“I see your twin has poisoned your mind against me—”
“You make that awfully easy to do,” Oz said, his sarcastic tone notable.
“Sean has done nothing of the sort. I know who you are and what you have done, both before and after your abilities were surrendered. I have also suffered at the hands of your son, Deimos, which I imagine was at your directive, at least in part. To tame me. To subdue me. To make me subservient to you should we meet one day.” I advanced on him until I stood only a foot away, and though I knew I—or any of the PC—could not harm him, thoughts of doing so ran rampant in my mind.
For my twin.
For my mother.
“And I see that particular tactic has not worked.”
There was no apology to his tone, no argument refuting my claim; only a cold, dead stare that should have been terrifying, and would have been had he possessed the ability to follow through on its malice.
“Say what you came to say, then leave,” I said, using his harsh tone against him. “I have neither the time nor the patience to stand here and posture with you when neither of us can land a blow.”
“I can,” Oz said, extending the tip of his wing toward my father in warning.
Instincts I could not understand—had never before felt—rose from deep within me, and I pushed the obsidian threat aside, slicing my hand in the process. Blood dripped on the ground at my feet, but I did nothing to stop it. Instead, I stared at Oz as I slowly realized what had happened.
Ares’ laughter rang out around us. “Now you see the strength of our bond. You are blood of my blood, Khara. There is no escaping its call, ever. No escaping me.”
“Perhaps I cannot escape you, but I still will not do what you ask.”
“That’s unfortunate,” he said, turning to leave. “I wonder how your mother will feel when she learns that her daughter could have saved her and turned her back on the chance.”
“My mother…?”
“Ah, ah, ah,” he said, wagging his finger at me. “You have made your stance abundantly clear, Khara. When you change your mind, send the messenger god for me. Only then will I tell you how to stop Phobos—and how to help your mother.”
“You fucking piece of—” Oz lunged for Ares, and I dove in between them, wing outstretched like a sword.
“Stand down,” I ordered, but Oz did no such thing. He barreled toward me with no regard for his safety, his singular focus on wrapping his hands around my father’s neck clear. And though I shared his sentiment, that maddening connection to the PC overrode my desire to join him. It was as if my body were not my own. I was Ares’ metaphorical puppet of protection, and he pulled the strings as Oz fought to get by.
“You have to stop before I hurt you,” I ground out as I dug my feet into the ground and pushed back against him with all the force I had. He barely budged, but when his glowing eyes met mine, the fight slowly left him. “Please, Oz. You must stop. We will find another way.”
“That’s my girl,” Ares purred, fueling Oz’s rage further. “Be sure to send Hermes when you’re ready to meet my terms.”
I did not watch Ares leave, but I could feel the moment he disappeared. The need to stop Oz’s attack evaporated in a flash, leaving the two of us entangled and breathing hard as we stared at each other. I stepped back from him to give him space, frustration coursing through me.
I had never wanted to kill someone more than Ares.
And that was a pleasure I would never have.
16
“We should be getting back,” Oz said, searching the sky. “Your brothers will be shitting bricks by now.”
I pulled out my phone and found myriad messages from each of them in very explicit language asking where I was. With a sigh, I put it back in my pocket and stared at the sky alongside Oz.
“I do not want to go back,” I said softly. “Not yet.”
“Where to, then?”
“I want to go home…”
He looked at the gates, then at me again. “You are home.”
“This is no longer my home.” The emptiness in my voice mirrored the emptiness I felt inside at that realization. “I want to go to the Victorian.”
“Yeah, not so sure about that, new girl.”
“If Kaine wished to come for me right now, he would be watching this place. The fact that he is not speaks volumes.”
Oz hesitated for a moment before speaking. “Flying there would be a risk.”
“Possibly, but when I tried to do as Trey does to escape Deimos’ room, I could not muster the ability. Whether it was the grip of fear that paralyzed me, or the energy I had just spent to travel to the Underworld, I do not know.”
He turned to face me. “Only one way to find out.” His hand took mine and he pulled me close. “And don’t fucking drop me if you get tired. I’m not in the mood to track you down again.”
“I will do my best.”
Unsatisfied with that answer, he released my hand and captured my waist instead. His arms were like iron around me as he pressed his body to mine.
“You do the transporting. I’ll do the holding on.”
I braced my hands on his biceps and closed my eyes. With several deep breaths, I drew up all the calming energy I could find and channeled it toward exporting Oz and me to the Victorian. Seconds later, the two of us stood at the porch entrance, his arms still tight around me.
“How do you feel?” he asked, his voice low in my ear.
“Tired, but functional.”
“I guess I should give Trey more credit. I always thought he was a bit of a pussy.”
“He most certainly is not,” I replied as I pulled out of his grip. “His gift may be unparalleled amongst the PC—it is just measured differently than the others.”
“Well, don’t burn yourself out using it. You never know when your other tricks will be needed.”
I took his words under advisement and opened the door. The home was dark and empty, except for the god tethered to the wall in the basement.
“We should check on Dionysus,” I said, heading for the door to my former room, “unless you and Sean have dealt with him.”
“Your brother hasn’t said shit to me about it.”
With a nod, I descended the basement stairs into the darkness—the perfect setting for an ambush. But we found none waiting. The basement was devoid of life altogether.
Including the former god of wine.
“Well, shit,” Oz drawled as he hurried to the wall where Dionysus had been shackled, eyes glowing. “Looks like we should have moved him sooner...”
“Hermes is to blame for this,” I replied. “He is up to something. I can feel it.”
“Hermes is a sneaky asshole. He always was up to something. That clearly hasn’t changed.”
“Do you think we were wrong to downplay their threat level? Do you think the gods are planning something?”
“Of course they are. You are the one being that can most easily end their little sabbatical from the Underworld. You’ve already taken out half of them. They won’t be so reckless next time.”
I stared at the blood-spattered wall and nodded absentmindedly.
“Did you learn anything from the Light One you sought out?” I asked, thoughts of my mother running through my mind.
His expression tightened. “Not what I’d hoped to.” When he did not expand upon his answer, I turned to face him. His eyes dimmed until their normal hue returned, leaving only the light from the doorway above to illuminate the space. “Let’s get out of here. I’ll tell you what you want to know when we’re not hemmed in by concrete walls—and chains. I’m still salty about the last set I saw.”
He turned and took the stairs three at a time. I followed him up to the living room and all the way to the top floor, where his old room welcomed us. I had already known where he was headed. The rooftop was his favorite place at the Victorian.
The air was colder than it had seemed when we had arrived, and the wind whipped my hair across
my face. I turned to face Oz, who loomed at the edge of the roof—the exact spot where he had thrown me off.
“If you are thinking of repeating that stunt, I should warn you, I will not go willingly.”
His eyes fell to me, an emotion I could not comprehend—had never seen there before—dancing deep inside them.
“That night started all of this,” he said, turning his gaze to the ground below.
“My birth started all of this,” I corrected. “You merely did what you needed to do to keep my soul intact.”
He scoffed. “Not so sure I succeeded in that endeavor.”
“I am as I was then,” I said, stepping closer, “except for my fancy new tricks, as you like to call them.”
“Yeah. Fancy new tricks that seem to have some inconvenient limitations. Tricks you’ll need to defeat Deimos’ brother.”
“You are worried,” I said.
“I’m aware of what we’re up against.”
“That is not the same thing.”
He pinned his deep brown eyes on me. “Yes. It is.”
With nowhere else for that discussion to go, I changed the subject. “My mother…what did you learn?”
“Nothing helpful.”
“Did this Light One have any suspicions as to what happened to her?”
He shook his head. “Raze said that you were gone and she was gone, and that’s all he knows.”
I pondered his choice of words. “Do they think I had something to do with her disappearance?”
“He didn’t say and I didn’t ask, but there was a hint of something in his voice when he said it that gave me pause.”
“But I was locked in my room long after my mother left.”
“Were you locked in, or was that part of the fear god’s illusion—if it was an illusion?” he countered, his question casting light on a precarious point. To the Light Ones, it could very well look as though I had betrayed her—set her up to be harmed somehow after I had gained entrance to a world that would not have accepted me without her escort. Perhaps, to them, I was the enemy.
“And what of the other Light Ones? How are they reacting to this?”
“He didn’t say, but I’m sure there’s a certain amount of chaos there, as there always is when a leader falls.”
“You believe she is dead?” His lack of response spoke volumes. I chose not to acknowledge that possibility and offered another instead. “Persephone had some interesting ideas on the issue when I encountered her in the Underworld.”
“I’ll just bet she did—”
“She proposed the theory that my mother is not missing at all. That everything that happened was a well-orchestrated plan to draw me into the Hallowed Gates and imprison me, my mother being the mastermind behind it.”
Oz pulled away to stare at me, his brow furrowed with confusion and anger. “Fuck no,” he said, pacing the roof. “Persephone is just starting shit like she always does. You have to see that.” When I said nothing, he stopped and turned to glare at me. “You do see that, don’t you?”
“While I do not wish for it to be true, her words, when objectively analyzed, bear consideration.”
“They’re bullshit,” he argued. “She doesn’t know Celia.”
“And neither do I,” I countered. “To one not emotionally invested, it could appear as though she arrived at a time of great duress and lured me to the Hallowed Gates, where I was immediately put into a room and left there—a room I had to later escape because it was magically locked down by some force or another. She never returned as she said she would. So either something happened to her, or she preyed upon my emotions to deliver me to my incarceration, at best. At worst, my death.”
“No way,” he said, resuming his pacing. “There’s no way Celia would do that.”
“She is a warrior, is she not? A cunning leader capable of making difficult if not impossible decisions?”
He looked over his shoulder and snarled. “Yes.”
“Then is it not possible that, after all this time, she has realized the potential threat I pose? And, for the greater good, sought to neutralize that threat?”
“Yes, it’s possible, but she wouldn’t—”
“You cannot know that, Oz. You no longer know her as you once did.”
“And you never knew her at all,” he said, voice cold as ice. The moment those words escaped him, his expression softened and he walked over to me, anger in check. “I didn’t mean it like that—”
“You said it because it is true,” I replied, shoulders squared and chin high. “I cannot argue your sentiment. I do not know my mother, which is why I can see the potential truth in Persephone’s words.”
“But if you did know your mother,” he argued, stopping before me, “you would see how ridiculous they are.” He closed his eyes and took a breath. “If you knew her as I did…”
“But I cannot,” I said, my voice soft and gentle. “Not unless you are willing to show me.”
Silence fell between us. “Do I really need to?” he asked. “Or could you just trust me?”
I contemplated that question for a moment. Could I trust his assessment of my mother? Could I trust that he had my best interest in mind when he argued against Persephone’s theory?
The answer seemed so obvious, and yet not.
“Would you bet your life on it?” I asked, scouring his face for any shred of doubt. Any sign of hesitation.
“Yes, I would, because I’m already betting yours.”
“Then I guess it is settled.”
“What is?”
“My mother is still missing, and Persephone is still a meddlesome bitch.”
He watched as the corner of my mouth curled, then laughed. “Sometimes I have no idea what to make of you.”
I walked over to him, only stopping once our bodies nearly touched. “And the rest?”
His eyes flared with something that looked like anger, and his jaw clenched tight.
“The rest of the time I can feel exactly who and what you are deep in my bones, like you are as much a part of me as I am myself.”
“And this angers you?”
He shook his head back and forth, a slow, calculated movement, only once. “Definitely not.”
“Good. I would not want to anger a Dark One. You have warned me off of doing so since you became one.” Another slight smile tugged at my lips. His eyes watched the movement like a snake waiting to strike.
“Glad to hear you’re listening.”
“I am capable of following your instructions—from time to time.”
Silence
“Because you trust me.” A statement, not a question.
“Something like that, I think.”
His head dipped lower, his nose grazing my hair. “I’m not sure I realized just how hot you admitting that would be.” His breath rustled my stray curls, and the slight movement sent chills down my spine. “Do you trust me enough to go play with those shackles downstairs? Or is it still too soon?”
I lifted my face to meet his, prepared to give him an answer, but a black cloud above drew my attention. An ominous, unnatural cloak of darkness plagued the sky, and I knew we had lingered at the Victorian too long. One of the many threats was upon us.
The Dark Ones had finally come.
17
They landed on the roof and the ground below, surrounding us just as Deimos and the Stealers had that fateful night when my wings had emerged and Oz had nearly died. The night he became a Dark One. Images of both ran through my mind until I forced it to heel. There was no time for that.
“Where have you been hiding?” Kaine asked, stepping forward from his legion of black-winged killers.
“Who says I have been hiding at all?”
“You have not been here,” he said, indicating the Victorian, “and you have not been in the Underworld.”
“I have. In fact, I just left there not long ago.”
“But you are not living there.”
“No, I am not.”
>
He took a step closer and Oz tensed, his wings ruffling behind me.
“It hardly matters. You are here now.”
“You seem irritated, Kaine,” I said, matching his advance, though being careful to remain out of reach. “Is that because I freed your prisoner, or because I escaped before you could kill me?”
His eyes narrowed. “If I wished you dead, you would be.”
Oz bristled at my side. “I wouldn’t talk shit after what she did to your boys, Kaine. She wasn’t even trying that hard.”
The Dark Ones on the roof fanned out around Kaine, the anger and hatred in their eyes as plain as their forced restraint. Kaine had clearly told them not to make a move, which begged the question as to why, if he truly was out for vengeance.
“Why are you here?” I asked as I took in their numbers and compared them to our own. The odds were far from in our favor, even given who was present.
“I’ve come to make you a deal, Khara, one that I believe you’ll gladly take now that I know what you’re willing to do for those you love.”
“That is a painfully short list, Kaine. Be careful not to overestimate your leverage over me.”
His eyes darted to Oz for a moment, then back to me. “I don’t believe I have.” Oz went suspiciously quiet, and I could not help but wonder why. When I glanced up at his profile, it gave little away; his jaw was tight and fixed, as it always was when Kaine was present. The only thing suddenly absent was his sharp tongue. “I’ll make this short, Khara, because I know you have other issues to deal with at the moment. I want what I have always wanted: you to join me.”
“And I, as I have stated before, do not wish to—”
“You were not properly motivated before,” he said, looking to the sky. “I think you’ll find that’s changed now.”
“Why is that?”
“Because I have an ultimatum for you—one I’m convinced you won’t ignore.”
“Confidence has long been the downfall of powerful men,” I cautioned.
At that, he smiled. “Here is the deal I’m willing to make you: join us so that we, like Oz, can be free.”
Unmade (Unborn Book 4) Page 11