Craved: A Chosen Ones Novel Read Online Free PDF Page A

realized. I was a Nephilim and an active member of The Society. I hunted daemons five out of seven nights of the week. I was good at it, but eventually a daemon would come along that was better. Stronger, faster, more powerful. Hell, one had already come along last night. It had to be by the grace of the Most High that I was still breathing, instead of lying dead on a backstreet in Five Points drained dry. I was sure that if I ever met the Brethren or another one like him, my luck wouldn’t hold a second time.  
    Nephilim could theoretically have extended life spans. The Archangel half of our heritage meant we didn’t succumb easily to human illnesses and diseases, and if we did they were never lethal. We were under the weather for a few days, healed swiftly, then got over whatever was affecting us. We could be mortally wounded as easily as our human counterparts, but even that didn’t necessarily result in our death. We couldn’t heal ourselves, but if another Nephilim was around, or got to us quick enough before the last of our life force drained from us, they could. Nephilim could heal other Nephilim, just like Nephilim could heal humans. It was the reason why when Bennett had been elected as Sect Leader, his first order of business was to group the Atlanta sect’s members into pairs and demand that they patrol with their partner. And yet for all of our enhanced endurance, we still died young. Tragically and ironically young.  
    My Dad wasn’t even an active member of The Society anymore. He left it and his duty as a Nephilim behind the day my mother gave birth to me in an effort to protect me from what was the near certain fate of all Nephilim. He’d wanted me to have what chances were more than good I never would if he’d stayed— a long, full life. Ironically, he still died way too young at thirty-two along with my mother, his non-Nephilim wife. Then there was Deacon and Danielle. They’d died too. Two years ago at eighteen.
    I physically shook my head to mentally clear my mind. Blinking back the threat of tears, I carefully put those thoughts away. Re-locking them into the parts of my mind and my heart that I usually kept pushed far to the back of the closet, deep down under an ocean of water, and buried within a mountain of granite. I didn’t know why the thoughts weighed on me today, pushing the door of their iron-barred cell open a bit. Maybe it had to do with my near death experience the night before. Whatever the reason, I shoved the thoughts back inside their cell, slamming the bars shut with a loud bang.
    Having gathered my wits about myself, I climbed the steep steps up to the heavy wooden door with intricate carvings that were actually symbols of a language so foreign it was not of the Earthly plane. They marked the house as the hidden in plain sight headquarters of the Atlanta sect of The Society. I brushed my hand over the carvings in the spot near the door’s knocker where a tiny piece of jagged silver protruded from it. I allowed the silver to nick my index finger just enough for a tiny drop of blood to bead onto its surface. It rolled into a crevice made by one of the carvings and the door swung open.
    The first floor of the inside of the antebellum-style home had long been gutted and in its place was an open area with tables, benches, and chairs scattered throughout. Situated off to the right of the open expanse of space sat a large meeting room with stadium seating and a raised podium at the head of it that was large enough to fit every member of the Atlanta sect in it and then some. The room was used for our monthly meetings and for any other time that required us to gather en masse.
    I nodded a quick but courteous passing greeting to a few of the Society members milling about the first floor whose gazes happened to lock with mine by chance. Then I hurried past the informal gathering area where a lot of members casually hung out when they had a little time to kill. To the left of the