“We are very surprised to see you as well,” Nomura replied as he shoved his hands into his pockets. “We never expected you to survive as long as you have.” By the slump of his shoulders and the frown teasing at the corners of his mouth, I could tell there was a great deal of animosity between these two creatures, and I was afraid it would explode all over my living room. Unfortunately, curiosity was winning out over common sense.
“How do you know each other?”
“I’ve been on this earth for several centuries, Mira,” Rowe drawled, hatred glinting in his one good eye. “I’ve traveled far and wide in search of ways to free my people. It stands to reason that I slipped far beyond the reach of the West. It was then that I ran across the nightwalkers inhabiting the islands of Japan. I thought we could come to some sort of arrangement. The naturi had been no threat to them in the past, and I assumed our futures would remain on separate courses. As a result, I sought an exchange of knowledge with them.”
“I am afraid to ask what happened.”
“Take a good look at me, Mira, and you will easily see the result of my so-called alliance with the Soga clan,” Rowe bit out.
I stared at the naturi for nearly a minute, trying to see what he was talking about before it suddenly dawned on me. The Soga clan was responsible for his changed appearance, which resulted in him being banished from his people by Aurora. I had met Rowe when I was human, when he was a golden-skinned creature with pale blond hair and sparkling green eyes.
Now, scars stretched across one side of Rowe’s face, half hidden behind an eye patch that covered his right eye. His hair was black as night and the color of his one remaining eye seemed to match it. His skin had taken on a swarthy complexion and was streaked with more scars. Like nightwalkers, naturi healed from nearly everything. And yet it appeared that the members of the Soga clan had found a way to mark him permanently.
“It is not as if you walked away empty-handed from our time together,” Nomura stated.
“Oh, you’re correct. I gained more than my fair share of blood magic—”
“You taught him how to use blood magic?” I demanded, raising my voice for the first time. “Do you know what trouble that has caused for all nightwalkers during the past year? Do you know that knowledge enabled him to open the doorway between the worlds in the first place? You are the reason Aurora is here now.”
“Don’t lay too much blame at their doorstep, Mira,” Rowe noted, earning a growl from me as I looked over at him. “They tried very hard to kill me over a five-year period. I’m sure while they were teaching me the magic, they never expected me to survive the lessons.”
“I don’t understand,” Danaus spoke up. The hunter laid a hand on my shoulder and squeezed, subtly hinting that I needed to calm down. There was no need to start a fight with four very powerful nightwalkers when I still had a fight with Aurora ahead of me. “Why bother teaching him in the first place if you only planned to kill him?”
“It was a form of torture,” Nomura replied in a nonchalant voice. “The learning process was extremely painful for the naturi since the style of magic went against his very essence. We were curious if it could even be done. Unfortunately, Rowe escaped us before we were able to complete our process.”
“You mean, the process of slowly trying to destroy him,” I said in a cold voice. “Leave.”
“I beg your pardon,” Nomura said softly, cocking his head to the side. “I don’t believe I understood you correctly.”
“No, I’m sure you did,” I snapped, glaring at the quartet of nightwalkers. “Leave. Leave Savannah and the New World. Return to Japan, and if I have my wish, never leave your home again. You are not welcome in this world.”
“You’re turning your back on our superior strength and abilities because you would rather side with the naturi?” Nomura demanded.
“I’m turning my back on you because of what you did to him! Because of what you tried to do to me!” I snarled. “I’m turning my back on you because of the fact that you brought this on us all in the end. If you had not been so cocky in your decision to give him knowledge of blood magic, Aurora might not be here. Leave here and take Matsui with you, now.”
“As you wish,” Nomura replied in clipped tones. He turned on his right heel and quickly exited the town house, his companions following close behind him. Matsui paused in the hallway outside the parlor and bowed deeply to me before he left the house as well. There was a look of genuine regret on his face. I preferred to think that he actually liked serving as my bodyguard. It had to at least be less formal than following behind the Japanese nightwalkers.
“I’m confused,” Rowe announced when the door slammed shut. “Are you angry at them for torturing me or for failing to kill me?”
“I’m angry they used you as a science experiment that could have triggered the end of humanity as we know it if we don’t stop Aurora,” I replied, glaring at the naturi. The story was all too familiar, as Jabari had been content to experiment on me. Both Rowe and I had merely been puppets, playthings for powerful creatures. And in the end, if the Soga clan had succeeded to get me to Japan to help them with their naturi problem, I would have been forced to stay so I would become their next pet project.
Rowe pushed out of his chair, standing so he was looking me directly in the eye. “It didn’t have to be the Soga clan. I would have begged for the knowledge of blood magic from anyone willing to teach me, regardless of the cost. My job was to free Aurora and the others.”
I took a couple steps closer to him. “And you don’t regret it, do you?”
Rowe smirked at me. “Nope.”
“Considering all the lives that have been lost over the years, do you regret anything at all?”
“Just not killing you when I had the chance.”
I matched his smirk with one of my own. “Which time?” Rowe had more than one shot at me over the long years, and here I still stood, alive and smiling at him.
“All of them, from our first meeting till this very second,” he replied.
Shaking my head, I turned my back on the naturi and started to return to the other side of the room. To my shock, Danaus brushed by me in a quick sweeping motion. I twisted around in time to see his meaty fist land squarely on Rowe’s nose, throwing the naturi back into his chair. I placed my hand on Danaus’s chest to keep him from taking another step toward Rowe. However, my eyes were locked squarely on Nyx, who had come away from the far corner like a dark shadow. Her face remained expressionless, but there was a new burning in her gray eyes that hadn’t been there before. This seemed to be more than just protectiveness of her own kind—there was something between her and Rowe.
“She spared your life in Budapest,” Danaus growled. “She gave you a second chance at life and still you persist in hunting her.”
“I’m not as easily tamed as some,” Rowe said in a low voice as he rubbed his nose, checking to make sure it wasn’t broken. Danaus tried to lunge at the naturi again, but I held him back, my eyes remaining on Nyx. There was no weapon in her hand, but I had a feeling she was only waiting for Danaus to make another move toward Rowe.
“Enough!” I shouted, shoving against Danaus so he was forced to take a couple steps back away from Rowe. Summoning up the energy swirling in the air around me, I turned off the lamps in the room, plunging the room into complete darkness for a breath before lighting all the candles as well as igniting a fire in the fireplace. Everyone grew still, seeming to hold their breath as they waited to see if my temper had reached its breaking point.
“We’re not getting anywhere with these talks!” I complained, returning to the other side of the room with Danaus. It was better if there was physical space between Rowe and us. I still wanted to set the bastard on fire after his little dig at Danaus, but I knew we would need him healthy for the battle ahead. “Aurora is out there somewhere waiting to attack. She is not only looking for the heads of you three, but I’m willing to bet she would like to add mine to her collection as well.”