Eternal Rider

Twenty-six

Ares did not want to do this. Oh, his body was alive with excitement—it craved battle. Craved the feel of flesh rending and bone crunching under his blade. But his heart and head weren’t in it. Not when he knew that one way or the other, Cara wasn’t coming back from their foray into Sheoul.

Reaver, who Ares owed an apology and who had been as battered as Harvester, had agreed to assist as much as he could, and though he couldn’t set foot in the region they were traveling to, he’d brought help in the form of Kynan, who was untouchable, and a blond Seminus demon named Wraith, who was apparently just as untouchable, part vampire, and the brother of Eidolon and Shade. Sin, their sister, and her vampire mate, Con, had come as well, since Sin was ultimately responsible for Pestilence’s Seal breaking in the first place.

And Shade had come to give Cara a power boost. It had improved her color and taken the cloudiness out of her eyes, but her lungs were rattling, and over the top of her head, Shade had given Ares the universal shake of the head that meant not much longer.

Fuck.

They exited the Harrowgate, which had been crammed full of people and three warhorses. Eerie silence greeted them. The only sound was that of the stallions’ hooves thudding on the hard-packed Sithbludd dirt.

Ares tightened his arm around Cara’s waist as she sat in front of him. “I’ve never been in this region before.”

Thanatos glanced around. “Me either.”

“Maybe because this place sucks.” Wraith flipped a throwing knife from hand to hand. “I thought we were going to get to fight. Talk about lame. I’m seriously disappointed in you Horsemen people.”

“Kynan?” Limos said sweetly. “Could you maybe have found a more annoying demon to bring with us?”

“Nope.” Kynan drew a stang from the harness beneath his leather bomber. “They don’t get more annoying than Wraith.”

“If you’re going to do something, you might as well be the best,” Wraith muttered, as he moved off toward an area of shadows. Not even the ever-present hazy light that permeated the land seemed to penetrate the murky darkness.

“What’s going on?” Cara’s voice was quiet, but whether it was because she was fading or because she was afraid, he didn’t know. “Where’s Hal?”

“Does any of this look familiar? From your dream?”

“Not really. When I saw it, there were lots of demons. It was smoky. There were big cliffs and vines. There’s nothing here. It’s like a gray desert.”

“I think we were duped by the Aegi,” Than growled.

Kynan peered up where reddish, cloudlike wisps floated, providing a sense of depth. “Thanks for letting Reaver take David back to The Aegis. He’ll never be released again.”

Limos let out a dubious snort as Cara sniffed the air. “It’s weird. It smells the same. And I swear, I can feel Hal. Give me a second.” She leaned back against Ares, resting her head against his softened armor. He held her protectively as her lids closed over eyes that were far too dull.

Desperation, sadness, and anger all combined to create an emotional cocktail that threatened to knock Ares on his ass. He’d never felt this way about another person, and his heart was in foreign territory. He wanted to scream at the unfairness of this situation, but he had to get a grip, keep the wall up, because he needed to be stronger now than he’d ever been.

“I can hear him.” Cara kept her eyes closed, but pointed directly ahead. “That way. He’s snarling. He says… he says they’re here.” She frowned. “I don’t understand. Something about a wraith. And a veil. A… whisper veil?”

“Shit!” Ares wheeled Battle around. “Open the gate! Open the fucking gate!”

Sin and Con sprinted toward the Harrowgate. An ear-shattering boom rocked the area, and everyone stumbled, including the horses. The whisper veil, a concealment enchantment, lifted to reveal the true area, which was a sea of demons and weapons, and in front of the Harrowgate, a creature rose out of the ground, all wisps of mist, sharklike teeth, and claws as long as Ares was tall.

“Fucking vapor wraith!” Con grabbed Sin, yanking her off her feet to snatch her out of the way of the beast’s snapping jaws in the nick of time.

Ares hated vapor wraiths. They could be bound to Harrowgates, and while a single beast couldn’t screw much with Ares and his siblings, the three more that materialized, each progressively larger than the first twelve-footer, could put a hurting on them if they tried to get out through the gate.

And he didn’t have to attempt to throw his own portable gate to know that Pestilence had neutralized that ability.

Swarms of demons rushed them from all sides, including from above.

“Watch the arrows!” Than shouted, even as he knocked one out of the air with his sword.

No doubt the tips were coated with hellhound saliva.

“Get me to Hal—” Cara cut off as a raptor horror, a man-sized, eyeless thing with bat wings, swept down and nearly knocked her out of the saddle. Ares caught her by the wrist, tried to haul her back up, but an ax caught Battle in the chest. He screamed, reared up, and Cara plummeted to the ground.

“Cara!”

“Go,” she gasped. “I’ll get to Hal.” Her gaze shifted. “Behind you!”

He twisted around in time to barely avoid being skewered by a sword twice the size of his, wielded by a troll. And yet, in the middle of the battle taking place, everything went slow motion, and he locked gazes with Cara.

Go, she mouthed. I love you.

He tried to say it back, but all that came out was, “Get to Hal!”

Cara’s life was more important than his feelings.

“Get to Hal!” Ares had shouted, but he didn’t need to. Cara was desperate to get to the hound, whose cries rose above even the shriek and thunder of hundreds, maybe thousands, of demons.

Ares said Hal would be kept in the pits by the same symbols that had imprisoned him in the cage Sestiel had put him in. All she had to do was destroy the symbols, and Hal would be free.

Crawling, she avoided being chopped in half by a huge ax blade. The creature wound up for another swing, but Kynan took its head off with something that looked like a sharp Frisbee. Blood showered her, a gruesome rain of blackish-crimson that splashed into her mouth and nearly made her vomit. Don’t think about it. Don’t think about it…

Adrenaline gave her waning strength a much-needed boost as she scrambled on her hands and knees beneath the feet of some horrible winged thing, and then rolled between the legs of another. On either side of her, Ares and Thanatos fought, shielding her from the worst of the horde. In front of her, Wraith cleared the way. Like Kynan, nothing touched him. If she hadn’t been so busy trying to avoid being skewered, she’d have been fascinated by the way things would swing at the two men, but at the last minute, the enemy would stumble or fall, or something else would randomly strike them down.

When she reached the pit, her heart stopped. Huge ivory spikes lined the twenty-foot-deep hole, all angled inward to keep Hal—and any other creature that got tossed in—from getting out. Blood, both dried and fresh, splattered the walls and pooled on the dirt floor. Dear God, it was barbaric. She’d love to shove the scumbags who’d done this in the pit with Hal and see how they liked being torn apart.

Except… Hal wasn’t in any condition to fight.

He lay against the wall, his panting, labored breaths spraying pink froth. His tail thumped once, and then he went back to just trying to survive.

“Oh, my God,” she whispered. “Get me down there.” She grabbed Wraith’s pant leg. “Get me down there.”

The demon scooped her up, and in one easy, nimble leap, sailed over the spikes to land, feather-lightly, in the pit. Hal growled, but it was a feeble attempt, the sound fading to a whimper, and her heart broke.

Still in Wraith’s arms, she gestured to the stone walls, which were covered in strange markings. “We’ve got to destroy them.”

“Those aren’t containment markings.” Wraith whirled so fast she shrieked. He hurled a morning star upward, and a batlike demon that had been diving into the pit tumbled in the air and landed in a heap at Wraith’s feet. “Bastard.”

“I hate this place,” she muttered.

“Ditto.” Wraith turned back to Hal. “His collar. It’s got the containment symbols on it.”

“Put me down. You watch my back.”

Wraith eased her to the floor. On her first step, she wobbled. On the second, her legs gave out. Wraith caught her before she hit the ground. Very gently, he placed her next to Hal.

“Hey, buddy,” she murmured. Hal licked her hand without lifting his head.

With the rumble of battle going on above her, and even inside the pit as demons leaped in but were dispatched by Wraith before they landed, she worked the collar. Her vision blurred with tears, and her fingers shook, all of which made for painfully slow progress as she manipulated the mechanisms on the series of tiny pins that held the collar in place. Removal had to be excruciating, but Hal took it like a trouper. When the last one popped free, the collar fell to the ground.

Hal didn’t move. His chest rose and fell in uneven fits and starts, and Cara realized that her own breathing had become shallow and raspy. The world spun and tilted as she wrapped herself around Hal and gave in to the exhaustion that rode her hard.

She was going to die in a pit of evil, wasn’t she? This… sucked.

“Wraith.” Her mouth was as dry as the hot air here, and she had to pause to work up some saliva so she could talk. “Help the others. Need the dagger.”

“Not without you two.” Palming a bone from some long-dead creature, he scratched out the markings on the walls. When every one of them was gone, the spikes at the top of the pit retracted.

“Let’s get topside before demons make a run on this place.”

Fear was a spike right in her heart. Wraith’s scenario would be a disaster. He might be untouchable, but he’d be overrun, and it would only take one demon to slip past him for Cara and Hal to be toast.

Wraith scooped them both up, grunting under their combined weight, and then he leaped, landing once again in a smooth crouch. Even though her energy and thought processes were flagging, she assessed the situation in a heartbeat.

With the exception of Kynan, everyone who had come to fight for the home team was bathed in blood, and a lot of it was their own. Their clothes—or armor—were torn, bashed, or broken.

The fighting raged, but as Wraith placed Cara and Hal on the ground, Ares was right there, and everyone else closed ranks, forming a protective circle around Hal and Cara even as they continued to fight. The demon horde, despite all the bloody, broken bodies on the ground, didn’t seem to have thinned at all.

“Cease!” The demons all froze as Pestilence rode through the masses, smashing demons who weren’t quick enough to get out of his way. “I call a five-minute truce.” He inclined his head at Ares. “Don’t say I never did anything for you.” He gestured in the direction of the Harrowgate.

“Hey there, Horsemen!”

Cara folded her legs under her and cradled Hal’s head in her lap as she squinted into the smoky darkness. A massive man with a dark blue mohawk broke through the ocean of creatures. He might have been handsome, if not for the extreme paleness of his skin, which revealed a pattern of black veins beneath. Protruding from his bare back were a set of black, leathery wings, which extended to his calves. She had no idea what kind of pants he was wearing, but they were silvery, form-fitting, and they kept shifting, as though they were constantly rearranging themselves on his body.

Demons bowed and fell to their knees as he passed, and the ones in front of him knocked into each other and fell all over themselves to get out of his way. If his smile was any indication, he was getting a kick out of it.

Thanatos’s split lips stretched into a big grin. “Hades. It’s about fucking time.”

Hades? The Hades?

“Fuck off.” Hades ran his palm up his hairless chest. “Try negotiating with Azagoth to stop the flood of souls into Sheoul-gra so you can take a break, and see how long it takes you.”

Wraith bent over and whispered in her ear, “Azagoth is the Grim Reaper. I’m kind of related to him. How cool is that?”

Kynan shoved his stang into a holster. “You’re such a name-dropper.”

“Why are you here?” Ares wiped blood from his eyes with the back of his hand. “Tell me you’re not working with Pestilence.”

“That’s the thanks I get?” He spun around. “Guess you don’t need me.”

“Hades, stop being a baby.” Limos leveled a grave look at Ares, one that even had Battle stilling, though his muscles twitched. “He’s here because you said to call in favors. Cara needed a favor.”

Ares’s entire body jerked. “Oh, hell. I didn’t… think of that.”

“Think of what?” Cara craned her neck to look up at him.

Hades turned around, his wings spreading and folding again with a soft whoosh. “You are human. If you die in Sheoul, your soul will be trapped here forever. I’m here to escort your soul aboveground.”

Oh, God. “Thank you,” she whispered.

He shrugged. “It’s my good deed for the millennium. And Limos promised to send me Baskin-Robbins.”

“Time’s up,” Pestilence shouted. “And did I mention my secret weapon? No? Ah, well, I’m forgetful sometimes.” He swept his arm in a dramatic gesture, and out of the sky, three dozen winged men dropped in front of Pestilence’s horse.

“Fuck,” Wraith breathed. “Fallen angels.”

“Well,” Kynan said grimly, “you said you wanted to fight.”

“I don’t understand.” Cara peeled her eyes away from one of the winged newcomers—Zhreziel, whose expression said he had an ax to grind, and probably on the Horsemen’s bones.

“The only beings that can harm me and Wraith are angels. Which includes the fallen variety.”

“And they’re hard as fuck to kill, unless you’re another angel. Or a Horseman. Even better, Pestilence probably knows about our charmed status, thanks to David.” Wraith’s fangs flashed. “Man, if I get killed, not even the fact that David is Serena’s brother is going to save him from her.” For some reason, he smiled at that. “My mate can be a total badass. It’s so hot.”

“Okay, boys.” Pestilence’s grating voice rang out. “Kill the human and the mutt, and let’s get this Apocalypse started!”

Thanatos released his souls, and they screeched as they shot toward the evil army. As if rejuvenated by the brief break, the demons swarmed, more vicious than ever. It was a nightmare of teeth, claws, and weapons. Helplessness splintered what bravery Cara held in her reserves, and somehow Ares knew. He tossed her a dagger, a last-resort weapon to be sure, but at least she had something with which she could strike a blow to any demon that made it through the wall of her defenders.

Assuming she had the strength to use it.

Everyone, including Hades—who made demons explode with a mere touch—fought hard, but one by one, the horses went down, and the Horsemen were crushed under the wave of monsters. Despair and fear became the air Cara breathed, so thick she couldn’t even scream when the rain of blows fell on Cara and Hal. Wraith and Kynan leaped on top of them, shielded them with their bodies, but somehow, blades found their way through the pile.

Pain ripped into her, as razor sharp as the weapons piercing her flesh and organs. Deep inside, a weird tugging sensation grabbed at her, and she felt as if she was being peeled like a banana. When the realization hit her, she cried out.

The tugging and peeling was her soul trying to leave her body.

Snarls rang out. Screams. Warm blood splashed on her face. A weight came off her as Wraith and Kynan pushed away. Ares. Where was Ares?

“Holy shit,” Kynan murmured. “Damn.”

Cara couldn’t move, could barely breathe as she lay on her side in a fetal position, wrapped around Hal. She figured she had about five breaths’ worth of life remaining, but dammit, she was going to watch the end come. With effort, she opened the one eye that still functioned, though it felt as if her eyelid was made of steel wool. Through uneven blurs and blood, she saw massive black paws. Teeth. Red, glowing eyes.

Hellhounds.

“There has to be thousands of them,” Wraith said.

The forest of black legs milled and parted. Something massive moved toward them, and before Cara could even blink, a monstrous, three-headed hellhound stood before them, easily twice as big as the largest of the others.

“Hey, Cerberus,” Hades said.

“Cerberus?” Kynan gasped.

“Yeah.” Hades scrubbed his hand over his mohawk. “This can’t be good.”

“And why is that?”

“He hates me for binding him to Sheoul-gra. He only gets to leave when I do. He’s probably here to rip me to shreds. Again.”

The beast shouldered aside Hades, and finally, Cara caught sight of Ares. His armor was mangled, his left hand mashed, and his legs impossibly broken, but he was using his one good hand to drag himself to Cara. She wanted to cry, but that tugging sensation had overcome her, and tears, it seemed, stayed with the body, not the soul.

Ares pulled himself against her as everyone else moved to block Cerberus, who was on a path directly for her and Hal.

Cerberus’s three heads snarled as one.

“S’okay.” Cara’s voice was reed-thin, barely there, but apparently it was enough, because everyone shifted, allowing Cerberus to pass.

The big beast sniffed at her, and then one of the heads licked Hal. Hal opened his eyes, and a single word came to her. Grandfather. He hadn’t said it to her, but somehow, she intercepted the transmission to the three-headed hound.

One of the heads turned to her, its crimson eyes glowing. You are reoush, beast-healer. Rare. You will not die.

Not dying didn’t seem like an option. She sucked in a gurgling breath… and it didn’t leave her. Blackness swallowed her whole even as she felt the warm stroke of a tongue over her lips.