Healed

Healed

A Rebirth Novel

By Becca Vincenza

Healed

by
Becca
Vincenza

Copyright © 2014 Becca
Vincenza

Smashwords Edition

ISBN: 9781311289230

Cover done by: Airicka Mystical
Creations

All rights reserved. The
book may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without
the express written permission of the publisher except for the use
of brief quotations in a book review.

The books are works of
fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are
products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any
resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales
is entirely coincidental.

Dedication:

This one is for my sisters, both
blood-related and chosen
.

Acknowledgements

I both love and loathe writing this part.
Know that you are one of the people I am personally thanking right
now. Yes you. I know it might be cheesy but where would I be
without your help? So my first thanks, and acknowledgments go to
you.

I have to practically praise, bow-down, and
kiss her feet, in thanks. Samantha Lunn, my wonderful, beautiful
PA, who has to deal with my craziness. She has to muck through my
first drafts, and have me constantly hounding her. I value your
opinion so much my love, and you are such an amazing friend. I
wouldn’t get very far (anywhere) without you. I can’t ever thank
you enough.

Thank you Katherine Eccleston so very much
for everything you have done. Seriously. I can never thank you
enough. Ever. Much love sweetheart.

So my betas, my wonderful betas - Nana,
Melissa, Stephanie, Nellysa, Janelle, Jaime, Crystal, and Hannah.
Seriously, I can never thank you ladies for taking time out of your
lives to look at my books not as just readers, but critical
readers. You are all amazing friends to me, helping me with this,
and everything you can. A special thanks to Nana, and Melissa!

I want to thank my amazing friends who might
not be helping with the writing aspect of this, but deal with my
other craziness. I cannot thank you enough. I am more than certain
you all know who you are. There are so many people I want to thank
but especially Kimberly Schaaf (for being such an amazing friend),
Candy Smith, and so many more!

Thank you Airicka Phoenix. You are an
amazing friend, who has supported me when I first started, and
helped me (well did most of the work) for the beautiful new and old
covers of the Rebirth Series.

Alex Wright. You sweetheart, are my hometown
girl who never usually reads, and read both my books in under a few
days. I couldn’t believe your enthusiasm for the series, and for
the characters. You made me smile on more than one occasion. Thank
you for detox nights, and being totally amazing.

To my other hometown sweeties, I love you
all so much, thank you for supporting me in this crazy adventure,
this includes my family. Thank you all so, so much.

Okay if you feel forgotten please don’t. I
love you even if your name isn’t up here
.

Chapter 1
– Elijah

I could feel her oppressing presence. It
pushed against my own ghostly skin and, oddly, I felt a tingle of
something.
Either way, it would make it that much easier to
find her. I strode across the hospital. A few nurses were watching
me closely, with my shaded eyes and dark presence. I was used to
it. I made those innocent healers feel uncomfortable. The new,
fresh from college ones were the worst. The older ones understood
that death was not a friend, nor a foe. It killed without reason
and without remorse. It was the nurses and doctors who understood
that. They could possibly tolerate my presence. This one would be
different though, I could feel it from here. My ears picked up a
soft, soothing voice.

I shut my eyes for a moment as her voice
filtered in. They snapped open as soon as I realized what was
happening. No. I had a mission. After joining the York Clan,
because of a certain dragon-shifter, I promised that I would find
the rumored elder race. York came to me with a file, a name,
description, and location. Finding her would be the easy part;
unfortunately, I had sensed other paranormals around.

I was not sure which clan they belonged to,
but it would mean a fight. I had no doubt that I would be
victorious; but if I was correct, this rebirth paranormal would not
know of her origins. If she was not aware, then having her leave
with me would be much more difficult.

As I thought on my predicament, I heard her
voice again. I turned towards the voice, knowing those who were in
my way would move or I would push them aside.

There she was. She was not hard to miss.
Silver hair and bright blue eyes that shimmered like gems,
reminding me of Audrey’s. Only Audrey’s were not as shiny, or as
happy.

No Audrey’s eyes held pain. Pain I had
wanted to feast upon until there was nothing left in her. Yet,
there was something else about Audrey, that made me want to stop,
and it was not the fact that she was a dragon-shifter. Her fear
made me
unnerved
. The feeling only arrived after I had
melded my mind with hers. I knew that by doing it I should have
kept it professional. In and out. Instead I lingered. I looked at
every dark corner of her mind, devouring her memories and
emotions.

I had to forget the dragon that was haunting
my mind and focus on my new objective. The short, petite woman in
front of me was nothing like the wild, untamed, maroon haired
dragon I knew. No, this new woman was the opposite.

Innocence came off her in waves. Goodness
and empathy filled her. I almost snarled at the amount of happiness
in her smile. She was completely light. Even her pale, creamy skin
was declaring what she was. Even those who weren’t supernatural
beings could see. She was good. She was pure. She was mine to
steal.

I moved forward, watching her carefully. It
was difficult to keep focus on the sprite, little thing ahead of me
when I could feel the enticing auras around me. Most of them on
this floor were close to death. Nothing quite smelled as sweet or
tasted as exquisite as the fear of death.

My eyes focused on the silver blonde-haired
girl who continued to flutter around a dying man. The sweet aroma
around him was tainted by her. My eyes shifted violently in her
direction. This was a new scent.

The scent was of petrichor, an odd lively
scent in this room that came straight from her. I was sure of it.
Before I smelled her, I was going to move straight toward her and
take her out of here, but now, I was intrigued. I was not normally
one to be intrigued. Instead of grabbing her, I stood, not in the
way, but in direct view of her.

I could see the man was in pain. Not only
was his scent tickling my olfactory glands and hunger, but his face
was pinched and distorted. She moved around the bed coming to the
left side. She stared down at him, smiling. Her long hair waved
with her movements and I could see through the strands that she was
placing her hands on his heart. I knew that he was bleeding
internally, but how she knew, I did not understand.

I could hear her whispered words. She was
trying to be kind, telling him all would be well, but I knew he
would be dead within hours, if not minutes. Then everything
changed.

The petrichor scent grew until it took over
the room. I had never smelled anything like it. While the inner,
decaying body of mine wanted to reject it, the new side of my
system wanted to capture it and keep it. I did not like this
feeling. My back straightened ever so slightly from its already
erect position and my eyes narrowed to less than a millimeter.

A new oppressive presence started to fill
the room, sucking out all the life-supporting pain. My teeth
clenched tightly. It pressed against my skin, it felt like it was
trying to crawl into my skin and extract my true form. A sound much
like a growl pushed out. It was a warning sign, but she did not
hear it. She kept on with whatever she was doing. The blinding
white, rainbow-edged aura grew, wrapping its way around the man’s
body.

It was so draining that I felt my knees
weaken slightly, and my hand lightly pressed against the wall for
support. I moved my hand away as if it was a poison. Standing
straight once again, I watched as she started to slump. I felt
myself moving toward her without realizing it. My footsteps were
loud and clumsy.

I did not understand this sudden need to get
there. Before I could even get halfway across the room a new sight
greeted me. A tall, willowy woman was headed toward my target. The
woman struck me as odd. Her hair was a deep purple color that fell
around her shoulders. She had piercings on her nose, lip, and
eyebrow. She was dressed head to toe in black. Her boots were
chunky and thundered across the room. My target, who was barely
standing on her own looked at the new addition. Vibrant blue eyes
looked in my direction for a moment until the black clad woman
stood in front of my target.

“You stupid, stupid girl! Val, how many
times have I told you? You can’t come here and do this. You cannot.
Ugh, you know next time, you stupid little twit, I am not coming
for you.”

The purple haired woman confused me. Her aura
was different from any other aura I had seen. It was a smoky purple
color. All auras were a distinct solid color. The small,
silver-haired woman smiled up at her friend. I could smell a
different type of pain coming off her. It smelled repugnant. The
purple haired woman started to lead the target out of the room, and
I followed. My fists were clenched and my body felt uncomfortably
tight.

Chapter 2 –
Valentine

I felt a cold aura. It was the coldest I had
ever felt before. I wanted to stay focused on Mr. Miller who was in
front of me and needed my attention, but I couldn’t stop my head
from snapping up to look for this horrible presence. There he was.
Tall, very dark, and he had shades over his eyes. I knew he was
watching me though. A strange look settled on his face, it was
almost like a smile.

My heart started to race from fear. I was
scared, and I needed to run. For some reason, it was my first
instinct, always. Run first, fight later. Or never fight. Who was I
kidding? My hands shook when I had to put an IV in or even give
shots. There were even times when at home I would capture a spider
and take it outside, versus killing it on the spot.

Amani, my best friend and co-worker, always
told me I could never hurt a fly, even if I tried. She said I had a
way with healing, but I had nothing to do with harming. She was
right.

In 7
^th
grade, when we were
playing basketball in gym, a boy in my class got pushed down and
fell on his arm the completely wrong way. I watched as the bone
jutted out of his skin, looking like a broken stick. Seeing it
happen, hearing the sickening snap, and then the howls of the boy,
I rushed over to him. I felt the undeniable need to fix him. It
wasn’t the first time my body reacted that way.

I placed my hands on his broken bone, and my
body just knew what to do. I snapped the bone back into its
original position and placed my hands over the exit point. I don’t
know if it was magic or what but I felt the bone melding together,
new pieces of marrow growing back together. I cried the whole time,
the sight of his blood, mixed with having seen the white of his
bone was sending me into shock. I pressed on.

After he was completely healed, I passed
out. I woke up three hours later in the hospital. When they
couldn’t get me to wake up with smelling salts at school they
called an ambulance. My foster parents at the time were there
waiting for me. They were a sweet couple, and they were so worried.
The doctors just stated it as a bad case of shock they couldn’t
figure out what else it might be.

At school the next day, the boy I had healed
came up with all these crazy notions about me. The other students
in the class made up a story that I was some sort of alien; another
rumor was that I was a Witch. He convinced the other students to
outcast me, I’m not sure how he managed to do it but the fact that
I was a little shy didn’t help. He never did thank me either.

When Amani moved there a year before the
incident, she was out-casted right away for her odd purple hair and
dark complexion. We lived in the Deep South where conservative was
the only style choice. I thought she was gorgeous with her violet
eyes, and Indian heritage. I had tried to befriend her when she
first arrived, but she ignored all my attempts. When I became an
outcast like her a year later, she finally accepted my friendship.
She had a very brash way of talking and flat out asked me why the
clones around me suddenly decided that I was too freaky even for
their likings. I told her that I had helped a boy in gym class. She
gave me the oddest look and the next day called me a huge, fat-ass
liar and said she heard what really happened. I was so shocked by
her casual attitude that I didn’t deny it when she recited the
almost real story back to me. Amani and I had been inseparable
friends ever since.