You will not win. I am stronger than you.
For an answer, Cosette sent another light ball flying at her. This one struck Lilin in the side of her ribcage, causing her to stumble backward.
With a shriek of outrage, Lilin called on her full power. Her entire body lit on fire from within. “I will bring this house of stones crumbling down upon you!” She lifted her arms above her head and allowed a burst of flames to encompass the ceiling.
Cosette was frozen in place, struck by the evil turning her home into a raging inferno. It wasn’t until Davien grabbed her arm, shaking her back to the present with a gruff command to run, did she finally find her feet.
The duke grabbed her hand and ran down to the foyer where Charlotte and Quinn were waiting anxiously by the front door.
Dashwood was nowhere to be found.
“It’s aboot damn time!” Charlotte snapped, worry lining her face.
“Do you have the tablet?” Davien asked.
Quinn handed him the satchel. He grabbed it and removed the item that Cosette and Charlotte had recovered from the gypsies. Only now did Cosette notice that it boasted several odd words and a sigil imbedded in the red wax.
“What do you have there, Blackburn?” Lilin’s chilling voice called down to them from the top of the stairs. “Do you mean to ensnare me? Rid me of my human form and send my soul back to the depths of Gehenna?”
“Yes.” His swirling black eyes were deadly. But the moment he opened his mouth to say more, she lifted her arm and the words were abruptly cut off.
“You forget that I still control the beast within you,” she said softly, as she slowly walked down the stairs. The second floor of the manor was crackling and popping from the ferocity of the fire licking up the walls behind her. It was a terrifying sight, as if Lilin was descending the very steps from Abaddon to enact her vengeance upon them. “Now, transform and do my bidding.”
Cosette watched in horror as Davien began to transform into a creature more hideous than anything she’d ever witnessed before. His entire body shifted and changed until he looked at her with unfeeling, bloodshot eyes, the whites becoming more red than not. He was black and had a long proboscis that protruded from a face that would cause nightmares in children. He was thin and tall, almost reaching the ceiling, and instead of speaking, he made a strange sound, like the ticking of a clock.
That’s when Cosette knew—this creature was the true form of the aswang, the one that she had seen swirling behind Davien’s eyes, the one he’d tried so hard to hide, to contain—to keep her from seeing.
She looked at the tablet that had been dropped at the marble near his feet.
And lunged.
