Page 1 of Grave Revelations

Prologue

2017

He dropped to the floor, cradling her head in his hands. “I’m so sorry,” he breathed.

Her limp form was too thin, too frail. This life had been the one hardest to watch. She had wasted away to nothing, brought up in a system that fostered only cruelty and selfishness. Her kind soul had been hardened under its weight.

A featherlight touch on his arm drew his gaze from her blood-streaked face.

“Gabriel. I stand by whatever decision you make. I owe you that much.”

“I know why you did it, Dina. It had to be done. Had they not hidden her from me so long, I might have stopped this needless suffering before it ever began.”

She dropped her gaze to the girl nestled in his arms. “We have her now; we can protect her.”

“I have no way of reaching her in Sheol. If she waits for her to return, there will be nothing I can do.”

He leaned down, pressing his forehead to the girl’s, and gently lay her head on the cold gymnasium floor.

She deserved so much better than this, but his ravaged soul couldn’t survive if she were taken from him again. He could protect her this time. Hewouldprotect her.

“Are you sure we should do this?” Dina asked in a hushed tone, breaking into his thoughts. She dipped her head beside his, leaning over the crumpled form of the nearly lifeless girl on the floor.

A sudden intake of breath made his chest seize as a wheezing rattle emanated from her lungs, air sliding between her cracked lips. A red bubble popped, splattering blood across his face. Agony tore through him.

“We have little time. She’s dying. It’s now or never.”

Dina’s gaze met his, and she breathed, “He still might find her, you know. Perhaps we should bring her home now.” She looked down at the too-thin girl clinging to life. “She's already suffered so much in this lifetime.”

He ran a finger over her smooth cheek, smearing a line of blood across it. In that moment, he vowed to himself that he would never again hold her bloodied body in his hands while she slipped through his fingers only to be reborn in her cruel world once more. He would find a way to save her soul and bring her home with him.

“If we take her with us now, there will be no one left to stop him.”

Another breath hitched in the girl's lungs; the exhale was much longer this time.

“Take my hand, Dina. We must do this now,” he said as he reached for her.

The pair circled their arms above the body and began a rushed chant, their words growing in fervor until a slow, glowing flame burst from their encircled limbs.

Rising to stand, they increased their pitch, lifting their heads to the sky as the fire grew into a brilliant white-hot light arching through the night. A wispy blue spark sailed up the path of flame, following its trail until the light and the two forms standing over the dying girl winked out.

All that remained was a flashing red exit sign, casting the disfigured girl in garish repose between moments of complete darkness.

Present Day

A steadydrip, drip, dripfrayed her already strained nerves as she blinked in the dark, giving her vision time to adjust. Copper tang mingled with the scent of loamy earth and decay.

A chill ran through her, and it wasn’t entirely from the frosty air. Death dripped from every surface, sluicing over the expansive stone table she leaned into to pool at her feet.

“Place your hand on the amulet and repeat after me.”

“I won’t.”

Whimpering behind her drew her focus to the women huddled together on the floor.

“Let me tell you a story,” the yellow-eyed demon said, drawing her attention back to the creature who had captured them all so easily. “The man who wielded this amulet before me only knew how to bind someone to him through magical spells and coercion. He failed to understand that to truly have power over something, you must get to the heart of it. Well,” she pressed a finger to her pale lips, “thesoulof it, really. You cannot hope to command obedience with a few simple binding spells.”

The yellow-eyed creature pressed a small hand to her chest.

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