Joran’s gaze flicked down to the blood on his shirt. With the injury he had, it would be hard to do much of anything when it came to fighting.
He led Nicole silently into the barn and frowned. Entering it had proven far easier than he expected. Just like the last time they had been in there, the Glycons were in the stables, each of them connected to tubes flowing blue liquid into them. He tried not to think about what the liquid represented.
The essence of the very being of hybrids was being pumped into these creatures. Their lives. Probably their souls. There was no telling how many hybrids had to die to make the product.
Movement caught Joran’s eye, and he found himself staring at Agatha herself. The pale woman seemed slightly more disheveled than the last time he’d seen her. She also no longer tried to hide the burn scars on her face. Instead she seemed to wear them as some sort of badge of honor. Or maybe a reminder of her hatred for his people.
Agatha turned and looked directly at him. Joran stilled.
For a moment, he was certain it was all over, and she would call for her Glycons to rip them both to shreds, but she did nothing. Instead she just continued to stare with her blood red eyes. It took a full minute for her to glance away.
Had she not seen him? It seemed unlikely given her heightened hybrid-like senses and attention. Maybe being in the blue haze put them in a different interface with reality or a different space. It was hard to tell really.
Erebus was where they were, so maybe it was the space in between worlds. Or maybe it had something to do with the stone. In either event, they were both near her but somehow invisible.
Regardless, the blue stone was the cause of this all, and if the hybrids could get their hands on it, they could end the threat of Erebus and stop Agatha.
Pain throbbed in Joran’s side as he stepped toward where Agatha had been.
He was in no shape to go after the stone, and above all, he needed to find a hiding spot for Nicole. They could figure out the rest after she was safe.
Joran turned to where she stood unmoving behind him. The whole time he’d barely heard her even breathe.
He nodded to the back of the room. A ladder led up into the rafters. It was likely where they stored the hay when there were horses and not men being kept there.
The pair crept up the steps and made their way to the small loft. The space was enough they wouldn’t be noticed, and it would give him a moment to think. Joran sank down into a pile of old hay and sighed.
He’d lost more blood than he cared to consider. This could end badly for him. He needed to fight and protect Nicole, but it was so hard to concentrate.
“I’m just going to close my eyes for a moment,” Joran said.
His words were already starting to slur, and the space around them was fading away, but it couldn’t be helped. Maybe if he just slept for a bit while they were safe, he’d feel better.
The blue world faded to black.
Chapter Sixteen
Nicole sighed and watched as Joran’s chest rose and fell as he slept. It hadn’t been more than thirty minutes, but she was already starting to worry. The bit of cloth she’d found in the loft hadn’t stopped the bleeding, and although she didn’t know a ton, she had taken first aid courses for the job.
The situation wasn’t good. Just because he was a hybrid didn’t mean he couldn’t bleed out. They needed to get out of there and get to a hospital, but she had no idea how she was going to pull that off with a severely wounded man.
Nicole reached down to pull off the now blood-soaked cloth to look at the jagged wounds again. A small bit of his tattoo peeked from beneath the shirt.
She furrowed her brow and looked down at her hand. When they had touched, there had been a blue light. It was after that she’d noticed her hand was healed. As strange as it might be, instinct was telling her to touch the tattoo again.
Tentatively she reached out but pulled back her fingers just before touching. What if in doing this, she only hurt him more?
Nicole sighed. She just didn’t know what to do.
Joran took in a shallow, shuddering breath, and she knew she couldn’t waste any more time. She either touched his tattoo or risked going to find help outside, and the latter assumed she could even find help.
With renewed resolve, Nicole lifted Joran’s shirt higher and placed the palm of her hand flat over the tattoo.
Bright blue light filled the air. This time she looked straight at it despite the blinding glare. The lacerations on the side of his body started to close. Her own body hummed inside. It was like whatever was inside of her was the force that was healing him.
A warm hand wrapped weakly around her wrist. “Nicole,” Joran whispered.
She only pressed harder as he tried to pull her hand away. “It’s not done yet,” she said through gritted teeth. She could feel her head starting to spin and knew she wouldn’t be able to take much more. But it didn’t matter. She had to save him.
With a grip much stronger than before, Joran pulled her hand from his chest. Nicole collapsed onto him and breathed hard as she tried to regain herself.
Soft warm arms wrapped around her, and she sighed, knowing that she was able to help him recover enough.
“You shouldn’t have done that,” Joran mumbled against her ear.
Nicole rolled her head to the side and looked up to his face. A tear trailed down her cheek, but she was too exhausted to do anything about it.
“You were dying,” she whispered.
Joran leaned down and pressed his mouth to hers. Once again, she found herself safe in his arms. In the blue haze, it was almost easy to forget everything that was going on around them. This wasn’t a dream, but a dangerous nightmarish reality.
Nicole leaned in and deepened the kiss for a moment, swirling her tongue with his, glad to just have him there with her.
When the pair pulled away from one another, each was panting with the passion they had felt earlier in the night.
Nicole tried to sit up but found her muscles shook too much.
Joran helped prop her up against a bale of hay. “You used too much of your energy,” he mumbled.
Nicole frowned at him. “I don’t even know what I did, but it was the only thing I could do, so you’re welcome.”
A small smile played at the corner of his mouth. “Thank you.”
The smile was still in place, but the levity of his look said something entirely different. So much was going on behind the surface, and each time she saw him, Nicole only wanted to learn more.
Joran brought her hand to his lips. “You saved me, in more ways than one. This is what it means. I’m your hybrid, and you’re my Vestal. We were two separated halves of one whole, and now we’re together. I hope you believe that now. I know it seems like a lot, but we were meant to be together.”
Nicole gave him a shallow nod. Her heart thumped so loudly, it was a wonder it didn’t wake the Glycons below them.
Was this love? She couldn’t really say. Never in her life had she felt this way about a man before. Everything he said about being meant for one another made perfect sense. It felt right. When she saw him lying there bleeding out, it had been the scariest moment of her life.
She snorted to herself. Her scariest moment was the chance of him dying, not the frightening monsters down below them or the even more terrifying monster in the woods.
As if right on cue, a scream filled the air around them. Her eyes found his instantly.
Joran frowned. “He found us.”
He knew it was only a matter of time before Erebus healed and found them again. He still wasn’t sure if it would count as good fortune or not that Nicole had saved him. Sure, he’d be able to fight Erebus, but now she was too weak to run, and if his Vestal died, he might as well let the creature kill him.
“Shit,” Joran said.
They needed a plan, but there really wasn’t time to come up with one.
“Stay up here,” he said to her. “I’ll fight him off
. When you think you have a clear shot to the door, you run like hell.”
“No.”
Joran clenched his hands into fists. Never before had he wanted to wring Nicole’s neck, but this was one of those moments.
“What the hell do you mean no?”
Nicole shook her head and patted her gun. “No way in hell I’m going to leave you to try and die again.” A hard look settled in her eyes. “I almost lost you once, and I’m not going through that again. I can shoot, and I’ll do whatever I have to in order to keep you alive.”
Joran was stunned.
She wanted him alive. He was important to her. He’d explained it and hoped she would understand, but now she’d proven to him that she truly did feel the connection as he did. He leaned forward and placed a soft kiss on her lips.
“I love that you want to save me, but that’s my job,” Joran whispered. “That’s what it means to be a hybrid to a Vestal.” With one shove, he pushed her back as his other hand unlatched her gun belt. “I’ll be back.”
Nicole blinked.
Without turning to look at her, Joran kicked the ladder to the floor. It clattered down below. He then climbed to the edge and jumped down with a thud. He tucked Nicole’s gun into his pants and tossed the gun belt to the ground.
He glanced around. The Glycons hadn’t even flinched at the sound of him jumping down. Another scream came from near the door.
The air drew cold around him. Frost chilled the glass containers surrounding the Glycons and its icy touch spread like a web up the darkened windows.
Darkness seeped through the door. It almost seemed to ooze around him, and the sight of it made Joran scowl.
“Show yourself like a man,” he shouted.
The darkness stilled, then began to pool itself into one area, building and building until some semblance of a being stood in front of him. Two big blue eyes shined at him through the black.
“Bravery is for the weak.”
The words were spoken in a strange manner, as if they hadn’t even been said aloud but just appeared in his brain. Joran hadn’t heard something, but he understood what Erebus was saying.
A chill passed over the hybrid, and he understood the connection they shared. It was like the two called to one another, urging the beginning of the battle.
Joran growled. “Evil never wins, motherfucker.”
Chapter Seventeen
“Damn you, Joran.”
Nicole had never been so furious in her life. Not only had Joran stopped her from getting down to help, but he’d taken her gun as well.
Shaking from both exhaustion and anger, she moved over to the loft ledge. She managed to hold her gasp in at the sight of Erebus and Joran squaring off together.
The monster didn’t even look like something she could easily wrap her mind around. A flowing and shifting gargantuan shadow roughly in the shape of a man towered over the already large Joran, two blue eyes peering out from the rough area of its head.
She couldn’t get over how huge the monster was. She’d seen it in her dream and again in the blue dome, but here, something seemed off, different, like he’d chosen a particular form.
As if he knew she was watching, Erebus turned to look at her. “My wife.”
Nicole’s heart pounded all the way to her throat. She recognized the words, but it wasn’t like she’d heard them with her ears. It was like they were coming from inside her.
“Over my dead body,” Joran growled. His eyes glowed bright blue.
The dark form shifted into a more clearly defined shadow man, and Erebus smiled. “As you wish.”
The monster moved first, but Joran met him in the middle. The pair moved so quickly Nicole’s eyes had trouble tracking them and trying to made her sick to her stomach. The hybrid was throwing punches and narrowly dodging sickening dark claws. Blow after blow landed, but Erebus didn’t flinch.
Her gun, which had been tucked into Joran’s pants, flew out after the monster punched Joran into a wall. From her vantage point, she couldn’t see where the weapon landed.
Nicole pulled away from the edge and swallowed hard. She needed to get down there to help. If she could get her gun, she might be able to do something. Joran had already proven Erebus could be hurt by a gun earlier, and all of the hybrid’s muscles and speed didn’t seem to be helping him win.
Deep down, Nicole doubted she’d even be able to hit Erebus without possibly hitting Joran, but doing something was better than sitting in the loft like a child. She was a grown-ass woman with skills that she could surely use if given the chance. The shadow monster and possible god was a little outside her experience range, but that didn’t matter.
Nicole crawled back over to the edge and stared down at the ground below, somehow it seemed even further away than it did before. She swallowed hard.
“All I need to do is lower myself down and get as close to the ground as I can.”
Her words sounded hollow, but she just hoped she could convince herself all would be well.
Not giving herself a chance to back out, Nicole slid her legs over the edge. They dangled there for a moment before she felt comfortable enough to lower herself farther.
When she was hanging just by her hands, she glanced down to the floor. It still seemed so far away, but there wasn’t much choice at that point.
Nicole let go and landed hard on the floor. Her hip throbbed with pain, and she was certain there would be a nasty bruise, but nothing seemed to be broken.
She moaned a little as she turned to her side, just in time to see Erebus slash viciously at Joran and narrowly miss his thigh. Nicole swallowed the bile that rose in her throat.
Her gun. That’s what she needed to find.
After pulling her pained body up slightly, Nicole crawled across the floor, trying not to draw much attention to herself.
There, nearly five feet from the door, she spotted the dark edge of her gun’s grip.
Joran and Erebus flew through the air, both growling. The impact from their bodies hitting was so loud it almost sounded like claps of thunder. If she were going to make her move, she needed to do it quickly.
The two opponents dashed to the middle of the room again, and Nicole took her chance. She sprinted like she’d never done before and dove for the gun. As her fingers grabbed hold of the piece, she heard a loud crash behind her.
Joran struggled to stand from the other side of the room. Blood dribbled down his brow and from a large gash across his stomach.
“Come with me,” came a voice, but not Joran’s.
Nicole turned and found Erebus standing in front of her, the shadow man looming over her. She struggled to move but found herself frozen. Not from fear but something else. As if she didn’t control her own body.
“N-n-n-n-o,” Nicole said. Her teeth chattered as she struggled to respond. Just as it had that night several days before, her breath billowed out around her.
“Hey,” Joran shouted. “We have some unfinished business, you son of a bitch.”
Nicole wanted to cry out but found herself still locked in place as Erebus turned to look at Joran.
“When I kill you, the girl is mine. You cannot win against me.”
As soon as Erebus stepped away, Nicole fell to the floor, her body once again hers.
Joran’s stomach burned as he met Erebus in the center of the room. If it weren’t for Nicole, he might have given in. It was clear the monster had the upper hand in his own world. He was too strong and too fast. It didn’t seem like a single one of Joran’s blows had done much to even slow Erebus down.
The hybrid ducked as the beast barreled toward him again. This time Joran threw all his force into a punch into the monster’s thigh. The impact sent a tremor through Joran’s body, but his reward was a loud crunch underneath his fist.
Erebus screamed. The sound made Joran’s ears ache, and he knew the unearthly sound was meant to cause pain. It was all the monster knew how to do.
Joran moved back from the strange
creature and stared hard at him, his jaw tight. Was Erebus really a god? He sure as hell hoped not. If had been hard for many of the hybrids to even think they might be a form of the Atlantean gods but to think they were related to something like this made his stomach churn.
“I will make her my wife.” Erebus grunted at him.
Joran could see that his blow had done more damage than it previously looked like, and he wondered just how powerful the creature actually was, or maybe trying to mess with people somewhere other than dreams was too much, too soon. It could have taken too much power to manifest in a more physical form, even if he’d not made it to the true real world.
“I don’t think she’s into freaky godlike monsters,” Joran growled.
Erebus stopped moving. A loud, ear splitting laugh echoed around Joran.
“I will consume her light and join your world as I am meant to.”
Joran swallowed the bile that rose in his throat.
“Then I will rule over you all,” Erebus continued, “and there will be nothing to be done.”
Pure burning rage pumped through Joran’s veins. No way in fuck was he letting that happen. Nicole was his. She wasn’t a light to be consumed for some moldy old chaos god. She was to be cherished. And that’s exactly what he intended to do, but first he needed to kill a god.
Joran launched himself at Erebus, taking him by surprise as the two tumbled to the floor. The monster’s claws raked down the sides of the hybrid’s arms, but Joran ignored the pain and pushed further.
“I’m never going to let that happen,” the hybrid roared.
Erebus grinned at him. His claws slammed deep into Joran’s thigh. “And what does a puny boy like you plan to do? You’re nothing before me, even in this partial form.”
“I’m going to rip your head clean off!” Joran roared loudly. He used the pain and anger he’d been holding onto to help him reach out and grab Erebus by the head. He twisted, and a loud crunch followed.
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