Stygian

  “Good.” Xander stepped back, clapped his hands together, and made a sound like a hollow cymbal. It echoed through the room with an ethereal recoil. “Shadow!” The call was low and deep. Not the typical kind of shout.

  Oddly enough, particles in the air began to swim about as if caught in a vortex. Light formed a cone.

  An instant later Shadow appeared. He glanced around the four of them, then grimaced. “Why? Why is it never Emma Stone? Gal Gadot? Hell, I’d settle for Artemis. Nah … it’s always one of you losers whining for me.” He looked up at the ceiling. “Why, Lord? Why?”

  “Stop … we have a favor.”

  “Of course you do. Figured you didn’t want a weather report, and I know you didn’t call because you were worried about my health or wanted to play Parcheesi. You’re all a bunch of selfish assholes. So what can I do you for?”

  “We need to get into Kalosis.”

  He laughed a much higher-pitched sound than Xander’s. “What? You’re serious? Who’s been knocking back Drano shots?” He narrowed his glare on Urian. “Remember what happened the last time I opened a portal for you? Didn’t end well for me. I’m still bleeding through my T-shirts.”

  “True. Would it help if I said I appreciate you?”

  “Not even a little. I thought you had a sister for this?”

  “She’s preoccupied with her brother.” Urian indicated Xyn.

  Shadow growled. “Have I said today how much I hate Hunters?” Urian grinned. “Yeah, but we’re not listening.”

  “Hope you all get eaten by Apollymi.” Shadow looked to Acheron. “Except for you. You’re to stay here. ’Cause I don’t want the world to end. It might suck, but not as bad as it would if she and her kin were in charge.”

  “No worries. I know the drill.” Ash winked. “Simi? Human form.”

  The tattoo on his forearm peeled itself off to manifest before them into Ash’s teen Goth, demon daughter who was wearing an adorable panda onesie. She blinked at all of them, yawned, and then changed into her typical skirt and corset wear, complete with a set of purple and black cyber falls. “Are we having a party, akri?”

  “No, Simikee. Sorry. I need you to go with them to visit Apollymi. Do you mind?”

  “Not at all! The Simi loves her goddess-akra. She’s the bestest!”

  Ash nodded, then paused as he met Xander’s gaze. “What?”

  “Just thinking … this would be better if we had a kerling going in.” He looked at Shadow. “I know you don’t, but do you have any friends?”

  “I do have friends, for your information.” Shadow turned toward Urian. “Think we can pry Brogan off Blaise for a little soiree?”

  He pulled his phone out of his pocket. “It’s worth a try.”

  Xyn was still baffled by that little device. It was quite impressive.

  Meanwhile, Simi came over and took her arm. “What’s your favorite people to eat, akra-Dragon?”

  “You know, Simi, I haven’t eaten any in a while.”

  “Oh. Akri has you on a diet, too. That’s just so wrong. He won’t let me eat hardlies anythings. It’s just so hard. But is how I maintains this girlie figure at my age.”

  Before she could comment, Urian slid his phone back into his pocket.

  “I have good news and bad news.”

  Xander made a face that said he felt a bit sick at the prospect. “What?”

  An instant later, Blaise and Brogan both appeared.

  “I got your kerling, but she comes with a two-hundred-pound tumor.”

  Blaise appeared baffled by his comment. “What?”

  Acheron snickered as he clapped him on the back. “Inside joke at your expense. Sorry, Blaise.”

  “What else is new, Ash? Everyone takes a potshot at the dragon. We’re low-hanging fruit. So large, we’re easy to hit. So everyone takes a shot.”

  Brogan lowered her hood to expose her braided dark hair. The petite fey witch was absolutely exquisite. Like Simi, she appeared so frail and harmless and yet was capable of extreme and utter violence.

  She held her hand out toward Xander. “You must be the reason Urian called. I’m Brogan.”

  “Xander.”

  “And this is Blaise.”

  Xander smiled. “A kerling Deathseer who commands a mandrake and a Crom. That’s something I’ve never seen before.” He clicked his tongue. “I take back what I said, Shadow. You have impressive friends.”

  “Yeah, remember that next time you insult me.”

  As they made ready, Xyn caught the look in Urian’s eyes. She stepped over to him. “Are you all right?”

  He nodded, but she knew better.

  And as they headed into Kalosis she had a bad feeling that things were about to go all kinds of wrong. Something about this wasn’t right. Trouble was, she’d been dormant for so long that a lot of her powers weren’t reliable yet.

  She still felt weak from whatever spell had been used on her.

  Urian hung back from the others. He let them go through the portal. But when Xyn started to go, he kept her with him.

  She looked up with a questioning brow. He sensed that she wasn’t at her full strength. Yet she said nothing about it.

  For him, she was going into this not knowing what they’d face. He didn’t take that act of loyalty lightly. Nor was he willing to risk her lightly.

  Summoning his powers, he let them flow into his arm, then lifting her chin, he kissed her.

  Xyn felt the surge Urian gave her and it wasn’t just from his kiss. He’d handed over a portion of his strength to her, as well. “What have you done?”

  He smiled down at her. “I’m trained to fight at half strength. You’re not.”

  And with that, he fell back into the portal.

  Stunned, she met Acheron’s swirling silver gaze.

  He shrugged at her. “Tory thinks I’m headstrong? I’ve got nothing on that one. I haven’t been able to do anything with that dumbass since the day I met him. May the gods have mercy on you.”

  Rolling her eyes, she went in after Urian, cursing him with every sickening twist of the vortex. Which thanks to Shadow, didn’t drop them into the main hall at Stryker’s feet.

  Because Shadow was able to manipulate the Nether Realm between the worlds, he took them in so that they arrived not far from her old cave. She actually envied him for the powers … in a way.

  They would be nice to hold for a bit, but with them came a profound loneliness and solitude that made what a dragon endured seem kind in comparison.

  As soon as they landed, she caught the look on Shadow’s face. Feeling for the dark demon, she went over and kissed his cheek. “Thank you.”

  Startled, he stepped back from her.

  Xyn scowled at his reaction. “You act as if no one’s ever thanked you before.”

  “They don’t normally. Not sure how to handle kindness. It terrifies me.”

  That was the biggest tragedy of their kind. Or perhaps that was the biggest indictment against humanity. When kindness and decency became so rare that people no longer knew how to respond to it, or when having witnessed a kind act they felt the need to comment on something that really should be so commonplace that it never should be newsworthy.

  If anything should ever be so common as to be taken for granted, surely in the name of the gods, it should be kindness and not cruelty.

  Shadow glanced around the dull gray landscape. “Ahh, I see today’s forecast is gloomy with an overcast of doom and despair. I like it. Should we build a summer home?”

  Blaise laughed. “My soulmate! We should hang out more.”

  Brogan appeared offended by that. “You fickle beast. I thought I was your soulmate? Now you’re making overtures to Shadow? I can’t leave you alone for five minutes.” She sighed heavily.

  “Would it help if I said he’s not as cute as you?”

  “Not really. Damage done.”

  Xander sighed. “I’m thinking this might have been a mistake.”

  Shaking his head,
Urian laughed. “Brother, I think that every day. Shall we?”

  Ash had just returned home when he found Styxx waiting for him.

  “Where’s Urian?”

  “Oh shit” didn’t quite capture the feeling of dread that ripped through him as he realized just how badly he’d screwed up. Because he was used to dealing with Dark-Hunters, he wasn’t used to thinking about the fact that Urian now had “parents.”

  More to the point, he wasn’t used to remembering that Urian had a mother and father who would kick his ass if anything happened to him.

  Ash gave his twin a nervous grin. “Um …”

  “That’s a bad sound, brother. That’s the kind of sound you normally make that precedes my desire to hurt you.” Styxx crossed his arms over his chest as he pinned him with a gimlet stare.

  “Let me remind you before you kill me that in order to get to your son, you’ll have to go into the domain where my mother resides, and she won’t be happy if you harm me.”

  The look of disgust on his face might actually have been amusing if Ash hadn’t felt so bad about causing it.

  “What did you do?”

  “He wanted to go after Phoebe.”

  Ash hadn’t been cussed out that effectively or colorfully in ancient Greek in a number of centuries. It was impressive.

  Styxx finally stopped long enough to issue one fierce command. “Open the portal to Kalosis!”

  “The one I control will take you straight to Stryker.”

  “I don’t give a shit where it goes. Get me down there so I can find my child. Now!”

  Bethany appeared instantly. “What’s going on?”

  Styxx gestured at Ash. “He let our child loose in Kalosis to go after his gallu-infected wife.”

  And now Ash was being cussed in ancient Egyptian and Atlantean. Which brought Tory out of the main room, into the hall where they were gathered.

  “What in the world is going on? Is that Egyptian?”

  Ash gestured at them. “I pissed off my family again … and yes, First Dynasty.”

  Bethany’s eyes flared to red. “Tory? Can you please watch Ari for a bit? I have to go find my oldest and drag him home before he does something stupid.”

  “Sure.”

  “Open the portal, Acheron,” Styxx repeated.

  “Stryker—”

  “Won’t stand in my way.” Bethany immediately pulled her hair back into a ponytail.

  While Ash would argue with his brother, he was going to cede that point to Bethany. Given the fury in her eyes and tone, he had no doubt that Stryker would get his ass kicked effectively. “All right, then.” He opened the portal. “Urian has friends with him. Please try not to skewer Simi.”

  That seemed to calm Styxx a little. “Thank you for sending her with him.”

  “You really think I wouldn’t?”

  “I didn’t think you’d send him!”

  “Stop arguing!” Bethany snapped. “Get to my baby!” She pushed Styxx toward the portal. “I’m going to beat both of you later.”

  As soon as Ash closed the portal, he turned to see Tory’s perturbed grimace. “What did I do to piss you off?”

  Smiling, she pulled him into her arms. “Nothing. You look like you could use a hug.”

  Finally, someone who wasn’t mad at him. “I really didn’t mean to put him in harm’s way.”

  “I know, sexy baby. It’s all good.”

  Stryker was used to unexpected visitors dropping through their portal. Over the centuries, they’d had quite a few interesting creatures.

  Dark-Hunters. Were-Hunters.

  A couple of gods. Demons. Forest creatures. A large number of trelos.

  Stupid humans by the dozens, especially in the nineties during the height of the vampire craze. He couldn’t count how many Goth counterculture members had dropped in, taken one look at them, and said, “Bite me!” and not in a bad way. They’d wanted to join them.

  They’d always provided a quick and easy snack for his Spathi warriors.

  Even his wife had dropped in at his feet a decade ago.

  But this … this was a first.

  An ancient Greek hero and an Egyptian goddess who landed on their feet with a searing glare that would have sent a lesser man scurrying for cover.

  As it was, Stryker remained seated and only lifted one insolent brow at the temerity of confronting him in his own living room, as it were. He tilted his head toward his wife, who came forward to lean against his throne that was made out of the bones of gods Misos had defeated long ago.

  “Hmm, Phyra. I’m trying to decide if I should be flattered by their visit or pissed.”

  Crossing her arms over her chest, she shrugged. “If they’re bringing tribute, flattered. Any other reason … I say we skewer them where they stand.”

  Bethany scoffed. “Try it and I’ll use your guts for shoelaces.”

  Styxx cleared his throat as he placed a gentle hand on his bloodthirsty wife’s shoulder. “What my nondiplomatic better half is trying to say is that we’re here on a mission of peace. And it’s one that concerns you, too, Stryker.”

  “How so? Since the last time I looked, we were enemies?”

  “Enemies or not, we have a common interest … Urian.”

  At the mention of his son, Stryker felt a rush of pain and anger. One that made him want to lash out as he remembered that Urian wasn’t really his son.

  He was theirs.

  “What of him?”

  “He’s here. Seeking Phoebe.”

  Those words went through Stryker like ice. He came off his throne before he’d even realized he’d moved. “What do you mean, he’s here?”

  “As I said. And I’m not a fool, Stryker. You don’t stop loving a child. He came here to find her and help her.”

  Damn him for the truth of that statement. Like it or not, he did still love the boy, even if he did want to beat him senseless. Stryker glanced to Zephyra. She was his strength.

  When she met his gaze, she gave a subtle nod. “We have to find our son before he’s harmed. Where would he be?”

  And that was why he loved her.

  “I don’t know. But we’ll find him.” Stryker ground his teeth in frustration as he glared at Zolan. “Fetch Davyn and Medea. One of them might know something.”

  Bethany stopped Stryker as he started past her. “Was he really so hard to raise?”

  He let out a frustrated sigh. “He was a nightmare unimagined … and my greatest joy and pride.”

  Tears gathered in her eyes. She lifted her hand toward his cheek. “May I?”

  Stryker knew she was asking if she could share his memories of Urian’s childhood. A part of him was selfish enough that he wanted to keep them for himself and deny her request. But then, he wasn’t quite that big a bastard. The rational part of him knew that he wouldn’t have had so great a gift if not for his two enemies.

  So the real crime wasn’t in the anger that lay between him and Urian now so much as in the fact that they had never known their son at all.

  He couldn’t imagine a worse horror than what they’d experienced. To have the son they’d wanted so desperately ripped from their lives and given to another. His gaze went to the scars on Styxx’s arm where he’d carved the name they’d intended to give Urian on his birth … Galen.

  No, he wouldn’t be that cruel to anyone. Enemies or not. So he nodded and braced himself for her intrusion.

  Closing her eyes, she laid her warm hand to his cheek, then reached to touch Styxx with her other hand. It wasn’t until Styxx gasped that Stryker realized she was sharing the memories with him as well.

  His head spun as he felt Bethany picking through his mind with a master skill.

  Strangely enough, she revived things inside him that he’d forgotten. Precious moments spent with Urian as a child when he’d once thought the world of Stryker. The night when Urian had picked up his battle helm for the first time, and tried it on.

  It’d fit over his head like a bell, and sa
t askew to the point where the poor child had been unable to see. Still, Urian had stumbled his way into Stryker’s bedroom to proclaim himself ready to battle by his side. He’d stood there, completely naked save for that helm and his wooden sword and a towel he’d knotted around his neck.

  “I’m ready, Solren! Take me with you to battle the human vermin!”

  Another time when Urian had stolen the laces from his armor to make a present for Paris.

  “Why, Urian? Why would you do this?”

  “I didn’t want you to fight and get hurt, Solren, and I wanted a present for Paris. So it seemed like a good way to accomplish both goals.”

  How many times had he been on the brink of strangling the boy only to have Urian turn around with a logic so sweet and loving that it pulled him back from homicide?

  Until the day he’d learned the staggering truth.

  Trates had been as nervous as always. Flittering about in his study.

  “What are you doing?”

  “I have news, kyrios. Distressing news.”

  “About Acheron or the Dark-Hunters?”

  “Neither.”

  That had stopped Stryker cold. “What then?”

  Trates had swallowed hard and hesitated. “Urian.”

  By then, Urian had been his last surviving child. Stryker had lost all of his grandchildren and great-grandchildren. And two unofficial “spouses” he’d refused to marry lest he give the women some false hope that they might claim a part of him that he was incapable of offering them. Since he knew he’d never love them, it just seemed wrong to marry them under a lie.

  So many of his family had fallen that his heart had grown to ice and his blood had turned to pure venom.

  He was dead inside and he knew it.

  Except for Urian.

  His son alone held his love and devotion.

  Stryker had thought himself above being hurt until Trates spoke. “Your son has married a daughter of the heiress’s bloodline.”

  “What?”

  “It’s true, kyrios.” Trates had shown him the pictures. Of Phoebe and Urian. “He’s running interference between our searchers and her sister, Cassandra. He’s been helping to cover her tracks.”

  And still a part of Stryker had refused to believe it. In the back of his mind, he’d convinced himself that Urian’s enemies had concocted a lie to put distance in his heart for his son. To spread discord in their house. After all, it was just the sort of thing they would do.