Nat said stay put. That was hours ago. He’d also warned the dogs would be attracted to something like me. But this panic was different. Had a real demon gotten in? Or was I the demon here?
I phased through the closed door of my cell-like room. The corridor stretched like a warzone, carpet shredded and flung askew; the walls slick with dripping, foul-smelling ectoplasm that glowed red like cooling lava, and the main double doors hung splintered from their hinges. Kitty-corner from my room, a gaping maw had been ripped in the wall, its edges jagged. It vaguely resembled a doorway, but now it was just… darkness. A hole punched into nothing.
I tiptoed toward the chaos. Below, the low, bubbling growls and skittering claws of hellhounds echoed as they chased something. I paused before the dark rupture in the hall. It didn’t swirl or shimmer. It was utterly motionless, more like a stain of void, a splatter of pure anti-color that drank the light around it.
Hesitant, I trailed my spectral fingers over its surface.
Nothing. No pull, no cold, no sense of space or depth. It wasn’t a portal. It was an absence, strange, and empty.
A sound cut through the chaos, a guttural hiss that twisted into a full-throated roar, something between a lion and a pissed-off dragon. It came from below.
What the ever-loving fuck?
I eased my way to the top of the stairs beyond the broken doors. Below the landing, the ancient wooden bookcases lay splintered and toppled like felled trees, their contents spilled in avalanches of parchment and leather. It looked as if a giant had swatted the shelves aside, leaving piles of books scattered like broken toys. The air swam with motes of shredded paper and dust, thick enough to taste. In the dim light, shapes were little more than vague, menacing outlines.
The hellhounds, two masses of snarling shadow and furnace heat, molten lava dripping from their jaws to sizzle on the stone floor, circled something big. I winced, fearing the books would ignite and set the whole place aflame. Though they hadn’t lit up when the dogs chased me, but they also looked more solidnow. Maybe because what they were after wasn’t a ghost but something worse?
A creature of liquid shadow danced between them with a feline grace that easily evaded their swipes. My first thought wasErlik, wondering if he’d found me and decided even my specter was useful to him. But a twang of something tugged at me, every remaining particle of my being desperate to step forward, toward thebeast.
I gripped the railing, surprised by its solid weight beneath my palm. The shadow-beast shifted, its form refusing to settle. One moment it was a hulking, indefinable mass of darkness; the next, it resolved into the powerful, predatory silhouette of a great cat, a tiger wrought from living night. Shadows dripped from its form like ink, thick and stained with a void of color, making the space around it grow larger, darker, hungrier, and inching closer to the hounds without fear.
Every logical instinct screamed within me to flee from the chaos, as power radiated from it. But my chest ached with longing, drawing me closer.
Its head swung toward the staircase. Narrowed eyes found me in the gloom, burning with a furious, familiar amber fire as though sensing me there.
It couldn’t be. Could it?
“Angel?” I whispered; the word torn from me as the wisps of our bond pulled taut.
The lead hellhound lunged, a streak of molten shadow and intent. The shadow-tiger moved. A massive paw lashed out, claws gleaming like obsidian daggers.
The hound’s snarl choked off into a pained yelp as it was flung across the room, its form scattering like smoke. The second hound hesitated, its fire-glowing eyes flicking between the shadow-beast and its fallen packmate.
The shadow-tiger snapped and snarled, a living wall of darkness shoving the hound back until it stood between me and the threat. Its growl vibrated the stone, a primal warning:Mine.
With a spitting huff, the hound backed away, molten drops spattering the stone, before turning and melting into the deeper shadows of the ruined stacks.
For a long moment, the massive creature remained poised, watching the darkness where they’d vanished. Then, the tension bled from its form. The furious amber light in its eyes softened, fading to a weary, familiar warm golden brown. The liquid shadows withdrew, drawn back. The giant cat shrank, the predatory lines melting and reforming.
Angel appeared in its place, kneeling on one knee, chest heaving, head bowed. He was shirtless, his skin glittering with sweat and streaked with what looked like soot and fresh, glowing scratches. The lines of his muscles were taut with exhaustion, and the air around him shimmered with residual energy, snapping and vivid.
He looked up, his gaze searching, frantic, and finally locking onto me at the railing.
He was here. He was real. He was here. The thought hit me like a cold wave—Did that mean he was dead, too?
The fear was eclipsed by a need so vast it erased everything else. I gasped and rushed down the stairs, desperate to reach him as he reached for me.
“Angel!”
Our hands met. Or they should have.
My spectral fingers passed through his solid, outstretched hand as if he were the ghost and I the living thing. There was no pressure, no warmth, only a faint, static tingle that raced up my arm and echoed hollowly in the bond we shared.
I stumbled, my momentum carrying me forward, through him.
It was the most intimate violation. For a heartbeat, I existed within the space he occupied. I felt the residual heat of his transformation clinging to his skin, the frantic drum of his living heartbeat, the raw, aching pull of the bond from his side. I smelled blood, snapping heat, and the familiar, anchoring scent of him beneath it all.
Then I was on the other side, whirling around.
