Frank’s eyes went wide. “Megan, why would you say that?”

Liam had a bad feeling this was not going to be easily cut and dried. “Megan, sit down.” He pointed to the ground, a few feet away from Thomas.

Thomas lifted his head. “Someone has gotten to her, I think. She is marvelously strong, but …” He didn’t finish. Megan lifted a hand and around them the ground shifted.

“I will kill you, old man. You’re too stupid to see you’re weak now. Too weak to stop me, too weak to open that gate. Orion will rule, and I will be his queen.”

From below, the dead began to rise, pushing themselves out of the dirt. Liam didn’t hesitate, though his heart faltered.

He leapt toward Megan, who had her back to him, and wrapped his fingers around her neck, lifting her from the ground. Quick and easy, he’d snap her neck; she wouldn’t feel a thing.

“If you kill her, we won’t be able to open the veil,” Thomas said, as though their lives weren’t in danger, as if zombies weren’t even now crawling toward them with open mouths and reaching hands.

“Knock her out. I can drain her powers. Permanently.”

There was no other choice. She struggled in his hands, her face going red and then purple. He shifted his grip so the pulsing carotid artery was under his fingertips and then he squeezed.

Out like a light, she slumped, her body loosing urine all down her legs, urine he couldn’t smell over the heavy perfume she wore. She must have known he could scent her lies and had covered them; the naivety had all been an act. Fortunately, the zombies she’d called stilled as she passed out, dropping where they were.

He all but tossed her limp body toward Thomas. “She is another of Orion’s pets.”

Thomas nodded. “It would seem that way.”

Something about this bothered Liam, a piece that didn’t make sense. “Why didn’t he use her the way he used Talia?”

With a sigh, Thomas crouched beside Megan. “She is still young, likely he was grooming her to be a back up. She is untrained and without the proper training she could never have opened the deep level of the veil for Orion.”

A back up necromancer. Shit. There was nothing for her then, nothing to redeem her of this if she’d thrown her lot so fully in with Orion. Which was obviously the case. Liam’s gaze met Thomas’s. “Do it.”

Thomas beckoned. “Frank, come, you must learn this too.”

Frank stepped forward, his eyes glassy behind his too large specs. “I thought she was … I thought she liked me.” He shook his head.

“We all get fooled by a pretty girl at least one in our lives,” Thomas said, putting a hand on Megan’s head, then taking Frank’s hand and doing the same. “Likely, more than once, actually. This will help you in the long run, you will be stronger now than even she was.”

Liam knew he couldn’t rush them, knew that it was going to be close.

Come on, Rylee, let it be you. Come home to me.

Chapter 21

We ran as fast as we could, but demons came from every side. Thousands upon thousands, more than I could comprehend. Most seemed pulled from the human psyche, nightmares lain dormant awakened, monstrous and terrifying. Others, though, were disturbingly normal.

Human like, and in that, all the more frightening. Because I never would have known them for what they were if they hadn’t been chasing us. They would have fooled me.

Ahead of us, far ahead, I saw a speck of light. An opening into the world. Our time was up.

“Hurry, we have to hurry!”

But even as I said the words, the light disappeared, closing us off.

Alex whimpered and Pamela choked back a sob. I kept my focus straight ahead. “Keep going. Liam is with him; he will get that fucking veil open.”

And so we ran, an avalanche of demons closing in, tightening the deadly noose that would swallow us whole if we slowed for even a heart beat.

“Rylee, when we get to the arch, put the others inside and you and I will defend,” Erik said, out of breath from running while carrying Milly.

We hit the archway a few minutes later. He dropped Milly to the ground and swung around. Pamela and Alex crouched beside her, and I spun to face the horde. But Alex didn’t stay with Pamela, he pushed her down and then leapt up beside me.

“I protect you.”

I wasn’t going to argue with him. We were done.

Fuck me, we were so done.

I had no illusions; this was a last stand, a way to etch ourselves into the memories of the demons as the ones who took out hundreds of them. Erik’s hands shot out, catching the first demon on the chin, his power vaporizing the monster before I even registered what it looked like.

“Rylee, you always bring the trouble, my girl.” Giselle’s voice made me smile. I knew she’d come; she wouldn’t let us fight on our own.

“What happens if you die here?”

“Then I am gone. Gone to my reward, wherever that is.” She loosened her weapons and steadied her stance. “There is no greater joy than to take a stand for those you love.”

Erik grunted. “Fierce love is a power unto itself.”

She smiled at him and gave him a wink, of all things. “That it is, Slayer.”

And then they were on us. I used my sword, my whip, my hands. The power I’d not understood flowed under my skin, driving the demons back. From the heart, it was all from the heart.

Giselle fought like lightning, striking and withdrawing, her weapons dropping demons all around her.

And Alex, everywhere he bit, clawed and struck, demons fell. It had nothing to do with symbols or etching designs into blades and weapons.

No, this was about the heart. Alex had more heart than anyone I knew, he fought for me because he loved me. And then it all clicked, and I finally understood.

Every person I loved, every child I’d brought home, every decision I’d made because it was the best I could do, that was what it took to take out a demon. This power was bottomless; there was no draining it, though I felt the toll on my muscles, on my stamina. The well in my heart would not run dry.

Liam.

Giselle.

Pamela.

Milly. All those I loved fed that power. Their love gave me this strength to face the darkest of hours without hate in me. Without anger. Without fear. That was why Alex could tackle demons. That was what the necromancer Talia meant when she said he had a pure intent. He fought from a place of love, he fought for those he loved.