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.He couldn’t breathe, but he could see, he could feel his limbs, and after a couple of seconds of gasping, he finally caught a breath.“So, how’s it going so far?” asked the bobcat guy, about two feet from Charlie’s head.“Good,” Charlie said.“They’re running scared.”There was a big chunk bitten out of the middle of Bob’s torso, and his Beefeater uniform was in tatters, but otherwise he seemed in good spirits.He was holding the Desert Eagle cradled in his arms like a baby.“You’ll likely need this.That last shot connected, by the way.You took off about half of her skull.”“Good,” Charlie said, still having a little trouble catching his breath.He felt a searing pain in his chest and thought he might have broken a rib.He sat up and looked at his chest plate.The Morrigan’s claws had raked the front of it, but in one spot he could see where a claw had slipped under the plate and into his chest.He wasn’t bleeding badly, but he was bleeding, and it hurt like hell.“Are they still coming?”“Not the two you shot.We don’t know where the one you stuck with your sword went.”“I don’t know if I can make it up that rope again,” Charlie said.“That may not be a _roblem,” Bob said.He was looking up to the ceiling of the grotto, where a whirlwind of squeaking bats was spiraling around the mast, but above them was beating the wings of another creature altogether.Charlie took the pistol from Bob and climbed to his feet, nearly fell, then steadied himself and backed away from the hull of the ship.The squirrel people scattered around him.Bummer let loose with a fusillade of angry yapping.The demon hit the water about thirty feet away.Charlie felt a scream rising in his throat but fought it down.The thing was nearly ten feet tall, with a wingspan of thirty feet.Its head was as big as a beer keg, and it appeared to have the shape and horns of a bull, except for the jaws, which were predatory, lined with teeth, like a cross between a shark and a lion.Its eyes were gleaming green.“Soul stealer,” it growled.It folded its wings into two high points behind its back, and stepped toward Charlie.“Well, that would be you, wouldn’t it?” Charlie said, a little breathless still.“I’m the Luminatus.”The demon stopped.Charlie took the hesitation to bring up the pistol and fire.The shot took the demon high in the shoulder and spun him to the side.He turned back and roared.Charlie could smell the creature’s breath, like rotting meat, wash over him.He backed up and fired again, his hand numb now from the recoil of the big pistol.The shot knocked the demon back a step.There was shrill cheering from above.Charlie fired again and again.The slugs opened craters in the demon’s chest.He wavered, then fell to his knees.Charlie aimed and pulled the trigger again.The gun clicked.Charlie backed up a few more steps and tried to remember what Minty had shown him about reloading.He managed to hit a button that released the clip from the pistol, which plopped into the water.Then he unsnapped one of the pouches under his arm to retrieve an extra clip.It slipped out and fell into the lake as well.Bob and a couple of the squirrel people splashed forward and started diving beneath the water, looking for the clip.The demon roared again, unfurled his wings, and, in one great flap, pulled himself to his feet.Charlie unsnapped the second clip and, with his hands shaking, managed to fit it into the bottom of the Desert Eagle.The demon crouched, as if to leap.Charlie jacked a shell into the chamber and fired at the same time.The demon fell forward as the huge slug took a chunk out of his thigh.“Well done, Meat!” came a female voice from above.Charlie looked up quickly, but then back to the bullheaded demon, who was on his feet again.Then he braced his wrist and fired, and again, walking forward, pumping bullets into the demon’s chest with each step, feeling any second as if his wrist would just shatter into pieces from the recoil, until the hammer clicked on an empty chamber.He stopped, just five feet away from the demon when it fell over, facefirst into the water.Charlie dropped the Desert Eagle and fell to his knees.The grotto seemed to be tilting before him, his vision tunneling down.The Morrigan landed on three sides of him.Each had a glowing soul vessel in her claw and was rubbing it on her wounds.“That was excellent, lover,” said the raven woman standing closest to the fallen demon.Charlie recognized her from the alley.The stab wound his sword had made in her stomach healed over as he watched.She kicked the bullheaded demon’s body.“See, I told you that guns suck.”“That was well done, Meat,” said the one to Charlie’s right.Her neck was still knitting back together.She was the one he’d blasted up onto the cabin roof.“You guys do bounce back with a certain Wile E.Coyote charm,” Charlie said.He grinned, feeling drunk now, like he was watching all this from another place.“He’s so sweet,” said the hand-job harpy.“I could just eat him up.”“Sounds good to me,” said the Morrigan to his left, whose head was still a little lopsided.Charlie saw the venom dripping from her claws, then looked to the wound below his chest plate.“Yes, darling,” said hand job, “I’m afraid Nemain did nick you.You really are quite the warrior to have lasted this long.”“I’m the Luminatus,” Charlie said.The Morrigan laughed, the one in front of Charlie did a little dance step.As she did, the bullheaded demon lifted his head from the water.“I’m the Luminatus,” said the demon, black goo and water running between his teeth as he spoke.The Morrigan stopped dancing, grabbed one of the demon’s horns, then pulled his head back.“You think?” she said.Then she plunged her claws into the demon’s throat.He rolled and threw her off, sending her sailing twenty feet in the air to smash into the hull of the ship.The Morrigan behind Charlie patted his head as she passed.“We’ll be right with you, darling
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