Page 163 of Last Gift: Supernatural Battle

If I’d clicked a gigantic red button to launch missiles, the effect would have been the same. There was an explosion of sound and movement and magic that shook the very cave system.

Luthers launched forth either side of me. Vissimo were hot on their heels. Magic pulsed either side of the entrances from my magus.

The chamber was too large to allow the demons to sprawl out. We didn’t want to keep them out of the eating chamber, but they did need to be controlled. The magus would use four-affinity barriers to extend the tunnels and limit the space in here. Until later.

I drew back to the center where Wild calmly—to outward appearances—waited for me with the other supernatural leaders.

Demons were engaged at all four entrances.

Wild’s gaze briefly flicked to me.

“Always wanted to do that,” I replied to his silent question.

Basilia came to stand beside me. “It set the tone.”

Andie stood on the other side of Wild. “Nicely done. One of the chunks hit another demon in the face.”

The first demon broke through the masses.

Kyros blurred forward, and then the demon’s head was parted from its body.

King Julius laughed again. The guy would’ve gotten on a treat with my grandmother.

A crack of bones rent the air, and then Andie and Sascha’s wolf forms were launching in the opposite direction at another demon. The orange scales guarding the female’s neck were no defense against Andie’s sharp claws.

The sentry pendant warmed. Barrow spoke, “Back up to west tunnels. They’re pushing out.”

We wanted to push them here. Like fire, we planned to snuff the demons out by pushing them into this central space while surrounding them on all sides. Their smoke would have nowhere to go. Their fire would die.

A green demon raced toward me, and Wild and I parted, striding so ten feet separated us.

The green demon hurtled toward Basilia, and at the last second, Wild lifted his hand and I lifted mine. Our magic connected. When the demon hit our barrier, we lifted our other hands, so the growling supernatural was caught between two barriers.

Wild’s dark eyes glittered as he clapped his hands together in unison with me. Our barriers snapped together, and the demon was shredded in the process.

“Gross,” Basilia said. “But cool. And I want the next one.”

She raced forward, and I only had a chance to watch Kyros steal her kill and to note that the demon numbers were steadily increasing before blue magic sliced before my face. Wild snarled and launched at my attacker, and then I was running forward to meet another green demon.

I sliced my father’s dagger across the demon’s torso, then plunged Ryzika’s dagger into his neck. There wasn’t much resistance. I poured in my battle magic, then tore outward to sever the supernatural’s head.

A whoosh of air.

I crouched as a blade sang where my head had been. Whirling, I sliced across the red demon’s thighs.

“Ruhng Sritch!”

Unnatural bitch. I laughed and then grunted as she managed to drive the hilt of her blade into my shoulder on the draw back.

A thread lashed out from her—an intention—and I blinked at the red thread before my magic instinctively rose to redirect it.

The drive of her blade veered wildly off course, and her confusion was evident.

I tilted my head and curled the thread back through her body.

The female demon screamed as she drove her own blade through her torso.

Shit. How the hell did I manage that?

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