Free Ignited by Desni Dantone Page A

heard it was possible, but had never actually witnessed it before. It was pretty cool—and a little funny—to watch. When he seemed to have it figured out, he glanced at me, and I didn’t hide the amusement on my face. 
    “Let’s go.” He stuffed the map and flashlight into the camouflage bag along with the rest of our gear, and flung it over his shoulder.
    “Wait,” I said. “Did you just use the stars as a guide?” 
    “Uh-huh.” He sounded bored as he started for the edge of the woods, opposite the direction I had run earlier.
    “You learn that in the boy scouts?” I was impressed, though he wouldn’t be able to tell through all the sarcasm.
    “I wasn’t a boy scout.”
    Yeah, no kidding. I was pretty sure they taught manners. “So, how did you learn to do that?”
    He turned to me as I trotted across the road after him. His face carried a blend of reluctantly amused annoyance, but when his eyes flicked to mine briefly, and then snapped back a second later, all traces of humor were gone. I didn’t know what I had done to piss him off that fast, but the look on his face brought me up short, and I cowered as he closed the distance between us. He dropped the sac to the ground and tipped my face up to his, tilting it from side to side. I realized this was the first he was seeing whatever damage that man-beast had done. Standing in the road, under a gap in the tree canopy, the moonlight showed him what he had previously overlooked.
    If the blue storm clouds I was looking into were any indication, I was sure he wished he could bring that guy back just so he could kill him again. After slowly peeling off every one of his toenails.
    Or maybe that was what I wanted.
    “Did this happen from the accident?” His voice was tight.
    I shook my head.
    “In the woods?”
    I nodded, and his jaw twitched.
    “Did you hear me yelling for you?” I saw the barely discernible nod of his head; saw that he wasn’t going to like hearing what was coming. “He smacked me around to shut me up.”
    Nathan’s eyes narrowed, hardened. He definitely didn’t like hearing that. Wordlessly, he lifted the hem of his sweatshirt, moistened a section with his tongue, and dabbed at the corners of my mouth and chin.
    “I don’t see where this came from,” he murmured to himself as he worked. He lifted his eyes to mine. “Is this your blood?”
    I shook my head. “He tried suffocating me.” Nathan’s hand stopped moving as he waited for me to continue. “So I bit him.”
    He nodded and I thought maybe, just maybe, he nearly smiled.
    “I drew blood.” I paused to consider something I hadn’t thought about until then. My voice rose in a panic. “Wait a minute. I got his blood in my mouth.”
    Nathan eyed me curiously, like he wasn’t sure he wanted to know where I was going with that. Did I want to go there? Too late now. I had to go there.
    My voice trembled. “Am I going to become whatever he was?”
    Nathan dropped his hand, letting his sweatshirt fall back into place. He looked at me and, this time, I knew he was trying to keep from laughing. “Whatever he was?” he repeated slowly.
    “He wasn’t normal. He wasn’t...” I shrugged. Did I really want to finish that thought?
    “What?”
    “I don’t know. It’s not like a vampire or zombie kind of thing, is it? Because I don’t believe in that stuff.”
    “Then why did you just ask if you would turn into whatever he was?”
    I narrowed my eyes at him. “Just answer the question.”
    “No, you won’t turn into whatever he was. Not because you got his blood in your mouth. Not ever.”
    I stared at Nathan warily. “So what was he anyway?”
    Nathan looked over my head and took a deep breath. “We’ve got to get moving, get off the road.”
    My voice rose again, this time in anger. “Are you ever going to tell me what’s going on?”
    He glanced at his watch like he was planning to set up an appointment to talk to me. “We’ve got a few hours of walking