He didn’t hear him. His breathing labored, he wasn’t really with them. Instead, he appeared to be in a waking nightmare of some kind.
Nick exchanged a concerned look with Kody before he closed the distance between him and Xev. “Xevikan!” Still, he didn’t respond as he kept looking around as if seeking an unseen attacker.
Or several thousand of them.
Pulling Xev’s hand from his mother’s leg, Nick forced him to take a step back. “Daraxerxes!” Gah, he hoped he pronounced that name right.
Only then did Xev focus on Nick’s face. But he still wasn’t completely recovered.
“They’re coming.” His voice was firm and intense. “We have to secure the children and women. They’ll hit where we’re weakest. You stay here with the others. I have to get to Lil and warn her. She’ll be their first target. If they reach her first, they can neutralize Caleb’s forces and crash the gates.”
Nick winced at the anguish in his voice. Lil would have been Caleb’s wife. Lilliana. The one Caleb blamed Xev for allowing to die. But from those words and the way Xev was acting, it didn’t sound like Xev had betrayed him and led the enemies inside the gate to take them out. More like he’d done his best to keep her safe.
“Xevikan!” he tried again.
Flinching, Xev turned as one of the symbols on the wall lit up. Recognition widened his eyes before they darkened with the bitterest hatred. He hissed like a cat and backed away from it.
Kody approached him slowly. “Xev?” Gingerly, she touched his chest. “Are you with us?”
His breathing still labored, he covered her hand with his and held it as if she were as precious to him as she was to Nick. A tic started in his jaw before he gave a slow nod. “You feel that?”
“Feel what?” Kody asked.
He looked to Simi. “Charonte?”
“Cursed god?” she shot back in irritation.
Xev rolled his eyes before he went to the door to take a defensive position behind the hinges. He manifested fireballs around his hands as someone knocked on it.
Nick scowled. “You know, X, from my experience, the bad guys don’t usually knock.”
A snide smile curved his lips. “They do when their brand of evil has to be invited in in order to enter.”
And now his gut was back to producing diamonds. Xev had a very valid point with that. There were Daimons and certain other entities who definitely required specific invitations into domiciles to wreak havoc and harm. Nick really wished he lived a life where he didn’t have to know that.
Great. Just great. More nightmares to worry about.
Hoping for the best, Nick went to the peephole to glance out, then passed a droll stare to Xev. “Put away your paranoia. It’s just my godmother. No doubt, the police contacted her about the attack on my mom, and she wanted to check on us. She’s barely five feet tall, and ninety pounds soaking wet. I don’t think we have anything to fear. And she’s probably terrified. Last thing she needs is for you to give her a heart attack.”
Unlocking the door, he opened it and pulled the tiny Creole midwife who’d helped bring him into the world into his arms for a tight hug. “Hey, Aunt Mennie.”
She squeezed him back while her sisterlocks tickled his nose. “Hey, Boo. I hope you don’t mind. But given all the weirdness I wanted to come by and check on you and your…” Her voice trailed off as her gaze went past his shoulder to Xev. Instantly bug-eyed, she gasped audibly.
Not thinking anything about her reaction, since most people tended to greet Xev like a cross between a leper and Bigfoot’s bigger and nastier older brother who was jacked up on steroids, Nick shut the door. “Menyara, this is —”
“We know each other, don’t we, Cam?” Xev’s voice was so cold, they could have used it to flash-freeze helium popsicles on the Pontchartrain Bridge in August.
Menyara staggered back and would have fallen had Nick not been there to catch her.
“Mennie? Are you all right?”
“What have you done, Nick?” she breathed in a horrified tone as she continued to stare at Xev as if he was the devil incarnate. “What have you done?” she repeated.
Xev glared at her. “Interesting that you would blame him, when this all started with you and your siblings.”
Shaking her head, Menyara dragged her gaze to each of them in turn – Xev, Simi, Kody, Cherise, and Nick – before she closed her eyes. “Who unlocked Nick’s powers? For the love of the Source, why would you do such a thing? Have you any idea what you’ve done?”
Sheepish, Kody bit her lip before she explained their actions. “We had no choice. Nick’s ousia had been split from his body by his enemies who wanted to weaken him enough to kill him. It was the only way to save him and return him to this dimension and save his life. Had we not moved fast, he’d be dead now.”
Menyara let out a weary sigh as she sat down on the armchair and hung her head in her hands. “You should have come to me before you acted.”