The First Male Read Free Page A

it was nothing more than a trick. The child was deceitful.
    Addie chanted as she let drops of her blood fall into his mouth. The child lapped up her blood as if it was mother’s milk. He could not resist the taste of blood. She anointed his head and his heart with her blood as she chanted, attempting to bind his power and imbue his heart with light. She felt weak, as if the child was draining her life force. Her eyes rolled to the back of her head and her knees buckled, but she continued her appointed task.
    She did not hear the heavy footsteps of the Shadowman punishing the rotting wooden floor until it was too late. A sudden force sent her careening into the wall, knocking a few wooden knick-knacks off the shelf. A figurine in the form of a bright-faced angel fell to the floor and rolled toward him. He raised his muddy black boot and crushed the angel without thought.
    Addie had been blasted by shadow magic and it drained her already weakened frame. The dank air, contaminated by his wretched odor, offended her nostrils and sent her lungs into a spasm.
    She waved her hand across her face and blocked his stench—she had no time for distraction. When she looked up, she saw the Shadowman walking slowly toward the child, who was held suspended in the air by his power. The child’s cries were intermittent and uneven, not at all like the cries of a normal newborn.
    Addie shook off the shadow magic, conjured a force as powerful as the one she had been hit with, and blasted the Shadowman. He crashed into the wall, his shadows howling; the part of him that was flesh took the lion’s share of the blow.
    Addie stood up and called for the child. He floated easily through the air into her arms as the Shadowman stood.
    Why do you resist what is meant to be? The voice came from the faceless blackness under his hood. His question sounded sincere, as if he had struggled to understand her resistance. When he spoke, his voice sounded musical to Addie’s ears, but she knew it was another trick.
    â€œYou cannot have this child,” Addie retorted forcefully.
    He belongs to me .
    â€œHe is of my blood. He belongs to me.”
    He is The One .
    â€œHe will never be yours.”
    By prophecy he is mine; the first male born of the first male. You could not prevent his birth; it has been ordained. He is mine . This time when he spoke, thunder cracked so loudly that the shack clattered.
    â€œYou do not scare me with your feeble tricks, Eetwidomayloh.”
    Be not afraid of what is and what will be .
    Addie looked once again into the face of the child. She could not imagine this beautiful child as the destroyer of worlds; she simply would not have it. The spiraling colors in his eyes dimmed a bit, which told her that her blood and her magic were taking root; maybe his powers could be bound.
    Then, Addie felt her body stiffen, as if encased in stone. The child floated out of her arms toward Eetwidomayloh. She looked on in panic, fearful that she would not be able to prevent him from taking the child. If he succeeded in stealing the child, he might be able to undo her very immature binding spell. She could not let that happen. She would not let that happen. She focused the last bit of her strength and freed herself from his stranglehold.
    She was breathless and dizzied, but she continued to use the ancient power. As the child reached his arms, and as she had yearsago with her son, she snatched the child away. In a harrowing split second, she opened a portal on the back wall that looked like a portrait of slick, black oil; the portal vibrated like waves in a still pool that had suddenly been disturbed by a pebble tossed into the water.
    With the child in her arms and with her last bit of strength, she jumped into the portal and vanished, as did the portal.
    No! The Shadowman’s cries poured deep into the night; the ground beneath his feet trembled, and every living thing—every plant, every blade of grass, every tree,