White Raven - a paranormal short story by S. Peters-Davis

Hello everyone – thanks for stopping: ) I belong to a short story writing group on GoodReads and I’d like to share one of my paranormal stories – a favorite genre of mine. Hope you enjoy – White Raven

            We met when I was thirteen. The cool morning mist lifted off the water, my parents had already launched to fish, and I was left tending the campsite. My book lay open on the picnic table and I was totally absorbed in the paranormal romance of shifters when a white bird the size of an eagle landed on the table in front of me.

            It studied me, cocking its head side to side, stepping to the right then the left of me.

            Watching it watch me might have been unsettling to someone else, but I found comfort with its interest in me. I studied it right back; a Raven, only white and a huge size, with deep purple eyes and dark lashes. So, it wasn’t an albino.

            “Where did you come from? You’re amazing.” My words must have startled it because it stumbled off the table, hitting the ground with a loud thud. I shot to the other side where it lay unconscious. “You can’t die. I’m sure you’re one of a kind.” I touched its soft feathered head. A tingle vibrated through my fingers and up my arm. The bird shivered and its eyes opened. “Oh, my gosh, you’re alive.”

            “And you, Lacey, are nothing like I was told you’d be,” a masculine voice spoke inside my head.

I jumped back landing on my backside. My heart beat erratic as I gasped for air. We stared at each other. “You just spoke inside my head. You know my name.” I croaked the words, still working to breathe. “What are you?”

* * *

            Blaze glared at me in the moonlight, his purple eyes glowed. “What are you doing? You’re supposed to be practicing.” His straight white hair fluttered around his broad shoulders, his lips pinched together. “You’re eighteen and should have full access to your powers. Now is when you need to be trained.”

            We stood on the edge of a Picture Rock cliff, he expected me to jump, gain my wings and fly. Only I’d never flown on my own, even though I could make feathers appear randomly on my body, it wasn’t like launching myself into the abyss of Lake Superior just to prove I can’t fly. He swore the full moon would give me insight on what would happen if I jumped off the cliff, but I definitely wasn’t feeling it.

            “Come on, Lacey. Your parents were strong flyers, both of them. You’ve spent too much time with the human family and lost your instinct to the Avian way.” He stepped closer, his palm rubbed across my shoulder blade, warming my insides and making me feel safe. “It takes a nice dose of adrenaline to get those natural abilities firing through your system.” He shoved me and I tripped off the ledge.

            The moonlit water was not my friend. I closed my eyes. The rocks below would kiss me dead.

My body jolted as his talons slipped around my upper arms. I opened my eyes, his strong wings worked to save us from the crashing waves and rocks.

            He sighed. “Enough for tonight, we’ll try something else tomorrow.” He flew toward the forest.

Blaze had introduced me to the Avian race of people on my sixteenth birthday. They told me that I looked like my mother, who I didn't remember. They also spoke of my parents as royalty, which made me giggle. My parents had left me, a newborn, at the campsite of a human couple. Perhaps to save me from the hunter that had killed them. My human parents never shared I wasn’t biologically theirs.

My ventures with Blaze and our people were in secret. The more I learned about our kind, the more difficult it became to live in the human world. Especially knowing my aging process had slowed, upon turning eighteen I aged one year for every one hundred human years.

But perhaps part of my draw to the changeling world was Blaze. He knew me like no other.

            Blaze flew us deep into the forest, where our people lived in a small village settlement far off the beaten path, a place no human would ever consider living. He set me on my feet outside his home then he changed into human form. He’d insisted as my mentor and protector that I stayed with him.

            “Maybe you should change out of that tiny bathing suit.” His gaze wove a web of sparking prickles from my chest to my toes and back again and then our gazes connected. Those sparks on the outside of my skin scurried into my veins like a hyper-wave of lava. He stepped closer, his head tilted toward me, breath brushing my lips.

            I lifted my face toward him, my heart spiraling, eyes closing.

            He kissed my forehead. “Go, change, sleep. We’ll start again tomorrow.”

            My spiraling heart dropped as if knocked-out with a punch. I opened my eyes and watched him walk into the house, no need for lights with our excellent night vision.

My human mother came to mind. She had worried about my deep teal colored eyes and the distance I could see…miles away. I learned at ten years old to keep certain things to myself after running through a ton of tests. Thankfully she kept me from becoming a lab rat. I never shared my ultra-fine hearing or my ability to feel the minutest vibrations of insects and small creatures.

Like now. Vibrations and sound, snapping branches and twigs, I scanned into the forest at my left.

A gun fired. I saw the flame, fumes ripened the air. I sensed the vibration of the bullet as it passed my shoulder and slammed into the side of Blaze’s home.

“Umph.” His groan echoed in my head, then a thud loud enough to be his body.

My heart hummed, blood pumping through my veins with force. I stretched tall, my body automated. My bones and muscles snapped into a new place. I stared downward at talons instead of toes.

Another shot fired, again just missing me. My wingspan freaked me out momentarily, wider than Blaze’s, and brindle in colored. I lifted effortlessly into the air, soaring around tree branches, ascending then diving, hearing the ragged breath of the hunter. He was reloading his firearm.

His look of surprise told me he’d never heard my approach. I knocked him down, used my talons to grab his gun and snap the night vision goggles from his face. The Avians swarmed overhead, all sizes, ascending and lifting the unconscious hunter. With flying stealth, they carried him away.

I flew back to Blaze’s home; the door was open. My body morphed into human form as soon as I landed. Arianna, the Avian medic, was already leaning over his prone body, her glowing hands spread across his abdomen.

“How is he?” I ran to his side. His eyes were closed. “Is he unconscious?”

She stared at me with a look of awe. “You are the one.”

Not the response I expected, nor a clue on what it meant.

Blaze shuddered, his eyes opened. “Lacey?”

“I’m here. It was a hunter. He’s been removed from the area. How are you feeling?” I brushed a tendril of hair from his eyes. My fingers vibrated at the touch of his skin.

Arianna slid her hands away and inspected the area. A bullet clinked on the wooden floor. “Looks like you’re going to make it, my King.”

My King? I’d never heard anyone call Blaze that before.

“A little rest ought to finish the tissue healing.” Arianna rose from the floor, pocketing the bullet, and reached out a hand. I did the same and we both helped Blaze to his feet.

“What happened?” His eyes narrowed, brows drawing inward.

“Your owling came into her own. She protected first and foremost, like a true leader, my King.” Arianna bowed her head toward Blaze, then to me, and said, “We’re honored by your presence.”

I shook my head in disbelief, not quite sure what she was talking about. Nor why she was calling Blaze “my King.”

Blaze’s wide smile took my breath away, and as his gaze connected with mine my brain stopped considering anything else.

“You morphed?” He pulled me in, wrapping his arms around me. I nodded. “You morphed,” he whispered.

Arianna clicked the door shut on her quick exit.

Blaze tilted my chin up. “You have no idea how long we’ve waited; I’ve waited. Your timing is perfect, my Queen.” He closed the gap between our lips, crushing mine to his in a smolder of passion.

I held his face between my palms, our chests pressed together and our heart rhythms matched as one. An owl and a raven…

To see books by this author – check out author pages below:

DK Davis BWL Publishing Inc. Author Page: http://bookswelove.net/authors/davis-dk-ya-paranormal/

S. Peters-Davis BWL Publishing Inc. Author Page – http://bookswelove.net/authors/peters-davis-s-suspense-paranormal/

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