Page 56 of Fated In Forever (Nocturne Vampire Clan #4)

We ended up in a quiet walled garden, where Angel and Bex were squeezed together on a stone bench beside a bed of nodding blue delphiniums, both of them sitting ramrod straight, cheeks pink, eyes wide, and every time Malachi’s tail swished, I swore they both let out a little squeak.

Seriously. I grumbled. You’d think they never saw an eight-foot monster before.

Nine , he murmured, squeezing my hand. I’m nine feet tall. I think they like my tail . He swished it again and I rolled my eyes, glad most of his nakedness was hidden by the mist of shadows wrapped around his hips.

Stop that. Don’t encourage them.

Are you jealous, Vicious? Because you sound jealous.

I didn’t answer, because I totally wasn’t jealous. Much . Blake and Riordan were here, too, watching from beneath a towering oak tree, arms crossed, feet braced wide, and once again, that sureness settled deeper inside me, the conviction we were on the right path.

That every twisted, shattered moment that led to right now had turned us all to tempered steel, to become the weapons we needed to be to finish this fight.

To win.

Nikolai lounged against a stone wall in the garden, Sabine sat cross-legged on a mossy bench, barefoot, in a parfait-colored dress of sequined tulle and a tiara, brown eyes dancing as she looked between us.

As if we were an interesting experiment she couldn’t wait to start on.

I shifted my weight, quite sure I did not want to become one of her science projects

Barely visible, black veins still crawled beneath my skin like living shadows, pulsing vaguely with each heartbeat, beside me, Malachi towered, eyes burning like embers, swishing that damn tail.

Yet somehow, I could still see my Malachi, in every beautiful curve and hardened edge, in the way his lips twisted into a sardonic smirk.

Is the fairy godmother really our only option ? He grumbled. What about the Elder, doesn’t he have some skills?

Not the sort of skills we need . We’d been bickering for an hour, and I was starting to think he was going to refuse to go through with this.

“Let me get this straight,” Sabine’s wild grin was a thing of absolute terror.

“You want me to turn him back into a mortal? I have to ask…why? Look at him. He’s an apex predator.

He’s perfect . He can rip through steel and rock with his bare hands, I mean…

” she waggled her eyebrows. “Once you go monster, you never go back.”

Nikolai closed his eyes, a veritable picture of the long-suffering brother if I ever saw one. Behind us, Angel and Bex giggled like a couple of teenagers.

Oh my God. You’re right. This is such a bad idea. I tugged at his hand . We’ll figure something else out.

“Just kidding. I can see where that form might be a detriment to Friday date nights.”

“What do you even know about date nights?” I asked, mystified by every aspect of her. The only girl I’d ever spent any amount of time with was Angel, and Sabine was a cobbled together version of a fairy princess, a werewolf and someone who just escaped from a mental facility.

“I read books, you know. Romances. Human romances. There are always dates involved. On Fridays. Hence, Friday date nights.”

Well, she isn’t wrong. And she’d probably get along with Angel and Bex. We could introduce them. I glanced over to where the two of them sat, a rapt audience.

Vicious, stay on task here.

“Right. We need your help,” I said. “We…uhm, there are certain situations where this form is not ideal. Can you change him back, or not?”

“Oh, you’re talking about sex.”

“For fuck’s sake, Sabine.” Nikolai muttered, dragging a hand down his face.

“I am talking about sex, and eating meals and fitting through doorways. I’m talking about sleeping in a bed at night and just…not scaring the living shit out of everyone around them.” Sorry, you really are kind of scary .

“Can you reverse this or not?” Malachi's voice was little more than a gravelly rumble, barely recognizable, but the unspoken hope in those burning eyes made my chest ache.

Sabine circled us slowly, her power humming in the air like electricity before a storm. Her magic felt ancient and vast, like nothing I’d ever encountered before and I gripped Malachi’s hand tighter. She took her time, probing at the darkness that had taken root in both of us, then sighed.

“Not reverse,” she finally decided. “That would be a tragedy. I could, however, perform a spell that would glamour you,” she looked at Malachi, “to appear mortal as long as you remain in this realm. Or I could cast a spell over you,” her attention turned to me, “for when you go back to the Underworld.

“Forget about me. I’m never going back to the Underworld.” I said quietly, shivering in the chilled morning air. “That’s what started this in the first place.”

“Do you want my help or not?” she asked, sticking her bottom lip out like a petulant toddler.

“Yes, we want your help.” I said, all the fight draining out of me. We had too many battles ahead of us for me to go to war with her, and anyway, I was pretty sure I wouldn’t win.

“Good.” She ran her eyes over Malachi again. “But you have to be sure. Choices like this can …” she cl amped her lips together, as if she was trying not to say something. “Are you sure ?”

No . “Yes,” I told her.

My eyes kept drifting over to Malachi, to the way shadows drifted off his shoulders, how darkness crept out of the corners of the garden, even though dawn was close. I hadn’t been brave enough to ask the really hard question—like… when do you have to go back ?

I couldn’t bear the thought of him leaving, not when he’d just gotten here, and from what I’d picked up so far, his time in the Underworld had been far longer than my own, three-week separation.

And truthfully, I loved this form, even the horns. I loved the way his skin glowed with an almost purplish hue, I loved how shadows spilled from him like water and I especially loved his tail. But I also wanted my old Malachi back.

I wanted to be able to wrap my arms around his waist and wind my fingers between his and I wanted to make love to him. I wanted to feel all of him inside me, and I wanted to have a future with him, in this realm, where he didn’t become some sort of side show.

“We’re sure,” I said, straightening my shoulders. “We’re ready.”

Sabine wove her spell without ceremony, her hands moving in intricate patterns as words I could never hope to understand spilled from her lips.

The misty air shimmered around us like gossamer, a comforting kind of magic, washing over me like warm honey, seeping into my bones, battling back the Underworld's cold corruption.

Beside me, Malachi roared as the transformation took hold. His massive form convulsed, thick, inky skin melting away, horns receding, until finally—blessedly—the male I remembered stood before me .

But even in this form, he had changed.

Before, he'd been lean and graceful, now his tall frame was a corded mass of pure muscle, shoulders more defined, layered with strength, wider than before. The Underworld had remade him into something magnificent and terrible.

And best of all, he still had that delicious V.

I sucked my bottom lip into my mouth, and he noticed .

His eyes caught mine. I want to devour you, Vicious. With a snort from Sabine and another swirl of magic, he was dressed in a long dark blue coat, perfectly fitting black pants, a white shirt unbuttoned to show his strong chest.

“I’m not sure this is an improvement,” Sabine sighed, lowering her hands.

“But there are some things I can’t change.

This is no longer your primary realm. Your place is in the Underworld now, because there is something that needs finishing.

” Sabine sounded almost regretful when she added, “They must all find their way home, they have waited long enough.”

Confused, I looked between them, hoping for an explanation, but Malachi just nodded solemnly. “I understand.”

“You should know,” Sabine continued, cupping his chin, “this burden you carry is sacred. There is honor in sacrifice, Malachi, joy in suffering, and the dead could not ask for a better guardian.”

I expected him to snicker, or make some depreciating remark, but he only laid his hands on her shoulders. “That is something I have recently discovered, but thank you for the reminder, amicus meus. Gratia te benedicat et te tueatur .”

I had no idea what he said, but then it didn’t matter, as Malachi's hand found mine, his fingers still just as callused and strong as in his other form.

“I expect you have something to tell me. About this burden of yours.” I whispered, half afraid to hear that story, but there was something so different about this new, steady sense of pride and quiet assurance, I kept my questions to myself.

He’d always worn his arrogance like a shield, his mocking smirk like a mask, but I had a feeling I was finally seeing the real Malachi, or at least, the one who’d been baptized in the shadows of the Underworld, and emerged from the darkness changed.

For the better.

His fingers tightened around mine. “May I choose how I spend my time here?” he asked Sabine quietly, more of that cautious hope threading through his voice.

“You will never be denied a choice, as long as you fulfill your duty to the Underworld,” her eyes softened when they landed on me and I braced myself.

The black veins had almost faded entirely, now appearing more like intricate tattoos than a sign of magical corruption, but something in her gaze told me I was about to get bad news.

“You, Evangeline, will always carry a piece of the Underworld in your veins,” she explained. “The Underworld's magic has changed you permanently, but I've... refined the darkness so it will not corrupt living flesh.”

I flexed my fingers, igniting the power humming beneath my skin—different from before, darker but also somehow more whole, as if all the jaggedy pieces finally fit together, with no spaces between. “What does that make me?”

“Lucky,” Sabine said with a faint smile. “Malachi will live forever, or until he lays down his crown and takes his rest. You…” Her smile gleamed like a cat’s. “Yo u will live for a very long time, both of you bridging the gap between life and death, between mortal and immortal.”

She grinned at her brother. “Not bad for one day’s work, if I do say so myself.”

Nikolai finally spoke, “None of us get the life we want. We all have to settle for what the universe gives us.”

“This is the life I want,” I insisted, meaning every word.

Malachi squeezed my hand, his touch achingly familiar despite everything that had changed. “We aren’t settling,” he agreed, and for a moment, we lost ourselves in each other’s eyes. “We’re going to build a future.”

“Once Ravok’s dead.” I reminded him.

“And the rift is stabilized.”

“And we kill all our enemies.” Sabine added, with just a little too much enthusiasm, in my opinion.