Page 87 of Red Moon Secrets
Chapter23
Broken Worlds
The night stalker who has been chasing after me doesn't look so intimidating when he's bound by Chaz's restraints. After the fourth slash Kane delivers to his body, he hisses out with pain, squirming uselessly.
"Tell us who the fuck is running this!" Kane blares, gearing up for another shot of power.
Imagine being hit by thirty whips at once. That's what I can only think each one of his lashings feels like. It's starting to make me sick to my stomach.
"You're not strong enough," he says grinning, though his voice is strained and his teeth are coated with his own blood.
Kane hits him with a fifth strike, one that forces the night stalker to scream and cry out when it cuts deep inside him, spilling his blood with a generous flow.
That's all I can watch.
I turn around, keeping my back to the torture session, and grip Thad's necklace around my neck for some sort of solace. I know this has to be done, but it's brutal—more so than I'm fully prepared to see. I'm glad Drackus isn't here. The night stalker would be in disassembled pieces, but still alive. I hope Mom brings him down without any problems.
"You're too late. Even if you could stop them," he chokes out, breaking under the pain, "you'll never get there in time."
"Who, damn it?" Kane says, probably threatening another strike.
"Damon and Dragona's daughter and some others. It's starting. Just before dawn, she'll open the gates. She has the two gate keepers."
My stomach rolls at the sound of those two names. I turn around, wide-eyed and terrified. Everyone else looks paler than me because they know the true weight of those names. I've only scratched the surface.
"The gates of hell?" Chaz asks warily.
The night stalker laughs, but winces and coughs as more blood spills from his wounds and gurgles in his mouth.
"The gates of hell only need one gate keeper. And the worst demons can cross over any time they want. These people have been waiting and searching for the second gate keeper for centuries. They've groomed her, making her strong enough to endure the opening. If she died before the gates were opened, all would be lost. Now she's ready."
"The little girl?" Kane prompts, demanding an answer.
"She's one of them. They needed Freya's spawned bitch creature out of their way. She's the only one who was foretold to stop it. But it's too late now. The gates will open, and Dragona and Damon will walk amongst us once again."
The faces I already thought were ashen turn even paler. "Purgatory. They're opening the gates of purgatory?" Chaz asks in a register lower than a whisper, speaking as though it's blasphemous.
"They'll release everyone from there," Kane says softly, cursing louder after he lets it sink in. "You can't open the gates for just two people."
The night stalker looks up, smiling. "I know. This world is about to go up in flames. Burn, bitch.Burn."
A lash of power bursts out of Kane before he can stop himself, and the night stalker screams out until his screams turn into silence and his head drops in defeat, leaving only his garbled final breaths to taint the air.
"Fuck," Deke gripes while running his hands through his hair. "Now we don't know where the damn gate is!"
Kane shakes his head as he walks toward the counter, grabbing his keys.
"I do know."
"How the hell do you know?" Dice asks as we all start hurrying outside.
"Because we lived on top of it. It draws in the immortals like nothing I've ever seen before."
"Fucking where?" Dice prompts as we make our way outside, following Kane to the vehicles.
"Pine Shore."
If I didn't know fora fact that this was Pine Shore, I'd never believe it. The apocalypse from hell is what it looks like. People are screaming and running as we come into the town that is literally burning. The lake is even on fire. How is that possible?
