Grounded ~Book Four of Winged~

Finding What Was Lost

I'm freezing again. I open my eyes and I see that I'm lying in the middle of the woods in the snow. My jacket and shoes are gone. I sit up fast and rub my arms. What happened? How did I get here? Where is my coat? I get up quickly and my feet hurt from the cold snow. I spin in circles. There are no footprints around me and there is no sign that there was ever a cave. I start off to my left, the direction that I feel is the way I need to go.

Etheriel

"I can't contact Dominic." I throw my phone against the wall, frustrated. "Something must have happened to him." Azrael looks up from my broken phone, now laying on the ground, and at me.

"Unless he was the one who gave away where she was to whoever took her." He hears something and looks over across the street.

"He wouldn't do that. That risks her safety and all he would want is for her to be safe... He loves her." I reply and Zerach nods slowly.

"To him, I was a risk for her safety." Azrael cracks his knuckles. I stare at him. What if it was Dominic? He betrayed us and joined the Demon side. He gave her up to them. It was probably Dominic's father who showed up in the middle of the night and took Trinity. She's definitely not safe with him and Eli when she is forced to bring him back.

Trinity

I stumble out of the tree line and into a clearing. In the middle of the clearing, laying on a concrete altar, is Eli. I run through the snow, stumbling a lot along the way.

"Eli!" I yell and slow down a couple feet from the altar when I see he doesn't move. His eyes are closed and he isn't breathing. He is only wearing dark slim fitting pants; no shirt and no shoes. I set my hand on Eli's cheek and he is surprisingly warm. I lightly shake him.

"Eli..." He doesn't move. I push back his eyelids and his eyes stare straight up at the sky. I set my head against his chest and try to hear his heartbeat. I hear nothing. I search for a pulse on his neck and wrist. Nothing. I struggle and climb onto the concrete altar and get on top of Eli. I fold my hands together and start to give him chest compressions. He is so warm under me. I continue chest compressions, desperate to have him conscious.

"Come on Eli..." I say loudly. He doesn't show any signs of waking up. "Mammon... please wake up..." He still doesn't move. I stop the chest compressions and hold my hands against his sides to help warm them up. I lay down on him and hide my face against his warm neck. I need him in order to get back to Hell. He is the only one who knows how. "Please..." I whisper. I lay on him for a few minutes and the hole time I slowly get more tired until I can't stay awake and pass out.

I'm not 100 percent sure how long I was sleeping, but I wake up with arms are wrapped around me. Eli is breathing...

"Eli?" I question and the arms tighten around me.

"Sweetheart... Why are you on top of me?" I smile at his voice and sit up, looking down at his face.

"Eli!" I smile more, relieved, and he sits up with me straddling him. I hug him tightly. "I gave you chest compressions to try and wake you up... and then I was freezing so I was using you for warmth and I just passed out." I pull away from him. He's okay. I can't stop smiling and am surprised when he suddenly leans forward and kisses me. I find myself kissing back lightly. All the emotions from my time with him comes back and confuses me. I pull away first and get off him and the concrete altar, sinking my bare feet back into the cold snow.

"Hm... Your Demon side is significantly weaker than I remember... Etheriel and Dominic must have found a way to make it dormant." Eli gets off the concrete altar and looks around.

"Yeah..." I reply and look up at Eli again while he examines our surroundings.

"I didn't expect the Pits to look like this." His gaze lands on me. His eyes scan up and down my body. "You're cold." He reaches out and brings me into his warmth, holding me tightly. He begins to look around.

"Why were you sleeping on that altar?" I question and look back at it. "Why didn't you wake up when I was trying to wake you?"

"I was in a suspended animation like sleep. I didn't wake because my body processes had stopped; I had no vitality. That's why you passed out. I was pulling your vitality faster than your body was maintaining it." He messes with my hair lightly. "How did you know how to get here?" I look up at him and he stares down at me.

"Sammael..." I whisper and he furrows his eyebrows together and then becomes concerned.

"Is Dominic okay? He must had fought hard to try and keep Father from getting you."

"Actually... I was on an island that was warded so I couldn't be found and Dominic told Sammael where I was..." His expression becomes confused.

"He sided with Father?" He takes a step back, surprised, and I nod, beginning to rub my arms. He comes back to me and wraps an arm around me, leading me toward the trees. "Let's get out of here."

"How?" He blocks a branch from hitting me.

"We have to get to a specific cave and deep in the cave will be the room to perform the exit ritual, which I will need a little of your blood for, and it will open a passage back into Hell. Into the Temple of Lost Souls."

"Temple of Lost Souls?" I question and he looks around while we stomp through the snow.

"The building Sammael would have had to taken you to in order to open the passage here. The pits is where human souls who don't belong in Heaven or Hell go; lost souls, and Demons and even some times Angels... Although getting an Angel back from the Pits is nearly impossible." His hand rubs my cold arms, sending waves of warmth through them.

"Why is it impossible to get an Angel from here?" I question and he looks down at me.

"When Angels die their bodies disintegrate and all that's left is a single feather and once the feather hits the smoldering ashes, it ignites and it puts them into forever peace or traps them in Barzakh depending what they've done and their status in Heaven, but if you take the feather before it ignites, their soul gets trapped in the pits." I stumble and Eli catches me quickly. "You okay?" He questions.

"Yeah... Do you know where you're going?" I question.

"Yes, I can feel its presence." He replies.

"You said that it's in a cave. I fell asleep in a cave earlier, but when I woke up I was laying in the snow." Eli nods like a disappearing cave is a normal everyday occurrence.

"That was the cave we are looking for. It's position changes every few hours. We need to hurry so it doesn't change position again and then we have to completely change direction or walk even further." He start to trudge through the snow faster.