The Skinwalker Hunter

Chapter 12 - Mia

The brightness of the sun forced my eyes shut, making them water and sting uncomfortably. It was the same sensation I got from waking up, except in reverse. From being blinded by darkness to dazzled by sunlight. Either way, it was inevitable that I would get hurt. I shielded my eyes from the glare with one hand and wiped away the moisture with the back of my other. Stumbling across the yard, barely making out shapes, I moved as quickly as I could to reach the darkness at the end of the yard. I hoped it was going to be bushland like at my place, my old place I corrected. Boundary fences would make this place feel more like a prison than a home.

My eyes slowly adjusted and the boundary split into trees and bushes just like I'd hoped. I focused on a small opening in the foliage, increasing my speed to make best my escape.

Clang! 

It was the sound of something hitting a solid metal object. That something was me and the solid metal object would have to be the clothesline. My head vibrated while my forehead began throbbing. I wiped my hand across my forehead and examined it for traces of blood. 

"No blood," I let out a sigh of relief. Blood on a fleeing human with possible vampires lurking around never ended well for the human. Glancing over my shoulder to the backdoor, I slowed my pace. No one was chasing me yet but there was no need to tenderise my flesh for them either.

The small opening in the foliage opened out into a dirt walking track worn from years of use.

"Ow," I moaned stepping on something sharp and glaring at the offending stone. My feet were bare and I contemplated going back for shoes until the face of the immortal bloodsucker appeared in my mind.

"Hell no," I shuddered carefully choosing my next step.

It felt like a million images and thoughts churned through my mind. Vampires with long, sharp fangs. Faceless hunters ready to spring out from who knows where hell-bent on killing me. Handsome violet-eyed strangers laughing at my misery.

The track narrowed the further I walked, now only wide enough for one person. The bushes so thick and dense it was hard to see anything through them apart from more bushes or trees. My heart finally slowed down and I stopped, closed my eyes and listened. Cicadas buzzed loudly as the crickets chirped and wild parrots trilled creating the harmonious soundtrack of the Australian bush.

I crinkled my brows and my eyes fluttered open silence fell around me. A broad figure filled the narrow pathway stalking its way toward me. I stiffened, my heart racing.

"Mia, is that you?" My shoulders relaxed instantly with recognition. It was a voice I hadn't known for long but a voice I could never forget.

"Yeah, Evan," I answered. "It's me."

"What are you doing out here by yourself?"  The violet in his eyes deepened as his face tightened with anger. "Which part of 'you are being hunted' didn't you understand!"

I balled my fists by my sides nails biting into my flesh and clenched my teeth. He was treating me like a toddler. I glared at him, not trusting myself not to say something I would regret. How dare he force his way into my life, turn everything on its head and then think that he had the right to speak to me like that. I narrowed my eyes defiantly, watching the colour of his lighten from deep violet to soft lavender. They were brilliant in the depths of the violet spectrum they encompassed, like amethyst dancing in the sunlight. His features softening the lighter his eyes became.

My stomach fluttered as his glare raked over my body, a heat forming in my core. I shook the sensation away and slammed my fists on my hips, wincing at the unnecessary force. He needed to know he had no rights to talk to me like that.

 "Why are you out here by yourself?" His tone may have changed but I could still hear the irritation. 

"Rosa!" I spat out not at all worried about the way I spoke to him. I was always told to speak to others the way I would like to be spoken to. I was only speaking to him the way he must want to be spoken to.

He clenched his jaw and his eyes darkened again. "What has she done now?"

Confusion crossed my features at his words. What has she done now?  What had she already done? My mind boggled at the thought. "What is she?"

He sighed and his shoulders sank slightly. "What did she say?"

"Answering my questions with a question isn't getting us anywhere." I ground out. "Tell me what she is."

"Rosa is my aunt, my father's sister," he started to explain with a sigh like he knew he had no choice. "My mother was murdered moments before I was born. Rosa saved my life and raised me to adulthood."

"She looks a few years older than you, how is that possible?" The sums didn't add up in my head. I dropped one arm to my side and popped out my hip, challenging what he said.

"Walk with me, Mia," he asked, extending his hand out towards me. "There is a clearing not that far up the path. When we get there, I will explain everything."

I glared at his hand, back to his face and back to his hand again. I swatted it away and pushed past him continuing along the path to the clearing waiting for us at the end. I knew I was being childish but I didn't care. He muttered something under his breath soft enough that I couldn't quite make out the words, then his footfalls followed behind me.

Just as he had said, a large clearing opened up in front of us. Wildflowers of every possible colour covered the clearing like a blanket. Their fragrance tickled my nostrils causing a quick succession of sneezes to escape from me.

"Bless you." His sweet voice broke the silence making me smile. I mentally slapped myself and quickly restored my resting b***h face.

Walking to the centre of the clearing, I stretched out my arms and slowly spun around until I was facing Evan. A hint of a smile crept onto his handsome features as he stood there watching me. I gestured for him to start talking. He nodded in acknowledgement and glided across the clearing towards me, his gaze not leaving mine. When he reached my side he dropped down to the ground, laying on his side and propping up his head up with his hand.

Shrugging my shoulders, I dropped to the ground as well sitting cross-legged in front of him. "Well!"

His gaze shifted to a place somewhere over my shoulder probably deciding on how much he was going to tell me. "Rosa found my murdered mother beaten up and covered with blood. Her stomach was heavily swollen with me but her heart no longer beat with life." He pursed his lips and his features contorted with anger and emotion before he quickly schooled expression again.

My jaw dropped and I sucked in a gasp. Now, I wasn't expecting that. It was an effort to shut my mouth, and pop my eyes back in their sockets before he noticed.

"My mother was only one week shy of carrying me to term." He paused for a moment, schooling his emotions once again before continuing. "The murderer's venom was transferred to me through the womb turning me into this, this abomination of nature."

I crinkled my nose in confusion. He looked more like a sculpture of divine perfection to me, not an abomination. "What does that mean?" 

He chuckled and my cheeks flamed red. "I am not a skinwalker like you Mia, nor am I a vampire like Rosa."

My breath hitched and a gasp escaped my mouth. "Vampire?"

"Yes," he murmured, barely audible before dropping his eyes to the ground.

I stared at him, words failing to form in my mind let alone reach my lips. He waited patiently for me to absorb what he had said squeezing the stem of a flower between his fingers, snapping it off and twisting it one way before spinning it back the other. His eyes stayed glued to the flower as if his shame or guilt was somehow staring right back at him. My heart surged a little at the emotion flashing across his gorgeous features.

"Will she try and eat me?" I asked, clutching my neck with both hands while trying to blink away the visions of sharp fangs snapping at my throat.

"No of course not," he answered quickly, his eyes shooting up to meet mine now. "Rosa has vowed to spend eternity protecting your people. She would never harm a skinwalker after what that monster did to my mother."

"My people," my thoughts catching on the words and failing to understand them. "If I'm right, then your mother was a skinwalker, therefore you are a skinwalker."

He shook his head slowly. "I am of mixed blood, a freak, a hybrid if you want to look at it that way. I am the only one of my kind, neither one nor the other."

"No, no, no, no," I threw back at him, an ache for his obvious pain, sitting in the pit of my stomach. "A skinwalker is recognisable only by the violet hue of their eyes. Correct me if I'm wrong, but you have every shade of violet there is in your eyes. There is no denying what you are."

"Correct me if I'm wrong," he smugly countered. "A vampire possesses immortality, lightning-fast speed and super strength. There is no denying I have all of those traits."

My eyes widened at his admission. I knew he had skinwalker blood with a hint of some other really cool abilities but I had figured that his Wiccan mentor used different training methods than Grandma. Never in my wildest imagination had a vampire come to mind.

He reached out and squeezed my shoulder. "Are you okay?"

I cringed at his words. I hated those words. Whenever anyone said those words to me they were filled with mock sympathy or a sense of obligation to make them appear caring or thoughtful. Rarely were those words ever filled with genuine sentiment.

"Do I scare you," he asked pulling his hand away from me. "I would never hurt....."

"Not scare, surprise," I cut him off reaching my hand out for his before dropping it awkwardly back into my lap. "For someone with so many supernatural abilities and you don't see yourself clearly."

His expression was unreadable as if it truly was carved out of marble. "I don't understand you, Mia. Rosa obviously frightens you and yet I only induce surprise and disgust."

"Disgust?" I furrowed my brow, I knew where the surprise came into it but where was he getting the disgust from. Appreciation and lust, maybe but not disgust. "I think your perception filter might be broken."

"Mia," he sighed pushing himself up and twisting his legs around to his front, resting one over the other at the ankles. "I have had nearly two centuries of experience in reading people and you are as easy to read as a book."

"If I'm so easy to read," I shot back at him, frustration and anger pulsating through me, smugness planted on my face. "Then why don't you understand me?"

Laughter burst out of him throwing his head back. I folded my arms over my chest glaring at his still laughing body, waiting for him to stop. Surely it wasn't that funny, I mean, the laughing had to have lasted a good couple of minutes before he managed to rein it in.

"I'm glad I amuse you." I pushed up from the ground brushed the leaves and dirt from my pants and started to storm off when strong arms wrapped around my waist from behind. A tirade of obscenities organised themselves in my mind ready to be thrown at him when he spun me to face him.

His breath was warm on my skin and our noses were almost touching, he was so close. My breath came short and ragged as heat flushed my cheeks. My eyes fluttered closed while my heart raced even faster than it had before.