First And Last

by Stacey Kennedy

  I snorted. “You all seem so sure of that, but I just hope your trust isn’t misplaced.”

  “It isn’t,” they all said in unison.

  Chapter Ten

  Back in the Otherworld, we’d said goodbye to the others and walked Finn and Haven home to the Witches House. After another round of congratulations and hugs, they went inside. Kyden and I made our way to Sabi’s.

  Just a few doors down, I read Sabi written in calligraphy on her door. I’d always been grateful for the mark of names on doors or I’d never find anyone in this place.

  At her door, I turned to Kyden. “I just hope she doesn’t mind.” Moving into our place for a little while probably wasn’t on her to do list.

  “It’s her duty.” Kyden gave a hard knock on the door.

  A moment later, Sabi answered and looked a little disheveled. Her long dark hair was a complete mess, her cheeks flushed, and her amber eyes, with cat-like pupils were a little wide. “What is wrong?” Her tone was urgent.

  “Er…” I laughed nervously. “Are we interrupting you?”

  She blushed and opened the door a little wider. Ryker appeared wearing nothing but a towel.

  My eyes widened. When did they get together? I hadn’t heard they were a couple, or even held the slightest bit of interest in each other. This little revelation surprised me.

  Ryker cleared this throat, tucked the towel in tight around his lower half. “What’s going on?”

  “We must talk with Sabi,” Kyden answered. “Is it all right if we come in?”

  “Of course,” Sabi replied, looking down her body. “Just give me some time to…ahhh…”

  “Pull yourself together,” I finished for her.

  She giggled and nodded. “Be right back.”

  As they headed off to the bedroom, Kyden and I sat down on the sofa. Sabi’s place was a Japanese marvel. Gray slate walls, gigantic painting of dragons on the wall, with low black couches. The look wasn’t my taste, but it was still nice nonetheless.

  Less than a minute later, Sabi joined us, looking much more appropriate for guests. “Sorry about that.” She sat down in the couch next to us.

  Oh, this I couldn’t hold in. I leaned forward a little and whispered. “I didn’t know you two were a couple.”

  She shrugged. “It’s new.”

  New usually meant dating not romping in the sheets. What kind of new was this? Love new or just friends with benefits? I was going to get to the bottom of this, but right now, we had more important matters to attend to.

  Ryker finally joined us, took a seat very close to Sabi. Surprise tickled a little. Since knowing him, he never seemed attached to anyone. Usually, it was a friend with benefits kinda thing. He seemed to want to stay close to her, needed to be near her.

  Kyden took my hand, and smiled, obviously sensing my happiness for the two. Sabi was a downright cool chick and Ryker was, well, just Ryker. A lot like Kyden. But he had become a close buddy.

  “What’s going on?” Sabi said, drawing me from my thoughts.

  I gave my head a shake, back in the moment, and got down to business on filling them in about everything.

  When I stopped, Sabi looked mildly frightened. “They’re summoning the Demon Lords? Like bringing them back here?”

  Ryker wrapped an arm around her and drew her in close to his side. It appeared to ease her slightly.

  “It appears so,” Kyden replied.

  “And you want me to what—stay with you?” She chortled.

  “It’s really the only way,” I told her. “We need to act quickly so that I can stop them but because your premonitions don’t give us much time this seems like the best option.”

  She looked at Ryker, then back at us. “Where am I going to stay?”

  Shit, I hadn’t thought of that. Not the couch. What kind of invitation would that be? Kyden burst out laughing at the horror flaying through me. I smacked his arm. “Shut up, you.”

  He winked at me. “We’ll have a room set up for you.”

  “How do you expect we do that when we only have one room?” There was no way I was sleeping on the couch. I needed space, thank you very much.

  Kyden arched a brow at me and Sabi and Ryker laughed. Then, I remembered, like a smack in the face, what exactly would take place. Oh, wasn’t I the stupid one now.

  “Oh, right.” I squirmed, a bit embarrassed. “Magic.”

  “All right,” Sabi said and stood. “Let me pack a few things and we can be off.”

  She took no time to get her things together and we all ventured over to gather Haven before going back to our place.

  Twenty minutes later, I stood in my living room, looked at Sabi’s bedroom that was now just off our living room.

  “There,” Haven said proudly, examining her masterpiece. “Looks nice, don’t you think?”

  Her ability with the Earth Element gave her the strength to manipulate anything attached to the earth. She could make stuff appear, or change, if she needed to. I gave my head a good, hard shake. “That’s so bizarre, I don’t even have words.” Seeing a room appear before your eyes takes a bit to get used to no matter how much magic I’d been around lately.

  Haven smiled big. “Who needs a designer when you have Haven the Extraordinaire?”

  I laughed. “Touché.” I reached down and touched the little bump on her belly. “So, how does it all work? I mean, you’re not even showing and you only have a few short months left. God, humans would envy you.”

  She glowed. Health exuded from her. Rosy cheeks, radiant skin, even her eyes seemed a deeper blue. “She’ll grow quickly. Give it a week or so and I’ll be out to here.” She made a big circle with her arms and even puffed up her cheeks to insinuate just how big she expected to get.

  “Let’s go, Haven,” Finn interjected. “You need your rest.”

  She grumbled something, then met my eyes. “He’s become more and more like Kyden every night.” She gave me a knowing look. “It’s very annoying.”

  I burst out laughing. Now, she knew what I went through. Looked good on her.

  After Finn and Haven left, I knocked on Sabi’s door. She answered it with Ryker sitting quietly on the bed. Talk about uncomfortable. “Er…do you have everything you need?”

  She leaned against the door and smiled. “Yes, thank you. If anything comes up I’ll come and get you.”

  “Okay, that works.” I was about to turn around, but said quickly, “The fridge is full—help yourself to anything.”

  She was already shutting the door before I even finished the words. She obviously had more important things to do than talk with me.

  “They need to leave,” Willow griped at my feet.

  I glanced down at her and gave her head a scratch. “It’ll just be for a little while, Willow.”

  She squinted her fluffy face and looked very unhappy about this situation. “Fine, but if that idiot—the Guardian—says one word to me, I’ll piss on his pillow.”

  Her threat was serious. I should know, she’d done it to me. I had other things to worry about right now so I ignored her little statement and looked back at Kyden.

  I sighed deeply, wanted desperately to have more time to put off this conversation. I’d dreaded this moment all night, but knew Kyden and I needed to have it.

  He was enthralled with the Diabolus Somes. His nose buried in the book. Sucking in a breath for bravery, I sat next to him on the couch and touched his hand.

  His gaze snapped up to mine and he leaned back, laced his hands behind his head. “Interesting read.”

  I eyed the book like a sworn enemy. “I’m sure it is.” Then, I took another deep breath, prepared for the fight ahead. “Listen, we have to talk.”

  His brow arched up. “We do?”

  I nodded slowly and searched for words to put this to him. “Okay, so…you know how Sabi is going to come get me when she sees something?” He nodded, intrigued. “Well…I think it’s…it see
ms like a good…”

  Kyden laughed. “What is it, Nexi?”

  “You should stay back.” Kyden’s brow arched, a bold look crossed his face, so I continued quickly, “Just until we know what we’re dealing with. We don’t know if my shield works against demons and you could get hurt.” I tensed and waited for the storm to hit.

  Kyden studied me a moment, then reached out to pick the book back up. “Makes sense.”

  I sat there dumbfounded. What the hell? No yelling? No demanding that he come? No punching holes in walls? Wait…what? “You’re okay with that?”

  He didn’t look up from the book. “I am.”

  “But why?”

  He laughed and met my gaze. “You get upset that I demand to join you, and when I say I agree with you, this upsets you too. Make up your mind.”

  “I’m not upset, it’s just so unlike you.”

  He cupped my cheek and ran his thumb across my lips. “I trust in you, Álainn. Besides, you’re right. My impulse to save you cannot be controlled so it’s best not to put ourselves in a situation like that again. Until we know if I can be shielded, I will yield.” He looked back to the book. “Be sure to call on Quinney so that you’re not there alone.”

  I sat there in silence and watched him. Holy shit. It happened. This never-ending battle between us finally reached its end and the biggest surprise of all was that he was the one succumbed.

  Of all the times I dreamed of this day, I expected to feel elated that he was the one to give in and I would be declared the winner of the never-ending fight. I felt none of that within me now.

  Only one thing captured my thoughts.

  A second later, I acted on that line of thinking and threw myself onto him. It surprised him, which showed just how quickly I acted. He hadn’t had time to even process my emotions, but it didn’t take long for him to grasp my intention. He lifted me up, carried me into the bedroom and slammed the door behind him.

  He reached for my kilt, but I stopped him and sank to my knees in front of him. “Oh no, this one is all for you.”

  It took him a second to free himself from his kilt, and the moment he did, I took him in hand, then into my mouth. Reward for good behavior, right?

  * * * *

  Not long after, I had stripped out of my gear and snuggled into bed next to him. He ran his finger down the length of my spine. “That makes you happy, does it?” he asked.

  “Very happy.” I lifted my head from his chest and looked at him. “I’ve waited a long time for you to come around and stop being such a jerk.”

  He arched a brow. “A jerk?”

  “Yes, a jerk. It’s about time you put some trust where it belongs.”

  He tapped the end of my nose with his finger and grinned. “If the roles were reversed would you behave differently?”

  I considered it. Would I allow him to fight without me? Especially if I knew he was in danger. Dammit! I hate it when he is right.

  He chuckled and pulled me closer into him. “As I thought.” He resumed running his finger along my back. “We’ll test this shield against Quinney to see if it will hold. Then, we’ll go from there.”

  “Look at us, Kyden, we’re compromising.” I really was quite astonished. “Whoever thought this would happen.” I sure as hell didn’t.

  “I don’t want to upset you. You’ve enough to deal with. I can put my wishes aside to stand behind you. That’s not a concern.” He gave my butt a little pat, then sighed. “We need to get back to the book.”

  I groaned. There was no putting off. “I’ll go.” I quickly jumped off the bed and headed for the door.

  “Where do you think you’re going?” Kyden demanded.

  “Getting the damn book.” I reached for the door handle.

  “Not like that, you’re not.” Kyden’s curt tone stopped me in my tracks.

  “Like what?” I looked down and realized I was naked. “Yikes.” I burst out laughing. “I totally forgot we weren’t alone.”

  I grabbed the bathrobe off the door, then went out to grab the evil thing. After taking the book off the coffee table, I returned to find Kyden had clicked on the night table lights and was just finishing putting up our pillows. I dropped the robe, jumped into bed beside him and ran my hands over the thick cover of the book. “Tell me, what does Diabolus Somes mean?” Since my skill in Latin was non-existent, his help in this department was very necessary.

  “Devil’s Remains.”

  I should have expected it to be something creepy, but wasn’t prepared since I shivered. Ignoring that, I opened the book and looked at the first page. It was so cryptic. There was some writing on it, but there wasn’t any sense of order. Just scribbles here and there. “What does this mean?” I asked, pointing to the words, Ego sum totus.

  Kyden leaned forward to look. “I am all.”

  Fear ran cold through my blood. The devil probably wrote this himself. I skipped through most of the literature part. I wasn’t interested in what he had to say and it would probably just scare the shit out of me anyway. I wanted to be able to sleep in the next year.

  Finally, some runes appeared. Page after page, runes with descriptions underneath flew by in front of me as we flipped through the book. I stopped at one that nearly jumped right off the page at me, and not in a good way either. A classic Pentagram, but had a goat’s head in the center.

  “What does that say?” I whispered pointing to occultus unus.

  “The hidden one.”

  I gulped and looked up at him. “This is very, very evil.”

  His gaze turned curious. “What makes you think that?”

  “I can just feel it. Something is very wrong with that rune.” I shook my whole body to rid it from the hebejebes and flipped the page, anxious to put that bit of horribleness to bed. Soon, I came upon a Pentacle. It looked normal enough, except this one was inverted slightly, and it practically glowed off the page. I looked at Kyden. “Does it glow to you?”

  “No.”

  “Weird. It’s glowing so brightly it’s hard to look at.” It really was that bright and hurt. My eyes squinted to adjust to the brightness. I ran my fingers across the rune and it tingled beneath my touch. Just as the rune before felt wrong, this one felt completely right. Looking at it, touching it—warmth and power spread through me.

  “That is an odd feeling you’re having, and one I have never felt from you before.”

  I examined the rune closely, unable to look away from it. “This must be what Azar meant when he said it would show itself to me.”

  Kyden nodded. “Let’s try something.” He jumped up and knelt in front of me.

  I burst out laughing.

  He arched a brow. “Problem?”

  “Er, yeah, look at your dangly bits. They just look so funny with you sitting like that.”

  He gave me a chastening look. “Will you focus?” He jumped off the bed, threw on his shorts, and knelt back down beside me.

  I laughed a few more times, then settled myself. Inappropriate I know, but when the funnies grab hold, sometimes they’re impossible to contain. “What exactly do you want to do?” I asked once I stopped smiling.

  “I believe Azar is onto something. I could feel it within you earlier. Something was there.” He examined me, typical show-nothing-on-your-face Kyden, but with the bond, I could sense he was completely enthralled. “Yet, it couldn’t come through. There’s a reason this rune shows itself to you.”

  Just as he reached for my hand, our door flew open and Ryker stormed in. I gasped and drew the covers up. “Knocking would be nice, you know.”

  “Come,” he stormed forward, pulled me from the bed. “It’s Sabi.”

  “Let go of her now,” Kyden roared.

  I ignored him, as did Ryker. Panic filled me. She had a vision. The urgency of this situation hit me. I dropped the sheets and ran to Sabi, who was slumped over the couch.

  Christ, that was fast! I wasn’t expecting it be
so soon. I reached out to her instantly and gave her a boost. She jumped to her feet dressed in a Hello Kitty nightdress. Who knew she’d wear such a thing? It was almost comical. Nothing in me could laugh and if I didn’t act now, another Demon Lord would be summoned. Oh, hell no!

  “We must go,” Sabi grasped my hand, and we ran toward the door.

  “Nexi!” Kyden shouted. “You’re…”