route.
The female, Maurelle, scoffs. “You have been forced to live among the Cowan. That is not a home, it is a prison. You are superior to them and you belong with your own kind.”
“Cowan?” I ask. Maybe if I lunge to the left I can lose them by jumping over the small gorge over there and looping around back to the house from the other side. I surely know the woods better than they do.
“You may refer to them as humans,” Olwyn explained.
They are almost close enough to grab for me now, I have to make my move. I fake right and Olwyn grabs for me but then I lunge left and start running. I can hear them behind me as I run through tree branches and then I lift my feet up into a jump over the five foot gorge and lose my footing on the other side. I am not fast enough in getting up and Maurelle catches my coat. She pulls me roughly to my feet and hurls me against a tree face first. My head hits it hard and my vision gets slightly blurry. I feel blood at the corner of my mouth and I’m pretty sure I’m close to losing consciousness.
“You will return with us,” she says as she wraps a hand around my neck and lifts me off my feet but as she makes contact with my skin the amulet around my neck shines brightly and she drops me just as quickly as she had lifted me. She pulls her hand to her chest and cradles it as if she has been burned and she takes a step back from me. She is about to speak when her attention is caught by a raven that lands on the lowest limb of the tree I am leaning against.
Maurelle’s lips pull into a sneer. “Kallen.”
Trying hard to stay still so as not to bring her attention back to me, I watch as the raven elongates and begins to take on the characteristics of a boy around my own age. A gorgeous boy. Where Olwyn is big and brawny with bulging muscles and is much older, this boy is tall and lean and has the muscles of a large cat. Sleek and strong. His black hair is unruly and his green eyes are piercing. He also happens to be completely naked like the other two. Doesn’t anybody feel the cold like I do?
“Maurelle,” the boy says as he jumps to the ground. “I will not let you take her.”
“There are two of us, Kallen. You cannot fight us both and expect to win,” Olwyn says pulling himself up to his full height that is still several inches shorter than Kallen.
“No, but I can slow you down,” Kallen says and from his closed hand he throws two objects hitting both Maurelle and Olwyn in the chest. Turning to me, he yells, “Run!”
I hesitate for only a second before I realize that whatever he had thrown at Olwyn and Maurelle has them kneeling in pain. I pull myself up and ignoring the pain in my head, I run as fast as I can getting cut by branches and brush as I push through them. I’m almost home when I hear the pounding of feet in the snow behind me. I dare to look over my shoulder and I find Kallen getting closer, his longer legs able to carry him faster than mine. Maurelle and Olwyn are no where to be found.
Breathing heavily, I slow down and finally come to a stop to try to catch my breath. Kallen slows to a walk and approaches me. I expect my savior to be happy I had escaped but all I find on his hard, gorgeous face is annoyance. “Why did you not use your magic?” he demands as he stands in front of me in all his naked glory.
“I-I don’t have any magic,” I stammer. Has the whole world gone crazy or am I suddenly in a parallel universe?
“Of course you have magic,” he scoffs. “The amulet around your neck is proof of that.”
I look down at the necklace Mom had given me. It’s no longer glowing if it really had at all. I look back up at Kallen and as my eyes travel up his body, a flush covers my cheeks. I’ve never seen anyone my age naked before. “Don’t you have clothes?” I ask casually trying to cover my