Burn the Night

by Jocelynn Drake

  While I lay there, I felt Nick’s powers increase again as he prepared for another attack. Balling my hands into fists, I pushed the power deeper inside of myself and then I disappeared. Stunned shock gripped me so quickly at the unexpected ability that I immediately reappeared exactly where I was, which did me little good against Nick. My eyes popped open and my mouth formed a perfect O in surprise. The only time I had been able to disappear and reappear before was when I tapped into Jabari’s powers. Now I either had the power to do it on my own or I could simply tap into Nick’s powers to do it.

  “You can do it on your own,” Nick said.

  “What else can I do?” I demanded with an eagerness I couldn’t hide. The world had suddenly opened up to me in a new way, and I needed to know the extent of what I was capable.

  Nick gave a slight shrug of one shoulder as some of the anger started to drain out of his expression. “You will never know until you try.”

  With a small smile, I wrapped a ball of energy tight within my chest, gathering together as much energy as I could stand. It crawled along my skin like a millipede and pounded against my chest like a heartbeat, but it was nothing more than power looking for an outlet, and I was willing to give it one.

  I directed the energy at Nick, sending it crashing into the center of his chest, throwing him several feet backward across the yard. As soon as he was standing again, I hammered him once more, knocking him off balance while I set him on fire in a towering inferno that threatened to light the nearby trees. I paused long enough to watch the flame-cloaked figure brush off his jacket and take a few easy steps toward me.

  “The fire bit is getting old and stale, Mira,” Nick said in a singsong voice.

  “Then how about this?” I said. Pushing to my feet, I directed my hands down to the ground, feeling the pulse of the earth beneath me. Straining to maintain the flames, I directed the roots of the surrounding trees to explode from the ground and wrap around his ankles. The roots pulled and slammed him to the ground again as he extinguished the flames. Pulling in different directions, I attempted to split him into two different pieces, but he disappeared before I could even get a grunt of pain out of him.

  Nick instantly reappeared before me and cocked back his fist to punch me, but I was gone this time before he could touch me. I reappeared a few feet away, my mind scrambling for some new way to attack him that could make some kind of impact when it dawned on me: use the same attack that had been so effective on me. Gods had to have souls as well, right?

  Gathering up as much powers as I could possibly stand before a scream could be torn from my throat, I reached out toward the energy flowing from Nick. I plunged the powers inside of him, searching for that faint wisp that was his soul. I found it in a heartbeat, but it was like trying to wrap my arms around an angry grizzly bear. The energy thrashed about, shoving me away anytime I grew too near. His soul could actually fight me, where mine lay limp and helpless against his attacks.

  “And that is why you should never have become a nightwalker,” he calmly said, before finally brushing me and my powers aside like an annoying fly. I was thrown back again, slamming into the ground.

  I pulled the energy back to me and disappeared again before he could attack me. However, it felt as if a hand grasped me around the neck and pulled me back so I was standing directly in front of Nick.

  “Enough playing for one night,” he declared. “I think you’ve begun to understand exactly what kind of power is at your fingertips if you only try.” To my surprise, his words sounded heavy, as though he was struggling to catch his breath. There was a slight flush to his cheeks, indicating that he might actually be tired from all the exertion of fighting me. I tucked that little mental note away in the back of my brain and kept my face clean of any expression.

  Of course, it was only after I released the powers I’d been holding onto that I felt a wave of exhaustion pour over me. My knees turned wobbly and threatened to buckle under me, while my arms felt as if lead weights had been tied to my wrists. I needed to sit down and wait for the feeling to pass, but was unwilling to show any weakness to Nick, knowing that he could potentially take advantage of it.

  “Do you think you can handle Jabari now?” he demanded.

  “It feels as if the fight will be a little more even,” I admitted. “He can still control me, which gives him an edge.”

  “And you can stop him from doing that if you truly want to. Take care of this, Mira, because you do not want me to,” he warned. Nick took a step back, and I did the one thing I thought I would never do. I stopped him. My curiosity had gotten the better of me.

  “The nightwalkers didn’t really cage the naturi, did they?” I quickly blurted out when I sensed he was preparing to disappear.

  The energy in the air seemed to dissipate with the spring breeze. He frowned at me, and I felt myself clenching all my muscles as I waited for him to strike me again. It was that statement earlier that had set off his temper in the first place. For reasons I didn’t understand, the story that had been told to me centuries ago about how the naturi and bori were caged was proving to be false. I had a feeling that only a creature as old as Nick might hold the truth I wanted.

  “No, the nightwalkers were not the ones to cage the naturi,” he said with a sneer. “Nor were the lycanthropes the ones to cage the bori. I will give you that both races aided in the capture of the naturi and the bori, but you were not the force behind the act.”

  “Then what happened? How were the two races drawn into their cages?” I asked, still inwardly cringing as I waited for his temper to explode again.

  “They both chased after the one thing they want most in the world.”

  “Control of the Earth?”

  “More power.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  Nick sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose with his thumb and index finger. He wandered over to the patio at the back of my house and silently settled into one of the wrought-iron chairs around the table. He waited until I slowly walked over and took a seat opposite him. It was the first time either of us had come close to a civil conversation, and I had a feeling it might be the only time. Nick’s temper was too like my own and could flare up with the smallest provocation. I was treading on thin ice.

  “The naturi and the bori are attracted to power. They believe that more power is the only thing that will give them an edge over the other, and thus the ability to wipe out the other,” Nick explained.

  “So what kind of power could have attracted them both into a cage?”

  “How about a pair of fallen gods?”

  I sat back in my chair, speechless as I tried to wrap my brain around the thought. “You sacrificed two of your own to capture the naturi and the bori?”

  “No!” he shouted, slamming his fist on the table. “They made the sacrifice. They made the choice to go into the cages and act as bait for those bastards. It’s their powers, their souls, that are keeping the cages from breaking down.”

  “But the naturi cage is breaking down,” I said, hating the words as they came out of my mouth. I didn’t need to throw more wood on the fire burning in his glowing lavender eyes.

  “That’s because she’s dying without her mate.”

  “Which gods were they?”

  “The creator gods. The first gods.” Nick looked down at his hands, which were folded in his lap. “They need each other for strength and stability. They have been separated for a very long time.”

  “They were the first?”

  “Born from the Earth herself,” he declared with a faint smile. “The Pagans referred to them as Freya and Woden, but they truly have no names. They were simply the first gods, and then came the other gods, and then the humans. The naturi and bori were later created to keep a balance with the humans, but it was a mistake. The two were constantly at war with each other no matter what the gods ordered. They had been made too powerful in their own right.”

  “So the first gods sacrificed themselve
s by locking themselves with the naturi and bori in cages. The cages have been feeding off their powers. The naturi and bori have been feeding off their powers, weakening because they’ve been kept apart from each other and the earth.”

  Nick gave a short little chuckle. “There is hope for you yet.”

  “Will they die?”

  “Eventually, if someone doesn’t take their place.”

  “And if they die, then the cages will break and the remaining naturi and all the bori will be set free again.”

  “Yes.”

  “But you said that the gods were half dead. How can anyone take their place?”

  Nick gave a twisted little smirk and shook his head at me. “They can’t.” My father pushed out of his chair and gave a pull at his jacket to straighten it. I remained lounging in my chair, turning over the dark information he had already handed to me. “And before you can ask, yes, the reason the gods are half dead and nearly forgotten from this world is because the first gods are gone from it. Their sacrifice nearly killed us all as well.”

  “But you’re looking for a way to make a comeback,” I said, bringing a smile back to his lips. “And I’m sure that you’re not the only one.”

  “Definitely not. But I wouldn’t get any ideas of finding some outside help. None of the other remaining gods are half as forgiving or generous as I am.”

  “I’m sure,” I said sarcastically.

  Nick started to turn away from me, but paused and turned back, scratching the tip of his nose. “And before I forget. Your nights with that bori bastard are growing short.”

  “What?” I demanded, trying to lunge out of my seat, but a wave of his hand succeeded in pushing me back down. I started pulling the energy back toward me again, ready for another fight with my father, but he only shook his head in warning.

  “He can control you, and I won’t allow it.”

  “Danaus won’t control me,” I argued, tightly gripping the arms of the chair. “We’re on the same side. He doesn’t want to control me.”

  “You’re on the same side for now. Considering your past relationships, I have a feeling that truce could end very quickly, and then you will have no choice but to kill him.”

  “Then let’s wait for that truce to end naturally,” I argued, inwardly confident that such a day would not come between Danaus and me. “There’s no reason to kill him now.”

  “He’s a distraction.”

  “He’s a needed ally in the coming war.”

  Nick shook his head at me, refusing to budge from his stance. “He’s a distraction and a threat. His days are numbered, but my main concern is Jabari. Take care of him.” And then, without another word, he disappeared from sight. I scanned the immediate area, but his distinct signature of power was gone. I was alone.

  I remained sitting on the patio for several minutes, turning over all the information that Nick had delivered as well as the new extent of my powers. He was right in that I needed to finally be rid of Jabari. The Ancient was not only a threat to myself, but to Danaus and anyone else that mattered to me. I couldn’t allow him to continue to risk their lives just so he could use and manipulate me. It was time for it to end.

  But then, Jabari wasn’t my only problem. I needed to get rid of Nick as well. I couldn’t be his pawn any longer. For that matter, I couldn’t be allowed to make him a more powerful creature than he already was. The world was far too fragile at the moment to stand the shake-up he would create. What I needed was someone else that had a similar problem as myself. Nick had intimated on more than one occasion that I wasn’t the only offspring of a god wandering the earth. There had to be another like me, with their share of impressive powers that could aid me in getting rid of a god. And in truth, I already had a solid guess as to where I could find one. The only problem was getting him to go along with any plan that I managed to weave into creation. It was one thing to take on nightwalkers, lycanthropes, and the naturi. It was a completely different story to stand toe-to-toe with a god and expect that you just might live through it.

  Sitting on the back patio, I closed my eyes and listened to the breeze as it swept through the trees, rustling the leaves. Crickets chirped softly now that Nick had left and I’d gone completely still in my chair. Around me, energies swirled and flowed, carrying with them burbles of emotions and broken thoughts. I could feel the soft swell of the powers that flowed up from the earth like a mother’s gentle reassuring caress. I knew what I had to do for the first time in my life. The only problem was that I couldn’t bring myself to move. I had so much to lose now. Danaus, Knox, Valerio, all of my people. The Savannah pack. My home here in Savannah. The quiet peace that existed between the occult and the humans. It all was balanced on a precipice, and I knew that if I failed, I would lose it all. It was time to act for the final time.

  Twenty-four

  Jabari was at the Dark Room. I hadn’t needed Knox to call me with the information as I was driving into Savannah, but the tenseness in his voice told me he was hoping I would do something. When I parked in my usual spot outside the club, I found both the bouncers missing from the front door and a small splatter of blood running down the door frame and pooling on the ground. A frown pulled at the corner of my lips as I wished I had heeded Nick’s advice sooner and dispatched Jabari when I first encountered him. I should have found a way to deal with the Ancient much sooner, despite my lingering feelings for my onetime mentor.

  Upon entering, I found the Dark Room nearly deserted; only Danaus and another bartender remained stubbornly at their posts. I had forgotten that it was Danaus’s night to work there, and need not have worried about his imminent arrival while I was with Nick.

  Knox was hovering in the doorway that led to the back rooms of the nightclub. He was leaning against the wall with his arms folded over his chest, a grim expression stretched over his handsome face. For the most part, Knox saw the Dark Room as his little domain within my territory. I left him to maintain the peace within the club when I was not present, and in many ways that peace extended out to most of Savannah. He was my second in command and always would be, despite Danaus’s new position within my life. He not only knew me and my temperament, but also knew Savannah and her nightwalkers very well. Knox was the perfect moderator between myself and the rest of the others that inhabited my domain.

  Without letting my gaze travel around the club, I walked over to where Knox stood, knowing that Jabari and some others were at my back on the far side of the room. I would deal with them when I was ready. First, I wanted to speak with Knox.

  “What happened outside?” I asked.

  He glanced over my shoulder for a second before directing his gaze back to me. He spoke in an extremely low voice, but we both knew that Jabari could hear us. “He killed the two bouncers, Clay and Karl, when they asked for some kind of identification. They didn’t realize who he was. I sensed him, but I didn’t get outside fast enough to warn them.” Knox hung his head and squeezed his eyes shut. I could see the memory as clear as day running through his head. He opened the door in time to see Jabari ripping both the lycanthrope and the nightwalker to shreds in seconds. Neither had enough time to react.

  It wasn’t their fault either—they were simply doing their jobs and didn’t realize that they were faced with a short-tempered member of the coven. If I or Knox or Danaus had been present at the door, we would have stopped them from questioning the Ancient, but things just hadn’t worked out that way.

  “Did you contact Barrett?” The alpha of the local pack needed to know that yet another one of his pack members had been killed while working at the Dark Room. Something that was happening far too frequently for my liking. The Dark Room had once been a very peaceful, pleasant place for nightwalkers and lycanthropes alike.

  “I left a message with his sister. It seems that Barrett has returned with Daniel, but the human is in rough shape. He’s going to need some time to heal. Barrett also appears to be worried about Daniel’s family.”

  “Of
fer to send some nightwalkers over during the evening hours. We can remain hidden better than the lycanthropes.”

  “Already done,” Knox replied with the first shadow of a smile I had seen on his face since I walked into the nightclub.

  “Good. Then I guess I’ll go do my job and take care of this matter,” I said, not caring if Jabari was listening to the conversation.

  Before turning around, I glanced over at Danaus and winked at him while a little smirk danced across my lips. He didn’t smile in return. He had eyes only for Jabari and wouldn’t relax so long as I was within the Ancient’s reach. There was no question that the Ancient had come to my domain with the simple intention of killing me, but he seemed content to drag out my execution and torment the members of my domain. Danaus was willing to hang back in the shadows for now, but he would be watching closely. If the talks seemed to turn sour, I knew he would be over the bar and at my side in a couple of heartbeats.

  I walked across the nightclub, crossing the empty dance floor to the large booth that Jabari inhabited alone. At the entrance to the booth, two humans lay sprawled on the ground. Their breathing was labored and they were a sickly shade of pale—the nightwalker had drained them of too much blood. If they didn’t get some help soon, it would be a miracle if they survived the night.

  “Knox, get these two to a hospital now!” I shouted, stepping over them so I was standing just outside Jabari’s booth. His feet were propped up on the table and his back was pressed against the back of the booth, looking for all the world as if he was the king of all he surveyed. Not quite.

  “I wasn’t finished with them,” he said lazily.

  “They’re nearly dead. You’re finished,” I snapped. For the first time, I noticed that his dark skin looked a little singed and he was keeping his hands curled close to his body. In our last fight, I had managed to score a hit with my blast of fire before he escaped. It had been enough to hold the nightwalker at bay for a few nights as he healed.