Excerpt: Eater of Angels

Once they reached the outside, Cameron hunched, and his wings burst from his back, ripping his shirt from the sudden releasing.
"You can't fly."
"It's the only way to get us out of here. I have to fly."
"There's no way you could support both--." Chloe's words fell from her lips without sound, and she turned to see the shivering creature grinning at them.
The light of the half moon showed some of what she couldn't see before. Its mouth was toothless, its skin an ash grey, and eye sockets empty. The shivering of its skin made her own feel like it was vibrating.
Cameron grabbed her around the waist and pulled her toward the perch. She reluctantly climbed up it.
Before Cameron could even spread his wings, the creature was on him. It knocked Chloe out of the way, and she fell backwards off the perch. She slammed into the ground, the wind knocked out of her.
When she finally caught her breath, she stared up at the perch. The moon back dropped the gruesome sight. Cameron struggled to escape the creature, but it had him by the wings, slowly ripping them off his back. Sharp claws scratched and pulled, and the mouth sucked in the feathers like a vacuum.
Cameron's blood flowed, dripped down onto Chloe. She couldn't move from the fall, couldn't save her brother. Her screams and shouts never ripped the air even though she knew they came from her mouth.
Once the creature finished every last feather, and Cameron's wings were as non-existent as they were when he pulled them into himself, it stroked his back and licked his neck. Cameron collapsed, stretched over the perch, and his deserted eyes stared down at Chloe.
No. Cameron. She wanted to call his name, but only her thoughts could make any sound, and only in her own mind.
The creature turned its attention to her, the empty sockets seeing but not seeing. It was her turn now to be ripped to pieces and receive one last lick of that poisoned tongue.
But that lick wouldn't come tonight. Instead, the creature turned away and darted off, the night swallowing it up.
The silence was broken.
"Cameron!" Chloe tried to move, but her body ached. She had to get help; she had to bring her brother back.
She managed to turn to her side, and that's when her body tightened, her back arching. The skin on her shoulders started to itch like mad.
Not now. No.
She rolled to her stomach and hunched over. Pain lanced through her entire back as if dozens of knives were inside her, trying to burrow out.
Cameron had told her it wasn't this painful, that there were only a few pinches. He had only bled a few drops. Now, she wondered if he had only told her that so she wouldn't be afraid. She was ashamed of herself for thinking he had lied to her. He never lied to her, and it was an insult to even consider it with his body above her, his blood still dripping down, dotting her back, mixing with the pain.
Chloe screamed. She would have thought the creature was back, ripping at her shoulders, if not for her ability to voice her anguish.
Right when she thought she'd pass out from the pain, her wings broke though her skin, searing and stinging her from their release. Her shirt was shredded, and she could feel her own blood pooling on her back, dripping down her sides.
She clawed at the ground, her wings growing, extending, until they were fully out. They shivered, sending a few droplets of blood onto the nape of her neck.
Chloe collapsed, the pain now a dull throb. She shifted to her side, tears flowing down her cheeks as she stared up at her brother.
The night she gained her wings, Cameron lost his.
This wasn't how it was supposed to be.
The one person that would have consoled her, held her after the brutal Emerging she had just gone through, lay lifeless above her.
And she was left behind.
In her post-Emerging delirium, her mind trembled. Eater of Angels. Yes. That's what it was.
Eater of Angels...I will find you, and you'll cough up every feather you inhaled.