Nero was already running after the assailants. Leaving the witches, I pushed through a side door and followed him into the underbelly of the airship. Dull, blinking lights illuminated our path down a very industrial-looking corridor. We passed exposed pipes screwed to the ceiling, and cables spilling out of holes in the walls.
The dark corridor ended in a storage bay. Six people dressed in black—plus Pyralis Carver and the shapeshifter dressed in the witch style—stood in a solid line blocking our path. As we ran through the door, thick steam shot out from either side of the frame, enveloping us. It burned my skin everywhere it touched. And in my current outfit, it touched a lot of places. I closed my eyes to shield them. Supernatural senses were a two-edged sword. Being ultra-sensitive wasn’t always a good thing, particularly when flesh-burning gas was involved.
A shock wave of air shot out from beside me, blasting the gas away. The burning sensation on my skin faded, and I opened my eyes. Nero stood with his hands extended in front of him, the distinctive pale blue glow of air magic sparkling on his fingers. He was blinking hard, obviously trying to clear his vision. His senses were even more developed than mine—and even more sensitive. I tried to take a step forward, but my leg wouldn’t move.
“It didn’t work,” said one of the women in black.
Pyralis Carver frowned. He pressed a button on the small remote in his hand. Steam billowed out of the doorframe, smothering us in that vile poison a second time. The burn was stronger this time, piling pain onto the first dose.
“They’re supposed to be dead,” the woman growled at him, gold light flashing across her brown irises. She was a shifter.
“A minor miscalculation.”
“We’re sick and tired of your ‘minor miscalculations’.” The woman looked at the men and women who’d clustered around her like she was their leader. They nodded, their eyes burning with that same gold light of shifter magic.
“If it were so easy to poison Legion soldiers, someone would have done it already,” Carver said.
“You said you could do it.”
“Enough.” Nero’s voice was hard, the golden gleam in his eyes rivaling their own. His hand shot up, and a psychic wave blasted the seven shifters and one witch across the room. Their backs slammed against the wall, where they remained stuck. “What are you doing on this ship?”
The panel beneath Nero’s feet exploded, dousing him in a green liquid that immediately burst into flames. He waved his hands calmly, but the fire didn’t go out. A savage growl born of agony and fury bellowed out of him. I tore against the spell holding me frozen, trying to free myself. I might as well have tried to move the sun for all the good it did me. I was stuck. All I could do was watch in horror.
As Nero battled against the fire consuming him, the magic holding the shifters weakened. His prisoners dropped from the wall. One of them, a young man with a shaved head and a dark goatee, lifted his gun. He didn’t look like he trusted the fire to handle an angel. He was going to shoot Nero himself.
I couldn’t let that happen. I continued to fight the spell holding me. There had to be a way out of this. Nero had broken the spell. How?
Stop fighting, stop pushing. Don’t try to break the magic holding you, Nero’s voice said in my head. Let yourself fall through the spell.
Any other time, I might have questioned the voice—and my sanity—but I was out of options and had no time to question anything. So I listened. I stopped fighting. I let go and let myself fall. I could feel the spell shatter all around me, its grip on me broken. I stumbled forward, quickly turning that stumble into a single-minded dash toward Nero. I had to help him.
I didn’t know how I was going to put out the fire on him. I had this odd feeling that if I could just touch him, everything would be fine. I jumped at him, throwing my arms around him. A gun went off, but the bullet sliced past us. And the moment Nero and I collided, the flames died. He stepped back, catching our fall before we hit the floor.
“Are you all right?” I asked, lifting my hand to his cheek. The skin was red and hot to the touch, but the fire hadn’t scorched him like it should have. He must have used magic to protect his body from the heat.
“Fine.” He glanced down at his arms. The flames had burned off his shirt sleeves to the elbows, and the exposed skin was freckled with blisters. Apparently, his magic hadn’t protected him completely. If that fire had gone on any longer, it might have actually killed him.
“How did you do that?” Carver demanded, his dark eyes glaring at me. “You shouldn’t have been able to do that!”
I didn’t have a clue how I’d put out the fire on Nero, but I wasn’t going to tell the witch that. I smirked at him instead.
“Another failed spell, witch?” the pack leader said.
“What does it take to kill them?” commented the woman beside her.
“A bullet in the head,” the goatee guy said, lifting his gun to shoot at us again.
Nero’s eyes flashed gold, then melted to silver. He lifted his hand, flicking the shifter’s gun away with a crack of psychic magic. A second blast glued them all to the wall again.
“Let’s try this again,” Nero said, striding up to them, every step dripping with pure menace. “What are you doing on this ship?”
“Screw you,” Mr. Goatee spat out.
A psychic wave shot out of Nero, slamming the shifter’s head against the wall. Nero watched him cooly, even as blood dribbled down the wall in crimson streams.