A Blood-Like Rain

— Kaden —

I took a careful step in her direction.

She didn’t try to stop me this time.

I took another step, then another.

I could see she was hesitant, so I walked cautiously, but I kept walking.

I think she only processed my proximity when I got within arm’s length. She put a foot back, I stopped. She extended her arms to give me back my bandana. I took it and in the process my skin touched hers.

It was like a lightning bolt of shivers. I didn’t take my hand away. I wasn’t sure I could. I heard her breath caught in her throat, her body sway lightly towards mine. I took one step closer. One long step that got our bodies nearly touching. My hand was still on hers, the bandana forgotten and lying on the grass now.

The moon was rising, it was a bright night tonight, but not bright enough to see within that hood. It was just shadows.

I wanted to ask her a million questions. Her name, to see her face, where did she live? But all those questions crumbled in my mind. It was like trying to hold water in your hands, constantly slipping away. I should use restrains but my body didn’t want to listen to me. I lowered my head barely catching myself in time, barely holding back. But in respond she bent hers back, and it was all the invitation I need.

I lowered my head further and pressed my lips on hers.

I’ve kissed a woman before, I’ve done plenty of things with a woman before, but it felt like, all these years, I had no idea what kissing could really be. There was, at this very moment, and entire universe opening before me.

The only way for me to release my hold on her hand was to wrap my arms around her waist.

She mewled and it was the sweetest little sound I’ve ever heard. I pressed her harder against me and her arms went up over my body to give her fingers access to my hair. Her grip was strong but not painful and she tugged at me to deepen the kiss. Which I willingly obliged.

We were taking short breaths in between caresses. Our lips never truly apart. Our breath intermingling. Our heartbeats deafening.

The intensity was such that it took me a little while to realize something was wrong.

— Elaeya —

My heart was becoming painful, my feet faltered. I was starting to think I was about to be sick. I opened my sense to decipher what was happening to me. That’s when a sound got me out of my head and back into reality.

Steps.

Someone was coming. Someone close.

And suddenly my malaise took a whole new dimension. Was someone doing this to me? Was someone hurting me? Attacking me?

to extend my senses further do detect this assailant.

I turned and easily saw the large figure close by. Too close. How did it get so

shoulders. I would say more than a foot taller than me. He had dark clothes, dark hair. The faint dusk light gave me a glimpse of his face. He had a few days old stubble. He was made of hard lines and square jaw.

looking straight at me with purpose and the pain in

step back in alarm and he stopped.

so I couldn’t guess at his intentions, but I feared

and I panicked, raising one hand to tell him to back off. My left. The

doing to me?” I dared ask.

to one side

sniff slowly the air then get his attention

a small rock. I didn’t understand this gesture. I focused my eyes on him, opening my senses up, but my instincts said nothing. He

ever, I caught

it. I didn’t feel any magic, any energies stirring when he did this. I didn’t sense negative energy from the cloth or the stone.

didn’t dare take my attention completely off him, but I turned my focus some. And I got a smell. A new smell.

from inhaling the fragrance, deeply.

was smelling, only that it

like he probably couldn’t see mine, but I know our gaze met. And

I heard very few tales of mates, and most not good ones. My father said a little to me, when my mother wasn’t around, that most wolves valued mates more than anything. Some could go to great lengths to find their mates. That rejections were rarely done. That it had an impact on someone’s

axis changes, and now gravity find a new source. Never did those words make any sense as much as now. I thought I understood him,

closer until I could finally see his face properly. His eyes were dark and searching for mine.

expression was hard to read, it was guarded, but I could also see that he didn’t want to stop. I didn’t want him too either, and it scared me

he was himself a poison far deadlier than anything I could have ingested. All of a sudden, the cloth in my

back to him, but

I was neglectful. I let our skin touch, never realizing the lethal potential something

not my own anymore, and neither was my mind, and as he grew closer—his heat palpable through my clothes—I could only lean into

I thought I had lost my mind, but never so much as when he kissed

a strength emanating from it, it should have been a warning. Something for me to be wary of. Not something to seek. Not something to embrace. Not someone to throw myself at in pure abandon.

so reckless, so impulsive. I knew restraint and control. But not tonight, not anymore.

probably both out of

on it instead. Like someone drowning in rapids, trying to hold on to the rocks. I needed a rock for my mind. Something to keep my head out of these intoxicating waters.

to it was another weapon,

on that knowledge harder.

He was armed and

I was just there kissing

my right hand until it lay on his heart.

gain back control.