Rob Thurman - Slashback

Now I knew.

No matter how deep you bury things, they always dig their way to the surface, more malignant and rotten than when you’d shoved them under in the beginning. No one would guess it and I wished I could deny it, but on the inside, Niko was every bit as fractured and fucked-up as I was. The leash on his issues was sturdier than mine, but eventually every leash breaks.

Sooner or later in this world, everything breaks.

Every one breaks.

“Do you know how old Niko was when he first killed for me?” I hissed in the puck’s ear as I shoved him farther back out of range as a sharp sai flew over our heads. “Fifteen. He was fifteen when he killed Jack’s homicidal buddy. Why do you think he is the way he is? All Zen and so fucking bottled up? It’s because he’s a time bomb. He killed a man to save my life when he was fifteen, lived through dragging my ass back to sanity after two years in Auphe Hell, ran with me to escape the sons of bitches, and lost me again. And then again and fucking again . You don’t know what’s inside him and what he’s had to do to stay sane.” To watch out for me, but not lose it so much that everyone he sees is a threat? To know that it’s not necessary to bury his katana in everyone who walks within a block of me although that’s exactly what his instincts and our history told him he should do?

Of all of it, what had happened when he was fifteen with Junior, it had been the worst. Over the Auphe stealing me away, it had been the worst, because I’d warned Nik about Junior and he hadn’t believed me. He wouldn’t forgive himself for that and I couldn’t get him over it as we didn’t talk about that time. We both thought we had our reasons.

I would simply have to make sure mine didn’t come to light, but Niko’s. . it was time for them to see the light of day. No more hiding for him. It had turned cancerous, poisonous, and it had to be cut away before he could heal.

Because this? What was happening now? This was as far from recovery as you could get.

Nik was now chopping viciously at the pummel horse with a sword. I couldn’t remember the god-awful jokes Robin had told when he’d first seen that piece of equipment, not with the raw snarl on Niko’s face. I knew what he was seeing and it wasn’t a piece of gym equipment. It was Junior. Given the opportunity Nik would kill Junior a hundred more times and it would still not be enough.

He’d left a part of himself in that attic he had not gotten back and now he was back there, losing more of himself. That was not fucking acceptable.

“Stay here.” I shoved Robin down on the floor between the couch and the table. “I don’t think he’ll know who you are.” He would know who I was. I didn’t question that, not as I sprang up from my crouch, ran across the floor, and tackled him from the side as he sliced a blade into a punching bag. I knew he saw me coming. I knew he was armed. I knew he was out of his mind.

And I knew he wouldn’t hurt me.

This brutality was aimed at himself, along with a stark self-blame that had his control so abruptly shattered. He held on to the sword like it was his only lifeline as we lay on our sides where I’d taken us down on the mat. “It’s me, Nik. It’s Cal. It’s Cal, big brother. Junior’s gone. He’s been gone a long time. It’s just us.” For a second, I thought I was wrong. I thought he didn’t know me, but then he turned his head back toward me and I saw the recognition, the blood from twelve years ago spilling behind his eyes. With the blood came sanity, although I couldn’t be certain he was happy to have it back. He dropped the sword and rolled over to wrap his arms around me, hurting too much to know how tightly he was holding on. He had to hold on, because he was lost. Nik, my brother-the man I’d thought of just days ago as fixed and unmoving as the North Star, was lost. He rested his forehead against mine and whispered one word for me alone. “Sorry.”

Fifteen. He’d been fifteen damn years old. A kid. As if any of it could’ve been his fault.

I lifted my hand to grasp his trailing braid and gave it a hard tug, that reassuring weight he was used to. He was sorry and I didn’t know that there was much that I could say that would change his mind about anything. I said something else instead. “We’re the reason Junior’s dead. You’re right, that’s Jack’s problem with our asses.” I said it, because Nik needed it. The problem spelled out for him. That’s how he managed to survive, to be able to take step after step, pretty much our entire lives, by fixing problems.

Goodfellow’s voice was strained behind us. “Now that we know Jack’s issue with you, we need to discuss something else.” I lifted my head to see him standing now, only several feet from us with Ishiah behind him. Ishiah’s wings were wrapped around Robin. To protect. To comfort. Both maybe? From their expression something bad was coming.

Could there possibly be worse than this?

“We need to talk about angels,” Ishiah said.

Jack the storm spirit with wings who saved sinners, knew his Bible, raised the dead, had worshippers, and called humans his Flock. Goodfellow had been gathering the information and it had hit critical mass with “sinners,” hoodie-clad praying followers, and the sacrificial skins. Enter Ishiah stage right. I shouldn’t have been at all surprised by what my boss and Robin told us.

It didn’t change the fact that I was.

“Let me get this straight: for six or seven years now you both, and everyone who works in the bar, have been lying to Nik and me about angels not existing. Is that right?” Hearing the words, I was still having trouble believing it.

I sat on the mat beside Niko, leaning against him. My ribs were screaming from the exertion, but they weren’t my concern at the moment. I’d white-knuckled my way through worse. Nik needed me there and visibly alive rather than stumbling around the kitchen looking for pain pills. I could’ve tried to pull him with me, but from the set to his shoulders, moving wasn’t part of his plan. Breathing was barely part of it. I wasn’t the only one white-knuckling it, but while I’d gone through worse than cracked ribs, Niko hadn’t gone through worse than this. Out of the corner of my eye I could almost see a short blond ponytail instead of a long braid, see a smaller frame, see eyes and a face that hadn’t yet mastered the art of hiding emotion that could be used against him.

Niko looked much younger than twenty-seven right now. Younger and older and the misery and recriminations of twelve years ago so plain on his face that I glared at Goodfellow and Ishiah each time they started to glance at him. This was private and they had to be here, but they didn’t have to see this. He’d recover. . and he would recover. . at his own pace. He didn’t need them watching him like a lab experiment while he did it. Sympathy would make him feel only. . lesser. Niko had stood firmly on his own two feet mentally before he could do it physically. He wouldn’t be grateful to know someone saw him stumble.

“That whole ‘peris are the seed behind the myth that became angels,’ that was all bullshit?” I went on. I’d thought Robin lied as tricksters do, but that he’d never lied to us, nothing big at any rate. Well, he had and it was huge.

“It’s only half a lie really.” Robin was back on the couch with Ishiah. “Peris aren’t angels. . anymore. Peris are retired angels with most of their heavenly powers stripped away. They’re expatriates if you will. They’ve gone native. Earth is their home, not Heaven. So when you asked me if that first peri you saw was an angel I wasn’t technically lying.”

“You’re a trickster. Jesus, take credit for it already, gloat, and go on. I’m used to watching your other victims be mortified. Why should I be any different?” And the other paien hadn’t told me there were angels in addition to peris or where peris came from because I’d never asked. They assumed I knew. They knew, everyone knew. Why would they think anything else when it came to me?