Eternal Shadows Read Online Free PDF Page A

blood I had been denying myself. My own skin felt cold like ice with his warm hand wrapped around my arm. I wanted to be warm. I wanted to feel alive, and not half-dead. I wanted to drink, and drink, and drink…
    I terrified myself.
    I was a monster. And at that moment, leaning against Rhys’s warm body, feeling his unnaturally cool breath on my face, I knew I would give in.
    He didn’t say anything, just threw me over his shoulder like a sack of grain and started walking. I tried not to bounce against his back simply because it would have been annoying. Honestly, I was too tired to really care, though. I watched the smooth red carpet pass beneath his feet in a blur. Interesting. My arms flopped around over my head—under, really, since I was upside down—uncontrollable and with minds of their own. His jeans rubbed against my wrists with each bounce, and I stupidly wondered how difficult it was to adopt new fashions all the time. Jeans hadn’t existed when Rhys was born. Though, he did look good in them, I could see that very well from my vantage point. Five hundred years had been kind to him in that department. Maybe that made it easier.
    My admiration of his backside was cut short when we reached the stairs. He flipped me back easily, carrying me in his arms instead. How nice of him not to let my head drag down the stairs behind him. He would have to cut it out with all this being nice stuff. It made it much harder to hate him utterly and completely. On the plus side, I was pretty sure I was getting blood all over his shirt.
    We were down the stairs, through the front hall and out the door in mere seconds. As soon as his foot touched the first step I felt the warmth of the sun hit my deathly cold skin.
    I had forgotten that it was daytime, somewhere around noon. I knew it took more than a stake to the heart to kill a vampire, but what of sunlight? Surely there had to be some sort of truth to the myth. Maybe it was the truth. Rhys had had enough and he was going to give me my wish. He was going to kill me.
    I started to scream.
    I kicked at him, hollered for him to put me down. I was so cold the spring sun felt like fire. I was burning, I was sure of it. But Rhys kept on walking. Down the seven steps I had counted so many times as a child and onto the large front lawn that stretched out in front of my house. When we reached the middle, he dumped me to the ground. I curled up into a ball, hiding my face from the light of the sun, and waited for the smell of my own burning flesh. Would I turn to ash like in all the movies? The vampires always screamed in the movies, screamed as they were burned alive. Now it was my turn.
    Turns out, I didn’t really want to die.
    But I didn’t burn. Shaking, I realized I still had possession of all my skin. My clothes weren’t on fire, and I smelled no sign of ash. But there was something else. Something that made my throat dry and my tongue burn. I felt the stretch of the teeth in my mouth. My pulse drummed, slow and lethargic, against my temples, in my wrists, at my neck. My shaking increased and I dug my fingers into the perfectly manicured grass.
    “Lesson one,” I heard R hys say from somewhere above me. “Sunlight will not kill you, you can go out in it all you like. But most young vampires avoid it for a time, hence the stories.”
    “Why?” The thirst was back so badly I thought I would die from the want. “Why avoid it?”
    “Because sunlight strengthens the bloodlust, makes it almost uncontrollable. Control can be gained with age and experience, of course, but in the interest of maintaining a low profile, young vampires stay inside unless they’re well fed.”
    The heat of the sun was driving me crazy, warming my skin in a way only human blood could maintain. “Then why did you bring me out here?”
    “To combat your stubbornness. You won’t be able to resist now when I put blood in front of you.”
    “I won’t kill anyone!”
    “I didn’t ask you to.”
    I