"This is gonna hurt," Jonny told the creature.

"You … cannot … kill me."

"Wrong answer, asshole." Arrogant until the end, he thought. "I can definitely enjoy making you suffer before he kills you." He tilted his head towards Darian. Not about to give the creature a chance to respond, Jonny tore into its throat.

In truth, Others tasted like shit. But he didn't care. He didn't listen to the gurgled scream of the creature or stop when it ceased writhing. Warm, metallic blood poured down his throat. He drank and drank until his stomach began to feel full and then threw the body to Darian to finish off.

Jonny tossed back his head to see the cloudy sky and closed his eyes, allowing himself the split second of victory before the reality of his critical situation returned. Darian snapped the neck of the Other and dropped it.

"Never thought I'd see the day," the Grey God said. "You did good, kid."

"I'm not a kid," Jonny replied, opening his eyes. "I'm the fucking Black God."

"Yeah." Darian winked. The golden-eyed Grey God was generally a loose cannon, whose side of crazy Jonny assumed resulted from ten thousand years of having his mind erased and living in slavery. Of all the Guardians and allies of the White God, Darian was the one Jonny tolerated best. "You wanna rein that shit in so we can all have a nice little chat?"

The politics were starting already. Jonny looked around them. His magic was dark and laced with red lightning bolts. It spread for a mile in each direction, across the grassy plains, and destroyed every living thing it touched. Not even vamps survived an encounter with the magic. When he loosened his control, he had the ability to wipe out a city. The location for the final confrontation with the Others had been chosen carefully for that reason. His temporary allies offered their assistance in exchange for no humans being hurt.

Ringed around his dark power was a buffer of white, Damian's magic, to prevent Jonny's power from spreading too far outside of the area. His vamps were beyond the white ring, waiting for the magic of both gods to subside.

The Grey God was capable of moving through the power fields of both White and Black Gods - but he was the only one.

Jonny released his breath and shook out his tense frame. His power responded to thoughts rather than commands, and the darkness around them dissipated.

"Just, you know, play nice," Darian told him, upbeat and unconcerned.

Jonny wiped the blood from his mouth onto his sleeve. The Grey God was rarely fazed by anything, even the three week marathon of hunting the final Others that left Jonny wanting to tumble into his bed for a two day hibernation.




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