Grounded ~Book Four of Winged~

Planning

Dominic

Everyone was immediately escorted out of the party suddenly and we have not seen Beleth nor Trinity since they both left the room. Belphegor, Eli, and I stand out by the car we took to the King's Palace, confused. Eli looks majorly worried.

"What happened? Why did they cut off the party so suddenly?" Belphegor questions out loud.

"Do you think Trinity is okay?" I look over at Eli. I hope so.

Trinity

Beleth is gone for hours and when he comes back he acts like nothing has happen. He walks through the door and for the couple seconds that the door was open I can see the servant standing outside the door. I slowly and painfully sit up.

"Hey, hey, lay back down!" Beleth rushes over and forces me to lay back down. I wince from the movement. "Sorry." He whispers and sits on the bed beside me.

"Did you find Lucifer?" I question and scan Beleth's face. He gets all the way on the bed and leans back against the headboard, bringing me closer to him carefully.

"No, he is in the Mortal Realm hiding." Beleth responds and combs his fingers through my hair. I stay silent and Beleth continues to run his fingers through my hair. "The war in the Mortal Realm is becoming worse. A portal to Heaven has also opened up." He speaks softly.

"Am I safe here?" I question and sit up slowly, turning and looking at Beleth directly.

"No, but you are safe with me." He responds. He holds me closely and I just let him because it would hurt too much to try to push him away. Beleth lifts his hand and rests it against my forehead. His touch is so warm.

At first, I think that it is my imagination, but soon I realize that it is not. The bed is trembling. The whole room is shaking. Beleth slowly gets up and I look at him rapidly, confused.

"What's happening?" He does not respond and I start to get up slowly, in pain. "Is this an earthquake? In Hell?"

"No... Angels are trying to break into Hell to fight." Beleth grabs my hand and brings me close to him.

"They can't do that... right?" I question and look up at Beleth, concerned.

"They can and they are. They want to fight. They want to force all of Hell to fight and they are going to force open the door to hell and force everyone to the Mortal Realm for a fight. A lot of people are going to die. Angels, Demons, Humans..."

"How much is a lot?" I question and Beleth's hand slowly slides his hand onto my face. Time slows down as he leans down and presses his lips to mine. I can't pull away before everything goes black and cold. I can still feel Beleth standing close, but I can't feel his warmth and I can feel his lips against mine. I begin to smell smoke all around me and the world around me begins to glow. Flames begin to form from the glowing, flickering. I see trees all around me and wooden buildings; all ablaze. What is this? Bodies begin to manifest on the ground. From just where I stand I see at least a hundred. There are ash piles too; dead angels. I spin around and there is fire everywhere I look.

"What is this?" I mumble and Beleth appears next to me and walks around to in front of me, staring down into my eyes.

"This is the last Angel-Demon war. Only part of it." He takes my hand and starts to lead me through this village like place, all on fire, hundreds of dead bodies all over the place. Despite all the fire, it's still cold. I carefully step over limbs of bodies, clinging onto Beleth's hand. The more that we walk the more bodies we see. There are lifeless bodies piled on top of each other all over the place. I try not to stare at any too long. Movement catches my eye and I look ahead of us to see a young girl struggling to drag a body to a pile of more bodies. She has white wings outstretching from her back. She lets go of the body and wipes her hands on her dress covered in black and dark grey ash. We walk closer and it doesn't seem like she can see us. We walk right past her and she doesn't look at us or register that we are even here once. The world around us begins to shift and change as we continue to walk. Only one thing remains constant; the raging fire. We are in a large empty field with long grass and many piles of bodies that are burning. Piles taller than me, taller than Beleth. I stare at Beleth's back and don't look at all the bodies, feeling sick. Beleth stops walking and turns to face me.

"There will be death all over the world. The whole world will break out into war. The population of the world today is much larger than it was during the last war. So... so many people will die." I look up from Beleth's chest and into his eyes, nodding and understanding.

"Anyway we can stop it?" I question and he looks conflicted. He smooths down my hair and the scene around us begins to fade and transform back into his room. His lips are still against mine and he is holding me close.

"Your lips are so soft." He mumbles and pulls away, staring down at me with that still conflicted look in his eyes. He looks like he is about to lean back down to kiss me, but the door flies open suddenly and he turns smoothly to look at who just barged in. It's a demon, but not a servant. He is dressed more casually than the servants are.

"The location has been located and it is secure." Beleth nods and waves him away. He shuts the door behind him and I look up at Beleth confused.

"What location?" I question and he stares down at me.

"On the mortal realm, an old temple that has been missing since the old times. It's heavily warded and is surrounded by trusted people. We are both going there so that you can be safe because as the tremor indicated earlier, it is no longer safe here in Hell." I stare up at him trying to process this. "I also notified and invited your ex-lovers and friends to join us." I cringe at his use of ex-lovers.

"How safe is it? How long will we be there?" I question and back up a couple steps.

"It's extremely safe as long as no one knows where it is and you do not leave and we will be there until everything has settled."