Blood Stained Tranquility (31 page)

He had no clue how much time had passed. Only that it’d been daylight when he’d gone into the basement, and now, as he stumbled ass-over-face to the first floor, it was night.

Mavrak was sated. Sort of. But for some reason, letting him loose had left Zeniel so weak that he could barely stand. As soon as he reached the top of the stairs, he fell into the wall.

The house shook. He lifted himself upright, groaning and wondering why he was so drained after letting Mavrak take control.

You didn’t let him take control. Admit it.

Shit. There was no denying that. Mavrak was back in the cage Zen had built, but for a few seconds down there, Zen had seen past the roars. He had seen past the rage, and the screams of the soul they had tortured.

They had become one, and Zeniel had glimpsed the memories.

His blood spilled, his flesh ripped off, the burn of his eyes being sealed shut.

But he had also seen his mother. She had smiled down at him, and lifted him into his arms, and he’d known that smile on her face was special. It was just for him.

She had blue and gray eyes. He knew this from the holographic image of her he had in his room. Yet, seeing them soften in affection as she tickled him had been indescribable. He had his father’s hair color and the markings of a war demon when in that form, but the shape of his eyes, and his facial features were all his mother’s. He’d known that, yet seeing her face . . . man, it’d hurt. Made him miss her even more.

Persicutis had loved him. Witnessing it firsthand, remembering her laugh and the way she had called him her “little demon” so playfully, stabbed Zeniel deep. He wanted to see more, to remember more. If only remembering her didn’t mean remembering everything else. The extent of his crimes; the extent of his torture. If only it didn’t mean merging with Mavrak and losing control.

Evesse. Where would his
R’ma
be then?

He groaned, his heart breaking so bad that he had to bring a hand up and rub his chest. His phone vibrated in his pocket. Grateful for a distraction, any kind, he reached for it.

It was a text from Ianthen. A set of coordinates, along with one simple statement.

I can guarantee you that’s where Enteax is. I finally locked on him
.

It was a rundown, three-story house on Main Street. The back of the house was pretty much kissing the small strip of woods behind it. Branches crowded the sides. Zeniel stood across the street, hidden between two similarly rundown houses, his fists clenched.

The streets around were empty. This side of Brownsville was practically a ghost town. When it came to convenience, this was perfect. As soon as Zeniel found Enteax, he would seize that fucker and drag him back to Enzyria. After tearing off an arm or two.

He had no clue why the ass was still on Earth. Knowing the Aviraji, there was definitely a reason. What the hell it could be—why they would send Enteax to this tiny corner of Pennsylvania—Zeniel didn’t know.

It didn’t matter, either. Zen was seconds away from having the bastard in his hands. Once he sunk his fingers into Enteax’s flesh, he wasn’t bringing them back out until they were curled around chunks of skin and muscle. Enteax was going to bleed. He was going to bleed a fucking ocean before Zen was done with him.

Having such violent thoughts should have bothered him. But it didn’t. It was simple. No one put their hands on Evesse. No one hurt her. And no one fucking killed her and got away with it, either. The thought crossed his mind to contact Dyletri. The male had as much of a right to Enteax as Zen did. But he didn’t want to share. Besides, there was always Lisrn.

Zen sensed Enteax before he saw him. The blue, freaky-looking motherfucker came around the back of the house, willing the plants out of his way.

Zeniel was ready to pounce. His muscles inflated, and he knew that the amount of adrenaline and testosterone funneling into his limbs was twenty times what a human could handle. His heartbeat accelerated, primed for battle. Despite his earlier weakness, he was fueled with pure rage and was more than ready to attack.

Mavrak was the one who stopped him.

Shock followed closely behind, gluing Zeniel’s feet to the ground. He couldn’t see exactly what Enteax was doing; just that he was focused on the house. And for the first time in his entire existence, Mavrak was pointing out a good deed instead of a bad one.

Zen’s heart jack-hammered inside his rib cage, and his mind struggled to comprehend what his war demon half was showing him.

He . . . protects.

And?
Zen screamed at his other half, incredulous.
It doesn’t change what he did.

It does! Look!

Enteax was willing one hell of a heavy duty
Gnetica
around that home. As he did so, his emotions were frenzied.

He was
worried.

Whatever was in that house, Enteax was downright desperate and determined to protect it.

He cares more about that than he does his own safety.

Zeniel gritted his teeth, hating that inner-voice, so like his own. Above all, he was completely fucked in the head at the thought that
he
was the one aching to hurt someone . . . and fucking
Mavrak
was the one stopping him.

The fuck?

He is willing to die. He is willing to betray all of them to do the right thing.

Zen was still reeling, his mind spinning so fast he was sure his brain was turning to mush, when Nylicia came up behind him.

“I told you to leave him alone. One would think that you of all people would have come to understand that if I say to do, or not to do something, it’s with good fucking reason.” That last part had been grated out, as if Nylicia were clenching her jaw. “What? Do I have to transform into the Buddha to get you to accept that? Because I’ll have you know, I’ve been doing this a lot longer than he ever did his thing.”

Zeniel was almost too shocked to speak. “Nylicia . . . what the hell is going on?”

Nylicia stood next to him, her eyebrow raised. “Enteax’s destiny is changing, and I plan to take full advantage of that.”

Well, fuck him.

“Now, if you are ready to give up on this little quest of yours, you’re about to have bigger problems on your hands.”

“Wait. What?”

She, of course, continued onward as if he hadn’t spoken. “This is what you get for
A
, being a scared idiot, and
B
, allowing yourself to think with your cock all those thousands of years ago. I mean, really, if you hadn’t allowed that female to give you orgasms, you would’ve never been fooled in the first place. And I told you so. I warned you, and you didn’t listen. I specifically told you not to sleep with that woman.”

Zeniel’s thoughts scattered at the same time his confusion swelled exponentially. He faced her fully, mouth open, ready to demand that she tell him what she meant. There was only one female he had ever slept with after awakening as Zeniel.

He hadn’t seen said female in centuries.

Nylicia interrupted before he could speak.
Again.

“Do you realize that your pattern of
not
listening stretches back really, really far, and that it keeps getting you into messes?”

“What?” he asked, wondering what the fuck she was going on about, but Nylicia was already gone.

What. The. Fuck?

When he turned back around, Enteax was gone, too. The
Gnetica
he’d put up still remained, and if Zen focused hard enough, he could sense it. He couldn’t see it, though. It was some powerful shit. Enteax obviously wanted to keep someone out of that house.

Zeniel knew who, too. He’d gathered as much from Enteax’s emotions.

He was betraying his own kind for something he loved.

He was somehow betraying Vermylea, the goddess that
owned
him, because he cared more about whoever was in that house than he did anything else.

Shit.

Enteax had been concerned. His intentions had actually been
pure
.

Zeniel understood the concept of forgiveness. He’d helped inspire teachings on it. But it didn’t matter because it couldn’t.
That male had hurt Evesse. The mated male within Zen demanded retribution.

Not every part of him, however. Mavrak had taken control, and . . .

Gods fucking damn it! Zeniel hadn’t been able to bring himself to canon-ball it across the street and rip Enteax to shreds as originally planned.

In the end, he’d gotten Evesse back stronger than ever—better. And, considering Zen knew how certain things worked when it came to destiny—how
Nylicia
worked when it come to that—he was damn sure that it had all been meant to be.

Enteax was protecting whoever was in that house, and the very being responsible for Zeniel finding his
R’ma
was telling him that Enteax’s destiny was changing. That he should be left alone.

Acceptance.

Zeniel was pretty sure he’d been big on acceptance once. Recently, too. Sure, he was having a hard time swallowing it down at the moment, but surely he could figure it out once again.

Hopefully before he stopped reeling about the whole having to forgive Enteax thing. Because, really, he was a tolerant being by nature, but this was pushing it.

“Zeniel?”

He froze at the sound of the voice behind him. It had been over six-hundred years since he’d last heard it, but he remembered it well.

What Nylicia had just told him came barreling back into his mind.

“Thank the Gods, Zeniel. I’ve found you!”

Illion
help him, he’d completely forgotten about the being approaching him. She sounded so happy, just as she did every time she saw him. Meanwhile, she hadn’t crossed his mind in centuries.

Guilt hammered him. He had only used her for the release his body needed when the urge got to be too much. Every five or six centuries or so. He always knew that she had feelings for him. It was in her tone, in her eyes, in the way she had touched him.

Rhalira was one of the few truly pure beings in the Universe. She didn’t deserve what he was about to do.

He was mated now. She was so happy to see him, and he was going to break her heart the moment he told her.

She approached him slowly, her steps seeming to echo as she got nearer.

“I’ve been looking everywhere for you. I felt your need flare up. I’ve missed you so, Zeniel.”

He swallowed, feeling like the biggest asshole in history. They’d opened a mild-connection thousands of years ago. One that allowed her to sense when his need became too great.

She placed her hand on his shoulder, sliding it toward his neck and in the direction of his hidden mating mark. The tip of her fingers touched it, making the skin blaze painfully to life as the lines began to break through. Zeniel flinched.

“Rhalira.” Determined to be the one to tell her, before she saw the spiraling lines bursting in vibrant colors across his neck, he turned around.

Before he could even blink, she had pressed herself against him, her lips on his. Mavrak roared to life, his bellow of indignity a perfect echo to the agony that shot from Zen’s nerves. He flew backward, slamming into the empty house behind him and leaving a dent in the structure. Pain hijacked his synapses, bent him over, and held him there as he began to cough.

First cough, nothing.

Second one was followed by a shitload of blood.

Then there was the boiling lava in his veins, the agony unlike anything he’d ever felt. It combined with the heat of his mating mark, scrambling his internal thermometer so hard that he could’ve sworn he could hear his innards cursing him out. His entire physiological structure was turning on him.

Rhalira stepped toward him, sounding horrified. “No. This cannot be. You belong to me. I’ve waited so long for you to realize—”

“No. I belong to someone else.” He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, trying to hold back the urge to cough and heave.

If that wasn’t fucked up enough, as he forced himself to look up, his vision took in her delicate but sophisticated appearance and he suddenly recognized her for what she was. For the first time since meeting her, the truth was hollering in his face, letting him know what a fucking moron he’d been when it came to her. He’d always believed her to be of the
C’ianye
. Her eyes and the shape of her ears had lent credence to that belief. Not to mention the fact that she’d claimed to be one, as well.