Chapter 15 Aaron
AARON
Seth was waiting for me in the Menaggio’s VIP club, along with Timothy and Miranda. I recognized a number of the gods from the Convergence in attendance, hanging about with cocktails. Ones I didn’t care to see again.
I couldn’t bring myself to even greet my friends before tearing into Seth.
“I t-told you—I told you even a vampire couldn’t pull that stunt off.
” Anger and grief shook every fiber in my being.
“Tony didn’t have to die if you just listened to me!
” I was yelling now. Maybe not a wise call since the god I was currently shouting down controlled my very will, but I couldn’t hold back.
“Tony?” Miranda asked, looking between us.
“A vampire stunt double,” Timothy supplied before I could. His voice was flat, but with one look I knew he was anything but. It was in his eyes. He’d been shaken to his core thinking it had been me that went up in flames.
I swallowed down the near irresistible urge to go to him, to hold him and remind him I was here. I was whole.
“And what did I tell you?” Seth said, unbothered to the point of boredom. “The crowd loved it. You just skyrocketed to the most followers on social media ever in the history of, well, ever.” He chuckled as he lifted his phone to show me the staggering numbers.
I didn’t care, and I didn’t want to be some idol.
The only reason I ever fell in love with stunts and extreme sports was because of how it made me feel. Because of the rush, the endorphins, the pride in achieving something that pushed my mind and body past its limits.
That was never what this was about for Seth. I felt so used and stupid for letting myself be used.
Looking at the numbers himself, Seth said, “The video is still flooding with views to see a vampire defy death. You’re more than just a daredevil, a handsome rogue. I just made you a god.” He was always a smug bastard, but there was a new edge to it.
“B-but a vamp—” I stopped, jaw tightening. “A vampire didn’t d-defy death.” Part of me was trapped in the moment. The other part was counting how long I’d been stuck.
I fought the stutter, but my emotions were white hot, and my P’s and D’s were caught up in an unforgivable web my brain and my tongue couldn’t bypass. The harder I fought it, the worse it got.
Seth rolled his eyes. “Well, this is just too pathetic. And exactly why I don’t let you open your mouth to do crowd work. We certainly can’t have everyone knowing what a dunce you actually are.”
The words slammed into my chest, striking parts of me I’d thought had healed years ago. My insides curled and blackened, transporting me to that dark place I’d visited on so many occasions after that surfboard slammed into my throat, leaving neurological damage in its wake.
Pathetic.
Weak.
Frustration built inside me, a red-hot backlog I couldn’t purge because the words refused to come.
My eyes burned with unshed tears as my tongue failed to shape what I wanted to say.
My voice caught behind a locked throat. My thoughts looped uselessly, tangling tighter every second as I failed to get them out.
They ricocheted through my head, clogging everything further until my face twitched and my speech broke into short, fractured bursts. My hands curled into fists so tight my fingers went numb.
“What the hell did you just say?” a dangerously quiet voice asked.
Through my blurred, watery vision, I caught Timothy’s face. His eyes darkened, and he was deathly still. For the first time, even as I continued to tic and stutter in painful humiliation, it registered that Timothy was the God of the Dead. And right now, he looked like impending death.
Seth didn’t even pause to consider the danger he might be in, articulating louder. “I said he’s—”
Power surged out of Timothy in a violent expansion, muscle and glowing blue energy flaring at once. Ribbons of hieroglyphs shuddered into existence around his body, vibrating with barely contained force, like live, wicked snakes ready to tear into the closest person nearby.
Timothy’s hand closed around the other god’s throat. Feet left the floor. Seth’s face flushed deep red as Timothy lifted him effortlessly, grip tightening with lethal intent.
Timothy’s eyes rounded as they turned to black marbles—inhuman, the same way they had when he took his ibis form.
“Never. Call. Him. Pathetic.” The words ground out of Timothy, heavy with dark, dangerous magic.
It was then I realized what this was really all about.
Seth meant for Tony to die, and he meant for Timothy to see it. He wanted Timothy to believe it was me and watch him lose control. With a quick glance around, I saw all the attending gods were watching the outburst too.
I was an idiot.
I tried to call Timothy’s name, to calm him down, but my throat locked again, breath stalling mid-chest. From the outside, I knew I must have looked like I was ticing, my jaw jerking as I fought for the word.
Even as he clawed at Timothy’s grip around his throat and his face turned red, then purple, Seth never stopped grinning.
Miranda unsheathed Bob, her teeth a feral grimace. She was waiting for Timothy to give her the go-ahead to end Seth. He’d be trapped in the blade again, for eternity this time.
“I can call him whatever I want,” Seth spat out so violently, his spittle hit Timothy on the nose.
“No,” Timothy said, his voice resonating through the room, not caring who heard, who saw him in his power. “You will not insult him or hurt him in any manner whatsoever. He may be blood-bonded to you, but you answer to me, the God of the Dead and keeper of souls.”
Warmth settled deep in my chest when he came to my defense, but a warning still prickled at the edges of my senses. Like we were standing on the edge of something big. Something terrible.
A slam of glowing green power forced Timothy back several feet, almost throwing him off-balance, but he regained his ground.
From under his lashes, Timothy sent a cutting glare at Seth.
Power sizzled in the air, crackling against the small hairs on my body and raising goose pimples across my skin.
Seth simply brushed off his suit. “Unfortunately, little Timmy,” he said with bored impertinence, “That doesn’t work for me anymore.”
“I gave you a chance, Seth—” Timothy started, but before he could finish, Seth raised a hand in my direction.
A scream of agony ripped out of some animalistic place inside me.
My feet lifted off the ground, dangling uselessly as white-hot pain engulfed me so fast, I thought I’d been set on fire.
The fibers of my entire body vibrated with violent convulsions.
My muscles clenched so tight I bit my tongue, hard.
It built and built until I was sure my eyes would squeeze out of my head and pop like grapes.
Wind rushed up through me, tightening into a violent spiral that pulled at me from every direction.
The smell of ozone stung the inside of my nose along with something bright like lemon and sunshine, while the copper tang of my own blood filled my mouth.
Energy ripped through me and out of me—a violent siphon that roared so loudly I couldn’t tell whether Timothy screamed my name or if I imagined it.
I was blind to everything except bright, hot swirling energy.
With a crack, my cheek hit the floor. I’d been released from whatever force hit me. I was on the ground, dazed, still feeling woozy from the intensity. It all happened so fast…
“Aaron. Aaron, are you okay?” a panicked voice asked as I was helped up.
Timothy held me to him as he patted my face and extremities, looking for injury. I buried my nose into his shoulder, inhaling his calming scent. “I-I’m okay.” Whatever happened, it unlocked my brain from the prison it had been stuck in. Still, I leaned heavily against Timothy to borrow strength.
I lifted my head in time to see Miranda charge Seth. He snapped his fingers, and she froze to the spot, her face etched with a deadly grimace.
Seth glowed with warm, bright light. It pulsed, filling the space. Gasps of surprise rippled through the room.
“What did you do?” Timothy rasped, even as he held me up.
“Your dog here was right to be suspicious. I have been a very naughty boy.” The curve of his lips made him look like the devil.
“While I personally haven’t been taking worship from souls of the living, he has,” Seth pointed at me.
“The more attention, the more followers, the more fans and views and attention from pathetic humans so starved for novelty, the supernatural, and honestly a good spectacle, he has been accruing a great deal of power without knowing it. A receptacle for power, an inert battery that can’t use its own energy.
But now that I’ve pulled that power through our blood-bond,” His words turned sonorous, the reverberations hammering deep into my bones.
“I am the most powerful god. I do not have to answer to you anymore. You will answer to me.”
With a snap of Seth’s fingers, Timothy fell to his knees before him.
A rumble had Timothy looking around at the gods witnessing his subjugation.
Dammit.
It wasn’t just about humiliation. Seth was making an example to prove to the rest of the gods that he was stronger than Timothy and it was working based on their expressions.
Even on shaky legs, I launched myself at Seth with a feral snarl that tore my throat raw.
My fangs extended to their full, aching length, saliva flooding my mouth with the primal anticipation of ripping into his flesh.
Every cell in my body screamed for his blood—not just to drink it, but to violently wrench it from his veins until he collapsed like a desiccated husk at my feet.
I was going to drain him dry until he didn’t have an ounce of strength left to hurt anyone.
I got within arm’s reach of Seth when my body ground to a halt, muscles seizing as though I’d slammed into an invisible wall.
“Ah, my little boy toy,” he purred. Then he snapped his fingers, and my arms and legs jerked around in an unnatural dance as something from above yanked my limbs.
Turning my gaze up even as I danced around, I caught sight of strings from a crosspiece of wood pulling taut in every direction from where they were connected to my wrists and knees.
My stomach flipped then flipped again in dawning horror as I took in that I was now wearing a flamboyant red, white, and black jesters outfit complete with puff sleeves and pants. The faint strains of a circus tune floated in the air.
Humiliation burned its way through my throat as I couldn’t stop or control my movements. The watching gods tittered with humor and delight.
“You dick pickle, I’m going to slice you from nose to naval,” Miranda snarled from where she was stuck.
Blue hieroglyphs shot out from Timothy with an audible whoosh, right at Seth.
I blinked and suddenly I was across the room, facing down the snapping whips of power headed right at me. Despite their cool coloring, a searing heat bloomed with every millimeter they swallowed between us.
I shut my eyes, bracing for impact, for whatever searing deadly power was about to slice through me.
“You see?” Seth purred again. “I have all the power now.”
I opened my eyes to find the pulsating tendrils of power near shivering with barely restrained energy as they stopped a mere inch in front of my face.
Looking past them, I met Timothy’s gaze. His face was screwed up with anger, pain, and what I could best guess to be regret.
“And I plan to keep it,” Seth snapped his fingers once more, and we disappeared from the room.