Page 79 of Spirit Storm

The shadows in the cavern lurch toward her like dogs answering their mistress’ call. They pile onto the demon in dense, smothering layers, and the thing is consumed.

Rowan twists her arm free as the shadow-mass collapses inward, folding the demon back into the darkness it came from.

I spin and throw up a wall of blue spirit fire, blocking off access to the rune circle of the lockstone. The demon that had been going for it turns his attention to me. Fine with me. Bring it.

Orion is also in the thick of it. He thrusts his palm out, and a wave of ice blasts across the cavern floor, catching two demons mid-charge and encasing them from the knee down.

They thrash, but he’s already moving, reaching back and driving an ice spike through a third with the kind of force that definitely comes from his shifter side.

Then, his shift rolls through him, and his white-and-black striped tiger takes form. The tiger that hits the ground is enormous, twice the size anything natural has a right to be, and when it roars, the demons closest to it actually flinch.

Good. They should.

My opponent is still screaming and on fire when Asher materializes beside me in a crack of displaced air. His shaggy blond hair is wild, and he’s grinning like he is freaked out but refusing to show it. "I'm here, I'm here. Where do you want me?—Fucking hell. He’s here.”

I follow his gaze and curse as Tharuzel steps out of the far wall.

Not through the cracks like his minions, no. The wall simply parts for him, stone peeling back like stage curtains as he makes his grand entrance.

Ten feet of emaciated, blackened mass, the rune-script beneath his skin burning red-hot, the vertical mouth splitting open as the chorus of stolen voices hisses through the cavern in his upper body.

Every light dims. The turquoise from the lockstone gutters as his fingers reach for the carved circle.

"No." I'm already moving. I throw everything I have at the space between Tharuzel and the rune wall. Spirit energy rips out of me in a shockwave, silver-white and furious, and it hits him with the force of a battering ram.

He doesn’t even falter. He turns his head and presses his hand against the stone.

The turquoise light that poured from the lockstone rune stutters, dimming in pulses like a dying heartbeat. The carved circle that was flawless minutes ago now has a thin fracture at the bottom where the stone is crumbling.

No. This can’t be happening. Not again.

Wylder is at my shoulder, the earthy pulse of his magic rising, plant matter pushing up through the limestone floor. Vines thick as rope erupt from the cracks and coil around Tharuzel's ankles, his knees, heaving upward toward his waist.

Tharuzel tears through the first wave like it’s nothing more than a flimsy spiderweb, but the second catches, and the third.

"We need to keep him off the wall," Wylder grits out, sweat breaking out on his forehead.

Asher flanks left, both arms up, and the golden shimmer of his shield snaps into place in front of the lockstone. It holds the first pulse of Tharuzel's energy back. "I'll shield the wall. Someone figure out how to get rid of him.”

Yeah, that’s the big question, isn’t it? How do we fight a major demon without weapons? How can we possibly stop him?

“You can’t, little witch. And the sooner you accept that, the better it will be for the both of us.”

I shake my head as his voice echoes in my mind, pulling my mental shields up to keep him out of my head.

Spirit energy burns hot and powerful in me, and I drive it at Tharuzel in a sustained beam. It doesn’t force him back, but he doesn’t step forward either.

Wylder layers more vines, thicker, faster, rooting them through the cracks in the floor with everything he has.

Behind us, the battle is chaos and noise. Clara's water roars. Orion’s tiger snarls loud enough that it vibrates in my chest. Rowan's shadows hiss and swallow two more opponents. Khylie's voice rises in something that makes the demons nearest her stumble, confused and disoriented.

But no matter how hard we’re fighting, the stone of the rune circle is still crumbling.

"Wylder—"

"I see it."

Tharuzel lowers himself, and I watch as the scarlet script on his arms pulses, shifting like a living tapestry of horror.