Eden's Creatures (10 page)

Her hands slid up his chest to coil around his neck, and her mouth greedily begged for more. He caught her bottom lip between his and pulled, drinking in all she had to give, sealing this moment in time between them.

When he finally let her go, he pulled back to study her face. The lidded eyes, the swollen lips, the flushed cheeks. Her beauty stole the breath from his lungs. “That was some first kiss.”

“I like this kissing, Cal.”

“Me, too,” he said, tracing the contours of her features.

“Do you like my face?” she suddenly asked.

He smiled. “It’s stunning.”

“Why do human girls wear paint?”

“Paint? Oh, I think you mean makeup.”

“Why do they do this?”

He shrugged. “I suppose they think it makes them look prettier. They can’t seem to get enough of it.”

“If I paint my face, will you consider to mate with me?”

“It’s not about that, Stassi. I just need to get to know you better.” As much as he wanted to strangle those words to death, they were the truth. His truth.

“I do not understand. What is there to know about me?” She turned around to rub against him. “You can get to know me here.”

He spun her back around and tilted her chin up so she had no choice but to look at him. “I want to get to know you here.”

“How?”

“You said you wanted to feel.”

“Yes.”

“We do that by talking and touching and kissing.” He smiled. “A lot of kissing.”

“Yes, I do want that, Cal. But I also want my wings.”

“I know.”

Once again, her eyes held a disappointment that he had put there. She pulled herself from his grip. “It is late, we should rest. The second trial will be held tomorrow.” With that, she moved to the corner of the room, lay down on a fur blanket and turned her back to him.

Cal stood there a moment, suddenly cold. After the incredible moment they had just shared, it hurt to have her just walk away from him now. Emotion welled inside from the events of the past days. Getting kicked out of his house. Thinking he had finally made friends only to realize they wanted nothing more than to humiliate him. Incurring the wrath of the Faedin for trying to help.

And now, Stassi.

Just another rejection in a long line of them.

He walked over to stand next to her, in need of her affection, her acceptance, and suddenly fearing that she would never be capable of either. “Can I lie by your side?”

Her slim shoulders tensed in the darkening light. “No. It is not—”

“The Faedin way,” he finished softly. “Yeah, I figured.” He went to the opposite side of the nest, curled up on top of his coat and went to sleep.

C
al’s lingering kisses kept Stassi from sleep. Her skin felt hot to the touch, her thoughts restless. She sat up and looked over at him, his scarred back visible in the moonlight. His soft, even breathing told her that he was having no such trouble this night.

With a soft snarl in his direction, she stood and flitted off into the night, in need of the rush of wind to calm her mind and cool her body.

But why the anger at Cal, she had to wonder. She had asked him to make her
feel
, had she not? Still, he could have warned her how it would tie her stomach in knots. Fill her body with unfulfilled desires. Crowd her mind with starry-eyed notions. All this and they hadn’t even mated yet!

She bellowed a scream out toward the stars as though they, and not Cal, were personally responsible for her frustration, and felt better for it.

That is, until a pair of white wings and an angry scowl filled her vision.

“Perstassia! Whatever are you doing?”

Stassi pulled up short and hovered in the air before Julius’s mate. “My apologies, Caliphy. I could not sleep.”

“And you wish to wake the entire village for it?” she reprimanded.

It was then that Stassi realized she was directly over her sire’s nest. “I did not wake Julius, did I?” she asked fretfully.

“A stampede could not wake your sire,” Caliphy replied with a snort. “Go on now. Return to—”

“Caliphy, can we talk for a moment?” Stassi interrupted

The older woman’s eyes narrowed with curiosity. “Of course. Walk with me.”

Stassi followed her back down to the ground and they strolled together at a leisurely pace through the village. Several torches still burned, illuminating the trails in soft, flickering light.

“Is there a problem?” Caliphy finally asked when Stassi didn’t speak.

“No. At least I don’t think so.”

“Where is Cal?”

“Back at the nest.”

“I see.”

“Did you hear what happened today? With Gilad at the lake?”

“I did.”

“We cannot blame Cal for that,” Stassi said, hoping to get Caliphy on her side. “He only did what comes natural to him.”

“Then he must be taught the ways. That is your responsibility.”

“Yes, Caliphy.” After another moment of silence, she suddenly blurted, “We mated with our lips.”

Caliphy inhaled sharply, but then quickly erased all emotion from her face. “Yes, I have seen humans do so outside of the veil. Such a barbaric custom, is it not?”

“I would not say that at all,” Stassi replied breathlessly.

Caliphy glanced sideways, trying unsuccessfully to hide her interest. “No? What did it feel like?”

“I cannot describe it in words.”

A delicate hand covered Caliphy’s breast. “Do try.”

“Well, as soon as your mouths touch, a flood of pleasure surges through your blood, building and building until…”

“Oh, my.”

“…you think you might burst through your skin. Your body grows hot. No, not just hot, boiling! Your knees weaken and your heart races uncontrollably, knowing that you are as one. Knowing that…”

“Yes?”

“…the soft caress of his lips whisper a thousand promises.”

Caliphy fanned her hand in front of her face. “I see. In that case, I am afraid that I cannot offer any further advice as I do not have experience in that… activity. However, I will caution you to be careful that you do not become too attached.”

“Why? What is wrong with feeling such rapture?”

“The Wonder is where we will obtain our rapture, Stassi, you know that. Besides, you are a warrior now. Duty comes before all other considerations.”

“Why am I not permitted to have both?”

“It is not—”

“The Faedin way,” she finished softly. “Yes, I know.”

Cal woke gasping for breath, his eyes wild. Although he quickly recognized the nightmare for what it was, it took several minutes to still his beating heart and then a second longer to figure out where he was.

Stassi’s nest.

He licked his lips and tasted her there. The bitter sweet taste of rejection.

He twisted to the side. She still lay in the far corner of the nest, sleeping. He wanted to go to her, but she had already made her feelings on that pretty clear.

Instead, he reached behind his back and removed a harmonica from his coat pocket. The soulful sound always helped to soothe his anxiety, especially after one of the shadow dreams. He cupped the instrument to his mouth and played an old love song his mother liked. The sweet music never failed to take him to a faraway place where shadows didn’t lurk. A place of innocence where his mind could be at peace — at least for a minute or two.

So lost was he in what he was doing that he didn’t notice Stassi standing above him until she spoke. “It is very beautiful.”

“Oh, I didn’t see you,” he murmured, shoving the harmonica behind him.

“No, do not stop.”

“I’m sorry if I woke you,” he said guiltily and jumped to his feet.

“No, you… Cal!”

“What?” he asked in alarm with a quick look behind him, just in case a monster Fallen had somehow appeared behind him while he’d had his back turned.

“You’ve grown!”

“What?” He looked down. Sure enough, his baggy sweatpants now hugged his legs around the thighs and stopped short at his ankles.

Does this mean that I’m really becoming Faedin?

The idea both terrified and excited him. The thought that he would be tall and strong and no longer a victim to the Pervalls and Ross Taylors of the world curled his lip with pleasure.

Yet another errant thought hit him at the same time.

Would the change also cause him to lose his humanity? Would he have to leave his world behind for good? What about his brother? Could he really abandon Landon?

Stassi laid a hand on his arm. “Cal? What is it? Are you all right?”

He shook away his thoughts. “Yeah, I’m fine. Just starving,” he said, deciding to put his concerns aside for now. Maybe it was just a growth spurt after all. Maybe he wouldn’t become Faedin despite all of Stassi’s claims.

“We will hunt then,” she said and grabbed a long bow and quiver of arrows hanging from a hook. She handed both out to him. “Here.”

“What? No Subway?”

“I do not know this word, Cal.”

He shook his head and took the items from her. “Never mind.”

“You should wear your coat so I can carry you easily.”

“Oh, right.” He put it on and waited for her to lift him out of the nest, thinking the entire time how quickly one could get used to things — no matter how bizarre.

The flight didn’t bother him as much as it had the other times. Stassi weaved low among the trees and along the many trails that cut through the forest.

In a small clearing, she dropped him — closer to the ground this time — and landed next to him. That was when he noticed the changes in her body as well. She, too, was taller, her muscles more defined, yet still feminine. Her walk now sleek and predatory with the feral grace of a warrior.

He tore his eyes away to study the woods around them. Although Stassi told him the Fallen would not directly attack, he still felt uneasy.

“Stassi, how many Faedin are there?”

“Around five hundred,” she said, gesturing for the bow.

He handed it to her. “And the Fallen?”

“Three times that number.”

“When you hunt them, how do you find them?”

“We hear them.”

“How so?”

“They are crying.” She removed an arrow from the quiver, fitted it to her bow and started away.

“Wait! Why would they be crying?”

“Because they are prisoners in their own bodies, compelled by the serpent. From what we can tell, the curse strips most of their intellect, but they know,” she said sadly. “They know.”

“Yet Julius indicated that they appear to be more aggressive lately.”

She shrugged. “I have seen no evidence of that, but I have not been a warrior either.”

Cal retreated deep into thought about all she had said as he walked beside her. That was why her sudden scream scared him so. “Get down!”

He threw himself to the ground and heard the
thrum
of her bowstring above him followed by great wrenching sobs and then a loud
thud
.

He glanced up.

A man lay in the middle of the trail with Stassi’s arrow sticking out of his back.

Cal gasped in shock and scrambled to his feet. “What did you do?”

Stassi walked over and pulled the arrow from the man’s back. She bent down to wipe the blood off on his shirt before notching it to her bow once again, her eyes cautiously sweeping the area.

“You killed a man!” Cal accused angrily.

“Keep your voice down,” she hissed and flipped the body over. “Not a man, a Fallen.”

Cal walked over to look down at the corpse and recoiled from the all-white eyes staring up in silent death. “What happened to his eyes?”

“All of the Fallen have them.”

“He doesn’t have any wings. I thought you said the Fallen were Faedin who had been cursed.”

“They are. All Faedin who are cursed lose their wings, just as they do when they die.”

“Faedin lose their wings when they die?”

“Yes.”

“I never asked. How does a Faedin become cursed in the first place?”

“One bite of a Fallen is all it takes.”

“A bite?”

“Yes,” she said and pointed to the jugular vein at her neck. “Their bite passes their tainted blood through their fangs to others.”

“And they never go after the villagers?”