Raziel’s church was connected to the tunnels. My coven and I ran through the underground cavern as I followed the tiny, warm pulses of energy that I knew were the other parts of me.
There was a scream, and I glanced back just as Stanton was overtaken by none other than Tammy.
Her pretty floral dress was shredded, and her face was skull-like and deformed as an inhuman screech exploded from her lips.
“Stanton!” I screamed as Sophie appeared out of nowhere and tore into him as well, her fingernails growing into sharp, bony talons before my very eyes.
Stanton’s screams turned wet as they ripped into his chest, and I was about to double back when two dark streaks of fur slammed into the possessed bodies of Tammy and Sophie.
Sköll and Fenrir ripped into them in their dog forms, and I winced as they tore out their throats, killing them before they could do any more harm.
I hesitated.
Stanton was bleeding out.
Magic flared in my palms, and his life force danced before my third eye.
I wanted to try to heal him. Leaving him here felt so incredibly wrong, but the hoard was closing in on us. He met my gaze, his face white and his eyes wide.
“Go!” he hissed, and I swallowed, giving him one firm but grateful nod before turning and continuing my mad race down the hall.
Fuck.
“Hurry!” I shouted at my coven, shooting a blast of fire back to slow the hoard down.
We turned a corner, and there they fucking were.
Astrid and my grandmother hung from their wrists in a hollowed-out cavern illuminated by a single torch.
My coven spilled into the space, and I threw up a magical barrier to prevent the hoard from following us.
It wouldn’t hold long.
I physically flinched as they threw themselves against the magical barricade. The power that the coven had called for me was strong, but it was finite. I wouldn’t be able to hold this wall for long. I needed Gabe to hurry up and kill Raz so I could focus on rebinding with my other selves.
“There she is!” Astrid chirped happily, glancing at my grandmother. “I told you she would come for us.”
“Yes, yes. I’m here,” I gasped, scrambling to help Luna and Willow set up the necessary candles and herbs for the rebinding spell as the rest of the coven formed a circle.
“It’s beendreadfullyboring without you, Harper,” Astrid yammered. The spell I had cast to animate them was clearly old and fraying. They were no longer behaving like humans and couldn’t sense the danger from the snarling hoard of incubi I was holding back by a thread.
“Hurry up!” I snapped at Luna and Willow as we all fell into position.
Once we were rebound, and I had my coven with me, I wouldfinallybe at full power… Well, minus Stanton. My heart twinged with regret at his death. We would honor his sacrifice once we were out of this mess.
Once the circle formed and I released my golems, I led them gently into the center with me.
“Here goes nothing,” I breathed as Luna led the rest of the coven in a chant.
Joining hands with the mother and the crone, I threw my head back and closed my eyes, opening my chakras to allow their essence to be re-joined with mine.
Alexa play: Unsteady by X Ambassadors
The world shifted as I became whole again. The magic snapped into place just as I felt the energy that signaled Raziel sputter and die.
As Willow had predicted, the second Raziel died, so did his hoard. The hundreds of people that had been possessed suddenly stopped attacking, and they all crumbled to the ground, clearly ill and broken from the damage the angels had done to their insides.
Thrumming with a seemingly endless, clean magic, my coven parted, allowing me to step out of the circle.
