Demon Among Devils

Chapter 14: "Not our rules. Not our laws. Not our judgment to make"

The battle turned when Inaerion smashed through the heavens to land in the hands of the one who deserved it most. It turned into a slaughter when six figures of light joined the seventh. It became wholesale butchery when a black-clad figure launched into the air on coffin-like wings.

Despite their craven master, the Fallen Angels still fought on with admirable courage. They reacted to the sudden change in circumstances with commendable alacrity and made haste to resist.

They surrounded the new arrivals with their superior numbers, harried the newcomers' flanks with practiced precision, and hurled light spears into the gaps in their foes' defenses with steady accuracy.

More than that, they fought with the strength of desperation, with the knowledge that the odds were hopelessly stacked against them.

Even then, they still sacrificed for one another, risked their lives to drag wounded comrades back, taking death blows that were meant for a friend. In the end, they were soldiers with all the courage, honor, and duty that title entailed.

And all of it was depressingly futile.

The tip of Sandalphon's spear was a white-hot blade. He used it to scythe down all opposition, cleaving apart shadowy forms, amputating limbs, detaching heads from shoulders in great spurts of blood.

When they sought to surround him, the Archangel changed the grip on his weapon, presenting the butt-end which was shaped like the yawning jaws of some great primordial beast.

From the opening, holy flame spewed, retched out in a continuous stream, covering Fallen Angels in killing heat, entwining around them like the coils of a fiery viper.

Sandalphon guided it like an artist would a brush, and created tornadoes of fire that sucked in his enemies and scorched them to the bone.

Raphael surged into pockets of resistance and ended lives with great, clean sweeps of his sword. The blade was a massive espadon that would have taken a dozen men to lift. It was an executioner's sword, made holy only by the one who wielded it, and Raphael spun the immense weapon in a one-handed grip with flawless grace.

He split Fallen Angels in twain as effortlessly as a man would chop firewood, bifurcated twisted forms from head to feet, folded enemies in half with horrifying ease. Such was the speed of his blows that his foes did not bleed until well after they hit the ground.

Uriel fought with a jester's grin bright upon his lips. Unlike his brethren who waged war in concentrated silence, the Archangel of Retribution plied his trade with barbed words on his tongue. He exchanged insults with the foe, hurled abuse at them in between expert strokes from his flaming sword.

Not a blademaster like Raphael, or possessing of a weapon like Sandalphon's, Uriel's method of battle was fire. Righteous, angry fire. Waves of it he summoned with mere flicks of his hand, pillars of it he conjured with his bright, burning blade. He turned the very air into a raging inferno and charred Fallen Angels into blackened skeletons.

Gabriel was shrouded in an aura of terrible beauty. She was a war maiden of unparalleled skill. A Valkyrie clad in silver plate. Beauty given wings and handed death to deal out. The Crimson Wake, she was known to her foes.

The Red Maiden, angelkind called her. She earned well both titles that night. Her smile seemed to grow with every enemy slain, seemed to become more radiant for every drop of blood shed. She left behind mangled, disarticulated corpses behind her like devastated wreckage after a hurricane. Flecks of ichor stained every portion of her battle-plate. It served only to make her all the more beautiful.