Page 308 of City of Souls and Sinners

“I don’t understand,” Max murmured.

He was standing in front of the pillar to the left of the rip in the Veil—the rip that had turned an entire wall into a doorway to another world. Standing on either side of him were Dallas and Blue, Darien and the others guarding the gate to Spirit.

As soon as they had made it down here, they had inserted the Moonstones into the impressions in the pillars, the stone swallowing them up immediately.

But the gate hadn’t shut. The demons were still coming, and the others were burning out, Darien pushing himself so hard that Max feared they only had minutes left before he would fall to his knees. And if they didn’t have Darien…

He refused to finish that thought.

Malakai was nearly as strong with his magic as Darien, which was a miracle in itself, considering the horribly small amount of time they’d had to prepare for this. But even the Reaper was tiring, and he was using so much Venom that Max thought he might pass out the way Darien had at the carnival. Venom may be a drug, a key that opened the floodgates of their magic, but eventually the outpouring of substantial power would bleed dry, leaving them defenseless.

Dallas stepped up to the pillar and brushed her fingers across a few lines of very faint lettering on the left side, the inscription so small he hadn’t noticed it before.

“What is this?” Dallas mused. Her red ponytail swayed as she turned her head, scanning the room until she found Dominic. The Angel was slaughtering a creature that looked like a decaying wolf, strips of gray flesh hanging off a skeletal body, the teal-and-black heart that was visible through its ribcage stilling with one last thump. “Dominic!” she called.

He looked up, wiping sweat off his brow, blood streaming down the front of his black bodysuit.

“Can you read this?” Dallas shouted.

The Angel hurried over to them. Dallas stepped back to give him room, taking Max by an arm, pulling him back as well.

Icy eyes scanned the pillar. As Dominic translated, more monsters leapt through the entrance. More bullets were fired. More bodies hit the ground. Every time Max heard the fleshy thud of a life being ended, he checked to make sure everyone he cared about was still standing.

They had to close this gate.

A few minutes that felt like a thousand years passed before Dominic read the lines, his bass voice nearly swallowed up by shouts and snarls.

“Sun, moon

Moon, Sun

What are we but two sides to the same coin?

The same but different

Different but the same.”

The room went quiet, save the cracking of bones as magic split demon bodies into pieces.

“On your left!” Jack bellowed.

Travis’s magic swept out, latching onto two bat-like creatures that had slipped through the cracks in the frontline. Their wingbeats kicked up a fiery storm that scorched the tunnels. A hail of fire rained down upon them, stopped by Blue’s water magic, an umbrella of pine-scented rain belling out to shield their group.

Travis was swift to down the creatures, more effective than a volley of arrows. Wings snapped as their bodies hit the floor, embers dying out.

“What does that mean?” Darien panted, streams of black running down his cheeks. His hand lashed out with blinding speed, the force of his magic sending a creature that vaguely resembled a dog careening into the east wall, where its spine broke in half, spikes of jagged bone tearing through skin. A spray of black oiled the walls, and the dog fell to the ground with a yelp. The jewel in its forehead was red, its fur like fire.

Inferno. Creatures of the Inferno.

But how?

A breath left Darien’s lungs, followed by a single word: “No.”

Max’s blood went cold at Darien’s tone.

Fear was an emotion Darien rarely showed, but it filled his voice and face as he shook his head, staring into Spirit Terra, and said again, “No. No, no, no, no.”

Max walked behind Darien, peering between him and Malakai to see what they were looking at.