29. WEN

My heart slams back into my spine with fright as Godric hurtles across the expansive space.

He crashes inches away from squashing one of Azazel’s pinned Cadre like a bug, his impact an explosion spreading fissures like malignant vines throughout the wall.

Without a moment’s recovery, Godric shoots back towards Azazel like a comet, his wings now masses of rune-emblazoned obsidian lightning. A sonic boom thunders in his wake as he knocks him down with a cyclone roundhouse kick. The fallen angel slams to the ground, cracking it and his now skinless, pocked face.

A cheering shout is barely a thought when Azazel is back up and lunging at Godric’s head, his mouth twice its size, snapping rows of razor-sharp teeth.

Godric evades him in the same movement he delivers a barrage of Melek blows, followed by another of those whirling kicks that could pulverize a mountain. It swats Azazel away like a gigantic insect against one of the archangels’ statues. The colossus detonates and crashes over Azazel, burying him in boulders.

Godric somersaults in the air, landing over the rubble, knocking it out of the way, and dragging Azazel out by one of his now jagged wings. Azazel twists in his hold and rams him in the chest with a salvo of tar-like sludge.

Godric frowns, his gaze dimming as his hand snaps to his tattoo, where that weird goo seems to be seeping.

He stumbles back as the blazing rune in its middle rises to the surface and flickers, as if about to blink out. Suddenly looking frantic, Godric claws at it, as if trying to pull it out of his flesh.

“What’s happening to him?” I scream as Azazel rises before him.

Before anyone can answer, Azazel opens his maw, and spews a swarm of slimy, rodent-sized worms. They slam into Godric with the force of a tidal wave, their torrent thwacking him back across the chamber, plastering him against the feet of Azrael’s colossus.

With a roar that slices my heartstrings, he tears them off with one hand, the other still convulsing over the flickering rune.

But they’re unending, and seem to be sinking into his flesh. His moves are slowing down, as if they’re injecting him with their master’s evil, or sucking out his Energy, or worse.

I turn on the others, roaring, “Help him, you bastards!”

Lorcan grimaces. “We can’t.”

Gideon waves me off. “And we shouldn’t. He’ll get up any second now, and kick that fallen’s ass, don’t worry.”

“What if you’re wrong?” I scream.

Godric himself once told me he was more powerful than Azazel. But that bastard could have let him believe that, wouldn’t face him in a battle until he had everything to gain. Like now. And if that’s true, he won’t only defeat Godric, he will kill him.

Azazel is now towering over him like every nightmare humankind ever had come to life. This entity that was born of light and chose to imbue himself with all that’s dark and vile. His wings are now masses of flaming soot as he brings down a fist half the size of Godric, and smashes it down on him.

The sickening sound of steel bones fracturing reverberates in my marrow, the agony of it tearing through my nerves.

“Why isn’t Godric manifesting his sword?” I scream, my sanity burning away in the blaze of Godric’s pain. “Why isn’t he using any of his nine Graces?”

“This is a fight without the benefit of powers,” Lorcan shouts back, agitated now, eyes blazing. “It’s the Rule of Duellum.”

I shred my throat on sheer panic and outrage. “Azazel has done nothing but use his powers since he turned into that monstrosity!”

Lorcan nods, shakes his head, his face twisting as Godric’s roars get louder. “Godric must have thought he could still beat him without breaking the rules himself …”

“He should win no matter what Azazel does,” Gideon growls, starting to look worried, too. “That bloody bastard is unbeatable, and the best I hoped for, was Azazel breaking a few bones, and messing up his legendary face long enough for me to take photos. But Godric’s actually losing. Azazel must be tampering with his mind.”

“There’s no way Azazel could get past Godric’s psychic defenses!” Lorcan shouts.

“In Godric’s current condition, he could.” We all swing around at Astaroth’s calm declaration. “Azazel’s evil feeds on passions and weaknesses, amplifying his preys’ own to cripple them. Godric doesn’t seem to be recovered from whatever had him disoriented when he first arrived. Add this to his constant efforts to keep you protected, Cadet White, and we have the perfect medium for Azazel’s powers to work on him.”

It’s only then I realize I must be within Godric’s forcefield again. Otherwise, I would have detonated from the inside out with the shockwave of that first blow.

He’s been protecting me all this time. Like he had during his first clash with Azazel, which had also been on my account.

But that forcefield isn’t as large as it used to be. The others are only within arm’s reach. If it’s shrinking, Godric must be unable to maintain it, and it’s draining him. I’m weakening him, and giving that monster the opening he needs to overpower him.

No. I won’t let him get hurt any more because of me.

“Get me close to that piece of shit!” I screech. “I’ll yank the living Heaven out of him! I’ll kill him!”

Lorcan looks pained as he shakes his head. “If we interfere now, Azazel wins by default.”

“I don’t care! I only care that we save Godric.”

“He won’t kill him, even if he can, which he can’t. He just needs to defeat him. Which he will, if we interfere.”

Feeling my head about to explode with fear and futility, I turn frenzied eyes between him and Gideon. “Can you make forcefields?”

Lorcan nods. “I can, but if protecting you from the fallout of the fight is distracting Godric, Gideon should just fly you out of here. As a witness, I have to stay till the end.”

“I’m not leaving! Godric only needs to know I’m safe.”

“As long as you’re around he’ll keep trying to protect you, and if Astaroth is right, he will lose because of it.”

As Gideon advances on me, I yell, “Touch that forcefield and I put you in a coma.” I turn to Lorcan and scream, “Just do it!”

Compressing his lips, Lorcan’s eyes and hands flare with a tawny fire. The flames snap around me, morphing into a bubble of golden energy.

“Let your shield go, Godric!” I scream, my shrillness slicing through the cacophony of Azazel’s manifestations. “I’m safe! Fight back! Pulverize that bastard for me!”

For long moments, nothing happens. Azazel is still battering Godric. Godric who’s no longer roaring.

I lose my mind with every blow Azazel lands. No matter what Lorcan thinks, not even Godric can withstand the unrelenting savagery and evil of a fallen angel. At least, not in his condition.

Only our connection is left, the connection that has to be there—is there. It almost undid me when it was interrupted. And even while it was, he heard me, wherever he was, and whatever was happening to him, when I screamed for him.

He will hear me now.

Please, Godric, please—hear me, listen to me. Stop trying to protect me. I’m safe. You know I never lie to you. You can drop your shield now. Just take care of yourself. Just win. Win for me. For us.

Moments drag like blades across my nerves, feel as agonizing as the seeming endlessness of his absence.

He heard me. I know it. He had to.

A second before I give up, and hurtle on a suicide mission to kill Azazel and die doing it, Godric rises to his feet.

Still covered in those atrocious critters, he spreads his arms as the rune within his tattoo starts glowing a terrible emerald. My emerald. It snaps and spreads all over him, and suddenly the chamber is filled with their screeching. Then they’re being expelled from his flesh in a million snot-like filaments, before bursting into ashes that smell of putrid vice and depravity.

Shooting in the air before Azazel brings down his fist again, Godric hovers high above, still glowing. The horrific welts and craters all over his upper body and arms start to knit. He twists his neck, stretches his back and limbs, roaring one more time, and horrifying cracks issue from his bones as they reset and snap back in place.

Azazel shoots up to ram into him, but Godric dives down, and crashes into him fists first. Azazel slams to the ground, and the rest of the colossi start to crumble.

Godric lands before him, as if he has all the time in the world. He reaches at his side, and draws that massive sword of his, out of nowhere. It’s also flaming emerald now.

As Azazel staggers to his feet, Godric looks up into the gaping pits of his eyes with those horrifying horizontal, white pupils, and points at him with the tip of the sword. “Cadet White requested that I pulverize you. I’m about to oblige her.”

With a cackle that raises every hair on my body, Azazel charges him, bringing his enormous fist down. Godric shoots up, swinging the sword. The monstrous appendage slams wetly to the ground, gushing golden ichor.

Azazel screeches and rumbles at the same time, a sound originating somewhere far worse than Hell.

Godric’s lips lift in a fond twist, as if it’s the most sublime music. He swings the sword again, and takes off the rest of the arm. It’s as big as he is, and he kicks it to the side like a twig.

Again and again, Azazel rises, comes at Godric, using all of his nightmarish powers. This time, Godric evades them, and smashes him down, each time with more force.

This goes on for what feels like an hour. I get the feeling that Godric is prolonging this, could have knocked him out long ago. He’s like a great feline toying with his prey, seeming to enjoy it immensely.

I know I am. It’s amazing watching him in torturer mode. It’s also a valuable learning experience. I’m taking notes for future implementation for sure.

The last time he knocks him down, Azazel doesn’t get up, lying there like a tattered pile of skinned flesh, swathed in those ragged wings of flaming soot.

Godric prowls towards him like the god of destruction that he is, runes blazing all over him, stamping the last of his wounds out, scorching their infection away and sealing their disfigurement.

Without moving his wings, he levitates above Azazel’s monstrous form and contemplates him, as if pondering which part of him to take off next.

His eyes glow and his lips tug, at what looks like a great idea. Then he descends, as if under the effect of a hundred G-forces.

He crashes into his torso, driving one of his boots deep into his chest. Just like Azazel did to Jinny.

As Azazel roars in agony and affront, Godric moves the tip of his blazing sword slowly from his groin, where that chainsaw dick is hanging out, up to his rotten-roots neck.

“Yield, fallen,” Godric rumbles, sounding like vengeance incarnate.

“I invoke the archangels!” Azazel roars, his shark-like mouth distorting and dribbling tar-like acid that bubbles and sizzles.

“That won’t work this time.” Godric cracks a scary laugh. “You’ve gone soft, old man. You’re so used to using others’ weaknesses against them, you no longer remember what it is to win a fight without cheating. A word of advice for your useless eternity; you should get back in shape, get some training in. Letting your fanatics do all the work is doing you no favors. Now, yield.”

Azazel shrinks back to his original form, but he’s in as bad a condition as his monstrous one.

He remains staring at Godric in a silent battle of wills, and the ferocity of his hatred almost knocks me off my feet. There’s no doubt Godric has indeed ignited that internal war.

Knowing it, and that nothing he does now can make it worse, he grinds his boot deeper into Azazel’s chest.

Pale lips drawing back in suffering, the fallen angel gasps, “I yield.”

Godric takes his time removing his boot, squelching in Azazel’s organs and fluids.

As soon as the intrusion is gone, Azazel’s severed arm begins to regrow, and his flesh and bones reform before my stunned eyes.

Seems that the demon who once told me angels can regrow anything was right. Apart from wings, according to Godric. I would have still loved for him to chop off that chainsaw dick. And make sure it didn’t grow back.

The fallen angel rises, body and wings drenched in ichor. With a last look at all of us, promising untold mayhem, he shoots up through the destroyed ceiling, with his battered army in tow.

The moment they disappear, I’m running.

Then I’m hurling myself at Godric, doing what I’ve been starving for. I jump him, wrap myself around him, arms, legs and being.

He stands there, not even breathing, hands clenched by his sides.

“Hug me back, you semi-Celestial lug,” I sob and hiccup, squeezing him with all I have. “Hug. Me. Back.”

He does nothing but let me mash myself against him.

Before I do something insane, like crack my head ramming it into his jaw, or dry hump him in front of everyone to get him to do something besides simulate a statue, he starts to withdraw.

I wind myself around him harder, burrow my head into the warmth and vitality, the necessity of his flesh and whisper, “Don’t let me go, Godric. Take me home, please.”

Just as I think he’ll stand there until I give up and climb off him, he shoots through the air like a missile.