Total pages in book: 87
Estimated words: 81867 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 409(@200wpm)___ 327(@250wpm)___ 273(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 81867 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 409(@200wpm)___ 327(@250wpm)___ 273(@300wpm)
When I finally stop and look at him, I struggle not to drop my jaw in shock. He’s told me what he is, but I wasn’t quite sure I believed it. I mean, all I saw was a man with stumps at his shoulders and some sparks at his hands, which could have been a magician’s trick for all I knew.
But we just moved at supernatural speed, and he didn’t even look winded.
Instead, he just motions with his fingers as if he thinks we’re upwind from the deer and need to position ourselves better.
I want to smack him or tell him that, duh, I know. But it doesn’t matter. Because I’m a hunter in a far more primal meaning of the word. And now that I’ve locked onto my prey…
I close my eyes and lock in on the heartbeat of the beast. I can also feel Layden beside me, impatient and sure that I’m doing this all wrong. Oh, ye of little faith. I can’t help the small smile from quirking my lips. This surprises me because it’s been a long, long time since any of my power brought me much joy at all.
But I think it might actually be fun to watch the look on his face as…
I stretch outwards beyond my body, listening and feeling for the heartbeats hiding in the woods. There are so many, many living things. I even feel the slight pulse of the sap in the ancient trees; everything is so alive out here. It can be overwhelming if I focus on it too long.
Then again, I’m used to hunting in cities, where the chaotic, discordant pounding of human heartbeats all but chokes me.
Here, it’s far more harmonious and easier to separate the large beating hearts from the small. For instance, I can feel four beating hearts in the herd of deer nearby and easily pick out the largest.
My eyes fall closed, and silently, I call to it.
Sometimes, I think of myself as a siren of the blood. For when I call, they come. Leaving family and any others behind, willingly, any and all will walk to their doom.
I can feel Layden’s astonishment as the buck walks out of the woods, antlers briefly catching on a bush before he shakes free to come to us. He walks right up to us as if he would eat out of our hands and then lays himself at my feet, head bowed.
I bend down beside him and murmur thanks for his sacrifice. “Thank you, my beautiful one.”
He snorts in response, a low chuff. I run my fingers through his fur, and he snuggles closer to my thighs. They all love me right before the end.
“That’s right,” I murmur. “You’ve done well, my beautiful one. Now you can rest.”
Then, I slit his throat with the knife I had hidden up my sleeve. Soundlessly, his head drops to the forest, his wise eyes looking up at me lovingly as the life drains out of them.
Only once the creature goes entirely limp do I sigh and stand, readying myself to dress the meat.
It’s then that I remember the other beating heart beside me and look up to see Layden watching me. For the first time since I’ve met him, his eyes are wide. And wary.
“Does it only work on animals?” he asks.
Ah. So he’s not just pretty. He’s smart, too.
I stand with my shoulders held high as I tell him the truth. “It works on anything with a beating heart.”
I sense he’s about to step back, but he stands still. Dammit. He’s brave, too. “Did you do that to me when we first met?”
I stare him straight in the eye. “I tried. It didn’t work. I told you to stay, and you didn’t stay.”
Since I’m looking at him, I can see the moment his lips tip up and his whole demeanor lightens. “Good,” is all he says, and then he reaches down for the hind legs of the buck to help me string him up and dress him.
We walk back to the cabin, Layden dragging the buck by the legs. We’re walking slow, like we’re just out taking a stroll in the woods. If it weren’t for the lingering scent of blood that always has my teeth on edge, it might almost be romantic. Blood is such an old smell to me. The first one I ever knew, it feels like. My oldest memory. I try to shake it off and focus on the forest around me, the mid-morning light filtering down through the tall branches above.
“How did you learn how to do that?” Layden asks. “Or is it something you could always do?”
“I could always do it.”
“How?”
“I just could.”
“I mean. . .” He waves a hand. “What are you?”
I sigh. Of course it was going to come to this. But what I am comes with too complicated a history to explain. Right now or maybe ever.