“Leave those to me.”
Patrick filled a mageglobe with a shockwave spell and sent it hurtling past Sage. The resulting explosion leveled hunters and demons ahead of them. Sleipnir trampled those already on the ground while Patrick’s group did the same, kicking a couple along the way to keep them down.
Nadine blocked a spell from hitting them by raising a shield, but the pair of soultakers that shoved through some zombies were Patrick’s immediate problem. Sage roared a challenge the demons screamed right back at her, whiplike tongues snapping through the air.
Odin raised a hand and made a fist. The soultakers were lifted into the air, bodies flailing, held in the grip of a god’s power. As Patrick watched, their maws were stretched open, skin and bone breaking as Odin fed the demons their own bodies until all that remained were twisted, broken balls of flesh that fell to the ground.
Patrick let Odin deal with the soultakers massed before them. Some slipped past the god though, hidden in the crush of zombies trying to stop them. Sage veered away from some other demons to guard the area on their right. Ashanti launched herself with brutal intent at one soultaker going after Nadine.
“Behind you,” Ashanti warned.
Patrick spun around to deal with the soultaker sneaking up on their six. He wasn’t up for losing any more magic than necessary, but baiting the damned thing was the only way he knew to get close enough without dying in order to stab it.
Patrick filled a mageglobe with raw magic and sent it away from him at an angle. The soultaker tracked the magic despite having no eyes, its huge maw splitting wide as its tongue lashed out. The soultaker caught the mageglobe with its tongue before twisting its bulbous head back in Patrick’s direction.
He gritted his teeth against the sensation of magic draining away from his soul and did his best to expand his personal shield. The soultaker was fast, snapping at his shoulder in a move that would’ve bitten his arm off if he wasn’t shielded. Patrick lunged around the demon with a grunt. Arm raised, dagger clenched tight in his hand, he rammed the blade into the soultaker’s gut, feeling its teeth bite into his shield with vicious pressure.
It screamed, deafening him in one ear, but the heavenly prayers in his dagger incinerated it to ash that didn’t blow away because of the rain. Patrick found his footing again, straightening up in time to nearly take a metal bat to the face. Only Nadine’s shield saved him from having his skull caved in by a hunter.
The zombies seemed to have multiplied, drawn from the Paris horde or Hel, it was impossible to know. Closing the distance between where they were and where Andras stood seemed almost insurmountable, even with Odin carving a brutal path in that direction. Maybe it would’ve stayed that way if Spencer wasn’t suddenly deposited on their six, swearing at Takoma as the master vampire unceremoniously dumped him to the ground.
Spencer stumbled forward a few steps, working to stay upright, Fatima clinging to his shoulder. “Give me a fucking warning next time!”
“Would you rather die or have me save your ass?” Takoma snapped before going after Ashanti and adding to the mess his mother was creating in the horde.
“Can you drop every zombie between us and Andras?” Patrick asked.
“They’ll rise again, so you’ll need to move fast,” Spencer warned.
“What about Andras? Can you exorcise him?”
Spencer grimaced, a tightness to his jaw that spoke of magical overreach, but there was no time for any of them to stop. “I can try. I’m not at my strongest, and I don’t know how much interference the Morrígan’s staff will cause.”
“I’ll take it.”
Fatima yowled loudly and launched herself off Spencer to the ground. A chill filled the air, not unlike traveling through the veil, as Spencer focused his magic on the walking dead arrayed before them.
The green of his magic danced over the zombies and drekavacs in a way reminiscent of the Northern Lights. The freed souls were drawn into the psychopomp’s mouth, guided to rest, the bones and bodies falling to the ground.
Patrick and Nadine kept Spencer between them as they pushed ahead over the bodies, trying to reach Andras before the dead rose again. Sage and Jono ranged out on either side of them, watching their flanks. Traveling in Odin’s wake made it easier, but not by much. Odin was a target that everyone was aiming for, and even a god could come under duress.
Wade managed to clear the sky directly overhead of incoming spells but some of the lower-aimed ones he missed. Patrick took those out with a couple of mageglobes, keeping one eye on the enemy around him. Jono stayed close, having chewed on so many bodies that strings of flesh dangled from his teeth.
Patrick nearly tripped on the edge of the sidewalk, their small group having managed to finally cross the street with Odin’s help. That put them closer to Andras, but Patrick knew the Great Marquis of Hell wouldn’t go down easy.
“Can you try exorcising the bastard now?” Patrick asked.
Spencer sidestepped Fatima, guiding his magic through a particularly thick group of zombies. “We’ll be sitting targets if I do. You’ll need to keep moving.”
“I’m not leaving you alone for that spell.”
Spencer shot him an irritated look, face pale and drawn, dried blood flaking off under his nose. “We’re all dead if you don’t make it to Ethan.”
“We aren’t leaving you behind,” Nadine shot back.
Patrick craned his head around, getting eyes on Andras and seeing the demon staring back at them out of Ilya’s eyes. The quartz crystal inside the carved wooden knotwork of the Morrígan’s staff they held flashed brightly.
Patrick’s eyes widened. “Nadine, shield!”
