Page 31 of Blood Lust

The other Wren whispers sweet promises of what could be if I let go. If I let her in.

Surrender control.

She is seductive and compelling, and it would be oh-so-easy to step aside and let her in. I don’t want to. This is my body, my mind, not hers.

You don’t belong here. I do.

She’s lying. We are supposed to be one. I belong here as much as she does.

Almost as if she is pacing a cage, I feel her desperation to rise to the surface, to be released. She whispers more to me. Promises of pleasure, swearing how much easier it will be for us if we rely on her instincts.

My brows knit together as I feed. The war inside my mind is something only I can be aware of. I didn’t know how to fight her off.

Don’t fight me.

She’s insisting.

Suddenly, it hurts. It’s like a sharp pain digs into my skull. The other Wren is taking her fingers and clawing her way into me. I don’t want it, and I don’t trust her. I want nothing more than for her to get away from me. The effort forces the part of myself that is me, my consciousness, my sense of self, further into the recesses of my mind. I don’t want her touching me at all. The darkness, the wild abandonment of reason. No, it can stay far away from me.

Suits me just fine.

I realize too late that she is making a play to control my body. I feel her slink her way into the mechanics of my nervous system. Everything I am is now hers to command. I struggle to stop her, to force my way back in. No use, it was over the moment she had her claws in me.

I feel as she pulls harder.

I can see what’s happening, but I am powerless to stop it.

I see my arms grip tight onto the human.

I feel when drinking turns to ripping.

Shredding.

Oz is behind me, trying to pull me off. Rolando had his hands on the man, trying to get him out of my grasp.

MINE.

I drink his blood and continue to tear at his throat. The arms trying to pull me from him are nothing.

Screeching as I devour him.

I can't hear. I can’t see. The only thing that exists is hunger and my prey.

I don’t release him until his heart stops beating.

Rising to my feet, I stare at my handiwork. A sickening wave of satisfaction washes over me, and in an instant, the other Wren is gone. Retreating back inside of me where she came from, I am left to pick up the pieces of her destruction.

I freeze in place, staring at nothing.

A flutter of activity surrounds me. The triplets take my victim’s body from the room and bring it outside. I can hear the clanking of wood being brought together, the sound of something liquid spraying, and then the whoosh of flames as the fire licks his corpse.

Rolando and Charlee set to work removing the blood from the couch.

Hands cup my face, and I don’t know how long they’ve been there. Oz is trying to get my attention. He blocks my view of the distant corner I am staring at.

“WREN!”

Oz is shouting at me?

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