Seals (7 page)

“Magic beans?” Kara forced a laugh. “I’d go
for magic. Period.”

Kara didn’t want to jinx it by moving just
yet. The knight appeared to be contemplating what to do with them.
It radiated power like a thousand heat lamps, but it was an
overwhelmingly dark and evil power. Thousand-year-old intelligence
gleamed in its eyes. This creature hadn’t been created just three
days ago. It had been around for a
very
long time.

The earth and fields seemed to pulse with
its energy. The smell of rot and decay rolled off it, like a
million rotted corpses. Both the rider and its steed emitted a
green glow, like glowing toxic waste. Kara knew the knight
controlled the atmosphere somehow. She felt a tinge of electricity
prickling her wings and her skin. Abnormally low dark gray clouds
with black underbellies hovered over them. The giant could probably
touch them. The air was moist with the scent of rain and static.
The knight’s power permeated the air like the silence before an
electrical storm.

A wave of terror ripped through Kara as she
locked eyes with the knight. She felt its hold on her, paralyzing
her with only its eyes. It didn’t belong in this world. It was a
dead thing, an evil thing that shouldn’t be.

She did her best not to show any fear as she
ransacked her mind for a plan. How to destroy this thing? Where was
its weakness? She knew that this knight was Famine, and because
their rings were still intact, she knew it hadn’t broken the seal.
Not yet. She took courage from that. Now, how to destroy it?

David leaned over and whispered. “Why isn’t
it moving?”

“I’m not sure,” Kara whispered back, but she
was certain that for whatever reason it
was
waiting, it
could only be a very
bad
one.

“Maybe it’s waiting for us to make the first
move. But that would be stupid since I doubt our weapons would even
make a scratch.”

“It smells like a demon,” David held his
nose. “Maybe it dies like a demon.”

“This is no mere demon.”

A cold rage spread across Kara’s face. “It
feels…different…more powerful and evil. So how do we kill it?”

“I guess we’re about to find out.”

Kara clenched her jaw. She
would
find
a way to destroy it. She had to—

“You cannot destroy me,” boomed a voice that
sounded like the mountains themselves were speaking.

Kara stiffened, but she planted her
feet.

“Go back now, angels. Go back to the comfort
and delights of your realm or you will perish along with this
mortal world and everything in it.”

A cold smile spread across Kara’s lips. She
raised her voice.

“We’re not going anywhere. It is
you
that should leave, not us. We are the sworn protectors of the
mortal world. We are the soldiers who drive the darkness out from
this world. This world is only for the living. You have no claim
here. Leave or face your doom.”

The knight’s red eyes shone like burning
coal.

“I have already unleashed my curse upon this
earth. You cannot stop the affliction. Mere angels do not possess
the power to control my destruction. It will spread until all of
this planet’s natural resources are consumed. My plague spreads as
fast and silently as the wind. It will corrupt and infect
everything. The earth is already dying. You are too late.”

The earth rumbled beneath Kara’s feet, and
she had the strangest suspicion that the knight had just laughed.
It was mocking them. She suppressed a shiver.

“We’re
not
too late.” Kara knew that
the rings were all still intact.

“We’re going to send you back to whatever
dimension you came from. And then the earth will heal itself.
That’s what she does. You might have destroyed some of the crops
here in China, but they’ll grow back, they always do. Life finds a
way. It’s obvious you don’t know anything about this world because
it always fights back.”

The knight lowered its head, and the horns
on his helmet made it look like a great bull ready to charge.

“You speak with such conviction, angel, but
you know nothing about the end of days. My curse is upon your
mortal world whether you’d like to admit it or not. The mortals
will starve. It has already begun, and you are fools if you think
you can stop me. In the end you will become like beasts and eat the
flesh of other mortals.”

“Okay, did he just say that we will become
cannibals?” David’s face was twisted in disgust.

“He did.” Peter’s eyes darkened. “Don’t
believe it. It’s lying. It’s trying to discourage us…to make us
believe that mortals are merely animals and not worth fighting for.
It wants us to let it finish what it started.”

“That’s not going to happen!”

Jenny looked up at the knight fiercely.
“We’ve sworn an oath to protect the mortal world, which is what
we’re going to do. I don’t care how scary you look. We’re going to
stop you.”

The knight leaned back.

“Accept the inevitable. Five angels cannot
stop the knights of the apocalypse. You are weak and connected to
this world. You care about these mortals. You love them, and that
will be your downfall. The power of the archfiends is limitless.
Mere angels could never understand. My words would not be
sufficient. To understand their power, you’d have to be gods
yourselves.”

“You’re delusional,” spat David. “The
archfiends are not gods. They’re just a bunch of god-botherers.
You’re all insane because you’ve been locked up for so long.”

He leaned over and whispered in Kara’s ear.
“What are we doing here? We can’t keep chatting forever.”

“For now we have to,” whispered Kara. “If we
can keep it busy long enough, keep it talking, we might be able to
distract
it from its job, and it’ll miss its chance to break
the seal.”

“But we don’t even know
how
they
break the seals.”

“I think it has to do with how much they
spread their plagues in seven days. They probably need a
percentage. A certain percentage of the entire world has to succumb
before the seal will break. Somehow we need to stop them from
reaching that goal.”

“I think we should kill it, just in
case.”

Kara nodded. True, if the knight were
destroyed, then they’d be ahead of the game. The trouble was she
wasn’t sure
how
to kill it.

She returned her gaze to the creature.

“The mortals have enough gods as it is,” she
said, keeping their conversation going. “They don’t need anymore,
especially ones that want to harm them. I don’t think that’ll sit
very well.”

The knight sneered. “It makes no difference.
Those who will not worship the dark gods do not deserve to live.
Non-believers will die whether they are mortal or not.”

“I’m pretty sure they’d disagree with you,”
said Kara, not fully understanding what other creatures it was
referring to.

“Mortals have the right to worship any god
they want. It’s part of being human, to have a soul, to have an
open mind and do what feels right. Who are you to decide who lives
and dies?”

“The dark gods decide. They are the true
gods, and they wield the power over all things.”

Although the knight was terrifying, Kara was
starting to get annoyed with all the talk of dark gods.

“That’s a load of bull, and you know it,”
said David. He gave the creature a withering glare.

The knight eyed the group for a moment. “The
time of angels and mortals is over. The dark gods have returned.
Join us or die.”

“We will never join you,” spat Kara.

She was surprised at how much she trembled
in rage. How dare this creature threaten her, threaten the angels
and mortals, or threaten this beautiful planet. She hated its
arrogant voice, so sure that it had already won. But it hadn’t. The
rings were proof. There was still time.

The knight cocked its head, and its thin,
withered mouth stretched disgustingly into a sneer. “And yet some
of you have already joined.”

Kara fumed. She didn’t like the way it had
said
you
, as though some angels had already sided with the
archfiends. No. It was lying to her.

“Your words are like poison,” Kara said
harshly. “But say what you want, it doesn’t matter because we’re
the antidote, the cure for your plagues. We’re going to fight you,
and we’re going to win.”

“You think you can destroy me?” laughed the
knight. “Five miserable little angels in soft angel shells? Are you
ready to die your final death for this world? Your beloved legion
has sent you on a fool’s errand. They knew you couldn’t defeat us,
and still they sent you. Why is that? Do they think you are so
insignificant that they are willing to sacrifice you? This is your
death sentence, little ones. Why do you fight alongside a legion
that cares so little for your fate?”

Kara took a step closer to it, enough to
smell its foul breath. “Shut your stupid mouth, or I’ll punch your
teeth down your throat and shut it for you.”

The knight revealed its teeth. “Your threats
are empty and meaningless.”

“You know nothing about us,” said Kara.

The knight stared at her blankly. “I have
known multitudes before you. I am a creature forged long before the
time of angels. You cannot defeat me with your weapons. And when I
kill you, because I
will
exterminate all of you, I will
savor the moment I take your pitiful life-force because I will know
how foolishly you have thrown your lives away—for a war you could
never win.”

The knight’s horse whinnied loudly, as
though it were agreeing with its master or laughing at them. It
shook its head and splattered yellow and black ooze all over the
ground. Despite its frail and withered body, its eyes were full of
vigor. If it weren’t some end-of-the-world horse, Kara would have
felt sorry for it and would have fed it some hay.

“We’ll see about that,” murmured David.

He leaned over and whispered in Kara’s ear.
“If you have any great ideas about how we’re supposed to defeat
this thing—now’s the time.”

Kara looked at David. She wanted to tell him
that she had some great plan, but the truth was she didn’t. She had
no idea how to defeat this thing. Her new wings felt small and
pathetic in comparison. And for the first time, she felt completely
helpless.

“Kara?” she heard Jenny whisper behind
her.

But she had nothing to give. She didn’t have
her elemental power anymore—the one thing that could have made a
real difference—and she felt overwhelmed by the weight of this
burden.

She looked up and glared at the creature’s
red eyes anyway.

“This is your final warning,
Famine
.
Yes, we know who you are. Go back to whatever world you came from,
or we
will
destroy you. Whatever it takes, we’re
going
to defeat you. I swear it.”

Kara had no idea where she found the courage
to speak to the knight like this. This was no ordinary foe. She
wondered if the knights were somehow like the reapers, if their
life force was linked to their weapons. If this creatures had been
created by the archfiends, just like the reapers, perhaps she could
she kill it if she disarmed it somehow. It seemed too easy. But
what else could she do?

The earth shook below Kara’s feet and broke
her train of thought.

“The dark gods have risen once more,” said
the knight. “In four days and four nights, the earth will die. It
will burn. And you will die with it.”

Kara took a step forward, straining to hide
her fear.

“This world does not belong to them or to
you. It belongs to the mortals!”

The earth trembled again.

“So be it.”

Just as Kara was about to yell some more,
the knight raised its sword above its head. Black lightning danced
on the blade, and thunder cracked. The steed neighed loudly, and
black spit oozed between its sharp teeth. Kara felt a cold shiver
roll down her back.

The knight grinned, and pointed its sword at
them. And before she could react, before she could even blink—black
tendrils shot out at each of them—all but
her
.

Her friends were encircled by the black
vines. The coils of darkness tightened, and Ashley screamed as the
black shadows cut into her angel flesh. Then Jenny, Peter and David
howled in pain as wisps of black mist looped around them. And then
something horrible happened.

They all began to wither.

Like the dead animals in the valley, their
faces wrinkled, stretched, and shrunk down as though their M-5
suits had been drained of their lifeblood. They looked like
hundred-year-old corpses. Their eyes lost their brilliance and
became hollow, gray and glazed. Famine was draining their life
force in the same way it had drained the earth of its natural
resources.

“NO!”

Kara cried out. She didn’t have time to
ponder why the knight had spared her. She only had time to
react.

Grasping her blade firmly, she stroked hard
with her wings and charged at the beastly knight, aiming for its
eyes. She would gouge them out.

The knight raised his other arm lazily and
pointed a finger at Kara. A fist of shadows crunched into her
chest, caught her in midair and spun her around. It squeezed her
wings and arms together until she was cocooned in a web of black
shadows. She dropped to the ground like a rock. She strained with
all her strength, kicking and screaming. But she couldn’t break the
hold.

“Stop! I’ll kill you. I’ll kill you!” she
cried.

She raised her head to look up at the
knight. Her malice poured through her. She knew that the creature
was going to kill them, and she knew that she wasn’t strong enough
to stop it.

Helpless, she watched in horror as her
friends began to die.

Chapter
6