Chapter 43 #2
Liam’s blood cloaked the air, yet they breathed normally, unaffected by the scent. Maybe the hooded man was old enough to have conquered his self-control, but Nicholas doubted that to be the case for the others.
He glanced at Kyrin’s man again, counting the months since he’d last seen him.
Nicholas supposed he could have regulated his bloodlust during that time, but Nicholas’s pulse still ramped up at the sight and smell of it, even if he didn’t outwardly react.
These men weren’t impacted at all, like maybe blood wasn’t what sustained them.
That was where the dots stopped connecting for Nicholas.
He absently reached into his pocket for Gabriel’s lighter, feeling steadied once his hand closed around it.
Gabriel.
He’d help him. He’d save him if he knew where to find him. He’d do what Nicholas was too afraid to attempt himself.
Opening his mental doorways would mean he’d know Nicholas was in danger. Gabriel would feel his overwhelming fear, and so would Marcus and Hamza—although not as strongly.
They wouldn’t know where to find him, but St. Michael’s would be one of the places they looked. Nicholas didn’t know what this threat was, though, didn’t know if it was something they could defeat. He wouldn’t put them in danger until he knew. Not even if it meant saving his friend.
Turbulent waves rolled low in his stomach, mimicking nausea, rising higher. It wasn’t sickness that afflicted Nicholas. It was his beach.
“Let him go,” he tried again. “He can’t give you what you’re here for.”
He had no idea who or what they were after, but their leader was inhuman—he was sure of it. If anyone could help him or be a more appealing victim, it was Nicholas.
Nicholas felt something press lightly against his skull, an invisible hand. He didn’t dare reach for it.
“You are of no use to me.”
Did he not realize what Nicholas was? Could he not detect that he, too, wasn’t human?
The sensation of something breathing along the column of his throat said the man did. Nicholas curled his fingers around the hem of Gabriel’s wet jacket, resisting the urge to raise the collar to shield his neck.
“You are like him, though. The one I look for. Even if you beg and bargain like a filthy mortal.”
Nicholas recoiled at that, his old friend shame wrapping his arms around him.
He was gravely outnumbered, but it never occurred to him to rely on anything but his humanity to get him and Liam out of this situation.
Partly because he was afraid of what Father Murphy would think of him if he knew, if he saw…
And because he wasn’t a killer, and didn’t think he ever could be.
It didn’t matter what these men had been turned into—or if it was sorcery that kept them obedient—blood pumped through their veins. What if they all weren’t bad? What if they had families who cared about them? What if they could be fixed?
No, Nicholas would not lay a hand on them.
“Who are you looking for?” Nicholas asked.
Something close to intrigue swirled within the depths of the man’s obsidian gaze.
“Al haaress,” he replied in Gabriel’s native tongue. Nicholas recognized the melodic cadence.
But unlike in his dreams, Nicholas couldn’t translate it, and whatever he had been able to translate while asleep had never stayed with him.
“Who?”
The man’s smirk seemed victorious, as if he’d scored a point in a game Nicholas didn’t know they were playing. It’d been a test, because what massas dimae, or witch, wouldn’t have understood him?
One who hadn’t been birthed in Saraad.
“The Guardian.”
“Of course,” Nicholas replied. “The Guardian. I-I don’t know him.”
The man chuckled, an evil, cunning sound, striding leisurely for the altar. The glassy-eyed men holding Liam handing him off.
Nicholas advanced a step, his unrelenting body of water humming its approval, urging him onward.
Liam looked small and frail against the much larger man’s chest, his hair bunched inside his fist. He prayed and pleaded for them all to leave, for them to let Nicholas go.
The man withdrew a nasty-looking blade from within the folds of his long coat, bringing the serrated edge to Father Murphy’s throat.
“Don’t!” Nicholas’s eyes pulsed cold, his voice exuding authority.
His tide rejoiced.
Liam’s eyes bulged, and Nicholas didn’t need a mirror to know his gaze glowed sapphire blue.
“Who are you?”
“I’m no one,” Nicholas said, and the blade pressed deeper.
“He’s just a kid,” Liam struggled to say. “An innocent young man.”
Nicholas slowly advanced on the altar. The army of men along the outskirts reacted, closing in. The ones packed into the balconies leaned forward, waiting for the signal to leap.
“Careful,” the man warned. “You will be dead before the tip of my blade reaches the other end of his throat. Now, who are you, and how are you here?”
Nicholas stopped, shocked that he’d been moving to begin with.
But what made him think he could kill Nicholas? Was it that he had numbers on his side? Or because whatever he was held dominance over a hybrid?
“What do you want with The Guardian?”
The man’s expression changed, making the lethal calm he’d exuded before seem like childish amusement now. He’d clearly grown bored with Nicholas and would kill him and Liam both, with or without the answers he sought.
Why were they here in the first place? Why, of all places, would whoever they searched for be inside these church walls?
Nicholas held Father Murphy’s terror-stricken gaze, thinking back on the voicemail he’d received. What had he wanted to tell him before the message cut off?
Did he know who The Guardian was? And if so, why would he protect him at the cost of his own life? At the expense of Nicholas’s?
Maybe he knew nothing. Maybe the hooded man was mistaken. Perhaps they were in the wrong place.
“I won’t repeat myself.”
Nicholas rewound his thoughts, trying to nail down the question the man wanted answered. Sooty water splashed around his feet, rising along his ankles, the temperature scorching cold. He glanced down to find nothing there, yet he could feel the tide rise higher.
“My name is Nicholas A-Armahn.”
The burning chill of the water made him stammer, and his fear echoed inside his blood, wrestling him into submission.
You must master what masters you.
The words drifted through his mind like a feeble breeze.
“Nicholas?” the priest breathed, blinking down the rows of pews, eyes lowered to Nicholas’s black-tipped claws.
Nicholas fisted his hands quickly, claws cutting into the flesh of his palms.
Do not hide who you are beneath the stars, young one.
He was now knee deep in poisoned waters, afraid he might drown before ever experiencing freedom.
Acceptance is the only path to true freedom.
“How are you here?” The man growled, his gang of zombies now lining the pews on either side of Nicholas.
“I was attacked in an alleyway. I woke up changed. I don’t know who did this to me. I can’t remember.”
He lowered the blade to Father Murphy’s side. “If I pierce him here, you’ll have fifteen minutes to save him before he bleeds out. Twenty, with enough pressure applied to the wound. Is that enough time for you to remember the truth?”
Father Murphy squirmed in his hold, face ashen. He’d already lost so much blood.
“Wait!” Nicholas cried as the sharp tip pressed more firmly against the priest’s cassock.
It was clear the man had run out of patience, but while Nicholas loved and adored his once-mentor and friend, he couldn’t betray Gabriel. What other options did that leave him with?
The power of self lies within you. Wield it.
The water rippled against his neck, then chin, and he gasped for air, flailing below its invisible surface.
He had to stop thinking and act, knowing that his worst enemy resided in his own mind. What was he so afraid of? Who was he beneath the stars?
Father Murphy choked on his own pain as the blade slid into his side.