Shapeshifter Wings

Cover made by @FlaminUnicornOfDeath on Wattpad

Her abilities make her their only threat.

Raven Meyford’s life is full of secrets and half truths. Her parents always used to tell her that her ability was normal, that all fallen angels could do the same thing. But deep in her gut she knew her parents had always been hiding something. A secret that she ultimately believes got her father killed and made her mother paranoid enough to move them off the grid.

When strange beings show up unexpectedly in their woods one morning, Raven knows she is in danger for they are like nothing she’s seen before. With them comes forth legends and truths kept secret from Raven her entire life, turning her life upside down. Now she must make a decision that will change the rest of her life forever. Normal doesn’t apply to her anymore, normal never applied to her. Nothing was ever as it seemed.

Can Raven outrun the past that is catching up to her in order to change her future? Or will all that her father died for be for nothing? There’s only one way for her to find out: She couldn’t hide behind secrets anymore.

embellishment 7

Shapeshifter Wings is a sneak peak first chapter of a fantasy novel in the works full of angels, demons, and half-bloods.

Excerpt:

My bare feet hit the accent rug beside my bed and cool air met me through the window as I eased myself out of bed, sending goosebumps up and down my bare arms. I wore nothing more than a pair of old shorts and a tank top that hung loosely around my frame. The morning Summer breeze blew through my open window, billowing the curtains out in its wake. The air was warm already, but I could still feel the faint chill in it from the night’s rain.

I stepped up to the window, folding my arms on the windowsill, and gazed out at the woods, searching for the source of the voices. All around me was nothing but endless woods, miles and miles of woods. When I said we were out in the middle of nowhere, I really meant it.

A couple minutes went by with no more sounds and no indication as to where the voices came from. But still I stayed at the window, fingering the silver winged pendant that hung from a piece of black string around my neck. The pendant was the last thing I had left of my father. My mother had said it was on father’s person when he was found murdered in that alleyway. He had bought it for me, but had never been able to give it to me. When my mother had given it to me at my father’s wake, I had burst into tears. Since then, I’d never once took the pendant off, not even when I showered.

I was about to return to my bed when the voices picked up once more. This time I could tell they were coming from my left, close to the little dirt track we called a road that lead in and out of here. I strained my eyes through the haze of dawn but could see nothing yet, the beings those voices belonged to were still out of my line of sight. What was more though, the voices had to be shouting pretty loud for me to hear them this far off if I couldn’t even see any figures yet. Granted, fallen angels — and demons and half-bloods for that matter — did have enhanced hearing, but even this was a stretch to our limits. At this distance, surrounded by trees that muffled the sound, I couldn’t even make out what they were saying to each other, though I could tell that there were two of them.

I continued to peer out the window in the direction the voices were coming from, occasionally glancing up to the sky to see if I could see any beings flying. I still didn’t know if the voices belonged to human hikers, other fallen angels, demons, or half-bloods.

Steadily, but slowly, the voices grew louder and I could catch words here and there. From what I could hear at this distance, they definitely sounded like human hikers that were out tracking some animal, possibly a bear. But a human hiker all the way out here tracking an animal was a bit odd, no one ever came this far into the woods. At least, no one human that is.

It was a good ten minutes later before my eyes finally caught sight of glimpses of moving figures. An arm there, a leg there, a hand behind a tree. By now the rising sun was over the horizon and gold streaks shone through the trees, bathing everything in dazzling light that made it impossible to see anything clearly without having to shield your eyes slightly from the bright dawn.

Leaning forward over the sill, I squinted my eyes against the dazzling morning sun and peered closer into the woods. My eyes strained against the light as I tried to discern where the moving figures were. A large shadow of wings caught my eyes deeper among the trees. As quick as I saw the shadow it vanished, the wings folding in to whatever, or whomever, they belonged to. Birds chirped here and there through the trees, their shadows flying across the ground and trees as they greeted the new day. In the dawn sun, their shadows were larger than normal, but still not nearly as large as the first shadow I had seen. Not even a hawk had that large a shadow.

I strained my eyes against the sun even more, trying to find the source of the shadow. There could only be one explanation for the size of that wing shadow.

There was a winged being in our woods.

My heart sped up at the prospect of seeing another like my kind. It had been years since I’d seen another soul like mine — besides my mother — since we moved to this forsaken place. I was more than excited to see someone new, especially if that someone was another fallen angel. Hell, I didn’t care if they were a demon or a half-blood either. I didn’t matter what they were exactly or what they wanted, all that mattered was that someone was here. I’d take the company any way it came, considering it didn’t come often.

With newfound hope I combed the woods with my eyes, listening to the voices draw nearer, as I searched for newcomers. Even though they were definitely a lot closer their voices had dropped in volume, almost as if they were trying not to be heard anymore. I couldn’t imagine why they would try to hide themselves now when they’d been so loud earlier, but I hardly cared. I just wanted to catch a glimpse of them to see if I was right on them being fallen angels. If they were, I might very well fly out to meet them in my excitement, to Hell with what my mother would think of that idea. I was lonely here. A teenager could only take so much seclusion, books only went so far with fictional characters as friends.

After what felt like hours of searching, the unknown figures finally stepped into my view. I couldn’t see their faces from where I stood watching, but I could certainly see their wings.

But it was their wings that sent a jolt of cold fear to my gut and effectively drowned all the hope I had been stock-piling in the past ten minutes.

embellishment 7