Ivar shook his head. “I can’t teleport yet. There’s a weapon—”
“You have to go.” Quade dragged him out of the cave to the edge. Three swirling portals were visible in the empty air. “Only way to get home.” He clapped Ivar on the back. Hard. “You probably won’t make it.”
Ivar turned suddenly. “I’m not leaving you.” The guy had been alone for far too long.
Quade’s eyes, for the first time, showed a glimmer of emotion. Raw sadness. “Two die, only one come back. Can’t guarantee it’ll be you.” He pointed to the portals. “Only way.”
Well, Garrett Kayrs had gone through a series of portals when he’d survived the ritual. Maybe Ivar would do the same. He looked at the three swirling masses of electricity. They all looked like certain death with a whole lot of pain mixed in. Yet somehow, they drew him. His body began to lean toward them. “Which one?”
Quade turned toward him. “The Viking was strong—strongest I’ve ever met. You have his blood, and you have his strength.” Urgency darkened his face.
“Come with me,” Ivar said, his heart racing.
“Can’t. If I go, Ulric gets free.” Quade grabbed him by both arms. “Time is different. It might take you a thousand years to get back, but it’ll be moments after you left. The portals—all lead to hell.”
Ivar’s back straightened. “I can handle it.” Should he drag Quade with him? Ulric be damned. Ivar couldn’t leave a brother, one of the Seven, in this hell any longer.
Quade shook his head. “No. You must go. Do you have a mate?”
“No.” But an image flashed through his head. A pretty physicist he’d been following—one of many in the last month. Dr. Promise Williams. He hadn’t even approached her yet.
“Good. You’ll want to die a thousand times, but keep going.” The wind picked up, throwing salt the size of tangerines at them. “Your name?”
“Ivar,” he reminded Quade.
“Goodbye to Ivar,” Quade said, his tone guttural. “Say it. Humanity is gone. Say it.” His eyes flashed hot and dark.
The male had lost it. Completely. Ivar nodded, sliding his arm down to grasp Quade’s wrist. They were doing this together. “Goodbye to Ivar.”
Quade relaxed. “Viking. You’re a Viking. The only. You can beat every monster out there. You’re Vike.”
He surely was. Ivar tightened his hold.
“Remember a good place. At some point, if you survive, you’ll teleport there. If you’re lucky.” Quade tried to pull back.
Ivar stopped him. Then he turned to jump.
At the last second, Quade twisted and kicked out, sending Ivar flying into the abyss. “No!” Ivar yelled, reaching back for his brother.
Quade’s grim face was the last thing Ivar saw before the portal swallowed him whole. Pain etched through his body to his soul, and he screamed, the sound silenced in the roaring void. Then he landed in pure ice.
It was the first of a million landings that held unimaginable pain.
Time became nothing.
He became even less.
Portals opened, and he jumped through them, at first hoping. Then wondering. Finally not caring.
Boiling water, monsters beyond comprehension, worlds filled with blades. He survived them all, his memories fading into nothingness. A face, a pretty face and intelligent eyes, filled his dreams sometimes. Promise. All he could think about was a promise.
But soon even that had no meaning.
He lost a leg and it slowly regenerated. More and more worlds—all hellish. No people, no vampires, no demons. Plenty of hell beasts.
Ivar was forgotten. Had to be. Had to die or he couldn’t survive like the animal he became. Viking. He was Vike. As a mantra, trying to survive, that’s who he became.
His hair changed color, streaked with black. As did his beard. He let it grow, trying to tell the passage of time, but then it stopped, too.
