By Gryffin Murphy
Copyright © 2016 by Gryffin Murphy
All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof
may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever
without the express written permission of the publisher
except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
www.gryffinwrites.tumblr.com
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Acknowledgements
“Dream lofty dreams, and as you dream so shall you become. Your vision is the promise of what you shall one day be; your ideal is the prophecy of what you shall at last unveil.”
-James Allen
Chapter One
Sophia
I was sitting cross-legged on top of a picnic table flipping through the pages of James Allen’s As A Man Thinketh. It was my go-to read in times of stress, loneliness, and boredom. Since moving to this small town in Montana, I found myself reading it quite often. In his book, Allen has his theory about the power of positive thinking, and how it can directly influence your life. He compares the mind to a garden: it can grow wild or it can be tended to with seeds (positive thoughts).
Over the past year as my mom battled with cancer, I guess Allen would have said my garden was overwrought with thorny vines and poisonous mushrooms. Any flower or plant couldn’t even bud before being drowned by thunderstorms of truth or trampled by rodents of reality. I dropped out of school to spend more time with her, pulled away from my friends, and withdrew into myself. I stopped living my life completely, and it still wasn’t enough to keep hers going.
The day before I moved to Montana to live with my dad, my uncle handed me Allen’s book and recited the quote, “Good thoughts bear good fruit, bad thoughts bear bad fruit.” It was his way of saying if I continued to feel depressed and lost without my mother, there was a good chance that’s all my life would consist of: misery and hopelessness. Instead of allowing this tragedy to define me, he wanted me to see Montana as a new beginning.
I sighed and closed the book around my finger to hold my place, deciding to take a moment to look back on my time spent in Montana so far. I mentally listed off some seeds to plant in my garden.
Seed One: Even though it was the start of summer and I had no classmates yet, I had still managed to make a few acquaintances of people my age.
Seed Two: My father was beginning to say more to me than just “Good morning” or “Good night”, which had been the majority of his vocabulary towards me ever since we became estranged after the divorce.
Seed Three (and probably the most positive): The town I’d moved to was beautiful. It had the greenest trees and bluest sky I’d ever seen, and everywhere I looked there was a breathtaking view of the surrounding mountains. Instead of hiding away in my room like I used to, I felt energized going out and existing in the town’s nature. This small but picturesque park in particular was merely a short bike ride from my house and had quickly become one of my favorite spots.
Those were all positive aspects I hadn’t anticipated before I arrived at my new home. When I first landed, I felt hollow; as if my life wasn’t my own and at any moment I would wake up to my mother’s voice proving this all had just been a bad dream. At this point, however, I had to accept that the only way this all could have been a dream is if I had fallen into a six-month long coma.
I had made it through grief counseling and all the stages of grief. Coming out the other side, I found all I wanted was normality. In order to piece myself back together I needed my life to have a lackluster, regularly human year that wasn’t stricken with tragedy or dramatics.
James Allen thinks this could be achieved with simple positive thinking? Okay, Jim, I’ll bite. I closed my eyes and tilted my head back. Taking a deep breath, I relaxed as a light breeze blew across my shoulders. I visualized positive energy in waves that left my body: hopes for happiness, fulfillment, and heck- why not add love in there too? I focused on how I felt over the past year, and how above everything else I didn’t want to feel lonely anymore. A calm came over my body and I was beginning to think that maybe it was working-
-When the thought immediately was interrupted by a loud engine of a rusted green pickup truck veering into the parking lot in front of me. Annoyed at the interruption, I tossed my book down to the side of me and watched as the truck parked diagonal across two spots. The driver cut the engine, and jumped out, slamming the door behind him and falling against it with a frustrated exhale. Looks like someone else could use some advice from James Allen too.
Unable to help my curiosity, I picked up my book again and held it high enough that I could eye him up without being caught. I took in his features one by one from the ground up: Muddy boots, dark jeans covering extremely long legs, a muscular structure that was accentuated by a tight white henley shirt, thin waist and wide shoulders, a manly amount of facial scruff, and tousled brown hair that could use a trim where some curls came down his forehead.
He was, without a doubt, one of the most handsome people I had ever seen in person. At this realization, my instinct should have been to be intimidated, but his long arms and grumpy demeanor gave off the impression of a big angry tree. I bit back a smile as the young Paul Bunyan paced back and forth muttering to himself. He ran his hands through his hair, only messing it up more. He turned suddenly and rammed his foot into the side of the rusty machine. I returned my eyes to my book. Maybe it would be best not to bother him.
“Careful,” I said from behind the book, unable to help myself.
“Excuse me?” he asked. His voice was not what I expected; it was gruff and practically sounded like a growl. Persevering, I faked a sigh and lowered my book, setting my eyes on his truck.
“Kick your Chevy any harder and its door just might fall off,” I joked. I looked at him with a smile but it faltered as I was met with the most vivid green eyes I had ever seen. They reminded me of the Montana forests I was so quickly growing fond of. It didn’t seem fair that a face already perfect should be blessed with such piercing eyes; the thickness of his brows and the dark curls that hung low on his forehead only amplified the intensity of the color more.
I blushed when I noticed the look he was giving me. He was facing me head on with a furrowed brow and his strong jaw was flexed with a slight gaping mouth.
Oh my God, I must have something foul on my face or in my teeth, I realized. I felt myself squirm with the instinct to just get up and run away. Instead I went with the other alternative: I nervously rambled.
“It’s just because the truck looks so old.” I chuckled. Oh no, I never laugh like that. “It probably can’t handle any sort of brute force. I mean, at this point I’m surprised that thing is even able to move. What holds it all together-glue? Duct tape?”
His eyebrow raised and thankfully he closed his mouth, but still he was silent. I was dying on the inside. He had to be doing this on purpose. What a dick move. Just stare at me
and make me feel like an idiot? As it typically did, anger flashed through me quickly.
“Anyway, you shouldn’t drive like that,” I began, my voice at risk of trembling, “it’s extremely dangerous. In case you didn’t know, this is a park, so I’m sure there are kids playing all around here. You could have hit somebody.”
“But I didn’t,” he blurted. As if that changed things!
“That’s not the point at all. Nice parking job, too, by the way. Where’d you learn to drive?” I slid off the picnic table and was preparing to really get into the argument when a loud noise from a motorcycle cut me off. It, too, sped into the lot and pulled up right next to Mr. Fast and Furious.
“Noah, you can’t just run off like that,” the guy on the motorcycle said. He was much tanner, and I could see he was significantly shorter, but he was just as muscular as his tall angry friend.
Noah (I supposed that was his name, then) ignored him and was still staring at me, giving me a look as if he was solving a difficult math problem. His curious expression gave me butterflies, which I promptly ignored and turned away to stuff my things on the table into my tote bag.
“She needs you, Noah,” I heard his friend say behind me. She. So, he had a girlfriend. Of course he did, a guy who looks like that usually isn’t single for long. I didn’t like learning that he was taken, but I also didn’t like that I didn’t like it. I barely knew the guy and in the few moments of knowing him all he did was activate my quick temper. I took a breath to calm myself down and turned back around, keeping my head down as I quickly made my way to where my car was parked.
“I’ll try to be more careful next time!” I heard him shout after me. I turned around and saw that he was leaning on both hands that were placed on the side of his truck bed, watching me leave. His gaze was a little softer and he had a slight smile on his face. Well finally he was showing signs of life.
“Glad to hear you’re going straight.” I rolled my eyes, my backwards steps a little clumsy. More than ready to put the whole interaction behind me, I quickly got in my car and drove away not even looking back once.
Okay, I looked back once, and he was still staring.
➹➹➹
Noah
“Are you even listening to me?” Milo asked.
The second her car was out of sight I fell back against my truck with my hand over my chest. My heart was beating so fast if felt as if it might burst right out of me.
“Noah, man, are you okay?” Milo got off his bike and put his hands on my shoulders.
“Something’s happening.” I gasped for air, feeling a cold sweat break out across my forehead. I closed my eyes and tried to focus my breathing, but the instance my eyes were closed all I could see was her face.
This can’t be what I think it is-can it?
“Noah, tell me what’s going on!” Milo was getting more on edge, which was unusual for his typical air of nonchalance. I shook my head and tried to collect myself, which was next to impossible with the strong new sensation of being pulled in the direction where I last saw her.
“Milo, I think I just Arrowed,” I said when I caught my breath. He looked around frantically, as if searching for someone he hadn’t yet seen.
“What- on that girl?” he asked skeptically. Reminded of her once more, images of her flooded my mind: the small details of her face: her freckled skin and cinnamon hair that perfectly matched her eyes, which had flecks of honey gold that sparkled when she teased me and flared when she became angry.
“Are you sure?” he interrupted my thoughts, lowering his voice, “Noah…I’m almost positive she was human.”
I opened my eyes again. That was something I had not yet considered. Arrowing itself was not something that had happened to our clan for a very long time, but Arrowing on a human was even more rare.
“We have to talk to somebody about this,” he insisted, moving his bike to the bed of my truck. “Give me the keys. There’s no way you’re driving in your condition.”
“I’m not drunk.” I rolled my eyes, although silently I agreed with him.
“Just shut up and get in the truck. And stop clutching your chest like that it’s freaking me out.”
➹➹➹
My knees were bouncing as I held my hands together in my lap. I was still having a little trouble breathing normally. I was trying to assess the situation as a whole, but my brain refused to entertain anything but thoughts solely centered on her.
She must think I'm a complete idiot, I realized. From the second she lowered the book and my eyes met hers, it was like a million strings burst out of me and attached to her. It had been too difficult to speak around her. I couldn’t even remember if I had said much at all. Thank goodness she left the second she did, or I might have given in to impulses and done something uncalled for, like try to move closer to her.
I was wrapped up in imagining what it would be like to be close to her, or to feel a lock of her hair that contained all the best colors of autumn, when suddenly a car's horn beeped loudly outside. The clan elders that didn’t live on the ranch were finally here.
“Where did you even learn to drive?” she had asked me. I could hear her voice in my head crystal clear, as if my brain did its absolute best to soak up every miniscule detail of that interaction and replayed it over and over. I bit back a smile thinking about her words. The girl had an attitude. She insulted my truck, claiming it was put together with duct tape, and then called me out on my driving. Recollecting all that she said brought up an aggravated desire to have come up with a clever retort. Instead, I said nothing and essentially just stood there drooling at her.
I had been told countless times by our kind what the process of Arrowing felt like but none of those descriptions could have prepared me for what had just happened. I would admit, however, that the name for the act was fitting. It definitely felt like I had been struck by Cupid’s arrow. The mystical bond that now tied me to her was strong and irrefutable. I was hers forever now.
And I didn’t even know her name.
Chapter Two
Sophia
It was clear that my encounter in the park was hard to shake from my mind because only minutes into my Skype call with my best friend Mollie I was telling her all about it.
“Ugh, you wouldn’t believe the nerve of this guy!” I threw a hand in the air in irritation, “He was just staring at me like I had three heads or something. I’ve never been so frustrated in my life.”
“Frustrated…sexually?” She smirked into the screen. I inhaled so quickly I choked on my saliva.
“What?” I gasped at her audacity. “NO, I mean he- “
“Why not, wasn’t he hot?” she interrupted. Of course that would be the only part of the story she would focus on. It was just so like her to only care about how he looked.
“He was- he was-” I stuttered as my mind battled with the description I wanted to say indignantly, and the truth, which was that he was inhumanly handsome.
“Because,” she continued, “all I’m getting from this story so far is that you met a Montana mountain man that got under your skin…and you’ve fallen in love? That’s what you’re telling me right?” She laughed at my responding baffled expression.
“Don’t be ridiculous! I mean, yes, he got under my skin- but the whole point of this story is that the guy was driving crazy recklessly, kicked the heck out of his truck, and then gaped at me like I was the one who was bothersome! Come on, does that seriously sound like the start of a fairy tale to you?”
“Who said anything about a fairy tale?” She waved her hand dismissively as she took a sip from her soda. “This was a real life romantic encounter, which is way more exciting- particularly when amped up with passionate anger. I will say it sounds as if he has a temper that rivals yours, however, so I might have some reservations over that. You two pissed off together might be a deadly combination.”
“Well luckily for all involved, there won’t ever be a ‘combination’,” I lowered my voice,
“I doubt I’ll ever see him again.”
“Oh no,” she said gloomily. I looked back up at my laptop screen and saw her shaking her head with a small smile.
“What?”
“Listen to how disappointed you just sounded, Soap! Oh, girl, you are in so much trouble.”
I laughed at her usual nickname for me and rolled my eyes. “Shut up. I am not in trouble. He’s in trouble. If I do ever see him again, he is not getting off easy.”
“Good idea.” She nodded with a wink. “Get him off. Hard.”
Scandalized, I stared at her with an open mouth. The sound of her laughter filled my room until I silenced her nonsense by ending the Skype call. I thought talking about the whole thing would have helped me to move on, but I clearly chose the wrong person to vent to. Now her delusions were clouding my judgment and I found myself questioning whether I should have been nicer, or if I ruined a good opportunity by being my typical difficult self.
By evening, I resigned myself to the idea that there was no use racking my brain over it. A guy like that most certainly was not still thinking of me in the slightest.
➹➹➹
Noah
“Okay,” Milo said from the doorway, “The clan elders are ready to see us now. They’re all in the office waiting for us.” I got up slowly and wiped my sweaty hands on the back my jeans. I hated clan meetings where I was the center of attention. Ever since my father died and Ma took the reins, the attention only got worse as the elders were looking to me more and more with the expectation for me to one day assume my father’s place.
Only my mother understood my reluctance. I just couldn’t see myself as a pack leader, especially not one that could be better than her. Even back when my father was the leader Ma was a strong and powerful beta, so much so that when he died not many doubted her taking the reins for a second.
“It’s weird not meeting in woods,” Milo muttered as we walked down the long hallway to my mother’s office. Typically, clan meetings were held in wolf form in the private sector of the woods on our property. It was ritualistic to commune in our shifted forms, but there was also a guarantee of confidentiality due to the fact we communicated through a combined mindset we shared after shifting.
Arrowed (Arrowed Series Book 1) Page 1