Blood Flows Deep in the Empire (18 page)

-Earth. Astoria, Queens, NY. (USA)

“Here? You traced the rip to this part of the planet?” Cy asked right after they had flashed into the alleyway between two buildings. “Why here?”

“I don’t know,” Xreak said. “The actual rip happened closer to the water. Right by the bridge.” He walked closer to the end of the alley and stuck his head out to look around. “We’re going to have to throw up a
Gnetica
en masse.”

Ian walked closer to Xreak, his sword in hand. “How much of an area do you think we have to encompass?”

The others passed Dyletri, each one throwing him a curious look. He avoided their stares, unwilling to let them see any hint of what was going on in his head.

Zen walked up behind him. “Your tranquility grid is shot. Nonexistent. Completely destroyed.”

He was whispering, but it didn’t matter, Dyletri knew the others could hear him anyway.

“Shut it, Zen.”

Xreak was kind enough to ignore them. “I don’t know how much of an area we’ll have to cover yet. I can’t sense anything other than the rip.”

“I don’t sense anything, either,” Ian said, and the rest of them agreed in chorus.

Dyletri fought the urge to support his weight against the brick wall as he approached the others. His limbs were so twitchy he felt like his ass was about to take off into flight.

Zen stared at him out of the corner of his eye. Dyletri gritted his teeth and fought to keep a calm façade.

Because that was working. Yeah, that was really fucking working.

There was some sort of danger threatening the human world, but all Dyletri was focused on was how a certain girl’s blood had rushed against the surface of his tongue. Or how her skin had tasted. Sweet and musky and so much like sex that his body was still aching.

What the fuck?

You want her.

But why?

She’s delectable. How dare you even ask that?

Dyletri flipped the mental finger at the asshole inside him. He restrained himself from doing it for real at the risk of pointing it at one of his companions and opening a can of worms. They were already having a hard enough time holding back their questions. One wrong move from him and the danger out there would be forgotten in favor of the “Dyletri-interro-round.”

Dyletri could already imagine them manifesting flashlights and aiming them at his face.

“We haven’t had to use a
Gnetica
on this planet
in centuries.” Nythi stopped next to Xreak, peeking her head out. “The human world has electronics covering every inch of it now, especially here. We’re right next to Manhattan for
Our
sake! How do we know we can even generate one strong enough to hide what’s happening from the humans if something does go down?”

Nythi had a point. Even in ancient times there had been instances of humans who were strong enough to see right through their shields. Yeah, most mortals were easily controlled or straight-up fooled, but every once in a while there was that one strong-willed mortal who had the power to see through any ruse.

Including the gods energy veils—mirrorlike barriers designed to reflect any part of the surrounding area they needed to hide.

And hold in anything they didn’t want getting out.

The problem was, as with anything energy related, modern technology interfered. If something went down, they ran the risk of some real pain in the ass complications. Either the
Gnetica
wouldn’t work and the humans would see what was happening, or they’d end up shorting out all the power to that side of Queens and part of Manhattan, as well.

Good luck hiding that one, oh ye powerful Gods.

Well, it could be done, but that one would be a headache, too.

“There’s fucking people everywhere,” Sil complained as they all stepped out of the alley.

She wasn’t mistaken. Down by the water, Dyletri saw dozens of cars parked with their lights on and people just milling about. This was a popular hangout for the humans. Even worse, there were cop cars patrolling off in the distance.

It didn’t occur to him the area was familiar until he took another couple of steps out of the alley and he looked up, seeing two massive bridges right overhead. He spun around and came face to face with the restaurant Ismini’s friend owned. The very one she used to work at.

“Wait,” he said, holding a hand up. “This place . . . that’s the place Ismini worked in . . . Her home is around here somewhere. This is where Enteax and Lisrn were chasing her the night I came for her.”

Silence.

No one in the group made a sound as they turned to look at Dyletri. He stared at the sidewalk, his mind rapidly putting two and two together.

“Xreak!” His voice left him on a growl. Rage pounded through him at the conclusion he had drawn. And he didn’t like it. Not one damned bit. “You never told us who you suspect of ripping open the
Kystm
.”

“The Aviraji.”

“What!” Several voices called out at once.

Dyletri was the only one
not
surprised.

“Xreak, why didn’t you tell us?”

“Seriously, dude. How could you not tell us?”

“Xreak, what the fuck?”

“Silence!” Xreak bellowed out. “I have yet to confirm it, and jumping to conclusions wasn’t going to do anyone any good. Then again, if you’re telling me you saw those two following the girl . . .”

“I fucking did. I plucked their likeness right out of her mind.” Livid didn’t even begin to describe what Dyletri was feeling. No, all his protective instincts were flaring again, manic and out of control.

It didn’t matter that the girl was back on Enzyria, safe. He was ready to bite someone’s arm off and use it to slap the shit out of them. The mere idea that the Aviraji wanted something with Ismini was more than his mind was capable of handling at the moment. He was teetering on a biological edge as it was. His body was going to snap, taking his mind with it.

“Has Zex been informed?” Dyletri asked in an effort to distract himself. If the Aviraji were breaking a peace treaty that had been in place ever since the end of the last war, then Zexistr had to know. His longtime lover, the mother of his daughter, had been involved in some shady shit with the Aviraji once before.

“Yes,” Xreak said. “He’s on his way to her realm to investigate.”

Liz scoffed. “A lot of good that will do. The asshole is pussy-whipped and therefore blind to who she really is. Even if she were guilty of anything, do you think he’d stand up against her?”

“Zex cares more about the fate of the Universe than he does her,” Cy said in a hard tone.

Liz pursued her lips and rolled her eyes at him. “Yeah, okay. And I’m Cleopatra reincarnated, and all that shit.”

Xreak opened his mouth, about to say something, but a blast of dark energy ripped through the air and cut him off. As one, the gods stiffened, sending out an energy wave of their own and willing it in a one-mile radius around the bridge and the surrounding area.

“Anyone noticing any power issues yet?” Zen asked.

From where they stood on the corner of a regular city block, the
Gnetica
pulsed and grew. It expanded out past the park, past the public pool, past the myriad of people who were oblivious to it, and past the bridge, pulsating upward until it surpassed the tops of the buildings and even the bridges high above them.

Dyletri could see every detail, down to the small geometrical marks within the molecules of the field. Each one was like a handprint with its own energy inside it. He felt it, too, the hum of power resonating in his ears and on his skin.

A roar filled the air that was ear piercing and familiar—in the worst way possible. Dyletri hadn’t heard that sound in thousands of years, but nothing could ever come close to the ear-splitting aggravation of that screech.

Sil gasped. “
CeFtuts
.”

Dyletri groaned. Dealing with those nasty motherfuckers was the last thing he wanted to do. His lip curled, his eyes shooting to a spot by the bridge in time to see the first portal spiraling open.

Fucking hell. The
ceFtuts
were one of the most powerful and monstrous things Dyletri had ever encountered. Early on in the last war, the Aviraji had decided to experiment with creation. Hello, gene-splicing. They’d created a whole new species by pouring together the DNA of every vile creature in existence and combining it into a genetic cesspit of fuck-ugly.

The result had been the gigantic, four-legged, lumbering pieces of rotten flesh that were storming out the open portal, their massive heads thrown back as they let out brain-shredding screeches.

“Keep them contained!” Dyletri screamed, barely able to hear himself above the creatures’ shrieks. “Don’t let them out of the
Gnetica
! They’ll run straight for the humans!”

Not that his command was necessary. He knew damned well that they all remembered what those creatures were capable of. What their insatiable hunger would drive them to do.

Taking off at the same time, several of the gods went one way while the rest went the other. Dyletri jumped across the street, over a line of the parked cars, and landed at edge of the park, where he saw the rip in the
Kystm.

It was next to one of the massive columns of the bridge nearest him. A dark, small spiral, it was no bigger than a child, and yet large enough for whoever was behind this to shove enough energy through to open the portals.

Another one opened to the left of where Dyletri stood, right on the street in front of a block of homes. At least eight more
ceFtuts
came barreling through, three of them heading straight for the edge of the
Gnetica.
He pushed another wave of energy out and into the shield.

Three of the franken-mutts ran into the reinforced
Gnetica,
their massive bodies crushing their faces into it. The sounds they let out on impact were strangely doglike and satisfying as hell. The growling whimpers made Dyletri curl his lip. Zen and Liz came up on either side of him, and together they stormed straight toward the animals.

It was clear the beasts were trying to get through the shield so they could attack the homes in front of them, and the gods would be damned if they let them kill the humans in those houses.

Or any humans at all.

Dyletri ripped his sword out of its harness, arching it through the air and willing the blade to slide out to its full length. It had been a long time since he’d had to wield the weapon, but his soul recognized it immediately. The energy he consisted of latched on to the sword and melded with it once more. His blade widened and morphed, extending until it was four feet long and at least two feet wide. No human would ever have been able to wield it.

Not just because of its size, either. It wasn’t made of normal metal but a titanium-looking amalgam that was as much energy as matter. It fused itself with Dyletri’s will and only remained strong as long as he did.

And Dyletri was never stronger than when he was furious. Considering how his body was still roaring and these things were the reason he’d been pulled away from Ismini’s luscious little—

No, I just didn’t . . .

Yes,
we
just did.

With a roar, Dyletri dematerialized and shot across the street, reappearing right above one of the
ceFtuts
. He landed on the fucker’s back, his sword sliding three feet into the thing’s huge, ugly head. It bellowed, rising up on its hind legs and thrashing around, trying to dislodge Dyletri.

Unfortunately, a sword to the head wasn’t going to be enough to kill the
ceFtut
. The only way to kill them was to flip them over and stab them under the chin, but that didn’t mean Dyletri couldn’t make its life hell before doing so.

He was determined to take out the rage, the fury he was feeling on something. So he pulled the sword out and plunged it in again, this time between its eyes. Twisting the blade and gritting his teeth, a wave of raw energy pulsated from his hands and down the sword’s length.

The freak beneath him made that odd whimpering sound again and ran around like a fucking bronco while trying to buck Dyletri off its back.

Dyletri held on, digging his boots deep into its side. For the hell of it, he materialized titanium spikes on his boots and dug in even deeper. The
ceFtuts
weren’t capable of speech, but the sound it let out sounded suspiciously like “
asshole”
.

Chapter 16