Arch 1 Chapter 7

Arch 1

Chapter 7

Eira opened her eyes-or, at least she thought she did-but the world, from horizon to endless horizon, was a vast expanse of white nothingness. Snow? No, it couldn't be. It wasn't cold.

"Oh no…" she muttered in a wavering voice.

"Oh, yes…"

Eira whirled towards the sound of her own voice, and came face-to-face with…herself.

Except this Eira…she was perpetually red-eyes and fanged, and looked at her other self with nothing but the utmost contempt.

"Did you really think you could get rid of me so easily? Look at us. I came out to the forefront as soon as we shed some blood. You know what we're going to do as soon as we wake up, don't you? We're going to tare out that old man's throat and gorge ourselves, and then we are going to make Max ours.Truly."

"NO! I could have hurt Max before and I was able to stop you! I would never hurt Max or the old man! I WOULD NEVER!"

Other Eira threw her head back and laughed, then clutched her belly and curled around herself, like Eira had just told her the funniest joke in the world.

"It is just so hilarious how you think we're different people! You were able to stop me, I AM you, you little demon! You were only able to "stop me" because I didn't want to be in that place any more than you did. And we held back because we're afraid Max wouldn't love us if he knew the truth about us. We never did tell him, did we? About the chaos we sewed, the rain of blood that followed in our wake, all the razed villages we left behind us… How much we reveled in it?"

"That was not me reveling! That was you and you alone! And Max does not love you, he loves me!"

"Your naivety is beginning to really vex me." Other Eira said calmly, before she ripped Eira up by the throat and slammed her hard into the floor, and it splintered around her, leaving a crater where she landed. "Look at what you're doing to our mind. You're fracturing it! All because you can't except that we are one and the same! I am a part of you retched little soul!" she kicked Eira, sending her flying, and she hit the ground again and skid, more of the floor cracking. "Look how pathetic you are without me! I was how we freed Max! I was the one that was strong enough to save him! You-you're nothing but a little bitch without me. A puppy to be kicked and abused. Do you think we're really good just because Max says that we are? And do you really think he'd give up being a wolf to stay with us forever? He's the noble son of two alphas. He has his pride. That's why we must turn him. We're stronger than him, we can make him. All we need is a little glamour and he'll think he wants to do it. We just have to tell him he wants it, that's all. It's the only way to keep him with us forever. Do you know what would happen to us if we lost him? You think the first four thousand years were bad, oh, we'll not have seen anything yet, if we allow ourselves to lose Max. Our mind wouldn't even be able to understand the concept of love at all if I wasn't in here." she stepped on Eira's neck with the heel of her boot, grinding down and Eira shrieked in agony, clawing at the floor, leaving rents in it. "You can't even get up and fight me."

Other Eira removed her boot and grabbed Eira by the back of the neck, bouncing her head off of the unforgiving floor, right where there was a crack with jagged edges, a tidal wave of blood erupting from the deep gash it left behind.

"N…no…" Eira said weakly, coughing up blood.

"Are you telling me no?! You have anything to back that up with or are you just trying to be ever so virtuous before I make us do what we both know we want to do?"

Eira stood, shaking, her teeth gritted against the pain in her body, but her wounds were slowly, slowly closing.

"You may very well be in my head…but you are not me." she staggered to the side a little. "You do not understand love at all. What you are describing is possession. If you really loved Max, you would accept him as he is, and be content to stay by his side for all his life. He is not some dumb creature that you can just make decisions for."

"It's the right decision!"

"Maybe for you! But you're supposed to think about him first!" Eira froze a minute, bringing a palm to her forehead. "This…this is love, isn't it? I do love him."

"DUH!" Other Eira shouted in exasperation. "I cannot imagine how you can be so slow on the uptake! He is meant to be our mate! And us his! Everyone knows how it works with wolves!"

Eira snarled, her fangs coming out and her eyes blazing red.

"No. He is meant to be my mate! MINE!"

Eira lunged at her, clocking Other Eira in the jaw and sending her sprawling backwards. Other Eira sat up with a wicked grin on her lips.

"Oh, do I actually have a challenge? How thrilling! I've never had one of those before!" she cracked her knuckles excitedly. "Well, have at me!"

Eira roared in righteous fury, flinging herself at Other Eira with nails extended forward like a bird of prey would do when diving for prey. She tackled Other Eira and they rolled, one over the other, grappling for dominion. Other Eira wound up coming out on top at first, but Eira managed to snake out from beneath her, slamming her down, a hail of fists rapid fire connecting with her face relentlessly, her teeth clacking together with each blow.

"Submit." Eira growled, which only got a smirk from Other Eira. "I SAID SUBMIT!"

"Oh, fine, fine." Other Eira said in a bored, blasé way, that half-lidded simper never leaving her face. "You may have won this battle…but the war is far from over. I will always be there, Eira. Eira, Eira…"

Her smooth, silky voice began to fade as she did, and Max's frantic voice came through.

"Eira, please!" Max cried, attempting to shake her awake. "Eira, come on, wake up!"

The stark whiteness shrank back, and Eira opened her eyes. They were blurry at first, but she needed only to blink a few times before Max's concerned face came into focus. It…was stained with the salty tracks of tears. He had given her his button-up shirt, and all he had on were a black tank top and his now very beat up jeans. How could he not be cold? It was full winter now. Then she registered the smell of burning wood. Whatever cave they were in, Max and Barlowe had made a fire.

"Max…" she said, a little hoarse as she reached up to stroke his face, a gesture that would have been perplexing to her before. She could feel the soreness still in her muscles from her previous endeavors. "You have been crying. Why are you crying?"

"I…Eira, you got hurt. You got hurt so badly…and then you were…you were screaming in your sleep and I just…I didn't kn-know what to think."

He wrapped his arms around her and squeezed her to him so hard his body began to shake.

"It's ok. It's ok, I'm here. I've got you." he took a shaky breath in, relaxing his arms a little so he could look at her, stroking her hair back." Barlowe left for a bit. He knew…no matter how you woke up, you wouldn't hurt me…but he didn't know how you'd react to him."

"He is right. I would never, ever do anything to harm you, Max. I love you."

Before he could respond, she leaned up and kissed him.

His eyes went wide, and the air seemed to leap from his lungs all at once. He couldn't believe this was happening-she had been the one to initiate their first kiss. His whole body trembled, and he gasped when her fingers wound into his hair, deepening it. She drove him insane. It was like an instant spark that quickly caught the kindling of his soul and set it ablaze. He pulled her close to him with a growl, cupping the back of her head in his hand. How could he have ever lived his life without this? Without her warm body next to his, without their lips pressed together, without the sweet taste of her breath in his mouth? With a little burst of werewolf speed, he pushed her against the cave wall, hands sliding down her sides to her hips. He broke the kiss only to lean down and nuzzle into her neck, his lips and teeth teasing her skin. Which reminded him…

"Eira…you've got to eat." he whispered, turning so his neck was exposed to her.

"Max, I-"

"No. Eira you may have healed a bit, but with the kind of damage you took, you need blood, or you'll take forever to fully recover. Please, just drink from me."

She hesitated at first. She could feel the terrible beautiful hunger deep within her, one he could sate her of. What if she lost control?

No. she thought. I will never hurt Max.

She kissed his neck, then opened her jaws over the side of it, her fangs grazing his flesh as she did, causing goosebumps to break out where she'd made contact, and then she bit down.

"Ah," Max muttered, more a groan than anything else.

She felt his sweet, coppery life flow into her, and with it, she felt strength course through her body, her face curling into a vampiric snarl as her eyes went red. But, still, she never felt the temptation to take more of him than what was necessary.

She pulled back and looked up at him, her eyes beginning to shift back to purple and her face relaxing.

Max reached down and wiped a ruby droplet away from just beneath her bottom lip with his thumb, his eyes inexorably locked on hers.

"You are, without a doubt, the most beautiful creature I've ever seen." he said, kissing her again, his own blood still on her lips and all.

"No, really, don't mind me." came a female voice from over Max's shoulder. "Really, I don't find this nausea inducing at all."

There was an awful heartbeat where they both had the same horrifying thought: Gretchen. Eira instinctively pulled her lips back from her teeth and hissed, but Max whipped around excitedly.

"STORMY?! No, no, Eira it's ok!"

"The one and only, cousin." said the girl haughtily. She was about average height, maybe a smidge taller, with wavy, strawberry blond hair and eyes that were the blue-green of tropical oceans. She was much paler than Max, but not quite as moon-pale as Eira. She seemed to have lips that were quick to smile and an all-around relaxed, if a little cocky, attitude.

Max's jovial smile quickly slipped away as his face turned to horror, and he slapped his hands over it as his cheeks burned.

"Please tell me you didn't see all of that."

"Nah. Just the part where you were giving her tonsils an inspection with your tongue. Still, could have been worse. At least your pants were on." she sauntered further into the cave towards them. "So this must be the Beautiful and Mysterious Eira we've all heard so much about. Wow, you really are pretty."

"Eira, this is my cousin, Stormy. My cousin Stormy, officially, this is my Eira."

Eira stared up at Stormy for a moment, as though taking her measure silently.

"Hello. And thank you." Eira finally said. She hadn't really had experience with what qualified "beauty", other than people thought she was. Stormy didn't look like her, but she thought she would have to be pretty, too. "You are very pretty as well."

"Oh, we're gonna get along just fine."

"What are you doing here, Storm?"

"What do you think? Everyone's out looking for you. We had no idea where you were, so we expanded into other states. You're a bit far away from Thorn Grove, Maine, my dude. We're in Vermont."

"They took us two states away?!"

"That they did." Stormy confirmed, nodding. "I came here with two scouts. They're with Barlowe at the car right now. We have some of our people on Claron's trail. You can come home now. Both of you."

"Yes." Max said with such joy, it was a palpable thing. "Are you ready, Eira? Are you ready to go home?"

"Going home…with Max?"

"With me. I'm not going to be separated from you like that ever again." he swore, kissing her on her forehead and stroking her hair back.

"Come on, then." Stormy said with a grin. "The whole pack will be ecstatic to meet you, Eira."