Page 9 of Fated Angel

The witch's gaze snaps with intensity. “Never.”

She throws her hands high, the tendrils of black smoke solidifying. Sharpening. And becoming deadly bolts of dark magic. The witch hurls them at Gabby with a furious screech.

Gabby surges forward, her arms wide as she summons a radiant barrier. The bolts glance off ineffectually, slamming into the walls of the cavern, cracking stone in sharp explosions. Gabby shouts a counter spell, ready to pulverize the woman, but it’s already too late. The witch has raised a swirling vortex, unleashing a torrent of elemental forces. A maelstrom of wind, water, and earth erupts through the cave, whipping at Gabby as she works to stay in the air.

Colt roars below, ducking low as pebbles and gravel pelt them, running as the cult members are exposed by the moving smoke. He summons a blade and it slices through the air, parrying the soldiers' strikes with supernatural precision. With every swing, he pushes them back, his demon strength and agility making it seem as if he were battling shadows.

Focusing back on the witch, Gabby braces herself against the wind trying to rip the very skin from her bones. With a powerful surge of celestial energy, she conjures an ethereal cage and throws it.

It flies like an arrow, wrapping around the witch, capturing her within.

The storm of earth, wind, and water instantly ceases.

Gabby lands, stalking toward the trapped witch. Colt’s mowing down the remaining cult members like the kick-ass demon he is.

The third stone is theirs.

Except the witch throws her head back and laughs, the shrill cackle echoing around the cavern. “You may have me, but you’ve failed.”

“No!” Colt roars.

Gabby looks beyond the cage, her own denial screaming through her mind as she registers there’s one cult member left standing. This was all a distraction. He has his fisted hand held high, fragments of onyx light fracturing through his fingers.

He has the third shard.

The central part of the obsidian needed to hold it together.

Without a backward glance, he disappears into the darkness at the other side of the cave.

4

Colt

“We’ll catch him!” Colt cries, spinning in the air like a torpedo after him, but the cackle of the witch stops him in midair.

“You think it will be that easy, demon?” She huffs a breath of air, fighting against the celestial cage even if it’s fruitless. “These caves are nothing but a maze, intricate and impossible to navigate unless you’ve been shown the way. Even a demon can fall prey to the traps and pitfalls, you?—”

“I’ve had enough of this,” Gabby whispers fiercely.

Colt’s head jerks just in time to watch Gabby pull the Spear of Destiny from her bag and throw it like a javelin straight at the witch’s chest.

“No!” he cries, but it’s too late. The spear pierces the witch’s sternum, exploding out of her back in a spray of blood.

“What?” Gabby shrugs, walking over to the dead witch as she waves her hand to dispel the cage.

“She had information, Gabby.” Colt flaps his wings, slowly lowering himself to the ground. With concern written all over his face, he puts his hands on Gabby’s cheeks. Her eyes are brazen, lacking regret. Her attention keeps darting toward the exit where the last member of the cult fled. Where he took the most important part of the obsidian.

“She said the cult’s doing something we don’t understand. She said they were trying to keep it out of the wrong hands. We could have questioned her and learned more about Vladimir.” He keeps his voice gentle, his thumbs rubbing over her cheekbones as he bends close to her face.

“There will be more people to question, people less dangerous than that witch,” Gabby cries, defending herself. She tries to pull away from Colt, tries to remove his hands as she licks her lips. She can’t seem to look away from where the obsidian shard disappeared.

“Gabby, please,” Colt begs, drawing her attention back to him like a snapping rubber band. “What’s going on? You aren’t acting like yourself.”

“Acting like myself?” she scoffs, shrugging his hands off her and putting the Spear bag in the bag. For a moment her eyes go distant, her hand still in the bag even though the Spear has long since left her grasp. She shivers slightly, and Colt’s blood runs cold.

“I think you should let me carry the shards for a while, my angel,” he says gently, reaching towards her shoulder bag as if he’s worried he’ll startle a wild animal.

“What? No!” Gabby gasps, taking two steps away from him. “Listen,” she wets her lips again, eyes shifting back and forth from him to the cave exit, “we don’t have time for this. If that guy is truly gone, we need to move onto the fourth stone. We can’t wait. If we get them all, they’ll have no choice but to come to us with the last one, and then…then…” She grins, her arm flexing as her hand wraps around something deep in the bag.

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