I don't own The Night World or seek to profit from the ideas or characters that belong to another. The Night World belongs to the wonderful L. J Smith. I thank her for creating such a wonderful series that I can borrow for the use of my characters.
The characters in this story are fictional and any similarities to living people are accidental. As this story contains sex between males, you need to be of legal age to be reading this story and if you don't want to be reading about sex between young men you might want to stop now. Feedback is very welcome, as is anyone who is keen to pre-read or edit for me. All can be sent to me via my profile. I hope you all enjoy!
Author's Note: Thanks for all the generous feedback. Apologies for the long delay of this chapter and thank for your patience, internet problems and life meant this took a back seat. But here it is the chapter you've all waited patiently before. Also thanks to the reader who gave me the idea for the hall fight and to take the fight to the country, this was originally in Glasgow. Enjoy the ride!
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I was jostled awake not long after dawn by a hard prod in the back. I felt my own fidgety shifting had woken my soulmate up for the second night in a row as I tossed fitfully from another of my uneasy dreams.
I felt him lean over me and saw both my hands were gripping the sheets in tight fists. I could see my claws were out and I had ripped the sheets and my own hands up with the same claws as they stabbed into the mattress, clawing my own nightmares.
I felt him sigh and get out of bed to fetch a damp facecloth from the ensuite bathroom attached to this room. He crouched naked in front of me and began to firmly coax my fingers to release my stranglehold of the sheets.
He used the cloth to clean up my own blood and self inflicted cuts, cuts that were already healing as he cleaned them. I felt him shift as he knelt on the floor his fingers moving to stroke my face comfortingly.
He kissed the side of my neck and shoulder nuzzling against my ear. I inhaled the familiar smell of him a unique mix of falcon, cold alpine air, and grass with a distinctive peppery undertone. I felt him drop the cloth on the floor and stroke his fingers through my hair.
As always if I was anywhere near the smell of him and his warm, hard body my own body responded, as I felt his own react. Because I was touching him the soulmate bond was enveloping our minds in hazy blue mist and I could feel his emotions, see his thoughts and I knew he could see the nightmare as the images still flickered through me.
It was the same reoccurring dream I'd been having off and on for the past two days. It was a natural response to the disastrous events we had faced with Michael and the larger looming war with the Night World.
I was running through a house that bore a perfect resemblance to the house of Michael's friends and was trying yet again to get to him before the gun shot went off.
I felt Chay's awareness of me in his head and his need to comfort me, stop the problem.
I felt my own purr as I slid my hand down to wrap my fingers around the wrist of his free hand, my fingers stroking his pulse. I felt his own matching desire for me in his mind, in the tensing of his muscles, his rocketing pulse and I could smell sex on him from earlier on that night.
Without reaching down to stroke his cock I could smell and feel his own arousal and knew he was hard too.
I felt him nuzzle my neck humming a tune that was nearly a soothing purr; I recognised it as an old Finnish lullaby I'd heard before, as he chased the dream out of my head.
In so many ways Chay he is the falcon that lives in him and in his own way is ruled by his instincts, in his savage drive to protect or defend his territory, his devotion to and passionate need of his mate.
But there is willingness in him to be coldly ruthless to get what he want, to get his prey. He is far more patient, precise and merciless then I am.
I could hear him think me reckless, hot heated and impulsive. The falcon he is hunts by using sheer relentless power, fear and merciless patience to exhaust his victims, he's far more intelligent than I am, the thinker and planner.
He thought I was taking what happened to Michael and this war we are in too much to heart and far too personally, this war was not going to end well. He thought the pragmatic thing was to move on to the next thing.
But my thoughts had strayed from his, I'd released him from our mingling thoughts but not for long, he never let me deny him for long.
He shifted pushing me over as he moved back up onto the bed and slid in next to me. He wrapped himself around me and pressed his lips into the hollow of my throat still humming the same old wordless tune. I felt his leg wind through mine, his foot stroking my calf.
I felt his fierce focus on me and was surprised to realise my own arms had wrapped around him with my fingers tangled in his hair as. I didn't remember doing that, it was so instinctive to touch him and respond.
I felt him pull me deeper into his mind, into his own memories. He distracted me with his own memories of flying as a falcon letting me feel and experience it through him.
I felt my own purr and his hum as I offered up my own treasured memories of running and stalking as a lynx, such was the way we distracted and comforted each other.
I must have dozed lost in our memories and the song he was humming because when I next opened my eyes time had passed and Chad had drifted back to sleep, I could see the approaching dawn through the blinds.
I felt the edgy restless urge to run to shake loose the thoughts and feelings still haunting me. Locked in the shape of a lynx I'd be beyond it, a lynx doesn't dwell on anything except prey, shelter, sex, danger and the odd bit of play.
Carefully I wriggled away from him untangling my limbs from his and couldn't help watching him for a moment. His fair hair was loose and mussed, his pale skin still flushed pink from sleep, face and body relaxed.
Pulling on my furry dark shifter pants and shirt I didn't bother with shoes, I wouldn't need them as a lynx, I padded to the bathroom down the hall to piss and then padded out of the house. I jogged to the big park a mile up the road, most safehouses were close to a big park with a small forest of trees and ours was no exception.
Once I was hidden by the trees I dropped to the ground and shifted feeling that familiar rush of pain and elation as I became the lynx. On all fours I trotted even further into the trees and began to run.
When I'd run my skittish nerves to exhaustion I sprawled out on the leafy ground under a willow tree to catch my breath.
I lazed, drifting as I listened to and smelled the sounds and scents of scurrying animals as they attended to the never ending business of finding food, defending territories and raising young. I even heard a couple of early runners doing their bit to stay fit even at this early hour.
One sound and scent caught my attention more than the others as I opened my eyes and glanced up to see the gyrfalcon landing on a branch of my willow tree. He folded his wings and watched me with those fierce dark eyes. I felt his hunter's pride, the satisfaction that he'd found me and the annoyance that I'd left without him.
I yawned feeling my ears flick at him knowing he could feel my amusement with him. I felt the sudden push-pull release of shifter energy as he shifted, to me it looked like his form wavered and flickered like a desert mirage or the heat haze above a road on a hot summer day, leaving the human sitting on the branch.
He jumped easily to the ground clothed in his white feathered clothing and simply waited as I still watched him.
"Why didn't you wake me up? You know I can't sleep without you." He grumbled.
I yawned again as I considered him, I got up and leisurely stretched out my strong supple cat body. I sauntered up to him, and I nudged him, rubbing against him affectionately. Being deliberately annoying as I knew he hated it, I licked the back of his hand with my rough tongue.
Sneezing violently I laughed as only a feline can as the exasperation, disgust and affection fought it out in his expression as he wiped the back of his hand against his pants.
I rubbed against him again purring as I deliberately leaned all my weight on him. He didn't move except to lock his legs and drop his hand in the short ruff on my neck, stroking the fur there with those long killing fingers of his.
Without warning I darted away from him feeling him fall against the willow tree in surprise at the abrupt loss of my weight against him. I growled at him playfully and unable to resist a challenge Chay smirked back lunging towards me; the game was on as I took off.
Alternating between human and falcon Chay chased me through the trees. There was a point where I lost him, he simply disappeared and that concerned the human and lynx equally, he was too good a hunter to lose me with the simple distraction tactic I'd used.
I crouched in the shelter of some bushes, still a lynx, my senses were better as a cat, and I strained my eyes, ears and nose to pick up any trace of him. I even checked the trees above me and silver cord, still nothing, not good.
Without warning a shadow dropped not out of the tree above me, but out of the tree behind me, and pounced on me easily bowling me over.
For a few minutes the pair of us wrestled on the forest floor, still human against cat, until I managed to wriggle free and dashed off again, realizing he let me, he was too skilled a killer and hunter. Scrambling to his feet I felt the grin, the hunger for the hunt that was singing through him, as he chased after me through the trees.
Getting far enough ahead of him, I was faster as a cat then he was as a human, I hid behind a thick oak tree and shifted, calling back my human form. I allowed him to approach my tree and saw him stop; he cocked his head clearly listening, sharp eyes scanning the area.
Before he could get a lock on me I jumped out from my hiding place, using my momentum to pounce on him. This time I bowled him over, I felt the instinctive, experienced tensing of his muscles as he automatically readied to defend or kill and abrupt release of that terrible energy as he recognized the feel and scent of me.
I smirked at my falcon as I pinned his sprawled body to the grass, he smirked back at me, his colour high, hair wild and dark eyes smoky with lust, flashing with the wildness of a hunt.
I quirked a challenging eyebrow knowing my green eyes would be reflecting the same heat and wildness. His own body was also stirring with the feel of me pressing against him and I couldn't help rubbing against him, marking him with my scent as my own cock hardened.
Chay's smirk stretched quickly shifting into that rare grin of his, as he titled his head back offering his throat and his body. He was so proud, so pleased that I'd managed to beat him it gave him hope that I'd survive this war.
