A Wild Hunt: an Aether Vitalis Novella

by Mercy Loomis

  This was one of those times.

  He knew from long centuries of experience that the itch would drive him to take her eventually, regardless of whether he wanted a fledgling. Not that he didn’t relish each contest, but occasionally it could be damned inconvenient.

  Gabriel closed his eyes and let the need sweep through him, gave himself to it, savored the rush of expectation. The itch grew until his whole body ached with it, his vision growing hazy at the edges; but just like with the hunger, once he stopped fighting it he could channel it, could use all that demanding, shrieking energy in pursuit of his prey.

  The ache evened out into a buzz that made every line and shadow jump into sharp focus, every sound resonate with extra clarity, every scent burst with complex nuances of emotion and health, environment and habit. His skin all but quivered under the stirring air. Yes. Now.

  Gabriel wrapped himself in an aura of harmless amiability, checking one last time to make sure no hint of his true nature peeked through before dropping the aura that hid him from the humans. Look away slid into you like me with hardly a ripple. He touched the thoughts of the boy sitting next to his prey and told the boy’s subconscious it was time to go home. As the oblivious student rose to his feet, Gabriel shot Paul a mischievous grin. “Besides, I wouldn’t want to show up to your latest wedding without a date. The last time I was fairly mobbed with female relatives, if you recall.”

  Paul sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “By all means, bring her to the wedding.” If she survives, he added, his voice a whisper in Gabriel’s mind.

  Already moving to claim the vacated bar stool, Gabriel didn’t bother looking back. The hunting grin was all in his thoughts anyway, not on his face.

  * * * *

  Amanda was only dimly aware of the guy next to her leaving, but a moment later a new voice stopped her mid-sentence.

  “Well, that’s a bit of luck, isn’t it?”

  Turning away from Brandy and James, she watched Gabriel Chapel settle in on the seat next to her. She smiled at him, her heart speeding up just a little. Relax, you, she scolded herself. You hardly know the guy. “Hey,” she said by way of greeting, her friends echoing her. Brandy giggled. Amanda kicked her. “How are you?”

  “Not too bad. Feel like I’ve been through a wringer, but at least that’s done with for another semester.” He rested both elbows on the bar and faced her with his chin on his shoulder.

  If he wasn’t so supremely relaxed Amanda would’ve assumed he was posing, because the position showed off not only his muscular arms, but also his strong, chiseled features and finely sculpted lips. Not to mention his eyes, which changed color from blue to gray to green, depending on the light. Amanda felt her stomach begin to knot and quickly turned away.

  “We were just talking about…um…” Shit, she’d totally forgotten. She stared at Brandy with wide, panicked eyes. Why does my brain turn to mush around the pretty ones? Although it wasn’t so much Gabriel’s looks as his looks; the blatant, unflappable self-confidence and good humor she saw in his face the few times they’d talked had made a bigger impression on her than his features had. He wasn’t exactly handsome by conventional standards—his nose was a little too strong, his hair a muddy brown-gold that could barely be called blond—but striking, yes, definitely striking. Sexy with a capital S, you mean.

  “Finals,” Brandy supplied with a knowing grin. “Amanda has also been through the wringer, as you might’ve noticed.”

  “Thanks, Brandy,” Amanda muttered, spinning her tumbler on the polished wood.

  “Happens to the best of us.” Gabriel squinted at her as if trying to remember something. “Marketing, right? You said this is your third year in Madison?”

  “Yep.” The tumbler spun faster, the remnants of her drink sloshing dangerously close to the rim. Out of the corner of her eye she saw him smile.

  “So what do you think of my fair city?”

  She glanced over at him, furrowing her brow a little. My city? Arrogant much? With a mental shrug, she said, “You mean other than being the biggest small town in the country?”

  He cocked his head to one side. “How so?”

  Amanda spoke more to the tumbler than to him. “Everyone knows everyone here. It’s like, if the rest of the country needs six degrees of separation, in Madison you only need three. I mean, I’m not even from here and I can’t go anywhere without running into someone who knows someone else I know. It’s not a bad thing, but I swear it’s beyond all normal probability.”

  Brandy and James were natives to the area and had never understood why she found Madison such an odd city. Gabriel turned in his seat to face her a little more squarely, leaving one elbow on the bar so he could still lean against it, cool and casual, but when Amanda looked up she thought that his eyes were too bright, too interested, to quite fit with his relaxed posture. Her heart gave another little lurch and her cheeks heated under that not-so-casual regard, and to her own mortification, she started to babble.

  “And it’s not a very impressive city, visually. From the Beltline or the Interstate it just looks like suburbia, and there’s no skyline because of that goofy law about not blocking the view of the Capitol, and the streets are a freaking mess downtown. It reminds me a lot of Point, er, Stevens Point, you know, up north? But bigger. Except Point has a river instead of these stupid lakes. I mean, why build a big city on an isthmus where there’s limited square footage and then make it illegal to build up?”

  She managed to cut herself off and started stirring her drink with the stupid black straw, because if she kept spinning the glass she was going to tip the thing over. With her luck, all over Gabriel. Nice one, Amanda girl. He tries to start a conversation and all you do is bash his hometown. Assuming it is his hometown. Hell.

  But he didn’t appear annoyed, only curious. “Why didn’t you go to school in Point then, if you don’t like Madison?”

  “I never said I didn’t like it.” The words nearly tripped over each other in her hurry to get them out. “I just said it was weird. I like weird. The vibe here, it’s not quite like anywhere else I’ve ever been.” She wasn’t sure how to put it into words. Gabriel and James were both watching her with interest, but Brandy was already bored and looking around for cute guys to gawk at. “Besides, two hours is the minimum distance I want to live from my folks. Since Point is right in the middle of the state, it makes it hard to get too far away from them. I’d have gone out of state if I could’ve afforded tuition.” The last thing I need is Mom trying to run my life for me like she did at home.

  “How is the vibe here different from up north?” Gabriel asked. “I’ve never been up that way.”

  “Not much reason to go there unless you have family,” Amanda replied with a sour half-smile. “It’s sort of muted and desperate and hopeless and oppressive.” Or maybe that’s just me not wanting to get trapped there. “It’s friendly here. You don’t get that whole townies attitude, and there’s just so much energy. Like there are big things going on, you know?” You sound like an idiot. “It’s really…really alive here, I guess.”

  James said something about how she should’ve seen State Street five or six years ago, but Amanda wasn’t listening. Gabriel continued to watch her from under half-closed lids, his gaze holding hers, ignoring James just as she was. Maybe it was the light, or those color-shifting irises, but his eyes glittered in a way that was beginning to make the hairs on the back of her neck rise.

  A finger of unease crept up her spine, and she looked down at her glass. An image flashed before her mind’s eye: a snake coiled and motionless, staring at a mouse.

  You’re imagining things, she told herself. She’d talked to Gabriel several times before now and never had the slightest cause for concern. She reviewed each meeting briefly. A few times on the bus, once or twice at the bookstore, down at the Inferno the one time… That had been the first, and when Brandy and James had met him, too. They’d been out for Leather and Lace, a monthly techno night at the c
lub, all dolled up and decked out, but Gabriel had just been in black, jeans and a t-shirt, nothing fancy, his gray eyes like bits of old green glass against the pallor of his face. He’d looked almost dangerous, stark and cold, until he’d smiled at her.

  I haven’t seen him all in black since then, she mused with a speculative look at his dark attire. Hell, could be the same outfit for all I know. Maybe it’s just not his color.

  I really am getting paranoid. I should get some sleep.

  “Sorry, guys, but I’m dead on my feet. I think I’m gonna catch the bus home.” Amanda gave a short wave and hopped off the bar stool.

  Brandy pouted at her until Gabriel said, “Yeah, me too.” At which point Brandy grinned at her and James gave her a surreptitious thumbs-up.

  Damned matchmakers, the both of you. Amanda rolled her eyes at them as she walked past, and Gabriel followed her out the door, falling in beside her as they headed up State Street to the Capitol Square.

  “I hate the new transfer point system, don’t you?” she said to him as they navigated the busy sidewalk. “I mean, used to be you could hop any bus and you’d get to State Street, and any bus you wanted would be there eventually. Now, God knows where you’ll end up if you get on the wrong bus.”

  “Why don’t you drive, then?”

  He actually sounded interested in her banal attempt at conversation. She wasn’t sure she believed him, but she appreciated it anyway.

  “And pay for parking downtown? At least the bus is free with the student pass.” She glanced at him and accidently caught his eye, and hurriedly glanced away again as she felt her cheeks flush. She’d had guys look at her speculatively before, as if they might be imagining her naked, but his look had been…not cold, far from it, but dispassionate almost. That makes no sense. How can you be dispassionate and heated at the same time? She fought down the urge to look again until they got to the bus stop, but by then whatever expression she’d seen was gone.

  The wait for the bus wasn’t long, which was just as well since Amanda couldn’t think of anything to talk about and Gabriel had given up asking her questions. After climbing aboard, Amanda took an aisle seat and Gabriel took the one across the aisle from her, close, but not too close.

  Poor guy’s probably just trying to see if I’m interested and I’m being a total basket case. And she was interested. I mean, we haven’t had any long conversations, but I’ll give him points for persistence. And cuteness. Assuming I haven’t made him think I’m a complete fluff-brain. I wish I was better at talking to people.

  Oh, hell with it.

  They were coming up on St. Mary’s Hospital, which was where he’d always gotten off the bus before. Amanda turned in her seat as the bus began to slow. “Hey, I’m sorry I had to bug out right away. I’m just totally scattered tonight, you know?” She meant to go on, say something about maybe getting together on purpose some time, but Gabriel was already smiling and shaking his head.

  “No worries,” he said as he stood up. “You’ve just got good instincts, and I’m not trying as hard tonight.”

  Before she could think of a reply, he turned and walked off the bus.

  What the hell does that mean?

  She mulled it over as the bus lumbered south to the transfer point, and mulled it over some more as she waited under the brightly lit awnings for her transfer, and was still turning it over in her mind as she rode the second bus to the stop near her apartment. The longer she thought about it, the less she liked it.

  Maybe it’s just as well I didn’t get that second part out. She shivered a little in the cool night air as she trudged up the steeply sloping driveway. Confident is good, but creepy is definitely a turn-off.

  She let herself into the building, grabbed her mail from the lock box, and trotted downstairs to her half-buried one-bedroom. Already thinking ahead to a long, hot shower and some serious zzz’s, Amanda unlocked the door to her apartment, stepped inside, and turned to lock the door again.

  A hand reached around from behind her and clamped down over her mouth.

  Something thin and cold pressed into her throat. Adrenaline shot through her like electricity, ready to be channeled into movement. Amanda was dimly aware of her keys dropping to the floor as her hands shot upward, closing around the hand that held the blade. Her thoughts raced madly as she realized her attacker was effectively pinning her in the corner. There wasn’t a lot of room to maneuver, and that blade felt very sharp…

  “Yes, you should wait until I move you away from the door,” Gabriel whispered in her ear. “You’ll have much better odds.”

  About the Author

  Mercy Loomis grew up in a haunted house, and has had quite enough of ghosts for one lifetime, thank you. Though she now lives in a 150-year-old house, it is remarkably ghost-free. (That, or they’re staying on the down-low. She doesn’t care which.)

  Mercy finished writing her first vampire novel when she was in middle school, and hasn’t stopped writing about them since. She loves stories about the paranormal because monsters are scary, but less scary than real people. Or at least less depressing.

  Mercy graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Madison one class short of an accidental certificate in Folklore. She credits her love of mythology to her mom reading Greek myths as bedtime stories, and her love of fantastical adventure stories to watching cheesy movies with her dad. Her love of history (and coffee!) is completely her husband’s fault, but she doesn’t know who’s to blame for the fascination with physics.

  She guesses that hanging out with Dad while he butchered deer also had an effect on her character, but exactly what effect, she leaves up to the reader.

  See what Mercy’s up to and find links to her other work at www.mercyloomis.com.

  Table of Contents

  A Wild Hunt: an Aether Vitalis Novella

  Midpoint

  Chapter 1 ( Scent and Shadow Sneak Preview)