Velvet Redemption

For the first few days after the fight, I was still coughing up blood. Pestilence’s venom was powerful. Had I been human and without the power of Velvet Redemption, I’d be a member of the undead for sure.

After a week, though, I was back on my feet.

Fortunately for the country of sand and mummies, once Pestilence was destroyed, all of the members of the undead simply dissolved to ash, much in the same way their creator did.

This, of course, left little evidence for organizations like the World Health Organization to study. After all, how were they going to find the cause of an illness that had vanished from the globe?

Lilandra and I flew north a little ways to Sicily where we rested up. We found a small village on the beach and rested up there.

I wasn’t going to lie; it felt good to have her back on my side. It took a day to officially break the ice and get back to where we could joke with each other, but once we had passed that point, we knew we would nary be separated again if we could help it.

Lilandra got me into this mess. I wanted her there with me as I fought my way through it.

This beach was the perfect place to rest. At night, I would just lay out in the water and float. During the day the beach was too populated. The crystal clear waters of the Mediterranean Sea easily attracted hundreds of thousands of tourists every year.

A eight or nine days, I felt much better. His crap had moved its way out of my system.

Under a half moon, I floated on my back in the water, my wings spread out to their entire span. My arms were spread out wide as I stretched. Once again, I had a moment similar to when I sat on the floor of the Columbia River after completing my training with Lilandra.

Couldn’t this war just vanish? Let me be? I was so happy in this moment. . . calm. . . relaxed. . . I wanted it to stay that way.

“I certainly don’t enjoy all this fighting,” I muttered.

I drifted for a few more minutes then sighed, “This killing horsemen stuff is for the birds.”

“Well, you do have the wings of a bird,” I heard a voice say, as a flapping of wings indicated the presence of one scarlet-haired demon.

“Go away,” I moaned, knowing she was here to ruin my moment, just like last time.

“I can certainly see how you’d make that request. It’s beautiful here,” Lilandra muttered, coming down into the water to join me.

She was right. When bathed in the sun, this rocky little beach was paradise. The small village we were hiding out in was right on the water. All the buildings were white and had blue windows.

The water in the beach was an immediate sky blue, and rocky hills arose from behind the tiny village. Some small boats dotted the seascape, most of them also white and blue, but other than that, the place didn’t see too much water traffic.

“Justin. . . I’d say we need to make our move soon. The other two horsemen will be on a higher alert now that their forces have been cut in two,” Lilandra said.

“Five more minutes please. . .,” I muttered.

I sounded like a child that didn’t want to get out of bed on a school morning. Fortunately for myself, Lilandra was convinced that the war between Heaven and Hell wasn’t going to start in five minutes. So, she gave me that luxury. We just sat there quietly listening to the water hitting the not too distant rocky shore.

“Alright Justin. . . that’s exactly five minutes,” Lilandra said, softly.

“Five more,” I muttered, with my eyes still closed.

“Don’t make me kick your ass in paradise,” Lilandra threatened.

“You can’t unless I make the first move, remember? You’ll dissolve. If I continue to lay here, you can’t do anything,” I muttered, smirking.

“Oh yeah?”

“Yep,” I said, with my eyes still closed.

I heard Lilandra muttered a spell softly in Enochian, and the water under me glowed a light blue and rose up several feet. It then rushed forward, washing me up on the beach, face first.

Lilandra landed near my head as I was getting up and spitting sand out of mouth.

“I thought you couldn’t attack first or you’d break your angelic vow and dissolve!”

“Oh, that wasn’t an attack. I just moved you. . . without consent,” Lilandra said wearing the same smirk I had been wearing only moments earlier.

“Don’t make me kick your ass in paradise,” I muttered, sitting down.

“Like you possess the ability,” Lilandra said, scoffing.

I scowled at her and after a few moments said, “Okay, you know the location of Famine. Where is he again?”

“They’re keeping him guarded at a small village in the country of Namibia,” Lilandra said.

“Could you be a little more specific?”

“The village is exactly a mile northeast of the Naute Resevoir. I’m sure you know exactly where that is, right?”

“Of course I do. . . I know the song by Toto. The village is near. . . Mt. Kilimanjaro?”

“Oh yeah, right next to where the rains are blessed down in Africa,” Lilandra said, mocking me.

“Whatever. You can take us there, right?”

“I can. The problem will be fighting off the few thousand demons that have surrounded the village. They’re going to be a challenge,” Lilandra said.

“I told you that I’d call in some friends,” I said.

“I don’t think Joshua is going to be of much assistance here,” Lilandra said.

“Not him. . . I have a couple others in mind,” I said.

“Who?”

“Death. . . will you please come here? Daniel, I’d like you to come too, please,” I said.

Lilandra immediately summoned her usually wooden sword and yelled, “Are you insane? Praying to Daniel? Do you have any idea-”

Daniel’s voice came from above as he said, “Relax, Lilandra. Justin and I made nice in your absence. We’re practically chums now.”

He was close enough that I could see him rolling his eyes. His white robes came to a rest as he landed between Lilandra and I on the sand.

“He’s right, actually. The short version of a long story is, while you were gone, I saved Daniel from Michael’s wrath, and we came to see eye to eye. Now he’s on team Justin,” I explained.

Lilandra did not lower her wooden blade for a few moments, unable to believe what her ears were hearing.

“You. . . two. . . made nice?”

“I know it’s hard for your tiny brain to comprehend, but the enemy of my enemy is my friend,” Daniel said.

“I think I heard that line in a really bad movie. . .,” I said, muttering.

“It was a proverb before it was in any human flick, I assure you,” Daniel muttered.

He finally landed in the sand, and at the sight of him relaxing and crossing his arms, Lilandra finally lowered her guard, at least visably.

“Good girl,” Daniel said, smiling.

“I’ll show you who is a good girl,” Lilandra said, her wings flaring.

“Enough, both of you!”

They stopped and stood opposite of each other.

After another tense moment of silence, I felt a familiar presence behind me. She wrapped two arms around my stomach and rested her head on my shoulder. Her eyes were fixed on something. . . it only took one sentence from her for me to know what.

“You’re not taking him back,” Death said, tightening her grip on me.

Her skin was cool to the touch, but not so much that it made me uncomfortable.

I thought to myself, Whoa, why is she so possessive all of a sudden?

Lilandra frowned and took a step toward me.

“I’m not trying to take him back,” she said.

Death didn’t let go of me. I would be the first to admit though, I wasn’t exactly upset about the situation. I had to work to keep from smiling.

“Ladies, please, there’s enough of me to go around,” I said, chuckling.

Their staring contest wasn’t over. In fact, they completely ignored my joke and stood in silence, each waiting for the other to make a move or say more words.

Daniel piped up asking, “What exactly is going on here?”

I sighed and explained, “Lilandra and I had a spat and split up for a little bit. During that time, Death helped me out a lot. Then, Lilandra came back and saved me during my fight with Pestilence. I haven’t exactly had the time to explain to Death what the new situation is though.”

“The situation is, you tell that red-headed bitch to leave before she nearly corrupts your soul again,” Death said.

“Hey, I apologized for misleading him already. And I didn’t exactly see you helping him in the fight against Pestilence. If I hadn’t showed up, you’d have had his soul to escort to the afterlife,” Lilandra said.

“Well, to be fair, she was busy dealing with all the additional death from the near extinction of Egypt’s populace. There was an undead crisis,” I explained.

I still hadn’t taken Death’s hands from around my stomach. My hands sank down to hers and joined them. Wait. . . them? I guess Death found her an arm she liked and took it.

I didn’t realize where my hands were until I saw the expressions from Lilandra and Daniel grow wide. It was at that point I realized where they were, and it took all my strength to keep from looking down to see our hands on top of each other.

I thought to myself, What the Hell is going on? Am I in a relationship with the queen reaper herself?

Still, as my mind began to wander, I began to realize there was at least a chance there were feelings there between Death and myself. I mean, she was very pretty. Not to mention she had really helped me after Lilandra and I went our separate ways.

I did enjoy being around her, but that didn’t amount of love, did it? I hadn’t given any serious thought to love since Lisa died. In fact, after that, I didn’t want to be involved with anyone else ever again.

Lilandra’s aggravated voice shattered my thoughts of Death as she asked, “Are you going to side with her?”

I removed my hands at once, but I didn’t remove Death’s hands from around my waist. It was at that point that I realized I didn’t want to. Death seemed to be on the same wavelength. She didn’t move her hands one inch.

I coughed and said, “No one is taking sides. I was just explaining the situation.”

“I understand that; however, you’ve yet to explain what Lilandra is still doing here. She saved you from Pestilence. . . great. You’ve thanked her and forgiven her. She can leave now,” Death said.

“I’m here because I want to be here, Death. If you have a problem with that, you can leave,” Lilandra said.

Daniel sighed and looked like he was about to abandon us when I said, “Enough!”

Thunder crackled overhead, and a few clouds began to stir in the previously clear sky.

“Lilandra is here because she knows where Famine is. She’s also here because we’ve come to a new understanding about helping each other. Lilandra admitted her wrongdoing and apologized. Furthermore, she did save my life. As far as I’m concerned, we’re teammates again,” I said.

Daniel crossed his arms and said, “Great. You two kissed and made up. Why did you call us here?”

“I called you two here because there are a few thousand demons between us and Famine. I want the four of us to team up and slaughter the lot of them in all-out combat, then kill Famine,” I said.

The group grew silent. It wasn’t exactly a plan of tactical genius, but it wouldn’t be impossible with all four of us. We were all fairly strong in our own rights, and an all-out battle would probably catch the demons off guard.

Daniel asked, “Where is Famine?”

“He is in a small country in southern Africa. The village itself is located in the middle of nowhere, and there are a couple thousand demons surrounding the village. Justin, it appears, wants us to simply charge in and hit it with everything we have,” Lilandra said.

“I don’t know about the chemistry of this team,” Death said.

“It has to be the four of us. Surely we can all put aside our differences long enough to kill 500 demons a piece,” I said.

Again, silence fell over the group. No one really supported the plan one hundred percent, but no one was suggesting alternatives.

That was when Daniel broke the silence and said, “When?”

“At sunrise, we move out,” I said.

“Fine. Don’t you girls go killing each other before then,” Daniel said, chuckling as he flew away.

“I think that’s the first time I heard that angel laugh,” I muttered, watching Daniel disappear.

Death and Lilandra said nothing. They offered no support or disapproval of the plan.

“Hey, why can’t I teleport like Daniel and Death?”

Death explained, “Angels and reapers have that ability. Demons and. . . whatever you are do not. It’s a totem pole thing.”

Lilandra scowled at the idea of being beneath Death on a totem pole.

“See you tomorrow, unless you get too caught up in an undead crisis,” Lilandra said, flying away.

Death stared daggers at her but said nothing.

“Wow. . . you two,” I muttered.

Death finally let go of me and said, “What are you doing?”

I turned to face her, and her arms rose up to my shoulders.

“You’re touchy all of a sudden,” I said, looking down at her arms.

“I’m pretty direct. You learned that about me with Benjamin’s death,” she said, without taking her arms off me.

“You think we’re something now?”

“I think I’ve developed feelings for you, and I also think you have for me. I didn’t exactly see you pulling my arms off you back there, “ Death said.

She was right, I realized. I was developing a thing for her. There really wasn’t any other way to put it.

I put my arms on her waist.

She laughed and said, “What are we, at a middle school dance?”

This made me a little nervous. I was definitely off my game since Lisa’s death. I hadn’t really thought about being with another woman (or man, despite some of Joshua and Benjamin’s jokes).

I moved in closer to Death and used my left hand to move some of her smooth black hair out of her face.

Suddenly, her skin didn’t feel as cool to the touch anymore. Instead, she felt normal.

“I don’t know how I developed feelings for the head grim reaper. . . it’s a little unnerving to say the last. What does that say about me?”

“It says that even after getting off track with your life, you are still capable of choosing great women to fall for,” Death said, smiling.

Her icey-blue eyes didn’t seem quite so icey up close.

“Thanks again for saving my life,” I said.

“Stop. Can we just not talk about the supernatural world for a bit? We’re having a moment,” Death said.

“Sure. Ummm, I’m at a loss for words here,” I said, quietly.

“Then stop talking,” she said, leaning in.

I returned her kiss slowly, and before long, we were laying on the sand, kissing passionately.

After a while, we just lay there, watching the stars and listening to the waves of the Mediterranean Sea.

We swapped stories from our lives, and I learned more about her. She told me about how she wanted to teach art but decided when she got to college that she didn’t want to teach anything below the collegiate level because she hated younger kids.

I laughed at that. I never was too fond of kids either. In fact, the only thing that would have made me give in to get a puppy instantly was if Lisa had started talking about us having kids.

I would have made her queen of the universe to avoid that conversation, and what was scary was I think she knew it. She had that as an ace up her sleeve, and she just died before she got the chance to use it.

As the first colors of the sun were threatening to come up over the horizon, I had already long fallen asleep with Death in my arms. I didn’t need to eat or drink, but sleep was a little different. Although I ate and drank just to maintain some resemblance of my old human life, sleep still came to me pretty naturally. When I was tired, I had no trouble falling asleep, physical or spiritual body.

My eyes opened first to see Lilandra hovering above us in the air. The sun literally had just popped up on the horizon. Local fishermen weren’t even out to the docks yet.

Lilandra’s judgmental scowl wasn’t exactly the most comfortable ray to sizzle under, and Death woke up as Lilandra’s voice pierced her ears.

“Well I see you two got plenty of sleep for our big battle today,” Lilandra said.

Daniel’s voice wasn’t far off, either, saying, “I don’t suppose we can keep this professional, can we?”

I asked, “We’re going to be fighting a few thousand demons. What part of that do you deem professional?”

He rolled his eyes and said, “You know what I mean. Is screwing the grim reaper really the best way to build teamwork today?”

“Hey, we didn’t-”

I was cut off by Death, “What we do or don’t do in our spare time is none of your business, angel. It’s not like this team is going to be a lasting thing anyway. Once we fight this battle today, I’m pretty sure we’re disbanding.”

“Good. I don’t need you interfering with mine and Justin’s plans,” Lilandra said.

Before Death could fire something back, I raised my arms.

“Peace be quiet,” I said.

Lilandra and Death looked confused.

Daniel again rolled his eyes and said, “The quote you’re fishing for is ’Peace be still.”

“Ye-yeah. That’s what I meant. Let’s focus our energy on slaughtering demons,” I said.

“With pleasure,” Death said, her scythe appearing in her arms as she stared intensely at Lilandra.

“The other demons,” I muttered, putting as much emphasis on the word “other” as possible.

Death took a moment but eventually put away her scythe.

She asked, “Where are we teleporting to?”

“We need to fly in. Teleporting requires too much magic that they could detect,” Lilandra said.

“Well not all of us have wings,” Death said.

“That’s not my problem. The majority of us do. Even Daniel is more useful than you here,” Lilandra said.

“That’s enough, ladies. Death, I’ll carry you like when we went to Purgatory,” I said.

Lilandra asked, “Why did you two go to Purgatory?”

“When I was helping Justin break a curse that Daniel put on him after you left and went your own way,” Death said.

“Oh, that’s how you broke the curse. You went and killed the nephilim that made the enchanted item. Oh man, that means the rest of his items are now worthless. The angels in charge of the vault are not going to be happy about that,” Daniel said, laughing.

Lilandra asked, “Anyone care to fill me in?”

“Later,” I said.

Death came close, and I scooped her up in my arms.

“Don’t worry, babe. I won’t drop you. I didn’t with the worms, did I?”

“If you do, I’ll stab my scythe into your gut again,” Death warned.

Her tone was fairly serious, and I didn’t want to piss her off with any jokes like in Purgatory.

Nervously, I asked, “Right. . . should we get going then?”

Lilandra wasted no time jumping on up into the sky.

Daniel and I followed, and our trail turned south. We were heading toward the Naute Resevoir and a few thousand demons.

We flew in silence most of the day, and we reached the country by dusk.

Landing a quarter mile away, we drew up our battle plan. We took an hour to argue about the best way to attack, and then I had enough and said, “Here is what we do. Daniel attacks from the north, Death takes the west, Lilandra takes the south, and I’ll attack from the east. First one to kill Famine wins. We’ll also have a separate competition for who kills the most demons,” I said.

Death looked skeptical, but Lilandra and Daniel botha nodded in agreement.

“If anyone needs help, yell. The nearest person will rush over to aide you,” I said.

Lilandra asked, “Any questions?”

Daniel asked, “Is there a specific way we should attack the demons?”

“Any way you want. We’ll call this a freestyle battle royale,” I said.

He nodded and popped his knuckles.

“May the best. . . supernatural being win,” I said, searching for the right adjectives to describe our group.

Teaming up to slay one of the horsemen of the apocalypse were a demon, an angel, the grim reaper, and a. . . me. It was certainly an event for the history books.

As we’d flown over, we saw a few thousand African bodies possessed by demons standing in a circular formation around the village. They weren’t that spread out.

The village itself had a couple dozen huts and one larger building in the center. That was likely where Famine was, and we had to make it to him, kill him, then haul ass in case War showed up. We didn’t want to fight two horsemen today.

“Good luck,” I said.

They all nodded, and three of us took to the skies to get into position. Death vanished from sight, presumably moving at an extreme speed to get to a good attack point.

In the sky, Lilandra and Daniel circled. I finally arrived at the point I wanted to attack from, and everyone paused.

The air was very warm, as the sun had just set. There was still a reddish hue in the west where the sun had gone down.

Around the village was just flat prairie-looking ground. There were a few scattered trees, but for the most part, it was just dust and mostly brown grass. Perhaps the most irking part of it all was the lack of animals. There were no birds, lions, gazelle, or anything I’d expect to live here based on what I’d seen on Animal Planet.

It was like the animals knew this village was about to become a crater of Hell. They got out of Dodge in a hurry.

A few tense minutes went by, and I heard no signs of battle. What was everyone waiting on? A signal?

“If nobody wants to ring the bell, I guess I will,” I muttered.

Clouds built, lowering the light even more, but everyone fighting this battle would be able to see just fine.

There was some rumble in the sky as I drew Velvet, and then lightning struck my blade as I held it out.

I smirked and plunged myself downward, the lightning building on Velvet the whole time. It grew brighter and brighter until I was sure I had all the demons’ attention.

Holding Velvet over my head, I screamed, “If you don’t want to die, leave now!”

No one seemed to take my advice, but I figured they would as the night went on.

Slamming into the ground, I sent lightning splintering off in several directions from Velvet, striking several demons.

I heard one yell, “Justin Pierce is attacking in the east! All demons to-”

He didn’t have time to finish his sentence before a small earthquake shook the area from the north. That must have been Daniel.

“They know my name. I’m flattered,” I smirked.

Before they could split into two groups, I heard more screaming from the west and south.

The demons looked like they were aimless for a moment. They didn’t expect an attack from four directions. I plunged Velvet into the nearest body, and it screamed in agony. Then, I pulled Velvet out and decapitated the demon.

To the naked eye, I was fighting a large army of blacks, but I knew they were all possessed. Some were fighting with blades, spears, bows, and a few had guns. I made sure to disarm them all quickly when they came within range.

The clothes they wore were not varied much. Most of the women were wearing bright colored tops with long and loose sleeves. Their pants were very wide and often were a darker color.

Most of the men I saw wore extremely long tops that covered most of their pants. Their tops and pants were typically darker colored than the women’s.

I never thought I’d ever set foot in Africa, so, I guess I didn’t know exactly how the locals would look, possessed or not.

One demon thrust a spear forward, and I parried with Velvet. I formed a blade of lighting in my left hand while parrying with Velvet in my right and stabbed the demon right through the forehead.

The body fell forward, and I threw the lightning blade into another body to my left while holding Velvet in front of me as a shield to block gunfire from a demon ahead of me.

I didn’t have much time to think on it, but I remembered Lilandra saying physical weapons couldn’t hurt me in my spirit body. That didn’t seem to hold true when a man with a dagger grazed my right side from behind.

The pain was real enough. I guess when demons used physical weapons, they took on a spiritual damage. That didn’t work out in my favor.

It was getting a little crowded in front of me, so, I extended my wings to their full span, charged them with my aura, and flapped them forward at great speed once. The result was several demons being knocked back by a strong gust of wind. Dust and dry grass went flying as well.

As the demon number in front of me grew again, I flew up 15 feet in the air and held Velvet high. Lightning came down, striking the blade. I brought it down to the ground again, and it shot out in all directions ahead of me, taking down several more demons.

Still, more replaced them.

“Damn. . . 500 is a bigger number than I thought,” I muttered, killing another demon.

I felt bad for all the Africans that were dying in this fight. They didn’t choose this battle. They probably didn’t even believe in the things that were possessing them and fighting this battle.

Like the Egyptians caught up in the undead pestilence, they were casualties to an approaching war, a war I was fighting desperately to stop. There was no way to exorcise this many demons. I simply had to kill them while they were in the bodies of these humans. A slash to my left arm forced me to stop momentarily from another flash of pain.

I grunted as I saw my blood drop to the earth below me.

How many had I killed? How many remained? How long had I been fighting?

I was quickly becoming overwhelmed by the gigantic war. I hoped that Death, Lilandra, and Daniel were okay. No. . . I knew they were okay. They could handle themselves, as could I. I just had to keep my head down and keep charging forward until Famine was dead.

Speaking of Famine, one last thing I noticed about these African bodies was that they were extremely scrawny. Their stomachs looked like they had imploded.

“So that’s the effect Famine has been having on these poor souls. I suppose I shouldn’t have expected anything less given his name,” I muttered.

I shot my left arm up and aimed it forward.

I pulled a bolt of lightning down from the sky, and it struck my body. The lightning felt warm and full of vibrant blue energy, like it always did. Rerouting the lightning through my body, I shot it forward, like my left arm was a canon. It was a technique I never really got the chance to test on Lilandra because she was always so fast. Techniques like this really were more for leveling a field of opponents anyway.

I used my aura to amplify the lightning into a continuous blue beam of energy. Screaming as I struggled to control the flow of energy, I slowly swept the beam of blue energy across the path in front of me from right to left.

Demons that were caught in the path of the beam dissolved entirely, or at the very least, suffered massive burns.

I was a little curious about the temperature of my blast, but I quickly settled for the estimation of “hot enough.”

As I caught my breath for a moment, I looked ahead. I had killed several dozen demons with that last attack.

“Serves you bastards right for ganging up on my ass,” I muttered.

To my left I saw headlights racing toward me. Headlights? In a remote African village?

A closer look revealed that a demon was driving a jeep straight for me in an attempt to run me over. The human being possessed was bald, and he had a pierced nose. He was shirtless, and his chest was bulging with some combination of fat and muscle.

Normally, I wouldn’t consider a jeep a weapon, but with this demon driving it straight at me, I assumed it was now a “spirit jeep.”

Tossing Velvet to my left hand, I summoned all of my immediate aura to my right hand, drawing it back.

“Don’t bring a jeep to a sword fight!”

Right after I yelled this, I dug my feet in and slammed my right fist into the middle of the engine block. That jeep stopped dead in its tracks, and it folded like a tin can toward me. The demon went flying through the air.

I tracked the demon with my eyes, and when it slammed into the ground, I slashed the air with Velvet, sending a bolt of lightning at the demon. It blasted the demon’s body, and the evil spirit screamed in agony until it left the human body and flew off into the night sky.

Pulling my right arm out of the jeep’s engine block, I saw I’d busted my knuckles with that punch.

“Damn. . . that stings,” I said.

Looking up, I saw more demons putting themselves between me and the village.

I was getting tired, and waves of exhaustion echoed through my body. I felt like the down time I had after killing Pestilence wasn’t enough. These battles with the horsemen of the apocalypse were wearing on me.

Grabbing Velvet with both hands, I charged forward, using less lightning and more sword to save energy.

I fought onward for an hour and finally made it to the village. My body was covered in cuts and slashes from where other weapons had grazed me. I hadn’t received any serious wounds yet. One demon got off a gunshot that scraped my left shoulder, but I quickly dispatched that particular servant of Lucifer after I pinpointed her location.

I knew that I’d killed at least a few hundred demons by this point. There were still a few fighting me actively, but they were a little more sparse the further into the village I got.

One demon came down out of the sky armed with nothing but his two fists. He landed a blow on my jaw, and I was thrown to the ground from the sheer power of it.

“Damn that was quite a punch,” I muttered.

Sheathing Velvet, I popped my knuckles. I was going to return the favor. The demon charged me, his long black hair bouncing with every step he took. I caught this punch, and that surprised him. Then, letting go of his fist with my left hand, I grabbed the back of his head, and pushed it toward my right fist, which was already moving forward at great speed.

The result was me literally smashing his face in.

Blood splattered on my face and clothes.

Looking down, I saw that what little bit of my green long-sleeved shirt was left reduced to a rag clinging to my body.

Tearing it off, I found a clean patch and used it to wipe the blood off my face. Shirtless, my white skin was quite a contrast to the seven demons that now surrounded me. Men and women charged me, thinking that if they all attacked at once, they’d have me.

Their problem was they were slow.

I blasted the woman in front of me backward with a thrust of my palm. Then, as the others got closer, I drew Velvet and spun, decapitating all of them in one fluid motion. Heads rolled on the ground, and more blood fell upon me.

Breathing heavy, I walked over to the demon girl I’d spared and picked her up by the neck.

Her body was much younger than the others. The human was perhaps only 13.

Her hair was braided, but her eyes were solid black.

“Tell me which hut has Famine in it, and I’ll let you go,” I said.

The demon scoffed and said, “Sure you will. And angels are merciful creatures full of love.”

The demon was being sarcastic, and I didn’t have time for that.

“Talk or I fry you with 100,000 volts of electricity and find another demon that will give me the information I want.”

The demon quickly pointed to a large hut in the center of the village.

“Seems like I should have figured that out on my own,” I muttered.

“Alright, get out of here,” I said, throwing the body down.

“You’re serious?”

Scowling at the demon, I asked, “You want to give me a chance to change my mind?”

The demon did not think twice before exiting the girl’s body and flying into the air. The girl, however, remained unconscious on the ground.

Killing a few more demons, I finally made it to the large hut only to look up and see Daniel’s body fly through the roof. He was covered in cuts and bruises like I was. His left arm was broken, and he slammed into the ground on his back next to me.

“Daniel. . . you okay?”

I helped him up, and he grunted as he popped his arm back into place. Growling, I heard him say, “I may require your assistance killing Famine. He is a powerful-”

He was interrupted by something smashing through the wall in front us and punching both of us backward at the same time.

I bounced across the dusty ground picking up more scrapes until I slammed into a smaller residential hut.

The hut came down on top of me.

Rising slowly from the wreckage of the hut, I inhaled and exhaled deeply, spitting up a little blood.

My wings looked like a mess as I straightened them out.

Looking over, I saw Daniel rising even slower than I was. His normally white clothes were stained with blood, and his belt was missing. His wings were in a similar shape to mine.

Then, I looked forward and saw a large African man bulging with muscle. He was shorter than I was, but he was built like a world class weight lifter. His eyes were not solid black like the others, but his stomach was the only one in the village that didn’t seem to be imploded. He was sporting a large afro, which normally I would have made fun of, but I was about to enter a fight to the death.

“You must be Famine,” I said.

“I am,” his surprisingly tenor-like voice replied.

“I guess there are no words to be said. We both know what our goals are,” I said.

“That’s true. We both seek each other’s demise. Although, I’m surprised you brought a team. Your group seems to have made quick work of my initial demon army,” he said.

Daniel asked, “Initial?”

“You didn’t think I just had the ground troops, did you? I have more,” he said, whistling and pointing in the air.

We both looked up to see at least another couple hundred demon-possessed Africans, all with black leather-like wings. The first few swooped down toward us, and I braced myself, as did Daniel.

That was when Death appeared and cut right through the two demons coming down toward me.

Lilandra took Daniel’s down with her usual wooden blade.

“Quite an ironic turn of events,” Daniel muttered.

“Don’t make me regret saving you,” Lilandra said.

Famine did not look pleased. The four of us looked worse for wear, but we’d all completed our mission to find Famine. Now we just had to kill him.

“Lilandra. Can you and Death keep those things off our back?”

The girls looked at each other, and then I said, “On second thought, Daniel, why don’t you and Lilandra go after them since you two have wings?”

Daniel clearly wanted another shot at Famine, but he flew into the sky after a few seconds. Lilandra did the same.

Death asked, “What’s the plan?”

I pointed Velvet at Famine and said, “Chew bubblegum and kick ass.”

Death said, “I’m all out of bubblegum.”

Smiling, I said, “I think I like this girl.”

Famine didn’t look pleased. His shirtless chest rose and fell slowly as he inhaled and growled.

“You may have taken down Pestilence and stopped his plan, but I honestly thought that making one country into his kingdom was too small to succeed,” Famine said.

Confused, I asked, “You think a village is bigger than a country?”

He laughed and shook his head.

“This village is just the start. I’ve been absorbing all the nutrition and will from these people, which makes me stronger. Imagine how strong I’ll be when I spread out to take the country, then the continent,” he said.

“We won’t let that happen. I’ll see to your death just like I did Famine’s,” I muttered.

I disappeared and reappeared next to him. He ducked to avoid my slice, and then he went in for a punch to my face. He was unarmed and fought similar to Daniel, just with more brute force and power. Before he could make contact with me, he saw Death coming down from the air above with her scythe.

He backed off of me and avoided her strike. We fought on like this for a few minutes without anyone landing a blow. That was when I tripped him, and Death severed his left arm.

The man didn’t even flinch. Clearly, he was used to intense pain. Before Death could get away, he backfisted her skull with his remaining arm, and she crumpled like a house of cards. She wasn’t used to taking direct hits like that. Blood fell from her nose as she collapsed to the ground.

Famine went to stomp her, but I came from behind and drove Velvet Redemption through his shoulder where his missing arm was.

“I’ve had enough of you, Justin Pierce!”

Reaching behind him with his good hand, he grabbed my head and flung me to the ground in front of him.

Then, before I could get up, he was sitting on my stomach and slamming his fist into my head, punching me over and over. My vision began to blur, and he said, “After you’re dead, I’ll spread my famine across this continent. As for Death, I’m sure Lucifer will love to have the grim reaper back in his services. I bet he has an even stronger spell to torment her with now.”

At the mention of Death returning to Lucifer’s control, I snapped into a fit of rage. I wouldn’t lose anyone else I cared about.

I began to roar, and Famine slammed his fist into my face again to shut me up. That didn’t happen.

“I’m going to roast you, you piece of shit,” I yelled.

Flipping Velvet in my right hand, I held it upside down and drove it into the ground through Famine’s left leg. He growled, but it was more from frustration instead of pain.

“Death isn’t going anywhere with you. I won’t let Lucifer lay one more finger on her! I’m going to kill all you horsemen, then your daddy. And you know what? I’m going to enjoy it,” I roared.

Famine tried to get up, but I summoned a blade of lightning to my left hand and stabbed it through his right leg and into the ground.

Famine was anchored and not going anywhere.

“Surely you’ve caught onto the fact that it takes much more than a blade to make me feel pain,” he sneered.

“Oh don’t worry. I’m just getting you right where I want you. Did you know that the average bolt of lightning contains one hundred million to one billion volts of electricity?”

Famine’s sneer faded slowly.

“Now imagine how many volts a streak of lightning contains when I’m pissed off,” I hissed.

“Death! Move!”

She jumped back as I yelled and pulled the largest bolt of lightning I’d ever seen down onto Famine and I.

Now he was screaming in pain, but I didn’t have it easy, either.

The dust under us began to turn to glass from the heat the lightning was putting off. While he was screaming, I yanked Velvet out of his leg, and with my last ounce of strength, I decapitated him.

After a moment, the lightning stopped, and a huge clap of thunder followed.

As soon as I saw Famine’s lifeless body start to fade to ash, I blacked out. Everything hurt too damn much.

I drifted in the blackness of unconsciousness for a while. At some point, I heard something familiar that drew me back toward life once more.

It was the ocean. I didn’t visit the ocean much when I lived in Denver. Even the west coast was far away.

Slowly, I opened my eyes. I saw that I was laying in Death’s lap while Lilandra’s hands hovered over my body, which was glowing green.

“Dammit Justin. That was beyond reckless. Your body is going to take several days to heal from this,” Lilandra said.

We were laying on the beach of that port town back on Sicily. Daniel was next to me resting. His wings were folded over himself, like feather blankets.

“I guess Famine died?”

Death nodded and said, “Yeah. You almost did too. You were lucky that Velvet provided you some protection from that lightning attack.”

Lilandra finished and said, “I taught you better than that, Justin. You’ve been using too many techniques that are designed to take you down along with your opponent. You can’t be taking risks like that at this stage of the game! What if that bolt had killed you, too?”

I said nothing. I knew she was right, but I was too tired to say anything.

After a few moments of silence, I muttered, “War. . ..”

“Just rest,” Death said.

“Your girlfriend is right, for once. War isn’t going to just recklessly attack us now that he’s the last one left. He’ll be more cunning. He’s much smarter than Famine and Pestilence put together,” Lilandra said.

She turned to walk away, and I closed my eyes again.

War could wait. For now. . . I needed time to heal and enjoy the company of the lady whose lap I had my head on.