I couldn’t believe my eyes.

They were nephilim.

18

“MEAT,” THE FIRST ONE CROONED.

My mind went blank with terror. I had no magic with which to fight these creatures. And the last time I’d faced a nephilim, I’d died. I’d managed to come back, but it was a traumatizing experience nonetheless.

“Azazel loosed the nephilim?” Beezle said. “He’s totally lost it. He can’t control those monsters. No one can.”

“Meeeeeeat,” the second one said.

All of the nephilim had been locked up in the Forbidden Lands for centuries. The cages that bound them were magically enspelled so that when the nephilim touched the bars, they would be burned or shocked. The cages were just small enough that there was no place for the nephilim to go to find relief, no way to avoid the magic that bound the cage together. Essentially, the nephilim had been tortured for almost the entirety of their existence. It had made already cruel creatures even crueler, and rather single-minded.

“Meeeat,” they said together.

I pulled Lucifer’s sword from the scabbard.

“Do not even think about attempting it,” Gabriel hissed. “Let Samiel and me manage them.”

“I’m not helpless,” I said.

“You are doing an excellent impression of it,” he replied.

There was a clatter of leather and armor in the hall. I turned to see several soldier-angels filling the gap behind our party.

“Now it doesn’t matter,” I said grimly.

We were trapped at the end of the corridor with the nephilim above us and the soldiers behind us and only about ten or fifteen feet with which to maneuver. The tight quarters meant it would be difficult for Azazel’s troops to fight as well, but that wasn’t going to be much comfort when the nephilim tore our heads off.

J.B. and Samiel engaged the soldiers. Spells shot everywhere in the hallway, bouncing off walls and doorknobs.

Wade and Jude howled and bounded forward toward the nephilim. Gabriel cursed aloud and followed after them. I chased after him, alarmed. I knew that he didn’t want to throw spells that might accidentally harm the wolves, but what was he going to do without magic? Engage the nephilim in hand-to-hand combat?

The wolves reached the first nephilim. Jude leapt for the monster’s neck, jaws open. The nephilim swatted him aside with one giant hand, but Jude seemed to expect this. He went boneless and twisted in midair, landing on his paws.

Jude’s purpose had been to serve as a distraction for his alpha. Wade closed his fangs around the nephilim as the creature was absorbed with Jude. The nephilim screamed as Wade tore a giant chunk of flesh from its side.

Gabriel reached the first nephilim and blasted it in the face with white fire. The monster lashed out with its fists, blinded by the blast but not particularly hurt. Nephilim are very resilient, and every nephilim responds to the same magical spell differently. What is fatal to one can be nothing more than an itch to another.

The white fire that represented Gabriel’s nephilim magic had barely harmed this one, but Gabriel was already ducking underneath its elbows to go after the second creature.

Jude leapt into the fray again, latching onto the nephilim’s arm and clamping it between his jaws. The nephilim smashed him repeatedly against the wall to try to dislodge him, but the wolf held on.

Wade sprung into the air, slashing the monster across the face with his claws. It felt like it was intruding on the functioning of a well-oiled machine, but I figured the sooner the nephilim were brought down, the better.

“Wade!” I shouted.

The alpha seemed to understand immediately. He squeezed between the nephilim’s leg and the wall and moved on to help Gabriel. Jude released the creature’s arm as I raised the sword high and plunged it into the nephilim’s chest.

The monster screamed. Then, rather horribly, he just kind of…disintegrated. Blood and bone and muscle seemed to melt into long sticky strands that flowed over the steps and made my boots hard to lift. Jude whined and slipped around the mess to help Wade and Gabriel.

Beezle landed on my shoulder. “That is disgusting. That’s even grosser than the spider goop.”

“Like I needed you to rank the quality of monster fluid,” I said. I lifted my boots out of the muck and ran up the stairs as fast as I could, which was not very fast. The nephilim’s remains were hardening quickly and it was even more difficult to get through them as they changed consistency.

“J.B. and Samiel aren’t getting a break back there,” Beezle said. “For every soldier they kill, Azazel sends three more.”

I didn’t have to look to know that. I could tell by the unrelenting pitch of battle that things hadn’t eased up. “We’ve got to get rid of the other nephilim. Then we can help them.”

I reached the top of the stairs. Gabriel, Jude and Wade had managed to back the second nephilim into the hallway. This one wielded some kind of magic that looked like purple paintballs, but wherever it splattered, the walls were cut through as if by lasers.

“If that stuff touches any of them, it will take off their limbs,” I said to Beezle.

Worse, the nephilim seemed entirely unfazed by either the attacks of the wolves or Gabriel’s spells. Gabriel’s shoulders were set in grim determination, and both the wolves panted from the effort, but they were getting nowhere.

“I’ve got a plan,” Beezle said.

“Really,” I said, looking for an opening.

“Really,” Beezle insisted. He quickly outlined it to me.