No, the rainbow.
His soul could be frozen and brittle, and a single smile from her face would warm every part of it. Set him on fire from the tip of his toes to the ends of his hair. He’d never known anything like it. No matter how bad he felt, the sound of her voice lifted him. The touch of her hand made his skin electric.
Unable to speak past the magnitude of everything rushing through him, all at once, he pulled her into his arms and crushed her against him.
And when she wrapped her arms around him and laid her head against his chest, he trembled.
Yeah, okay, this was why he fought. He remembered now.
For her.
She was so worth it.
“You okay, Boo?”
“Am now,” he said gruffly. There was no need in letting her know how stupid he was being. How weak.
“Aww! You’re so precious!” Kody’s laughter turned cruel an instant before she changed into a hideous gigantic fanged, corpulent beast. The same beast he’d just killed.
Voracious in all things. It’s unnaturally Titian hair reflected like gaudy rust in the dim shadows. Hissing, Nick stabbed it through the heart and drove his claws through the hollow of its jaw, catching the mandible. Fury caused his Malachai wings to launch through his back and it took control of him for the mockery. Before he could stop himself, he curled his fingers around the bone and wrenched the mandible free of the sinew and muscles.
It was disgusting! But he couldn’t help it and it didn’t satisfy his need for vengeance or his cry of indignation. He wanted more.
He wanted every last drop of its blood to coat his body and drink the beast dry. He was through playing these cruel games with them.
No more!
“Who’s next!” he shouted to the twisted trees surrounding him. “Bring it on! I’m done with you all! You want some of me? You better come prepared!”
Forget the Malachai. Generations of Cajun blood boiled inside him. They were swamp people and they didn’t take injustice and mockery lying down. They gave it back with both fists and two kicks.
He ran at the next shadow that came for him.
Azura pulled back the second she saw the degree of fury inside the Malachai and the form he’d taken. No longer was his skin mottled red and black.
He was a pure saturated ebony. So dark that he absorbed all light itself. Matte and resistant to all color. He took in the living essence of everything around him. It was something she hadn’t seen since the beginning of time.
Something wholly unexpected.
Even her brother, Noir, the darkest of all the ancient gods hesitated in respectful trepidation. “Well, this is new.”
“Indeed.”
And by the expression on her brother’s face, she could tell that this Malachai wasn’t feeding his powers.
Another first.
“Are you all right?”
Noir’s nostrils flared. “Do I look all right?”
Honestly? He looked a bit green. Which contrasted greatly with her naturally blue skin. Knowing better than to answer him when he was this upset, she quickly changed the subject. “This must be why Cyprian and Laguerre hid him from you.”
“How can a Malachai drain me?”
Azura felt the blood leave her face as the only possible answer came to her. It was the same reason they’d demanded the life of Braith’s husband. Why they’d made sure that their sister never birthed another brat from Kissare. “He would have to be part Sephiroth.”
And Noir had drank his blood …
