Blood Stained Wings - Chapters Three and Four

Chapter Three

Surprise, surprise. Lexi, shadow hunter, stumbles on to familiar faces as she tries to rescue her friends. But is it really a surprise after all?

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I inched further, closer and closer towards the brown bricked two-story building. It looked like a run-down Victorian mansion that belonged on the outskirts of a small town somewhere. Overgrown vines draped over the edges of the red-brown building. Luminous lights glared from the cracks of the curtained windows. As I drew closer to the heavy doors of the manor twigs and sticks started breaking and snapping resonantly under my feet. I glanced down and numb realization caused goose bumps to ripple across my skin. Those twigs and sticks were a polluted white color. I felt the gasp on my tongue but instead clamped my lips shut. They were bones. Completely clear of flesh. The cause was the two creatures that waited patiently at the feet of the steps. Both had disconcertingly wan white skin, almost translucent, like it had never seen the sun, and were grotesquely deformed. Demons.

In battles, all I could do was fight these things, it was only now that I could fully take in their forms. All I could feel now was the disgust and horror swelling inside me like nausea. They looked completely inhuman and it felt so wrong, they gave me the sick feeling. I’d gotten when I first laid eyes on a shadow that had lost its mind and had a pile of dead human bodies surrounding it, all the while feeding on another victim. Or when I’d first seen a picture by Hieronymus Bosch, the artist who did scenes from hell, with people who had lobsters’ claws or windows in their bodies. So unnatural and revolting.

The one on the left looked like a larger version of a slug: white, flaccid and immobile. But conspicuously more deformed and monstrous. It had eyes and a mouth. Its flat black eyes filled with nothing but evil and hunger. Its mouth was wide open, its teeth sharp and pointed like they had been filled that way. Drool or something that resembled slime adorned the edges of its opened slack mouth, black transparent venom was coated everywhere.

The other one was crossed between a lizard and spider but more disturbingly mutated than any monster I’d ever seen. It had six furry legs growing out of a hard black exoskeleton and attached to each of its legs were three hooked black claws. Protruding from a short neck was something that resembled a lizard head, with a long pointed mouth and large slanted black eyes at the top. At the sound of my footsteps the thing prodded its white forked tongue out and released and a rancid hiss. Malice rolled off it with oily ease like dark waves. The sight of them both made me want to dry retch.

Swallowing the urge to hurl, I tried silently bypassing them and towards the doors but when I tried for another step, the thing with the six legs lashed a swipe at me with one of its clawed legs. I leapt back, ignoring the harsh snapping beneath my feet. I skimmed my thigh for my hidden knife but remembered, I’d been stripped of any weapons just in case I was searched later. I cursed under my breath as the demon closed in towards me. Without warning, the heavy doors burst to an open with a loud bang that seemed to ring through the night, silencing everything and everyone. There stood two silhouettes, shadowed in the bright doorway.

"Now, now. Don’t frighten our…beloved guest." A familiar shrill voice was heard in the still air, just like the night, the person the voice belonged to killed my parents. My eyes snapped to focus on her face, a glare darkening my set mask. There were no doubts that my suspicions were correct.

"Ruby." I said, despising the very sight of her as she strode into the misty rays of moonlight. Her face was, unsurprisingly, a mirror reflection to the one I’d laid eyes on the night, I met her and it would always remain that way. The small stature of hers that would easily fool others into thinking that she was merely a child, but the curves of a grown woman proved otherwise despite her being petite. The long blonde curls that dangled around her shoulders and a baby face, with doe like bloody red eyes, petulantly pouty lips and high cheekbones. Save that now she seemed, not unattractive, just less. Her pallor matched the wan color of sterile hospital sheets and the shadows that sat beneath her eyes and cheekbones made her eyes look sunken in. And the faintest hint of madness stirred in the depths of her crimson irises, never-ceasing to exist until now. If she wasn’t sporting the usual scheming malevolent leer on her face, I would have thought something was seriously wrong.

"Alexia, no help? I must admit, I’m rather disappointed that you think so highly of yourself." She said, feigningly upset. I almost laughed, but caught myself. Instead my eyes went to the person that shadowed her every step, no doubt that it was Kyle. Anyone else would have hated the sight of him too. Wondering many things like: how on earth he could love someone like Ruby? But I couldn’t, not after knowing Ian. Just having my eyes settle on his face. He was so much like Ian, they shared the same faded navy blue eyes, the same short chocolate-brown hair, even the same face except for nose, Kyle was the slightest bit crooked, my best guess being that it’d been broken as a human. And what Ian had told me made it so that I couldn’t hate him.

I turned back to Ruby, shelving away the thoughts of Ian or anyone else as future problems instead, knowing emotions would crack my mask. I plastered a smirk on to my face and ignored the tightening puzzle of a knot that grew expansively unbidden in my stomach.

"You’re mistaken. It’s not that I think highly of myself, it’s just how little I think of you." Sheer fury flashed across her bloody eyes, but the gleeful leer that remained on her cherubic face told me if I knew what was coming I wouldn’t be so damn smug.

"Bring her." She waggled her fingers towards my directions and whirled on her heels. She left Kyle waiting for me on the steps, his face, as always, a mask of opaque fog. His eyes darkened by the dull yet clouded expression in them.

With oily ease, the demons slithered backwards, allowing me space to walk, but continued watching me like vigilant bloodhounds, as if I were going to jerk out-of-place to pounce on them and slice them to shreds. It was sort of comical how I was thinking the same thing about them.

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Chapter Four

Ian can feel himself deteriorating each minute, a girl is thrown into his cell and as well as a starving monster, he's a guy. Will the girl's virtue be risked besides her life of course.

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Ian.

A small crack of light unveiled as the heavy steel door creaked to a slow open. The sound of Ruby’s scraping giggling made me turn to glimpse what was happening. The action, if I were human, would leave me to cough until whatever was left pumping through my veins was purged out my raw throat. Instead I attempted to muffle it with a groan instead. The shape of a slender woman was nudged forward, but she made no attempt at resistance.

"Don’t try anything stupid, or your precious friends are the ones who will receive the punishment for it." It was evident, Ruby was ecstatic at having something to hold over this woman. In fact to her, toying with the lives of others was always a game, and one she enjoyed. Well… when she was winning anyway. And it was damn near sickening that I used to be like her.

The rusted steel bars of my cell door swung open, causing a few leaves to brush dryly against the cement floor. The faceless woman tumbled in and to her credit still managed it with grace. But the moment I took a breath, the scent of her hit me like the full impact of a truck to a mortal. Now set alight, I could feel the flames licking the insides of my raw throat. Then it dawned on me that it was because this woman was human.

"Oh and I forgot to mention, don’t become dinner. I’m sure he’d be very dreadfully moody and brooding if he killed you in a fit of…desire." Ruby added beatifically, slamming the cell door with clout until it shut. With a click Ruby and, assumingly, Kyle were gone, along with the sliver of light. My nostrils flared as I took in this girl’s enticing fragrance. The aroma from this girl was young and sweet, meaning she was barely a woman. The gentle but ardent pounding of her heart, the zealous rush of thick steady flowing blood calling to me from her fair neck. It would be so easy. I’d compel her, coercing her into thinking it was pleasurable beyond her wildest fantasies, that way she’d feel no pain and I could… Drain. Her. Dr-

"Ian?" Her voice broke through the barricade of hysteria, the hunger was rousing inside me. I stopped breathing. Ignoring the blazing sensation that felt like it was peeling my skin open, I bolted upright. Squinting against the darkness, I hoped I’d get a better look. But the lack of blood promised me a weak body and weak powers.

"Lexi?" I croaked. Even my voice sounded ridiculous to me, I sounded raspy and hoarse. If I were the usual me I would laugh at my pathetic self.

"Ian!" She cried, relief wild in her soft yet reassuring voice. Not letting a moment pass, she was tucking me into her slender arms. The warmth in her touch never-failing to surprise me. But the fast beating that pounded in my ears was a mystery to me, unsure whether it was her heartbeat, mine or even the harmony of both. I held my breath even harder, resisting the aroma wafting off her skin knowing the sheer impact of it would ricochet me back. My fangs shot out, blood welling in my mouth but the broken skin healed with speed and stealth. The venom pooled dangerously in the back of my throat as I returned her embrace but I ignored it and focused on the hale faced Lexi in front of me. But before I could even apprehend her warmth again, she’d untangled herself from me. Embarrassment forming on her face.

"Oh, sorry. You haven’t fed for a long time have you?" She perched on my cot, some way from me, her heart-shaped face flushing puce with guilt and contriteness. I smirked and shrugged nonchalantly. As if that actually mattered right now, with her sitting here.

"You look like hell." She said out right, her eyes impetuously searching my face. Her eyes concerned rather than cautious as they should’ve been. There was no way I’d admit to Lexi that I felt even worse than I looked, knowing she was dead right.

"Oh sexy Lexi, a guy, can only get so hot being locked away in a dungeon. Even if it is me." I retorted playfully, trying to hide the worse from her. I took a stab at swinging my legs off the cot and over the side but that movement gained me a coarse grunt, letting her see through whatever pretense I had going.

Without letting a moment pass, Lexi was sliding into position by my side, guiding me into a more comfortable position. Her jade green eyes star bright even in the darkness, which would always remain a fiery beacon in a monotone crowd for me. They rose to meet mine. Those doe like eyes widening with surprise and confusion, but mostly still concern.

"You’re not okay. The color of your eyes are slowly changing." She told me, her tone grave and worried, but seemed puzzled and not at the change of my eye color. She patted my pockets and apparently found what she was looking for. A knife. Huh.

"Thought they would’ve stripped me." I noted bemusedly out loud, mildly curious. She shot me a stern look that shut me up but also quirked a smile out of me, sort of amused. I didn’t know if I should’ve laughed at the situation or myself. I felt like a God damned masochist! I choked back chuckles and watched Lexi’s busied hands instead.

"You went limbo on them, not libido." She mocked, haughtily sarcastic. I laughed, unable to help it. Lexi unsheathed the knife from its scabbard and glanced up at me expectantly. Almost as if it was written plainly on her forehead, her thoughts were conveyed to me resulting in me pushing her weakly from me.

"No." I said stonily. I didn’t care that everything in me was on fire, the idea of her hurting herself for me was a nightmarish hell in my mind, and in a demons’ den where they’d crawl into her easily enough at that.

"Don’t be stubborn Ian. You need it." She countered sternly. Defiance flashed dangerously in her eyes but it swept away as she was honestly trying not to be pissed off. I would’ve grinned and made a snide comment but I wasn’t myself, evidently enough.

"Not on your life. Literally." I told her, the muscles in my jaw tensing furiously. She glared at me as I glared at her, the defiance and anger now flaring in her bright eyes. Before I knew what was happening she’d twirled the knife in her fingers and slit open the palm of her hand. I sucked in a breath and froze as realization struck me as to what a dumbass action that was. The alluring fragrance of her trickling blood beckoned me, making my eyes darken shade by shade with each subsequent breath. Soon they would be black from hunger, if they weren’t already.

"Lex-" I started fuming but she dragged down my chin, forcing open my weak mouth and rammed her bleeding palm against my lips. As soon as her blood made contact it felt like pure spring water hosing down my throat in a desolate dessert. Soothing every raw burnt nerve in my body. The piquant taste came seconds later, the sweet thickness of it streaming down my throat was so intoxicating, almost addicting. I knew it wasn’t right. I acknowledged that I had to pull away, but the beast I’d locked away was starved, frenzied and it craved this girl more than anything, and this girl alone. The quiet whimper that unwillingly escaped her lips filled my ears. The chilling realization that I’d clamped my hands around her wrist like chains and was draining her veins paralyzed me. Snarling loudly, I shoved her hand away.

"The hell was you thinking?! I could’ve killed you!" I spat, rising to my feet, hating how I missed the warmth of her skin already and the pounding of her heartbeat in my ears. My anger was raging and exploding from all sides. The silence that followed was implicitly heavy in the inert air. Panic fueled me, pushing me faster as I spun to face her. My heartbeat boisterously against the inside of my rib cage as I laid eyes on her. Her face was perilously pale, alabaster and practically translucent, her lips had drained of the usual color of roses, each breath of hers was shallow and her luminescent jade green eyes were closed tight.

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Hey everyone,

For not being able to make it on time, Happy Holidays and Happy New Year as well! And for each holiday I have a new chapter, yay! Please comment for whatever or tell me what you think! Enjoy!