by Heather Long
“We can’t let him do anything he would regret.”
Seth shook his head, his gaze sliding toward the half-eaten plate that was Dahlia’s. “Why? There’s no Dahlia here to make him be a better Keeper. The only reason he came back at all was for her. Now that she’s gone, I doubt he’s going to care about anything.”
Sucking in a sharp breath, Zhan jerked back and narrowed his gaze on Seth.
How could he be so callous?
Minutes.
Minutes, Dahlia had been gone. And Seth was already reverting to the asshole Zhan knew him to be. He tried to respond, but he couldn’t bring himself to talk about Dahlia just yet.
“I’m going to look for Tarus. He doesn’t need to be alone right now, and we damn sure don’t need to be in Sinner’s. Come with me.” Zhan pushed away from the high top table, taking care to scoot his stool back under the table.
Right now, he needed the little things to keep him grounded. It would be too easy to do exactly what Seth accused Tarus of and lose himself to his grace. But he couldn’t.
That wasn’t who he was. That wasn’t even who he was when he fell.
Now he was a new person, and he’d be damned if he fucked everything up out of grief.
No, he’d allow himself to mourn, and he’d never forget, but Dahlia had changed him on such a fundamental level, he would never let go of who she thought he was.
That was important to him. Even if Dahlia wasn’t here to see it, he would keep her memory alive by not spitting on her wishes.
Too bad his brothers didn’t see their current situation the same way.
“Like hell. I also lost the best thing I ever held in my possession, to fucking Bish of all people, and the last thing I want to do is chase after Punishment to babysit him. I have my own problems. And the bar is exactly where I need to be right now. Nectar of the Gods is the only thing that’s going to dull this wretched pain.” Seth stood and slung his stool haphazardly under the table without even an ounce of the care Zhan had used. “Have fun. I’ll be at the bar for the foreseeable future.”
There were only a few Keepers here tonight, and none of the usual crowd, outside of Quetta. Still, the bar was packed, and even though the humans hadn’t witnessed Bish stealing their one true love…
Dahlia had told them how much she loved them, but none of them had returned the sentiment. Did they really let her leave with Death, thinking that they didn’t feel the same?
A sudden onslaught of fury raced through him as he turned and punched a hole through the old brick wall. Humans jumped away, not understanding what they were seeing. At least he’d had enough wits about him to cloak his presence.
“What the hell was that?”
“Did you see that? The wall just exploded for no reason.”
Human chatter circled around him as he made his way toward the exit. The brief pang from his hand did little to distract him from his latest revelation. He was such a fucking idiot. Why did he let her leave without telling her he loved her?
The humid night air did little to soothe him once he stepped outside. Not really expecting to see Tarus, he still looked up and down the street for any sign of him.
It didn’t matter if Tarus wanted to be alone. He was about to have company.
Closing his eyes, he found the link to his brother. The ranch.
He had gone to the ranch.
And Seth had thought Tarus would use his grace to distract himself from missing Dahlia.
The world fell away in a wash of indigo and navy blue, the slightest threads of white and silver weaved through his grace.
When he landed on his porch, he fell to his knees.
He still had a piece of her.
A contradiction of blinding joy and drowning sorrow filled him at the sight of her colors. It wasn’t nearly as strong as it had been earlier, but he hoped he always had a little bit of her with him. He could almost believe a part of her stayed with all of them.
He knew how he wanted to move forward without her.
Not that he wouldn’t sacrifice anything for her to stay with them, but that wasn’t an option.
Now he just had to convince his brothers that his way was the only way.
Seth
“Another, Quetta.” Seth’s words were barely recognizable in their slur.
He had no idea how long he’d been there at the bar, but that was the beautiful thing about Sinner’s. They never closed to Keepers. And out of all the years in his long existence, he needed this place more than ever.
Maybe not the people here, but the Nectar. And the white noise to keep him from sinking too deep into his own thoughts.
“I think you're cut off, as much as it goes against my grace to say so.” She walked by and cleared five of his most recent glasses off of the counter.
“I’ve not had that much.” He worked extra hard to make sure he sounded at least a little coherent, but he suspected from his constant swaying, and the second Quetta standing in front of him, he failed.
“Sure, the seven empty bottles were nothing. Especially to someone like you, who never partakes.” She rolled her eyes as she set the glasses in a bin under the counter. “Listen, I’m sympathetic to your situation—”
“Fuck off. I didn’t ask for your opinion,” Seth growled, but it sounded more like a groan, even to his own ears. Maybe it was time to quit.
He thought it would be impossible so soon, but the sweet oblivion of sleep was calling him.
“Yeah, whatever. You can settle this bill next time. For now, you’re banned. Don’t come back until you’ve had an attitude adjustment. You’re also going to pay for Zhan’s property damage.” She left him to fill an order at the end of the bar.
Damn, she could be a bitch when she wanted to be.
From the weak light filtering through the windows, he could deduce that he’d been there at least through the night. But who knew? He wanted to forget everything from the last few weeks, so he’d quickly and successfully drowned himself in the one substance that was sure to accomplish his goal.
He tried to stand, but flopped back down over the bar.
Would his grace even work if he tried to go back to his house?
Loosening his reins on his grace, he thought of his bed. Deep purple and crimson red flickered around his head, but he didn’t move from the bar.
“This is utterly pathetic. If I’d known you would have failed this miserably, I wouldn’t have put that darling girl in your path.” Karmen, the bitch, touched his shoulder right as Sinner’s melted from his vision. He had to close his eyes, otherwise, he’d be sick from the motion.
Karmen let go, and he crashed to the stone floor of his patio.
“Nice! Real fucking nice,” he hissed as he rolled around, clutching his sore ass. Through the haze of the Nectar, he had to admit he was pathetic just as Karmen very kindly pointed out. But he still couldn’t find it in himself to give a shit.
“No, what was nice was trying to give you brothers a piece of happiness. I set everything up as much as I could. I meddled as far as my grace would allow, and you three just let her slip through your fingers.” She pulled at her hair and paced back and forth. “You couldn’t even do the one thing within your power and save her. In fact, you failed multiple times. I swear, I’ve never seen a bigger bunch of incompetent morons.”
“Wait,” he groaned as he pushed himself to a sitting position. It didn’t matter that he was tilted severely to the right. “Back up. I don’t think I heard you right. Or I’ve had too much Nectar, and now I’m making sense where there is none.”
She sighed in heavy exasperation. “No, you’re not making any sense. It’s too late now. Even after you fucked everything up, you still could have saved her, but you fucked that up, too. I should have placed her in Vengeance's path. He would have pulled it off.”
“I need you to slow down for a minute.” Seth’s head started to throb from thinking too hard, the drink, or a combination of both. Slowly, the fog started to lift from
his mind as he repeated her words over and over again in his head.
“You’re saying…” He gulped as shards of the pain he’d worked so hard to numb crept back into his chest. All night, he hadn’t thought of her name once, but now he couldn’t not think about her. She didn’t deserve what happened to her, and he wished with all his grace that he would have stepped in and saved her. Even if that meant that she wouldn’t have known him. Or his brothers.
He would have found more peace in watching her live her life.
“Yes,” Karmen snapped, bringing him back to the present. “You could have saved her.” She spoke slow, deliberate words. “But you failed. Again.”
“Wait…” He stared at her, incensed. “I came to you, and I asked. I asked you what you knew and what I could do…”
She stared right back. “And?”
“I even asked Kindness…”
Eyes rolling, Karmen tapped her foot. “Catch up, Judgy one. Kindle told you she didn’t need her kiss because she was already overflowing with kindness. What was the one thing that beautiful girl needed?”
“Time, she needed time, and I could only—”
Seth stopped dead.
“And that, ladies and gentlemen, is when the big brain took over for the little brain.” Arms folded, she glared at him. “You were supposed to be the smart one. The literal one. How did you miss that?”
How had he missed that?
His stomach lurched, and his head pounded. Turning away from Karmen, he stumbled through the doors and headed straight for the bathroom. His vision tunneled as he staggered his way past the sofa where her sweater lay folded over the arm of it and the nail polish she’d used to paint her toes still sat in the center of the coffee table. Wavering, he turned to the hallway for his room, ignoring the kitchen where their dishes from dinner waited in the sink and a note stuck to the fridge that declared it a ‘no wing zone’ for all their safety.
The bedroom gutted him as he headed for the en suite. It still smelled like her.
Dahlia was everywhere.
Except where she belonged.
Right next to him.
In the bathroom, he flipped up the toilet lid and summoned his grace.
A moment later, he threw up everything he’d consumed, his body catching fire as he purged the Nectar. His head screamed and his stomach revolted, but he emptied it out.
“Yeah,” Karmen drawled. “That’s sexy.”
“Fuck,” he spat. “Off.”
Her laughter was a taunt, and it raked against his already raging headache. After splashing water on his face and washing his mouth out, he nodded. The fog had begun to clear. Towel in hand, he faced the little pixie standing in the middle of his bedroom—a place she should never have been.
“I needed Time.”
“She did. She needed him.”
“I gave her my grace.”
“Oh, I am well aware,” Karmen said. “She’s so full of grace, I’m surprised she wasn’t sloshing, and still, you didn’t see it.”
Then he had truly failed her. She’d kissed him, told him she loved him, and thanked him for the last few weeks. Then…
He’d done nothing but just let her go, let Bish take her.
Except…
Eyes narrowed, he studied Karmen. “Why did you put her in my path?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
He took a step toward her, but she gave him a bored look. “You don’t frighten me, Seth.”
“Why. Did. You. Put. Her. In. Our. Path?”
“Do you care? Or do you just love her?”
The barb landed.
Of course he loved her. Did he care why Karmen had acted as she had…? “Did you cause her boyfriend to lose his mind?”
“No,” she said with a shrug. “That would have happened anyway. Actually, it shouldn’t have happened. If any of you had intervened, she’d be merrily out saving the world with her friends. But I knew you wouldn’t.”
Because they hadn’t.
“Bish liked her.”
Karmen gave him a tight smile, but didn’t comment.
But she was here. While she could be a fickle bitch, she’d never been particularly vindictive. Why tell him after all of this if…?
If it was pointless. It wasn’t pointless.
“Oh, finally,” she groaned. “Good luck.” With a wave, she sauntered away. “You’re going to need it.”
Scrubbing his hands against his face, he focused on his brothers. She loved all of them. She needed them.
He wouldn’t fail her this time. Not if he could help it. When he traced the thread of Zhan and Tarus, he wasn’t surprised when it led to the ranch. Where she’d insisted he set himself up a room, because Dahlia knew better than all of them.
What they’d needed was each other and to work together.
He could slow time.
But there was only one who could truly extend it.
As he transported himself, the sunset colors threaded around him with bursts of white and silver.
Dahlia.
He paused in her favorite spot, staring at the house, and his heart fisted. Instinct brought him to where she loved the view the best. But she was there. She was still a part of him.
If this worked, he’d kiss Karmen.
Maybe that was going too far.
He’d buy her a drink.
Yes, that he could do.
Tarus
He couldn’t stay at Sinner’s, couldn’t stomach the place, not without Dahlia. Not when she had just—
His mind refused to accept that last part. Every fiber of his being had wanted to strike at Bish. His sword had been right there, he could have drawn it. The battle might have been lost before he threw the first punch, but he could have tried. Instead, he just let her tell him goodbye.
“I love you.”
Her sweet voice wrapped around him, a constant refrain stuck on repeat. So he went to the only other place he had ever found some sort of peace before her. The first step between Sinner’s and the ranch, he’d seen her strands of silver and white intertwined with his own, and his heart had nearly lodged itself in his throat.
Selfishly, he’d thrust his grace into her. He’d wanted to hold on to some part of her, have her be a part of him, and he had that.
And lost her in the process.
Bish’s accusation rang in his ears. She’d had a week.
A week before Zhan gave her his grace and Tarus had given her his.
They’d whittled her time down to nothing because they wanted her, wanted to give her more, to hold on to her longer.
Irony.
Karma.
“Bitch.” Rage surfaced in him again. The kiss she’d given him. This was how her grace stung him. He’d spent millennia avoiding his grace, avoiding his duty, but he’d have embraced it all if it meant keeping Dahlia, and they lost her anyway. They’d had joy right in the palm of their hands, Seth was with them again, it had been a slice of perfection.
The vacuum where Dahlia belonged sucked at him.
He stalked through their house and to his own rooms. The weapons lining his walls were numerous. Even after leaving his grace behind, he’d continued to collect them. Weapons of war. Swords. Daggers. Garrotes. Even guns. He had something from every era. Humanity was efficient at coming up with new weapons to kill.
Surely one of these would end him. Then Bish could take him to Dahlia. The other Keeper might be shocked, but he couldn’t be so cruel as to keep them apart. Dahlia deserved more than to be alone. Fuck, Tarus didn’t even know what happened to human souls when Bish took them.
He’d wanted Dahlia for himself, it was why he’d taken her to his little island. But no sooner did the rage kindle in Tarus than it calmed again.
If he went after Bish it would disappoint Dahlia. He couldn’t do that to her. He had failed her in so many ways, he couldn’t fail her now.
“I love you.”
Power exploded out of him, and the weapons twisted, broke, and som
e vanished into the ether. They didn’t matter. None of the weapons in this room could kill him. Likely, the only one that could was his own. Still, it wouldn’t come to his hand.
“You see so much. When you look, you see. Don’t close your eyes. Don’t lock yourself away. I’m not going to tell you to look after your brothers, because I know you will. You deserve everything, punishing yourself isn’t what I want for you.”
Killing himself, even if he could figure out how, would only disappoint her. Sinking down, he sat on the edge of his bed and rested with his elbows against his knees. He had no idea how long he sat there, but he could feel her. Imagine her leaning next to him, her head against his shoulder, her soft giggle as some new absurdity struck her, and just like that, she would strike away the darkness consuming him. There really was only one thing he could do. The one thing she’d tried to impress upon them.
He couldn’t abandon his grace, and he couldn’t slice away that part of himself. Maybe they couldn’t change the whole world, but they could change it for one person. One person at a time.
People like her. People who deserved more than what life had given them.
It was in their power to give them better fates.
Even if it only delayed the inevitable.
A tear splashed against his hand. Then another one. He should have seen it sooner. If he’d not stopped Zhan that night…
“Brother,” Zhan said quietly from the door, and Tarus lifted his head to meet his brother’s grieving gaze. “Don’t.”
“We had a lot of chances,” he whispered.
“I know.”
“We blew it.”
“I know that, too.” Zhan sighed as he crossed the room. Dropping to sit next to him, he bumped his shoulder. “But we had her. I can’t regret that.”
No. “There will never be another like her.”
“I wouldn’t want there to be,” Zhan agreed. “Would you?”
Tarus shook his head. “Where’s Seth?”
“Drinking.” His brother shook his head. “He’s lost without her.”
“We all are.” Slanting a look to his right, Tarus studied Zhan. The grief was there, like a layer of electricity crackling over his skin, but there was more. Purpose.
