The tar monster in front of him shined with a red glow from within the tar until the tar was gone, leaving a very human-looking girl standing in its place—a girl with light-brown hair tied in a side braid and hazel eyes . . . a girl with the Roman numerals XV written in faded gray on her left forearm.

Tenn dropped Michael’s sword in the snow. “Libby.”

Libby grinned and raised her sword up above her head and grinned. “Did ya miss me?”

There was a beat of silence where the world seemed completely frozen.

“L-libby?” Tenn whispered, his voice breaking. “H-h-how?”

I had no idea who this girl was to him, to them, but I did not trust the way he reacted to her. This was not like him, not even as Archie. Libby just grinned up at him like a lunatic. And then she screamed and thrust her arms straight forward—a bright, glowing white orb shot from her hands right into Tenn’s chest. He flew backwards into the air, rising higher and higher with every beat of my heart in horrifying slow motion. Those big white angel wings of his popped out but instead of catching him, they flew forward and wrapped around him like a cocoon. The air whooshed over my head.

And then that pressure holding my body against the snow vanished. I pushed off the ground and lunged forward like a jungle cat pouncing on her prey. Except I wasn’t moving in for the kill, my focus was laser-sharp on the glowing six-foot-long sword of Archangel Michael lying in the snow where Tenn had dropped it. I had no idea what would happen if our enemy touched it, but we couldn’t risk anything. With my gaze locked on the sword, I didn’t see what anyone else was doing, but I felt my Coven-mates rushing around me in a panic. The world seemed to be moving in slow motion, like trying to run in a dream. My knees hit the snow beside the sword, sending a tidal wave of snow straight into Libby’s face.

The power radiating off Michael’s sword was too bright to look at, but that meant I didn’t need to. I just dove for it and prayed it didn’t incinerate me for daring to touch it. In the back of my mind, I remembered hearing that while Tenn was the only one who could wield the sword, his sister and the entire Bishop family had been able to touch it to some extent—because they had angel blood in their bloodline.

I was also a Proctor with angel blood in my veins.

My fingers wrapped around the golden hilt and electricity shot through my entire body. I hissed as every one of my muscles tingled and buzzed, but my grip tightened on the weapon. I craned my neck back and looked up to find every gaze of our enemy locked on me.