The Lure of the Devil (The Demons' Muse #4) - Auryn Hadley Page 0,179

a few things in the battle on Vesdar. He was no longer treating Sia as a joke. Instead, he was fighting her the same way every other angel fought Satan: as if one mistake would cost him his consciousness.

"Just fucking stop already," Sia snapped.

Gabriel's hand darted out to grab a handful of her hair, and he pulled, hard. "You are becoming a serious pain in my ass," he told her.

So she shoved her hand against his jaw, forcing his face up even as she sucked his life away. "Leave. Earth. Alone."

"Soon as we have our slaves, we will!" Gabriel snarled.

"When you kill them all, you’ll still be short of aether."

Gabriel grabbed her wrist and shook her hard, even as he pulled his own aether from the air between them. "That's not how it works. You, Muse, have taught us a few things. We no longer need you to paint those pretty little gates for us."

I managed to break another angel, dropping his body to the ground to get it out of my way, and someone started banging at the door. It wasn't like we were being quiet in here, but all of us knew that this fight could not leave this room. If we wanted to keep humans insulated from the horrors of what we could do to them, we had to make sure that door stayed locked.

"Ron," I ordered, "reinforce the door. No one gets in. Not even if they break it down."

"Already on it," he assured me.

Then I grabbed another man by the throat and slammed him against the wall the same way I had Stieviel. Okay, maybe I put a little extra force into it. I heard the crunch that proved I’d definitely broken him, and the angel's human body went limp. But as I turned for the next, I saw Gabriel shove. Sia ducked and twisted, planting her feet to hold herself in place, but that hadn’t been the normal type of push.

"Don't cross the veil," I yelled at her.

But it didn't do any good. Sia had been born human. Her body only had human strength, and while her ability to manipulate aether was the strongest we'd ever seen, she stood no chance against Gabriel's muscles. The archangel jerked her sideways, forcing her to lose her balance, and in slow motion, I watched it.

Using all of his force, and adding a little extra aether to increase it, Gabriel pushed Sia the same way she'd pushed so many angels before. It didn't matter that he couldn't reach the aether inside her. This time, he was manipulating her actual body. I saw the shock take over her face just as she slipped off this plane, her arms reaching out for something to hold her in place - but it didn't work. In that one motion, she was gone, and I had no clue where he'd sent her.

"That's my woman," I roared as I stormed over, intending to add him to the growing pile of bodies in this room. "Do not ever touch my woman!"

Without hesitation, Gabriel threw a sprite directly into my face. I grabbed the thing, feeling the skin of my hands start to burn at the contact, then pulled it apart the same way I had the angels before it. My feet, however, didn't slow.

"Drain them!" Gabriel yelled as he took that one, single step back.

Just as my hands were in range to grab him, he was gone. Unfortunately, at least four more angels stepped in to fill the gap. I grabbed one and threw him into the others, giving myself a little room to work. Turning back around to Ron and Sam, I tried to find another to toss away, but they clearly had it handled. The problem was that they didn't realize Sia was gone. They hadn't seen her be pushed off this plane.

"We have to go," I ordered.

Sam shoved his aether blade through the guy before him and looked up. "The corridor’s probably full of angels. We can't get out that way."

I swung behind me when I felt a breeze, hoping to keep the cannon fodder from closing in. "Sia's gone. Gabriel pushed her."

"Fuck," Ron snapped. "And these guys just aren't stopping."

Well, this was the very thing I was good at. Using my mass, I waded through the desperately fighting angels, aiming for Ron's side. When I was almost there, I called over to Sam, "Slip and push. Do not hesitate. It's time to go."

"Can do," Sam assured me. "I'll be right behind