Her Avenging Angel (Her Angel Romance Series Book 7) (37 page)

Her huge violet eyes darkened and she swung her head to her left, away from him. She stared into the distance there, beyond the plateau. What had she seen?

He squinted and tried to make it out, and his stomach dropped when he saw it.

A gate, carved into a sheer wall of rock.

In front of it stood the four angels who had taken him.

They drew their weapons and Lysia roared, turned and thundered towards them.

He cursed the vile bastards for goading her into attacking a gate, but thanked them at the same time for luring her away from the area around the Devil’s fortress, beyond the sphere of his power.

He wouldn’t let the four angels get what they wanted. He wouldn’t let Lysia destroy a fourth gate and set them free.

“We need to stop those angels,” Nevar hollered at Amelia and Marcus where they stood below him to his right. He pointed towards the gate and they swung their heads in that direction.

They both nodded and spread their half-feather half-leather silver wings. Einar cut down the last of the hunter angels and rushed over to them, blood covering the front of his armour. Nevar hoped it belonged to his enemies. The male was a valuable asset and they couldn’t afford to lose him.

A scruffy blond mediator angel flew towards the group and Nevar flexed his black clawed fingers around his blades and switched direction, heading towards them instead of the gate. The male approached from behind the group, unseen by them, wielding a long white and gold spear that matched his armour.

He landed and Nevar hit the ground between him and his allies, blocking the male’s path to them.

Someone placed a hand on his shoulder and he tensed, swinging his gaze towards them. Einar.

“It is okay. This is Lukas, another friend.”

Nevar looked back at the sandy-haired angel as he furled white wings against his back. The male nodded.

“I take it you are Nevar?” Lukas’s green gaze ran over him. “An interesting appearance. Like your master’s.”

“How long have you been here?” Einar moved around Nevar, placing himself between him and Lukas.

The staff of Lukas’s spear shortened, transforming it back into a sword. “I was assigned to the area around the prison. When I saw Apollyon arrive with Asmodeus, I knew I would find you all closer to the beast.”

“She is not a beast,” Nevar snapped and narrowed his violet eyes on the newcomer. “She has a name. Lysia. I will not let you and your kind harm her anymore.”

Lukas’s green eyes darkened. “I am not here to harm her. I am here to assist you. Lysander and the others are with me.”

The angels of the apocalypse.

Nevar didn’t believe they would be on Lysia’s side. Their mission was to stop the apocalypse from occurring. He had no doubt that they would employ any method that would bring them success in that mission, including killing Lysia.

“Where are they?” Nevar said and stumbled when the ground bucked beneath his feet.

He swiftly turned to face Lysia and growled when he saw she had reached the gate and there was a swarm of angels heading towards her.

“If you meant to delay me, I will have your head,” Nevar growled at Lukas and kicked off, beating his black wings hard as he tried to gain enough speed to reach her before the angels could.

“A touch distrustful, isn’t he?” Lukas’s voice drifted into the distance and Nevar had half a mind to shout that it wasn’t that he had no faith in anyone; it was that he knew Heaven and he knew their tactics. That realm wasn’t above forcing Lukas to delay them without him realising it.

Nevar flew harder, staying low and using the thermals coming off the cracks of lava that formed a web across the basalt to boost his speed and conserve his strength.

Lysia unleashed an enormous fireball at the gate, her focus seemingly turned to it now rather than Astaroth and his band of fallen angels. They fought the army of Heaven and Hell, keeping the angels away from her as she wreaked havoc on the gate.

Nevar shot beneath their radar and came up below them, his sights set on them.

He grunted as someone slammed into him and sent him tumbling through the air. He spread his black wings to stabilise himself and growled when he saw the blond angel hovering in the air between him and Astaroth, his blue eyes filled with cold fire.

“Stay out of this,” Lysander said, his golden wings beating the air, shimmering in the light from the fires raging below them, devouring the black land. “I will deal with them.”

The blond angel turned, gave one hard beat of his wings and shot towards the four angels.

Samael turned flinty silver eyes on Lysander and said something. Leviathan looked down, his golden gaze flickering with something akin to amusement, and beat his crimson wings. He took off and the others followed him, leaving their assault on the angels. Astaroth was the last to leave, fending off four angels with only one hand and half of his attention on them. The rest was pinned on Lysander as he approached.

Astaroth’s mouth quirked into a cold smile and he crooked his finger.

Lysander flew harder, giving chase.

He was strong, but not powerful enough to defeat the four angels if they fought together.

Unless he only meant to fight them long enough for Nevar to calm Lysia and stop her from destroying another gate.

Nevar snapped his gaze to her as she raked at the gate with her talons, screeching at it and stopping from time to time to attack the angels swarming around her.

He readied his blades and flew at the angels, determined to force them away from her so he could try to reach her again and stop her from taking down the fourth gate.

Twin blinding blue spherical explosions swallowed the angels ahead of him, leaving holes in the swarm. The angels closest to him turned their focus away from Lysia and towards Amelia and Marcus as they approached with Einar. In the distance beyond them, the golden bursts of Apollyon’s power were growing closer. He and Asmodeus were coming to join the main fight to protect Lysia.

Nevar veered left, towards her, leaving the others to deal with the angels and hold them back for him. He had to stop her.

Lukas broke away from Einar, gaining his attention for a heartbeat.

“If you had given me a moment earlier, I would have told you this then,” Lukas said, his green eyes swirling as he extended his spear again and halted just a short distance from Nevar. “She is different now. I was watching from the plateau. I saw you injured. I saw her react to it.”

A cold chill skated down Nevar’s spine and arms.

Lukas was right.

When the Hell’s angel had cut him, she had turned her wrath on them, aiming specifically for the two he had been fighting and not launching an attack that would swat at the whole group of them, including him, as she had been before that moment.

He nodded his thanks to Lukas and the angel returned it and joined the fight beside Einar.

Nevar looked across at Lysia as she clawed at the air, battering the angels who dared to fly in front of her and attack her head on.

He could reach her.

He flew towards her and over her great black form. He maintained a few metres between him and the spikes along her tail and then her back, flying between her furled enormous wings and up towards her head.

She swatted the final group of angels between her and the gate away and stilled.

Her immense head turned, her violet eye swivelling towards him, and smoke curled from the nostrils in her beak.

“Lysia,” Nevar whispered and sent one blade away. He pressed his left hand to his chest, wishing he still bore the mark that had connected them. He missed feeling her emotions in his heart, but felt sure that she was afraid somewhere deep beyond her rage.

He flew above her head and she tracked him, keeping her eyes locked on him but not attacking him.

Nevar moved his hand to his injured arm and palmed it, squeezing more blood from the healing wound.

Her nostrils flared again.

Her elliptical pupils widened.

“Recognise me,” he said and breathed through his fear, not wanting her to sense it. It wasn’t a fear of her. It was fear of losing her. “Follow me.”

He flew sideways, heading off to his right, intending to lure her away from the gate and the battle raging behind her. Apollyon and Asmodeus were fighting together, cutting a path through the forces of Heaven and Hell, but the two realms had sent reinforcements.

The angels of the apocalypse had joined the fight.

Lysia snorted and stomped towards him, her chest beginning to glow behind the wide plates of her armour that spanned it.

She still wanted to attack him.

He drew in a deep breath, making it last five seconds, and then exhaled it just as slowly.

When the last of his breath had left his lungs, he stilled, beating his wings to hold himself steady in the air ahead of her.

Her huge violet eyes narrowed on him and she snarled.

She didn’t trust him.

“Look at me. Am I not like you?” He looked down at his black form and then back at her. “You told me that once. We share more than a similar form, with similar eyes, Lysia. We share a need and we share a desire, and we came to share a heart.”

He drew his hand away from his bleeding arm.

“And we share blood.”

Her nostrils flared as he held his hand out to her, his palm facing her, coated in his blood.

“Remember me.” His violet gaze flickered to the fight beyond her. He was running out of time. The others were struggling to hold back the angels of the apocalypse and the other angels.

He swallowed his thundering heart and gave a single soft flap of his black wings to propel him slowly forwards, towards her huge sharp black beak.

It would be easy for her to capture him now and snap him in half with the crushing force of her beak.

“I am here with you,” he whispered and kept staring into her violet eyes as he slowly approached her. “I will never leave you alone again.”

Her pupils narrowed into thin vertical lines and he swore her eyes had widened.

Nevar carefully placed his bloodied hand against her hard beak.

She exhaled, her breath hot and fierce, threatening to blast him away from her. He beat his wings to counter the wind and stroked her, feeling her warmth beneath his palm and sensing her fear as it went through him.

He closed his eyes and focused on her, on his blood and hers, searching for a connection to her. Heat travelled through his limbs, spreading outwards from his heart, as he savoured the feel of her and that she allowed him to come this close to her.

She huffed again and he soothed her, running his hand down her beak between her nostrils, and looked at her.

“Come back to me, Lysia. We have a way to restore the bond between us. We can be together again, and I swear to you, I will
never
leave you… because… I love you.”

Something shone in her eyes, something that reached deep inside him, right down to his heart, and he swore she was looking at him. Not as a beast who didn’t know him, but as the woman he had fallen in love with. That emotion reflected back at him, warming the cold violet of her irises.

“Lysia,” he whispered with a smile.

She threw her head back and shrieked, the sound deafening, and stumbled backwards, her wings beating furiously. Her pain shot through him, lancing his chest, and his eyes widened as he searched for what was wrong with her.

His heart stopped.

A glowing white spear penetrated her chest.

The black-haired angel holding it pressed his booted feet against her body and thrust it deeper, ripping another agonized cry from her.

Nevar roared and shot downwards. The male didn’t have time to block him. He barely had time to turn towards him before Nevar was on him and had slashed his black blade across the angel’s chest. It swept down in a diagonal arc, slicing a line down his black leather-covered armour and cutting into his stomach and side.

The angel beat his black wings and kicked off Lysia’s chest, coming at him.

Nevar had hated this angel’s twin, Samael, but he despised this angel even more. He didn’t care that the angel of the apocalypse was only following orders, doing his duty as dictated by his master. He had dared to hurt Lysia and he would pay with his life for that sin.

A black blur shot between them before the angel could reach him, shadowy tendrils wrapping around his body and sinking deep into his flesh.

The dark angel stood off to Nevar’s right, his violet eyes bright with fury and his sharp teeth bared at the black-haired angel he held with his shadows.

Asmodeus curled his fingers into a fist and the shadows attached to them tightened around his foe, and he tugged hard, yanking the male through the air to him.

Lysia stumbled sideways, her pain increasing as it flowed through Nevar, and he flew to her. He grabbed hold of the spear and screamed as it burned him, blistering his hands. He refused to let go. He planted his feet against her broad chest and pulled on it with all of his strength.

The spear glowed bright white and he hissed as it sank deeper into her chest and he couldn’t hold on to it.

She pushed him back with her enormous right paw and he shook his head and tried to fly closer again, determined to remove the spear for her and end her pain.

She stopped him with one huge black claw, pressing the tip of it to his chest, and he looked up into her eyes.

A wild look filled them and gave way to fear, and Nevar growled as he pushed past her and flew towards the spear.

Bright light exploded from the spear, the shockwave sending him flying through the air. He straightened and flew back towards her, battling through the wind and reaching for her as she looked up at him with terrified eyes and reached for him, her talons stretching towards him.

“Lysia!”

He stretched for her, his wings aching as he tried to fly harder.

The white light reversed, funnelling back into the spear and then died, leaving the weapon black. The armoured plates of her chest that surrounded it rapidly turned dull black and it swept over her body, everywhere it ran turning solid and grainy, like basalt.