Page 19 of Discord and Cinder (Fire Witches of Salem #7)
CINDER
I meant it when I said I could take care of myself.
Give me six vampire ghouls at once and I’d kill them all, no problem.
Fae mosquitos? Call me the witch bug zapper because those babies were getting burned to a crisp.
Fighting the beasties that could make it to my side of the veil was usually easy-peasy.
I had forgotten, however, that witch fire had zero effect on this side. Why would it? Streams of literal lava meandered through town like babbling brooks. I bet the shedims were planning a picnic on the rocky bank when they got through with us.
Too bad we were going to be through with them first.
Discord flung the back door open and charged toward the shedims. In his human form, he stood about six feet four. The would-be assassins towered at least half a foot over him, which meant they probably saw me as about as threatening as a cockroach.
Four of them swarmed Discord while the other two sneered at me, their thin lips peeling back to reveal jagged teeth with chunks of Hecate knew what lodged along their gumlines.
I had no intention of letting them add my flesh to the rot, but hey, if they won this scuffle, at least they could use my hair as floss.
“Standing tall or on your—” Oof. The shedim charged so quickly, I barely noticed the blur of movement before it smacked into me. I careened backward, landing on the ground and hitting my head on a rock with a thwack .
Pain shot from the back of my skull to my eye sockets, making my vision swim. I squeezed my eyes shut, blinking them open in time to see the demon’s claws glinting in the moonlight as they swiped toward my face.
The envelope filled with powdered binding spell had skidded across the rocks when I fell, but I still clutched my dagger tightly in my right hand. I slashed, slicing into the shedim’s wrist. The force of my thrust knocked his claws away, sparing me from the wicked scars he’d attempted to make.
It did not spare me from getting a face full of demon blood, however. Thankfully, my mouth obeyed the command from my brain and kept my lips tightly shut. I did not want to know what this nasty sucker tasted like.
The shedim wailed and raised its other arm. I jabbed my dagger into the fiend’s chest, twisting it and slicing up and down to make sure I got both hearts. Its eyes widened. If it had a human face, I’d have said the expression was a mix of incredulous and downright terrified.
Then it exploded.
Demon guts went everywhere.
My stomach lurched at the rancid stench of decay and garbage, but I managed to scramble to my feet in time to see Discord take out another one. That left four to contend with. I was certain the guys breaking into the front of the house wouldn’t be far behind.
Switching my dagger from hand to hand, I inched backward toward the lava bank where the potion envelope had landed when I fell. The demon matched my strides, sizing me up as it snarled.
The rocky terrain tested my balance. My ankle rolled again, but I recovered.
One of Discord’s attackers screeched, drawing my shedim’s attention, and I lunged for the envelope.
My boot slipped on a patch of smooth obsidian, and I went down, catching myself with my hands and knocking the envelope farther toward the lava stream.
The corner hung over the edge, and it ignited, hellfire threatening to consume the last of my spell. I scrambled toward it. The demon charged. I flipped onto my back, bending my knees and kicking out, planting both boots in the demon’s stomach and knocking him back.
“Get them,” a deep, menacing voice ripped through the air.
I snapped my gaze toward the house and found the mob from the front door barreling out while one man stood on the porch, his arms crossed, his stance wide.
He wore black cargo pants and a matching tank over his human form, and he inclined his chin, looking down at us as if he were Emperor Commodus, ready to give his gladiators the thumb down.
I grabbed the half-burned envelope and poured what was left of the charred powder into my hand. The Shedim charged again. I recited the incantation at warp speed and threw the powder at the beast.
It didn’t freeze.
The fire must’ve changed the chemical makeup of the potion. The demon wrapped its claws around my throat and lifted me from the ground. My feet dangling, I clutched its hand and kicked, but it only squeezed me tighter.
“Discord,” I rasped.
He whirled toward me, his expression livid. Three more of Commodus’s lackies descended on him, trying to drag him to the ground. He fought back, landing a punch on one guy’s jaw that ripped it from its socket. Even with his mandible hanging loose, the frigging demon continued his attack.
Another guy hit Discord with an uppercut while yet another kicked him in the gut. The shedim holding me looked to its master, and the guy actually gave him the thumb down gesture as if we were in the movie.
It looked like the monsters might get to use my hair as floss after all, dammit.
The shedim grabbed a handful of my locks, and my pulse sprinted.
I whispered a prayer to the goddess that I’d pass out from lack of oxygen before it ripped my head from my body.
Black drool dripped from its teeth, the stench of its sulfurous breath making my stomach turn.
It snarled, opening its mouth like it was ready to chomp my face.
I’m sorry, Ash. I squeezed my eyes shut, unable to suck in another breath.
I wouldn’t say my entire life flashed before me in that moment…
only everything I’d ever done wrong and every regret I’d ever had.
I was the oldest sister. The next in line to lead our coven.
The entire town was counting on me to end the curse, and I had failed them.
I’d made one mistake after another during this entire ordeal, and…
The shedim wheezed, and I squinted blearily. Its eyes bugged, and it loosened its grip enough for me to drag in a breath. Its grip loosened more, and I scrambled away, gasping and coughing.
The demon exploded. Its guts blasted out in every direction, and two arrows fell into the heap of goo.
Another arrow whizzed by my head, landing in the center of a demon’s chest. Thankfully, this guy didn’t explode, because I couldn’t handle swimming through any more gelatinous innards. He turned blue and then crumbled into ashes instead.
“Cinder!” Discord grabbed my arm. “Run.”
Before I could make my feet move, an arrow clipped my shoulder.
Searing pain ripped through my arm, jerking me into action.
My boots pounded the rocks, adrenaline—and maybe the remnants of Ash’s speed sigil—powering my strides as I pumped my legs, matching Discord’s pace, my lungs heaving in the oppressive heat.
“This way,” he said.
We hung a left down a narrow alley, darting behind a row of two-story buildings and slowing our pace, but my heart kept up its sprint, thanks to the adrenaline still surging through my system.
My shoulder screamed, reminding me how much the Underworld amplified pain. I’d had cuts before, bigger and deeper ones, but this felt like someone had sliced me open and sprayed liquid nitrogen into the wound.
“Where are we going?” My chest tightened and my head spun, so I leaned against a wall to steady myself. “I need to sit down.”
“We have to keep moving.” He took three long strides before turning around.
I must’ve looked like death warmed over because his expression went from determination to horror to anger in two seconds.
He strode toward me, gingerly taking my arm and lifting the torn sleeve from my shoulder.
He winced, but I didn’t dare look to see why.
Most of the blood from my head had already plummeted to my feet. I didn’t need to push it.
“This isn’t from the shedim.” He placed his palm over the sigil and inhaled deeply, focusing on healing my injured shoulder, I assumed.
“Someone got me with an arrow.” I leaned my head against the wall and closed my eyes.
“Poisoned with hoarfrost root. It’s toxic to all who are born of fire and can turn them to ice.”
“I guess that includes fire witches. Can you fix me like you did before?” The freezing pain shot down to my elbow, triggering the funny bone nerve, and I groaned, opening my eyes.
“I cannot. We must get you to the seer before…” His breath came out in a mist, as if it were below thirty.
“Before?”
He lifted his hands. The color in his fingers receded, turning them white from the tips to his palms. “We must both get to the seer. Can you walk?”
I pushed from the wall, squeezing my eyes shut as the world spun. My stomach flipped, but I opened my lids and managed to stay upright. “How far?”
“The cave just beyond that stream.” He pointed, and whiteness crept up his arm, freezing him to his shoulder.
“Looks like I have no choice.” I headed in the direction he indicated, and he trudged behind me.
We passed another row of buildings with crumbling bricks and lopsided windows. The farther we got to the edge of town, the more dilapidated the structures became until they gave way entirely to leafless trees, mounds of stones, and a crushed basalt trail leading toward the cave.
“We’re about to be out in the open here.” I paused at the edge of the last building and rested my hand against a splintered piece of wood. What kind of trees grew in this sulfurous air and moonlight I had no clue, but there would be time for questions later. I hoped.
At the moment, my biggest concern was my swimming vision and the frostbite stretching from my collarbone to the middle of my forearm. That was my biggest concern, anyway…until I turned around.