But it was one that couldn’t—wouldn’t—last for long.
I had to get down into that portal now, while I still could.
I tightened my grip on the naked blades and called on Vita, hoping like hell she could help the bird as she’d helped the human so many times in the past.
Once again, energy pulsed, but this time it was internal rather than external. It radiated through my body and out into my broken wing, forming a pocket of energy around the bloody plumage; it didn’t heal, but it did allow me to get back onto an even keel and simply fly like hell.
Multiple winged demons screamed in frustration and swung around after me. Others dropped from above, forcing me to once again duck and weave through the forest of their claws. But I was no longer battling them alone. A shout had risen from below, and the guards manning the walls and the soldiers in rooftop bunkers began to target the demons in the air.
It gave me time. Gave me hope.
I kept my gaze on my destination, getting closer and closer, until the pulse of the shield’s power skittered across my senses and filled me with a sense of even greater urgency.
They couldn’t—wouldn’t—keep that portal open for much longer.
I reached for more strength and simply flew, as fast as I could, toward the opening. Demons came at me from the right and the left, and the air was so thick with bullets it was a rain of deadly silver.
A scream rose behind me. I pumped my wings harder, all too aware of the demon’s closeness thanks to the turbulent air striking my body. I had no choice but to ignore it.
The portal was closing. I only had seconds.
I tucked my wings in close and dove down.
Felt claws strike at my tail, felt the rip of quills from flesh. Began to spiral as I dove and didn’t care.
The air screamed its warning of another attack. There was nothing I could do. I was too close to the portal now …
As the demon struck at me, I plunged through the small gap. Magic burned my wing feathers and tore away the shield protecting my broken wing. I tumbled more than flew downward, but somehow found balance at the last possible second, landing on my feet and in human form.
Bits of blood and flesh and gore rained all around me. I looked up, saw the upper half of a winged demon’s body sliding down the shield’s outside curve, leaving a bloody trail behind it.
Saw other demons hovering, their energy weapons aimed at the still closing portal. Its edges were pulsing frantically, and the rate of closure had slowed. I needed to act, and fast, before the bastards managed to burn their way into the palace grounds.
Footsteps, coming in fast from behind me.
I swung around, Nex and Vita held at the ready, lightning flickering angrily between their blades. It wasn’t enemies who approached. It was the Blackbirds, one of whom I knew.
Ricker. Luc’s cousin.
“That was some fucking show you put on.” He slid to a halt in front of me, his gaze sweeping me and coming up concerned. “You okay?”
“I’m alive. Right now, that’s all that matters.” I shoved Vita through my belt and then reached back and drew Elysian with my free hand.
The gray rolled away from her blade, and Ricker’s eyes widened. “Is that …?”
“Yes.” I gripped her fiercely and strode toward the ornately decorated front gates, the red asphalt under my bare feet cold and lifeless. I hoped the lack of a pulse was simply because I wasn’t yet calling on the earth’s energy, rather than the multiple layers of stone and brick and paving that lay between me and it being too thick.
Ricker ran after me. “What do you want us to do?”
“If that shield falls before I’m finished, protect me.”
“Those orders have already been given,” he said. “I don’t think those of us who remain would dare go back to the table and face Luc’s wrath if we failed in that duty.”
“I think Luc’s wrath will be the least of your worries if we fail.”
I stopped several yards away from the ornate gates. Demons and half-bloods surged forward, pressing against the shield, the sheer weight of their numbers forcing it to bend inward briefly. Others repeatedly, uselessly, fired their weapons. The shield held steady against it all, but for how much longer?
I sucked in a breath and then glanced at Ricker. “No matter what happens, no one is to touch me until my hands leave Elysian—understood?”
He nodded, drew his own sword, and stepped back. He and the other three Blackbirds formed a circle around me; their blades hissed and screamed, a hunger that was audible despite the din being made by the demons beyond the gates.
I shifted my weight, bracing my feet against the red asphalt, then raised Nex and held her against Elysian’s hilt with both hands.
With another of those useless deep breaths, I plunged Elysian deep into the asphalt and followed her down, ending up on my knees. The force of the drop reverberated through my body, and my knees were twin hotspots of pain, but it was quickly washed away by the steady beat of the earth’s pulse. I drew in her power, felt it rush through limbs, muscle, and bone, making me more than flesh, more than a being of blood, but something less than a god. Felt a darker response from Nex, a hunger and need to disperse the gathering power.
I pushed the energy back into the ground through my feet, completing the circuit. Deeper awareness surged … the heaviness of blood staining the ground, the thunderous weight of the demons that ran through nearby streets, the rumbling vibration of the heavy vehicles that chased them. From beyond the immediate palace surroundings came the searing pain of destruction; it raced away in four arrow-like swaths toward the whisper-soft presences that were the gateways.
Once again, Elysian pulsed, and that inner awareness sharpened. Mist briefly blurred my vision, and I stepped into that otherworld, though I remained anchored to this.
A gate stood before me. A gate into which dark forms now raced, desperate to reach the safety of Darkside before dawn fully rose. Not only could I see them, but feel and smell them, even though I wasn’t physically there, but viewing it all from the outskirts of the gray.
I tightened my grip on the two hilts. They were my anchor, my connection between the palace, the gates, and the gray. Lose it, and I might well lose myself, just as Cedric had.
As the pulsing of the two blades grew stronger under my grip, I reached for the indefinable energy of the gray. Mist swirled, thickened, briefly blocking my vision of the gate. The tempo of my heart increased, and an odd sort of weariness began to descend. I suddenly realized why using the gray when not wholly within it was so dangerous. It was calling on my strength—my connection with the earth—to interact with this world.
But to permanently close these gates, I had to keep a presence in both worlds, simply because I had no idea how to find individual gates within the gray. Not without physically standing in front of them, as past kings always had when it came to the main gate.
When the mist cleared, the gate was closed. Tendrils of gray clung to its rim and the deeply etched carvings glowed faintly, though whether that was a result of the gray or something else I couldn’t say. The demons were screaming in terror, throwing themselves at the door, beating and tearing at it with fists and claws in an attempt to force it open.
I didn’t linger to see if they succeeded but moved on to the other gates, repeating the process and closing them down one by one. By the time the fourth gate had been locked, sweat bathed my body, my limbs were shaking, and my heart beat so fast it felt like one long beat of pain.