Blood and Fire
Chapter 5
Dark Angel

The aurora borealis burned brightly overhead. It created a spectacular display. Sheets and waves of cold fire, as if the sky itself were somehow burning, swept across the starry expanse. The colors were a dazzling rainbow array that swirled and mixed together in flowing patterns that painted the pristine white canvas of snow covered hills below.

Beneath this spectacle, two figures sat on top of a low hill. Lying on his back and gazing up at the sky, Aidan didn't feel the cold. He fanned his pure white wings idly back and forth, creating a peculiar kind of snow angel. His eyes were riveted on the display above his head, and he kept brushing a stubborn strand of raven-wing black hair out of the way so that his view would be unobstructed. Beside him Flame Song sat, purring contentedly. Her own gaze spent as much time resting on Aidan's face as it did on the sky.

"What are you thinking?" Flame Song asked, softly.

Aidan smiled up at her. "Just that I'm still amazed sometimes how lucky I am. Back on Earth I used to daydream about this kind of life. I can remember dreaming about being able to fly, and making up hundreds of stories in which I rescued a fair maiden who turned out to be my true love. And now I'm living my dreams. Though I guess I get to be the fair maiden, since I need rescuing more often than you do."

Flame giggled. "One thing you're not, love, is a maiden."

Aidan blushed and laughed. "I suppose not."

"You're in a good mood tonight."

"Everything is going right. I have all my dreams and more. I never dreamed that I'd be a father. I never dreamed that I'd live for two centuries with my true love."

"No more regrets about being a vampire?"

He shook his head. "No. I still..." he considered how to say it. "I still don't always love it. There are things about it that are not exactly pleasant. But I don't hate it any more. It's just the way things are. If I weren't a vampire I'd be dead, and I'd rather be alive."

"I'd rather you were alive too," said Flame with a smile. Her smile turned mischievous and she leaned down and licked his face affectionately with a sandpaper tongue.

"Augh! There are better ways to show it than slobbering all over me!"

Flame laughed. Her form shimmered and shifted and then she leaned down in human form and kissed him. "Is that better?"

"Mmm. Yes, very much so." He put his arms around her, and pulled her down to kiss her again.

Eventually she broke off the kiss. She shivered as she sat up. "It's cold. Let's go inside."

Hand in hand they descended the snow-covered hill, Aidan wrapping a wing around Flame Song to shield her from the chill. They went down the dark entryway and opened the door that led into the fire-warmed house. The stone fireplace stood where before there had been just an open hearth, the flickering flames there the main source of illumination in the room. Gradually they were adding little comforts to their home. Flame Song and Aidan had settled themselves on a pile of cushions in front of the fire and were continuing where they had left off when a soft sound from another room interrupted.

Flame Song sighed, then got up and opened the door to the nursery, where Littlespark had been taking her nightly nap. The little halfbreed girl was sitting up in her crib. She was a year and a half old now, and large for her age. She was developing fast, though her flight feathers hadn't come in yet. She'd also showed no sign as yet of being able to shape shift. Flame was profoundly grateful for both those things. A flying, shape-shifting toddler would be a handful and a half.

As it was, Littlespark was still enough to keep them busy. Between entertaining her and dealing with the ordinary day-to-day, or rather night-to-night, tasks of keeping house they occupied the hours until Littlespark's bedtime. This deep into winter the sun was only up for few hours each day, so Littlespark and Flame Song both went to bed well before sunrise. Aidan, however, found that so long as he slept for the entire time the sun shone he would awaken completely rested, even if it was only an hour or two. Even in the deep winter when the sun hardly peeped above the horizon for weeks, he found he needed little sleep. He would sometimes catnap an hour here or there during the long night, but otherwise he didn't sleep at all until the sun returned.

But tonight Flame Song didn't retire to the bedroom after tucking Littlespark in. Instead, she joined Aidan by the fire. She picked up a log and added it to the dying blaze, careless of the flames that licked up around her fingers.

"I'm never going to get used to you doing that."

Flame chuckled. "You could do it yourself instead, if you like."

"No thanks."

He leaned against her shoulder, and they both sat in comfortable silence for a long time. Eventually Aidan voiced something that had been on his mind for some time. "Do you think you could manage without me for a few weeks?"

Flame looked over at him, a little bit surprised. "I suppose so. But why?"

"I've been thinking lately about Thomas. I think I may have mentioned him to you once or twice."

She nodded. "He's another aerian."

"Yes. He's the one who took me in when I was a scruffy gutter rat in Aerievale. He took care of me, when nobody else cared if I lived or died. He put up with a lot of nonsense from me, and he taught me a lot."

"So you want to go visit him then."

Aidan nodded. "Yes. I've never had time to when we've been south on other occasions, and I've never wanted to make that long of a trip just to visit him, but... I don't know his age but he seemed as old as the hills to me when I knew him. If I don't go soon, I may not be able to see him. For all I know he's died already. And it won't even take me a week to fly down to Aerievale by myself. I wouldn't be gone more than two or three weeks at most."

Flame put her arm around him. "I'll miss you. But I agree you should probably go. When were you thinking of leaving?"

"Better sooner than later then. If you don't mind, I'll leave tomorrow."

Flame Song smiled. "In that case, maybe I should give you a proper send-off."

"Oh?" Aidan raised one eyebrow, which always made Flame Song laugh.

She giggled as he'd intended and said, "Yes, you definitely need a proper send-off. And I had better start by helping you out of this thing. I don't know how you're going to manage it on your own." As she spoke she moved behind Aidan and began unbuttoning the buttons by the wing holes in his shirt. Aidan wore special shirts designed with aerians in mind. They had wing holes that fastened with buttons so they could easily be slipped on over his wings, but trying to button them alone resulted in twists that would do a contortionist proud. Aidan could manage them by himself if he had to, but he liked having Flame Song undo them, for more reasons than one. She finished the buttons and slipped the shirt off. Then with a little laugh she ran her fingers over his bare back and onto his soft, feathered wings.

"Mmmmm... What would a guy have to do to get a back rub from you?"

Flame Song bent her head to kiss the back of his neck, which sent a pleasant shiver through him. "I'm sure I can think of something," she said.