“You guys have lost your mind if you think I’m going to sit here while Havoc is out there.” I can’t leave Havoc. He’s my everything. We’ve suffered through so much together and he’s always been there for me. I can’t give up on him now.
Yoko kneels next to my bed. “We have everyone looking for the ones who are missing, Miles. Baron’s whole pack is out there. Johnson’s gone and Lanni’s gone too. We think Geoff has them.”
If Geoff has Havoc… I’m shaking just thinking about it. Once he finds out he can’t bind Havoc to him, he’ll have no reason to keep him. Or he could torture him. He doesn’t care what he does as long as he gets what he wants.
I just know I can’t sit here and hope he returns. “I’m going to go look for him—”
“You’re going to rest so you don’t die. There’s no choice here, Miles. If you go out there, you could die. Geoff has the city crawling with people looking for you. We don’t know who we can trust. They’ve found evidence that people working in the prison were in on it. They personally let Geoff in. Whether out of fear or… whatever he’s promising them… people have joined his side,” Yoko says. “You need to stay here until you feel better.”
“Fine,” I say, but they shouldn’t be dumb enough to believe I’d agree that quickly.
I innocently sit there as Leo looks me over and heads out the door. Then I reach for my water glass, but I make sure it looks like an accident when I push it off. “Ah shit,” I say as the water tilts off the side and hits the ground, splashing everywhere.
“I’ll get you another one,” Yoko says as she picks it up and heads toward the door. As soon as she’s out, I look over at the only thing left in the room that could stop me.
“Menace, I need to find him.”
He watches me for a moment before jumping from the bed to the windowsill.
“Oh, thank god. I thought I was going to have to stuff you in a pillowcase or something,” I say as I get up and push the window open. I feel woozy and dizzy, but I’m managing to keep my feet under me, so I slip through and creep toward the driveway. I start peeking through the windows of cars, looking for keys that could have been left in one.
“Menace, can you go inside and find some keys for me?” I ask.
He turns to the door just as I hear Yoko yelling something.
“Shit,” I hiss as I turn around and slam into a horse. A fucking horse.
Etienne’s horse.
“Hey, buddy,” I say as I pet Enzo. He’s too busy chewing on grass to care. How a dead horse can eat grass, I’m not sure, but he seems to be enjoying it.
“I’m sure you have some like… awesome connection to Etienne, but would you do me a super huge favor and let me ride on your back? See, Havoc is missing, and I need to find him, and I can’t run.”
The horse continues to chew.
Menace meows at me like I’m crazy talking to a horse.
“You’re a cat and you understand me,” I remind him.
He huffs.
“Please don’t kill me,” I say as I grab Enzo’s mane and pull myself up. It’s been years since I’ve ridden a horse, but I’ve had plenty of experience. I can guarantee that I’ve ridden more years than Etienne has been alive. Doesn’t mean the horse will trust me and not kick my head in. It clearly has a connection to Etienne that it doesn’t have to anyone else.
“Please?” I ask as I sit on the horse’s back. Menace meows, so I reach down to him and he leaps up, snagging my pants, but I catch him before he uses my flesh to help himself up.
Enzo extends his neck to tear some leaves off a tree before munching away. I click to him and squeeze my legs and am honestly a bit surprised that he starts to walk as the house door opens. The moment he starts trotting, I realize why this was such a bad idea. I feel every wound in my body and quickly urge him to a canter, a much smoother gait. He does so without qualm as I hold on to his mane with one hand and Menace with the other. It’s oddly nostalgic running through the field on the back of a horse while wishing to save Havoc.
Another time, many years ago, I was in a similar scenario. Havoc had been ambushed and taken captive while I’d been away. As soon as I heard, I jumped onto the back of my stallion and raced across the fields. The men had been slave traders, dealing with magical beings, and they didn’t realize that I would be quite pissed when I found him. At the time, I had armor that fit my horse that I would light on fire, making him look like something that crawled out of the pits of hell. Half the men ran in terror before we even reached them, the other half wished they had. Havoc was laughing when I saved him and reenacted the terror on the faces of the men for days.
I smile at the memory, hoping to push back any negative thoughts of what could have happened to him to keep him away from me for this long.
“Please be safe,” I whisper.
Menace meows at me, so I let the fingers of the hand holding on to him run over his soft fur.
“Thank you for saving me. You did a good job back at the prison,” I say.
He looks up at me and kneads his paws a little and I swear I hear a hint of a purr, but I bet he’d be angry if I said anything.
I wasn’t sure if I could find Havoc without our bind, but we’re connected enough that I know what direction to go. Since Enzo has no bridle, I gently squeeze my right leg and the horse veers to the left. In the still night, the only noise I hear is the sound of hooves beating on packed ground as pain and worry eat away at me.
The horse begins to slow, and I question if he’s tiring, but there isn’t even an elevation to his breathing. Even so, the squeezing of my legs and clicking won’t urge him on. Is Etienne calling him back? We’re still too far away—miles away still—and I’m in the middle of a field.
“Come on, buddy, can’t you ignore Etienne?”
He’s stopped now, but he weaves a little and I realize it’s like there’s an invisible barrier in front of him. I try one last time to urge him, and he puts a hoof forward but as the hoof falls, in the light of the moon, I see that there’s nothing left of his leg but bone.
Etienne’s magic must only work so far.
Enzo is hesitant but he takes another step, revealing another skeletal leg, head and neck changing with it. He turns his skeletal head to look at me even though it appears that he has no eyes, but it’s clear that he seems uncertain. I press my hand against his neck and feed him my magic. I have no idea what kind of magic Etienne holds or if there’s even a name for it, but I do know that I can aid magic. And if what he needs is more magic to make Etienne’s reach farther, then I can give it to him. When I open my eyes, his hair is back and his dark eyes are watching me. He drops his head and blows his nose before stepping forward.
“You don’t like that, do you, buddy?” I ask.
Enzo continues on at a slow lope, but he seems hesitant. I don’t push him because I don’t want to hurt him. And all too soon, he’s stopping again. I try to feed him more magic, but he tosses his head and weaves, telling me our journey together has come to an end.
“That’s okay. Thank you for getting me this far. You can go back to Etienne,” I say as I slide off his back. My legs feel weak and my body tired. I guess dying does that to a person.
I start walking with Menace by my side, but I don’t even know what I’m going to do. If he’s with Geoff, how will I stop him? I feel too weak to make it to a road that I can see. How will I fight? Maybe I’m an idiot for going out, but there’s no way I could lie in that bed with Havoc out here.
“I have to find him,” I tell Menace. “He may be… prickly toward others, he may be rude sometimes, and slightly evil… but I love him. I grew up without a family to love me or care for me. I associated people with coldness, hate, and pain. I knew nothing else and I feared that would be all there would be for me. And then I met Havoc.” I smile at the thought. “He was an asshole at first, and I was as wary of him as I was interested in him. I saw him as a means to escape hell, and then he became something so much more. He became my
support to the point that I’m not sure I could have done anything without him. He was always there for me, even if he pretended like he didn’t want to be or he was going to leave me behind. But I knew he cared because even when he had the option to, he never did. If I just had my fucking bind with him, this would be easier.”
Menace meows as he looks up at me.
“I’d pet you, but I feel like if I leaned over, I’d just topple to the ground. The road’s right there. Once I’m on the road, I’ll get someone to stop and drive me.” Drive me where? I don’t know. Thankfully, I can still feel Havoc. It must be from our centuries together.
The road can’t be more than a hundred feet away, but I can’t even fathom how I’ll go ten more feet.
“What about a little breather?” I say, feeling dizzy and nauseous. I touch my neck, but all I can feel is the bandage. I kneel down in the weeds and immediately sink to my ass. “I feel kind of stupid. Do you think I’m stupid? Now instead of trying to find Havoc, people are stuck looking for me as I just lie here in the weeds wishing I’d had time before I left to put my spell of immortality back on myself. I didn’t even put a fucking barrier up. I just lah-di-dahed the fuck out the door.”
I sprawl out onto my back, feeling like maybe just a moment flat on my back would help. Then once I rest, maybe I could use a spell of some kind that’s simple just to give me a leg up.
I hear a flutter of wings and my eyes snap open. I sit up so quickly it feels like my head nearly falls off from where my neck had been slit. Startled, I watch as Havoc drops to his feet in front of me, staggers, catches himself, then trips at my feet.
“Hey, babe,” he says, all cool and shit.
“Havoc…”
“Whatcha doing out here?”
“Just… enjoying the stars,” I say as my eyes water. “Dammit, Havoc.”
I crawl over to him as he holds his side with one arm and reaches out for me with an even bloodier arm. “What happened? You’re hurt!”
“Shh. I’m fine,” he says as he grabs my waist and pulls me onto his lap. I instantly sink into him. It’s like a weight has been lifted off me as relief floods through me. Am I dreaming? Could he really be here in front of me? Could this torturous night end on a good note?
“I thought…” A sob escapes me as I dig my fingers into his back. “Havoc…”
He grips onto me tightly. “Hey, Miles. It’s okay! I’ve been much worse. I’m fine. You’re the one that died, you asshole.”
“I didn’t die on purpose.”
He sinks into me, arms squeezing around me. “I thought I lost you. Etienne made it sound easy to bring you back, but he… it took so long.”
I tuck my head against his neck. “That… might have been my fault, not Etienne’s.”
“What?” Havoc asks as he pulls back. “Is this about you thinking you deserve to be punished for those people Geoff killed?”
“No,” I lie as I look away.
He reaches out and presses a tear into my cheek. “I’m okay. You shouldn’t have been so worried.”
“I thought he had you again,” I say, feeling like I can’t grab onto him hard enough. I know he’s hurt, and I should be careful, but I just want to feel every part of him. Squeeze him until he knows that he’s never allowed out of my sight.
“I’ve never seen you like this… Miles, I’m fine.”
“I know,” I say as I kiss him. I let go of his back with one hand and grab his face, kissing him gently. “I thought I lost you.”
“I’m sorry I worried you,” he says as he presses his forehead against mine.
“Why’d it take you so long to get back?”
“I managed to push him back far enough that they could lock him in the far side of the prison, but he had people with him. I think you fully enraged him by coming back. He thought he finally had access to your heart… to your power. God… if he got ahold of your power, there’d be no stopping him.”
I nod, fully understanding the consequences of it. “I heard he took Lanni and Johnson.”
“I was trying to stop him, but he was too powerful. He collapsed part of the building trying to attack me. I finally managed to get away, but I could tell he had people looking for me, so I hid. I didn’t want to risk them following me back to you guys. I couldn’t contact you through our link because it was severed when you died. I really wanted to tell you I was okay, but I didn’t want to move from my hiding spot when they were so close. And with Geoff’s connection to demons, if I opened a demon gate, I was afraid he’d notice. When it was finally safe, I slipped away, but Geoff has the city crawling with magic users who are specifically looking for us. There were a few close calls, but I finally got away, and that’s when I felt you down here. And lo and behold there you were, staggering around.”
“I was staggering, wasn’t I?” I ask, realizing that now that my adrenaline is gone, I feel exhausted.
“Yes, then you were sprawling.”
“I rode a horse here… it reminded me of the time I saved you with my flaming horse.”
He grins at me. “Their faces when you came in on this mount ablaze!”
“Yes,” I say as I kiss him. “I’m too tired to walk back.”
“I’ll carry you.”
I shake my head then realize that’s a horrible idea when your head and body aren’t very well attached. “You’re hurt!”
“So are you!”
“Then Menace can carry us,” I say as I reach over to the cat.
Menace makes a huffing noise.
Instead of getting up, I tuck my head against Havoc’s neck and contemplate going to sleep like this, but he really should be looked over. “Shift, I’ll carry you.”
“I’m not making you carry me; I’m fine.”
He eases me off his lap and stands up. Gently, he pulls me to my feet with him. I hang on to him as he runs a thumb over my cheek. “Don’t scare me again.”
“Same for you!”
“Never… leave me,” he whispers. “Please.” He holds me to him and runs his fingers down my back and I just feel tension leaving me.
“I won’t. We need to get you back to them so they can help you. Shift and I’ll carry you.”
Havoc gives me a look like I’ve lost my mind. Maybe I have. “Let me carry you.”
Now he’s lost his mind. “Havoc, you’re bleeding, my wounds are stitched up.”
“Your head looks like it’s going to fall off.”
“It’s not going to fall off. My bones didn’t get severed. My head’s not just going to topple off.”
“And you were just sprawled on the grass staring up at the sky because…?”
“The stars are pretty, obviously.”
He sighs and reaches for me.
I stare at him in disbelief. “You’re not carrying me! You’re hurt.”
“I’m a demon.”
“Demon… shit! I forgot to rebind Iya! Sam is probably losing his mind. Hold on, let me summon Iya and he can carry us.”
“Good idea.”
I grab a stick and draw his summoning circle in the dirt. I’m a little anxious that I’ve taken too long and someone else has nabbed him or Geoff has realized he’s free. I would feel like shit telling Sam that I can’t get him back. But I’ve literally never summoned anything faster.
And out he comes as naked as the day he was born.
“Is whipping your clothes off the first thing you do when you go back to the demon realm?” I ask.
His eyes are huge as he grabs me and pulls me into a hug. “Iya thought you had left him forever!”
“I’m sorry for leaving you alone so long,” I say as his flaccid penis hangs awkwardly between us. I can feel it a little and it’s creeping me out. Must creep Havoc out even more because he slips his hand between us and pushes Iya’s hips away. Iya won’t let go, though, so now we’ve got this weird hug thing going on with our asses pushed out and Havoc kind of between us, but not really joining the hug.
“Iya thought you w
ere gone forever. I-I thought you died. The sever of the bind was like someone who died, and I was very sad.”
I pat his broad shoulder. “Aw, I’m okay. I promise.”
“Good. No more dying.”
“I sure hope not!” I say as I pet his fluffy white coat. “Can you help us get back to the safe house? Havoc’s hurt and so am I.”
“Yes! Of course!” Then he grabs me around the waist and Havoc around the waist and picks up both of us, like he’s just going to carry two grown men miles back to a house.
“Iya, Havoc can shift!” I say. “You don’t need to carry us like this!”
“Huh. I forgot about that.”
He puts Havoc down who then shifts into a raven before landing on my shoulder.
“I feel very awkward with you carrying me,” I say. “Especially with your huge penis right below me.”
“You think my penis is huge?” Iya asks as he holds me with both hands.
“I feel like I walked into that, and I feel like an idiot being carried. It was so much cooler riding the horse here.”
“I could get on my hands and knees and you could ride on my back!” Iya decides and when his legs start buckling, I vigorously shake my head.
“No! Please, no!” How can this day get worse? Can it get worse?
“Fine, fine,” he says as I pull Havoc off my shoulder so he’s not sitting so precariously and hold him to my chest. His feathers are ruffled and wet with blood. When we reach the horse, we find Etienne there as well as Badrick, who is watching us.
“Etienne, I have found them!” the forest spirit exclaims.
“Thank you for pointing that out! I never would have noticed them ten feet from my face!” Etienne says, voice coated in sarcasm.
“You are very welcome. Humans have such poor eyesight. It’s a wonder they’re still alive!” Badrick says, not at all noting Etienne’s sarcasm.
“Wow, he could drop you and catch you with his penis,” Etienne says.
Ah yes, my day just got worse. “Shut it, Etienne.”
He shrugs. “You stole my horse, so I should be able to say whatever I want.”
“He wanted to be stolen!”
Familiar Beginnings Page 12