Page 109 of The Road to Hell

“Stay with me, Lily,” he said, his voice rough, urgent. The wind buffeted his words, but I heard them. Felt them.

I wanted to—I did. But the darkness was too strong. The exhaustion too deep.

The last thing I heard was Lucifer’s enraged scream from below, a sound that would haunt me for the rest of my days.

ChapterTwenty-Six

LILY

I drifted, weightless and untethered, caught between the waking world and the abyss. Time had no meaning here. Seconds. Minutes. Hours. I didn’t know. I only knew that I wasn’t alone.

Somewhere, just beyond the haze, a voice broke through.

“…not healing…why isn’t she healing?”

I recognized it. Familiar, grounding, but laced with something I’d never heard before. Fear.

Rathiel.

I tried to move, to reach for him, to force my body to respond, but nothing happened. My limbs were heavy, unresponsive, my breath shallow and ragged in my own ears. I could barely register the pain anymore—it was distant, like a memory rather than something I was still experiencing.

“…too much damage…why isn’t she…”

The words came faster now, closer, edged with frustration, with panic. I’d never heard him like this. Rathiel didn’t panic. He didn’t falter. He didn’tbreak.

But I couldhearit. The cracks in his voice, the helpless rage in every breath he took.

Something warm pressed against my forehead—a touch, fleeting, gentle.

“…please, Lily.”

I wanted to answer. Ineededto answer.

I couldn’t.

The darkness tugged at me again, pulling me under before I could fight it.

The next time I surfaced, another voice had joined Rathiel’s. Deeper. Rougher. Familiar in a different way.

“…not normal…look at her…destroyed her…”

Levi.

Relief curled through me, weak but real. I fought to focus on what they were saying.

“Celestials don’t justnotheal. If she’s not improving, then this isn’t just blood loss,” Levi said.

“She needs more time,” Rathiel snapped.

“Wedon’thave time,” Levi shot back. “If he finds us, findsher, he’ll finish what he started. I thought she’d succeed. I truly thought she would fulfill the prophecy. I never…”

Silence. A beat stretched between them, thick with tension. I wanted to say something, to tell them to stop, to tell them I was still here. But the effort was too much.

I slipped under again.

The next time I gained awareness, it was to the sound of raised voices, carving through the fog in my mind.

“…have you lost your mind?” Levi’s voice was raw with disbelief, edged with fury. “Do youhearyourself?”

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