Chapter Forty-Nine
Nero tensed up inside as his brother landed on the platform.
Brother? There it was again.
He tried calling out to him, warning him. He wasn’t even sure why. He only knew that this wasn’t how it was supposed to go down. The Entity couldn’t be allowed to win. Amunet could not be allowed to wake up. Battles were one thing, wars another, but complete planetary annihilation was another ball field altogether.
The Entity had done something to the area above the platform, filling it with a magic-draining energy. And Nero had the other Sleeper. The odds were stacked against Nicholas.
But nothing Nero did worked. He couldn’t make a sound. The Entity was determined, now more than ever. Nero felt his body quietly changing, switching to Nightmare form just as his brother passed by, heading for the young dragon. Nero’s Nightmare form was even more frightening than Nick’s, a little larger, a little sharper, a little darker. His wings spanned great distances on either side, his eyes became the very fires of hell, crackling yellow, orange, and red like an angry bonfire.
But Nicholas saw none of it. The Nightmare King approached the dragon girl. She held up her hands and said, “No, it’s a trap! He’s here somewhere, invisible! He has a dagger!”
Nick stopped – and spun, just as Nero attacked.
The Sleeper’s twin dagger came down in a clean, directed arc, but Nick’s arms came up in plenty of time to stop it. They clashed like lightning, creating a shockwave that knocked Mimi Tanniym off her feet. Fortunately, she hit the sarcophagus. It stopped her progress, otherwise she would have flown directly off the platform and into the nothingness below.
Nero couldn’t focus much on the child, however. The Entity had control of his body and he was attacking with an all-out fury. Roars of rage shook the platform beneath their feet, forcing the rather stunned young dragon to slide close to the sarcophagus altar and press her body nervously against it.
Nero swung the dagger with cold determination, grabbing Nicholas by the throat and taking him once more into the air. But Nick spun, knocked his claws away from his neck, and grasped Nero’s weapon arm, squeezing his wrist.
Yes, thought Nero. Fight!
Nicholas looked him in the eyes where they hovered above the endless chasm – and for just a moment, his red eyes flashed silver. Some kind of comprehension dawned on his otherworldly features. It was as if, just for a split second, he’d seen Nero inside, and not the Entity.
Nero tried to tell him everything then and there, sending the information as nothing but a hard burst of warning.
Nicholas wouldn’t be able to use his magic out here. The Entity had seen to that. This would be a battle of brawn, not brains. Sheer will, pure force, unaided power is what it would take to win this day and return to the land of the living. And Nicholas had to win. It was imperative.
The Entity could not be allowed to go any further.
Nick’s aura changed, his determination redoubled. Nero could feel it. He’d understood.
Nicholas grinned, fangs flashing, red eyes beaming like searchlights in the night. He spun with Nero, their forms a dark whirlwind in the strange cavernous chamber. Then he dove, taking Nero with him.
Nero felt his wings bat wildly against the air, attempting to find purchase. Despite the fact that they were larger than his brother’s, Nick had the advantage. He’d had the training. He was the king, and right now, he knew just what to do.
They hit the platform with an immense, explosive impact. Nero took the full brunt of the collision, and he had never in his many, short lives, felt such pain. He tried to roar, but the Entity was already doing so, filling the space around them with crackling, negative energy.
There was another scream, higher pitched and innocent, and Nero found himself searching through the haze of redness around him, knowing it was young Mimi. The platform was now collapsing beneath them. She couldn’t transform. She couldn’t grow wings. She would plummet into nonexistence if one of them didn’t help her.
“Mimi, I have you!” came a new cry, familiar but not quite.
Nero looked through his bloody haze of pain over Nick’s broad shoulder and just past his wings to find an angel descending toward them. Wings like an eagle’s spanned out to fantastic lengths on either side of her, shimmering curls graced her shoulders and cascaded down her back A glow emitted from her body as if she were lit from within.
He’s killed me, he thought. The impact was so great, Nero was dying again. He had to be. It certainly hurt enough for that. But this time was different. Because… there were angels?
No, that’s not an angel, he realized with his own soft smile. That’s a Nightmare. A female Nightmare. A beautiful, transcendent, impossible and more precious than life Queen of the Nightmares.
It was Adelaide.
She swooped down like a miracle toward the platform, her stunning wings beating the air as if she’d done it for centuries. Mimi ran to the edge to meet her, and Addie wrapped her arms around the girl. Mimi grasped onto her like a baby monkey. She knew her life depended on it.
Adelaide rose once more, those wings taking her right back up and over the chasm to the outcropping on the other side, where it looked as though someone was magically trying to reconstruct the destroyed bridge.
Nero closed his eyes. He felt something hiccup inside him. The Entity’s attention was on the queen now. She’d fully become. It was too late. The Entity was too late.
And he was furious.
Nero’s body was temporarily broken. He would heal, if he were allowed to remain on Earth, but he knew he wouldn’t be. And at the moment, he could feel one of his wings had given out in the impact. He lacked the will to fight.
So the Entity tore himself away from his form, and that pain was even worse than the pain of the impact.
Nero roared again, throwing back his head as the Entity seared himself free, and his soul bled from the heartless tear. He forced his eyes to open back up and stay open, though. He wanted to see the son-of-a-bitch bastard leave his body. He wanted to know it was happening. And he wasn’t disappointed.
A shadow grew from his chest, rising up into the atmosphere. It was deep and twisted and wrong, and somewhere in its hollowness, there was a set of equally hollow eyes and a yawning mouth.
Nicholas ripped the dagger free from Nero’s loosening grip and rose to his feet. He stepped back on the platform that was now rocking dangerously back and forth.
Pieces of the stone fell away, tumbling into the endless nothing, disappearing beneath the pitch forever. The lid of the sarcophagus rattled and slid ever so slightly off to one side, bearing mere inches of what waited inside.
The Entity coalesced, a shadow drawing together into a dense ball of evil with tentacles that whipped out around it like the curling limbs of a many-armed sea star or urchin. It turned in the air as Nicholas stepped cautiously back, and his eyes darted back and forth and his mind obviously churned, trying to figure out what exactly to do next.
But maybe Nero was wrong about that.
Because Nicholas looked down at him as Nero slowly sat up on the wobbling, crumbling platform. He met his gaze, and Nero stilled. Nicholas smiled slowly, knowingly. In Nero’s head, he heard a voice.
You win, brother. Take care of her for me.
And then he looked back up at the condensed mass of hatred – and using a Nightmare’s inherent ability, Nicholas pulled the bastard into himself.