Pine Needles (Veil Realms Series) (14 page)

Slipping past Rayden I linger just for a second
and ask, “Will you be okay keeping watch?” A nagging worry for him weigh my thoughts down, has he had any rest? Has he had enough to eat?

“Yeah, I think I can handle it, and when you’re ready we’ll search for more food and water.” With only a
small smile I agree with a nod and follow Tiffany.

Propped against the soft inner wall of the overturned tree, I listen to the idling rhythm of Tiffany’s breathing as she drifts off to sleep. Her once fuchsia-red hair
cascades lower curtaining her refined face. The Yavoro fruit has helped restore some of her natural tone. Nibbling on my lip I mull over one conclusive plan to another on how to successfully get to the veil. But then what? And more importantly what about the beast that lurks just on the edge of our boundary.

Ever so gently I ease Tiffany’s relaxed body off me
. A slight dissatisfied grumble spews from her lips as she curls along the dormant enclosure. Blanketing her legs I lap over the hem of her skirt and step out. Jack, along with Cass and Louisa have all but vanished. Connecting on the fact we are in a precarious environment they won’t dare wander too far. Rayden is fully aware of the impending threat that pursues us.

I allow
the infrared spectacle of my vision to unleash, my eyes rove and directly pinpoint the camouflaged creature less than forty yards away now. The vivid description Sirius had described before comes frightfully to mind. Its form has a reptilian flesh flaying claws splaying outward, crouched down on two hefty legs ready to pounce. The head superimposed with armored plates, no real mouth conceals the skull crushing teeth. Its swinish long and lean tail whips back and forth vigorously as if it’s waiting for something to strike.

I take precise steps as I maneuver by the protruding roots, the creature’s deadly glower generates a thundering pulse pounding throb within me, and it’s watching every
single move I make. Resting my hands on the cragged bark as if it were a shield, I know it is only a matter of time it will come and attack us.

I turn slowly and listen to a
cluster of intimate whispers fluttering out from behind another larger tree, providing a mindful glance to our ominous threat as it continues to view in my direction I come up to a mesh of thistle shaded vines and smaller condensed trees.

“You can’t trust her, Rayden. She’s one of them now. I know you don’t want to believe it, and God knows you don’t want to hear this, but we just can’t jeopardize our lives for hers.”  Louisa’s coercing hands hold Rayden’s face forcing him to look at her, his dark eyes blaze over hers and I get the distinct impression there is definitely something more between them than mere friendship.

Her fingertips flit lightly along his bruised, blacken eye
as she remarks, “We need to find something to clean these wounds… we can leave her. Find our own way.” Her hand lowers following the line of his jaw. His head jerks back like her touch just burned him as an irritating look surfaces.

“Don’t Louisa. You know damn good and well why we are here. We need to focus our attention on
how to get the hell out of here,
with her
.” Strands of her muddled blonde hair fall against her cheek and she pulls it back with a mortified look. 

“Just because you think you can trust her doesn
’t mean I will, Rayden.” She drops her hands from his face and shoves her way past him, madly parading back and mumbling under her breath. I grip onto my ill-advised resentment toward her and employ the same path, but come to a complete standstill when I hear Jack whisk through the umbrageous canopy.

“Rayden! We found it!”

Chapter Sixteen

The Promises

Soaring coniferous trees
and slanting lowlands surround us as Jake and Cass lead us to a freshwater river. Bordered with an incredible montage of plants and insects that thrive here Tiffany and I laboriously tread the trail noting the blood sucking leeches that embrace the trees and ground.

The shivery, slimly creatures slip in between my fingers as I reach for a tree, making our way to the waters edge. Relief mingles inside me once I see the sunken imprints left on the soft
soil. The water must be somewhat safe for us if other creatures trek a path here often.

“Selene, do you think this water is safe to drink?” Rayden kneels warily down scooping a handful of water up and smells the
questionable water. 

As I move closer I feel Tiffany grasping firmly onto my
forearm insuring her place beside me as I reply, “I can’t smell anything out of the ordinary,” I point down at the animal tracks near the water’s edge and add, ”I think it’s safe to drink.” Rayden scoops his hands back into the water and begin quenching his thirst. Everyone stares quietly for a moment with expectancy. The instant he looks at me with a rewarding grin, Louisa eases herself next to the water resolutely and starts to drink. She motions her hand encouraging Cass to join her.

I back
away and leave some space between myself and the others while they drink. I wander along the embankment. Always on alert I steal a quick glance over my shoulder to my right and then to the left, crouching down I wash the gold anointment off my arms and neck allowing the rich glistening residual to flow down stream.

I scrub
my face which becomes a task within itself, the resin and gold bind to my skin like glue. I rub and rinse my face several times and then I gape at my current reality, my own reflection in the water. I quietly catch my breath and touch my face mortified, the woman I once was has reconditioned, evolved to someone or something that I have no understanding of. Staring back is an ethereal polished face of beauty with intensely hued golden eyes triumphing over any evidence of ever being human. Nevaeh was right. I’m grief-stricken for the humanistic part of me that has died. I close my eyes and discover the inability to even cry. Unable to shed one single tear, but inside I’m screaming at what has become of me.    

After a few moments of reflection I can hear Tiffany’s footsteps softly tread my way. 
“Have you ever seen Sirius drink the water?” I ask inhaling the sharp distinctive scents of the shimmering waters and the floating water lilies.

She timidly whispers
, “No…” I consider Tiffany’s words and glance up seeing her shaking her head and biting her lip.

I recline back and ask
her to continue, “What else do you know, Tiff?”

“T
he Manannuki are different than humans, Selene, in many ways. Nevaeh told me about them…
about you
, while we gathered food at night.  As you know humans take their food and either burn it off right away as energy or store it as fat for later use. The Manannuki’s body converts all the food they consume into raw energy, they call it, Giateta. It is their word for life force. This energy flows through their bodies like blood does through a human. That’s what she’s told me anyway.”

Her hand readily brushes back the bothersome bangs that conceal her enl
ightened eyes. She hunches over and wraps her arms around her bent knees and looks thoughtfully out over the running river. “They also use one percent of the energy we do for the same task.  They are… you are now, a highly evolved being that can go months, maybe even years without dying due to the way your body controls and uses its Giateta.”

Memories impel my mind of the feasting.  I craved for a substance without a modest hint of guilt that would have a grow
n man cringe in horror. The information Tiffany provides only confirms the obvious.

“I am no longer h
uman, or the person I used to be.” I say the words out loud to see if it resolves my mental state. I’m left with ire at how circumstances can change in the blink of an eye. I look over to Tiffany and question, “How… how can any of this be possibly real, this world, you…me…Sirius?” I stand tugging the dank fabric from my legs, the humidity increases as mid-day gains on us.  The unanswered questions hang in the oppressive air between us and I take two steps weighing my options. Should I explain to her my relationship with Rayden or is there nothing really left to explain?

“Tiff
any… do you remember asking about the others, if I knew the man, Rayden?”  I don’t turn to face her but I can hear the rustle of her feet as she rises.

“Yeah?”

“I know him, or I should say
knew
him. He was my first true love, we were planning on marrying before the quake hit. He was my fiancé and I loved him so very much and for him to see me like this devastates me.”  I turn back to Tiffany to see Rayden standing just beyond her, looking condolingly at me.

“You know
, Selene, we will find a way,” he broadcasts as he sidesteps an overgrown plum-colored plant connected to a tree as he ventures our way. His voice carries an heir of seriousness that I had forgotten about until this moment. He’s dead-set on something and once his mind is focused on something he has the will of thousand men. He was always stubborn and resilient like that.  

“Find what?
” I sound much more impartial than I intend and I prod myself to meet him halfway.

“A way to change you, a cure, there has to be a way to fix what they have done to you
, Selene. We can undo this. I know we can, you just need to trust me and give me some time to figure it out.”  His rough hands take my own as the pad of his thumb grazes lightly over the mark on my wrist. He stills and I can instantly sense his body becoming discomposingly rigid. He slowly turns my wrist as his eyes drop and glares down at the unmistakable imprint.

“What is this?”

“It is the sign of Sirius. A mark to show she belongs to him,” Tiffany matter-of-factly states. Her intense expression is just unexpected as the statement she just publicized. Stunned, Rayden and I both stare at her wordless for a split second but then the hot-blooded temper in him diffuses and he fumes out grinding his teeth together furiously.

“They fucking branded you!”

Retreating my arm from him is short lived as his hand reinforces his hold, determination sets into his dark steely eyes. My own indecisiveness begins to creep in me, he won’t understand if I try to explain, and even if he did there is nothing he can do to change this situation that can’t be denied.  A hunger like no other looms over me. One that I can’t even begin to come to terms with, and the ability to discard gravity the way I can only proves no mere man, doctor, or specialists could ever alter with chemicals or treatments. I meet his eyes and swallow back the suffocating heartache inside me.

“It’s nothing,”
I say lifting my arm up and keeping my tone docile. “We don’t need to worry about this. What we need to really worry about is the warlords, the creature that is stalking us and how to get to the veil, Rayden.”

He quietly releases my hand and tips my chin up
ward with an air of composure. He pins me with a look that tells me he will not let this go anytime soon. He draws out my name, “Selene— ”

Desperate to redirect this
persistent connection between us I use my free hand and quickly cup his marred face, regarding the discoloration around his half-swollen eye. “Tiffany, could you find something for Rayden’s eye? We don’t want an infection to settle in.”

H
is gruff voice barks out as he slants back slightly toward her. “Don’t worry about it Tif—”

“She knows these plants, and I’m sure the
re is something useful close by,” I interrupt his dismissal of her and draw his attention back to me. “She can do this, Rayden. Trust me.”

Tiffany veers nimbly around us and pioneer
s a path along the river’s edge. Rayden’s eyes follow her until she’s out of our view and then he asks, “How old is she?”

“I’m assuming somewhere around
sixteen maybe seventeen,” I reply dryly and dart a look behind us where the others are still engorging themselves with water. Still, I’m finding I have no desire to drink, and the worry starts to set in. Rayden slips a steady hand around my lower back pulling me closer to him. Prohibiting any space between us, my will to fight off the urge to take pleasure in his presence momentarily fades and my hands run smoothly along his bare arms as I lean into his stouthearted chest. The beating of his heart drowns out the enigmatic world briefly. But I can’t let my guard down, no matter how badly I wish I could. “Rayden? Tiffany has no one, no family on the other side. Promise me no matter what happens you will take care of her.”  

“Hey, no matter what happens we will take care of her. Besides we’re not that far off from
the veil, I remember crossing this river before we were captured.”

In the distance I he
ar a low guttural growl and seconds pass and then several intense high-pitched clicking sounds. “Did you hear that?” My voice barely breathes out my concern. I take in Rayden’s confused expression.

“Hear what?” 

Tiffany canters back with handfuls of roots and strips of bark she asks, “Selene, where are all the Ketibals usually you see them regardless night or day. But I haven’t seen even one… Selene you sense something, don’t you?”

Drifting my eyes from Rayden I bring
my attention to the infrared and uncover not one beast, but four more dashing through the colossal tree-lines. Something has drastically changed and with the daylight evading soon my greatest fear of having us massacred right before my own eyes is now real.