Rain hammered the pavement around him, scoured the walls of the towering buildings that hemmed him in and stole the clouds from view with their bright neon signs, and saturated the two daemons gathering their wits around fifty feet from him in the narrow Tokyo alley. It mingled with the black blood that turned the air rank and coppery, a stench he wanted to erase from this world.
And he would.
Esher moved forwards, through the heavy droplets that began to gather and condense, responding to the hunger mounting inside him—a desire to eradicate the foul creatures stumbling onto their feet now.
At the far end of the narrow street beyond them, a mortal male tucked beneath a clear convenience store umbrella paused and glanced their way.
Big mistake.
The darkness was swift to rise, to pound in Esher’s blood like a tide that battered him, powerful waves that rolled over him and washed all the light away.
On a black snarl, he pressed the toe of his right boot into the wet pavement and launched forwards, little more than a blur as he closed the distance between him and his prey.
The male daemon swiftly turned his way and stepped in front of his comrade—a female. Protecting her? Valen had reported the daemons in Rome had done something similar.
As if the creatures were capable of feeling anything tender or sweet.
They were as devoid of softer emotions as he was.
But still the male reached behind him and shoved her in the hip, forcing her to stumble out of the firing line just as Esher threw his right hand forwards. The rain that had been gathering around him exploded towards the male, whipping into a spiralling spear as it zoomed away from Esher. It hit the male with the force of a tidal wave, sending him flying through the air. The wretched daemon hit the pavement near the far end of the alley and rolled to a halt next to the mortal.
Esher growled and spat on the pavement, the gnawing hunger growing stronger as he stared at the wretched human.
It would pay in blood for daring to remain near him, for daring to gaze upon him.
It would pay in its own blood.
His lips stretched into a cold grin, the lower one stinging as the cut on it pulled, filling his mouth with the metallic tang of his own blood.
He twitched as memories surged, wrapped around him and felt as if they were pulling him down into them with claws that shredded his insides—tore his heart to pieces.
Blood.
So much red.
He had never seen so much of it, had emptied his stomach more than once when they had been butchering the male in front of him, spilling crimson and flesh on the hay and dirt. Their sick laughter had prodded at him, ripping at his strength and dragging him down. He had been weak. Stripped of his powers. Left vulnerable. He had been an easy target for their fear, their rage. They had beaten him. Tore more of his strength from him. He had been weaker. Wounded. Bound and broken.
But fucking gods, he had shown them the error of their ways when his power had returned.
Just as he would show this human.
Esher reached his left hand out and focused on the mortal male. It took only a brief thought. One moment the male was standing, the next he was prone on the floor, blood leaking from his eyes, nose, mouth and ears. Weak. Humans were weak. Pathetic. Unworthy of the protection of the gods.
Thunder rolled overhead, golden lightning striking a split-second later, snapping at the buildings that loomed over him and tearing a fearful gasp from the daemons.
A warning from the king of gods.
His uncle could go fuck himself.
The mortals deserved death.
He wasn’t on this plane to protect them. He was here to protect one realm—the Underworld. His home.
This entire world could burn and he wouldn’t give a shit as long as his home was safe.
The male daemon picked himself up, pausing to look at the dead human, his dark eyes wide and a flicker of fear emerging in them as he turned them on Esher.
And the female.
The blonde staggered onto her feet, clutching her stomach, her limbs visibly trembling beneath her long black raincoat that matched the one the male wore. They had come prepared for the turn in the weather. It was almost a shame they hadn’t come prepared to win. It had been a long time since he had fought a worthy adversary.
Keras’s words rang in his ears.
An adversary was coming for him, one of the group bent on destroying the gates to the Underworld that he and his brothers protected, all in an effort to merge the worlds and claim dominion over both.
Esher just hoped they were worthy.
He wanted a good fight, one that would test him to his limit.
Fire tore through his right arm and he grunted and snapped back to the alley. The blonde bitch leaped away from him, her silver knife stained crimson.
With his blood.
It rolled down his forearm to his wrist beneath the sleeve of his long black coat and he raised his hand before him and watched it drip to the ground to dissipate in the water beneath his leather boots.
Water that began to vibrate, tiny droplets of it bouncing higher and higher into the air as he stared at the blood flowing along the side of his hand to bead at the tip of his little finger and fall.
Typical of inferior creatures to use weapons in a battle.
He had never understood why some of his brothers relied on them too, one or two of them even favouring mortal-made guns, when they were gods and wielded powers strong enough to defeat any adversary they might face.
Personally, he never used weapons.
His powers were more than enough.
Without even taking his eyes off the blood, he flicked his left hand towards the female as she launched at him again, her blade flashing in the neon lights and a battle cry on her lips.
It turned to a scream.
She dropped from the air, landing in a shaking heap on the wet pavement, her convulsions growing more and more violent as he slowly turned his gaze on her. Hatred seethed inside him as he looked at her, as he commanded every molecule of her vile blood to dance to his song. He despised using his power over water to end his prey in such a way, because it was just too easy, but she had brought it upon herself.
“No!” the male barked and sprinted towards her.
He sank to his knees at her side and grabbed her arm, pulling her onto her back.
Too late.
Black blood rolled from her eyes and her mouth, streamed from her nose and her ears.
Esher closed his right hand into a fist.
Her body lurched upwards as her heart exploded.
“Bastard.” The male daemon shoved to his feet.
Esher slowly smiled. Crooked a bloodstained finger.
Flames licked over his left side and he grunted as he clutched it through his coat and grey-blue shirt. Waves of heat rolled through him, each stronger than the last. He gritted his teeth as his vision wobbled, shadows dancing across the alley before him, swirling around the corpses and drifting towards him.
No.
He wasn’t sick now. He was safe. Healed. The intense burning in his side mocked him, screamed that he wasn’t healed, was far from it. The wraith’s blade had done more damage than anyone had suspected, and more than Ares’s female could mend. He could feel it. It had been weeks since the attack, and his body could heal even the most vicious of injuries in less than a day. He should have healed by now, but the pain lingered, came in sharp bursts from time to time to remind him that he had let his guard down and paid the ultimate price.
Or he would have, if a mortal hadn’t saved him.
He chuckled through his gritted teeth at that.
“You won’t be laughing in a minute.” The male voice came from behind him and Esher heard other words, in another male’s deep voice.
Give your sister my regards.
Fiery agony streaked across his side, just as it had that night in that heart-stopping moment before everything had gone black, but this time the flames licked at his right side, just below his ribs.
He grunted as the pain combined with the lingering effect of the wraith’s blade, stripping more of his strength from him. The shadows scattered as he growled and focused on the male behind him now, not the one who had been there on that rooftop almost two months ago.
Esher raised his right arm and slammed his elbow into the male’s cheek, and grunted in time with him as the daemon was knocked sideways and his blade scraped over bone before sucking free of Esher’s flesh. Heat spread down Esher’s side, and he clamped his left hand down over the wound, spun on his heel and grabbed the male by his throat.
He kicked hard, shoving the male into the concrete wall of one of the buildings with enough force to break bone. The male screamed as several of them shattered and choked on blood that burst from his lips, coating them. Water streamed over his face as the rain fell harder, so thick and fast that it created a wall around them, shutting out the world.
Esher reined in his hunger, breathing hard as he wrestled with the need to butcher the male and then turn his sights on anyone else in the vicinity. He focused on each breath, his hand shaking against the daemon’s throat with a need to reach into the breast pocket of his grey-blue shirt and pull out the noise-cancelling earbuds. He needed the quiet, the solitude. He needed to let the strings wash over him and sweep the world away.
He could have it, but first he had to ease back on the daemon’s throat and do what he had promised to do.
“Who sent you?” Information.
He and his brothers had all agreed to get information out of any daemon that dared attempt to reach their gate, but Esher had forgotten all about it when the female daemon had clawed and bitten him when he had caught them near it, drawing blood and pissing him off.
Toying with the bitch had become priority one, shortly followed by killing her.
Getting information hadn’t even ranked.
It was a miracle he wasn’t bursting the male daemon like the pustule he was and was instead attempting to get something out of him.
Although, it seemed he had failed to rein his temper in quickly enough.
The male sagged in his grip, his weight tugging Esher’s arm down and sending a fresh wave of pain rolling up it from the cut on his forearm.
Esher huffed and discarded the dead male.
The rain eased enough that he could see the female.
His brothers wouldn’t be pleased that he had killed them both, but they would understand when he told them he had done his best. He wasn’t the only brother with a habit of forgetting to get information. So far, Daimon was in the lead. His younger brother had killed almost fifty percent of the daemons who had attempted to get through the Hong Kong gate, only remembering after they were frozen popsicles or shattered into meaty pieces that he was meant to beat information out of them before killing them.
Esher drew his hand away from his right side and frowned at the blood coating his palm. It caught the light of the narrow signs that jutted out from each building, running their entire height to mark what was on each floor, and reflected white, red and yellow back at him.
The wound would heal rapidly, not like the wraith wound, but he would have to conserve his strength until it had knitted back together, which meant he couldn’t teleport home. Stepping, as he and his brothers called it, would drain him, and it was only just gone one in the morning, meaning there were still another four or five hours of darkness in which another daemon could attempt to find the gate.
Or a Hellspawn, one of the accepted species in his father’s eyes and one allowed to enter the Underworld via the gates, could call on him to open it.
So, he would have to do the unthinkable.
Public transport.
He ground his molars and reached into the breast pocket of his shirt, tugged the tiny headphones out and jammed them into his ears. Instantly, the soothing melody of Bach filled him, swamping the song of the rain and the grating noise of Tokyo.
Esher took a few deep breaths, giving the beautiful classical piece time to do its work, and then trudged forwards, past the two dead daemons. He didn’t look at the dead mortal as he passed the male, kept moving onwards on auto-pilot, slowly constructing a wall of calm inside himself, a barrier that would shut the world out and allow him to venture down into the train station and tolerate the presence of the mortals as they surrounded him.
Crowded him.
As the strings rose, he spotted the airplane-wing canopy that stretched above the central entrance of Tokyo station, extending from the glass skyscraper to its right. Clouds swirled around the top of the towering structure, glowing yellow from the city lights. The rain continued to pour, soothing Esher as much as the music, but as he approached the entrance and the number of mortals rose, hurrying to catch the last trains, his grip on calm began to weaken.
He could do this.
He balled his right hand into a fist, and grimaced as the cut across his forearm stung as his muscles flexed beneath it, a flash of fire that tested him. He breathed deep, letting the flare of irritation fade without affecting his mood.
He was calm. In control.
Calm. Control.
Esher breathed through it, steeled himself and moved forwards, avoiding the busier paths into the building.
It was only a short trip. Barely fifteen minutes. He could do this.
A mortal female passed close to him and he tensed, his breath seizing in his throat as he leaned to avoid her even though she was more than ten feet away.
Breathe.
Calm. Control.
Keras would fucking kill him if he lost his shit and caused a bloodbath. His oldest brother had lectured him more than once about playing nice around the weak little mortals. By the gods, he tried. He could almost tolerate them now. He had even managed to speak with some when he was feeling strong, able to cope with breathing the same air as them.
But he wasn’t feeling strong.
The coppery odour of blood clouded his senses, tugging at his memories, and it was hard to keep them shut out, to hold the wall of calm in place.
He shoved the bloodied fingers of his right hand through the longer lengths of his black hair, pushing the damp strands out of his face, and scrubbed at the shorter sides.
He could do this.
He took another step towards the building, a pressing sense of urgency building inside him and driving him to move as he picked up the warning over the public-address system. It was last train time.
Now or never.
He froze as a male passed him, flicking a glance his way that turned into a double-take before he pivoted on his heel and hurried away from the station.
Esher touched his face, drew his hand away and looked at his fingers. Black smeared their pads. Daemon blood.
He huffed, grabbed the handkerchief he always kept in the back pocket of his dark blue jeans and wiped the blood away, scrubbing his neck and face, and then his hand to clear it of both daemon and his own blood.
It took barely a second for the blood to roll back down to his fingers. He buttoned his coat to hide the crimson stain on his shirt, tugged the sleeve back and wrapped the handkerchief around his forearm, covering the wound there. It would have to do.
The last of the mortals ran into the building ahead of him.
Esher strode towards it, his left hand closing over his right side again as the wound below his ribs burned. He pressed hard against it, stopping the flow of blood down his side, and trudged forwards, moving as quickly as he could manage.
The lights inside the station stung his eyes and he lowered his head, letting the hand-length ribbons of his black hair fall forwards over his brow to shield them. He kept his head bent as he hurried past the closed shops towards the Yamanote Line. It would stop at Yoyogi Park and he could walk from there. The streets in that neighbourhood would be quiet.
Unlike the immense room around him.
Someone almost ran into him as they rushed towards the ticket barriers, and he bared his teeth at their back. Keras would have to forgive him if someone bumped him, because he wasn’t sure he had the strength to stop himself from hurting them.
It was leaking from him as he passed his bloodied right hand over the card reader on the barrier, using his abilities to force it to open for him. It swung open and he passed through, scanned the area ahead of him and spotted the sign for the line. It was further than he remembered. He was going to have to use a little bit of power to make it to the train.
Not stepping. Just running.
He clutched his side and sprinted, passing the mortals with ease, and reached the platform just as the last train pulled in. He boarded at the first door, and moved down through the carriages until he found one that was quiet.
The seats near the next car were empty, so he slumped into them, arranging himself in a way that put off the mortals who were eyeing the spot beside him. He looked at his bloodied hand, felt a few mortals glancing there too, and then moving away. He was tempted to wipe it on his jacket, but since it was acting as a nice deterrent, he kept it on show. Another barrier to keep the mortals at bay.
He couldn’t believe he had been reduced to using public transport. He eyed a few of the humans, issuing glares to the braver ones who looked as if they might chance it and sit beside him on the three-seater bench. Wretched creatures. The wall of calm cracked a little, and he drew in a deep breath. Mistake. His right ribs protested, a sharp pain echoing along them from the wound, worsening his mood and adding a few more cracks to the wall.
He closed his eyes as the train pulled away, meaning to shut out the crowded carriage so he could claw back the calm.
Not meaning to fall asleep.
He woke with a jolt as the train rounded a bend, and his black eyebrows pinched in a frown as he swept his blue gaze around the carriage. It was almost empty.
“Fuck,” he muttered and peered out of the window, trying to see where he was as he silently berated himself for succumbing to sleep around so many humans. They weren’t to be trusted. Fuck knew how many of them might have taken the opportunity to kill him if they had known what he was.
Building after building whizzed past outside, none of them standing out to him. The damned city looked the same no matter where he went in it. He rubbed his tired eyes and squinted at the display screen above the doors. Broken. Just his luck.
Had he missed his stop?
He looked at the two people in his carriage, assessing them, and then squeezed his hand over his side as he leaned forwards and looked to his left, into the next one. Five people in that one, none of them a threat.
He leaned back into the padded seat.
A shriek rose from his left.
Esher edged forwards again and glared into the next carriage. A petite raven-haired female with bunches and a fringe that cut a straight line above her eyebrows swatted at a male with her black backpack. Her thick-soled patent leather shoes skidded on the floor of the car as she swung again, causing her short black dress to rise up and reveal the tops of her stripy black and white stockings.
A little Lolita with a vicious streak.
Or a terrified little Lolita.
He canted his head, trying to figure out which one it was, and growing increasingly annoyed and disgusted with everyone in her carriage as they all pretended not to notice her plight.
“Chikan!” Pervert.
A public transport one in particular.
The male grabbed her again, snapping his hand tight around her delicate wrist.
Still no one moved to help her.
Why the fuck was he forced to protect a people who cared nothing about their own kind? No Hellspawn or god would tolerate this female’s cries.
She battered the male again, but the bastard pulled her towards him, undeterred.
Esher growled and shoved to his feet, not pausing to consider what he was about to do.
He was going to save a human for the first time in his life.
