Free HER SWEETEST DOWNFALL (Paranormal Romance / Fantasy Novella) (Forever Girl Series - a Journal) by rebecca hamilton Page A

on your path. If I fail to see you to your calling, they will only move me to start fresh. Another girl, another place.”
    “So this is it? I can’t ‘ave a life of my own?”
    “You are free to do as you wish, but I cannot be the reason you deny your calling. I won’t .”
    “I understand—”
    “No, you don’t.”
    “They can make their orders, but the decision would still belong to ye.”
    The corner of Ethan’s lips turned up, as though to smile, but the expression was more of a grimace. “Everything isn’t a choice. I accepted my calling long ago, and now I must go where they send me.”
    “Ye can’t just say no?”
    “It is for life. I have always gone willingly, but should they choose, they can move me where they need me, and there will be nothing I can do to stop it.”
    “That’s not right. Ye should always have a choice.”
    “Sometimes we meet challenges. Other times we dodge consequences.”
    “We’re being forced into this. There is nothing ye can say to change that.”
    “Then you plan to go through with your calling?”
    Ophelia sighed, though it didn’t release the weight on her chest; the confusion just kept crashing through her. 
    “What choice do I ‘ave?” she asked wearily.
    She wasn’t sure where she stood anymore. What kind of ‘choice’ was this? Either she would sacrifice her own life to save humanity, or she would hold selfishly to the things she wanted in exchange for a life on the run. A life knowing her selfish choices had doomed herself and everyone else. Yes, her father had been right when he’d said she could never make up her mind . . . but this was more than that. 
    That night, as Ophelia closed her eyes and began to drift to sleep, she heard Ethan whisper, “I tried to go after you, Ophelia. I tried.”
    But she had not been meant to hear, and so she said nothing, kept her eyes closed, and pretended she was already asleep.

Damascus, 1808
    Shortly after nightfall, Lenore stumbled into the cabin, her boots clobbering across the dirt floor. She eased herself to the ground by the fireplace and rested on her back, wincing. Her hand clasped the amulet around her neck, and she closed her eyes. Ophelia almost choked on the smell—the rotting stink of burnt skin.
    “Everything hurts,” Lenore mumbled.
    Ethan’s gaze steadied on the open sores of Lenore’s sun-blisters. “You spent the whole day outside?”
    “It’s been centuries.”  
    Ethan strode over to the counter and prepared her a glass of his blood then brought it over to her. 
    “Elevate her head,” he said to Ophelia. “She’s too weak.”
    With a resolute nod, Ophelia kneeled on the ground beside Lenore. As she lifted the Cruor-girl’s head into her lap, Lenore gasped, and Ethan hurried over with the glass of blood. He tilted the glass against her lips, but Lenore could barely swallow the blood. Her head lolled to one side, blood seeping out the corner of her mouth and dribbling down her chin and into the creases of her neck. The firelight danced over the spots of white on her teeth that were not coated in red.
    Ophelia lifted her gaze to Ethan. “Will she be all right?”
    “If we can get her to drink.” To Lenore, he said, “Do you not think about these things? You should have returned hours ago.”
    “I haven’t see the sun—” Lenore coughed. “—in two hund—”
    For a second time, Ethan attempted to help Lenore drink the blood, and this time, she managed to swallow a few sips. Some color returned to her cheeks and her eyes brightened.
    “Can you sit up?”
    Lenore tried, but the effort seemed to take more of her energy, and Ethan told her to lay back and rest.
    “She really needs human blood.” He turned his deep brown, apologetic eyes to Ophelia. “Do you think . . . ?”
     “Now?” Ophelia eyes went wide. “Ye want me to change now ?”
    Ethan nodded.
    She took a shaky breath. Once she did this, there would be no turning back. Things would only get worse.