I stagger through and immediately feel something on me. I jerk back, expecting it to be another wolf before realizing it’s Kit. When my vision clears, I see Torin hit the ground behind me, the sword that’d been driven through his body clutched in his hand.
“Riley, run,” he begs while he uses the sword to try to push himself to his feet, but he’s struggling to rise. “Please.”
The strange magic wells up inside me, shoving me to my knees as I feel absolutely overcome by it.
“Riley, RUN,” Torin yells, finally forcing himself to his feet before he grabs my arm and drags me up.
The horseman swings around and rushes us, and Torin throws me back as he barely manages to block the hit before another arrow strikes him right in the stomach. Torin staggers back yet continues to stand, as though he’s going to do everything he can to protect me from this monster.
Even die for me.
“This is a joke. It’s like playing with defenseless mice.” The horseman chuckles.
Pain shoots up my arms when the magic wells up inside me before it rips out of my body in a white blast and tears through the wolves crowding around me. They dissipate as the horse is thrown off its feet and slams down onto the ground. I hear the horseman growl out something before darkness invades my mind and I hit the ground.
Chapter Twenty
Riley
I don’t know how long I was out for, but it couldn’t have been long since the dust is still settling. I can hear screaming and crying, but as Kit looks around, I don’t see the horseman or the Door.
“Did he leave?” I ask Kit.
She can’t answer, of course, but looks toward the spot they’d stood as if to tell me they’re no longer there. I don’t know whether that means he went back through the Door or he’s roaming our world, bringing it to ruin.
My hands are shaking so badly that when I put them on the ground to help push myself up, I fall forward, unable to support my weight. And just as I nearly land on my face, I see Torin leaning against the side of a building, eyes fixed on me.
“Torin?” I call, trying again to push myself up. I struggle to my feet and discover that even my feet hurt. The ache is deep inside me, but I push through it while I hurry toward Torin. “Torin, are you okay?”
He’s standing, so he must be okay. I mean… he’s a god, after all.
“Torin, is he gone?”
I step up to him as Kit looks down and I take in the blood running from his wounds.
“I’m glad you’re okay,” he whispers before he begins to slide down the wall. I reach out to catch him, but I can’t hold his weight with my shaking hands, and he pulls me straight to the ground with him.
“Torin?” I call, clutching him. “Torin, please.” My words get lost in the screams for help as I hold the heavy man against me and look around at the destruction—at the bodies, the wounded, the people begging for help.
The horseman was here for mere minutes, and this is the devastation he caused. And we were only able to hold him off because of the god who currently lies in my arms, bleeding to death. My hands slide into his hair while I look around anxiously for Vinny, Imani, and Mickey, who I haven’t seen in so long.
“Kit, find the others.”
Kit jumps off and rushes to find them as I lower Torin to the ground. My hands slide down his body while I blindly try to find his wounds then fumble to tear cloth, winding it in balls to staunch his bleeding. Finally, I do my best to wrap his injuries tightly with Torin’s clothes that I’ve cut with his scythe.
“Please heal. You’re going to heal, right?” I beg. “You’re a god… you have to heal.”
I check what Kit is looking at and see that she’s found Mickey, who is being rescued by his undead. He was pinned under some debris but seems okay. And Vinny is helping a woman who is screaming in pain.
Emergency vehicles and healers descend on the scene while I compress Torin’s wounds.
“You’re a god, aren’t you? Wake up,” I say as I gently smack his cheek in the hope of startling him awake. “Wake your ass upor I’m going to make you ride all the escalators and… you know what? I haven’t put you in an elevator yet. That’s next.”
Still, he doesn’t wake, though I at least feel relief when Kit finds Imani. She’s bleeding but she’s rushing this way. Imani nearly slams into me when she reaches me, grabbing me in a hug while she pulls my head back to look me over.
“Fucking hell. Are you okay?” she asks.
“Torin’s not. He… without his people, he has no power… I don’t know if he can even heal himself. He needs help. If that Door opens again, we can’t stop it without him,” I say, knowing very well that’s not the reason I’m concerned.Ineed him unlike anything I’ve ever needed, and I don’t even know why. He crashed into my life, and I’ve been unable to get him out of my mind ever since.
