But Esher surprised her.
He despised humans, and with good reason. The thought that he would want to continue living in the mortal realm, subjecting himself to them when his history with them made it difficult for him to be near them, physically and mentally pained him, made no sense to her at all.
Esher’s blue eyes drifted to Aiko, lingered on her as she petted Milos. Her dark gaze lifted from the cat to lock with Esher’s, and a hint of crimson climbed her cheeks. Perhaps it was a combination of things that had Esher wanting to go back to the mansion when the war was over. His love for his home, and his love for Aiko.
And possibly a desire to overcome his past so he could erase the hate he felt towards humans and could grow to like them, just as he had grown to love Aiko.
Esher and Valen would need to visit the Underworld regularly with their women, staying periods of time in this realm to be near Persephone and Hades so Aiko and Eva would eventually absorb the power those within their sphere were exposed to—a power that would render them immortal too. The effect would weaken in the mortal world, slowly pushing them back towards being human, but a stay in this realm would strengthen it again.
The brothers filed from the room one by one, those who were remaining behind moving to an area of comfortable seating and beginning to talk.
Enyo looked across her shoulder at Keras.
He squeezed her hand. “We should prepare.”
She had brought her armour with her and had stored it in his room, on a stand next to his. A trickle of nerves, or possibly excitement, ran through her as he led her upstairs, as they dressed in silence.
War.
She could feel it already, brewing inside her, rousing her battle instincts.
It was hard to tame the wild need to surge onto the battlefield right that second, with or without the brothers and their women.
With or without the allies Hades had called upon.
She took her sword from the stand and fixed it to her belt, drew the weapon and stared at it as it caught the light and shone at her.
Hunger raged through her.
Pushed her.
Keras’s gauntleted left hand came to rest on her right one and she tore her gaze from the blade, lifting it to lock with his green eyes. They shone with amusement, and a hint of fear.
“This is a scouting mission first and foremost. We do not know what to expect.”
She nodded and sheathed her sword, reined in her urges and tried to tamp down her instincts. It was hard when those instincts hummed in her veins, filled her with a buzz that had her raring to go.
“We will observe the gate from a vantage point and see what we are up against before we do anything. Do you understand?” Keras’s firm tone had her nodding, battling with herself to soothe the need to fight.
He was right. They had to go about this in a more tactical fashion. Their forces were limited and there was a chance that the furie who had captured Marinda had joined with Nemesis and the army she had been amassing in secret.
The thought of fighting an entire legion only increased the excitement that flowed through her.
She tried to hide it from Keras.
Tried and failed, judging by how the corners of his sensual lips curled into the semblance of a smile and amusement lit his eyes again.
“It has been too long since I have fought by your side like this.” He lifted his hand from hers and slid it along her jaw, gazed down into her eyes as his grew hooded and his voice lowered. “All those wars we fought in centuries ago, and before every single one I wanted to kiss you. I ached for it, a slave to the fear I might be struck down and never know the taste of these lips.”
He rubbed the pad of his thumb over her lower lip, the cool kiss of metal sending a shiver down her spine that ignited her blood.
Enyo tilted her head up, as eager for his kiss now as he had been to kiss her back then.
She had never feared battle. Never feared dying. Now, a sliver of her heart feared both of those things. Because she feared being parted from Keras again.
He dropped his head and kissed her, his lips softly dancing over hers, pouring warmth through her that chased the cold fear away and had strength flowing into her again.
Nothing would part them.
She would make sure of that.
He gathered her to him and teleported.
Warm wind buffeted her and she broke the kiss and looked down into the valley far below her. At the blonde female who pulled an unwilling Marinda towards the gate, flanked by four valkyries and defended by six of the huge demonic males they had battled in the mortal world. A force Enyo and her side could easily contend with now the brothers didn’t have to wear their limiters and Hades’s allies would be joining them in the fight.
This was going to be almost too easy.
Keras grabbed her arm and yanked her down into a squat beside him on the bluff, and she frowned as she glanced at him and found him staring not at the furie and her group, but beyond them.
Enyo looked there.
And cursed.
There had to be close to two hundred males and females gathered between the gate and the furie, and the one who stood just in front of them told Enyo they weren’t there to protect it.
They were there to breach it.
Nemesis.
Chapter 26
Keras lunged for Cal and grabbed his arm, exerted his will and stopped his youngest brother from teleporting. Cal turned stormy wild eyes on him, the wind that chased around him building as Valen seized him too, and Esher moved to block his view of the valley.
“I know you need to go to Marinda, but to rush headlong into battle without a plan would be foolish.” Keras had wanted to say reckless, something Cal was most days, but his brother had been working hard to curb that trait of his, had grown more mature and serious in the weeks since he had met Marinda.
Plus, Keras could understand his brother’s desperate need to launch into action.
He looked down into the valley at the gathering force. If it had been Enyo down there, held captive by his enemy, he would have stepped straight to her too, would have shunned all reason to reach her and free her.
To have her back in his arms.
“We just need to assess what we’re up against,” Esher whispered with a glance at the valley bottom.
Steep mountains surrounded it on all sides, jagged and black, fractures in their faces bleeding lava that turned the sky orange and heated the air. This part of the Underworld was still forming, pushing back the boundaries of the realm to expand it. Every year the realm grew in size, land masses growing to eat away at the abyss.
Keras had tried to grasp the science of it once and had only come away with a headache.
Mortals viewed the universe as ever-expanding into nothingness. The Underworld was going through the same process. Entire regions had been formed in his lifetime, areas as vast as a continent.
The valley stretched at least two miles long, with a flat bottom shaped like the tip of a spear. At the point of it, the gate shimmered, the colourful rings bright against the black rock as they rotated horizontally above it.
Unlike the gates in the mortal realm, the ones in the Underworld were always visible.
Visible but locked.
As it stood, the gate was safe, but that would all change if the furie reached it with Marinda. They would be able to use the powers they had siphoned from him and his brothers to open that gate and form the link between the Underworld and Tokyo.
Once the gate was open, they would attempt to shatter it, damaging it in a way that would force it to remain open long enough for the two realms to collide and bleed together.