Valen lifted Esher from the cold stone floor and jerked his head to his left as Aiko glanced at him. “I’ll show you to his room.”
Eva followed them as they disappeared into the small hallway that adjoined the large foyer and banked right.
Ares stood, taking Cal with him, cradling him gently as he looked down at Keras. “You okay?”
Keras nodded. “Get him comfortable.”
“I’ll get the boiler running.” Marek turned away from them, leading Caterina to the hallway and taking a right too, only Keras knew he was heading down into the basement with her rather than up to the first floor. His brother’s deep voice faded into the distance as he said, “You can check on your brother while we’re down here.”
Caterina’s brother had been turned into a wraith, his transformation completed by Eli, the wraith who had been on the enemy’s side. Guillem had pledged his allegiance to that side too, but Marek’s latest reports on Caterina’s efforts to reach her brother and turn him to their side were positive. Guillem had started giving them information.
Showed signs that he wanted to go back to his old life with his sister.
Keras wasn’t sure how much of it was a desperate act to save himself since he had been locked in the basement cells for months now.
He thought about the other source of information they were holding down there. A need to force her to talk in case she knew where the furie might have taken Marinda filled him.
Pain ripped through him and he doubled over as he gasped, as he wrapped his arms around his stomach and gritted his teeth. His stomach twisted violently, hunger swamping him as feelings collided inside him, forming a maelstrom that swept him up in it, had him spinning out of control just as he had thought he had pulled himself together.
Fear and anger crashed together, blurred with the bitter disappointment of having to withdraw from the Tokyo mansion, the self-loathing of losing a battle. The dark need to bite Enyo and claim her.
He screwed his eyes shut and struggled to breathe as they all rushed through him, rousing a terrible urge to return to the Tokyo mansion and fight.
Cold sweat rolled down his spine beneath his shirt.
His entire body quaked and his breath stuttered.
Shadows whipped around him, moving faster and faster as he spiralled downwards, into the mire of his feelings, drowning in them.
Light breached the darkness.
Her touch whisper soft.
He leaned into that caress as it chased over his right cheek, seeking the warmth of it, the steadiness as his entire world tilted wrong way up and he felt as if he was falling.
“You should not have teleported so many when you were weak.” Her soft chastising words roused the dark beast inside him, had him seething with a need to lash out at her for calling him weak.
He battled it, conquered it and sank into her touch instead, seeking the comfort of it.
She took hold of him, gently pulled him up onto his feet and helped him into an adjoining room. She set him down on the hard antique couch and kneeled before him, stroking her fingers over his brow.
“Is he all right?” Valen’s voice was low, filled with worry that was unlike his brother.
Things had to be bad if Valen’s bravado had slipped, revealing the heart he insisted on hiding from the world.
“He will be.” Enyo feathered her fingers down Keras’s cheek. “He will be.”
He appreciated the conviction in her tone, clawed together the strength it instilled in him, the belief that the emotions bombarding him would pass if he could just hold it together.
He wasn’t going to drown in them.
He didn’t need a pill.
He had pulled himself together a few minutes ago, and he could pull himself together now. A mocking voice inside him asked if he believed that. He didn’t. He did. The suddenness and the strength of the episode had caught him off guard, that was the only reason he was doubting whether he could make it through it. He could.
Other voices joined Valen and Enyo’s, a blur of them that it hurt to focus on, so he focused on himself instead, on slowly picking apart the wretched mash of his feelings and processing them one by one.
Eventually, his head cleared enough that the conversation came into focus.
“What if we took another look at Guillem’s mind?” Daimon’s words were met with the sound of feet scuffing the stone floor and a muffled grunt.
Keras cracked his eyes open, squinted across the room to the arched stone doorway where Caterina had Daimon pinned against the wooden panels that covered the walls.
“Or maybe not,” Daimon muttered and raised his hands at his sides.
“Pointless.” Keras shoved that word from his lips with effort and everyone looked at him. “Cannot.”
If he was going to crack open anyone’s mind for answers, it would be the witch’s he probed.
“Aiko could.” Valen shrugged when Keras frowned at him.
Aiko was a Carrier, with the talent of reading intentions in people, and sometimes their minds, but Guillem was strong and might block her. The last thing Keras needed was Aiko hurting herself trying to read his memories and Esher finally coming around to find her recovering from it.
Esher was going to be angry enough as it was.
Keras wasn’t sure what condition the enemy would leave the Tokyo mansion in.
There was nothing of importance stored there. Keras had made sure of that only a month ago, when Calistos had first used his favour mark to summon a portal to the Underworld so he could report to their father.
He had made Calistos take all their swords and shields with him.
Marek had kept every scrap of information they had on his computer, and Keras had no doubt that his brother had evacuated that item from the mansion too. His brother would never leave his beloved laptop behind.
There might be a few documents left there, and their clothes, but that was all.
“I can force the witch to speak.” Keras held his hand up when everyone looked as if they might protest.
It didn’t stop Enyo.
“No. You are not strong enough right now. You are being reckless.”
Reckless.
He kept being called that recently.
The look she gave him said it wasn’t like him, and he had to admit that she was right. He was being reckless, letting his emotions rule him when he should have been following a more logical path.
“You’re going to rest.” Ares huffed as he preened the overlong lengths of his tawny hair back and secured it with a leather thong. He folded his arms across his chest and frowned down at his black T-shirt when his muscles flexing caused one of the small tears in it to grow longer. “We all are. Today, we take a moment. Take stock. Think shit through. Then we’ll come up with a plan. Don’t give me that look.”
Keras wanted to deny he was giving his brother a look, but he couldn’t wipe it from his face.
It wasn’t like Ares to think things through and be the one to recommend coming up with a plan.
Valen slapped Ares on the back, jerking him forwards and earning himself a glare. “Look who’s all grown up and mature like. Never thought I’d see the day when you chose careful meticulous planning over flexing your muscles and going with the flow.”
Ares took hold of Valen’s hand, removed it from his shoulder and shoved it away from him. “Well, I can safely say we’ll never see the day it happens to you.”