Eternal Rider - Larissa Ione [119]
No doubt they were. He’d seen this so many times… humans were like freaking sheep who panicked at the first sign of trouble, buying up supplies, moving to isolated areas, building bomb shelters, taping windows. Humans imagined there was an Apocalypse around every corner.
This time, they were right.
Shit, he had to throw the king of Hail Marys. “Stay with Cara.”
“Where are you going?”
He opened a Harrowgate. “To our mother.”
“What?” Li snared his arm. “Why? Are you insane?”
Probably. Lilith was one of the few beings who was more powerful than him. She’d kept Limos captive, and if she got hold of Ares, she could very well hold him until Pestilence broke Ares’s Seal.
“Lilith and Pestilence tortured Tristelle to learn where Unfallen are hiding. I’ll give Lilith anything she wants if she’ll tell me where to find one.” He had to save Cara. Desperation was a lava flow in his veins.
“There are no more Unfallen.”
Li and Ares whirled to Reaver, who stood just off the path near a fish pond, his expression as angry as Ares had ever seen it. “What do you mean, there are no more?” Ares ground out.
Reaver’s blue eyes swirled with storm clouds, and lightning flashed in the pupils. “Just what I said. Either they have gone to Sheoul, or Pestilence has destroyed them. My brethren are gone, and we’re out of time.”
All the emotions Ares shouldn’t be feeling—panic, fear, anger—distilled into poisonous fury, and Ares lost it. He didn’t think. He reacted. Snagged Reaver’s expensive-ass jacket by the lapels and slammed the angel into an olive tree. “You lie.”
“You failed.”
A five-bazillion jolt blast of pissed-off angel hit Ares like a freight train, throwing him a dozen yards across the gardens and through a pillar. Stone crashed down on him, he was pretty sure he’d be pissing blood soon, and he leaped to his feet with a roar.
“Ares, no!” Limos leaped in front of him at the same time Harvester flashed in, her shit-eating grin rocketing Ares right into orbit again.
“Evil is winning,” she said, in a taunting, sing-song voice.
Reaver, a category five heavenly storm, shifted his focus from Ares to Harvester. She snarled, and they came together in a sonic fucking boom. Light flashed, and they were gone.
This couldn’t be happening. Couldn’t be happening. Couldn’t fucking be happening! Ares wiped a stream of blood off his temple and cursed in a dozen different languages, but that didn’t change the fact that they were so fucked his ass hurt. Though he guessed that could be the result of having a pillar shoved up it.
He shook stone dust out of his hair and rounded on Limos. “Contact Kynan. We need that damned dagger. It’s Cara’s only hope now. And I want the island’s Harrowgate shut down. Pestilence isn’t leading any more demons through it.”
Limos whistled. “Won’t be easy.”
“I don’t care,” he snapped. “I’ll pay whatever price I have to—”
“My lord! Ares!” Vulgrim ran toward them, gesturing back at the house. “The hellhound—”
Ares didn’t wait for him to finish. Armoring up, he tore off across the garden, darted through the house, and found Cara on the bedroom patio. She had one hand on the scruff of Chaos’s neck, the other scratching under his chin, and the only way this could be happening was if Cara had invited the hound in, which bypassed the ward. Limos came in behind Ares, her own armor creaking as she drew her weapons.
The hellhound swung his great head around, and Ares swore the beast was grinning. Ares could read it as clearly as he could a billboard. Your female likes me.
“Ares,” Cara said quickly, “before you say anything—”
“Get away from him.”
She ignored him. “Listen to me. For just a minute.”
He was so not in the mood for this. “I want that monster dead.”
Chaos snarled, and bullets of drool dropped from his mouth to splatter on the pavers.
“You need to call a truce,” Cara said, and