At that moment, the door swung open.
As always, when Maddie stepped outside, the world around her suddenly turned submissive. The wind shivered through the trees with a softer note, the snow flurries cleared a path, etched with paisley patterns. Even the moon herself peeked through sullen clouds and cast a path of silvery light.
If ever there was a magical creature, it was her.
A sigh echoed through my chest, came out in a gentle puff of frost.
She glanced in my direction, though I crouched hidden and invisible in velvet blue shadows. I longed to reach out and pull her into the Land of Dreams, to hold her in my arms and kiss her as she fell asleep.
But of course, she didn’t see me. I was invisible after all.
And even if she had, she wouldn’t have come to me willingly.
I was a monster, a nightmare; the stuff of legend and myth.
And she was formed from mortal flesh and blood.
Behind me, Sage shivered in the cold pocket of human architecture, no shelter from the wind. I could tell that her every fiber and muscle longed to spring from this cursed porch and shout through snow-drifted skies. She wanted to soar over rooftops, listening for the right timbre and cadence, for the human so filled with poetry that even his dreams would be lyrical.
She wanted to hunt. Now.
But I couldn’t leave, I clung to the cottage wall like a lovesick suitor. We both knew that this certainly wasn’t the first time I’d taken a fancy to a human woman. Elspeth was evidence of that. A part of me knew that I needed to remember these were the fields of harvest, there were no mates hidden here.
There were no more Lilies waiting for me.
“We must leave, brother,” my sister whispered when the clouds rolled across the sky, hiding the sweet moon and muffling her song. Now my muscles were beginning to ache.
“Soon,” I growled in response.
Human language becomes difficult when the full moon sits upon her throne—circle of heavenly light, surrounded tonight by a blue halo.
Already Maddie was shuffling down the walk with her boy and dog, claiming all the moonlight for herself, calling it to follow her like a wayward child.
“Even Elspeth has left for the Hunt,” Sage said as she spread her wings, then shook the snow from their folds.
I glanced at her with raised brow. “She’s not sleeping?”
“No. The house is empty, save Driscoll, who lies tangled in his own dreams.”
“Where is she?” I lifted my head, thankfully distracted from Maddie, and took a long sip of crisp, cold air.
“Your daughter changed her scent, some mingling of crushed rose petals and clover.”
I spread my wings, pushed away from the porch and sailed into the low sky, still drinking in the flavors of night. Finally I nodded. “I found her scent,” I said. “A few streets away. Surrounded by humans, I think.”
Sage was at my side then, wings eager to push past me. Still she forced herself to stay. “Aye. She has a right to hunt, you know.”
Silver eyes watched me, a challenge in their depths.
“She’s of the age and you must allow her this, brother.”
“It doesn’t mean that I have to enjoy it,” I answered.
We were passing Maddie and her boy, flying high above them. She glanced up at us, seemed to search the sky for our shapes, unable to discern the difference between wing and cloud. Together Sage and I continued on our journey, over the rooftops, above the trees, always looking down at the humans that drifted in small huddles over snowy sidewalks, leaving a trail of prints in the soft white powder. They would be so easy to track tonight, so easy to hunt.
“Remember the cold,” I warned Sage as we hovered above Elspeth and the crowd she traveled with. “Humans can’t be out in it too long. If you harvest someone outside you must shelter them with a Veil and then make sure they are awake and moving before you leave them.”
“I know.” She smiled.
“You’re sure Thane and his clan are gone?” I asked.
She was just about to depart. The moon’s song latched about her limbs, pulling her. Meanwhile, music wafted from a nearby hilltop, and I could tell it was making it hard for her to concentrate. My sister had always loved musicians.
“Sage?”
She glanced at me. “Aye. Sienna, River, Thane. I searched the village for their scents while you were in that human’s cottage. All three are gone. I’m certain.”
“Go,” I said then, remembering the many hunts we had shared before I came to Ticonderoga Falls. “Hunt ’til you be full! I will see you on the morrow.”
“And I will see you. May your harvest be both rich and deep.”
Then we parted ways.