Page 23 of Rites of Passage

The garment sailed above the ghouls. Their heads snapped around as they followed it with their creepy, yellow stares. One of the fiends leapt and snatched the jacket from the air before Mae could grab it.

“Shit!” Nikolai cursed as the monster made for a gaping window. “Don’t let him get away!”

Brimstone transformed into his nine-tail spirit form. He sprung, his jaws opening to gargantuan proportions a second before he devoured the ghoul and the jacket in a single bite.

The creature’s screech cut off abruptly. The other monsters faltered, ochre pupils flaring with wariness as they studied the demonic fox’s monstrous appearance.

“You’ve never done that before,” Mae mumbled numbly.

“Please tell me you can bring my jacket back up,” Nikolai said, pale faced.

“Fear not,” Brimstone growled. “I’m only guarding it.” He spat out some human bones, burped, and snarled in disgust. “Hellreaver, do not eat these fiends. They’re bad for your health.”

I kinda feel queasy already, the weapon whined.

“You shouldn’t have had that third pizza,” Mae admonished.

Her shoulders tightened as she watched the monsters observing her with raw hunger. The ghouls were surrounding her and Brimstone where they stood back-to-back in the kitchen.

“You said you met one of these things today?” she called out to Nikolai.

The sorcerer’s knuckles whitened on his spear where he stood braced inside a ring of monsters in the living room. “Yeah. Alicia helped me get rid of him!”

Mae started spinning Hellreaver above her head, the power that dwelled within her warming her blood as she drew upon it. “How?”

“She pinned him down while I used a ley line and isolated him within a column of white magic. It destroyed him!”

“Think you can do that again?”

Nikolai’s expression grew awkward.

“What?” Mae asked.

“I can. As long as you don’t mind the roof of this building lighting up like the Fourth of July.”

Mae blinked. “Oh, wow. Is that what happened? Those military guys must have been thrilled.”

“They were ecstatic,” Nikolai said glumly. “I’m sure Bryony will have something to say about it once Rita tells her.”

Mae tensed. She felt a dark energy growing around them. The aura of corruption wreathing the ghouls was thickening.

How are they doing that?!

“I don’t know,” Brimstone grumbled.

Power pulsed from the monsters, an eerie wave that rattled china and glass and made Mae’s stomach roil. Shadows filled the apartment. Her eyes widened.

What the—?!

The ghouls attacked.

Brimstone roared, the sound so powerful it pushed back the creatures before they could reach her. It was all the time she needed.

Magic blasted around her, a red haze that lit up the gloom. Mae levitated off the ground, body vibrating with power and hair rippling wildly around her head as she twisted Hellreaver faster and faster.

“Wind Fury!”

A crimson whirlwind swirling with inky currents erupted in the center of the apartment, magic arcing from the weapon in her hands to the rapidly spinning funnel. She’d discovered using Hellreaver helped her focus the spell on a more defined area during her practice sessions with Bryony and Violet.

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