Free The Fallen 3 by Thomas E. Sniegoski

as something more than that, something more than human actually—
Nephilim
.
    He glanced around the room at the others as they, too, readied themselves. Janice, Kirk, William, Melissa, Samantha, Russell, Cameron: he was proud of this group, proud of how far they’d come, and that they had been able to step up to the responsibilities that life had so cruelly dropped in their laps. With the Powers gone, they were the protectors of the world from darkness. Sure, some of them were still a little raw—heglanced at Jeremy Fox—but they were doing well. They were surviving. They were getting the job done.
    At the front of the room, Lorelei closed her eyes and took another deep breath. Besides her ability to use the ancient Archon magicks, she was also able to psychically share her visions with the other Nephilim. Aaron wasn’t sure if he or any of the others would eventually be able to do the same, or if this was just another of Lorelei’s unique talents, but he did know that her ability had proven quite useful in carrying out their missions.
    Aaron felt the girl’s presence in his mind almost at once. It started as a dull pain that gradually intensified, followed by a flood of imagery and knowledge. He heard some of the others cry out as the information flowed forcefully into their brains.
    And then it was done. Aaron blinked, then looked about the room. The others were recovering; some were dealing with small nosebleeds, while others had headaches that would eventually fade.
    Now they all saw what she had seen: the troll-like things emerging from the darkness of the underground, and the innocents that were threatened.
    And they knew where to go to face off against this threat.
    Lorelei looked the worse for wear, leaning against Lucifer as she attempted to pull herself together.
    “Are we set?” Aaron asked as he rose from his seat.
    The others almost visibly shook off the effects of the psychic connection and stood as well.
    “Do we all know where we’re going?”
    As one, they nodded, a certain grimness passing over them, not knowing if they would return from their mission.
    Not knowing if they would survive.
    “Then let’s do this,” Aaron said, wings beginning to unfurl from his body.
    Wings of white, gold, brown, and copper began to emerge from the backs of the eight other youths. It was truly an awesome sight to behold, and it drove home to Aaron the importance of what they were doing on this world.
    Vilma was ready beside him, her white wings slowly fanning the air. She gave him a wink, and he returned the favor with a smile.
    “We’ll be back as soon as we can,” he told Gabriel, who watched him with serious eyes. “Look after things while I’m gone.”
    “Be careful,”
the dog said.
    Aaron promised he would, then wrapped himself in a cocoon of feathers, as did the others, and one after the other they were gone, traveling to the place of darkness they saw inside their minds.
    K EMEROVO O BLAST : R USSIA
    Anatoli Olegushka always knew that working in the Ulyanovskaya coal mines would probably be the death of him, but a certain sense of invincibility was developed whenone descended into the bowels of the earth day after day and ascended again into the fresh air and gray Russian skies.
    Certainly there were accidents—cave-ins, methane and coal-dust explosions—but those things happened to other people, and when they did, he knew he was safe for some short time, that the spirits that lived in the earth had taken their sacrifice and would be sated for a time.
    For a time
.
    Anatoli lay upon a bed of broken rock, the lantern on his helmet shining upward onto the curved ceiling of the chamber. He struggled to remain conscious in the thinning air.
    The day had begun just like any other: Anatoli, Pavel, Nikolai, Olik, and other members of the crew descended into the tunnels 885 feet below the surface. They couldn’t have been working any more than twenty minutes—Olik had barely settled into his latest tale