Lilith’s dark complexion pales to a ghostly white, the pupils of her azure eyes flaming to vermilion. The once-sensuous mouth deforms, twisting … distorting into a hideous vertical orifice. The purple labia-like lips widen, the grotesque grin chilling Jacob’s blood.

Moving toward him, the she-demon allows the straps of her nightgown to fall, then she steps out of the garment, exposing her vile sex.

Jacob swoons, unable to focus, the nexus whirling in his head.

She leaps for him, driving him backward as if he were struck by a sledgehammer. Straddling his chest, she claws at the remains of his body armor as he struggles to regain his breath, the slit of her hideous mouth pressing closer to his face, revealing multiple rows of tiny, razor-sharp black teeth.

Jacob dry heaves at her sulfuric breath. He grabs her throat with his right hand, attempting to keep her groping face away, while his free hand fights the claw at his groin, frantically attempting to prevent the rape.

From his isolated isle of calm, the consciousness that is Michael Gabriel feels the sudden disturbance within the nexus. A sense of dread overwhelms him as he registers waves of energy and senses the struggle so close to his protected domain.

Devlin abandons Dominique, moving as if in a trance toward the shoreline of the lake, whose waters now radiate an emerald tinge. ‘Hear me, Father. Send forth your demon sentry. Empty the pit of Babylon and reveal the Gates of Hell, so that I might release thee!’

Dominique crawls toward Jacob, distancing herself from the Seraph. ‘Jake? Jake, wake up!’

Jacob is pinned beneath the thick roots of the calabash tree, thrashing wildly, as if in the throes of a horrible nightmare.

The sound of a heavy gong tolls in the distance.

The village of the Fallen Ones empties, its members slowly making their way to the shoreline of the metamorphosing lake.

Jacob’s mind screams as he struggles in vain to keep the Succubus at bay.

Lilith’s face is hideous, taking on the proportion of a Gorgon. Amoeba-like mealworms crawl from porous openings along her flesh, releasing a putrid secretion and inhuman pheromones.

Jacob flings his head from side to side, gagging at the stench. Physically outmatched, mentally exhausted, pinned to the earth, he finds himself overwhelmed by a presence whose sheer force of will threatens to tear his own consciousness apart.

A bloodcurdling scream bellows from his throat as scalding-hot mucus drips from the Abomination’s naked loins.

Let me die, please God, I’d rather die—

Jacob cannot turn away as the Succubus increases her chokehold, a thousand icy pinpricks puncturing the fabric of his existence as he somersaults within her sulfuric lather, every cell in his body screaming for mercy.

And then he glimpses a shadowy figure appear from the hazy periphery, moving toward them through shimmering phase disturbances.

Father …