Chapter Nine

"If I see the inside of one more Gods-forsaken church…" Malachi grumbles, nudging the toe of his boot at a crumbling bit of plaster as we pick our way through the third abandoned church we"ve checked. There aren"t many more to go. People don"t abandon their holy buildings often.

"Afraid you might be struck dead?" I tease, carefully combing through every room in the dilapidated building. I don"t think it"s been in use in this century. At least not by penitent parishioners anyway. Dirty needles, empty plastic baggies, and condom wrappers litter the sagging floors, making it clear that someone has been here. I don"t think they were looking for the Christian God, however. At least not through traditional means.

"I would be, if I believed in their God," Malachi retorts, his grin wide and cheeky. His blue eyes spark with mischief in the dim lighting.

An ungodly bang echoes through the somber stillness of the church, rattling the tarnished stained glass and sending a shower of dust particles swirling in the air. The echo reverberates off the cracked plaster walls before settling into an ominous hum.

Malachi"s massive body jolts as he spins around to face the direction of the sound, a startled yelp escaping his lips.

A low rumble of laughter bursts from my chest as I catch sight of Adriel standing nonchalantly beside the door he just slammed, unperturbed by the dust and debris floating around his head. His one black eye gleams with savage delight under his scarred brow.

"Did the big bad "church ghost" scare you?" he taunts Malachi.

I howl with laughter.

"Drit og dra. Both of you." Shit and leave—go to hell. Malachi flips us off without missing a beat. His tone holds no real venom, though, only good-natured annoyance.

"I have no fear of hell." Adriel strides forward, dust motes dancing around him like a veil of shadows. "But perhaps the priesthood would better suit you since you"re so afraid of it," he says to Malachi.

"Oh, I"m not afraid of hell," he taunts, his pointed gaze locked on Adriel. "I sit at dinner with it every night."

Adriel growls in response to the barb, though there"s no malice in the sound.

"And I sleep with an angel," I say, grinning.

They both groan, making me laugh.

"Jealous assholes."

"Maybe I will quit and go be a priest," Malachi mutters after a moment, nudging at a pile of used needles with his boot. "It has to be cleaner than this bullshit."

"Good luck with that," I respond dryly. "You wouldn"t last five minutes without cursing."

"And you wouldn"t last two minutes without stabbing something," he parries right back.

"You"re both idiots." Adriel shakes his head. "If God was up there, he"d cast the both of you out as soon as he set his eyes on your miserable faces. You"re hideous."

"Well, damn," Malachi says without heat. "Why don"t you tell us how you really feel?"

Adriel flashes him a lethal look, the corner of his mouth barely quirking up. "I"ve been telling you for millennia."

I eye him sideways, surprised at how calm he seems. It"s different. New. Usually, he"s cloaked in anger and steeped in rage. But today, he seems…lighter. As if he"s finally found a little sliver of peace.

Abigail. It has to be Abigail.

He"s barely left her side for the last few days. Neither has Damrion. The two of them still snipe and snarl, unable to get along. But spending so much time with her is healing pieces of him, pulling him back from the brink after millennia spent at war with himself.

It"s damn good to see. He"s been tormented and haunted long enough by what he endured in captivity. He deserves peace. If finally admitting to himself how he feels about the tiny Seer has brought him a measure of it, then good for him. I just hope his peace doesn"t come at the expense of Damrion"s.

Malachi opens his mouth as if to say something, but before he can, a deafening roar shakes the old stone church, the reverberating echo slicing through the calm like a double-edged sword. The pained cry that follows sends ice into my veins.

As one, we pivot and charge towards the disturbance.

We burst into the old nave to find a dozen Forsaken advancing down the aisle, their silhouettes etched in harsh relief against the stained glass and stone. Dark magic pulses from their hands, coiling tendrils contorting like snakes.

Their eyes burn with an unholy light as they advance toward us, each step echoing off the high-vaulted ceiling. Their gaze flickers over Garrison—who is crumbled and bleeding on the filthy floor—with dismissive disdain before settling on us.

"I guess we found the right church this time," Malachi says dryly. His umber skin glows under the dim light seeping through the discolored windowpanes, making him appear much like a deity about to roll up his sleeves and mete out a little divine retribution.

"Ja. I guess we did."

Adriel is all naked fury and lethal grace to my right, his pale skin stark against the backdrop of chaos. Savage intent brims from his solitary black eye. The scar marring his other eye seems to pulse in rhythm with his rage.

To my left stands Malachi, cool as an arctic breeze, a cheeky grin playing about his lips…as undeterred by looming death as ever.

I see the others in my peripheral, taking up positions around the room—Dax and Damrion to the right, Stephan and Daric to the left—but I keep my gaze fixated on the Forsaken.

They"ve trespassed on sacred ground where they have no right. They"ve threatened our people. Destroyed our home. They hurt my mate. For that, they will pay.

With a war cry born of raw fury and searing vengeance, I lunge at the Forsaken, my lystst?l spinning through the air in an arc of Light. It shears through the tendrils of polluted evil the Forsaken send spiraling in my direction, my fury too hot to be stopped.

Adriel is beside me, as wild and unpredictable as ever, like a raging sea crashing through the church. His savagery is a wall against which the Forsaken crash over and over again, unable to bring him down or slow him at all.

Malachi counters their onslaught with effortless grace and brutal strength. The grin never leaves his face as he toys with our enemies before executing them with brutal precision.

Dax moves as if he"s dancing—an artist painting death with his lystst?l. Each swing is a lethal stroke in his masterpiece, each kill another testament to his prowess.

Damrion fights alongside him, their movements in uncanny sync—two ancient warriors battling in perfect harmony. Damrion"s lystst?l slices through the air neatly, severing dark flows of magic with blurring speed while Dax ends lives without hesitation.

The rest hold their ground too, never allowing a single Forsaken to breach their defenses. Stephan"s piercing gray eyes ignite with primal hunger for battle; Daric"s gruff face remains impassive as he decimates our foes one by one.

All around us the screams of the dying and the scent of charred, burning flesh fill the air. But they"re not our screams. It"s not our flesh. And we"re not the ones dying.

The Forsaken start to falter, their collective strength waning under our relentless assault. Panic flares in their eyes as they attempt a futile retreat. They showed no mercy to my mate or the people in Eitr. I"ll show none to them.

The space around us is a whirlwind of blood and violence, screams and roars echoing against the stone walls. None of them will escape this sacred place alive. They never should have trespassed here to begin with. This may not be our holy place, but it is a holy place. Evil doesn"t belong here. We"ll root it out, smothering every last shadow.

When the last Forsaken stands, his back against the wall and his companions nothing but ash around him, Damrion calls a halt.

"Where is the Valkyrie?" he asks.

The Forsaken"s lips curl into a macabre grin, his eyes burning with an unholy light that makes my blood freeze. He staggers, weakened but still defiant. "You"ll find her when it"s too late." His voice is low and raspy as he spits the words out like venomous daggers.

Damrion"s face tightens, an inhuman growl rumbling through him. "Where is she?" he commands again. "You can tell me, or we"ll let the Valkyrie torture it out of your worthless mind."

Instead of answering, the Forsaken"s lips stretch further. His gaze never leaves our leader as he lifts his arm slowly. Black tendrils of magic curl around his wrists like serpents seeking prey, growing more ferocious with each passing second.

I heft my lystst?l, preparing to lob his miserable head from his body before he attacks. But I don"t even get that far.

In a moment that seems frozen in time, the Forsaken plunges the malicious tendrils into his own chest. An agonized scream tears its way out of his throat as he begins to rip himself apart. His form rapidly deteriorates under the onslaught of his own magic, flesh and bones consumed by the very power he wielded.

In seconds, there"s nothing left but blood and ash, a deafening silence pressing onto us heavily.

"Gods alive!" Malachi breathes, shuddering. "I"ve never seen one of them do that."

"Me either," Damrion says, his voice soft.

"I guess he didn"t feel like talking," Dax says, deadpan.

"Either that or he didn"t want the Valkyrie torturing him," Malachi mutters.

We fall silent again. The bastard"s warning lingers around us: We"ll find her when it"s too late. No one asks what he meant by that. The possibilities are too grim.

Garrison groans, pulling us from our dark, worrisome thoughts. Dax hurries across the cathedral to him, kneeling at his side.

"We need to go," he says, urgency in his voice. "He isn"t going to make it if we don"t get him help soon."

We spring into action, moving as one to save the fallen human warrior.

"Reaper!" Tori plows into me, nearly knocking me off my feet as soon as I cross the threshold of our room. "You"re back."

I scoop her off her feet, pulling her up against my chest. "Ja. Of course I"m back, little Valkyrie." My lips come down on hers in a hard kiss. "I told you; nothing is going to take me from you."

She sinks her hands into my hair, sighing sweetly against my lips. I know she hears me, but she still fears whatever she saw in her nightmare the first night she spent in my bed. It haunts her mind even now, plaguing her.

I"d take the fear from her if I could. But all I can do is this: return to her safely. Kiss the fear from her lips. Promise her that I"m safe.

"Did you find her?"

"Nei, we didn"t."

She sighs, a sad, worrisome sound.

I brush my hand through her hair, reluctant to tell her that Garrison was injured. We dropped him off at the hospital. His injuries were beyond the abilities of anywhere here but her, and she hasn"t been able to access her Light again since she healed me.

Had he died while she attempted to sort it out, she never would have forgiven herself. I won"t allow that. I guard her peace and her heart as much as her life. That"s my role as her mate—to protect and guard her in all things.

"You"re not telling me something," she says, tipping her head back to look at me. Gods. She"s perceptive, her instinct unerring. She sees right to the heart of things, far more clearly than someone her age should. She"s nineteen, barely in the full bloom of adulthood. Yet there"s a wisdom to her that"s as ancient as the stars.

How someone can be so wise and so innocent at the same time, I"ll never know, but the little Valkyrie standing in my arms is both at once. And both sides of her make my dick throb.

I love every part of her in equal measure—her sweetness and her innocence, her quiet strength and unerring wisdom, her grace and bravery, her shyness and her fierce loyalty. She is a Valkyrie in every way, her heart as pure as any that ever walked the Halls of Valhalla.

"We were attacked by Forsaken," I tell her, unable to lie. "Garrison was injured. He"s in the hospital."

"Oh no," she whispers, her face paling. "Is he–?"

"He"ll live, but it was close." I take a breath. "Too close."

Guilt flickers in her expression. "I should have been there."

"Nei. You were exactly where you should have been, solsken. Rissa and Abigail weren"t there either. That was by design. We won"t risk the three of you to recover another Valkyrie."

She worries her bottom lip between her teeth. "You might not have a choice."

"There"s always a choice."

A gentle smile tugs at her lips as she brushes her thumb across my bottom lip. "I love that you believe that," she whispers. "For someone who has lived as long as you have, you"ve never lost faith. I love that."

"I"ll never lose faith." I drag my teeth across the pad of her thumb, nipping. "Never, Valkyrie."

Her eyes darken with desire. An answering heat stirs in me, hardening my cock. I pull her toward the bathroom attached to our room, a new mission taking precedence—getting this little Valkyrie naked and on my cock.

I crave her. Need her. Ache for her.

"What are you doing?" she asks, curiosity burning in her gaze as I strip, dropping my clothes to the floor.

"If you must ask, I"m doing it wrong, hjartae mitt," I purr, prowling toward her to pull her into my arms. My lips descend on her neck, biting gently into her sensitive skin.

"You"re not doing it wrong," she gasps, melting into me as I reach for the hem of her shirt. "You"re definitely not doing it wrong, Reaper."

A smirk curls the corners of my mouth as I hoist her shirt over her head. Her bra follows suit, discarded to join the growing pile of clothing on the floor. My hands trace the familiar landscape of her body, making her shake and tremble. She"s a masterpiece beneath my fingertips—soft, innocent, yet burning with untapped power.

"Stand still, Valkyrie," I command.

She obediently tips her head back against my chest, as if to say, "Do your worst, Fae".

My hands start their journey again. Down to her waistband to unbutton and unzip her pants. She steps out of them, just as naked and vulnerable as she is beautiful. I touch her everywhere then, slowly driving us both mad.

Once she"s whimpering, unable to stand still, I adjust the shower until steam billows around us, quickly fogging up the entire bathroom.

"Into the watery realm we go, solsken," I murmur before lifting her into my arms.

Her laugh echoes in our bathroom—joyous and bright—while I carry my petite Valkyrie into the shower. Pressing her back against the wet tiles is an excuse to explore more. My hands travel down to her thighs, splitting them apart and bringing me to eye level with her pretty pink folds. Even here, she"s beautiful. Especially here, she"s beautiful.

I lift her leg over my shoulder, burying my face between her thighs. I savor the taste of her on my tongue, drinking in each gasp and moan that drops from her lips. Every tremor of pleasure that courses through her body ignites a fiery explosion within mine as well.

I devour her, kissing and licking everywhere like the greedy Fae I am. This Valkyrie consumes every thought in my head, driving me mad with lust. Every minute of the day, I ache for her.

Gods, I ache.

"Kyron," she moans. "Oh, Kyron."

There"s nothing sweeter than the way she says my name. In our bed, I"m not Reaper, harvester of souls. I"m Kyron, her mate, her lover, the other half of her soul. I"m addicted to that sound. I"m addicted to her.

Once she"s teetering on the edge of release, I rise like a storm sweeping ashore—powerful and unstoppable. She welcomes me between her thighs with a cry of ecstasy as I bury myself in her tight heat.

My thrusts are primal. Need consumes us like wildfire as water falls in sheets around us, unable to tamp this flame. Each strike of my cock pushes her higher, until she"s screaming my name.

She clings to me, lost in an ocean of intense pleasure as waves wrack her body, the orgasm ripping through her again and again. My knot lodges inside of her, locking me to her—mate to mate.

A growl rumbles in my chest as I bury my face in her neck, and let go, claiming her completely and irrevocably.

"Mine," I whisper against her skin, panting. "Mine."

"Yes," she whispers back, clinging to me. "Always, Reaper."