But this ...
How do I fight against evil when I have no powers?
For all intents and purposes, Amanda and Tabitha were human and female. He couldn't even hit them to protect himself. There was nothing he could do. The moment he left here, they would be on him like spice on sausage. And there was no telling what they planned to do with him once they had him alone again.
Why did I tell them I was the Malachai?
Because they were supposed to be your allies.
Yeah, in a different time and place. Now he'd trapped Kody and himself.
What would Acheron do?
Stupid question. Ash could teleport. He'd never be in this position. He'd simply wave his hand over the women or the cop and they'd forget that they'd ever seen him. These are not the droids you're looking for. Ash made those powers seem so easy to command and yet Nick screwed them up every time he tried.
I'm so not Ash.
Nor was he Kyrian, who could fight or talk his way out of the worst event.
His stomach tightened to a painful knot while the priest called and Nick sat in a chair, waiting for the rest of the preternatural world to come get him.
C'mon, Nick. Think....
There had to be some way out of this.
Father Jeffrey hung up the phone. "His mother is showing a house in the Garden District and his father's in a meeting."
"Then they can pick him up at the station." The officer pulled out his handcuffs.
Nick bolted to his feet. He started to protest, but was distracted by the door behind the cop that opened to show what had to be the baddest of bad. Standing a good six-eight, this newcomer oozed the kind of feral power that Acheron held. Massive. Terrifying.
Lethal.
That don't-cut-your-eyes-at-me-if-you-want-to-keep-breathing-human stance.
With short dark hair and a goatee, the man had eyes so dark a blue they appeared purple in color. He was dressed black on black and held himself like a predator. Head low, eyes alert to every single thing.
When that deadly gaze locked on him, Nick felt like he'd just been targeted by a nuclear device of some kind. One that would take no mercy on him.
"Come with me, kid."
It was only then that Nick realized both the priest and the cop were frozen.
Ah man, this can't be good.
What now?
"Who are you?" What was he?
A slow, arrogant smile curved his lips. One that said he enjoyed Nick's fear a little too much. "Your only hope."
Last time he heard something like that was in The Terminator movie.
Not a good analogy.
Nick stepped back at the same time another person joined them in the room. One who lacked Nick's self-preservation as she playfully slapped the supernatural being on his arm. It was tantamount to popping a rabid lion on the nose with a newspaper and telling it to shush. "Savitar, stop. He's traumatized enough."
Nick let out a relieved breath at the sweet, soft tone that meant everything to him. He was so glad to see her that it left him weak in his knees. "Kody, thank God you're all right."
It wasn't until she stood in front of him that he saw the bruises on her face where someone had hit her. Hard.
His vision darkened as he gently touched her cheek. "Who did this to you?"
She covered his hand with hers and offered him that tender smile that always made it hard for him to breathe. "Long story, and we don't have time for that now. We have to get you out of here before Tabitha and Amanda tell everyone where you are. Right now, they think you're about to be led out to them."
In spite of the danger, he had to hug her, just to make sure she was really all right and here. The sweet scent of her hair went a long way in soothing his ravaged nerves.
"Break it up before I throw water on you two to separate you."
Laughing, Kody pulled back and ruffled Nick's hair. "How did you get away from them?"
"Ran screaming like a cheerleader in a horror film. You?"
"Fought like a demon."
Nick laughed at her joke. "Are you really a ghost?"
"We'll talk about it later, okay?"
Nodding, he took her hand and allowed her to pull him toward the back of the church where a side door let them out onto Pirate's Alley. Savitar pulled up the rear and herded them down the Cabildo Alley to St. Peter.
As soon as they reached the curb, Nick slowed to a stop. Bubba was waiting for them in his large black SUV.
Without warning, Savitar literally picked Nick up and threw him into the backseat. Kody climbed into the back with him while Savitar took shotgun.
"Buckle up, Nick, or Mom will kill me." Bubba didn't wait as he pulled away from the curb. "Did you have any trouble?" he asked Savitar.
"No. They had no idea we were there."
"Good."
Completely baffled, Nick rubbed his head as he struggled to catch up to this newest and most bizarre turn of events. "Pardon, but I think I left my sanity in church. We might need to go back and get it."
Bubba laughed. "He looks and sounds just like my boy. Are you two absolutely sure you're right about him?"
"I'm positive." Kody took Nick's hand and squeezed it. "And we stupidly informed the Malachai's sakkan in this realm what Nick really is."
Now there was a term Nick had never heard before. "My what?"
"Sakkan," she repeated. "He's the head general who leads your strongest forces in battle. And he's going to come for you, full force, so that he can take your powers and use them as his own."
Bubba cursed. "Like we needed anything else to fight."
Kody expelled a heavy sigh. "I know. Sorry."
"So who is this sakkan?" Nick asked, wanting to make sure he cut the beast a wide berth.
"In our world, he's someone you haven't met yet. He was imprisoned until your father died. Here in this realm, the sakkan who leads their dark forces is Thorn."
Nick frowned at the name of someone he thought was friendly ... ish. "The scary dude who helped me out when I was imprisoned in the Nether Realm?"
She nodded.
"Dang, I really liked him, too." He shook his head. "I don't understand why he'd be our ally at home and against us here."
"Free will."
Nick cocked his head at Savitar's words. "Say what?"
Savitar ran his hand over a vicious scar on his forearm. "For better or worse, every decision we make, good or bad, small and large, puts us on a course to nightmares we don't see coming until they're in our face." Savitar turned his gaze to the road. "In every universe, we play out different decisions we've made for whatever reason. What breaks one person at one time can make them strong at another. And one small variable can have devastating consequences. Timing is everything, kid."
Kody nodded. "In our world, your mother was attacked by the Malachai and you were born. In this one, there is no Malachai so she was able to live out her life under more normal circumstances."
"But she still had me."
"And Bubba's still your father."
Nick fell silent as he considered that. In many ways, Kody was right. Bubba was the closest thing to a dad Nick had ever known. And though they weren't blood related in his world, they were still family. "But what about Kyrian?" He was as much of a mentor and father for Nick as Bubba. "I found out this morning that he's dead in this world."
"Nick Burdette didn't need to meet a Dark-Hunter to put him on the right path, away from the darkness that was trying to claim him. He has Bubba here to keep him straight. He doesn't need Acheron to watch over him. Or Caleb to guard him from forces he's not strong enough to fight yet."
He was struggling to make sense of it all. Everything she said was valid, but ... "What about Amanda and Tabitha and Karma? Why are they good in our world and not in this one?"
Kody sighed. "In both worlds, they, like you, were born to walk the line of shadows. One foot in the light and one in the dark. A few are scared enough of both that they stay in the middle and never p
ick a side. Others are strong enough to choose the light and stay firmly planted there, even while the darkness tries to claim them. And others are too weak or blind to fight the lure of darkness. It overwhelms them with false promises and before they know what's happened, it owns them. Sometimes, like the Thorn you know in our world, they can battle their way back to the light and put the darkness behind them even though it continues to try and reclaim them. But those people are very rare. I don't know what kept our Tabby and Amanda on the right side in our world nor do I know what corrupted them here. As Savitar said, it's a matter of free will. Decisions made at the wrong or right time, for the wrong or right reasons."
Nick picked her hand up from the seat and studied the scars on her knuckles. Even though she was a veteran warrior, her hands were soft and tiny. Delicate. And yet they held a strength that was unfathomable to him. "How old are you, Kody? Really?"
"I had just turned nineteen when you killed me."
He sucked his breath in sharply as her words slapped him hard. He wasn't that far away from turning nineteen himself. Just a little over two years. "And you were fighting the Malachai at that age? Why?"
She snorted. "By the time my father was nineteen, he was an experienced war veteran and a feared general."
"And he was okay with you following in his footsteps at that age?"
"Not really, but he had no say in it. I became a soldier after you killed him."
He winced and wondered how she could stand to be in the same car with him right now. Why she didn't try to claw his eyes out every time she looked at him.
Kody squeezed his fingers as if she knew what he was thinking. "As an infant, my oldest brother was taken from my parents and they weren't allowed to raise him. For centuries, my father thought him dead while my mother ... well, both of them really, were imprisoned by different gods. When they were finally reunited, long after my oldest brother was grown, they had my brother Ari right away." A bittersweet smile curled her lips. "They were so overprotective of him that I'm told it scarred him for life. And for the longest time, they were afraid to have another child. They just wanted to protect the two they had and make sure nothing bad happened to them."
"Were you an uh-oh baby?" Nick teased, trying to ease the grief in her eyes.
She wrinkled her nose at him. "No. I wasn't an uh-oh." There was a hint of laughter in her voice. "Many centuries later, after Ari was grown and married, my parents decided that they were finally ready to have another baby to viciously overprotect."
The light faded as sadness darkened her eyes again. "I was only two when something happened to you. I don't know what. But it unleashed the Malachai and you went crazy on the world. I was sent into hiding and trained to battle your forces while my family rallied their allies and did what they could to keep your army at bay and protect the world."
Nick ground his teeth at the horrors of her life. Horrors he'd caused for her and all the people they loved. He'd never hated himself more than he did right now. "I'm so sorry I hurt you."
"You didn't."
That wasn't true, but he appreciated her saying it. At the end of the day, he was the Malachai. Whatever his future self did, it was him, too.
Now he understood why Ambrose was so desperate to change the past. His future self had told him that he could feel the last of the goodness inside him dying. That any day, he expected the Malachai to devour his conscience and render him a merciless monster. Because of it, Ambrose was barely sane at times as he tried to keep Nick from making the same mistakes he'd made at Nick's age. To steer Nick onto another path that kept him firmly planted in the light.
And once that decency was gone, the Malachai would take over and kill everything and everyone. That was what his species had been born to do.
Man, it sucked.
"You should have told me the truth before now, Kody."
"You weren't ready to hear it, and you definitely weren't ready to accept the reality of what you're headed toward."
Who would be? No one in their right mind wanted to be told that they would one day destroy the entire world and everyone who lived in it. That they would kill or cause the death of every being who mattered to them.
And so what if she was right? It still stung that she'd lied to him and kept such a huge secret. "Is that why you came to see me in the hospital after I'd been shot? Were you planning to kill me?"
She looked away. "I was supposed to kill you that first day we met at St. Richard's."
That news floored him and flooded him with memories. Even now, he could visualize her clearly that day in his mind when he'd first seen her standing in the office--it seemed like a lifetime ago. She'd looked like a vision. So sweet and innocent. Confused by her new school, or so he'd thought. Meanwhile, there she'd been with the intent of ending his life. "Why didn't you?"
She laughed bitterly before she met his gaze. "You were so not what I thought you'd be. I went there expecting a cruel Malachai to battle to the death. Someone like Stone." The bully who'd caused him to be sent to the office. "And instead I found a sweet, bashful, respectful boy who wore the tackiest shirt imaginable just to make his mother happy and not hurt her feelings, even though everyone else mocked him for it. One who gladly took a beating to protect his saintly mother's reputation. An innocent soul who found humor at the worst of times and who held himself up with hard-won pride even when everyone else was relentlessly trying to knock you down. You have inside you a purity that is so rare. The capacity to love unconditionally and completely. In spite of what you are, and as unbelievable as it is, you are truly decent."
Swallowing hard, she wiped at her eyes. "Gah, it gets so confusing for me. I just can't reconcile the creature I know you will become--the heartless beast I have battled--with the man you are, here and now."
Savitar handed her a tissue. "Life hammers us all. Too many times we become things we never thought we'd be. For many reasons."
Kody drew a ragged breath as Nick pulled her against him and held her.
He buried his face in her hair and inhaled the sweet, precious scent. "But now that I know, Kody, I won't hurt you. How could I?"
She shook her head. "You don't understand, Nick. When your blood takes over you, you won't be able to stop. The Malachai will control you, not the other way around. If you could stop it, I wouldn't be here. I'd be snatched back to my time to live out the life I should have had. But the mere fact that I continue to exist as a ghost says that you will ultimately kill me."
"I refuse to accept that."
She patted his chest. "You are ever a stubborn Cajun."
"Dat right, cher. Born on da bayou, with boudin in one hand and gumbo in the other, and riding a gator."
That succeeded in getting her to laugh. "You were born on Menyara's couch and you hate those stereotypes."
"Yeah, but I am proud to be Cajun and I happily embrace my stereotype ... sometimes."
Bubba shook his head. "It is so disconcerting to hear a stranger speaking out of my son's body. Talking about things I know my boy has never seen or done. How are you coping with this?" he asked Kody.
She straightened up in the seat. "I don't see your son when I look at him, Michael. I see the lunatic I'm in love with. Blue eyes, dark hair, big ears, and a goofy grin ringed by dimples."
Nick gasped in indignation. "I don't have big ears."
"Yeah, you do." She reached up to touch one. "Not in this body, but the one at home ... total Dumbo. You really don't need your wings to fly. You could just wiggle the ears and catch a breeze."
He pretended to be wounded by her teasing. "Now that's just cruel, woman."
With an innocent expression, she held her hands up to her ears and waved her fingers like wings.
Savitar rolled his eyes. "You know what truly terrifies me, Michael?"
"Very little?"
"Well, yeah ... that's true. But for the moment, it's the fact that the fate of the entire universe rests in their hands." He shifted his gaze to Kody. "You really should
do us all a favor and end him while you can."
She scoffed at words that seriously offended Nick. "Don't take it to heart, hon. Savitar had a chance to kill you himself and instead, he taught you how to surf."
Savitar screwed his face up as if surfing was the most repugnant thing he could imagine. "Surf?"
She nodded. "I asked you once why you didn't kill Nick during the two years he spent with you on your island, and you know what you said?"
"I'm an idiot?"
"No," she said with a laugh. "You told me it wasn't your place or his time. That he still had good he needed to do and that if you'd killed him then, people you love would have suffered because Nick wouldn't have been there to help them when they needed it. But what you didn't say was what my father told me later. That in spite of all your denials and gruffness, you, like my father, carry hope. You curse it, but for whatever reason, no matter what the world does to you, you can't let it go."
Savitar made a sound of ultimate disgust. "I take back what I said. Your father's the idiot."
"No, he wasn't. He was the most intelligent man I've ever known. Even you respected him, Mr. Hostile."
"And I find that impossible to believe."
Nick took a moment to study Savitar. He knew from his future self that Savitar would be important to him one day. But he didn't know when or why. Only that this was an extremely powerful being.
A shiver went over him as he leaned to whisper in Kody's ear. "Are you sure Savitar is on our side?"
"I can hear you, kid," Savitar growled. "And yeah. I'm on your side."
"Just checking. My other former allies turned out to be myths. And you," Nick said to Bubba, "are supposed to be in a meeting right now."
"I was in a meeting when the priest called. With Savitar, who was explaining you and Kody to me."
Nick scowled. "You already knew Savitar?"
The men exchanged an amused look.
"Yeah," Bubba said. "For a long time now. We've headed off many a Daimon invasion."
That was an interesting turn Nick hadn't expected. "So you're as crazy here as you are in my world?"
Kody laughed. "No. Michael's much more sane here, but he does stalk the night, protecting what he loves ... with Mark."
"What about Mom? Does she know any of this?"
Bubba shook his head. "I've kept all my nocturnal activities away from you and your mom. After the way she reacted when we were attacked years ago, I knew better than to let her in on anything me and Mark do. Not to mention, I didn't want to endanger either of you."