“He’s summoning the spirits of the dead to return his mate.” The fog began to thicken as it rolled over the ground, concealing everything below Nicholas’s knees.
“Don’t be shy, brother!” Phillip called to him from somewhere amongst the mass of headstones. “I’ve been waiting for you!”
Chapter Twelve
Pulling up behind the last SUV parked alongside the old wooden fence, Jonas had his door open before Ridley had even come to a complete stop. His energy was draining swiftly, so he didn’t dare trying to jump out of the vehicle like he normally would. Though his body felt frail and useless, a fire burned inside him, propelling him forward to stand by his mate.
The fog lapped at his calves and around his knees, billowing up around him with each step he took. As he and Ridley approached, a dozen sets of eyes turned in their direction, but Jonas searched for only one. Nicholas stood a couple of steps ahead of the rest with his chest almost touching the fence.
When their eyes met, Nicholas let out a sharp gasp that Jonas could hear, even over the roar of the wind. The closer he traveled toward his mate, the harder and more ferocious the wind blew around him, fighting him as though desperate to keep him from Nicholas.
“Why?” Nicholas shouted.
“We’re in this together,” Jonas croaked in answer. Even his voice sounded feeble, but he pushed on, battling the wind as he trudged toward his mate.
All at once, everything stilled and became eerily quiet. Jonas paused in his forward trek and craned his neck, looking for any signs of trouble. Ridley caressed his arm and gave him a sad smile as he slipped past him to join the others.
“And now you’re both here,” came a deep, husky voice.
Jonas snapped his attention toward his mate and cried out when it felt as though he’d shattered his spine. Standing just on the other side of the fence was the one person he’d never thought to see again if he lived forever.
Phillip looked no different than he had the last time Jonas had laid eyes on him. The moonlight glinted off his dark hair, giving it a bluish tinge that only made him appear more handsome. They weren’t twins, but no one could deny the familial ties between Phillip and Nicholas.
“What are you doing to him?” Nicholas snarled at his brother but made no attempt to touch him. “Stop this!”
“A life for a life, brother,” Phillip answered easily. “Your mate for mine.”
Jonas shuffled forward, each step sending electric shocks of pain coursing through his body. He didn’t stop until he stood beside Nicholas, though. When he was close enough to touch his mate, he reached out and took Nicholas’s hand, squeezing it with as much strength as he could. “Do you still love me now that I’m all old and disgusting?”
He’d meant it as a joke, but tears welled up in Nicholas’s eyes, shining in the moonlight that caressed his face. “You’re beautiful,” he whispered. “I will always love you.”
“Oh, gag me,” Phillip interrupted with a sneer. “I’ve waited a long, long time for this.” He looked over Nicholas’s shoulder toward the group at his back and waved his hand in their direction. “Manere.” There were loud growls and roars as the twelve men were flung backward and pinned by some invisible force to the sides of the SUVs.
Phillip smirked evilly and turned to walk back through the fog.
“Come.”
Jonas started forward, but Nicholas stopped him with a gentle tug.
“Stay here.” He caressed the side of Jonas’s face and gulped audibly.
“Please, don’t do this.”
“We’re in this together,” Jonas repeated. “I’m not letting you go alone.” He wasn’t fooling himself. He knew he couldn’t fight Phillip and win. Hell, at the rate his body was shutting down, he probably couldn’t fight a kitten and win. For better or worse, he’d be by Nicholas’s side until the end, though. “I’ll be honest and tell you that I feel like shit, so do you think we can argue about this later?” As he stared up into Nicholas’s glistening eyes, he knew that Nicholas understood as well as he did that there wouldn’t be a later.
He wasn’t going to walk away from this, but at least he’d chosen an appropriate venue to die. Cutting out the middle man, so to speak.
With a sigh and a shake of his head, Nicholas grabbed the top of the fence and launched himself over it before turning to help Jonas over as well. Then a strong arm wrapped around his waist, and Nicholas held him up as they walked amongst the gravestones in the direction Phillip had disappeared.
It seemed to take an extraordinary amount of time, but eventually Nicholas stopped and pulled Jonas to a halt beside him. “Let them go,” he demanded, jerking his head to the side.
Jonas followed Nicholas’s gaze. His low growl turned to a violent coughing fit, and by the time it ended, he found himself kneeling on the ground with his mate crouched in front of him.
“I’m fine,” he assured his lover before returning his attention to the four men tied to individual headstones. Their heads lolled on their shoulders, and they were obviously unconscious. Studying them carefully, Jonas noticed a few cuts and bruises, but nothing of immediate concern. “I think they’re okay.”
“They’re completely fine,” Phillip agreed, “for now. I needed bait. Now that they’ve served their purpose, I don’t really have any use for them.” He closed his eyes and lifted his arms toward the sky as he began chanting words that Jonas couldn’t comprehend. “Spiritus mortuorum ego advoca te. Return to consorti mea lux. Spiritus mortuorum ego advoca te. ”
Over and over he recited the words, and though Jonas didn’t know what they meant, he could feel the life slipping out of him. “Vita vitae. Mors mortis. Revertetur quod abiit. Spiritus mortuorum ego advoca te. ”
When the pain started, Jonas clenched his withered hands into fists and doubled over, crying out in agony. His insides boiled, his bones bent and creaked, and his muscles spasmed until he thought his entire body would break apart into a million pieces.
“Life of life. Death of death. Return what is mine. Spirits of the dead, I summon thee!” Phillip grew louder with each repetition, alternately switching between English and the language Jonas didn’t understand.
“I guess he doesn’t want me to be confused,” Jonas choked out as another blast of pain gripped his body. Slumping over to his side, he curled into a fetal position and panted heavily as the fog licked at his clammy skin.
“Stop this!” Nicholas shouted from beside Jonas. He caressed Jonas’s face and stroked his lank and lifeless hair. “You’re killing him. Please, Phillip! I love him.”
“And I loved Andre!” Phillip shouted vehemently. “You took him from me. It should have been you that died in that pond!” As his heart rate slowed, the pain began to subside, leaving only exhaustion. “It’s not so bad,” he whispered hoarsely to his mate.
“Death isn’t scary, Nicholas.” His eyelids grew heavy, and he struggled to make his lips form the words he wanted to say. “I love you, and I’ll always be with you. Don’t forget me.” With his last bit of energy, he slid his hand across the dew-covered grass and placed it over Nicholas’s.
“Jonas, don’t do this. Open your eyes.” Nicholas shook him roughly and his breath hitched twice. “Don’t fucking leave me.
Phillip, stop this!”
“Don’t forget me,” Jonas repeated in a tired whisper. He sucked in a shuddering breath and let it out on a slow exhale as everything vanished, and he floated away into a peaceful, endless sleep.
* * * *
As Nicholas watched his mate take his last breath on this earth, an all-consuming rage enveloped him. There was nothing he could do for Jonas now, and there would be plenty of time to grieve for the man he loved—an eternity of it.
Just then, however, the only thing in his heart was hate, and the only thought drifting through the red haze of his mind was inflicting as much pain on his brother as possible. Phillip’s death would not be quick or painless. Nicholas would make sure he suffered, drawing out the tortur
e until the resurrected vampire begged for death.
“You can’t beat me,” Phillip said cockily. “It’s over. I will have my Andre back, and you will lament in agony as I have for the last two centuries.”
Rising slowly, Nicholas turned to face his brother head on and squared his shoulders. “You can’t bring him back, Phillip. Andre is gone, and he’s not coming back.”
Phillip laughed harshly before he began chanting again.
“The spell isn’t meant for those who have moved on. You can’t recall someone from the other side.”
“Shut up! You’re lying!”
Some of Nicholas’s rage melted away, replaced by pity for the brother he’d idolized for years. “Only the souls trapped in Purgatory, those with unsettled debts, can be called back.” He took a step closer to Phillip and spoke softly. “Andre isn’t coming back.”
“Silence!” Phillip roared, and Nicholas felt his lips clamp together as though someone had slapped a hand over his mouth. Faster and with a slight growl in his voice, Phillip began chanting again.
“Revertetur quod abiit. Return what is mine!” That was wrong, though. Phillip wasn’t asking for the return of something that belonged to him. He was calling back all things that had passed. Once Nicholas figured that much out, it didn’t take long for him to realize that all hell was about to break loose.
The wind whipped and howled, blowing Nicholas’s hair around his face. The clouds over his head darkened and churned, coming together to blot out the moon, while a loud, terrifying wail ripped through the night, closely followed by several other distinctly different, murmuring voices.
Nicholas might not be able to speak, but Phillip hadn’t frozen him in place as he’d done the others. Taking several running steps, he launched himself at his brother, tackling him to the ground hard enough that Nicholas’s teeth clacked together upon impact.
Phillip growled and tried to shove him off, and his break in concentration lifted Nicholas’s curse of silence. “Stop this! You’re going to kill us all, you idiot! You have no idea what you’re doing.” Even as he spoke the words, Nicholas knew it was too late. The wind battered against them brutally, and the temperature dropped to bone-numbing cold in the span of seconds. The ground began to tremble, and the wails and murmurs increased in volume as the fog churned around them.
“What’s happening?” Phillip whispered, his eyes darting about them frantically. “This isn’t right. This isn’t what’s supposed to happen.” He grabbed at Nicholas’s shoulder, looking less like the maniac of moments before and more like a scared little boy. “Do something.”
Nicholas rolled to the side to sit on the grass beside his brother and shook his head. “I don’t know how.” When the first grisly specter appeared just feet in front of him, he really wished he’d had a better answer. Huddling closer to Phillip, Nicholas stared in wide-eyed shock as several more gruesome spirits appeared out of thin air, each more horrible than the last.
Looking past the angry ghosts, Nicholas stared at Jonas’s unmoving and lifeless body where it was still crumpled on the ground. His fierce defender was now nothing more than a shattered memory of the man he’d once been.
Grief and sadness welled up in his heart, and tears prickled at the corners of his eyes. He had no guarantee of what would happen after he died, but he hoped he’d be reunited with the man he loved. Jonas said death was nothing to fear, and in that moment, staring at his broken warrior, Nicholas welcomed an end to the pain ripping at his heart.
He couldn’t fight what was coming. There was no way out of the mess Phillip had created for them. Heartache over losing the man he loved had driven his brother mad, and for the first time, Nicholas understood the unrelenting anguish Phillip must have felt.
“I forgive you,” he whispered to Phillip as he closed his eyes and waited for the end.
“Light of the righteous, vanquish the darkness. Reclaim your lost souls and deliver them unto the night.” Opening his eyes, Nicholas looked over his shoulder to find Torren struggling against the ropes binding him to the headstone as he chanted the words. How he could have forgotten that they had a powerful witch on their side, he’d never know.
Scrambling across the ground on his hands and knees, he unsheathed his dagger and began sawing at the thick ropes wrapped around Torren’s torso. Once he’d finished with those, he set to work on the ropes around the witch’s ankles and wrists.
When Torren was free, he jumped up from the ground and rushed forward to stand beside Phillip. “Get up and join hands,” he ordered, never taking his eyes away from the angry and advancing spirits.
Nicholas didn’t waste any time as he hurried to join him.
Grabbing his brother under the arms, he jerked Phillip to his feet and dragged him several feet back before shaking him roughly. “Join hands!”
Nodding dazedly, Phillip took Nicholas’s hand in one of his and Torren’s in the other. “Light of the righteous, vanquish the darkness.
Reclaim your lost souls and deliver them unto the night.” Over and over, faster and faster, they chanted the words as the souls of the banished moved ever closer.
Thundering footsteps raced over the ground but stuttered to a halt just outside their circle as their friends and allies stopped and gaped at them.
“Join in!” Torren shouted at them, releasing Nicholas’s hand and reaching for Kieran.
“We’re not witches!” Ridley argued, yelling to be heard over the vicious wind.
“It doesn’t matter,” Phillip responded, finally coming out of his stupor. “Join in the circle, damn it!” Every man gave one look at the gruesome and grisly horde closing in on them and shuddered before moving quickly to join hands. Once the circle was closed, Nicholas immediately began chanting again, giving his friends a hard stare to get them chanting as well.
Then he closed his eyes and focused all the energy inside of him.
“Light of the righteous, vanquish the darkness. Reclaim your lost souls and deliver them unto the night,” they all shouted in unison again and again.
The wind quieted, slowing diminishing in its strength, and the temperature began to rise. Nicholas’s palms heated where they met with Torren’s and Phillip’s. Without warning, a blast of wind exploded from the center of their circle, barreling into them with enough force to knock them all off their feet.
Landing on his back with a grunt, Nicholas rolled to his side and panted for breath as he searched the night for their enemies.
Everything was quiet, though. No ghosts, no howling wind, no dark, foreboding clouds—even the fog began to roll away.
The only evidence that they’d just fought for their lives and won was the presence of a brother he’d thought was dead, and a mate who really was.
Chapter Thirteen
“Do something!” Nicholas begged as he scrambled across the ground to his fallen mate. “Jonas, wake up.” Holding the tears back by sheer willpower, he cradled his mate’s head in his lap and stroked his hair back from his face. “No, no, no. Jonas, no.” The danger had passed, the rage at his brother had faded, and all that was left was the debilitating pain that gripped his heart and squeezed until it bled.
“Phillip, fix this!” he screamed. “You did this. Fucking fix it!”
The tears streamed down Phillip’s cheeks, and he shook his head as he eased to the ground beside Nicholas. “I’m sorry, Nicky. I can’t fix this.”
“Bullshit! You can. Do you really hate me so much?”
“I did,” Phillip whispered. “I never meant any of that shit, Nicky. It just hurt so much when Andre died, and I let the grief control me and pollute my brain. I didn’t just hate you. I hated everyone.”
“Fuck you,” Nicholas whispered. “I don’t want your fucking excuses or apologies! I want you to bring him back, goddamn it!”
“Nicky…”
“No!” Nicholas roared. “What happened with Andre was an accident. You… You took Jonas from me. It wasn’t enough that you kept us apart for al
l those years with your stupid curse, or tried to kill him with that gold dagger? No, you couldn’t let it go until you ripped us apart. Well, you can take your remorse and shove it up your ass.”
All he wanted was for Phillip to disappear again. Do not pass go. Do not collect two-hundred dollars. Just go straight to hell. Was that really too much to ask for?
Phillip started chuckling, quietly at first, but it grew louder and more maniacal with each passing second. “I can’t believe you were able to stay away from him for so long. I had to do something when you wouldn’t claim him, so I followed you two down to the pond. How else was I supposed to get my Andre back?”
“You’re crazy.” His brother had completely snapped.
Running one finger along the side of Jonas’s face, Phillip grinned sadistically. “I wonder how long it will take you to lose your mind. How long do you think you’ll last, Nicky? Was it worth it? Was his blood sweet when you sank your fangs through his neck and claimed him?”
“Would someone please fucking arrest him already?” Ridley huffed and waved a hand at Phillip.
Varik, Demos, and Devlin stepped forward and dragged Phillip to his feet none too gently. “Hands behind your back, asshole,” Varik snarled at him.
“Ha!” Phillip laughed. “Or what? Are you going to kill me? Haven’t you heard? I can’t die!”
Cian Murphy pushed through the crowd and marched right up to Phillip. Then he hauled off and decked him in the mouth. Phillip’s head snapped back on his shoulders, and Cian took the opportunity to jab a needle into his neck and depress the syringe. Seconds later, Phillip was out cold. “Maybe he can’t die, but that should be keepin’ him quiet.”
“What was that?” Varik asked, though he seemed unconcerned about the answer.
“Inhibitor,” Cian answered with a shrug. “It’ll keep the shifters from changin’, but wouldn’t ya know, it’ll knock anyone else on their arse, ya see.”
Haven 3: Forgotten Sins Page 10
