Seeing with the Shadows

Chapter 41

The wind blew into Lena and Quoim’s faces as they stepped out onto the flowerbed. “We should seriously get something to eat.” Quoim announced instantly, “Because I’m starving.”

“Oh, you’re starving... I’m not!” Lena said, “I just had so much food... I had a, um…  I had a BLT and a milkshake and chips and-”

“You are such a liar.” Quoim interrupted, “Let’s go get something to eat.”

Lena shrugged and headed inside. Finally, away from annoying little children! Lena thought happily to herself, but all too soon Gabrielle plowed into her, wailing at the top of her lungs and screaming in French. “Hi...” Lena said awkwardly, trying to get out of her grip but failing.

“You aren’t being very nice, Gabrielle!!” Sorren screamed, but in English.

Gabrielle stuck her tongue out at him, suddenly let go of Lena, and darted past her.

“Hey!” Sorren shoved Lena out of the way so hard that she almost toppled over and pelted after her.

“So... how you adjusting to life as being a sister?” Quoim asked, standing on the counter and reaching for a package in the back of the cupboard.

“Half-sister.” Lena corrected.

“Same thing. Same amount of annoyingness, right?” Quoim grabbed the bag and jumped down, almost bringing the entire shelf down with her by accidentally hanging onto it.

Lena smirked, “Smooth.”

“Whatever. I got chips, didn’t I?” Quoim opened up the bag and grabbed a container of hummus off the shelf, scooping up a lot of dip on the chip and shoving it in her mouth. While Vampires had their own food, they also had a lot of typical Human foods, which Lena was happy for because she didn’t think she could live without some Human junk food.

“Hey, where’s Pelicia?”

“Oh!” Quoim exclaimed, “Come look!”

She followed Quoim outside and saw Phelicia and her babies swooping around the backyard.

Phelicia caught sight of her and dove down. Her babies followed, squeaking excitedly. The tiny Phoenixes all landed in a small pool of water, sending up a huge splash. Lena caught her breath- Phoenixes are fire,  and water is water. Fire’s enemy. This would not be good.

The water froze around all of them, then flames erupted on top of the ice. It quickly melted, and all of the baby Phoenixes turned a dangerous black and purple, with black flames flickering around their bodies.

Above them, a fiery symbol became clear: black teeth dripping with purple blood and glittering purple claws. A Phoenix the same color as them swooped down, and they followed it. Phelicia stood there, burning a bright red fire until it was blinding to look at her. She was like a miniature sun, with was radiating from her. With a graceful swoop of her wings, she took off the ground.

Is this the Phoenix she mated with? Lena hoped that she had had better taste, but it really didn’t seem like there was any other alternative because Phoenixes were so rare. It was hard to believe that there just happened to be another Phoenix hanging around Half Moon. But it was obvious that Vanessa and Slade had set this trap to create more of their mix between ice and fire. That was a dangerous thing to do, but they were obviously sure enough with themselves to do it.

Phelicia and the other Phoenix were fighting in the air, fire raining down and scorching whatever was unlucky enough to be underneath it. Unfortunately, what was underneath it was the entire lawn, which quickly caught on fire. The pond was drying up as if someone was vacuuming the water straight up out of it. Quoim ran inside screaming for Nadine. Lena just stood there, transfixed at the sight of two screeching Phoenixes fighting, fire and ice.