The first floor was a battleground. I could see five of the Nephilim, tall and ungainly, easily recognizable. I took in the scene quickly: Azazel was fighting fiercely, blood streaming from a head wound and mixing with his long black hair. Tamlel was down, probably dead, as was Sammael, and I realized with belated horror that it had been Carrie out on the sand, fighting to the end with the monster who was devouring her.

The noise, the smoke, the blood, were too much. I couldn’t see the other women, couldn’t find Raziel in the melee. The Nephilim who fought Azazel went down, and a moment later its head went flying, the rest of it collapsing into a useless pile of bones as Azazel turned to face the next attacker.

And then I saw Sarah behind him. She held a sword in her hand, and her face was calm, set, as Azazel defended her. There were others protecting her as well, Fallen whose names I didn’t know. I saw Raziel by the door then, cutting down the horde as they poured into the building, wielding a sword of biblical proportions. The noise was deafening: the screams of the dying, the clash of metal, the unearthly howls of the Nephilim as they set upon their prey.

A blade slashed, and I felt blood and bile spray me, hot and stinking of death. The Nephilim were everywhere, and I watched in horror as the madness surrounded me.

Something grabbed my ankle and I screamed, looking down to see one of the women lying on the stairs, grasping at me for help. Poor thing, she was well past help of any kind, but I sank down, pulling her ravaged body into my arms, trying to stanch the endless flow of blood. “You’ll be all right,” I murmured, rocking her, trying to hold her broken body together. She was going to die, but at least I could comfort her. “They’re going to stop them. Just hold on.”

To my amazement, the woman reached up and touched my face with one bloody hand, and she smiled at me, peace in her fading eyes. A moment later, she was dead. Blessedly so, given the horror of her wounds. I let the woman go, setting her down gently on the stairs, and looked up.

I could try to run. Back up the endless, blood-soaked flights of stairs, through the torn pieces of what had once been living flesh. Or I could face the bastards.

One of the Fallen lay across the bottom of the stairs, his torso ripped almost in half. One arm was gone, but the other still held a sword, fighting to the end.

I stepped down and took the sword in my shaking hand, then turned to look for Raziel.

One of the Nephilim must have spied me on the stairs. It turned away from the men defending Sarah, advancing on me with its hideous disjointed shuffle.

It was too late to run, even if I wanted to. The thing had seen me, caught my scent; and when one of the Fallen attacked it, the creature simply tossed him away, and the body flew across the room, landing on a table that collapsed beneath him.

I wanted to scream for Raziel, but I kept my mouth shut, gripping the sword tightly in my hand. If I was going to die, then I was going to die fighting, and I wouldn’t distract Raziel from his defense of the portal. Maybe death wouldn’t hurt, I thought, still backing up, the screams of the dying belying my vain hope. It hadn’t hurt the first time. It didn’t matter. I was supposed to be here, I’d been drawn down here, and if I was going to be torn apart, then so be it.

The Nephilim rose up over me, so close I could see the maggots living in its skin, and the smell of blood and death was enough to make me gag. If I was lucky, it would rip off my head—it would be quick, rather than having my stomach and intestines clawed out—and I wondered if I could get away, run far enough up the stairs to jump, as I’d promised Raziel. Maybe that was what I was supposed to do, land on a Nephilim or two and crush them.

The creature had a hideous open hole for a mouth, and the double sets of teeth were jagged, sharklike, made for tearing flesh, and I wasn’t going to scream, I wasn’t, even when it reached me. Its hands were deformed, more like pincers, razored and bloody, and I slashed at it, blindly, severing one of them. It didn’t react, coming closer, and its remaining claw made a horrible clacking sound. I clutched the sword, prepared to fight to the death.

And then the hideous head disappeared, simply vanished, and I stared in shock. The monster collapsed in a welter of bones in front of me, and Raziel stood behind it, a bloody sword in his hand, the sword he’d used to decapitate the creature.

I almost didn’t recognize him. He was covered with blood, his eyes dark and glazed, and I half-expected him to yell at me. But he simply turned around, keeping his station at the foot of the stairs, protecting me as Azazel protected Sarah.

Some of the Nephilim carried swords, knives, spears—primitive weapons. Others simply relied on their claws and teeth and superhuman strength.

They fell beneath the fierce onslaught of the Fallen, making no sound as they went. Their howls had been screams of hunger, and that had been assuaged by the torn bodies that littered the hall. They died in silence.

We were going to survive, I realized with sudden shock. I’d come downstairs prepared to die, certain I was going to, and now everything had shifted.

Only one Nephilim was left standing, a thick pole in his claws, out of reach of Azazel’s blazing sword, and I felt the pull of Sarah’s gaze from across the carnage.

I turned to look, and Sarah gave me a sweet, loving smile—almost a benediction—a second before the heavy pole pierced her chest, slamming her against the wooden door behind her and impaling her there.

I heard Azazel’s scream from a distance. I scrambled past Raziel as if he didn’t exist, climbing over corpses and twitching victims, pushing past Azazel himself to reach Sarah’s side.

Someone had wrenched the pole free, and Sarah slid to the floor, her eyes glazing as I caught her, lowering her carefully. That sweet smile still clung to her mouth, even though her blue eyes were filled with tears. “I’m . . . so glad . . . you’re here,” she managed to gasp. “You’ll help . . . Raziel.”

There was nothing around to use for a bandage, so I simply mashed together an armful of my full skirts and held it against Sarah’s ruined chest. “It’s going to be all right,” I said desperately, refusing to admit it wasn’t. “Hold on.”

I’d said the same thing to the girl on the stairs, the girl who’d died in my arms. Just as Sarah was going to.

“Try to help Azazel,” Sarah whispered, trying to gather her ebbing strength. “He’s going to be in trouble. Raziel can help him. You can help Raziel.

Promise.”

“I will,” I said helplessly. “But you’re not going to die.”

“Yes, I am,” she whispered. “I’ve known it for quite a while. You must . . . stop the one who betrayed us. You must . . .” Her voice faded, but her eyes sharpened, grew warm with love.