Chapter 25: Chapter 25

Cutter was shocked when Sky told him she would actually be on the field herself. He couldn’t remember the last time she’d taken part in something like this, but once they reached Turkey, he was glad she was there. While he didn’t mind coordinating his small group, having twenty of her Keepers alongside his own team would make things more difficult if she wasn’t there to give instructions.

It was eerily quiet when he first arrived. However, the serenity didn’t last. A wave of Creepers crawled out of the nearby buildings, and he knew that would just be the advanced troops, the scouts, the expendable pawns. As soon as they’d handled them, which didn’t take much, there was a pregnant pause and then all Hell broke loose.

Kayakoy may have been abandoned for almost a hundred years, but thousands of structures still stood, and it seemed a Reaper or demon emerged from almost all of them. “Holy hell,” Cutter muttered, raising his eyebrows at Sky. In the darkness, it was difficult to see precisely what they were dealing with, but some of the demons took animal shapes, some were in human form, and others appeared as spirits. The Reapers, which had to number about a couple hundred easily, each carried a scythe.

“I’m gonna go ahead and call for some more back up,” she said, her eyes as wide as his were.

“Good idea,” Cutter replied. He looked down the street and saw Rider and Ivy, their backs to each other, their hands up. They looked just as surprised as he was, but prepared.

A demon in the shape of a large snake began to wind its way out of a building down the street headed for the church. Cutter didn’t wait for any orders. He sent a beam of light out of his palm in its direction. The beast, which had to be close to thirty feet long with dark scales, and now he could see, three faces, reared up all of its ugly heads and tried to fight against his blast, but it couldn’t escape, and Cutter spoke the incantation that would destroy it.

Before he could even relish in the small victory, another beast began an attack on the church, followed by two more, with three closing in on the other side. He could see Ivy’s vines spring out of her hands as the ground began to shake. Rider was also engaged, and Sky’s first line, the one that was supposed to be there as a perimeter, was forced to move in to hold them off.

Cutter chose a demon to concentrate on, one that was closest to the doorway of the church, but before he could do too much damage, he looked up to see four Reapers closing in, their scythes raised. Unlike any of the Reapers he’d ever pursued, these actually were made of bone, which was startling to him. It took him a moment to recover, and that split second was enough time for one of the Reapers to hit him with a wave of black energy. Cutter staggered backward and fought against it, managing to bring the light from his right hand around to cut through it. Two Keepers he didn’t know rushed in to help and within a few seconds, Cutter was winning and was able to blast the Reaper who had engaged him back at least twenty feet.

These Reapers seemed less powerful than the ones he spent most of his time chasing, and now that it was one-on-one, Cutter managed to get it in position so that he could say the words to destroy it. The Reaper disappeared in a puff of smoke.

Around him, Cutter saw Keepers of the Light flashing their power in streams of blue and white as masses of black charged in shapes and sizes he’d never encountered. The wind picked up as Keepers of the Wind created tornadoes and wind gusts to carry off screeching demons. Plants sprung up from otherwise dead and cracking ground, entangling Reapers as they closed in or tripping up the demons who sought to destroy them.

The reinforcements arrived quickly, and by the looks of it, Sky hadn’t pulled any stops. Hundreds of Keepers flooded the area behind him, and much to his surprise, Cutter saw the flicker of wings as well, their white feathers gleaming in the starlight. Sky was nearby engaged with a demon whose red scales covered all but the center of his face. He carried a pitchfork, and Cutter thought he must be a brown-noser wanting to impress his boss by looking as much like him as possible. “How’d you get the angels to show up?” Cutter shouted to her as he stepped in to fight off another Reaper.

“Ask and you shall receive,” Sky replied. The demon thrust his pitchfork at her, and Sky sidestepped, taking hold of the shaft and spinning it around until she had control of it. The demon held on, not wanting to lose his weapon, and she spun again, sliding her arms down the handle wide and wrapping them around him so that the shaft of the pitchfork was pressed against his neck. The demon strained to break free, his black eyes beginning to bulge. “Infernus et perdere faciam te in nomine Domini!” Sky shouted, and with a shriek the demon disappeared, leaving Sky swiping at air.

Cutter was able to dispatch his Reaper as well, but then, seeing that the enemy was managing to hold most of the Keepers away from the church while others attempted to sneak inside, he began to close the distance between himself and the building, hopeful that if anything managed to sneak inside, he would get to it before it could prevent Ru from doing her job. He knew Lyric was with her, but he’d feel better if he was there as well.

As he went, he fought off attacker after attacker, sometimes two at a time. A scythe came down hard on his shoulder at one point, but the blade didn’t catch him, and that Reaper was sent into the side of a nearby building, hitting hard enough to knock a hole in the plaster before Cutter sent him back to where he belonged. A gorilla-creature with horns and a spiky tail proved himself to be quite formidable, but Cutter finished him off with the help of Rider who was also headed toward the church door. While they could’ve leaped inside, it seemed more helpful to take out these demons the best they could on their way inside.

When Cutter reached the doorway, he checked to make sure no more demons or Reapers were closing in on their location and saw that most of them were still far enough away that the Keepers and angels would be able to hold them up, at least for a while. It seemed like the second one was destroyed, three more crawled out of the crevices. Even with the extra help, they’d need to hurry.

Rider stepped into the church first. Cutter backed in, assuming it was clear or Rider would’ve said so. “We good?” Cutter asked.

“Uh, yeah. Church is empty,” Rider answered.

“Good,” Cutter said, relieved they’d managed to keep all of the enemy out.

“No, I mean, it’s empty,” Rider said.

Cutter turned around to see that he was right. Not only were there no dark creatures scurrying about, Lyric and Ru were nowhere to be found.