“How did it gain entrance here?” Erebus had asked as he gently bandaged the cat’s bleeding leg.
“You tell me, brother. It was you who was alone with the Goddess when it struck.”
Erebus had had no answer for his brother, and neither had Nyx. But what had begun that day continued to spread until almost every day Kalona battled some kind of Darkness.
In the beginning the attacks brought Kalona and Nyx together once more. They became lovers again for a brief, beautiful time. The Goddess sought his company, and they found a way to speak to each other. Kalona even happily agreed to visit the mortal realm with Nyx while she made an appearance to her favored children, the vampyres, as they christened the first House of Night after their Goddess of Night.
But that visit ended in jealousy and anger when Nyx remarked joyfully, “Look, Kalona, there are so many cats here! They are such loving familiars of my children.”
“Yes, I am sure Erebus will be thrilled at the joy his gift still brings you,” Kalona had quipped, and then fallen silent.
Nyx could say nothing—not about the gift he had given her that night, and how that gift pleased her more than any mortal creature could. No, Nyx could say nothing. Her own vow silenced her. She could only watch as jealousy and anger warred within Kalona.
As they returned to the Otherworld, a great horned creature of many heads and with teeth like daggers, had attacked them. Kalona destroyed it, escorted Nyx to her chambers and then, without speaking, he left her there, alone, while he searched for more enemies to slay.
That night Nyx wept bitterly as Mother Earth’s warning echoed from her memory:… watch Kalona. If he begins to change, it will be because his anger has grown greater than his love. If he allows anger to consume him, it will also consume you and your realm.
Nyx realized it was happening. Kalona’s anger was consuming their love and the Otherworld, as well. Though it would create a wound within her that would ache for eternity, Nyx knew Kalona must be stopped.
* * *
“You summoned me?”
Nyx had dressed carefully, choosing the gown she had worn that day so, so long ago when their love had been new and Kalona had created the waterfall for her, and they had first shared their bodies with each other. At the sound of his voice, Nyx turned to face him, filling her smile with all of the love she would eternally feel for him, and wishing desperately that he would answer her smile in kind, take her into his arms, and put his anger aside.
“You should not be out here alone, especially so close to the edge of our realm,” Kalona said, striding around the Wishing Tree to stand on the patch of red earth that was the Otherworld’s entrance. When he finally looked at her, his amber eyes were hard.
“Has my warrior completely defeated my lover?” Nyx asked him.
He blinked in surprise. “I do not know what you mean.” He approached her, obviously meaning to guide her back to the palace.
Nyx shook off his hand and walked purposefully to the hard-packed dirt at the edge of her realm. Kalona simply crossed his arms over his chest and watched her.
“Do you understand that I love you?” she asked him.
Again, surprise flickered through his amber gaze. He nodded, not speaking.
“No. Let there be no more silence between us. Answer me, son of the moon. Do you understand that I love you?”
“Yes,” he said. Then he added in an emotionless voice, “You love all of your subjects.”
“And you truly think there is no difference between what I feel for you and what I feel for others?”
“Which others are we speaking of? Your vampyres or your Consort?”
“I see my answers in your questions. You do not understand that I love you, and that my warrior has defeated my lover.” Nyx bowed her head, steeling herself.
“I do not understand you at all anymore,” Kalona said.
Nyx lifted her head and met his eyes. “Kalona, my warrior and lover, I have not changed. You have.”
“No! I am as I always have been!” He almost spat the words at her. “I have never wanted to share you with Erebus.”
“He is not my lover!”
“So you have said, over and over again. Yet you always, always turn to him over me.”
“Kalona, your mind is so filled with jealousy and anger that you can no longer think clearly.”