Anger balled in my gut. It rose up and spewed from my lips.
"No!" I growled. My voice shot through the night like lightning through the sky.
And this was all I could do. Stew in this pathetic emotion humans call anger, as I perched on a high branch. The fact that I was angry at all only made me angrier. It should not have bothered me that Luna's life was about to spin out of control. It should not have bothered me that Aradia, Messiah of the witches, was here in Sleepy Hallow with my brother, Rune. It should not have bothered me that Rune's host, Sean Hylander, was on his way here, and that The Coven was gathering to determine Luna's fate.
"I am a demon! I am the first-born immortal angelic son of Lucifer! I am the prince of The Prince of the Powers of Air!" I ground out the words through clenched teeth.
How I ever came to care for the thirteenth daughter of the Lanchester bloodline was beyond me. It was hinder-some and arcane. Ludicrous, even, that I, son of Satan, felt anything other than hate and rage.
But I did care. And I did feel more than hate and rage.
I felt love.
My wings unfurled, their primaries stabbing into the night air like daggers. I sprang to the sky, fueled by the intensity of these pejorative emotions.
The pernicious state My Lady Moon was about to be in angered me even more than did these silly emotions. I needed to find relief, no matter how temporary it would be.
And I knew exactly where I could find it.
With heavy, hard strokes I streaked the sky with my stealthy form. My longing to go straight to Luna was nearly impossible to deny. But she weakened me. Now, especially now, I had to stay away from her. Rune was a powerful being. Even through the protective barrier of my mind, he was still capable of slipping into Luna's thoughts. I had to stay focused on her. With an unfaltering focus, nothing, not even my father, would have the power to penetrate the protective barrier I was capable of erecting around My Moon's mind.
Instead of following my instinctual pull to My Lady Moon's window, I passed her by and headed straight for the town that slept at the bottom of the mountain.
The need to satiate the fire that was burning inside of me, the hunger, the ancient, ever-present obsession for pain, had overtaken me.
Now someone needed to die an excruciatingly painful death.
As I swept over the tree tops, eyes on the little dots of light that were coming from the street lamps in Sleepy Hallow, I thought of Isis Blackhawk. It had been too long since I had found relief, too long since I had ripped a body to shreds with my bare fingers.
An ambrosial taste of delight salivated on my tongue with the memory of Isis' blood, seasoned heavily with the scrumptious fear I had easily induced her with.
Fear was important. Fear was the drug that fed my addicted soul. It was a crucial element, when taking the life of a human.
"As if I have to remember," I grumbled to myself. The wind licked the words from my lips.
But I did have to remember, for My Lady Moon made me forget, at times, what I was.
"No, I shall never forget. And she shan't neither!"
But it was fear for my brother and his host, Sean Hylander, that My Lady Moon had possessed. She feared them more so than she feared me. And this was unacceptable.
"No! She shall fear only me!" I roared.
But she loved me. She should have felt no fear for me.
"Oh, but she should. And she will!"
A heartless beast, I was! Who was I to think I knew anything about love?
I curved my wings stiff and firm into my sides. My eyes locked on to the girl in the park. Rosetta Randal. I did not have to see her to know that it was her. Rosetta sat here every Friday night, waiting for her secret lover. Tonight, though, her secret lover would not find her here.
Tonight, Rosetta Randal would feed my hungry soul!
She did not see me coming. I landed like a shadow in front of the park bench, where she was sitting. Of course, I could have killed her long before she saw me coming, but that lack of fear would have ruined the taste of her blood. I needed a whole lot more than Rosetta's initial shock of my appearance to satiate my hunger. Hell knew I needed a whole lot more than a hundred Rosetta Randals could have offered.
Surprise, laced with growing horror, filled Rosetta's eyes the instant she saw me. And it only made me hungrier than I already was. Before she could scream, I swooped her up into my arm and crushed her against me. One of her flimsy ribs broke with a cracking sound.
With a swooned Rosetta Randal dangling from my arm, quickly, impatiently, I took to the sky and flew back into the direction from which I came.
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