"You can't do this, Hope. I won't let you." Freya gripped Hope's arm with such force she could feel pin-point pressure through the leather of her jacket.
Hope's voice shook as she gripped her arm in return. "I have to. I'm the only one who can, you know this," tears stung her reddened eyes as she said, "You have to let me go."
With a trembling lip, Freya swallowed and slowly let go of her arm just as a blast of energy rocked the night sky. They looked up as shards of glimmering glass rain from the buildings, reflecting off the hellfire that enveloped the streets of the French Quarter.
"They're here." Freya blinked tears away and looked at Hope, her brows pulled together in a warrior's scowl. "Go, I'll hold them off the best that I can. GO!"
Hope grinned a blood-stained smile and squeezed her wrist one last time.
"I'll see you on the other side."
With a mad dash, Hope took off at a full sprint. She launched herself over debris- stalled cars and fallen lamp posts. Careful so as not to touch down on the live wires that littered the streets.
A person, or what used to be a person, was laid across the center of the road. Their skin was charred from electrocution, mouth gaping in an endless pit with their teeth still intact. Hope swallowed back the bile that rose in her throat and charged on, ignoring the agonized screams as she raced against time.
Don't stop.
Don't stop.
Don't stop.
Hope nearly slammed into the first grave in Lafayette cemetery but managed to twist her body around the turn and continue in her hungry sprint.
A dark mass slammed into her from the side, sending her crashing into one of the standing stones. The engraving was demolished as Hope kicked against fur and muscle, the hellhound's massive canines snapping at her face.
Settling her feet under its belly, she kicked hard, forcing it to smash into the opposite wall. The hellfire flickered in its eyes, but she didn't have time to ensure it stayed down. Hope took off running again, this time at a limping gait.
There, at the end of the row, stood Cameron above the altar where the Book of the Damned sat.
Hope's eyes became a blazing amber, almost as firey as the inferno around them.
"Hope," Cam let out a soft cry as tears gushed down her cheeks, "I'm sorry, I didn't have a choice, I-"
Hope slammed into her with a vampire's speed, sending her crashing into the stone behind.
"I warned you to stay away from it." Hope spat.
This girl, this sixteen-year-old girl.
This girl, whom Hope had mentored and taught to embrace her witch ancestry, single-handedly destroyed her city, well on her way to destroying the entire world.
"I didn't know this would happen," Cam sobbed, holding the back of her golden blonde hair that had tinged red from the collision of stone, "I didn't have a choice!"
"There's always a choice, and you chose wrong." Hope ground her teeth and looked down where Cam had been standing.
Where she'd opened a portal to Hell.
"Please…" Cam slowly started to stand. "Let me help you fix this."
Hope flashed a scowl at her. "You can't," Hope stared at her for a long moment, "there is nothing you can do. May the victims of your mistakes be far less kind than I am."
Waving her hand, Cam was gone. Relocated to another part of the city.
Hope snatched the book from the altar and quickly read through the inscriptions, glancing up frantically as the sound of distant howling grew nearer. She had to close the portal, but would the hellhounds and demons that escaped be trapped here on Earth to wreak havoc if she did?
Would anyone be able to survive them if they remained?
Hope knew the potential price of attempting to wield a power like this, but if she didn't…and more escaped into this world…
Shivering at the thought, she knew she didn't have time to deliberate.
Placing her hands over the pit before her, which steadily grew hotter as the seconds ticked, she chanted, "Universa Ruina In Tenebras Ra Damis Infinitum. De Lon Dem Ex Nahal da Six."
The ground shuddered as the wind gained strength. The howls neared, and Hope gritted her blood-stained teeth and curled her dirty fingers.
"Universa Ruina In Tenebras Ra Damis Infinitum. De Lon Dem Ex Nahal da Six!"
The portal beneath began collapsing within, like a tunnel without supports.
"UNIVERSA RUINA IN TENEBRAS RA DAMIS INFINITUM. DE LON DEM EX NAHAL DA SIX!"
Blinding white light forced Hope to stagger backward. A scream ripped up her throat as the hot flash tore across her skin, leaving it raw and ragged. It was almost as if her very soul were being torn from her body, trapped in a whirlpool of chaos and destruction. The white light, deceivingly beautiful, was trying to rip her apart.
Hope's head broke the surface of the ocean during a raging storm. The hot, white light was gone, replaced by a thunderous sky and endless, frigid black waves.
Looking up, Hope kicked her legs in a frenzy as a wave the size of a house hovered above her. She let out a scream just before it came crashing down, sending her deep into the pits of the sea.
Calm darkness covered Hope like a balm on a burn. It was almost comforting to drift in the vast nothingness.
It was death- Hope knew it well, and while she otherwise would have fought it, the soft caress of its smoky finger trilling over her skin was too lovely to pull away from.
After the pain she'd just endured, she wanted the peace to last just a little longer.
"I can hear her heart." An unfamiliar male voice broke the silence in her head, and she almost groaned, but reality came rushing back as the cloudy sky returned to her vision.
Hope instinctively rolled over, and with it, the water that had entered her lungs spilled from her mouth. Deep, ragged coughs tore up her throat as she dispelled more seawater. It burned all the way up her esophagus, yet despite the heat behind her eyes from the salt, her body shuddered with cold.
"She's so pale—her lips are blue," another female voice said, "we need to take her to Madja."
"Careful." Another voice. "Keep her on her side."
Hope didn't have the strength to move any part of her body, though she desperately wanted to. All she could do was shiver even as she was rolled back to her side; she hadn't realized she'd flattened on her back in that time.
The sand and salt in her eyes slowly cleared away the more lazy blinks she could muster. When her vision focused, when she could finally see clearly, Hope slowly stared at a pair of black boots on the sand.
Slowly, she looked up and, against the rain that pelted his face, stared at likely the most beautiful person she'd ever seen. His dark hair clung to his forehead as shadows grew and lingered around his body.
Shadows?
That couldn't be right.
"Azriel?" The female voice from before rose again. "What's wrong?"
The man, Azriel, slowly sank to his knees in the sand. His hazel eyes met Hope's as he let out a soft breath.
"My Mate."