ë Archer - Demon’s Bride

She readied herself to hurl more energy at the demons. Then she fell backward, thrown to the ground by Leo. His body covered hers. A loud crash rang out.

Peering up from beneath the heavy shelter of Leo’s body, she saw a thick, jagged tree branch on the ground behind her. The demon she had pitched back into the tree shrieked in frustration as it hovered nearby. Anne glanced back and forth between the branch and the demon. It had hurled it like a spear, intending to hit her. And would have, had Leo not flung her down and shielded her.

It would not have been a scratch, the damage from the thrown bough. The jagged branch would have pierced her chest. Killed her.

Leo rose up onto his elbows, his body a lean weight atop hers. “Hurt?”

She shook her head.

The outraged demons howled. Anne already knew the sound. It meant they planned to strike again. Leo also seemed to recognize the creatures’ noises. He rolled off Anne, then helped her to stand.

Shoulder to shoulder, they readied themselves for the next attack.

The three beasts dove down. Anne summoned her magic to push them back. Two could not withstand the force of her energy, flapping hard against the tempest but still finding themselves shoved away. The third was bigger, stronger. She could not hold him back. It swooped close, a terrifying winged force of claw and tooth.

Leo swung at it with his musket, but the demon flew out of reach. They were locked in this dance, back and forth, the demon lunging near, Leo pushing it away as he brandished his weapon.

Anne’s glance fell on the gravel path beneath her feet. Her answer.

Swirling her magic, she used the energy’s force to scoop up gravel. Then she flung it with all her strength toward the demon. It shielded itself from the onslaught, throwing up its arms to cover its face. But its wings were spread wide. Unprotected.

Gravel tore through its leathery wings. It gave a scream of pain and anger as membranes perforated. It could no longer keep itself aloft. It spun as it crashed to the ground.

Leo wasted no time. He ran to the creature and clubbed it with his musket stock. Over and over. This time, Anne did watch as Leo turned the demon’s head into a mass of sticky pulp. The creature twitched, then was still.

Infuriated, the final two remaining demons charged. Anne hurled the force of her tempest at them, but the maddened creatures plunged forward. She crouched low as one dipped down, reaching with its taloned feet, and the stink of the thing as it swooped close nearly made her gag. She came out of her crouch to see Leo holding back the other demon, swinging with both his fists and his musket.

The first demon charged her again, and she bit back a hiss of pain as it cut her arm. Leo saw this. His face twisted in fury. He ran toward her, but the other demon held him back, its wings beating at the air, claws slashing.

Terror, exhaustion, and anger all seethed within her. This nightmare world—she wanted nothing more to do with it. Energy coalesced through her limbs, the force of a hundred storms. When the first demon rushed her once more, she let out a primal, furious scream, a battle cry, as she flung out her hands and unleashed the tempest inside.

“I have been lied to, manipulated, betrayed,” she said through clenched teeth. “Made fearful. No more.”

The beast made a frantic, enraged sound as it fought against the gale. But Anne’s wrath could not be contained. She let everything run riot, letting slip any control she might have possessed. The demon struggled, and then, with a shriek, it was caught on the storm she had created. Like a leaf, it spun on the wind backward. Higher. It clawed uselessly at the air to stop its mad flight. She was unrelenting.

Anne continued to blast the creature with the force of her magic, and it tumbled back through the sky. Toward the nearby towering Pagoda that rose ten stories above the ground. The demon tried to stop its ascent by clinging to a gilded dragon on the corner of one of the Pagoda’s roofs. The ornament snapped away, and the demon was flung high, higher. Until it reached the very top of the Pagoda.

It saw Anne’s intent and let out one final scream of outrage. She refused to yield. Manipulating her magic, she brought the demon up, then dropped it—directly onto the Pagoda’s spire. Skewering the demon. The spire stabbed through its chest, and the creature’s dying howl rose up to the dark night sky before trailing away into silence.

The last remaining demon looked to where its compatriot lay dead. It turned panicked eyes to Anne, then to Leo. She reveled in seeing the creature’s fear.

With a frightened yelp, it spun around and flew away. Its wings beating against the air, it disappeared into the darkness like the last vestiges of a bad dream.

The dream, however, was quite real. Demons’ bodies lay strewn about, becoming only carrion, their inky blood spread on the ground and splattered on Leo’s clothing, his face and hands.

In the aftermath of violence, the silence became its own war. Anne felt the magic within her recede, its blue energy a quieting storm, and as it ebbed, she was left shuddering and dizzy. The ground rushed to meet her.

Strong arms wrapped around her, holding her steady. She caught the metallic scent of blood, the warmth of Leo’s body, the fierce beat of his heart.

“I have you,” he murmured. “I have you.”

She struggled to push away from him.

“Stop fighting me. You haven’t the strength to stand on your own.”

“Give me time, and I will.”

Yet he did not release her, and of their own volition, her arms came up to wrap around his hard, wide shoulders. She leaned against him, raging at herself for allowing this moment of peace. For letting him comfort her. He was the source of her torment, not her solace. Yet the past few hours and the horror of what she had just witnessed left her shaken and stunned.

My God, the things I have done.

“You fought well,” he said, his lips against the crown of her head.

“I did not know ... I could do any of that.” She drew in a shuddering breath. “Surprised myself.”

“And me.”

Yet she did not like the warm humor in his voice. He had no right to it, to the intimacy of such tone and words. For it felt like a blade of ice through her heart. She pushed away again. This time, he let her go.

Even in the darkness, she saw his wounded, wary gaze. But he did not reach for her as she stepped back.

“There will be more.” He glanced at the demons’ bodies. “This was a test. To know what kind of enemy I am to the Devil.”

“Are you his enemy?”

His hand brushed against the tears in his coat, revealing deep gouges in his flesh, and the wetness that gleamed darkly on his fingers was both the blood of the demons and his own blood. Her heart contracted painfully to see him hurt.

“This proves that I am.” He clenched his hand. “I’ve forsaken the Devil. He has nothing for me, nothing I want.”

“What do you want?”

His gaze was level as it met hers. “You.”

A throb of longing pulsed through her. She saw how he wanted it to be. He wanted her to run to him. To throw her arms around him and declare that all was forgiven, and they could return to how it had been between them, two strangers finding an unexpected bond.

She wanted the same. But it could not happen. Not in the span of a few hours—if ever.

“It’s not so simple.”

“Tell me what I have to do. I’ll do it.” His words were forceful, not a plea but a statement of intent. She almost smiled at this. Leo never saw obstacles—only ways over or around them.

She answered him with the truth. “I do not know.”

His jaw tightened, but he did not press her harder. “Where were you going?” When she hesitated, he added on a growl, “I’ve just killed five demons. That should give you some measure of trust.”

“Four,” she said. “You killed four. I killed the fifth.” She could hardly believe that she, a woman of genteel birth, who’d never known bloodshed beyond an occasional reading of the Newgate Calendar, had not only fought against demons, but actually slew one—and happily.

Leo’s mouth tugged into a small smile. “That you did.”

“To the Black Lion Inn,” she said at last. “In Richmond. Lord Whitney is there. He said ... he could help, when I was ready.”

She waited for Leo’s outburst of anger. It did not come. Instead, he nodded tightly. “Whit severed his tie to the Devil. He’ll have answers.”

“I am glad someone does,” she said, weary, “for I’ve none of my own.”

Glancing around, Leo frowned. “Damn horse got spooked and ran off.” He planted his hands on his hips. “I’ve been to the Black Lion. It’s less than a mile from here. Have you the strength to walk the rest of the journey?”

She had never known such exhaustion, her limbs made of lead, her head thick and shoulders aching. Yet this was nothing compared to the weight in her chest, a heaviness so profound that she felt as though she observed the whole world from beneath miles of granite. She wanted only to run away and hide, to throw her arms over her head and surrender.

Instead, she took in a breath of cold night air. Straightened her shoulders.

“I am strong enough,” she said.

Cold morning mist lay chill upon the ground and draped the tree branches as Leo and Anne trudged along the road toward the inn. Difficult not to see this mist as a winding cloth, wrapped around the world as it was made ready for burial.

Leo was not a man given to flights of imaginative fancy. He dwelt in the real, the possible. Even when he used his visions of the future, he sought out truths that he might gain more profit, more power. He had never been a poet, nor aspired to be one. Pretty words and fanciful images meant nothing in Exchange Alley. And when he had spoken tender words to Anne, he had been plain, blunt. He could offer only that.