End of Days (Penryn & the End of Days, #3)

by Susan Ee

Thermo takes it and drops the flaming cloth onto Beliel’s soaked body. Beliel ignites. His hair fizzles like quick sparklers, lighting up, then disappearing. His shriveled skin and pants light up as the flames spread all over his body. Waves of heat distort the road beyond him and warm my exposed neck and face. The air fills with the smell of burning gasoline mixed with the faint scent of meat beginning to char. Five of the Watchers step forward and grab his burning arms, legs, and shoulders. I move to stop them, but Raffe puts out his arm to block me. “What are they doing?” I ask. “They’re going to burn themselves.” “It’ll be painful. But they’ll heal,” he says. All the Watchers take to the air. Their wings spread and beat in unison against the sunrise. Just as I think that the flaming body between them must be burning them to a crisp, a new set of Watchers relieve them and take over the flaming burden. The others fly, crisscrossing each other like a net far below the body. Bits of burning debris fall, much of it burning out before reaching the other Watchers. The bits that continue to fall, the Watchers catch, one by one. “They won’t let any part of him fall to the ground,” says Raffe in a quiet voice. “His brothers will keep him from falling.” In the distance, the Watchers weave a beautiful dance in the dawn sky beneath Beliel’s shower of fire.