by Rue Volley
He tilted his head at me.
“I could have sworn that you… you know.”
I shot him another look. “No I did not.”
Josh stood up.
“Well, you could have fooled me,” he said as he grabbed his leather vest and pulled it over his head.
I placed my hands on my hips and he stared at me in this dress. He grinned.
“You look hot,” he said. I rolled my eyes again.
“We have to leave, evidently they fed here,” I said to him, trying desperately to leave this conversation behind us.
If I have one more, you know… without him really touching me… I’m gonna die. He smiled at me.
“Why did the furniture vibrate, Rue?” he asked me. I looked at him and crinkled my eyebrows.
“I just wanted to make it seem believable,” I said.
“Uh huh,” he said, as he put his shoes on.
He stood up and I felt my heart start to slow down in my chest. Thank god he was finally dressed… good. I couldn’t take him naked or half naked any longer. Josh cracked the door open and peeked out. He looked both ways and grabbed my hand. The man next door cracked his door open and stared at Josh then winked at him. I rolled my eyes and we ran from the motel and across the parking lot.
I looked at him, as we made it a safe distance from the motel, then we slowed down.
“I thought that we killed them,” I said. Josh kept pulling me along with him.
“No… if we had, it would have alerted any other rogues there at the carnival.”
I looked up at him. “But you cut his head off, I saw it.” Josh laughed.
“Yep… bet that pissed him off.”
I stopped and looked at his back.
“So… we can have our heads cut off and it’s no biggie?” I asked him. He grabbed my hand and started to pull me along with him again.
“Can we walk and talk?” he asked me.
I looked over at a tattoo shop and stopped dead. Josh looked back at me and then at the tattoo shop.
“No Rue, we do not have time for this crap,” he said to me.
I ran across the street and dodged a car. Josh grabbed his hair and grumbled as he ran to catch up with me. I opened the door and listened to the bell go off. I looked around and saw a thousand pictures on the walls. Josh stepped in behind me and leaned in.
“We have to go,” he whispered.
A girl stepped out and looked at us. How crazy we had to look, me being in circus gear and him in white leather. She grinned and leaned on the counter.
“Can I help you?” she said as she tapped a pen on the glass counter top. I stepped up to her and Josh tried to stop me. I pulled my arm from his hand and smiled at her.
“I would like to get a tattoo,” I said. She looked me up and down and then looked at Josh.
“Okay… what would you like to get honey?” She said to me.
“Birds… black birds,” I said to her. She smiled.
“Well, I have some pictures you can look at.” She stepped away from the counter and Josh leaned up to my ear.
“Do you remember that we are in danger?” he asked me. I grinned up at him. He sighed.
“I will never understand you, I swear,” he muttered.
The girl came back out and laid a book down in front of me. I opened it up and started to leaf through the pages. I suddenly stopped on two ravens, one sitting on a branch and the other just going into flight. I pointed at it and grinned up at her.
“I like that one too,” she said. I looked back at Josh and he raised his hands up.
“Whatever,” he said. It upset me that he didn’t want to put in a “yes” or “no”.
I held the book up to him and he grinned at me.
“Of course you would want your families crest,” he said as he looked at it. I looked at him. “Ravens are a symbol for my family?” I asked him.
“Yes Rue…Valon descendants have a raven and my family has the blade, that’s what I have on my leg.”
I smiled and looked at the ravens on the page. I turned back to the girl and smiled.
“I will take this one,” I said. She walked away from the counter.
“Let me make a copy of it, how big do you want it?” she asked me. I looked at Josh and raised my eyebrows.
“It’s your tattoo Rue,” he said to me. I looked back at her.
“I want them here.” I pointed to the front of my chest, right under my shoulder. She smiled at me.
“Okay, let me adjust it for it.” She slipped into the back and I looked around at all the pictures on the wall. Josh looked at me.
“The ink will not mark you,” he said. I looked at him.
“What do you mean?” I asked him. He shook his head.
“I will have to mix my blood into it.”
“I want it to be black Josh,” I said as I crossed my arms. He looked at me and grinned.
“It will be. You need to distract her and I will put some of my blood into the ink for you… without it, you will not be marked.” I tapped my foot.
“This isn’t some bonding girlfriend-boyfriend thing… is it?” I asked him.
“No Rue…it’s not. Our blood has mercury in it, you have to mix it into the ink or it will not hold.”
I looked at him and tilted my head.
“Okay Josh… listen, thank you for being okay with this.” He laughed.
“Oh, I’m not okay. We need to leave, but as usual… you do what you want.”
I opened my mouth to say I’m sorry, but the girl came out with a sheet of paper with my ravens on them. She laid it down on the counter and I looked at it.
“I love it,” I said to her. She looked at me.
“Well… let’s go to the back,” she said. I looked at Josh and he followed me.
We stepped into a small room with music playing. I looked at the ominous black chair and back at Josh. He waved his hand at it and I sat down slowly. I leaned back and sighed. I can’t believe I am doing this… well, I can… I guess. I sighed and tried to relax. She looked at me and smiled.
“First one, huh?” she asked me. I nodded.
I sat up and looked at her while she loaded her tattoo gun and turned it on and off. The humming made me flinch. The thought of me saying, “yea… go ahead and stab me with that needle” was crazy. I sighed again. I started to sweat a little. Josh stepped up to her and looked down.
“Hey, do you think that you could get her some cold water and maybe some ice?” he asked her.
She smiled and looked at me. I probably looked just like I did when I thought I was about to get a shot at the doctors. I wiped my forehead and rubbed my hand on my dress, as I grinned nervously. She stood up and nodded at him. She touched my arm and grinned.
“It’s really not as bad as you would imagine.” I nodded at her and she left the room.
Josh picked up her tattoo gun and opened the ink. He bit into his finger and squeezed some blood into the small vile. I watched it swirl and then blend into it. I laid my head back and he placed it down on her table. She returned with a bottle of cold water and a cup of ice in her hand. I took the water and twisted the cap. I gulped it down and set it to the side. She grinned at me again.
“Ready?” she asked me. I looked at her and nodded.
“Can you pull the top of your dress down?” she asked me. I looked at Josh and he smiled.
I pushed myself up and unbuttoned the front of it. I looked up at Josh and he was biting his lip. My eyes got big and he sat down in the chair, off to the side. I pulled my dress over my shoulders and leaned back. She smiled at me as she pulled my bra strap over my shoulder. I swallowed as I heard her tattoo gun started to hum. She leaned forward and placed the copy of the ravens on my skin and held up a mirror so I could look at them. They were beautiful. They pretty much took up all the space that they could. I leaned back and Josh craned over me. He stared at my chest and I cleared my throat. His eyes rose to the ravens and he gave me a thumbs up. I grumbled. The girl l
eaned forward and I saw her hand coming. God, I should have got it on my back… where I couldn’t see her coming at me.
“Wait,” I whispered. Her tattoo gun went silent.
“Did you change your mind?” she asked me. Josh laughed. I got mad as usual.
“No… no… do it,” I said and I relaxed.
Her needle pushed into my skin and I hissed for a second. It did hurt at first, but then it faded away. I closed my eyes and started to enjoy the vibration against my skin. I almost drifted off when I heard the gun stop humming. I opened my eyes up and looked at her. She rubbed it with something that made my skin feel cold. I leaned up and Josh stood up and grinned.
“That is bad ass,” he said to me.
I stood up and walked to the mirror. They looked real on my skin… beautiful, deep black and strong. I turned to her and smiled at her.
“You like?” she asked me.
“I love,” I said back to her. She walked up to place paper on it to protect it and stopped.
“Huh,” she said. I looked at her.
“What?” I said. She inspected it.
“It looks like it already healed,” she whispered as she placed her fingers on it.
Josh flashed up behind her.
“Rue here is a fast healer… uncanny really. She’d fall when she was little and no bruises, it was weird,” he said as he pulled the top of my dress up over my shoulder.
The girl looked at me and then at him. “Okay, but take this with you… Put it on twice a day, it will finish the healing process and help the ink hold in your skin.”
“Thanks,” Josh said as he grabbed it from her and started to shuffle me to the front.
She followed us and told us the price. Josh pulled out a credit card and she swiped it. It cleared right away, of course. He signed his name and she looked at it.
“Thank you Joshua,” she said.
He looked at her and grinned. “Just… Josh.”
“Okay, well don’t forget to put that on twice a day. Come back anytime,” she said to us as Josh shuffled me out the door. I looked back and waved at her. Josh pulled me along.
We walked down the street quickly and Josh spotted a car. He grinned and pulled me to it. He waved his hand over the door and it unlocked. We both got in. He then waved his hand over the ignition and it started up. I looked over at him.
“Didn’t you pick on me for stealing books?” I asked him. He grinned, as he jammed the stick shift into gear.
“We need this car, we cannot portal. Our friends are all about mirrors here. I don’t trust it.”
I crossed my arms and looked out the window. He turned to me.
“Can we please go back to the town now?” he asked me.
“Yes, let’s go home,” I said.
He sighed and pulled out. I watched the town disappear in the rearview mirror. I traced my fingers across the ravens, now embedded in my skin. Josh glanced over at me.
“I finally got inside of you,” he said as he grinned.
I dropped my hand. It was true, his blood and the mercury in it would forever be in my skin now, holding the ravens in place. I looked at him and crinkled my eyebrows.
“Nice,” I muttered.
He looked back at the road and I watched the houses go by. I touched my skin again and smiled… just a little. I liked the fact that his blood was inside of me. I closed my eyes and let the sun heat my face through the window.
***
Caine flashed across the countryside and came to the edge of a forest. He knelt down and placed his hand to the ground. Erik leaned over him and looked down.
“What is it?” he asked him. Caine stood up and grinned.
“Looks as if we have unexpected friends,” he said.
Suddenly Jonah and Lily flashed up to them and Jonah tipped his hat.
“Well… seems that we just can’t avoid any of our own kind lately,” he said to the three of them.
Caine tilted his head.
“Jonah,” he said as he grinned.
“Caine,” Jonah said, as he rose up slowly.
“What are you doing out here?” Caine asked him as Lily stared at Laurie Anne. She shifted back and forth and grinned at her.
Laurie Anne held onto Caine’s hand and looked up at him.
“Oh… you are hungry?” he asked Lily. She nodded.
Caine threw Laurie Anne to the ground and she looked up at him.
“What are you doing my lord?” she asked him.
Caine knelt down and placed his hand to her face.
“I thought that I would need you, but things have changed.”
He stood up and stepped up to Jonah. He looked back at Lily and nodded. She lunged at Laurie Anne and started to tear her apart. Laurie Anne screamed out as Jonah and Caine started to walk away from the carnage. Erik watched as Lily pulled one of her arms off and tore into it with her saw like teeth. He grinned and jogged up to Jonah and Caine. Caine looked at Jonah and stopped walking.
“You are hunting, are you not?” he asked him. Jonah looked back at Lily as she kept eating. “Yes… we had an unfortunate incident last night. Neither of our tracking skills are very acute, we prefer for the food to come to us.”
Caine placed his hand on his arm and Jonah looked down at it. He looked back up at Caine.
“Still with the travelling circus, I would gather?” Caine said to him. Jonah smiled.
“Children are so sweet to the palate,” he whispered. “I admit to this guilty pleasure.”
Caine looked to Lily as she rose up, her face and clothing covered in blood.
“Your sister is still quite tenacious,” he said as she licked her fingers.
Jonah looked at her and back to him.
“What are you doing out here?” Jonah asked him. Caine sighed.
“It seems that I have a nervous bride,” he said to him. Jonah grinned and looked at Erik.
Erik remained silent, he did not know who these two were, but he guessed that they were cannibals. He gripped his blade when Lily flashed up to them. She tilted her head and Jonah took her hand. He placed it to his mouth and licked the leftover blood on it.
“She will not try to eat you, unless I say,” he said to Erik.
Caine held up his hand to Erik and he relaxed his grip on his blade.
“You can relax… Jonah and Lily are old friends. Their parents promised to help me, but fled before the war. These two did what should have been done to those two cowards.”
Erik stepped forward.
“You two… ate your parents?” he asked.
Jonah wrapped his arms around his sister and kissed her neck. Erik crinkled his eyebrows.
“We waited as long as we could, we did, but our parents were so weak. They insisted on feeding us food. I simply do not have the stomach for it,” he said as Lily rocked back and forth.
Caine looked over at Laurie Anne… or what was left of her.
“Well, I have given you a gesture of friendship, at a loss to me. It is not an easy thing, to maintain a human, with protector blood.”
Lily smiled and stepped up to him. She placed her hand on Caine’s face and smiled at him. Her teeth covered in blood.
“A vision of beauty,” Caine said as she leaned forward and kissed him.
Jonah cleared his throat and Lily stopped, looking into Caine’s eyes. She backed away and put her arm around Jonah.
“Well… it is true that you did give Lily a delicious meal. So what is the business you have?” Jonah said as Lily played with his hair.
“Rue Valon is on the run from me. You have encountered her correct?” Caine said as he looked at Lily.
She pulled her blouse apart and let her breast barely show to him. He grinned and looked down. Jonah closed her top and looked at him.
“Small… very pretty girl, blood as sweet as honey?” he asked.
Caine’s eyes flashed to him, he flashed forward, into his face. “You did not taste her did you?”
Jonah pushed Lily behind h
im and stared at Caine.
“No… I did not, I did want to eat her, I will not lie. She was so sweet though. I might have saved her, just to snack on. I don’t know if I could have controlled myself though. She is very unique.”
Caine stared into his eyes and started to relax. Lily placed her hands around Jonah’s waist.
“She stabbed Lily in the stomach and her body guard cut my head clean off.”
Caine grinned as he looked at the light scar on Jonah’s neck.
“Most unpleasant,” Caine said to him.
“Well, unpleasant as it was, they did not destroy us. Obviously… maybe they were afraid to use their power at the carnival.”
Caine looked at him and at Lily, who still stared at him wantonly. Caine cleared his throat and felt his hands tingle. He looked at Jonah.
“Yes, dark haired boy… rude?” he asked. Jonah tilted his head.
“Yes… she called him ‘Josh’,” Jonah said.
Caine turned to Erik. “I swear those Barringtons will not die,” he muttered. Caine turned back to Jonah.
“Do you think that we could rest with you? I would like to discuss some business, it could be to your benefit… not to mention your sister’s.”
Lily leaned around Jonah and lifted her leg up. She ran her hand up slowly lifting her dress. Jonah grabbed her hand, just before she pulled it over her panties. Caine grinned.
“Lily, you need to behave,” Jonah whispered to her. She leaned over and licked his face. Jonah smiled.
“You are both welcome to come back with us there is much to feed on there, constant flow of new meat,” Jonah said as Lily rubbed against him.
Caine stared at her and Jonah stepped toward him.
“As in… feeding, not taking advantage of my sister Caine,” he said as Erik squared his shoulders and stepped up behind Caine.
Caine grinned in Jonah’s face. “I would doubt that I would not end up a meal at her hands, unless I bound her and placed my hands around her neck to hold her down under me.” Caine leaned over and smiled at Lily, she licked her finger and started to move it down her body. Jonah caught her hand and kissed it.
“Yes… you would be wise to leave it alone.” He said as he flashed into the woods and pulled Lily along with him. Caine walked up to Laurie Anne’s remains and stared down at her.
