Page 42 of Death Match

A wave of dizziness knocked into me. Too much concentrated power used at once. I put my hands on my knees to steady myself as the flashes of pain shot through my temples, leaving me breathless. My insides wretched, and I dry heaved stomach bile, the acid burning as it climbed up and out.

After gulping down mouthfuls of air, the spinning stopped and my eyes focused again. In those few moments, the flames had stretched across the alter at the back of the church, engulfing the beautiful woven tapestries and cloths adorning the dais. This place would be consumed in no time.

Hurrying over to the crowd, I yelled, “This way!” as loud as I could and pointed toward my newly established exit. Heads turned, finding it, and as a few people ran for salvation, others followed.

As I ushered them out to safety, the sounds of frantic coughing snatched my attention. I followed the hacking along the aisle and found two stragglers—a mother and a little girl, both huddled between the pews and both coughing fiercely and wheezing.

Quickly, I snatched the girl, who couldn’t have been any more than five, and tucked her under my arm. The woman went to yell, but I grabbed her hand, too, and threw her arm over my shoulder. Then, not even wasting time to say a word, I hauled tail toward the exit.

I half tossed them through the hole, where a group of onlookers had begun to help people out and pull them to the street. In the distance, a firetruck’s sirens blared.

Rushing back inside, I scanned the room through squinted eyes. Tears gathered from the stinging smoke. Toward the alter, I could barely make out two motionless forms lying on the floor.

There was a terrible splintering and cracking came from overhead. My head snapped up just in time to see the ceiling bend, split, and then collapse. Right on top of me.

Weight slammed into my shoulders and back, knocking me flat onto my stomach and blackening my vision. Screams filled my ears. Maybe my own, I wasn’t sure. Pain unlike any other ricocheted through me. Stabbing, throbbing, and searing, all at the same time, and I lost all sense of my surroundings.

I couldn’t move. The mass on top of me pinned me down, and I gasped for my next breath. I tried to move my arms. Tried to wiggle my hips. Tried to kick. But nothing I did made a difference. My breathing turned shallow. Every inhale was like needles jabbing into my lungs.

I waited a beat before tilting my chin up and opening my eyes. Through my teary, burning eyes, I could make out smoldering wooden beams, debris, and the ash through the haze of heat and wreckage. Sputtering a cough, I tried to push myself up with shaky arms, but the heaviness of the ceiling and roof made it almost impossible to move.

This was it. This was how I was going to die. Me, an Archangel, crushed by a church’s roof.

Talk about irony.

I laughed—well, more like wheezed—but the fit took over me. I couldn’t help it.

I was losing it. And I was scared, I could admit it. At this point, I didn’t know what to do next. I was completely out of ideas. My body thrummed with so much pain that I couldn’t focus on anything specific besides the laughter, which was coming out in breathy spurts now.

Jade Blackwell, dead by a church roof.

What was wrong with me?

So, so many things. The list was too long to count.

A soft whine came from my right. Someone was stuck under the rubble with me.

I planted my hands on the ground and heaved as hard as I could to push myself up. I don’t know how I did it, but I was able to lift myself enough to lock my elbow. I grunted as the agony grasped me again, leaving me momentarily frozen in place. Gritting my teeth, I pushed past it, knowing deep down, I had to do whatever I could to rescue whoever else was trapped with me.

Pins and needles raced up and down my arms as my power ignited again. My small space underneath the rumble flooded with light as it crawled all the way to my shoulders and spread across my chest, filling me with energy and strength. I held on to it and used it to climb to my knees, lifting the wood, plaster, and roofing up higher over my head. It took everything in me, and yet, it felt effortless at the same time, like tapping into this part of myself was as natural as walking or breathing. If I managed to beat the Trials and figure out how to control it, this whole saving the world business might be possible.

I just had to survive this first.

Since the ceiling had come down mostly in one large piece, I was able to see the bodies of two people nearby once I hauled it upward. The farthest one was an older woman. She laid unmoving on the floor, but the man—the church’s pastor from what I could tell from his embellished but now ash-covered robe—was squirming. His gaze found me, and he stared in desperation. When he opened his mouth to tell me something, no sound emerged.

“Don’t worry,” I panted, my arms wobbling slightly with the massive weight of the ceiling pressing down on me. His panic-stricken gaze looked to me for assurance. “I’m going to get you out.”

And I was.

I didn’t know how exactly yet, but I’d find a way.

Calling to my power again, the light flashed all around me, and with its help, I heaved the piece of ceiling higher, quickly getting my legs underneath me to stand. Every part of my body trembled from the immense weight, but I locked my knees, forcing them to stay put.

Glancing over at the pastor again, his eyes widened as he watched me. His mouth moved in a rush of silent words, and it took me a second to realize he was praying.

Behind him, the woman remained motionless. Her body began to shimmer, and my gut clenched. My time as a reaper had taught me what that meant. Her soul was about to leave her body.

There was no way I could reach her in time.

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