Instinct (23 page)

Nick nodded slowly. “I think I get it, though. Why you said it could endanger everyone I loved.” He shifted back to his human body and brushed his hand through his hair. “Yeah, definitely, don't try this at home, kids. Only with professional drivers, on a closed track.”

A slow, knowing smile spread across Aeron's face. “But try it again? Just to be sure?”

Nick did.

And again, it worked. For the first time, he had complete control over his body and his powers. “Have I mastered it?”

Aeron wasn't so quick to agree. “You're getting there. No doubt. It'll still take more practice.”

He offered Nick a proud smile. “Just remember, your temper will always be the key to unlock those powers, and you'll have to ride herd on that temper for all your days. As the Malachai, hatred will forever be your weakness. Your undoing. That special place where you'll want to go for comfort. But it's the one place you must avoid at all costs, less you want to eat your neighbors and family.”

“Yeah … no. Think I'll pass.”

“Wise choice, lad.”

Livia straightened and watched him with a peculiar light in her eyes. One Nick wasn't quite sure about. But he didn't have time to worry over that. Let her have her tantrum later. Honestly, he was tired of dealing with her and her theatrics. The more he was around her, the more grateful he was for Kody, who never brought drama to his door—other than the demons who followed her there that she couldn't elude. Yet that wasn't her fault. She always did her best to get rid of them first.

Right now, he had to save his mom and Caleb. For all he knew, his unknown, mysterious half-brother was nearing the end of
his
test.

And Nick had to beat him to it. While he honestly would be glad to hand over the reins of Malachai to someone else,
anyone
else for that matter, he couldn't allow his mother to stay asleep.

They had to get the berries to wake her. That was his goal.

Nick launched his wings, but kept his human body. Ah yeah, now this was cool. “So … shall we fly to the Nemed?”

With a nod of approval, Aeron turned into the ball of ghost light, and led him through the forest with Lerabeth and Livia trailing behind them.

Now that Nick was able to access his Malachai powers without them taking him over, they were able to reach the tree in a matter of minutes.

Nick also realized that his mission had been a manufactured trick by Chronus and Tiamat. The tree was so tall that without his Malachai wings, he wouldn't have been able to reach the berries at all. They hung too high. But there was also another problem.

He frowned up at the fruit that was nestled along the leaf-filled branches. “Do I pick the black, green, or red berries?”

“Blackberries,” Livia answered.

“Nae!” Aeron shouted as Nick reached for them. “Nemed blackberries are for death. The green are unripened fruit. The red are what you be needing to revive your loved ones,
boyo
.”

Livia scoffed at him. “He's lying to you, Nick. For once, listen to
me
!”

Nick growled low in his throat, tired of Livia's eternal bickering and whining. “Lerabeth? Which is it?”

“I was to lead. You're here. You pick the berries you were told.”

There was only one problem with that. “No one said anything about color-coded berries, crow woman. They just said to pick six.”

“Then pick six and be done with it.”

Nick wanted to wring the neck of that unhelpful red crow. He glanced to Livia, who was glaring at him as if she could kill him herself.

She might be one of his generals, but every part of him said that he should listen to Aeron. “Fine. Then I'm going with the one who calls this place home. If anyone should know which to pick, Aeron should be he.”

He reached for the red ones.

The moment Nick had all six in his hand, Lerabeth opened the portal back to their world.

Nick hesitated. “Can Aeron return with us?”

“I brought two in and was only told to take two out. That is all I can do.”

Nick scowled as he faced the one person he owed everything to. Without the p
ú
ca they'd have never made it. It didn't seem right to leave him here and go home after everything Aeron had done for him.

“Aeron—”

“It's fine,
boyo
.” He gave Nick a cheerful smile that didn't quite reach his pale eyes. “Give Xev me best.”

Nick nodded glumly, feeling like crap over this. It wasn't fair or right.

But then, life seldom was.

As Nick started to turn to leave through the portal, Livia ran up to him and grabbed his Malachai dagger from his back pocket. Before he could ask her what she was doing with it, she cut his throat and vanished through the portal, then sealed it closed.

Stunned by the pain, Nick fell to his knees as he tried to stop the bleeding with his own hands. But it was useless. He was going to die.

He couldn't believe what had just happened.

Livia had murdered him.

After everything he'd done for her.

I saved her life. Kept her from having to go back to her prison.

And this was how she repaid him. Kyrian was right.
No good deed goes unpunished
.

Kneeling by his side, Aeron cawed and summoned a small murder of crows to them. Since he couldn't hold or grasp anything, he had the crows bring straw and brush to make a pillow for Nick's head. “Breathe, Malachai, stay calm.”

Easier said than done. His senses reeled as his fury mounted over her actions. Livia had betrayed him in the worst sort of way.

The bitch had cut his throat! Literally. And left him to die alone in this realm without friend or family!

But there was nothing to be done about it. In a few minutes, he'd bleed out and be gone from this life.

Forever.

And in that one heartbeat when his anger and hatred were at their highest point, when all he wanted was vengeance and blood, he let it go and released all that negativity from his body and heart.

There was no need in holding on to it now at the very end of his life. Not when he had so many regrets that saddened him and made him wish he'd spent his finite time more productively.

And with the people who'd mattered most to him.

The biggest regret inside his heart was his inability to save his mother and Caleb.

Not being with Kody, during these final precious minutes.

Yet there was one last regret he could take care of before he died. While it wouldn't render aid to those closest to him, it would to one who had helped them all in the past.

At least he hoped it would. And if he could help one last person before he died, then he could go in peace.

His eyesight blurring and fading, he pulled out his grimoire. It and the dagger Livia had stolen were two of the most powerful tools a Malachai had, and the two he'd first mastered. Sort of. No one ever really mastered the grimoire since it was possessed by an ancient
y
ō
kai—
a mischievous eastern oracle spirit that had been trapped by his father and tricked into the book. The only way to communicate with her was to offer Nashira a blood sacrifice.

Blood has power and yours has more than most. Make sure you guard it and bleed as little as possible
. Caleb's words of warning went through his head.

A little late since he was now bleeding all over the place. It saturated his ugly Hawaiian shirt and the ground around him. And it covered the necravitacon where his father had trapped her centuries ago.

“Nashira,” Nick gasped weakly, hoping this worked and that he could free her before he died, “hear me and step forward. Not in words, this time, but in your woman's form. The time has come for you to be restored. A favor to a favor. A Malachai once took you from this world, now the time … has come … for a Malachai to return you.” He held the book to his chest and prayed for it to work.

The air whipped around him, like a violent hurricane. Strong and furious. It drove the crows back as a cloud of dark purple smoke rolled out of the grimoire. It rose up into a column by Nick and Aeron's side.

A pair of perfect lavender eyes formed to stare incredulously at him. The smoke turned into tendrils of long white hair that was fastened with purple flowers bound in flowering ribbons. Then, ever so slowly, the smoke solidified into the rest of her body.

The white crow tengu that his father had captured centuries ago and bound to his service against her will was a lot tinier than Nick had imagined her. More fragile in appearance … especially given her nasty and biting sarcasm. But in reality, she was similar to a tiny, adorable pixie. Like Simi in her real form, she had pointed ears and a pointy chin.

She was so beautiful. In a unique, impish way. How he wished he'd been able to free her in the human realm and not here. But maybe she'd be able to cross over again. Someday.

And at least she again was in her own body.

Gaping in disbelief, she stared down at her hands and turned them back and forth before she met Nick's gaze. “I'm restored?”

Nick nodded and offered her a smile even as the darkness stole his sight. “With my dying breath, I free you from your slavery. I'm just sorry it took me so long to figure out how to do it.”

 

CHAPTER 15

Nick came awake slowly as he remembered Livia's vicious attack on him in Agonia. And he knew he was dead.

Because I'm an idiot.

He'd been looking for treachery to come at him from everyone
but
the one who'd actually done it. Xev. Dagon. Acheron. Ambrose. Caleb. Aeron. Lerabeth.

Even Kody and Menyara.

Yet it had been the one he hadn't been paying attention to who'd done it.

Yeah, ain't this a bitch?
Never failed. Never came from the bus you saw, that was blowing the horn and flashing its lights. It was always that sneaky SOB in a small Toyota coming up behind you that you missed.

Nick swallowed, wishing things were different. But he knew better. There was no way to have suffered such a vicious neck wound and not feel pain from it.

Not without death.

And he'd never felt better than he did right now.

Nothing hurt.

He bit his lip, scared to open his eyes and find out where he'd ended up for eternity. He was hoping he'd gone north to a pearly gate where Peter would be waiting with a lengthy list of all the things he'd screwed up in his life, but as the Malachai, he wasn't betting on it.

Please don't let it be really hot here
. New Orleans in August was about as hot as he wanted to deal with. And he definitely didn't want to smell rotten eggs for eternity. He'd had enough of Kyrian's dirty laundry for that.

And Bourbon Street alleyways after Mardi Gras.

“Nick?” A soft, gentle hand stroked his cheek. One that didn't belong to Kody or his mother.

Confused, he opened his eyes to find Nashira there. “Am I dead?”

A slow smile spread across her beautiful, fragile features. “No. We saved you.”

“We?”

She inclined her head to the other side of the room.

Nick shifted to see … holy crap. It was Aeron. Only he wasn't a puck anymore. He was now fully restored, too.

How had that happened?

No longer pale-skinned, Aeron had a glowing, tawny complexion. And he was a tall beast, too. Close to Acheron's massive butt-kicking height. Or maybe he just seemed that tall given his tough aura and that deadly, piercing expression on his face.

“What happened to
you
?”

A slow blush crept over Aeron's skin that mottled his cheeks and tempered his badass aura. He shifted slightly in his chair. “Remember what I told you about holding your temper, Malachai?”

“Yeah?”

“Hold your temper.”

A bad feeling went through Nick. “Why are you telling me that?”

Rising to his feet, Aeron put a little more distance between them. Enough that he could bolt if he had to.

Ah, that can't be good …

Nick's scowl deepened that someone as powerful and deadly as Aeron would ever be so skittish around him. Honestly? He doubted he could touch him on skill.

And given his current condition, he knew he couldn't catch him. So then, what was the deal?

“In order to save your life, I had to take a small involuntary blood donation from you.”

Nick froze as those words rattled around his three brain cells. “You drank my blood?”

“Aye.”

He screwed his face up at the mere thought of it. “Dude, that's so gross. I hope you brushed your teeth afterward. Saw a dentist. Drank a gallon of Listerine.”

Aeron laughed.

“I told you he wouldn't be angry for it.” Nashira took Nick's hand and held it in both of hers before she bowed low to him. “I can't believe that you were dying and your last act was to think to free me.”

“Well, I just figured out how to do it. But I wasn't completely sure it would work. I wanted to ask Caleb about it, then he got sick before I could. And all this other crap happened. Since I was dying, I figured it was worth a shot before I went. No need in you being trapped in there for the rest of eternity if you could go free.”

Tears filled her lavender eyes as she squeezed his hand. “And that is why we worked together to save your life. Why we have watched over you and worried that you wouldn't pull through.”

Touched by her concern, Nick wasn't sure what to say to that.

Aeron came forward finally and handed Nick a small, folded handkerchief.

Nick opened it to find the berries he'd picked for his mother and Caleb. “Ah man, this is great, but how do we open the portal now that Lerabeth is gone?”

Aeron shrugged nonchalantly. “It's not a problem. You're the Malachai. At
11:34
, the veils weaken. It's easy for you to open a portal and go through.”