Fallen

Chapter 1

Picture is of Cadi :) And please give this book a chance x

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The only thing I can smell right now is my own blood, pooling out of the cut in my leg. The pain is unbearable. I can see my own reflection in the ravenous thing's eyes: what is it, wolf or dog? I'd guess wolf. Dogs aren't usually this vicious, or this big.

All I know is it wants my blood. Well. More of it. I look down where the claws ripped through my skin. I close my eyes as the rest of it's pack close in - is it the whole pack? There's about five of them in total. I blink feebly. We were never told to expect ravenous angry wolves wanting to eat us - we were taught that the mortal world loved angels and that it would be easy to pass our initiation. All we had to do was stay out of the way of demons.

Evidently it's not so easy. The wolf opens it's mouth so I can see it's razor-sharp, gleaming teeth. Thunder rolls across the sky, the lightning tearing through the inky black of the night like it's paper. The rain makes the wolves' fur matted and drenched, and my hair much the same.

I can't believe I'm thinking about my hairstyle when I'm going to die.

My ratty curls are too dark blonde and my eyes more grey than blue, and my skin tans very easily. I don't have the fragile beauty that angels are supposed to have and appreciate; the delicate, slim, willowy figure; the creamy milk-white china skin; the bright blue eyes and the pale blonde curls. I need to lose some weight. I'm not fat or anything. I' m not even overweight, just very curvy, but angels don't tend to like that.

Why should they? It's nowhere near as beautiful as some of the perfect girls that I used to admire, back at home. They were the sweet, pretty girls. They always tried to include me. Despite stereotype, their good looks didn't make them the spawn of the devil. Everyone was friendly to me, it's just that despite their efforts I always felt like an outsider. The big clumsy ugly one. If we were in a group, I'd be the fifth wheel.

I hated it. Guys never liked me, girls didn't really, and neither did most adults, including my parents. I knew they wanted a model daughter, someone like my mother, but I was nothing like that.

Why did that even matter? I'm about to die, in the rain, looking absolutely awful as usual, by the hands of a ravenous angry wolf pack who have been chasing me for hours. My feet are sore and bleeding, and I'm absolutely exhausted after running for the past one hundred and twenty minutes.

Hey, at least I probably lost some weight after that marathon.

I close my eyes and think of some happy moments of my life. Welcoming the death.

When the wolf lets out a loud howl.

My eyes snap open - it sounds like pain, not victory, not a cheer that it's finally going to get a meal. More howls punctuate the air. Some kind of dark shadow spins around like a whirl wind, and soon the five wolves are lying, dead on the forest floor. I whimper. Maybe he's a crazed maniac. Maybe I'm his next victim ...

"What's your name?" he asks. His voice is husky, exotic, deep; not the voice of a murderer.

"C- Cadi."

"Are you hurt?" His voice thrills me. "Can you stand?"

"N- no. And yeah, I can stand ... I think." And I can, though I wince from the pain and tears flood my eyes. I hobble over to him, the twigs and dry leaves snapping beneath my feet, and I can hear him chuckle to himself.

"When I said can you stand, I meant without hurting yourself."

"I- I'm fine. Really."

He doesn't reply, just scoops me up and begins walking through the forest with me. He must be strong. Like I said, I'm hardly tiny, and he hardly makes a sound. It's kind of relaxing, being in his capable arms, especially when I saw how easily he killed the wolves. If he really is on my side, he can help me. Then there's the fact that I imagine him as being really hot.