“You two have some explaining to do, once we reach the villa.”
They had a villa they were driving to. Okay.
The police sirens had faded to nothing. Perhaps they knew nothing about our fracas on the beach. Most of what had happened would be invisible to a human, and no one else had been on the beach, though it was possible someone had been watching from a campsite.
All those facts slotted in, but I barely registered them.
Val is alive.
How the fuck is this possible?
“You bastard,” I whispered. “You scared me.” Then I bent and kissed his forehead.
His eyes opened, revealing a blueness to the irises I’d never seen on a man. His eyes were glowing.
CHAPTER 5
STAYING ALIVE
Val
The murmur of voices woke me, and I sat up and swung my legs over the edge of the bed. A thick rug met my feet. Vertigo and a lance of pain in my head stopped me doing more, until it ebbed. Drawn by the voices and the lights, I padded out through a pale curtain that shielded an open glass door, onto a narrow balcony. Below, a swimming pool darkly mirrored the moon, the stars, and the lights set around it.
Shimmers of light of many colors and almost-there shapes that might be scaled limbs and wings, or feathery wings showed where creatures dwelled. Dreams not nightmare creatures, I assumed. On the other hand…a black hound with red eyes was pursuing something spidery at a merry gallop, around the pool and under the pool chairs, toppling one into the water.
The hound fell in and was scrambling to get out with its front legs slipping on the paving.
When the man-sized spider thing proceeded to teabag the hound’s head, I grinned, realizing this was playtime for them. If that was a hellhound, it was a nice one.
Play was better than war. Far better. I’d seen enough violence.
But it wouldn’t be the last.
Up here, on a wide deck to my right, four, no, five people were talking, their chairs in a rough circle.
Crisscross timbers painted aqua guarded the balcony edge. If you fell, you’d hit the pool or paving. I used the railing to steady myself. The stars wobbled; the house wobbled. I placed my hand flat to the glass door behind me.
The glass was still warm from the sun. How long had I been out?
Where was this?
*Mexico* said an internal voice. It sounded familiar and, thank the gods, was not shouting at me. I massaged my temples.
Not the King, I reminded myself. Then who?
*I am Jörmungandr. Remember? You were dead.*
That had been real? The pain of my throat being slashed. The gush of my blood and an awareness of doom even as I had reclaimed my own mind and body. It had been an el primo absurdity.
*Yes. It was real. In a vague alternate-physics sort of way.*
I ignored the voice, hoping it would go away.
I had to pay a tithe. Do such deals count when you’re stressed out over dying?
*They do.*
And how was this thing going to enforce that payment? Either it hadn’t heard that thought or couldn’t be bothered to tell me the answer.
I moved toward the wider deck. Why are you in my head? I thought I knew but needed it verified.
*I had to possess you to fix your wound.*
Well, you can fuck off now. Wait. I’m completely free of the Nightmare King?
*You are.*
The interaction on the beach…
There’d been a fight, and the King, who had been me at that time, had assaulted Zara, then he’d torn my throat out with a knife and left me to die.
The usual sort of thing he did.
But the big plus was that I was free.
The discussion these people were having warranted my full attention. Zara sat side-on to me. Another woman in her twenties, with long auburn hair, tiny shorts, and a well-filled top, had her bare feet resting on a man’s lap. I flicked a glance past the other two men then moved on, to Zara.
“So now you know something about me and Val. Tell me how you all happened to arrive just when I needed you?” Perched on the edge of her chair, Zara frowned then looked about her at the other four.
I’d never seen any of these people before. Or had I? Seeing things through the King’s eyes distorted my memories. There had been gatecrashers, running down the beach, waving blue tentacles. There’d been the hellhound, which was downstairs by the pool, and a—
A tortoiseshell cat padded into the light and glared at me with evil intent. The dick-shaped patch on its nose verified this was them.
“Do you think it was my wish through the eyeglasses?” Zara continued.
“Perhaps,” someone said.
I entered the circle of lighting, put my hands to the back of the only unoccupied plastic chair. Were they expecting me to join them? “Are those creatures downstairs safe?”
Zara gasped and thrust herself upright. “Val!”
The other woman dropped her feet from the man’s lap, and they smacked to the decking.
“Hi. I’m Viktoria, and yes, those?”—she jabbed her thumb backward, in the direction of the pool—“they’re fine. Harrow here attracts creatures.” Her British accent was obvious. “You’re naked and your eyes are rather glowy. Not that I mind the naked.” She pursed her lips. “Nice muscles.”
I was? I looked down. I was.
Her man seemed unfazed. “I’m Harrow. Viktoria, he’s not for sale.” Considering the climate, he was as overdressed as I was under-dressed—buttoned, black shirt, and jeans. The top of his short black hair stuck up in tufts and looked deliberately messy, in a way that only Brits could manage. I guessed they’d all come from the UK.
He gestured at the man sitting past Viktoria. “This is Ash or Ashcadel if you want his full incubus name.”
Ash widened his grin, hand half-raised. His T-shirt had Equal Opportunity printed in small black text, above Fuck the Patriarchy and the Matriarchy.
My mind braked. He’d said incubus. An incubus was a creature.
Obviously, he inhabited, AKA he had possessed, a human. I pinned a dangerous-until-proven-otherwise tag on the grinning guy. As if to underscore that, black otherworldly hair twisted above the blond mop on his head.
Zara came to me, wearing a sad but beautiful smile. Watching her approach was solace to my soul. Assuming I still had one of those soul things.
“You’re awake,” she rasped out the words as she snuggled into my chest. “And naked.” She snorted and wrapped her arms around me.
Sighing, I hugged her, nuzzling her hair before I gently brushed my fingers along her nape where she must have bruises. “I’m so sorry, for this…for all of this.” He’d ruthlessly gripped her neck. A mere human might not have survived that. “Thank you. For trying so hard, for everything.”
How did one thank someone after that sort of epic rescue effort?
“No problemo.” Her answer was muffled, buried as she was. “You’re welcome. I’m sorry some of it backfired.”
It was true that her healing me after the bomb had given the King too much power.
“There was no way you could have foreseen that.”
“I know.” Her voice cracked. I held her tighter.
“Shhh.”
The past days and weeks weren’t easy to shrug off, and I should be unreservedly angry at what fate and the Nightmare King had done to us both…but…I wasn’t. This was strange.