Blood Rites Read Online Free Page A

surrounding the fire. Slowly, she moved around the circle, hugging her new brethren, sharing separately the thoughts of each as she faced them.
    In each, she sensed hope, but felt it strongest in the women. A terrible burden had been lifted from them. Their lives would not be needed to save their race. Helen, with her unique human power, could bear children and live.
    Forever.
    The thought dizzied her. She took an unsteady step forward and gripped Rachel, who was nearest her, for support, then moved from her to Denys.
    He raised his hands and stretched between them she saw a gold chain. A crystal teardrop, black as the eyes of her new family, dangled from it. She bowed her head and he placed the chain around her neck. The crystal still held the warmth of the fire that had forged it and, more, a steadying power she would only understand with time.
    “ Nas gevornes !” We are born! Denys chanted, then whispered to her, “Welcome.”
    Did she sense an invitation beneath the simplicity of that word? Perhaps someday, she thought. After all, their affection had forever in which to grow.
    The circle broke into groups of two and three. Helen saw Stephen standing in the shadows at the edge of the trees. She walked to him and he took her hand and led her away from the fire, down a winding footpath. As they moved, their speed increased until she was running, running swiftly behind him toward his home.
    —Our home.—
    Though he hadn’t asked a question, she could refuse. Helen didn’t think to be coy or to tease the uncertainty Stephen tried to hide. She wanted him more than she ever had before. She merged passion and assent into one quick thought and was pleased to see Stephen stumble and whirl, ready to catch her. She hit him without stopping and they fell together onto the twisted thyme lawn that surrounded the house.
    “Here,” she whispered and lay on her back, staring up at the scattering of stars.
    Since the night she first exchanged blood with Stephen, they had shared a mental bond. She would feel his need before they touched; he would sense her demands even when she did not speak of them. But tonight’s family bonding let her sense more than Stephen. As Stephen unbuttoned the front of her green cotton blouse, she felt Rachel’s quiet passion as she lay on top of Denys, her long dark hair tickling his chest. She became Denys, feeling him harden, his lips brushing the tips of Rachel’s breasts.
    She merged with Ann and James and Sebastian gliding four-footed up the hill, bringing down a deer in some forest clearing, feeding briefly on its blood and terror, then letting it go. Only life tonight.
    She felt the silent laughter as Marilyn ran, pursued by her evening’s suitors, laughing still when she let them catch her and pull her down.
    She shared the human rapture as, in an empty clearing, Elizabeth lay beside her human lover. Through her mind, Paul Stoddard became part of the sharing, through his blood in her, he became part of them all, and he lay open to the rapture as Elizabeth’s face hovered above him, a dark shadow against the stars.
    She sensed them all, a dozen minds around her.
    And in the distance, too far for even her ears to hear, Laurence played a flute. It flowed through her mind like the family’s thoughts.
    Lost in them, she felt Stephen undressing her as if she were one of the others and he someone else, felt his hands pushing apart her legs as if they were Rachel’s hands pulling Denys deeper into her or Laurence’s fingers fluttering quickly over the pipes.
    His need, hers, theirs, so perfectly one.
    She heard Stephen’s laughter, coming it seemed from a great distance. She felt his brief stab of pain as he bit his lip and then he was kissing her, feeding her his blood, forcing her back to him. He hadn’t touched her since her changing but it made no difference. He knew her body as perfectly as if it were his own.
    She screamed his name as he entered her, mentally kept on screaming it as he