Return to Celio by Sasha Cain Read Free Book Online

fur and pulled me against him. I snuggled right in, deciding I didn’t hate the smell of that fur after all. In fact, right at that moment, I loved it. Darrios’ body heat enveloped me and his fur wrap sealed the warm in oh-so-toastily.
    In no time I was back to sleep, nice and cozy, cuddled up against a man who was not my boyfriend, and right then, I was fine with it.
    I woke up in the morning nestled against Darrios’ neck. The sensation was pleasant, his stubble, his scent. Suddenly, I remembered where I’d slept and I tried to jump up. He laughed when I fell right out of bed onto the floor. Regaining control of my limbs, I managed to stand.
    “I’m sorry,” Darrios said, clearly not meaning it.
    “You just looked so cute all bundled up like that. I didn’t have the heart to wake you.”
    “You were awake?” I shrieked. “Watching me?”
    “Well it was kind of hard to watch you with you draped all over me like that.”
    I felt my face change colors. How embarrassing.
    “Actually,” he continued, “I was listening to you breathe. It was kind of nice.”
    I rolled my eyes. I seemed to be doing that more frequently. Darrios got up and started rummaging around the shelves again. I slipped into the washroom to freshen up. Without much success, I tried to smooth my hair out as much as I could before rejoining Darrios.
    He’d prepared our breakfast, the same thing we’d eaten for dinner. I wasn’t complaining. It hit the spot and I was anxious to get moving. He headed into the bathroom, telling me to get ready to go as he pushed the door shut.
    I made the bed and put my shoes on since there really wasn’t anything else to do. He came out, wrapped up some sort of baked goods in a towel, put them in his pack along with fresh flasks of water, and we left.
    ****
    We walked for over an hour without incident. It was almost too quiet, no birds, no bugs. Weird. I wondered when we would reach some sort of civilization with hopefully a more modern mode of transportation, but I kept my thoughts to myself.
    We had just reached the bottom of a hill, walking through a particularly shrubby area, when a terrible shrieking noise scraped at the inside of my head. The sound gave me that “chills up your spine” feeling, like when someone rakes their fingernails over a chalkboard or bites down on a fork, only amplified by about fifty. Something had to be in excruciating pain to make that noise. Turns out I was wrong. Darrios pushed me behind him and pulled from I don’t know where—an enormous, very sharp-looking knife.
    “They’re coming,” he hissed. “Stay behind me.”
    Two matted, fur-covered creatures, with long, thin noses and what looked like three rows of teeth descended upon us. I couldn’t breathe as I frantically searched the ground for anything I could use as a weapon, a rock or a stick, something. I found nothing, only sand. The branches on the trees and bushes were all too small to be of any use and the rocks were too large to lift.
    All of a sudden, like in some superhero-ninja movie, Darrios started swinging that huge knife, yelling some unintelligible phrases as well as several choice curse words.
    With what seemed like one swift move, he swung the knife, decapitating one of the creatures and fatally wounding the other. Seemingly unfazed, Darrios wiped the bloody blade on the creature’s fur, resheathed his knife, and grabbed my hand.
    “We have to move faster,” he whispered anxiously.
    I gawked at him with my mouth hanging open.
    He shook me. “Maggie,” he urged, “let’s go...faster!”
    I nodded weakly, still not sure of what the hell had just happened. We walked very quickly, or rather more like Darrios dragged me along in a high-speed fashion. Finally, I snapped out of it and moved on my own, nearly running for a little while. My adrenaline was still pumping and I could’ve kept going, but he slowed down.
    “We can go back to walking. I think we’re far enough ahead. Besides, the bodies