His heart broken for him, Nick stepped away from Kody and took her hand to lead her closer to Jaden and Caleb.
Once Jaden had Caleb's wound packed, he stared down at him. "I can't believe that wound didn't kill you."
"Yeah, especially since you dragged your feet tending it."
Jaden rolled his eyes. "Same Malphas. Ever cantankerous." He moved away from him. "Since you were maintaining your human form, I knew you weren't overly dire." He manifested a cloth and wiped his hands off. "You could thank me, you know?"
"For what? Being a father for once in my extremely long life? Well then, thank you." Yeah, there was no sarcasm in those words at all.
Ignoring it, Jaden scowled at the mess around them, and the sounds of the demons still trying to break in. "What exactly is going on here, anyway? Where's Cam?"
"Missing," Xev and Kody said simultaneously.
"Again?"
Caleb sat up with a grimace. "We don't know what's going on. Hence why Rainbow Pony over there decided to call you in against my better sense."
Crossing his arms over his chest, Xev glared at his brother. "Go ahead and insult me, but we need information. The one thing I know about the other side ... they're a chatty bunch, especially my mother."
Jaden nodded. "He's right about that. Discretion's not her valor. But in terms of this ... I know nothing. This, they haven't talked about."
Irritated, Nick growled low in his throat. "Well something isn't right. I've lost my powers. I can't use the Eye. My generals are missing. We got hell-monkeys at the door and mortents disguised as Aunt Mennie, who's now missing, too."
"Aunt Mennie?"
"Cam," Xev said. "His generals are Dagon and Aeron."
Jaden gaped at Nick. "Why would you pick them for your generals? Have you lost your mind?"
"Up until they vanished, it was working."
Jaden pressed his hands to his head as if he was developing a migraine.
Or a brain tumor ...
Strangely, it was the same look Kyrian got whenever he had to deal with too much Nick logic. Bubba, too, for that matter. Well, at least he had one superpower that was still working. He could frustrate full-grown adults past rational speech without even trying.
Bully that.
Nick grinned at him. "And lest I forget, there's still the matter of my missing Aamon demon named Zavid."
"That one, I know."
They all turned to Jaden.
"Pardon?" Nick stepped forward. "You've seen him?"
"Noir has him."
Kody placed a comforting hand on Nick's shoulder. "So it's true. He isn't dead."
"Well ... he is dead. But Noir took custody of his soul. Poor bastard."
Xev cursed. "You just had to add that last bit, didn't you? You couldn't leave well enough alone." He made a sound of supreme disgust.
"What?" Jaden asked innocently. "What did I do?"
Caleb joined his brother in making the noises of IBS. "Isn't it enough I've been poisoned and almost killed? Gah! I don't need the Eye to see this next act of blatant stupidity that Nick's about to hurl at us."
The two brothers gave Nick an identical droll stare of utter contempt and irritation.
"Well, don't give me that look. Obviously, you know me well enough to know what I'm going to say and do. So it's not going to be any surprise to either of you."
Caleb hooked his thumb at Xev. "He can't go. His blood is what's holding them down there. If he steps foot into Azmodea, it'll blow those seals wide open and set them free. And if you go, little Malachai, they'll never let you out. You are their power source. Daddy Dearest Hernia, tell him."
Jaden nodded. "He's right. You don't want to know what they did to Adarian. There's a reason he was psychotic. Even I felt bad for him, and pity doesn't come naturally to me."
Xev snorted. "The poster child for I Need Serious Parenting Classes isn't lying about that."
"Yeah, Nick. And it's not hard to know why." Caleb jerked his chin toward his father. "You met his parents during our last fun-filled Disney adventure."
Nick scowled. "I did?"
Kody leaned in to explain what they were hedging around. "Tiamet and Chronus."
His jaw went slack at the reminder of two of the scariest things they'd been up against in a while. And with Tiamet as a mother, it explained a lot about Jaden.
About everything.
He didn't know who to feel worse for--Jaden or his sons.
"Those were your parents?"
"She birthed all the original monsters," Xev muttered as he cut a pointed and meaningful glare toward Jaden.
Jaden arched his brow at the less than subtle innuendo. "Pardon?"
"Oh..." Xev blinked innocently and spoke with utter sarcasm. "Did I say that out loud?"
Jaden narrowed an evil glare on him. "Yeah, you did, and need I remind you that she didn't birth the Malachai?"
"Oh, pardon. There's one she didn't birth. How forgetful of me. Must be all the centuries I spent in hell being tortured. Tends to take a toll on one's memory." Xev rolled his eyes.
"What's that supposed to mean? Need I remind you of where I've been? Where your brothers are ... because of you?" Jaden snarled.
"I had nothing to do with that!"
"Yeah, sure you didn't!"
"I didn't betray my own army!"
While they continued to argue and Caleb blatantly ignored them, Nick's mind spun with what they'd just inadvertently disclosed.
"Hold on! Wait with the family squabbling for a sec." He scratched at his head as he ran through what they'd said.
Yeah ... that was what they'd said.
He met Jaden's freaky gaze. "Your father is Chronus, right? That's what you said. As in the god of time?"
"What of it?"
"Is there any way you can get me into the future to talk to Ambrose?"
Kody turned pale. "Nick, that's a profoundly bad idea."
Caleb sat up. "She's right. No one should know too much about their future and you already know way too much about yours. It's why it keeps getting screwed up."
"True, but I need to ask him one more thing. Please?" Nick turned his puppy eyes to Kody. "You said you could help me barter with Jaden to get what I needed, right?"
"I didn't mean this."
Xev shook his head. "Listen to them, kid. Don't do it."
"Maybe. But all of you, except Jaden, know how stubborn I am. You really think you can stop me?"
Caleb lay back down with a groan. "You know you can't stop King Stupid from blatant acts of supreme idiocy. Believe me, I've tried everything. He wears you down with it and always wins. I've learned just to go with it and save my strength for battling whatever nightmare is unleashed by his failure to listen to good advice."
Nick cleared his throat. "You know, Caleb, I am standing right here."
"Yeah, and I'm laying right here, bleeding from the last time you didn't listen to me."
While he might have a valid point, Nick refused to concede--which was exactly what Caleb was arguing. But he was too old to change his ways now.
Besides, this was the best shot they had.
"Look, Ambrose hasn't failed us. He's been honest from the beginning." At least for the most part and they didn't need to know about the few lies he'd told himself.
"You said yourself that he was slipping," Kody reminded him.
"True, but we could go back before Ambrose goes nuts and kills everyone. Right?"
Jaden hesitated before he answered. "That's one unstable theory."
And still the only thing they had to go on. Nick glanced around at them and at the destruction that told them nothing about whatever power or entity they were up against. "Fine, I'll go alone. Risk only me. The rest of you can stay here until I return."
"No!" they all shouted at once.
Jaden cast his gaze around at them. "Take it you've all had a bad experience?"
"You don't want to know," Caleb said bitterly. "He's the only one I know who could find troub
le waiting for him at the bottom of a Rice Krispies box."
Nick would be offended if it wasn't true.
Xev stepped forward. "I'll go with him. I'm the least likely to screw something up."
The look on Kody's face said she wanted to argue, but after a few minutes, she relented. With an irritated glare, she turned toward Nick. "Are you set on this?"
Nick nodded. "I have to see it through."
She glanced at Jaden. "Can they get back here?"
"Returning's not the issue. They just have to make sure not to bring anything back with them."
Nick held his hands up. "Not a problem."
"See that it isn't." With that warning spoken, Jaden let out a long, tired breath. "We'll work on the dramonks outside. I trust you know how to return?" he asked Xev.
Xev nodded. "So long as my curse doesn't prohibit it."
For the first time, Nick saw guilt in Jaden's eyes. "Let me see your arm."
With an emotionless stare, Xev loosened his sleeve and rolled it back to expose the ancient words that bound him to eternal slavery, and limited his powers.
Jaden examined it for several seconds. "Now your side."
Xev hesitated as his gaze went to Kody.
"I won't look." She turned around to give him privacy.
Still, there was shame in his hazel eyes as he dropped his gaze to the floor and lifted his shirt for Jaden to see where the rest of the curse had been brutally seared into his flesh on the day they'd ripped his wings from his back and condemned him to this existence. His muscles were absolutely taut from the rigidness of his stance.
Nick wanted to comfort him, but how could anything do that? He'd lost his wife, his son. His wings. His freedom. All he'd done was try to help and they'd coldly taken everything from him for the effort.
Yet in that moment, Nick understood why Jaden didn't trust him.
He saw Xev as a young teenager. Probably no more than sixteen or seventeen--his age.
While Jaden had slept, Xev had crept into his room and swapped amulets on him. Not the green one he currently wore, but another that had drained his powers and left him at the mercy of Xev's mother and her demon horde.
The moment he'd discovered his son's treachery, Jaden had declared his hatred and enmity. "I welcomed you into my home! Why would you do this to me?"
Xev had returned his glower without flinching or shirking. "For all the years you didn't welcome me, Father. For every lash and insult I've been given in your name, and for all the years I was forced to serve them as an animal because you refused to acknowledge me as your son. I do this for her, and I go free. You owe me this!"
"I owe you nothing save my hatred."
"Then we are even, after all."
Worse? It'd been a trick. Azura had still refused to release Xev even after he'd handed Jaden over to her. Instead, she'd laughed in his face and slapped him for being stupid and gullible enough to believe her lies.
So as a final act of defiance, he'd freed his father two days later. Rather than return the favor, Jaden had left him behind, locked in his cell as punishment, even while Xev had begged his father for mercy and forgiveness. Even while he'd begged his father for death.
"You can't leave me here ... you can't conceive what she'll do to me for it!"
"Like I care? Rot here with your mother and her demons. I never want to lay eyes on you again, you treacherous bastard! You are no son of mine!"
And so Xev had been left to face his mother's unreasoning wrath.
Nick flinched as he felt the nightmare Xev had barely survived.
Jaden had no idea what he'd condemned his child to. Any more than Caleb understood the nightmare that had been Xev's existence. It was why Xev still lashed out and trusted no one. Why he had a hard time accepting kindness of any sort. While Lil had saved Caleb, it was nothing compared to what Myone had done for Xev.
Xev swallowed hard as Jaden finally stepped away from him.
"You'll be fine to return."
Lowering his shirt, he cut a suspicious grimace toward Jaden. "Can I trust your word, this time?"
"He's not lying to you, Xev, and you know I won't leave you behind. Not for anything. They come for you, they deal with me."
His gaze softened as he reached out and pulled Nick to his chest so that he could hold him. He clutched his fist in Nick's hair so hard, his hand trembled. It was weird and awkward, but Nick tolerated it by reminding himself that Xev didn't see him as a boy-toy.
He saw him as his child. His great-grandson. His last link to Myone and to the son he'd been forced to give up in order to keep that child safe from being treated the way he had. Rather than watch his child be raised in the same environment he'd known, he'd returned to the shadows to live alone and watch from a distance as the woman he loved more than his life took another husband who believed Xev's child to be his.
So long as she'd lived and their son had been protected and safe, Xev had been leashed and content.
But the moment she was gone and their son enslaved ...
He'd been an insane, suicidal monster ever since. Not caring who he harmed or what happened to the world or himself.
Until now.
Everything had changed the moment he'd learned what Menyara had done and that Nick's mom was his granddaughter. Since then, Xev had become a worse Velcro Nick-don't-skin-your-knees monster than his mother was most days. He was lucky Xev hadn't bubble-wrapped the bathroom to make sure Nick didn't injure himself whenever he went in to brush his teeth.
Xev had even modulated the water pressure and temperature to barely more than a lukewarm drip, because you just never knew ...
Sighing, Nick patted him on the back. "You good? 'Cause, no offense, you're freaking me out, Gramps."
Laughing, Xev kissed him on the head before he let go.
Nick ran his hand through his hair to settle it back into place. "We really need to get you your own pet or teddy bear or something."
"No, we just need to make sure you don't get hurt."
Nick nodded, then turned around to face Jaden. "So what exactly's involved in doing this? We sacrifice a Lego? Bathe under the light of a full moon? Eat nachos? Yank on Acheron's coat and run before he catches us?"
Jaden wore that same pained expression his teachers often had whenever they saw him in their room on the first day of class and realized he was there to stay and not dropping off books for a friend, especially his English teacher.
Like they were nursing an ulcer.
He glanced at Kody. "Is he always like this?"
"Yes."
"Poor you."
Kody screwed her face up. "You know ... a lot of people say that to me."
"Yeah, it's beginning to give me a complex."
Laughing, she kissed Nick's cheek. "Don't listen to them. I think you're wonderful. Just the way you are."
"I really appreciate that, Kode. And I love and adore you. But the mere fact that you go out with me and continue to do so brings your entire ability to reason and judge into question."
Laughing, she wrapped her arm around his waist and buried her face against his shoulder blade. Nick sucked his breath in sharply, savoring the warmth of her body pressed against his back. She had no idea what that embrace did to him. What it meant to his sanity.
Then again, she was his anchor. Maybe she did know and that was why whenever he needed her most, she was here to keep him grounded. For all the preternatural abilities and magic he normally wielded, they paled in comparison to the sorcery of her touch. She alone could tame the Malachai inside him and bend it to her will.
He was completely helpless where she was concerned. And he couldn't imagine a world where that would ever change.
Sobering, she peeked up at Jaden. "Don't let him get harmed. Nick better come back whole and healthy or else you're going to meet the Bathymaas side of me."
Jaden's eyes widened. "You're threatening me?"
"I'm promising you." She gave Nick a fierce hug before she rose up on her tiptoe
s to whisper in his ear. "Please stay out of trouble."
"Cher, you know how hard I try. But when the devil be wanting a fais do-do, what's a po' boy to do?"
"Stay out of trouble," she repeated. "I mean it."
"I will do my best."
Her eyes sad, she nodded and let go of him. Then she went to Xev to give him a hug. "Be careful, especially since you're hauling the trouble magnet."
Nick clapped his hands together. "All right. What--"
A bright light cut his words off.
One second they were in the remains of Menyara's store and in the next, he was standing outside of St. Louis Cathedral.
At least that was what it looked like it used to be.
His heart pounding in terror, Nick turned around slowly to see that he was definitely in what remained of Jackson Square. But it was currently on fire. The Pontalba Buildings and Cabildo ... even the Cafe Du Monde were all ablaze. This was a hellacious inferno. Bodies were strewn like contorted dolls in the street. Cars were twisted, burned-out chassis, interspersed with military equipment that included the remains of tanks and even downed helicopters.
Bile rose in his throat to choke him. He felt the color drain from his face as he realized that Jaden had dropped him straight into ground zero of his worst nightmare.
This wasn't before Ambrose had lost his mind.
This was at the height of him and his army destroying the world.
Xev appeared as stunned as Nick was while they both turned in slow circles to stare agape at the unholy destruction around them. "How is this possible?"
Nick swallowed hard at the devastation. "This is what I've been seeing in my visions. It's what Ambrose has been warning me about."
Suddenly, a loud pterodactylesque scream sounded. They turned in synch to find a huge red-fleshed demon bearing down on them from the sky. Closing the distance between them, Xev grabbed Nick to shield him with his body.
Just as the beast would have reached Nick with its claws, it burst apart with an ear-splintering cry. Blood and entrails rained down everywhere, along with hot fire that luckily Xev used his powers to deflect.
Straightening, Xev loosened his hold. Disgusted by the mess, Nick lifted his head as the smoke around them swirled and dissipated a bit.
Out of the darkness stepped the last person he'd expected to see.
It was his lunatic demon friend, Simi. Only she appeared older than the teenaged shopping, diamond-eating Goth he knew and adored. Dressed in gleaming armor and with her black hair braided, she was the best sight he could imagine in this madness.