Excerpt: Raindance

The pain in his head was nothing compared to the pain in his heart. Blaze drew in a breath and cursed the fact that love was so darn confusing. He knew she did not return his favour and yet he still fought for her attentions. Still tried his best whenever he saw her, dressed better and did his hair the way he thought she would like it. And all because of the silly notion called love. But it had all backfired. They never would have killed her and he knew it. If they went through all that trouble to get her in the first place why would they kill her because of him? They wouldn’t, and that was what disturbed him. Blaze had fallen again into the pit that he himself had dug. It was shameless; he could have spent hours there, wishing with all his soul that Salem, even just once, would return his feelings.
In the next room over Shadow was thinking along the same lines, providing a slim connection between the two of them. The only difference was who she thought about. Ellis and Salem had been friends for years, practically since birth. But somewhere between her twelfth birthday and the day she turned fifteen she had noticed something else. An emotion she had never felt before, not truly. It made her warm when she was cold and thoughts of him burst uninvited into to her mind. The kind of feeling that made her heart leap whenever she saw him, the feeling that made her crazy when they whispered in class. A feeling she had come to know as love. Love was an interesting thing for Shadow; she was just coming to understand what it was. Love allowed two people a connection to each other, a unity that could not be broken. True love did not break. It could be separated, stunted, and it could be schemed against. But never, not ever, would a love as true as hers ever really be broken. But there was also no way he could love her back. She might as well just take her chances with Blaze, he was the next best thing; tall, handsome, and charming. If she thought about it though, Blaze fell just short of her expectations. Sure he was good looking, but Ellis was better. Yes he was tall, but Ellis was just a smidge taller. His charm paled in comparison to Ellis’ and it saddened her to think she might actually leave behind her dream and settle for something lower. She had no feelings for Blaze, she would be better off if he were dead.
The lights flashed once before going out completely. In the darkness Salem realized she could never be called by her given name anymore. There was no way; the Salem everyone knew was happy, fun loving and ebullient. This new person, this Shadow of the person she used to be, this person deserved to be what it was; a shadow and nothing more.