“Thanks for that.”

Cian swirled the whiskey in his glass, kept his eyes on it. “There are some things I’d like Moira to have, if you can get them here.”

“I’ll get them here.”

“I thought to leave the club and the apartment in New York to Blair—and to Larkin. I think they’d suit them better than you.”

“They would. They’ll be grateful, I’m sure.”

Annoyance rose up at his brother’s easy and practical tone. “Well, don’t let sentiment choke you, as it’s more likely I’ll be holding a wake for you than you for me.”

Hoyt angled his head. “Do you think so?”

“I damn well do. You haven’t had three decades and I’ve had near a hundred. And you never were as good in a fight as me when we were both alive, however many tricks you have up your sleeve.”

“But then again, as you said, we aren’t what we were, are we?” Hoyt smiled pleasantly. “I’m determined we’ll both come through this, but if you fall, well... I’ll lift a glass to you.”

Cian let out a half laugh as Hoyt did just that.

“And would you be wanting pipes and drums as well?”

“Oh, bugger it.” Now a wicked gleam came into Cian’s eyes. “I’ll toss in some fifes for yours, then console your grieving widow.”

“At least I won’t have to dig a hole for you, seeing as you’ll just be dust, but I’ll show you the honor of having a stone carved. ‘Here doesn’t lie Cian, for he’s blown off with the wind. He lived and he died, then stayed on like the last annoying guest to leave the ball.’ Does that suit you?”

“I’m thinking I’ll go back and change some of those bequests, for principle only, seeing as I’ll be singing ‘Danny Boy’ over your grave.”

“What’s ‘Danny Boy’?”

“A cliche.” Cian picked up the bottle he’d set on the floor and poured more whiskey into the cups. “I saw Nola.”

“What?” Hoyt lowered the cup he’d just lifted. “What did you say?”

“In my room. I saw Nola, spoke with her.”

“You dreamed of Nola?”

“Is that what I said?” Cian snapped. “I said I saw her, spoke with her. As awake then as I am now, looking and speaking to you. She was still a child. Jesus, there isn’t enough whiskey in the world for this.”

“She came to you,” Hoyt murmured. “Our Nola. What did she say?”

“She loved me, and you. She missed us. She’d waited for us to come home. Damn it. Goddamn it.” He pushed up to pace. “She was a child, exactly as she’d been the last I saw her. It was a lie, of course. She’d grown up, grown old. She’d died and gone to dust.”

“And why would she come to you as a grown woman, or an old one?” Hoyt demanded. “She came to you as you remembered her, as you think of her. She gave you a gift. Why are you angry?”

It was fury in him now, fury to wrap tight around the pain. “How can you know what it is to feel this, to have it ripping inside you? She looked the same, and I’m not. She talked of how I’d swing her up on my horse and take her riding. And it was like it was yesterday. I can’t have those yesterdays in my head and stay sane.”

He turned back. “At the end of this, you’ll know you did what you could, what was asked of you—for her, for all of them. If you live, whatever pang you feel at leaving them behind will be balanced out by that knowing, and by the life you make with Glenna. I have to go back where I was. I have to. I can’t take this with me and survive it.”

Hoyt was quiet a moment. “Was she in pain, afraid, grieving?”

“No.”

“And you can’t take that with you and survive it?”

“I don’t know, that’s the plain truth. But I know that one feeling leads to another until you drown in them. I’m half drowned now with what’s in me for Moira.”

He calmed himself, sat again. “She wore the cross you gave her, Nola did. She said she wore it always, just as you told her. I thought you should know. And I thought you should know she told me Lilith had come back, and tried to lure her into an invitation.”

As Cian’s had done, Hoyt’s hand fisted. “That hell-bitch went for our Nola?”

“She did, and got a boot up the ass for the trouble—metaphorically.” He told Hoyt what Nola had said, watched Hoyt’s grim face soften a little with pride and satisfaction. “Then she flashed that cross of yours and sent her packing. According to Nola she never came back again, until we did.”

“Well now, well. Isn’t that interesting. The cross didn’t just shield the wearer, it frightened Lilith enough to send her haring off. That, and the prediction we’d end her.”

“Which may be why she’s so determined to end us.”

“Aye. Nola’s threat could have added weight to that. Imagine how it must have been for Lilith, being frightened off by a child.”

“She wants her own back, no doubt of it. She wants to win this, of course. To set herself up as a kind of god, but under that, it’s us. The six of us and the connection between us. She wants us destroyed.”

“Hasn’t had much luck with that, has she?”

“And what do you think of that? The gods depose, don’t they? We’ve all of us had our close calls, and bled for it. But we’re all of us, Lilith included, being driven toward one time and place. The fact of the matter is, I don’t care for being led by the nose by gods any more than demons.”

Hoyt lifted his brows. “What choice is there?”

“They all talk of choice, but which of us would turn away from this now? It’s not just humans who have pride, after all. So, the time clicks away.” He rose. “And we’ll see what we see on that reckoning day. The sun’s well down. I’m going out for air.”

He walked to the door, paused to glance back. “She couldn’t tell me if you survived it.”

Hoyt lifted a shoulder, finished off his whiskey. Then he smiled. “‘Danny Boy,’ is it?”

C ian went to see to his horse. Then, though he knew it was risky, saddled Vlad and rode out through the gates. He needed the speed, and the night. Maybe he needed the risk as well.