Free Cravings by Laurell K. Hamilton, Eileen Wilks, REBECCA YORK, MaryJanice Davidson Page A

those metaphysical cords that
bound me to Jean-Claude and Richard. I had a confusing image of meat and
viscera, and other bodies crowding close. The pack was feeding. I shoved that
image away, because it wanted me to bite down. Richard's muzzle was buried deep
into the warmth of the body, buried in the sweet things inside. I had to run
from those feelings, before I fed on Nathaniel the way they were feeding on the
deer.
    I found Jason lying pale on Jean-Claude's bed, bleeding on the sheets.
Jean-Claude's blood thirst was quenched but there were other hungers. He looked
up at me, as if he could see me. His eyes were drowning blue, and I felt it, the
ardeur had risen in him. Risen in a wave of heat that left him staring down at
Jason's still form with thoughts that had nothing to do with blood.
    He spoke, his voice echoing through me. "I must shut you out,
ma petite
,
something is wrong tonight. You will force me to do things I do not wish to do.
Feed the ardeur,
ma petite
, choose its flame, before another hunger
comes and carries you away." With that, he was gone. Gone as if a door had
slammed shut between us. I had a moment to realize that he'd slammed a door
between not just himself, but Richard and me, as well. So that I was suddenly
cut adrift.
    I was alone with the feel of Nathaniel's pulse in my mouth. His flesh was so
warm, so warm, and his pulse beat like something alive inside his skin. I wanted
to free that struggling, quivering thing. I wanted to break it free of its cage.
To free Nathaniel of this cage of flesh. To set him free.
    I fought not to bite down, because some part of me knew that if I once tasted
blood that I would feed. I would feed, and Nathaniel might not survive it.
    A hand grabbed mine, grabbed mine and held on. I knew who it was before I
raised my face from Nathaniel's thigh. Damian knelt beside us. His touch helped
me get to my knees, helped me think, at least a little. But the ardeur didn't go
away. It pulled back like the ocean drawing back from the shore, but it didn't
leave, and I knew it would come back. Another wave was building, and when it
crashed over us, we needed a plan.
    "Something's wrong," I said, and my voice shook. I held on to Damian's hand
like it was the last solid thing in the world.
    "I felt the ardeur rise, and I thought, great, just great, left out again.
Then it changed."
    "It felt wonderful," Nathaniel's voice came distant and dreamy, as if all
he'd been having was good foreplay.
    "Didn't you feel it change?" I asked.
    "Yes," he said.
    "Weren't you afraid?"
    "No," he said, "I knew you wouldn't hurt me."
    "I'm glad one of us was so sure."
    He raised up onto his knees, from where he'd half swooned. "Trust yourself.
Trust what you feel. It changed when you tried to fight it. Stop fighting it."
He leaned in towards me. "Let me be your food."
    I shook my head, and clung to Damian's hand, but it was as if I could feel
the tide rushing back towards the shore. Feel the wave building, building, and
when it came, it would sweep us away. I didn't want to be swept away.
    "If Jean-Claude told you to feed the ardeur, then feed it," Damian said.
"What I felt from you just now was closer to blood lust." His face was very
serious, sorrowful even. "You don't want to know what blood lust can make you
do, Anita. You don't want that."
    "Why is it different tonight?" It was a child asking someone to explain why
the monster under the bed has grown a new and scarier head.
    "I don't know, but I do know that for the first time when you touch me, I
feel it. A dim echo, but I feel it. Always before, Anita, when you touched me,
it went away." He made a movement with his fingers like putting out a candle,
"snuffed out. Tonight…" He leaned over my hand, and I knew he was going to lay
his lips across my knuckles. One of the gifts of the ardeur is that it lets you
look inside someone's heart. It lets you see what they truly feel. When his lips
touched my