Eros

Chapter Forty-Eight

The scythe hit the floor in slow motion. Falling, falling, falling until it fell.

Angie grimaced at the sound. She felt it in her bloodstream. That sound was mocking her. Rubbing salt in an open wound.

She stumbled back, as far away from that bloodied weapon as possible. Her feet stuttered, tripping over the air.

Her eyes fell on the angel God who doubled over in agony. Her hands grasped at the air to hold him, but she knew better than to interfere in whatever this was.

His tanned skin was slick with sweat. His wings were downcast, depressed.

His heavy, erratic breaths hit her ears, piercing at her heart.

Please work.

Angie couldn't bear to see him in agony.

She'd never seen him hurt. She'd never seen him ache. And now she had to stand tall and watch him cry out in pain.

She only knew him as the happy go lucky God who'd stolen her heart. Watching this now, she felt that heart being ripped from her chest.

He screamed in pain.

Pain that she'd inflicted, even if it had been under his instruction.

Her skin felt cold, icy. Her empty stomach flipped and churned with sickness.

"What's happening to you?"

Angie didn't know why she bothered asking. Between his rapid intakes of breath, there was no chance of him working up a reply.

He fell to his knees, bellowing a scream to the rafters.

Pain.

Pain.

Pain.

And then came the magic.

It bristled through the air, flooding the room with unholiness. Flooding the place with something unnatural. Something inhumane.

Slowly, ever so slowly, the skin on his face began to flake. Disintegrating.

Angie bit back a scream of horror.

This isn't supposed to happen!

"No!"

He was supposed to be materialising right now. He was supposed to solidify, appearing before all of them.

Instead, he was dying.

His hair began to sizzle, feathers falling and breaking from his wings.

He spat blood. Angie stood helplessly as it trickled from his mouth down his chin.

Their eyes met. Had she ever seen eyes so full of misery and pain?

"No!"

Angie was done standing by and watching. She didn't know much about this world, but she knew a mission gone wrong when she saw one.

Not knowing what she planned to do, she started forwards.

Arms tightened around her body, drawing her back.

"No! Let me go!"

But the hold tightened. No amount of thrashing could set her free. Ares simply ground his teeth and held her tighter, tugging her further back from the mess of Eros. Feathers were blowing along the throne room floor. A wind seemed to push the demons back.

"I can't do that Evangeline."

"He's hurting!"

Her voice was lost in the same wind. An unholy breeze came from every window, forcing them open to the night sky.