“No.” That was spoken sharply. “Leave me. Go …”

“You’re going to die here.”

“Let me.” Layla tried to talk, but Xcor didn’t let her, his voice reedy and thin. “I am happy now … I shall take your memory with me … unto Dhunhd …”

Layla began to weep over the male, draping herself across his snow-covered form. “No, we can save you, I can save you …”

Whatever, V thought. Time to do his job.

What he was staring at now was just emotional bullshit, irrelevant to the true issues at hand—which hadn’t changed merely because the pair of them were doing a Kate and Leo after the frickin’ boat sank.

Man, thank fuck he was here to make this right, because any other of his brothers might have been swayed by this display. He was of tougher stuff than that, however, and no, it wasn’t that he was angry at Layla or feeling vindictive or even particularly hostile toward Xcor.

Hell, in the bastard’s current state, that would be like wasting time hating a block of dry ice.

No, he was just fixing Qhuinn’s fuckup back at the Tomb when Xcor had somehow overpowered the brother and then locked the fool in: V was going to send Layla back to the safe house, and then he was going to put Xcor down like a dog right here and now.

’Cuz, really, enough with this shit. One bullet through the brain and this waste of energy and focus was going to be over for the Brotherhood. Yeah, sure, they might be able to torture the fucker if they could get him back to viability again by yet another medical miracle. But the Band of Bastards were no dummies. They’d had thirty days to regroup, relocate, and distance themselves from their disappeared leader. Xcor wasn’t going to have any intel worth following up on, and as for Tohr and his right to kill the guy? That brother was already on the edge of madness. Taking out Xcor was just going to drive him further down, not elevate him from where he was at.

Besides, the war was heading to a crisis point. The Lessening Society was collapsing, but the Omega wasn’t going anywhere, not unless someone displaced him by force—and that was Butch’s job, at least according to the Dhestroyer Prophecy: After all these years of fighting, the end was near—and the Brotherhood needed to return to their core function of eliminating the true enemy of the race.

As opposed to getting sidetracked by this also-ran group of vigilantes who had been castrated anyway.

V was making an executive decision on this.

Time to make this all go away, true.

Raising the muzzle of his gun, he stepped out from behind the tree.

EIGHTEEN

As Layla laid herself over Xcor’s naked, cold body, she was desperate to make him warm, get him out of the woods, give him food and water. How was he even alive? How had he survived the passage of even an hour in these conditions, much less an entire day? Dearest Virgin Scribe, he was so chilled he was past shivering, his torso, arms, and legs frozen into a statue’s intractability, his bearded face contorted with suffering.

“We have to get you out of here,” she said urgently. “You can take my vein, and after we’re safe, we’ll … I don’t know, we’ll have you talk to them or …”

Abruptly, she remembered Vishous telling her that Xcor had left the key to the gates behind when he’d escaped the Tomb. Surely that meant something? If he intended harm or retaliation, he would have taken it with him, right? And the Brotherhood had to know that, had to interpret that as a sign of peace … right?

“We need to—”

“Layla.” Xcor’s thin voice was urgent. “Layla, look at me—”

She shook her head as she sat back from him. “There isn’t time! You’re freezing to death—”

“Shh.” His navy blue eyes softened. “I am warm in my soul with you before me. That is all I need.”

“Please take my vein? Please—”

“’Tis a fine way to die, in your arms. A better death than I deserve for certain.” Against everything that was rational, his gray lips smiled. “And I have something I need to tell you—”

“You’re not going to die, I won’t let you—”

“I love you.”

Layla’s breath caught. “What …?”

His dying smile became something close to wistful. Or mayhap worshipful was the better word. “With all of my black and withered heart, I love you, my female. I deserve not the earth beneath your feet, nor the scent of you in my nose, and never the gift of your blood, but I … I am e’er grateful for the change that you wrought upon me. You have saved me, and the only thing greater than my love for you is my gratitude.”

He spoke quickly in the Old Language, as if he were aware that he was running out of time.

“I am at peace and I love you, Layla.” Xcor reached up, bringing an immobile claw toward her face. When he brushed her cheek, she gasped at how icy his skin was. “And I can go now—”

“No, please, no—”

“I can go.”

That smile of his was going to haunt her for the rest of her life: He must have been in excruciating pain, and yet there was peace all over him, emanating from him. On her side? It was the opposite. There was no peace for her. If he lived, they had a terrible fight before them. If he died? He was taking a part of her to the Other Side as well.

“Xcor, please—”

“It’s better this way.”

“No, no, it’s not, don’t leave me—”

“You will let me go.” His tone became stern. “You will walk forth from this moment with your head held high, knowing you have been honored and adored, even if just by the likes of me. You will let me go and live your life with your young and find someone worthy of you.”

“Don’t say that!” Layla wiped the tears from her cheeks with impatience. “And we can fix this.”

“No, we cannot. You must let me go and then go forth out of this forest, clean of the sin I brought unto your life. The fault was, and is, all mine, Layla. You have never done anything wrong, and you must know that you are safer and better off without me.”

She leaned forward once more and brushed his matted hair from his forehead. Thinking back to Qhuinn’s anger and the issues with their young, it was hard to argue with those words. As much as it was killing her to lose him, it was impossible to contradict the chaos Xcor had wrought in her life.

“Swear to me you will move forward,” he demanded. “I cannot be at peace unless you swear it.”

She put her hands to her face. “I feel as if I am breaking in half.”

“No, no, this is a joyous night. I have wanted to speak my truth for so long, but it was never right. First because I denied it, then because I fought it and sent you away from me. Now that I am departing this mortal coil, though, I am free—but more importantly, so are you. There was no good ending to us, Layla, my love. There will be a good ending for you, however. You shall be forgiven by the Brotherhood, for they are right and just, and they know I am the evil, and you are not. You shall go on and be the mahmen you are meant to be, and you shall find a male worthy of you, I promise. I am but an obstacle in your destiny, something to be surmounted and left behind. You will go on, my love, and I will watch over you.”

Layla opened her mouth to speak, but then he coughed a little, groaned, and shuddered.

“Xcor?”

He took a deep breath and his lids lowered. “I love you …”

As his voice drifted into silence, it was as if all his life force went out of him at once, his corporeal form deflating, his energy spent.

As his head settled back into the snow, she hadn’t even realized he’d lifted it. And then there was another of those shuddering breaths, and the light in his eyes dulled even further.

He remained at peace, though. He seemed—

The snap of a twig right in front of her brought her head up and she gasped.

Standing before them, with his boots planted wide and a gun in his hand … was the Brother Vishous.

And his face was so emotionless and composed, it was as if he were an executioner wearing a mask.

Xcor felt like he was underwater. His already frail physical state had so degraded from exposure to the cold and the elements that it was as though he had to swim to an unreliable surface against a powerful undertow to hold onto consciousness—and he was not going to last much longer. His message to Layla had been of sufficient import to provide him with extra strength, but once his words had been imparted, he was fading fast.