Rakshasa Book I, Part #2: Aurora Read Online Free PDF Page A

shoulder. The Rewa stood where I’d left them until I reached the treeline, at which point they turned and darted back towards the mountains, vanishing the moment they moved away from the clearing.

Chapter IV

    Waiting to Dream

    I knew that I should head back to the coven at the cave, but the news that Ishan was visiting the city drew me back to Canberra. It was as though we had some kind of connection; he was there, so I needed to be there, as well. I needed to feel him again, to hold him in my arms, to kiss his lips.
    As I approached the edge of the city I spent a moment straightening my appearance. I had no shoes, nothing I could do about that, but I tidied my hair and adjusted my clothes so that I didn’t seem so… wild. It didn’t take a moment and, when I was ready, I casually wandered along the road as though nothing were wrong.
    I heard a car slow down beside me, pulling off the road in front of me. A new model Hyundai, sleek and black. Curious, I watched as the door swung open and the driver stepped out. It was Jacques, a guy my friend Katelyn had hooked up with at a club, the same night I’d met Ishan.
    “Hey!” he called, grinning a stupid, human grin. “I saw you walking, I thought I’d give you a lift? You live northside, right?”
    It was so strange how I regarded him, now. Before, back in that club, he was Jacques, a nice looking guy with a sweet car, someone who was way out of my league, the kind of guy who’d be nice to you just so he could sleep with your hot friends. Even if you knew he was doing it, you put up with it because, well, they were nice and there was no clear reason to tell them to piss off.
    Now, though, he was just a transparent and pointless human whose every mannerism bored me. “Actually,” I said, “That’d be nice. Thanks so much.” I preferred to walk, but I had to keep up the appearance of normality.
    “Great,” he said, running around the other side to open the door for me.
    Transparent niceness. I slid into the seat, smiling and clipping on my seatbelt out of habit, even though I doubted I needed it anymore.
    “So why were you out walking?” he asked as he pulled back onto the highway, accelerating to keep pace with the other cars. “Just out for the exercise?”
    “I just wanted to run, that’s all.” I shuffled my feet further forward, hoping he wouldn’t notice I had no shoes.
    He nodded, though, and I figured he wasn’t really listening to whatever I said and just wanted to talk about himself. “Yeah, that’s cool. I just came back from shooting.”
    The car drove down the highway towards the city, keeping pace with the other cars on the road, but I felt like it was travelling extremely slowly. A quick glance at the speedometer revealed it was a little over the speed limit. To me it seemed to be crawling along, time barely passing.
    I found his life, his existence, entirely meaningless, but I wanted conversation to drive away the boredom. “Shooting?”
    “Yeah. Competition trap. Basically, they have this machine, right, it throws little clay disks into the air, and you shoot ‘em—”
    “With a shotgun.” I yawned, stretching in the seat. “I know how it works.”
    He laughed, nodding as he turned a corner towards the city. “You shoot?”
    “No, I read,” I answered, a little more acidic than I meant.
    “Sorry. I know chicks aren’t usually into guns.”
    “It’s okay.”
    We made polite conversation until the car pulled up outside my apartment. I stepped out, giving him a polite smile. “Thanks for the lift.”
    “No worries.” He smiled, un-clipping his seatbelt. “Hey, you mind if I come in for a bit?”
    Seriously? The guy slept with my best friend, now he was trying his moves on me, too? “Actually, my boyfriend is coming over.” Well it was the truth. “And I still have to clean. The cops made a huge mess of everything. Sorry.”
    “No worries, no worries. Maybe next time.”
    “Maybe.”
    He gave a little mock salute,