Overwhelmed [3] 《SHADOWHUNTERS》

Chapter Thirty-Three

The smoke that Andina had imagined choked her nostrils. The scent of blood and death billowed through the air with the stinging clash of a faltering battle. The action was further off from her eardrums than she had expected – until her feet met the solid stone and suddenly it engulfed her. Shouts for medics' assistance surrounded her: immediately from her left, a nearby gasp, and galls far off over the hills. Behind her, someone sobbed and hacked their soul onto the torn up grass – undoubtedly the cry of a Nephilim who had just lost their significant other or parabatai. A Circle member pled for mercy where none would be given; a blade sliced through a neck with a jagged and thick tug of detestation.

When Andy opened her eyes, she was cloaked in dark grey smoke that denied her clear vision. It burnt the whites of her eyes and coaxed out her veins, the heat beside her urging her to move swiftly. Her lungs choked for the fresh air that was whipped in by the wind. She gained a glimpse of the square as the smoke split and the nearby fire lit up with vigor.

There were lifeless bodies everywhere. Her heart smacked her throat and echoed back to her over the unmistakable roar of a fractured city. The lost had been gathered across the cobbled stone, long ago overflowed the tents that had been prepared to cover them. It was a tragically systemic affair as those who began to prevail in battle took care to collect those who had not. Her gaze wavered across the uneven piles and rows, at least a hundred lost souls before her as she stepped out of the smoke that billowed from a pyre. They'd already began to set the corpses ablaze. With the demon towers broken around Idris, no risks could be taken to allow a vessel to be taken advantage of.

The Herondale's mouth twisted as she spied colorful clothing amongst the dark gear of Nephilim and mundane-forged protection that the Circle had adorned. Denim and clear skin, colorful tattoos and Warlock Marks stood out to her. Her lips fell apart as she realized that Downworlders lay among the dead. A single cold prick dabbed at her arm, warning of the rain that was to come and wash away their misdeed before it could even be chronicled.

Andy's gaze lifted, eyes fluttering as the heaviness of it all caught up to her. She had not expected for things to be resolved so quickly. In reality, it had been a long and hard effort. It was in the heat of it – where she usually was – that it just seemed to take up so much time.

A body that had been stilled shifted, a bloody cough ripped out of a middle-aged Shadowhunter's mouth. A pair of Nephilim rushed to the man, one shouting to get him to the hospital. Their culture had adopted the mundane term for a place of healing long ago, when Hypocrates had shared his studies with those of angelic blood. The thick, concrete building that hid behind the House of Records was a place that all of their medicine could be performed at once, acting as a large infirmary for all of those who resided within Idris. Andy had to wonder if that was why the man that had raised she and her brother had never taken them to a doctor in their times of need. Not only would the medics have discovered who his children actually belonged to, it was probably too far of a trip into the city for the evil man to care.

The wind picked up with the pin pricks of an icy rain, diluting fresh blood as it began to drizzle down. Smoke swirled across the air and furled around the branches of ancient trees. The fair hairs around Andina's face were all that had dried, and they began to brush her face as they wavered in the breeze. For a long moment, she didn't truly witness what was in front of her. It was just another soldier down, with a weeping family that stood bloodied around it. Her eyes blurred out, dried out from the smoke, as her brain attempted not to see what lied before her. A torn sob forced it upon her brain. Alec.

Her heart stopped and her eyelids tried to snap shut to deny it. Suddenly, her ducts had no problem producing liquid. She had never heard the man scream as he did just then, above a still figure that Isabelle held in her arms. "No!" The Lightwood's eldest son threw himself down to the ground, where his sister had fallen with her heap of disturbance. Maryse grasped at Alec's arm, an attempt to keep him up and composed failed as she lost her own resolve. Robert stood behind them, his expression grim.