We took to the air alongside Mephisar and Dragon.
I drew Inferno’s Kiss in one hand, Dragonbane in the other, and dropped. Clutching both hilts tightly, I aimed them at the nearest creature’s skull and landed, immediately cleaving it in two. Rathiel and Calyx adopted my technique, apparently finding it rather useful.
One by one, we took them out. Thankfully, my soldiers outnumbered and easily rid us of this newest obstacle. The lastcreature fell by my blade, driven through its eye. The thing screeched its death cry, thrashed for a moment or two, then collapsed, the ground shaking beneath us.
A moment or two passed, and then my hellspawn suddenly cheered their victory. Chest heaving, I took stock of the surrounding area and scanned the wreckage. We’d lost a dozen or so soldiers during the battle. But that meant nothing when I could simply resurrect them.
I was already stepping toward the closest fallen soldier when Rathiel caught me by the arm.
“Lily—”
“It’s fine,” I told him.
“It’s not,” he cut in. “The darkness is growing within you. You’ve lost control twice in as many days. What if that happens again? Or worse? We can’t risk that right now, not when we are so close to ending this. We can spare a dozen soldiers.”
The urge to resurrect my people, to bring them back from the edge, to give them another fighting chance was overwhelming. I clutched my swords’ hilts so hard, I thought they might break.
“Please, Lily,” Rathiel said. “Now is not the right time.”
The shadows within me writhed, hungry, whispering promises I almost wanted to believe. But slowly, I forced them back down.
I swallowed hard, forcing my voice to carry over the field. “We press onward.”
I lifted my chin and stared into the distant horizon where Lucifer awaited. If he thought he could bleed us dry before we reached him, he was dead wrong.
Chapter Twenty-Three
LILY
We marched and marched,and then, for a change of pace, we marched some more. At least this time, there were no tremors or face-eating, ground-burrowing, cavern-mouthed creatures. So…win? Admittedly, it was a tad boring. Never thought I’d admit that. But traipsing over the same monotonous terrain for hours on end was hardly exciting. And a little unsettling.
I didn’t trust it.
The phrase “the calm before the storm” kept circling my mind. If Lucifer wasn’t actively screwing with us, then whatwashe doing? Was he preparing for our attack? Or was he doing something evenmorenefarious? With my father, there was no way to know. The quiet was too neat, too manufactured, and I kept waiting for the next shoe to drop. Or, in my father’s case, the next abomination to claw its way out of the ground.
I kept my eyes moving, scanning every inch of terrain for signs of shifting rock or bubbling lava. Anything to indicate what might come next. But there was nothing. Just the steady beat of my army’s footsteps.
It wasn’t until we were about half a day’s march from the palace that I started to feel a strange…itch. And no, not thedown therekind. This was different. It started as a low prickling at the base of my spine, then climbed upward until the hairs on the back of my neck rose. It was subtle at first, almost like when a sunny day turns to rain on Earth—a slight pressure change before the storm rolls in. But I couldn’t figure out why. Was it my nerves? Or was I so out of sorts that I was imagining things? Because I didn’t see anything suspicious at all.
I rolled out my shoulders, but the itch didn’t dissipate. If anything, it worsened the farther we went.
Eventually, it reached a point where I was rubbing my arms and looking over my shoulder every few steps. Rathiel kept glancing my way, concern furrowing his brow. When our gazes met, he arched a brow, as though to ask me what was wrong.
