Red Blood (Series of Blood Book 2) by Emma Hamm (best short books to read .TXT) 📕

“Growing up sucks,” she muttered. “I don’t want to do anything other than nothing with you.”

“I’ll miss you and your shopping trips.”

“We can still go on them?”

“Probably not.” Jasper shook his head.

“Yeah. Probably not. But we’ll always be best friends, no matter what else happens. You know that right?”

He nodded.

“But you don’t really love me, Jasper. You love the idea of me. Putting a woman on a pedestal and thinking that she’s going to be this perfect golden thing never gets you anywhere.”

“Enough with the talking.” He rolled his eyes. “I can’t keep hashing it out, Fish. You don’t love me. Maybe I don’t love you that way either. But it’s not something we’ll be figuring out right now.”

“You’re right.” She nodded firmly. “Where are we going?”

“The rest of the team is waiting with Wolfgang at the graveyard. He seemed to think that was where Malachi was going to be focusing his efforts.”

“It’s the opening to the tunnels where everyone lives.”

“Makes sense then.”

“Any sign of an army yet?” Lyra asked.

“No. We keep thinking that we’re feeling eyes on us though, so that’s something.”

“So we don’t know what weapons we need to bring?”

They slipped easily into this kind of conversation. They had fought with each other far too many times and knew exactly what to do. Jasper had already brought her favorite weapons. Three jagged knives were in his pack, along with all her usual choices of magic globes. He’d even packed her favorite outfit to wear while fighting.

“Turn around,” she said while pulling at her shirt.

He did as told and twisted to stare at the wall. “Are we going full out on this one?”

“I think it’s about time, don’t you?”

“Still not exactly comfortable with it.”

He was referring to himself. Jasper had always held back in a fight because of one particular reason. Lyra let him sit on his own thoughts while she struggled into her leather outfit and quickly turned around.

Her heels clacked against the ground as she walked towards him. He remained staring at the wall. The broad expanse of his back was turned towards her. She ran her fingers from shoulder to shoulder.

“I think that whatever tricks we have up our sleeves, we should use.”

She saw his head move forward and back. At least he was in agreement with her. Lyra patted him once on the shoulder but stepped back when she felt the movement under his shirt.

He reached behind his head to pull the black cloth off. There appeared to be tattoos upon the backs of his arms and down the length of his back in two delicate looking dragonfly wings. She knew from experience that they covered from shoulder, to elbow, to nearly the backs of his knees.

They throbbed with violet light before the black lines of the tattoos began to pull away from his skin. They weren’t really tattoos, after all. They were the softest and thinnest membrane of the last remaining set of fairy wings in this world.

Jasper shook himself slightly as he stretched out the appendages, which were rarely used. They were nearly five feet in length and glittered as the light reflected off of them. Lyra could pick out many colors but could not name a single one that would accurately describe the kaleidoscope of movement that was his wings.

“It’s a shame you can’t fly with them,” she said.

“I can teleport. Why fly? It would be slower anyways.”

She laughed as he turned towards her. “It’s not that bad you know. I don’t think anyone would make fun of you.”

“A mountain of a man who could snap a man’s neck with one hand, who also has fairy wings?” He snorted. “I’d rather hide them.”

“They’re so pretty though.”

He smacked her hand out of the air when she reached out to touch them. “Don’t.”

“I just wanted to see what they felt like.”

When she reached out again, he smacked her hand once more. This time, he pointed a finger at her and arched a warning brow. “I warned you once already.”

She stuck out her bottom lip. “Fine. But I’m still excited to finally try and use some of that Fairy dust.”

“It’s not to be used as a toy!”

“This a war.” She batted her eyelashes at him. “So I get to use it however I want, right?”

He looked like he was ready to throttle her. But she could already see the extremely potent substance gathering at the edges of his wings. Pink and sparkly, it was right on the edges of the membranes. Fairy dust only formed when the wings were exposed to air, and he had the only set of male Fairy wings as far as anyone knew. Fairies notoriously picked female hosts, even the males.

When it fell, Fairy dust was the worst kind of drug for magical creatures. They were instantly happier, a lot sleepier, and most would do absolutely anything anyone told them to do. Which was likely why it was banned as any sort of useable substance.

Lyra had only managed to grab some off of him once, and boy had it made them some money. Not to mention the Minotaur they had following them around as a bodyguard for a full three days. She had so enjoyed doing that and begged him for more.

Obviously, he had never given her any after that experience.

His eyes narrowed on her. “You know, you never did tell me why it doesn’t affect you.”

“Oh, that’s because any creature that deals in emotional magic can’t be affected by you.”

“Excuse me?”

“Sirens, Mermaids, Incubi, Succubi, probably even Dryads. You know, the ones that could probably do the same thing that you could do.”

Jasper stared at her. “You couldn’t sing a man to shore if you tried.”

“Nope, terrible voice. It’s the one thing Bones refused to give back to me.” She shrugged. “Probably a smart choice.”

“No kidding.”

The corner of the room shuddered and seemed to warp in on itself. Pitch. Lyra knew it was Pitch even before the shadows started to form. She planted