Page 99 of Walking in Darkness

And I let it go.

It was an earthquake.

A burst of lightning.

Blinding as it surged out in every direction.

It struck the men in a flash of light.

They flew.

Blasted backward a hundred feet.

They seemed to be airborne forever.

Immune to gravity.

Before they finally came careening back to the ground like darts shooting from the sky.

Dust gusted and whipped, and it was seconds later before it cleared and we could see where they’d landed.

Their bodies were bent at odd angles. Contorted and mangled.

A sob wrenched out of me when I realized what had happened.

Their deaths marked.

I choked on the sickness that curdled in my stomach, and the overwhelming weakness that rushed through me sent me staggering two steps forward.

Disoriented and grieved at the truth of what had to be done.

“Oh my God, oh my God.” I could hear Dani whimpering, and Timothy whispered something to her that I couldn’t make out.

Because the world spun and spun.

The darkened clouds continued to writhe, and a torrent of ice-spiked rain suddenly pelted us from the gaping hole ripped in the heavens.

The Kruen above howled their rage.

One rose high, its gruesome face warped in hate as it peered down at me from the toiling clouds.

And there was no time to devise and plan.

No time to deflect or anticipate.

None of us were prepared for the fiery tendril that streaked from the sky.

One that struck me in the side, as deep as a blade.

Chapter Thirty-One

Pax

The tendril whipped out of nowhere, striking down from above, aimed directly at Aria, who was a few feet out in front of me.

“Aria!” I shouted, my chest in a clutch of anxiety.

But the warning came too late. There was no way for her to get out of the way before the belt of fire struck the lower left side of her abdomen.