Original Sin Read Online Free PDF Page B

coven.
    Don’t think, just act, don’t think, do, quiet quiet quiet, they won’t see me, don’t let them see me …
    Rafe didn’t know how he knew what the coven was doing, but as he neared the assembled group he understood everything as if he’d known it all along. Yet when he tried to concentrate on individual thoughts they disappeared, like a partial recognition of an old friend, or a suspected enemy. You know you know them, but you don’t remember where or why or when.
    He didn’t need to know why or how he knew, he just needed to accept the truth: this coven was summoning demons and sacrificing the girls on the altar to do it.
    Neither girl would survive when it was over. That he knew with certainty.
    Rafe told himself this was foolish, one weak man against a dozen witches. How long had he been asleep? How long had he been in the hospital, knowing time passed but not knowing why?
    Painful memories cut into his thoughts. He pushed aside the blood-soaked helplessness of his past … He had been unable to stop the witches before, when he was physically and spiritually strong; how could he stop them tonight, when he was weak and doubting? He would die in such a confrontation.
    He deserved to die. Maybe this battle was meant to be. His death to save someone he didn’t know. Dying would give him peace, silence the constant pain and pressure and agonizing memories of his murdered friends. He was supposed to protect the priests who sought forgiveness and healing at Santa Louisa de los Padres Mission; instead, he’d allowed their slaughter through his own blindness.
    How do you know what they’re doing, Raphael?
    Rafe pushed the question aside, the overwhelming urge to hurry forcing him to walk faster until he was running, and before long he stood on the edge of their circle. Even though the demon trap was in the center of a clearing, the witches were so engrossed in their ritual that at first they didn’t notice him through the fog and smoke.
    The High Priestess, with dark red hair that shimmered in the light, held a bowl over a naked girl, and said:
    “Ashes to ashes and dust to dust, as God in Heaven created the angels from nothing, so I command the Seven to rise through the gate which I have opened. In the name of Barbiel, Azza, and Mammon; in the name of Moloch, Olivier, and Sammael; in the name of Beelzebub and all the Fallen: come through the keyhole and submit to my command.”
    The body of the naked girl began to convulse, and a hooded woman next to the High Priestess held a dagger above her, as if to ward off an attack. The hooded woman was familiar … but Rafe couldn’t focus on her as the earth rumbled, a growl that shot primal fear directly to his heart, putting every one of his senses on high alert.
    The girl was lifted from the ground by unseen forces as she writhed. The gowned girl next to her was still, and at first Rafe thought she was dead. But then her eyes moved, her face twisting in panic. She was an unwilling sacrifice.
    Save the arca …
    A deafening roar filled the circle and the naked girl screamed and convulsed as around her black smoke rose from the ground, then swirled like a hurricane above the coven. Lightning flashed as unformed demons crashed and collided. As the six witches within the double circle, and the one in the center, chanted urgently, the demons were drawn against their will into the double ring, swirling, straining, screaming, until they were wrenched apart, separated, into seven distinct columns that rose from ceremonial bowls into the sky. The column in the middle grew bigger, wider, darker.
    Pride .
    Rafe was too late to stop the opening of the gates of Hell. The demons were here, and he didn’t know how to send them back.
    Save the arca …
    The arca? He laid eyes on the terrified, frozen girl on the altar. The naked girl was dead; Rafe knew it as certainly as he knew he was alive. But with the knowledge that he could—that he had to—save the other girl, the arca ,