"Now, Daddy, that's not true. I always knew you two apart." Aside from the fact that her father kept his shorter hair their natural blond shade while her uncle dyed his black, the twins had different eye colors. Acheron's were swirling silver and her father's were blue. But other than that, there were identical copies of each other.
Except for one thing.
"And how is that?" Her father challenged.
She could tell by the suspicious light in his celestial eyes that he expected her to say the scars on his body, which was true, but like her mother, she didn't really see those. Rather it was a much more obvious difference. One that made her lean forward to whisper loudly above the club's din. "Your pockets don't bulge from carrying Simi's barbecue sauce and snacks."
Nick laughed. "That is true enough. Gah, I'll never forget that Thanksgiving when we almost ran out. You've never seen anyone run faster to make groceries, cher, than me in your life. I don't know who went paler, faster. Me or Ash."
"Oh that was definitely Alexion," Ash said with a laugh. "He was the most frightened by Simi's pout that day. I assure you."
"Nah, it was Savitar."
Kody tsked as she saw Simi approaching with her husband. "Are you hearing the lies they're telling about you, Aunt Simi? Terrible, terrible lies!"
"Hey, Kody!"
Blinking, Kody left her memory to return to the present or the past ...
For the first time, it was strangely confusing for her. As she finally had real memories of her life with Nick.
Takeshi had been right.
She'd been a lot older than Sroasha had led her to believe. Had led her to remember. She hadn't been the young teen she'd originally thought. They'd taken more than just her life from her.
They'd taken everything.
I was lied to ...
Kody cursed as she realized what they'd done. They'd stolen the water of the Lethe. It was the only thing that explained all this. Hades gave it to all the dead so that they would have no memory of their life.
"How could I have been so stupid?" she breathed.
No, not stupid.
Trusting.
She'd believed in them and they'd intentionally misled her. Told her partial truths, and never given her enough of the past to refute it. It was easy to believe a lie when you only had one side of an argument. When you only had a bit of the facts. Too easy to paint someone as a scoundrel or villain. But she should have trusted her gut more.
Past behaviors were far better indicators of someone's habits. A leopard doesn't change its spots. She knew that adage well. Nick had never given her a reason to doubt his integrity. It was why she'd hesitated from the moment she met him. He'd never been anything other than a gentleman.
He lived his life with honor and code. Through and through. Unlike others, he wasn't a liar or a cheat.
Deep down, she'd known where the truth was.
Just as she knew right now that something else wasn't right. Cherise knew it, too.
All of this was wrong.
Nick wouldn't stand her up. Not like this and not once they'd made plans. It wasn't in him to be so thoughtless or selfish. Something else was going on.
Trust in what you know.
Nick wasn't a scoundrel or a liar. He didn't treat people like this. She had no reason to doubt him.
But the others ...
She needed to find Caleb and Xev, and investigate what was really going on here. Nick was in trouble. Every part of her instinct told her that if they didn't sort this out, it would be too late.
He'd be lost to them forever.
CHAPTER 11
Alone and abandoned, Nick wandered helplessly through the barren fields of the Broken Mind. Everything here was twisted and dark. Shadows lurked and attacked. All around. All the time. Out of the countless scary places he'd been and hundreds of enemies he'd faced, this was by far the worst.
The most insidious.
Because he never saw the attacks coming. They were random and violent. Every time he dropped his guard, something swooped in, out of nowhere to bring him low.
As he staggered through the dark, the shrieking winds were deafening and he felt so alone and isolated. He didn't know how long he'd been here. It seemed as if eternity had passed as he fought to survive.
Cyprian had been right. No one knew the difference between the two of them. His son had taken his place and no one was the wiser. They really didn't know the shadow from the truth.
I'm completely forgotten.
He didn't matter to anyone. Not to his mom.
Not to Kody.
No one.
How could anyone be so deliberately blind? Did they want to be lied to? Or did they just not care?
I should just lie down and die. Really, why was he bothering? What did it matter at this point? He was so tired of the fight.
So tired of living.
I'm just a kid. If it sucks this bad at this age, why should I bother trying to make it to adulthood? It'll only get worse.
He knew that for a fact. Wasn't like he hadn't seen the future and the mad nightmare that was waiting to swallow him whole.
Just like the beast rushing now to attack from the dark.
Shouting out, Nick swung at the hideous mass of a corpulent monster closest to him that was going for his throat. Its claws slashed as it tried to open his jugular and drain him dry. He had no idea why he didn't let the creature have him.
Maybe it was sheer stubbornness at this point.
Face it, his son sucked. His daughter, not so much. But Cyprian was a major douche nozzle. World would be so much better off without them both.
Yeah ... he should do everyone a favor and just end this. Right here. Right now.
Throw his sword down and let these things eat him whole.
He almost succumbed to the weary desolation.
Why not? His mom was still young enough, she could pick up the pieces. Have another kid. One who wouldn't get her killed in a few years.
Her and Bubba could make a nice life together, without him. Surely, he owed her that much.
His breathing ragged, he watched as the shadows shrank away as if they knew something inside him had changed. As if they sensed it, and were terrified by it.
"If you die, Nick, Acheron's wife will, too. And his sons won't be born. He'll never find it in him to make peace with Styxx, and Kody won't be born, at all. Neither will her brother, Ari. Urian will never know who his real parents are. Bethany will never be freed from her prison. For all the bad you think you'll do, you do a whole lot more good for the room."
Nick froze at the familiar lilting voice that rumbled through the darkness. "What?"
Vawn stepped forward so that he could see him more clearly. "It's true, mate. More than that, Kyrian'll die. You're the one who saves his life from Desiderius. Amanda won't find him without you. She won't have any idea where to look. And Valerius Magnus's life. Without you, he'll never marry Tabby. You are crucial to them all. Even Talon and Zarek owe you. Dark-Hunters you have yet to meet. You're seeing only the bad right now, boyo. The pain. 'Tis easy to get lost to that pity. Believe me, I know."
He moved closer to Nick. "There's not a day what goes by I don't lament me life and what I've done in it. As the old song says, mistakes, I've made a few. But we do what we do, and we carry on as best we can. It's not how we deal with the best what life gives us that makes us who we are, Nick, it's how we pick ourselves up after we fall. It's not brave to stand tall underneath a shining sun, and with praise at your back. Bravery comes when there's no reason to get out of bed, and every reason to run for the door. But you make yourself crawl out and face the thundering hoard and hatred, knowing you're most likely going to get your arsling and pride hand-fed to you."
"Yeah, I've had enough of that. Thanks."
"We all have." Vawn gestured at his body. "You think I enjoy this?"
He had a point. Nick couldn't imagine anything much worse. That was his bitterest nightmare there. Waking up in someo
ne else's body. Not knowing yourself when you looked in the mirror. He still hadn't gotten over the PTSD of it. It'd left a lingering impression on him and at least he'd been in an alternate Nick body, with some of the same things he knew.
Vawn's reality was a lot more crushing. He couldn't even begin to imagine that horror.
"But I don't have the luxury of death," Vawn continued. "This is me fate. Deserved or not. For all eternity and there's nothing I can do about it, except strap up and cope." He smirked. "Complain a bit, too, from time to time."
Nick snorted, knowing the truth was that Vawn seldom did that. Honestly, he almost never spoke about it at all. It was one of the things Nick admired most about him, or her, rather. The subject only came up whenever Vawn met someone like Aeron or Kaziel who knew him before his curse.
Otherwise, he soldiered on.
Reckless abandon. It was their unspoken code of honor. What kept them all going in the face of everything that sought to lay them low.
Which made Nick wonder something. "How are you here, Vawn?" Was he hallucinating from some kind of delirium?
He had to admit, that last round of demons had rung his bell pretty hard. Wasn't too far a reach to think he could be lying unconscious and dreaming all this.
Kaziel moved to stand by Vawn's side. "We're here to fetch you home, boyo."
In his demon form, Caleb swooped in to examine the monster Nick had last taken out. "Have to say, I'm impressed. Figured you'd be elbows deep in trauma. How'd you manage without us?"
Nick snorted at his droll tone. "You know me. God hates me too much to kill me and get this over with. Besides, give it a minute. Sure my friends will be back any second. You just missed them."
Caleb laughed. "That's a first."
"Right." Nick shrank his sword back to the size of a pocket knife before he returned it to its flap. He drew up short as he caught sight of Kody.
Emotions tore through him so unexpectedly that for a minute, he couldn't breathe.
These were the times when he knew he loved her. When he finally understood how much Lil had meant to Caleb. Myone to Xev.
His mom to his dad.
That fist to the gut he got every time he saw her face. There was nothing else like it. She was the air he breathed. The sun that came after the torrential rain.
No, the rainbow.
His soul could be frozen and brittle, and a single smile from her face would warm every part of it. Set him on fire from the tip of his toes to the ends of his hair. He'd never known anything like it. No matter how bad he felt, the sound of her voice lifted him. The touch of her hand made his skin electric.
Unable to speak past the magnitude of everything rushing through him, all at once, he pulled her into his arms and crushed her against him.
And when she wrapped her arms around him and laid her head against his chest, he trembled.
Yeah, okay, this was why he fought. He remembered now.
For her.
She was so worth it.
"You okay, Boo?"
"Am now," he said gruffly. There was no need in letting her know how stupid he was being. How weak.
"Aww! You're so precious!" Kody's laughter turned cruel an instant before she changed into a hideous gigantic fanged, corpulent beast. The same beast he'd just killed.
Voracious in all things. It's unnaturally Titian hair reflected like gaudy rust in the dim shadows. Hissing, Nick stabbed it through the heart and drove his claws through the hollow of its jaw, catching the mandible. Fury caused his Malachai wings to launch through his back and it took control of him for the mockery. Before he could stop himself, he curled his fingers around the bone and wrenched the mandible free of the sinew and muscles.
It was disgusting! But he couldn't help it and it didn't satisfy his need for vengeance or his cry of indignation. He wanted more.
He wanted every last drop of its blood to coat his body and drink the beast dry. He was through playing these cruel games with them.
No more!
"Who's next!" he shouted to the twisted trees surrounding him. "Bring it on! I'm done with you all! You want some of me? You better come prepared!"
Forget the Malachai. Generations of Cajun blood boiled inside him. They were swamp people and they didn't take injustice and mockery lying down. They gave it back with both fists and two kicks.
He ran at the next shadow that came for him.
Azura pulled back the second she saw the degree of fury inside the Malachai and the form he'd taken. No longer was his skin mottled red and black.
He was a pure saturated ebony. So dark that he absorbed all light itself. Matte and resistant to all color. He took in the living essence of everything around him. It was something she hadn't seen since the beginning of time.
Something wholly unexpected.
Even her brother, Noir, the darkest of all the ancient gods hesitated in respectful trepidation. "Well, this is new."
"Indeed."
And by the expression on her brother's face, she could tell that this Malachai wasn't feeding his powers.
Another first.
"Are you all right?"
Noir's nostrils flared. "Do I look all right?"
Honestly? He looked a bit green. Which contrasted greatly with her naturally blue skin. Knowing better than to answer him when he was this upset, she quickly changed the subject. "This must be why Cyprian and Laguerre hid him from you."
"How can a Malachai drain me?"
Azura felt the blood leave her face as the only possible answer came to her. It was the same reason they'd demanded the life of Braith's husband. Why they'd made sure that their sister never birthed another brat from Kissare. "He would have to be part Sephiroth."
And Noir had drank his blood ...
That would not only weaken, it could kill him.
Shrieking, her brother recoiled as if he recognized the truth of her words, and was every bit as disgusted that someone else might have discovered their one weakness. "Get those swords! Rebuild our army and turn them to our side. We need them to bring down Cam and Verlyn! I want Rezar's throat!"
"That's all well and good, but we don't know where Rezar is."
He turned on her with fury in his black eyes. "A Sephiroth can find him! Don't be stupid!"
"I wasn't trying to be stupid." She ground her teeth at him. And if it was so easy for a Sephiroth to find him, he'd have been located. Sadly, there were only two people alive who could call Rezar out of hiding.
Braith, whom the god loved and would do anything for. And Rezar's brat, Bethany. Too bad for them that Bethany was currently being held as a living statue, prisoner in a realm where neither of them could venture.
Yeah, neither option was open to them. It was so frustrating. He was right. She was stupid.
Yet not so stupid that as she turned back to her brother, she didn't realize something else.
The color of his skin.
Green.
Verlyn.
Suddenly, everything clicked into place as she remembered the end of the war. The fall of the Sephirii army. Verlyn had been charged with rounding up their swords and destroying them.
Behind their backs, the Kalosum had taken Seraph medallions and created a new army with a loophole. While not Sephirii, they were made up of their children.
The same concept, only instead of their swords holding the more powerful creatures who'd bonded with the Sephirii such as Takara, these swords held Seraphim souls who would bond with their own kin during combat so that they could fight against her and Noir, and whatever forces they unleashed.
I should have known ...
They could never trust their siblings. For creatures who claimed to be goody two-shoes, they were ever plotting mayhem.
And this time, those jackals might have finally found the way to destroy them. Terrified, she pulled Noir close and took him home to their dark palace to hide before Jaden or anyone else learned their secret.
She would have to walk carefully and guard this
, as it could undo them both. This was treacherous ground, indeed.
"What are you plotting?" Noir accused.
"Shh!" She laid him back in his bed. "You rest. I'm going to find a way to use those swords to make Tarhnen from them." The Tarhnen were the dark Sephirii who'd been corrupted. With them, they could turn the tables on their brethren and overthrow the balance.
Brushing Noir's dark hair back from his forehead, she offered him a determined stare. "Have no worries. We will rise and they will regret this."
No one got the better of them. Not without paying a bitter, harsh price. This war was far from over.
CHAPTER 12
Nick shook as he felt the powers of the Source flowing through him. It was the first time he'd ever tasted real blood. And what blood it was.
Colors exploded around him as every voice in the universe cried out at once. The sound hit him like a thrumming drumbeat that reverberated through his entire body until his own heart synched to it and they pounded as a single unity.
He felt the cosmic alliance. Was this what Acheron lived with? If so, he couldn't imagine the responsibility the Atlantean lived with. It was heady and terrifying.
I could destroy the world ...
He understood the power. It wouldn't be hard. As the Malachai, he had the ability to call forth every dark entity from its prison or corner and force it to his command.
No one born of the Mavromino could deny him.
Nothing can contain me.
Nick tilted his head as he realized a truth that had escaped even his father. Because his father had never dared what he'd just done. Lifting his hand, he threw a burst of fire through the membrane that held him inside his grimoire.
While a part of him doubted his discovery, another part knew the truth.
Lucky for him, that part wasn't insane. His fire caught and spread into a circle in the air, hovering like a manhole. It formed a sizzling ring of fire that made a portal from this world back into his own.
Like a dialing a phone. All at his command. Even Grim would have been impressed that Nick had finally learned to master the very powers they'd all tried so hard to teach him.
I am the Malachai.
Unrestrained.
May the gods help them all now. Honestly, even he was scared by it. I have to remain in control of it.
So long as he did, everything would be okay. He couldn't let his emotions rule him. And whatever he did, he had to keep reign on his temper.