Page 26

Enko

Nine Years Ago

“Goddess, Enko, you know you don’t have to work out all day,”

Damon asked me as he entered our bedroom. He was older than me, but at some point in the past few years I’d grown bigger than him. “You’re a beast.”

That’s where that nickname came from.

He could probably still beat me with his mind games, but I tilted my chin up in greeting, continuing to pull myself up in the doorway. My chin went above the bar. One-hundred.

“Buffing yourself up for our girl?”

We didn’t even know who she was yet. But after my shift, it was confirmed through a blood test that we shared a Fated mate, somewhere out there. Maybe that’s why Damon had felt drawn to help me that night. Maybe the goddess had put him there to rescue me. I hoped our Fated mate was having an easier time out there than we had.

“Believe me, no one’s gonna fuck with you anymore, Enko. You’re bigger than a full-grown man and you’re only fifteen.”

“Yeah, yeah. What did you get for breakfast?”

I muttered as I grabbed some fresh clothes to take a shower.

It was just after sunset, but we had both just woken up. Damon liked to stay awake all night in the dreamworld.

“Do you ever think about anything other than food and working out?”

But he passed over a double portion of salisbury steak from a diner down the road slathered with extra gravy. I popped it open and we hopped out on the fire escape to eat.

We had only just finished when a frantic knocking came at the door.

Damon groaned but hauled himself up and crawled back through the window, opening the door.

A man in a full suit bowed to him. “Lord of Nightmares.”

My breath caught. Damon had never been close to his father. But if he had inherited the title it could only mean one thing.

The Lord of Nightmares was dead.

Damon was deadly still, deadly silent. The Lord of Nightmares never used his voice with the servants and I knew Damon was speaking to the man in his head.

The guard handed over a large black envelope. Damon snatched it from the man and slammed the door in his face. I kept still, watching his every movement. I was sure that Damon was prepared to take over the empire. He had grown to be more powerful than his father as a Mind kitsune since I met him. He had less of an alcohol problem and had more fun doing what he called playing in people’s dreams. Or nightmares.

But I was sure he wasn’t expecting to have these responsibilities at only eighteen. And with the new job, he now wouldn’t be attending Firefox Academy in three years.

“I’m fine, Enko,”

Damon said, ripping open the envelope and pulling out the paperwork within.

He went to his father’s office, sitting in the large black business chair as though it had always been his, laying the papers on the desk in a neat stack and grabbing the fancy pen from its holder.

“What happened?”

Damon’s eyes rose from the paperwork. “Demons coordinated an escape from the Hellgate,”

he told me simply. Then he flashed the image in my brain. It wasn’t as clear as he normally projected, so I knew it came from the guard.

A massive arch of blue fire, hellfire. Inside the Hellgate, inky black shadows distorted, so nothing on the other side could be seen. It was a gigantic underground cave, and I could see part of the ancient staircase rising into our world, its entrance covered long ago by the city of Lethe, right below our feet. The Lord of Nightmares sprawled in front of the Hellgate as a pack of demons rolled out, high Tier, III and IV. One collapsed on its knees, unable to resist the allure of kitsune blood as its teeth dug into the Lord of Nightmares neck.

When its solid black eyes rose to the Watcher, red blood dripped from its chin.

“Is that enough for you?”

Damon asked calmly. So calm, the opposite of me. Was he okay?

“I’m fine, Enko,”

he repeated.

“So...that’s the Hellgate,”

I said, taking a seat in the fancy armchair across from him as he read through the pages and signed at the bottom of each one. Except it wasn’t his name. He signed each as Lord of Nightmares.

It was a contract.

“A thousand year old contract,”

Damon remarked. “The goddess gave this responsibility to my ancestors when she ruled the earth long ago. Now, it’s my job.”

“Whatever you need, I’m here for you, Damon,”

I said. Just like he had been there for me three years ago.

He nodded solemnly. “I know, Beast.”