“But then why would Sroasha want me to kill Nick? Especially if he wasn’t the one who destroys everything?”
Simi tsked at her. “Make total sense, Akra-Kody. ‘Cause if the bad Malachai demon-boy had already kilt you and Akri-Nick, then he’d be stronger. So the best way to beats him would be to kills his father afore he’s borned.”
“She’s right. It’d be the only way to stop him, especially if you don’t know who he or his mother is.”
Nick scratched his head. “I’m still so confused by that. If I’m in love with Kody and I know it, then I know I didn’t two-time her with someone else. I’m not that kind of dirtbag.” He jumped as his phone rang and startled him. “Sheez!” Grabbing it, he saw it was Virgil again. Sheepishly, he answered it.
“Where are you?”
“Sorry. Had a little demon trouble to take care of. We’re on our way. Be there in a few.” He hung up. “I have to meet Virgil and go to the police station.”
Kody’s eyes widened. “What?”
“Yeah. It’s good to be me.” He sighed. “Let me get this over with and then we can clean this mess up.”
“I’ll tell Caleb to meet you there. Just in case you get stuck.”
He started to tell her not to be so paranoid, but they were talking about him. Yeah, with his luck, a backup plan was always a smart idea. Things tended to go sideways as soon as he lifted his head off the pillow. Sometimes before he even opened his eyes in the morning.
Sliding the phone into his pocket, he faced Takeshi. “Anything I need to know going into this?”
A deep, dark red light flickered in his eyes. “The future is determined by the decisions you make every second of the day. Victor and victim. Both come from the Latin word, victus. To vanquish or be vanquished, yet the original meaning of victim was to be a living entity killed and offered in sacrifice to some higher, supernatural power.”
Those words sent chills over Nick. “Invictus.” It was the tattoo on Ambrose’s arm that meant unconquerable. Never subdued.
Like his friends Bubba and Mark always said, you might kill me, but I’ll be taking you to hell with me so that I can chain you to the throne of Satan myself and spend the rest of eternity whupping your ass. That was the Southern way.
It was also very Cajun and vintage Malachai.
“No dang demon kills me and lives. On that you can bank.” Nick held his hand out to Takeshi.
Takeshi smiled as he shook it. “That’s the Ambrose I know. Take care. I’ll be seeing you, kid.” He vanished and left Nashira.
Kody frowned. “Caleb isn’t answering his phone.” She hung up. “Can you reach him?”
Nick didn’t bother with the phone. He used his powers to call out for his surly bodyguard. “Yo! Baby Cay-Cay? I’m doing something stupid and dangerous. You gonna come knock me in the head for it? Or do you plan to let Simi have all the fun honors?”
Caleb didn’t answer.
An awful feeling went through him.
Where was Caleb?
Kody swallowed hard. “He’s not answering you either, is he?”
He shook his head. “I can’t go to Virgil until I make sure Caleb’s okay.”
“I know. We’ll meet you there.”
They all teleported to Caleb’s front door. Nick would have gone inside since he had permission to get past Caleb’s sigils, but he wasn’t about to pop in alone when he didn’t know what was on the other side, waiting to devour him. While he was about as reckless as anyone could get he wasn’t particularly stupid as that tended to be fatal in large doses.
So he paused until Simi, Nashira and Nekoda caught up to him. Then he knocked on the door of Caleb’s huge antebellum mansion. The sound echoed through the place.
No one came to the door.
Nick passed a grim stare to the women. “All right. I’m going in first. Simi, anything rears its head, barbecue it up.”
Rubbing her hands together, she smiled so wide it showed off her fangs. “Oh goody! The Simi knews there was a reason she loved her demon-boy!”
Not wanting to think about that, Nick took the knob in his hand and used his powers to unlock it. He opened it slowly, expecting snot-demons, hell-monkeys … who knew what to come flying at him.
But there was nothing in the foyer. Dark and quiet, the house seemed abandoned.
“Caleb? Vawn? Aeron? Xev? Anyone? Bueller? Bueller?”
Snorting at his joke, Nashira jerked her chin toward the staircase. “Upstairs. I heard a groan.”
Nick bolted for the steps and took them two at a time. He didn’t slow until he reached Caleb’s upstairs study where he found them wounded and bleeding. “Oh my God!”
In his orange demon form, Caleb was flat on his back and lying with a blood-soaked cloth over his abdomen. “Not exactly the right entity.” Then, he groaned.
Aeron grimaced. “Be speaking for yourself, demon. When I lay me hands on the bloody knackers, I’ll be teaching them what it is to come at a war god unawares. Ain’t been hurt like this since the time I ran afoul of The Dagda.”
Vawn nodded in agreement as he drew a ragged breath. “They came upon us like a pack of jackals. So fast we ne’er saw them until they had us all bleeding.”
“Who were they?” Nick knelt beside Caleb while Kody checked on Aeron.
“Sephirii.”
Nick froze at the last word he expected out of Caleb’s mouth. “Pardon?”
Kody shook her head. “That’s impossible. They were all put down.”
Caleb pushed himself slowly to his feet to face her. His features were strained and earnest while he held his makeshift bandage against his ribs. “Yeah, I know. I was there. I saw them fall. But I also led my army against and for them for hundreds of years. Believe me, I know a Sephiroth sword when it cuts me.” He pulled the cloth away to show them the grisly wound on his stomach. “Nothing else looks like this, cuts as deep or burns half as much.”
Nick screwed his face up at the painful sight. “Bruh! There’s ladies present. Cover that!”
Kody ignored his outburst. “Jared is the only Sephiroth left and he’s imprisoned. His sword was destroyed when they enslaved him.”
“Yeah, I heard that lie, too.” Caleb pointed back at his wound. Then he threw his head back and let out a shout that practically shook his rafters. “Shadow! Get your rank, worthless carcass here. Now! Don’t you dare drag your ass or I’ll kick it every step from here to Avalon and back.”
“Sheez almighty, demon. What’s your dama—” the disembodied voice broke off as a man materialized in front of them and he saw Caleb’s wounds. “Oh … you really are damaged.”
About half a foot shorter than Nick, he appeared to be mid twenties, with hazel gray-blue eyes that held a storm inside them. The man’s hair was a strange shade. Neither light nor dark, it held strands of both and managed to fall between the two colors. And he wore it pulled back into a short, tight ponytail. The one good thing about him was that unlike Aeron, Kaziel and Vawn, his British accent was light, pleasant and easy to understand.
Caleb glared at the man as if he could rip his throat out. And the funny thing was, he didn’t react to Caleb’s venom at all. He was so cool about it, he practically bled icicles.
“So Shadow, explain to me how it is we were just attacked with Sephirii swords.”
Shadow blinked twice before he glanced around at each of them. Still so nonchalant that Nick admired his ability to show nothing. Dang, to have that amount of control over his emotions. He’d never get in to trouble for anything. “No idea.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
“So, you’re telling me that you really destroyed every last one of them like you were instructed to do after the Primus Bellum?”
Only then did his facade crack. In fact, his expression was the same one Nick got whenever his mom asked if he was the one who’d forgotten to put the toilet seat down. Which she already knew the answer to since he was technically the only guy in the house—and Xev didn’t count because he was in the disguise of a cat and his mom didn’t know it. And well, the nasty buggar never forgot to put it down once he was finished. All that aside, Nick hated it whenever she pulled that crap with him, as it was grossly unfair. Although, to be honest, he’d tried to blame it on space aliens a couple of times.