Magic Trials (Half-Blood Academy #1)(49)

The minions stopped in their tracks, but kept their weapons up around me, ready to resume stabbing holes in my person as soon as their boss gave the go ahead.

The captain sniffed the air yet again, and his black horns twisted and hissed like snakes.

He creeped me out.

His goons followed suit and inhaled the air, too. Their pitiless eyes now rolled with astonishment and confusion.

“If she’s the one, our banishment will come to an end when we offer her to the great master,” the leader said, his black eyes swirling with foul darkness.

He spoke in a demonic tongue to his lackeys, yet I understood all of it, as if the evil language was etched in my bones and flowed in my blood.

A chilling panic filled my mind.

No one could understand the demonic language, not even the demigods, unless they were a demon. But I couldn’t be a demon, could I?

No demon could step through the wards of the Academy, yet I’d dwelled in the center of the school grounds with the Olympian girls. The Ritual of the Blood Runes would burn a demon to ashes, but— My breathed shortened.

The runes had burned me mercilessly, but I hadn’t turned into a pile of ash. Instead, I’d survived and gained power greater than any descendant’s.

Yet my fire didn’t seem to be from any of the twelve Olympian gods’ houses.

And now this sorry-ass, demon rogue band was taking an uncanny interest in me.

“Can she really be...the Lost Princess?” the red-horned demon asked with reverence.

No! Terror struck me. I couldn’t be a demon spawn, even though I had been lost on the street when Vi found me.

“There is this rumor in the Underworld that no one even dares to whisper...” murmured the gray-horned demon as he looked at me in a different light.

The demon captain snapped, sweeping them with a harsh look. “Say no more. I won’t lose my head because of you fools’ loose tongues.”

“We’re finally having good luck, right?” asked the red-horned demon hopefully. “I mean, she just fell into our laps like this? I’m sick and tired of being called a loser.”

“You three keep looking for the weapon,” the demon captain said sternly, his eyes roaming my every inch while he sniffed me again. “I’ll take the girl and get her ready.”

He’d drag me to the core of Hell.

I wheeled and swung my spear up toward his neck.

I realized that demons could take a lot of damage. It’d be a bad strategy to wound them here and there with small holes, an effort that would soon wear me down. The best strategy was to strike as hard as I could, weaken them, and then make my escape.

And now I had one advantage—the demons wanted to capture me instead of kill me.

The captain brought up his ax to parry, but I shifted my angle.

My spear sank into his throat.

He ducked, but not quickly enough—probably because he was daydreaming about me being his ticket to a better life.

My spear left a thin trail of oozing black blood around his neck.

He bellowed in rage, darkness twirling eerily inside his eyes.

“I’ll kill you if you prove more trouble than you’re worth, little girl,” he hissed.

“And we’ll bury the secret of killing the possible Lost One,” the green-horned demon echoed, totally onboard. I figured he hated me for stabbing him.

Three demons closed ranks, no longer worried that they might severely injury me.

The chainsaw cut into my back below my shoulder blade.

Screaming, I tore myself away from the jagged metal, sidestepped, booted the captain, and wheeled toward the red-horned demon.

The gruesome chainsaw dripped with my blood.

With a furious roar and a burst of strength, I tossed my spear toward the red-horned demon’s throat. I aimed true, and it pierced the demon’s neck.

He widened his eyes in disbelief before he dropped in a heap, his chainsaw flying from his hands. His red horns scratched the ground with a coarse scrape.

Before I could snatch his chainsaw or yank out the spear from his throat, the other demons charged.

Things didn’t look too hot for me.

Harsh, urgent flapping sounds beat into the wind. A vast shadow flitted over us, blotting out the sky.

Goddamnit! More demons were coming.

I dared not look up as I trained all my attention on the gang that was now determined to cut me to pieces.

I would jump on the wounded, green-horned demon next.

“A demigod!” shrieked the gray-eyed demon.

Had Axel or Zak tracked me down?

A sliver of hope rose in me. It would suck to return to the Academy, but it was better than going to Hell.

“We grab her and shift to our domain,” the demon captain barked. “One, two....”

They slammed into me.

I roared in dread, shoving them off.

As a claw sank into my skin, latching onto my arm, a wave of black wind and light tore the demons from me.

A demon’s razor-sharp claw slid through my hair and then dropped to the ground, cleaved from its hand by a long black blade.

A pair of mighty obsidian wings flung demons away from me.

A formidable, gorgeous warrior with the face of an angel descended from the sky above and planted himself in front of me, his sapphire eyes burning with dark, heavenly fire.





CHAPTER 14