Page 32 of Eternal Mate

The circle—immune from his wild scratching on account of Barimuz infusing it with his demonic power—continued to grow brighter. We just had to keep him in it for five minutes total, tops.

Preferably without anyone dying.

Azazel was kicked in the head by Sariel before he could catch up to Atlan. While that stopped his trajectory, it also immediately drew the beast’s attention to Sariel.

A disgusting piece of black goo shot out of Azazel’s body and wrapped around Sariel like a tentacle.

I was immediately overcome with rage.

In the blink of an eye, I’d shot over to them, put both hands on the tentacle, then pulled it apart like paper, freeing Sariel from its grasp.

The severed limb dropped to the ground and rejoined the mass. Azazel seemed more annoyed than angered by it, although it was admittedly difficult to tell with his inhuman face, but he viciously stabbed those spider leg limbs toward me in a bid to impale me.

I dodged out of the way, backflipping in the air. On my way down, I saw Atlan clamp his jaws around several of the limbs at once and throw his head back, ripping them clear off of Azazel’s body.

The demon let out a furious shriek. He jabbed out his remaining limbs at random, seeking to destroy anything and everything he could reach.

All three of us darted out of the way.

Azazel kept whirling in every direction like a caged animal, spitting and snarling. While looking for an opportunity to strike, I noticed that black veins were starting to quickly spread out along the ground from his body.

My gut clenched. “Look out!” I shouted.

Atlan and Sariel looked down, saw them, then bolted out of the way, but Barimuz was slower.

The black veins abruptly shot upward as solidified spikes, their edges sharp and dangerous. They caught Barimuz on the arm as he was leaping backward, putting a sneer on his face. The magic circle’s lines dimmed significantly once he was no longer touching it, although they didn’t go out completely.

A vision of Kiyomasa, impaled on the very same kind of spike as these, passed through my mind.

“The circle is calibrated and a quarter to activation,” Barimuz announced. He looked hatefully at the thrashing Azazel from between the spikes. “I’ll need to not be distracted.”

In other words: Do your jobs better.

Atlan huffed. My angel was unhappy with the Archdemon and shot him a scowl, but I had to concede that he had a point. There were only two demons here who could power the circle, and one wasn’t friendly.

All of a sudden, the circle’s glow picked up again despite Barimuz not being back in position.

I blinked, then looked around for the reason.

In the space between the spikes, I caught a splotch of gray, brown, and white feathers and a beak, as well as one scaled foot set firmly on the carved lines.

Ashe. He’d decided to help like this, though he technically wasn’t part of the fighting team.

Smiling, I flew up to join the fray.

Once our trio started pummeling him again, Azazel took the spikes back into his body with a growl, flailing his limbs almost comically to try and hit us. We were landing hits on him, but with the way his skin was, it was hard to judge whether they were doing anything other than annoying him.

We didn’t want him dead or threatened enough to up his ante, though, just distracted. Using our angelic or fae powers would just be a waste of energy.

After a full minute of kicks, punches, and bites, Azazel let out a roar of frustration that rumbled the rocks around us. He roared on end, never taking a breath, not minding how we hit him to make him stop.

When his roars were steadily growing in pitch and my head was starting to hurt, I knew something was wrong.

“Barimuz!” Sariel shouted, having also sensed what I was. “He’s doing some—”

The roar evolved into an ear-splitting screech. I cried out in pain, putting my fingers into my ears to plug them.

I could see Sariel do the same. Atlan was also backing away with his ears flattened, his paws raising to block them.

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