Chapter 39: Hawthorne

  “Ashen Aegis,” he croaked.

  The chunk of building that was about to crush him slammed into that unseen line and stopped cold. For a fraction of a second, it hung there. Dust sifted down in a steady stream, drifting across Cole’s face and sticking to the sweat and blood.

  Cole didn’t waste the gift.

  He crawled.

  His body didn’t want to move. Pain sparked up his side with each shift of his weight, sharp enough to make his vision flare. He kept going anyway, scraping his elbows, hauling himself across ash and grit.

  His Crozier was only a few feet away. It might as well have been across the city.

  He reached, fingers trembling, and hooked it toward him. The staff clattered against the pavement, then slid. He pulled again. His shoulder screamed, but he got his hand around it, and the contact grounded him. The Crozier’s weight felt real. Familiar.

  The Aegis ended the instant he got clear.

  The building came down.

  It smashed into the street; the impact punched through the ground. Cole felt the shockwave in his teeth. A deep boom rolled outward, followed by a grinding roar as concrete slabs shifted and scraped against each other.

  The street trembled.

  Rubble bounced. Dust exploded up in a choking cloud that turned everything into a gray storm. Cole threw an arm up over his face, coughing.

  Something struck his head.

  A chunk of debris clipped his forehead and opened him up. A hot line of pain flashed, and he cried out as blood spilled down his face. It ran warm over his eyebrow, down his nose, and the world blurred on one side when it hit his eye.

  He swore, wiped at it, and only smeared it worse.

  More pieces fell after the main slam, smaller chunks skittering and clacking around him. Something hit his shoulder. Something else bounced off his leg. None of it mattered. He stayed low until the worst of it finished and the building finally settled into silence, the last groan of concrete fading.

  Cole lay there for a second, panting.

  His ribs were on fire. His back ached. Every breath was a negotiation.

  He was groaning.

  The worst part was the helplessness.

  Cole wasn’t done.

  He retrieved a mending potion from the Crozier’s storage, fingers slick with blood as he fumbled for it. He popped the top with his thumb and chugged it.

  The relief hit hard.

  It tore through him. The ache in his ribs dulled, then vanished. The sharp, stabbing pain backed off. His lungs expanded fully again without that awful grinding sensation that made him want to scream.

  He sucked in a breath.

  And when he did, his ribs no longer throbbed.

  He sat there with his eyes closed for a moment, breathing, letting the potion do what it could. He wasn’t fully okay. He could feel that. His head still stung. The cut on his forehead still bled. His muscles still felt heavy.

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  He needed another potion to be fully okay.

  He had two left.

  He’d need to make more.

  Later.

  That word didn’t exist right now.

  Cole pushed himself up, wiping at his forehead again, doing a slightly better job this time. Blood still ran, but he could see. He got his feet under him, leaned on the Crozier, and looked down the street.

  Veritus was gone.

  But the settlement wasn’t far.

  Cole started moving.

  At first he limped. The potion had sealed him, but it hadn’t given him back time. His body still felt sluggish. He forced it anyway, jaw set, eyes hard, and after a few steps he found a rhythm. It turned into a steady jog.

  He ran through empty streets that should’ve had monsters, and there were none. That absence felt wrong too.

  His boots slapped pavement. His coat flapped behind him. The Crozier stayed tight in his hand.

  He didn’t stop.

  It took some time, and he was a little out of breath, but he managed to get there.

  The shouts and clash of battle met him before Hawthorne came into view.

  Steel ringing. Gunshots cracking. Voices raised in panic and anger. A scream cut through it all, high and raw, then it got abruptly cut off.

  Cole crested the last stretch of street and Hawthorne came into sight.

  The gate was open.

  That hit Cole hard.

  The palisade was still standing, but the area in front of it was chaos. Dust and ash swirled under scrambling feet. Bodies were down, some moving, some not. Blood streaked the ground in dark smears that stood out against the gray.

  A contingent of fighters, those Cole had been helping to train, were fighting Devin’s possessed body.

  Veritus.

  The demon was laughing.

  That laugh sat over everything. A cold, cruel sound that made the hairs on Cole’s arms rise.

  His clawed hands snapped out.

  He speared one fighter through the gut. Blood erupted, bright and shocking. The man’s mouth opened in a silent gasp before sound finally found him, a wet choking noise as he coughed and more blood sprayed.

  Veritus looked at him for half a second, almost curious.

  Then he tossed him aside.

  The fighter hit the ground hard and didn’t get back up.

  Other Hawthorne warriors rushed in. They were braver than they had any right to be. Cole recognized one of them, one of the men who had first followed him out into the city, sword raised with shaking hands. Another had a spear and was trying to jab at Veritus’s legs.

  Veritus didn’t care.

  A sword scraped along his side and sparked like it had struck stone. A spear point bit, and Veritus barely flinched. He backhanded the spearman and sent him flying, body slamming into the ground with a sound that made Cole’s stomach twist.

  A gun barked. Twice. Three times.

  The bullets hit Veritus and did nothing.

  One of the fighters tried to retreat, realized too late Veritus was already there, and a claw opened him from chest to shoulder in one brutal swipe. The man screamed. He fell. Blood spread quickly beneath him.

  Cole stood at the edge of the fight.

  And it felt like all he could do was watch.

  His mind tried to catch up. It kept showing him the same problem, over and over, and refusing to accept it. His spells hadn’t worked before. His shield had failed. His attacks had been brushed aside. Veritus in a human body was something else. Something that wasn’t supposed to be here.

  The gate behind Veritus opened wider.

  More fighters poured out.

  Cole’s chest tightened.

  They were coming out because they thought they could stop it if they just threw enough bodies at it. Because if they didn’t, Veritus would walk into their home and into the place where those kids were trying to recover.

  Veritus killed someone else.

  He grabbed a fighter by the throat and lifted him off the ground. The man’s legs kicked helplessly. His hands clawed at Veritus’s wrist. Veritus held him there for a heartbeat, watching him struggle.

  Then he slammed him down.

  The body hit hard. Something cracked. The fighter stopped moving.

  Cole’s grip tightened on the Crozier so hard his hand hurt.

  If he didn’t do anything about it, the settlement would burn.

  Time seemed to slow as he took it all in.

  He saw Dr. Alina Park near the gate, her face scrunched in concentration, hands out. She was trying to heal. Cole could see it in the way her shoulders shook, the way she clenched her jaw. A wounded fighter stumbled toward her, holding his side, eyes wild. Alina pressed her hands to him, and he sagged.

  Hawthorne’s gate opened again.

  Naomi was there for a second, visible in the doorway with her clipboard abandoned, shouting something to someone, her voice swallowed by the noise. Her eyes were wide, and Cole saw the same thought he felt.

  This wasn’t a wave.

  This was a slaughter.

  Veritus killed someone else. Cole watched it happen and felt nothing but a cold, steady pressure behind his eyes. There was rage. Focused. Subdued.

  Cole had to do something.

  But his spells hadn’t worked before.

  What could he do?

  Cole’s eyes stayed on Veritus as the demon moved. He wasn’t running. He wasn’t frantic. He was strolling through them.

  Cole’s authority stat kept pressing at him, telling him the same thing again and again.

  Danger. Action. Now.

  Cole swallowed, blood still slipping down his face.

  He tightened his grip on the Crozier.

  He had to act.

  Then he knew.