My Immortal (12 page)

I can't see the face of my carrier.

So I know it's not one with glowing red
eyes.

I drift back to sleep and enter dreamland not
too long thereafter.

I'm suddenly awake but there is no light
whatsoever. I'm also tied to what feels like a wooden post if the
splinters piercing my back when I breathe are any indication.

A forceful blow to my stomach knocks the
breath out of me and my body's response is to double over but I
can't. I am restrained and instead I suck in a breathless gasp,
rubbing those splinters into my sensitive flesh.

My heart beats a thousand beats per minute
but I am trying not to panic. I'm trying to rein it in.

Another blow, this one to my temple and my
head rings loudly.

"Where's your night vision at now, freak?"
one of the Guards asks.

I distract myself by noting everything that I
can in the darkness that might help me in any situation.

I know from experience that if I let my
temper get the best of me my eyes will burn red and my fangs will
elongate.

It makes the Guards happy when that happens
and they shoot me with a few trial syringes that react badly each
and every time.

They study me in all sorts of ways, painful
and uncomfortable.

If I did let my natural instincts flare I
would be able to see at least. The red is my night vision of sorts,
among other things.

I must find my happy place and think of
Alexia. She's the only thing that keeps me sane in this hell that
I'm living. She keeps me calm and my temper in check. Red eyes and
teeth held back.

She keeps me alive.

For now.

"Well, I didn't want to have to do this, but
you disappoint me, Shadow." His voice I hate. It has become
familiar but I never get to see his face. I would love to stare him
in the eyes, that way if I ever get free he will be the first one
to die.

A torch is lit and it draws my attention
being the only thing I can see.

"Tsk tsk tsk," the evil man tutts. "Why look
away? Face your nemesis."

My lip curls and I can't keep my wrath in
check. "I would if you would show your ugly face."

There is a moment's pause before he speaks
again. "If you could see me right now, you would see a huge smile
on my face because nothing brings me more pleasure than burning you
with this fire and watching your little fangs appear and those two
red orbs."

The Guard with the torch jabs in towards me,
taunting me and I cringe back into the splinters feeling liquid
trickle down my sensitive flesh of my back. No doubt it's more of
my blood.

"You'll never figure out how to replicate
those kinds of things. The Overlord is crazy if he thinks he can do
that. He's not a god!"

He laughs deep and cryptically.

"Ugly and stupid too. You should have never
been born! But to correct your idiocy, we aren't trying to
replicate them. We are aiming to make them a permanent, constant
feature on our new weapon against those of your kind. And the Hell
Horde."

A Guard walks forward and shows me his
gleaming knife in the torch light before he makes a gash in his
palm. Blood wells to the surface and he sticks it up to my
nose.

I grit my teeth together and hold my breath.
Male laughter taunts me, echoing off of barren walls.

I recite what I noted in my head of my
surroundings: surrounded by dirt walls that cause an echo, no
windows so we must be underground, and…and the Guard spears his
bloody palm onto my nose. I turn my head but his blood is dripping
from my nose now and my breath is short. I open my mouth for air,
trying my best not to smell anything.

"Don't fight it. You're just wasting
everyone's time. You haven't had blood in a week, I know you're
ravenous. Just take what's been given to you."

The blood runs down from my nose, small
amounts pooling into the corners of my mouth. I shut my lips
tightly but now I'm screwed. I have to either open my mouth for air
or my nose. I will either taste it or smell it.

I open my mouth and it leaks in, bursting
with robust flavor on my tongue. My gums are severed moments later
by my long, throbbing fangs. I spit the blood out, refusing to
swallow that filth, even if to just make a point.

"I will die before I live off of any of
you."

The Guard snarls from somewhere behind me and
I want nothing more than to see the coward's face!

"It is you that is not worthy of our blood
you idiot! You may yet have your wish and this world will be a
better place without a freak like you in it! Burn him!"

My body trembles from my insane lust of the
man's blood. My tongue is thick with want and my throat is dry and
sore.

The man thrusts the torch at my stomach and
hot fire ignites me. I quiver and thrash, tearing up what's left of
my back.

My back starts trembling, like it always does
when they start in on me with the fire, and I know that my wings
are going to try and spring forth, only to be blocked by the wooden
post I am shackled against.

The ice water is a blessed relief more than a
shock. They throw it on my stomach to snuff the fire. I don't dare
look down at my burnt flesh.

My back is still trembling and I try my best
to hold back. I grind my teeth together and chant my love's
name.

Oh Alexia
, I whisper like a
prayer.

I'm afraid of what I am to become. If I make
it through this, I don't think my mind will be the same.

If you're listening, and you can hear
this…I'm sorry, and I love you. I always will.

"He's fighting it, Sir," the Guard with the
torch explains.

All is quiet but for my teeth chattering and
my ragged pants.

"Turn him around. I want those wings."

"Yes, Sir!"

Someone fiddles with the chains around my
wrists and the next thing I know I am on the ground.

"Hold him you moron! He could get away!"

"With all due respect, he can't even stand on
his own."

Someone lifts me, arms under mine and then I
am hugging the splinter ridden post. I am sure that they roughen it
up between my sessions.

My wrists are secured again and I see that
it's a new face, a Guard I don't recognize. A young one. He stares
into my eyes and I barely have the strength to hold mine open.

He doesn't know that I can see him probably,
because the light is behind me along with the torch.

"On with it!"

All I feel is a hot, electrical pinch on my
back that is a million, tiny, open wounds and then I feel
numbness.

Followed by cold and it's so cold it burns a
slow, unbearable sting.

"You passed out on us. Which just means we
will have to do it again. You know your wings can't come out when
you're not even lucid."

Before I can really figure out if this is a
nightmare or reality they torch my back again. I tremble and hold
my wings in with all of my might but it's no use.

They spring forth and I am in all of my
beauty: wings, fangs, eyes.

Guards rush at me and stick me with more
syringes. My vision swims and everything turns hazy almost
immediately.

I lose all sensation in my neck and my head
droops forward and lands against the post, rough to my
forehead.

My breathing turns ragged and all I hear is
my heart beating and my breath wheezing and I think they may have
finally given me an injection meant to kill me.

Oh well, freedom at last
, I think.

One sound does register above my wheezing and
heart throb, and it's the sound of steel against it's sheathe.

All hope leaves me and I close my eyes,
letting despair set in.

I flap my wings to keep the Guards away, only
knocking a few back. Next thing I know, my wings are severed from
my body and my eyes fly open, not seeing anything except for her
face in my memory.

I wake suddenly in a blind panic. I knife
into a sitting position and the first thing I notice is the fire
not far from me.

My hands fly to my mouth, my stomach, and
then over my shoulder to my back. I finally inhale and it's a shaky
one.

I am in one, healthy piece. No burns, no
cuts, and no severed wings.

I look around me, surveying the scene.

Wraith and Kaia are curled into each other
fast asleep across from me, on the other side of the fire.

The wind blows against my skin and causes
chill bumps, but I am just close enough to the fire that whoever
carried me was hoping I wouldn't get too cold, and not too hot
either.

Looking right behind me is Gabriel, and
looking back into my memory I know that he's the one that found me
asleep against that tree and carried me here to sleep, safe and
sound under his protection.

I scan for Shadow, whose dream I just had. I
haven't had one in a while, but the fact that he really went
through that just tears me open inside.

I'm not sure if it's his dream that I share
or if it's his memory, but my eyes finally land on him and his red
eyes are watching me, boring into me.

Has he been asleep? Does he know I just had
that nightmare?

Next to him is Jezebel and my heart explodes
before dropping into my stomach like it felt when I fell off of
that cliff.

He is sitting up with knee up, leaning back
on his hands with her head on his straight leg.

He's letting her lay her head on him?

He's letting her touch him now, to make
matters worse.
Why
not shove the knife in and twist
it-right?

I frown trying to grasp this, and then
accepting it past all of my hurt.

Feelings of betrayal try to spring forth but
I won't look at it like that. I won't let those feelings cause
anymore dissension between us. He thinks he doesn't deserve me and
he's wrong.

He didn't ask for this life he was handed,
but I am going to help him accept it.

We are the only ones awake, and it doesn't
look like he has had much sleep as I examine the dark circles under
his heavy eyelids from here.

I stand up, and put one foot in front of the
other until I am seated beside him.

He doesn't turn his head to look at me; we
both just stare at the fire. Although he is farther away from the
fire than the rest of us were sleeping, he is still close enough
that it's uncomfortable for him, and I know he's doing it for
her.

I sigh and we just sit together for half an
hour. The fire pops and sizzles and I throw little sticks and twigs
on it from all around me until there are none left.

I pick a blade of grass and sit cross legged,
picking it apart, trying to figure out how to blurt out what I want
to say.

"Have you told her?" I whisper.

He glances at me quickly and then just as
quickly looks back at the fire of all places.

"Yes."

"How did she react? What did you say?"

He frowns at me. "Why do you want to know,
Alexia? I don't want to hurt you anymore than I already have. Can
we talk about something else?"

"After you tell me about the
conversation."

He blows out a frustrated breath. "I told her
she was pregnant, that I tasted it in her blood. Her eyes got
really big and she was shocked for a moment. Then when it sank in
she asked me if I knew about how far along. I told her it seemed
about a week or two. But it must be only a week because, well,
that's when it happened."

I nod my head a few times.

"Are you happy now?" he asks. "I doubt
it."

"Did you tell her that she will have to drink
your blood soon? And that you will have to drink mine?"

"Actually I walked off after that and tried
to find you, but I saw Gabe carrying you to the fire and you were
asleep. But Wraith explained all of that to her. He also told her
that it only takes 6 weeks for most shifter mothers to deliver a
baby. However, demon babies are completely formed at 4 weeks, so we
don't really know what to expect."

I inhale deeply and nod some more because
that means I don't have to speak just yet.

I think about me and examine my feelings. It
occurs to me that the only reason I feel this way is because I
didn't get something I wanted. Just because I wanted him doesn't
mean he was mine. I didn't have some special claim on him. He is
his own person. He can make his own decisions. But that doesn't
mean that I can't tell him how I feel about him and make me wants
clear. The rest is his decision.

Suddenly, I decide to stop focusing on my own
wants, and focus on him. Giving him what he wants and what he needs
after going through such a traumatic past and being tortured so
recently because of me and him.

Maybe he resents me on some level because of
that. If it were never for us, he wouldn't have gotten in
trouble.

I glance down and see where his hand is and
then I gently rest my hand on top. "I just had another dream where
I saw everything through your eyes."

"I was wondering what you were dreaming of.
You were tossing and turning, and mumbling incoherent pleas."

I press my lips tightly together. "I know
what they did to you, in the dark, with the torches and syringes,
Shadow." I squeeze his hand comfortingly. "And it doesn't change
anything. I know that you think you are damaged, and that you've
lost your soul, but it's just a way of coping. Your mind tells you
that so that you can accept it more easily. You feel guilty, and
disgusted with yourself that you did those things, but the thing
is, you didn't! You were raped, not the other way around! You were
drugged, and you were beaten! The fact that you feel guilty just
proves that you still have a soul and are a good person who didn't
deserve any of this."

I look back to the campfire. I glance at my
friends and they are either still fast asleep or pretending to be.
Jezebel hasn't moved either so I continue.