I posted a chapter before this one tonight, so be sure to catch both. I really need to post more slowly or I'll catch up before I've finished writing... augh.
If you're enjoying this, let me know ;) I am greatly saddened by the sound of crickets...
Now...
Another shudder passed through him. He closed his wings more tightly, lowering his head to his knees, carefully avoiding the gash at his temple.
"You are not well," the furred creature said.
"No, I am not." He sighed. "I do not understand."
"Why?"
"Because I do not get sick. Another of my kind can wound me, but I should have healed from this by now."
The beast stood to all fours, its bulk somewhat intimidating.
"Perhaps it is because you fell, from the place you call Heaven?" Its jowls quivered as it spoke and breathed, revealing an impressive number of teeth. "Is it far, this Heaven?"
He didn't lift his head, and stared towards the rising moon. "It is, in one sense, yes."
A frown tugged at the corners of his mouth as his heart clenched.
He would never be allowed back. The gates of Heaven were forever closed to him now.
That hurt. Closing his eyes, he tried to burrow more deeply into the soggy nest of feathers he'd made for himself, and shivered again.
"What is your name?" the beast asked. "I have heard your kind have them. The other two legs do too."
That stirred his interest. Raising his head he stared at the beast.
"I am..." There was no equivalent of his name in the beast's tongue, so he had to use his own.
Samael
"What two legs are you talking about?"
The creature bared its teeth. "Never speak that name again. I do not like it. It is too loud."
With a small shrug, Samael returned his head to his knees. A wave of dizziness washed over him.
"They look like you," the furry creature continued, "but are wingless and weak."
He smirked against his knee. "They survived then? I am glad to hear it. I liked the first of them. We had sex. A lot of sex. First time for me. For all three of us. I would like to do so again. If you see another two legs you must tell me so I can have more sex."
"You sound strange now."
Blinking against a new wave of dizziness, Samael looked up at the creature, surprised to find another of the same exact beast standing beside it.
Slowly the two creatures resolved into one.
Was that bad? That seemed a bad thing.
"What is your name, friend?" he asked, his voice slurring.
"I am me, the bear."
Nodding was a mistake. Samael grasped at his head as everything lurched sideways.
"Me-The-Bear, do you have anything to eat? I am... I think I need..."
Something compelled him to stand, most suddenly. An urgent instinct to outrun something at that moment that his logical mind hadn't quite intercepted as unnecessary.
Samael lurched to his feet as the bear watched, groaned something that might have been a question, then took a clumsy step towards the forest and keeled over.
He did not move again.
The bear's breath rumbled out slowly.
Were all winged ones this odd?
He lifted his great head to stare along the rapids, then to the falls upstream, and back as the river twisted its way through the forest, the trees crowding it thickly on both sides.
A scent reached him on the breeze. Chemicals and sweat. Metal and oil.
Men.
Men were coming with guns.
He looked down at the winged one. He'd spent this much time protecting it. It seemed a shame to leave it here.
Perhaps the Tall One would know what to do with it?
Taking the thing's arm in his mouth, the bear pressed against the winged one's body, and pulled the creature up and over his furred back. One wing trailed oddly, but there was little to be done about that.
Satisfied that the creature wouldn't fall off, the bear carried his charge into the darkness of the woods.