Dominion of the Star (Descendants of the Fallen Book 1) Read Free

Eclipse…and now…” She ran with
Kayla’s arm in her grasp, letting her last grave words dissolve into the heavy
summer air.

 
    2
     
    A fingertip brushed lightly against Kayla’s collarbone as
she turned restlessly in her sleep, but it was the sharp edges of the bone in
her pocket that woke her. She sat up suddenly, straining her dream-clouded
senses for recognition of her surroundings and situation. Jeremy was sitting
very close to her. He seemed to have been staring into the dying fire until her
abrupt movement caused him to glance sidelong at her.
    “You okay?”
    She instinctively clutched the
box around her neck and then nodded.
    Jeremy’s head absently mimicked
her gesture before he slid himself a few feet away from the fire to sit,
leaning casually against one of the trees lining their camp. He watched as
Kayla twisted her long, red hair into a coil over her shoulder so that the
night air could reach the back of her neck. “Why are you out here?”
    She looked down at her hair. “I
told you…I was on my way to Madeline.”
    “Yeah, I know. But why?”
    “I’m looking for someone. Ash—”
    “Ssh!” Jeremy hissed through
clenched teeth. Then, seeing her wide-eyed confusion, added, “That won’t help
you find this person. That’s how you’ll find a predator. I don’t wanna know the
name, and you shouldn’t spread it around.”
    Kayla turned her head away, her
facial muscles tense. She felt as if the world beyond the town she left was
already incomprehensible.
    When he spoke again, there was
a trace of kindness in Jeremy’s rough tone. “Listen…you seem like wherever you
came from, you’ve been lucky enough to be sheltered from what’s been going on
out here. But you’ll be safer if you keep who you’re looking for to yourself.
And if that last name of yours isn’t a fake, make one up. First lesson in not
getting eaten alive.”
    She didn’t understand why she
had to conceal her own identity. Why would it even matter? But she couldn’t
ignore the urgency in his harsh whisper. “Sorry,” she mumbled, at a loss. They
both sat silently for a while before she braved speaking again. “So what about
you? Why are you out here?”
    He laughed a little. “All
right, that’s fair. Well, Kit sort of tells fortunes. We can make pretty good
money in the summer doing that kind of thing, and I help her out, provide
protection… But this time, when we got to Madeline, it was under attack. We ran
into some trouble,” he motioned to his bandaged arm and head wound with a grin,
“but hopefully we’ll have better luck in Torin. It’s a ways east, but it’s on
our way home.”
    She watched Jeremy as he
talked. He seemed completely relaxed, leaning casually against the tree behind
him, one arm locked, his palm to the ground, while his other hand rested behind
his head, his elbow jutting brazenly out of its bandage. His long legs were
sprawled out before him, ending in heavy boots that dented the earth. He was
clad entirely in black; the only exception the dirty, white dressings that
covered his right arm from knuckles to shoulder. The shape of his legs were
almost hidden by the wide cut of his heavy pants, weighed down with large side
pockets, but his sleeveless shirt was like a thin undergarment, revealing his
lean, powerful form. Emerging from his ragged and scorched clothing was his one
bare arm, defined by hard lines and patterns of scars, and right above the edge
of his collar she could make out the dark band of a tattoo.
    Jeremy noted her glance, and
with a swift movement that matched the tightening of his shoulders, he pulled
his shirt up to cover the marking on his chest. Kayla quickly looked away,
searching for something else to focus on. She saw Kittie sleeping close by on
what appeared to be a protective over-shirt, Jeremy’s size. She was lying
carelessly on her stomach, mouth open, her smooth and innocent face surrounded
by cascades of warm brown hair. Kittie didn’t look like she