Page 11 of Watch Me Burn (Sanctuary #1)
CHAPTER 10
BURN
I roll my eyes. “Funny, Elise.”
“Sorry, Bridge. I couldn’t resist. But you’ll be fine. It won’t hurt, and I’ll only take a few sips. Just enough to get rid of the worst of the thirst. As long as you don’t bite me, there isn’t any blood exchange.”
It’s a good thing that I have no intention to find out what a vampire tastes like.
Elise is an amazing teacher. Though she obviously knows the most about vampires, and witches are some of the rarer types of supes so she doesn’t have firsthand knowledge about my kind, she’s been giving me a crash course on supes ever since I stopped pretending I was one.
And so far I’ve realized that the two most important things I need to know are that silver can incapacitate any powerful supernatural creature, and that one bonus to being most supes, is that they’re owed a fated mate.
Again, because witches have to be difficult, I don’t get one of those. On the plus side, that means I can screw around with whoever I want and Fate won’t get all pissy about it, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t like the idea that there was one guy out there meant specifically for me.
Unless it’s someone like Conall, that is. In that case, no thanks.
When it comes to vampires, their bonding ritual is fairly straightforward. There needs to be a blood exchange, so each part of the couple has to take a nip from their prospective mate, and then they seal it with sex.
Because I’m curious—and, to be honest, a bit horny since I haven’t gotten laid in, like, forever —I ask her about shifters. Of all the types of supes out there, vampires and shifters are the most common, and I wanted to know how the more beastly supes claimed their mates.
Claim, of course, being the right word for it. Not being a shifter herself, she only knew the basics. How a shifter has to make their mate, receive a mark in return, and then, like vamps, bang it out. The only difference is that while blood usually is drawn during the marking—whether it’s a bite or a scratch—there’s no drinking required. Instead, shifters usually leave a visible silvery scar somewhere on their mate’s body to prove that they’re taken.
Makes sense. In Dyea, we have a handful of mated couples that sought sanctuary together. Though none of the shifters here are predators, seems like all shifter are predatory when they have their mate under them.
Elise can take my blood. I’m just feeding a friend, and if the memory of Conall’s sneer as he asked Elise if she bites me runs through my mind at the moment, I quickly shove it aside as I shift a little closer to her.
“So how do we do this? Neck? Wrist? Forearm?”
“You’re right-handed. In case witches don’t heal as quickly as other supes, let’s go with your left wrist so it doesn’t interfere with your drawing hand. If that’s alright.”
In answer, I fist my hand to get the vein bulging a little, then offer her my left wrist.
Elise hesitates for only a few seconds, but the thirst must’ve been worst than she was letting on because, like a rattlesnake, she strikes. Her fangs sink right into my skin, and the piercing sensation only lasts a second before she takes a pull on my vein.
One sip. Elise manages one sip before she’s yanking her fangs out of my hand, hissing.
Uh oh.
“Elise?”
Her eyes had darkened, going from pale green to a vibrant red as she starts panting now that she’s no longer hissing. Her lips are painted with my blood, but her tongue is… blistered?
Holy shit.
“Did I burn you?”
I think I burned her.
“What can I do? How can I help?”
She shakes her head, her ruby-red hair falling forward into her face. A few seconds later, she shoves it away, and her eyes are back to the same pale green shade I know.
Her tongue looks better, too, but that doesn’t change what I saw.
Elise swallows, obviously testing her mouth out. Vampires, she’s taught me, do heal quickly so I’m not too surprised when she nods. “I’m better.”
“What happened?”
“I’m not sure,” admits Elise. “Only that I’ve never experienced anything like it. I was burned, and I think… I think it might be because your blood itself, it might be fire.”
You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.
“I can’t feed you, can I?”
Elise looks more pained now than she did a moment ago as she says, “Not if you’re a fire witch.”
Well, that seals it, doesn’t it? I need the fire opal to get rid of my magic—and I need it as soon as possible.
As much as I want to, I don’t go in search of the caves tonight.
Since it’s going to be dark no matter what, I figure it doesn’t matter when I take the trip underground. If Conall is snooping around, it’s probably better if I leave the village at night when he should be sleeping.
But it didn’t feel right, running out on Elise after I burned her tongue like that. So she healed quicker than I did. It took hours before her bite marks were gone, while Elise’s tongue was back to normal in minutes. Doesn’t matter. Finding out just how much the fier is pervasive inside of me freaked me out. Discovering that her only chance at blood issn’t going to work made it worse.
So we sprawled out on the couch together, watching television until Elise decided she was ready to head to bed. Only then did I go into the kitchen and make me a sandwich. I scarfed it down, chased it with some water, then decided to turn in myself.
I’m tired. I don’t ask how the magic works here, but so long as I have enough Wi-Fi to work on my commissions, contact my clients, and continue our Supernatural marathon, I don’t care. Tonight we watched seven episodes, and I’m ready to change into my sleep clothes and pass out.
Instead of turning on my light, I feel my way through my room so that I won’t have to get up and turn it off again after changing. And maybe it’s because my eyes are used to the dark, but when I move past the window, pausing to yank the shade down, I notice that there’s someone out there.
My stomach sinks—and my hands spark.
What the…
I can’t see who it is. Their back is to me, legs braced apart, their shadowy form standing out against the glitter of another snowfall. It stopped snowing earlier tonight which makes it easier to see someone is out there, at the back of the house.
It’s dark. In Dyea, the sun’s complete down by four-thirty. By eleven, it seems like it’ll never be light out again.
Who is that?
What are they doing?
And, more importantly, why do I care?
This is a sanctuary. You have to be granted entry.
It can’t be a witch hunter.
Right?
Yellow snow.
I’m looking at yellow snow.
Did Conall piss out here? I see boot prints, too, and I’m pretty sure those tracks belong to a man. It doesn’t take Sherlock Holmes to put two and two together about what I saw out of my window last night.
It wasn’t a witch hunter standing out here. It was Mr. Grump, stopping to take a leak outdoors. Did he know that this was mine and Elise’s house? Duh. Stupid question. Of course he does. He’s the one who got ticked off when I insisted on sharing a house with her in the first place, and even if he forgot about that, he’s the head of security. I’d bet he knows where everyone lives.
He’s not out here now. In fact, I haven’t seen him all morning. Elise and I went to get breakfast at the canteen—where I ate toast and eggs and she sipped coffee while looking wistful for blood—and there was no sign of Conall there. Same when we went back to the house.
Maybe he slept in. He doesn’t seem the type, but if he was skulking around the sanctuary as late as I caught him last night, it’s possible.
Figuring that this was as good a time as any to start my search for the fire opal, I grabbed the envelope holding the map that bus driving witch gave to me, said goodbye to Elise, and slipped out the back door.
The house that belongs to Elise and me while we live in Dyea is backed up against the woods. Most of the wooden cottages are. Such a small community, our front doors face each other from opposite sides of the long oval. The back doors come with heavy duty locks in case someone manages to break into the sanctuary—or if one of the wild creatures that live in the woods do.
It isn’t often that happens. I ran into Mayor Lou the other day on my way to the canteen, and after I got past the worst of his renewed odor—black cherry air refresher on top of skunk—I noticed he looked nervous. He tried to downplay any concerns, but I can be pushy when I want to be. I nudged a little until he confessed that, on one of his patrols, Conall got sight of unfamiliar footprints near enough to Dyea to be a worry.
My first paranoid instinct was that the witch hunters found me. It must’ve shown on my face because the kind mayor patted me on the shoulder, assuring me that it looks like one of the wild Alaskan wolves might’ve got curious and padded near our village.
The magic keeps out people. People and supes, I guess, but since this land belongs to the animal and other creatures who are native to the land, the coven’s spell doesn’t affect them. Instead, it’s the markings from the shifters who live in Dyea that warn away some of the more curious predators.
I get it. If an actual wolf caught the scents of a skunk, an opossum, a hedgehog, even a freaking porcupine all in one community, it must think: smorgasboard. It doesn’t have any clue that, in Dyea, our prey animals turn into humans. Their scents are just different enough to make the wild predators hesitant, and with enough territorial markings, they’ll stay away.
Which is good. This is Alaska. It didn’t really dawn on me that I’m living out in the woods, basically neighbors with Alaskan wolves and grizzly bears, until my chat with Mayor Lou.
As I tuck the envelope under my arm, using my winter boot to erase the last of the yellow snow by kicking some of the fresh powder over it, the idea that this might’ve been a territorial marking pops into my brain.
But why would Conall piss outside my house? I still don’t know what kind of supe he is, though I’ve brainstormed with Elise when my ability to keep from bringing up the grumpy head of security fails for another night. We agree that he’s obviously not a vamp—as a vamp herself, Elise would instinctively recognize her own kind—and she’s pretty sure based on his movements and how he’s acted since our arrival that he’s a shifter.
What kind? No clue. It would be hysterical if he was, like, a hamster shifter or something. A teeny tiny prey animal when he shifts, it would make sense why he’s constantly scowling when he’s standing in front of me, a six foot lumberjack with melted gold eyes and a frown that irks me all the way to my bones…
Another kick and the yellow snow is covered. If that was his way of warding off a moose or a caribou or whatever else they have here, that’s on me. I don’t even really know that it was Conall. Just because the shadowy figure seemed to have his shape and size, and none of the other supes I’ve met in Dyea are as strapping and broad-shouldered as he is, doesn’t mean it was him. Elise keeps teasing me that I’ve had it out for him since his less-than-enthusiastic welcome. Maybe I have. Right now? I have something to do, and now that the snow’s covered, I’m ready to go.
I’m not too worried about heading out of the sanctuary. Sure, there are wild animals out there, but Dyea really is a ghost town. The trees have reclaimed the land over the last century, and any human residents live on the outskirts of it. I’d have to be super unlucky to run into another person out in the woods, and if it turns out to be a witch hunter?
Light ‘em up.
I’ve been practicing. When Elise’s thirst gets to be a little too difficult for her to ignore, she heads to her room. I don’t want to bug her when she’s already having a harder time of it than either of us expected, and I end up going upstairs to my assigned space.
With the window shades drawn and my door closed, I work with my fire. The way I see it, if I find the fire opal, it should help me get rid of my magic. What if I don’t? I have to look to the future. For the moment at least, I’m a fire witch. What good is being a fire witch if my magic is unpredictable and uncontrollable?
I’m playing at being a human. My secret’s safe so far, but the last thing I need is to get jumpy and accidentally shoot fire at one of the supes in the village. That means I need to learn how to wield it. It helps that I know what my trigger is, but I’d rather be able to call on the fire when I need it instead of it bursting free of me.
So if I need to protect myself in the woods or in the caves? I’m confident enough that I can.
It’s a good thing, too, because I start getting the all-too-familiar tingle in my fingers about ten minutes into my trek.
The map that the bus driver gave me was folded in half, with a drawing on each side of the page. One part illustrated where the entrance to the underground cave system is in comparison to Dyea. The other is a guide through the connected caves, with two separate ones marked with a star. The stars mark the caves that Celeste believed might be the best spots to find the fire opal.
One problem: I’m shit when it comes to reading maps.
I’m okay with the dark. I’m good with enclosed spaces. None of that bothers me, but it’s frustrating how the endless amounts of trees make it difficult to navigate my way to the entrance. Add that to how I’m pretty sure the magic surrounding the sanctuary is working against me, trying to keep me inside its borders, and I’m paying more attention to where I’m going than what might be creeping up on me.
That was my mistake.