by A. R. Cooper
“And yet, you have survived this long without the Blood Spirits knowing anything about you. Shifters have been hunted and their offspring destroyed. If your father had stayed too long, they would have killed your mother if they’d known she was pregnant. Many weren’t as fortunate as you.”
“What about you?” I remember being little and looking at the few photos my mom had of my dad. One was both of them together at a carnival. They looked happy. He had a nice smile and mischievous eyes. I used to believe he would burst through our door any moment and announce that he’d been kidnapped by terrorists. Except he wasn’t. And he never came back, or called, or even wrote—until the text message. “Are you a shifter? How did you get into that gargoyle?”
He gestured me to sit, but I shook my head.
“Can’t you tell me as we fly? I won’t rest until I know everyone I care about is safe. And you talking will help me not freak out about flying without a plane or parachute. Maybe.”
Instead of answering, he stepped towards me, slow and measured, as though I were an injured deer about to bolt. My heart hammered against my ribcage as his breath tickled my forehead.
He scooped me into his arms. He was warm against my bare skin and our faces, our lips, were inches from each other. I fought the flirting memory of my first kiss against his pouting mouth.
He carried me outside of the cave and we swooped into the air, feeling like the big dipper on a roller coaster. As the ground and sky began to totter, I squeezed my eyes shut and took deep breaths. I was sure I sounded to Amar like I was hyperventilating. I needed to focus on something else. Anything.
“Tell me about your history.” I rested my head against his chest and heard the beating of his heart and his wings. Wind gushed past and I snuggled against him for warmth.
“I was born eons ago. Back in ancient times, when shifters were worshiped. Humans depicted us as gods and carved our natures on their temples.” His deep voice made my toes curl, so maybe his words would stop me from screaming like I had on the few roller coasters I’d ridden.
“Wait.” I looked at him. “Are you saying like the ancient Egyptians or something? The hieroglyphs?”
“Yes. The Egyptians revered our dual or triple nature. Isis was worshiped for her kite; a type of bird, cow, and sometimes scorpion forms. Anubis for the jackal, and so on.” His voice was hypnotic and calmed my nerves. “Then Seth and others came. He mutilated his own brother and killed so many that the Nile ran red with blood. We became feared and the old religion faded. The Blood Sprits hunted us. I volunteered to be cast into stone, one day to be resurrected by the blood of a shifter in need.”
I shivered. “Why would you do that? How long were you a gargoyle?”
“I lost count of the centuries. Originally, I was in France but then was purchased along with a twin statue. It broke when they were installing us on the building where you found me.”
“OMG! Was the other gargoyle a shifter too? If you shattered in that form, would you have died?”
“Thankfully, the other statue was just a decoy. It would seem odd to have one gargoyle rather than a pair.” He moved as though to look at me and bumped his chin on my head instead. “If I had been the one that fell while trapped in the granite form, I would have died.”
I was glad he wasn’t dead. Or I wouldn’t be alive without his help. “I know you have wings like a bird. Is that what you shift into? I thought you said shifters can’t transform into their animal.”
His wings beat a few times, then we glided on the air current. “We used to have our animal’s full body and gifts. Our blood has been diluted by intermarrying with humans; it will never go away completely. I used to transform into a hawk as my hereditary animal, but when I accepted the curse, it only allowed my wings to stay. I can turn back into the gargoyle or this form at will. Maybe with time, I can shift the wings away.”
“I guess I’m glad I won’t turn into an octopus. Having eight arms and my klutziness would be disastrous.” Also slimy, so gross. “I have to at least see that my mom and my best friend are safe.” I dreaded not being able to touch the ground. Even flying on a plane made me nervous. I guess I could rule an air creature out of my potential spirit totem animals. Wasn’t that what he had called it?
“It is unwise, but I will do as you wish.” We swerved toward the west.
Despite my brave words, I squeezed my eyes shut and buried my head into his chest as my stomach tickled the back of my throat. I inhaled his scent of musk, stone, and a spice I identified as cinnamon, swirling through me. God, what must I smell like? Stinky sweat probably.
Being this close to him made my throat tighten with nervousness. I wanted him to kiss me, yet I wanted to go back to my normal life. This was just a hot guy I’d kissed, and not boyfriend material. Especially not with wings. The wind threw my hair in every direction. Over his shoulder, mountains faded into the distance as we flew.
I tightened my hold around his neck.
“I won’t let you fall.” His voice made me feel warm all over.
Of course not. ‘Cause I’m taking you with me if I do.
I gave him directions to Jacqui’s once familiar landmarks began to come into view. I saw the corner gas station that Jacqueline and I strolled to nearly every day in the summer, and the skateboard ramp at the end of the dead-end street. The ramp was where I’d twisted my ankle the same week Jacqui had got her first kiss.
My mom would be at work. Hopefully. First, I would make sure Jacqui was safe since she had helped me escape the bar. They’d probably be after her for helping me. Maybe she’d fly to meet her folks on their vacation—that would go over wonderfully. But I wouldn’t have to worry about her being alone with those lunatics after me. Then we’d get my mom. Take her with us until all of this died down. Both of them had to be safe. They were my family… my pillars.
With the grace of a male ballet dancer, he landed. My feet touched the ground and I let out a sigh, but my hands still wound around his neck. Maybe it was feeling his heartbeat next to mine, or that I had survived a flight with a birdman.
He moved my hands away and whispered for me to be quiet.
“What is it?” My legs felt as though someone replaced my bones with sticks that wobbled when I moved.
“This place reeks of Blood Spirits.”
The only thing I smelled was cut grass and BBQ, and my rumbling stomach reminded me that I hadn’t eaten anything besides bar peanuts since last night.
“Jacqueline?” I ran to the door and pounded on it.
After a few minutes, she opened the door, still dressed in her red strapless. Her mascara was smudged and her hair tangled. “Beth! Where have you been?” She grabbed my hand and yanked me inside. “I found your purse in the alley beside the bar. Your lipstick was smashed to pieces and your cell has a huge crack down the screen, but it still works.
“You better call your mom. She’s been making both our cellphones hot all night. I finally had to turn them both off.”
I released a breath. She wasn’t changed like Amar said, despite what he sensed. I would know if my best friend had been taken over by some Blood Spirit creeps. And Mom calling, that meant she was safe… didn’t it? “You might want to sit down.”
She went to the fridge and pulled out a wine cooler. I bit my lip as Amar came inside and shut the front door. Before I could explain, Amar entered the kitchen.
Jacqui screamed and grabbed the broom propped against the kitchen door. “Get out of my house!”
“He saved me!” She didn’t turn at my words. “Jacqui, he saved my life. I know this is freaking you out, but he won’t hurt us.” Hopefully, the neighbors would just think his wings were an extravagant costume like I had thought.
“There are worse things than I.” His voice sent shivers through me and I was glad he was on my side. The edge of his black wings folded, giving him more room as he glared at her.
Did he think she was possessed by the blood things?
“Why does he talk
like that? Is he an actor or something? He’s cute enough.” She kept one hand on the broom but tossed her golden hair over her shoulder with the other. “Are those robotic wings? We need to get those for our costume party this year. I could have white ones and go as an angel opposite your…” She waved a hand. “Whatever it is you’re supposed to be.”
“Are you flirting?” I was livid. My life was in danger and she was beaming as if she’d lost half her IQ points. “This is no joke. I-I…” Where did I start? At the point where I’d been thrown off a building? When my finger was chopped off and grew back?
“He’s a shifter. His wings are the real thing.” I motioned for Amar and he glided closer.
“No freaking way!” Her eyes widened. “Where did he come from?” She backed up as though to run.
A thump hit her roof and my pulse quickened. “What was that?”
Jacqui grabbed the broom with both hands, she must have heard the terror in my voice. When Amar moved to the door, we followed. Neither of us wanted to be alone, I guessed. My friend didn’t even know the whole story. The doorknob rattled. When Amar reached for the door, the windows in the living room shattered.
I screamed and hauled Jacqui down to the ground with me. Five huge men crashed through the dining and living room windows. They shoved aside the kitchen and coffee tables, chairs, and whatever else was in their way until they surrounded us.
The hatred in their eyes made me break into a sweat.
Too many of them.
Even with Amar’s knife, he couldn’t take all of them. At least I didn’t think he could. I’d never seen him fight, so I had no idea. The front door opened and Ms. Moor sauntered in. “We knew you’d visit her or your mother. Guess we see who you favor.”
“Leave me alone!” I rose with my fists clenched. I’d come to Jacqueline first because she had been the last to see me, and had been up close with Ms. Moor’s freaks. Mom. Had they already gotten to her? Or only set up surveillance, as they had with Jacqui? Maybe there was time to save them both.
“After you die, then we’ll leave you alone.” Hooknose guy smirked.
Amar drew his obsidian knife, and it looked like it sucked light into it, yet remained just as black. He leapt in front of us and slashed at the man nearest to him. Then again, and made contact. The man, instead of bleeding, fell into a cloud of grey smoke. Amar spun and brought up his blade into another’s stomach and he too became a pillar of smoke.
Within seconds, the two men Amar had cut materialized again in the same spot.
“Holy shit!” Jacqui shouted.
I kicked one of the men racing toward her in the gut, but another yanked her back by her hair. She shrieked. This was all my fault. I should never have come back.
Blood splattered on the ceramic tile as one of the men ripped off a piece of Amar’s wing. He wrestled against them but was soon pinned.
No! I struggled against two men as they each grabbed one of my arms.
“Now you watch your friends die,” one seethed as he bent and picked up Amar’s knife. He held it to Jacqui’s throat.
I trembled. Not from only from terror, but rage. Something uncoiled inside of me. Around me. Like the sensation of ghost limbs, like I had felt when my finger had grown back. But deeper, from my gut, and it spread out from me. My vision narrowed. An invisible force threw the man threatening my best friend backward. Was this from Amar? A power he had that was defending me and Jacqui? The obsidian knife clattered across the wooden floor. Again, energy tingled like pins and needles through my body, like when an arm falls asleep.
At the same time, an invisible force yanked the two men holding Amar and smacked them into the kitchen countertop. They vanished in a puff of smoke but didn’t reappear. My two assailants knocked into each other in midair. Another goon’s legs swept from underneath him.
“What was that?” I asked Amar. Maybe he had magic or something. A protection that he had tossed over me, and flowed through me to toss those guys around, making it seem like I was doing it all.
He shook his head. “That was you.”
Chapter Nine
“Me? I don’t have powers.” If I had abilities, then why hadn’t they saved me when Ms. Moor and her goons had thrown me from the rooftop? Or maybe that had something to do with the drug they gave me or that others were in danger, rather than just me. I wasn’t even sure if I could do it again.
Well, I did grow a pinkie back. I shivered. Never wanted to have to do that again, it was just weird.
The men, instead of vaporizing, lay unconscious around us. Ms. Moor bolted out the door, probably to round up more goons.
“It is the eight arms of the octopus. Your mind has the ability to fight as if you did have them.” He cocked his head. “Has something similar ever happened to you before when you were frightened or angry?”
“No! I mean…” Once, I’d stayed up late and watched a poltergeist movie, then complained to my mom that my stuffed animals danced around my room. Mom said it was a dream, but until she locked them in my toy box, I wouldn’t sleep. Another time, Mary Anne, who had picked on Ryan, tripped in the hall right in front of me almost like her legs hit something solid besides just air. But that wasn’t because of me, was it? Had my focusing on the animals and wishing Mary Anne to fall caused my phantom limbs to do my bidding, regardless of the outcome?
“Let’s get out of here.” I stomped toward the garage door and shards of glass from one of the shattered windows crushed under my heel. No use changing now, those smoke goons could show up any second.
Jacqui snatched her purse. “Then you can tell me what the hell is going on.” She waved me forward.
I couldn’t agree with her more.
We ran to her BMW. Amar climbed in the backseat and sat facing a side window to make room for his wings. One of them stuck out between Jacqueline and me, and it took every inch of my restraint to stop myself from patting it.
“Let’s get out of here.” I tightened my seatbelt while I glanced around.
“What about clothes?” Jacqui revved up her car, then reversed out of the driveway.
“There’s no time. We have to leave now before they come back.”
We tore down the road. She drove through two red lights until I placed my hand over her white-knuckled one locked on the steering wheel. My cell battery was dead, so I plugged it into Jacqui’s charger so I could contact my mom. The shakiness wouldn’t leave me.
“How long will we need to stay away?” She forced a smile, but it didn’t last. “You stink, Beth. And you ruined my dress.”
“I think we’re okay, for now.” That was Jacqui, making fashion more important than a horrible situation.
“For now? What the fuck, Beth? Tell me what is going on.” Her pupils were dilated when she glanced over her shoulder toward me.
“These chariots race faster than any I have ever seen.” Amar’s voice sounded with excitement.
I tried to shift and see his face, but one of his feathers tickled my nose and I fought back a sneeze.
“We need to see about your wing.” I moved further in my seat. I didn’t know what to do about it except maybe wrap it. Maybe Biology would have been beneficial if I had been more interested; which I would have been if they had talked about how to help animals, rather than cutting them up.
“The bleeding’s stopped. It will be fine.” Amar gave a sideways smile. “I am used to fighting these creatures, you are not.”
I turned back to the front and away from his arrogance, hadn’t I just saved all our butts? I took a breath to tell her everything I knew. “Umm… remember my dad?” When she gave me a short nod, I continued, “Well, he wasn’t entirely human.”
“Like an alien or like wingboy back there? Oh shit, is he your dad?”
“Enough with the cursing.” I frowned. “No, Amar is not my dad.” Ewww… as if. Amar looked like a junior in college. He certainly did not resemble a father of a teen.
“Sorry, you know I do that when I’m nervous.”
She stomped on the brakes at a yellow light, and we jerked forward.
I filled her in about Amar, shapeshifters, and the Spirits of Blood or Blood Spirits or whatever they were called. Amar corrected me often and earned an eye roll from me. I didn’t care about their names, just that they could take over anyone I knew—just like they’d tried to do with Jacqui. She seemed to take it all in stride, minus her gripping the steering wheel in a death grip and turning pale.
We whipped past pine, oak, and elm trees and scattered oil rigs. The afternoon sun elongated the shadows across the road and I wondered if the creatures could pop out of shadows like these.
“I need to call my folks, and tell them what’s happened and to stay away from home for now,” she added. “And what we should do.”
I glanced out the window to see if anyone had followed us. A lone pickup swerved into a gas station. “How can they help? These lunatics have powers.”
“Beth,” her knuckles turned white on the steering wheel, but her voice didn’t sound scared. “I-I’m a shifter too.”
“What? If this a joke, it’s not funny.”
“No, I am.” She stole a glance at me. Was she worried how I would react?
“Then what about the club?” I crossed my arms over my chest. “Why didn’t your eyes change like mine in the black light, and why didn’t you tell me before now?”
“I-I’m a chameleon shifter; so is my dad.” She put her blinker on to switch lanes and shrugged. “We have the same spirit animal, a raccoon. So now you know why I love new shiny things.”
Like her car. She had gotten a new one every year since she’d had her hardship license at fifteen. “Why the hell didn’t you tell me this?” Like yesterday! I wanted to add. Like when it might have helped, and when I’d showed her my dad’s text. Then I thought about how Jacqui always wanted to leave during the black light songs. It was either to go outside and find a cute guy she’d just seen or to the bathroom to fix her hair. It was only by chance that we were still inside when they’d flipped on the Madonna song a bit earlier than usual.