Invincible Chronicles of Nick - By Sherrilyn Kenyon Page 0,76
right, though. What if I can’t fight it?”
“That’s the wrong question, Nick. What if you can?”
CHAPTER 18
It wasn’t many people who got inspirational speeches from demons. Nick counted himself lucky in that regard.
Or cursed.
“C’mon, Nick,” he said to himself. “Concentrate.” He supposedly had all these untapped powers just waiting to be carefully unleashed. It was time he learned to use them.
Barely one hour ago, another fourteen-year-old had been found murdered only three blocks north of Sanctuary—same style with the peculiar emblem around his body.
His coach was planning on delivering all their souls up to his boss like the cherry on a special homemade chocolate sundae so that Devus could move on and repeat his offenses again and again.
Well, Nick Gautier was no cherry and he was no fool.
Honestly, he didn’t know what he was anymore, but he couldn’t stand by and let anyone else die or become a victim. Not if he could help it. It was time to fight, and fighting was the one thing he understood well.
“You can do this.” He clenched his fist tight around the cord and thought as hard as he could.
It was useless. Grim’s lessons were more aggravating than helpful. Frustrated, he started to lower his hand, only to feel a warm presence next to him. The room was bathed with a soft, glowing light that seemed to emanate the sensation of a mother’s love and acceptance. It was so comforting, he wanted to lose himself in it.
Kody appeared by his side with her feet tucked up under her. “You can do this, Nick.” She smiled at him, and his insides danced. Dog, if she wasn’t the most beautiful girl he’d ever seen. She always looked so sweet and inviting.
“Hi,” he whispered, half-afraid he was dreaming and that she’d vanish on him.
Her smile widened. “Hi.”
Kody knew what her job was. Keep Nick straight or deliver his head on a platter to the powers who commanded her. But every time she looked into those dark blue eyes of his, she lost a part of herself to them.
A part of herself to him.
He was a hard man not to love. All that power wrapped in the body of someone who was still unsure and vulnerable. Someone who always put others’ needs above his own. He wouldn’t teach himself his powers to serve his own interests. It was to protect others that he sat here in utter frustration.
She closed her hands around his. “You’re trying to force it.”
“I need it to work. Don’t have time for bull crap.”
She gave him a chiding glance. Her brothers had always been like him, too, blindly forcing their way whenever they ran into opposition.
You see where that got them.
She forced her pain aside. This wasn’t about them and the stupidity that had damned them both and ruined all their lives. A stupidity that had almost ended the world.
This was about Nick and his current idiocy. “And if you’re building a bookcase and you break the nail in half because it won’t obey you, what do you have?”
“Splinters.”
She smiled. “Indeed.”
Nick shivered as she leaned against him and held his hand in hers. She had the softest skin he’d ever felt. Like warm velvet.
“Close your eyes.”
Her breath tickled his skin as he obeyed her.
“Now, picture in your mind what you want to know and then listen to the universe as it speaks to you.”
He tried, but right now all he could really focus on was how good she felt against him. Oh yeah, I’m twisted.
“Are you getting anything?”
Um, yeah, but he wasn’t about to go there. “I’m never going to make this work.”
She dropped their entwined hands, then took the hematite into her palm as if to test its heft. “Maybe the pendulum isn’t your thing.”
“What do you mean?”
“Everyone’s different. What works for one doesn’t always work for another.” She held her hands out in front of her and cupped them so that they formed a ball in her lap. She whispered in a beautiful language he couldn’t decipher. But it was one he could listen to all day. Especially with the sweet musical cadence of her voice.
As he watched, a strange blue light emanated from her hands. It pulsed like electricity, then swirled around until it began to form a shape. After a minute, the mist became a dark gray, almost black mirror. But the surface wasn’t glass. It appeared more iridescent and fluid.
She held it out to him. “It’s a scrying mirror. Try it.”