The Chosen

“I’m sorry … what did you say?”

Wrath leaned forward as well, such that Tohr, sandwiched between them, was the only one sitting back against the seat.

“Yeah,” the King said as the engine roared and they got thrown around. “What was that?”

The Brother looked right into Xcor’s eyes. “I am Hharm’s son. So are you. We are brothers by blood.”

Xcor’s heart began to pound so hard his head hurt. And then he felt his stare narrow of its own volition on Tohr’s face.

“It’s the eyes,” the Brother said. “You’ll see it in the eyes. And no, I didn’t really know him, either. I gather he was not a good male.”

“Hharm?” Wrath muttered. “No, he wasn’t. And that’s all I’ll say about it.”

Xcor swallowed through a tight throat. “You … are my brother?”

And yet was confirmation truly needed? Tohrment was right, those eyes … were the same shape and color as his own.

“I am,” Tohr affirmed roughly. “I am your blooded kin.”

All kinds of things went through Xcor’s mind, snippets of images, echoes of sadness, memories of loneliness. In the end, as the Mercedes reached a cruising speed that suggested they were on a highway, he could only lower his stare and fall silent.

When one was granted something that was both secretly yearned for and utterly unexpected, when a sudden revelation seemed to darn a hole in one’s life, often the response was of a shock not dissimilar to when one was injured gravely.

Or perhaps he was just that. Injured gravely and losing mental function.

They were silent for the rest of the trip to where’er they were traveling, Xcor passing the time watching out the blackened window as he bled all over himself, the seat, and his … brother.

Sometime later, a lifetime, it seemed, they began to stop and go, stop and go, stop and go. And eventually, they came to a halting that stuck. Wrath opened his door immediately, as if the King knew where they were was safe, and Tohr followed their ruler out of the back.

Xcor went to get his own door—

His hand flopped uselessly at the latch. Even on the second try.

Tohr opened the way for him and leaned in. “We’re going to get you treated. Come on.”

As the Brother, and the brother, held out his hand, Xcor commanded his body to move. But it rebelled. He seemed to have …

A rousing dizziness made him feel as though he were going to lose control of his stomach, but he shook his head to clear it and demanded that his flesh obey him. And so it did this time. His broken-down, beat-up, shot-at body, managed to rise out of the back and ambulate forward.

For one step.

As he collapsed, strong arms locked around him and a powerful stance kept him from hitting the floor of what appeared to be a parking garage.

Tohrment accepted his weight easily. “I’ve got you,” came the rough affirmation.

With a halting series of ungainly movements, Xcor held onto the male’s shoulders and pushed himself back a little. Meeting Tohrment in the eye, he whispered, “My brother.”

“Yes,” the male said hoarsely, a sheen of tears making that blue stare glow like a pair of sapphires. “I am your brother.”

It was hard to say who embraced who, but suddenly they were both holding on, one upon another, warrior to warrior.

There had been many consequences of the night that Xcor had contemplated, many contingencies and probabilities that he, like any good leader, had assessed and reassessed.

Finding family had never been on his radar.

And though his sire had not proven to be the brave warrior on horseback come to rescue him … his blooded brother certainly fit the bill quite readily.

SIXTY-FIVE

When Cormia appeared in the courtyard, Layla was up on her feet in an instant. “Tell me.”

Lassiter had long since left, fading away in a shower of golden sparkles, leaving her alone with her terror.

The Chosen was frantic. “You must go down now. They need blood and I have given all I can. I shall stay with the young.”

The two of them hugged and then Layla took off, traveling between the two realms in a rush, and re-forming outside the mansion, for she could not get into the interior for the steel mesh.

She didn’t notice the cold as she ran up the front steps, yanked wide the vestibule’s heavy door, and threw her face into the security camera—and as she waited, she wanted to scream.

It was Beth who opened things up.

“Oh, thank God,” the Queen exclaimed with a hard embrace. “Go, go now to the training center. That’s where they all are.”

Layla started off and then called out over her shoulder, “Has anyone died?”

“Not yet. But, oh … just go. I have to wait for Wrath and then take him back down again.”

Layla made it through the underground tunnel and out the other side into the training center in record time—but as soon as she broke into the corridor, she stumbled to a halt.

The smell of blood was overwhelming, and so were the number of males down on the floor in various stages of injury and wound care.

It was not only Brothers. In fact … what she assumed were all of Xcor’s fighters were lined up shoulder to shoulder with the Brotherhood, Ehlena, the nurse, and all of the other Chosen, tending to them.

While Manny and Doc Jane were no doubt in surgery.

“I am here,” she said to no one and everyone.

In her mind, she was yelling at them all, demanding to know what had happened to Xcor, for she didn’t see him and couldn’t sense him, and that terrified her.

Yet she went to the first of the injured she came to, yanking up her sleeve and putting her wrist out.

She recognized the male. It was one of Xcor’s.

Zypher shook his head at her. “I am honored, sacred Chosen. But I cannot take your vein.”

“You must,” she breathed.

“I cannot. You are the female of my leader. I will die before I know the taste of your blood.”

One of her sisters came up. “I shall feed him. Go down to Rhage.”

And so Layla did, offering her vein unto him. When the Brother had taken what he needed and thanked her, she went to the next male in line.

But he was a Bastard and he, too, shook his head and refused her. “I cannot know your blood. You are the female of my leader.”

And so it was down the line, until she focused only on the Brotherhood and didn’t even try with the others.

So many wounds, some so deep that she could see anatomy that terrified her. And all the time, she worried about Xcor, and panicked over what Lassiter had done, and prayed that no one died.

She was about to move on to Phury, who needed another vein, so grave were his injuries, when she felt her elbow get taken in a grip.

As she looked up, Tohr’s face was grim. “Xcor needs you. Now.”

Layla got up so fast that she grew light-headed and Tohr had to help her down the corridor.

“You would have been proud of him,” Tohr said as they came up to the closed door of the second OR. “He was unbelievably brave, and he was the one who got Wrath out of there.”

“He was?”

“Yes. And he knows. About him and me. I told him because … why the fuck not after a night like tonight?”

Tohr opened the way in, and Layla gasped. Xcor was on the operating table, his stomach cut open, his intestines showing—and yet he was conscious.

He turned his head and tried to smile. “My love.”

His voice was so reedy, and oh, his coloring was bad. And yet he still tried to sit up.

Manny’s tone was sharp. “Okay, that’s not working for me. Not while I’m stitching up your bowel.”

“Do not look,” Xcor commanded her. “You do not look at my body.”

In a vivid flashback, she remembered him not wanting to take his clothes off around her.

Layla raced to him and held her wrist to his mouth. “Drink. Take of me.”

“We did this once”—he winced and coughed—“once before when I was dying. Did we not.”

“Twice, actually. And both times it was colder,” she said through tears. “Oh, God, don’t die on me. Not tonight. Not ever.”