Heart Two Heart (4 page)

I love Pau and I knew he wanted only the best
for me and his grandson, still… He got me into this damn mess and
it was up to him to get me out of it. He answered on the first
ring.

“You bastard, I screamed at him. You set me
up. You are an interfering old coot that doesn't know when to keep
his nose out of something. Now the local skinwalkers are after me.
You better come get me so I don’t have to kill them all.”

Chief of the Nevada Skinwalker tribe

I hung up the phone and tried to decide my
options. It was unfortunate that the camazotz was still alive. It
was even more unfortunate that she chosen to come into my tribe's
territory. The council had given me very strict orders. Now I had
to decide which consequences I would be able to live with. The
Navajo council wanted my tribe to hunt down the camazotz and kill
her, no matter what our losses were.

They felt we should continue to hunt her
until all of our resources have been exhausted. I told them my
people were more than just a resource and we have lives, wives and
children just like them. They said they understood my tribe would
have to make sacrifices and that lives were going to be lost but it
would be far less than the damage of the camazotz wreaking havoc on
the tribes and pale faces all across the Americas. I wasn’t worried
about every tribe in the America’s. I was worried about my tribe,
my people and my family.

I swung my arm and slammed into the desk lamp
and sent it flying across the room. I heard it crack against the
far wall of my office before shattering into a million tiny little
sharp pieces. I heard a gentle knocking at my door and expected to
hear my eternal heart Paula’s voice when I hollered

“What”

I was unprepared for my four year old son
Isaija. He threw the door of my office open and skipped in with
nothing on his feet. I shouted out for him to stop and even tried
to stop his forward movement but he managed to get several pieces
of the broken glass from the lamp imbedded into his bare feet.

I scooped him and his now bloody feet off the
floor and realised one thing with clarity. The camazotz had already
caused my tribe and my family enough damage. I would not
participate in anything that could bring additional harm to my
tribe or more specifically to my family. The council would need to
use someone else’s tribe to hunt down the camazotz. I was going to
look the other way and pray she left my territory.

I sat down on the hotel bed and looked around
the room. I was still pissed at Pau but some air conditioning, a
shower and a real bed that I could get a good day’s sleep on was
moving me towards forgiveness. He was lucky that I knew his
intentions were good even if the results were not.

I was glad that Pau and his partner Waylon
were joining me tonight at the Tropicana. In fact Pau had paid for
this room and had arranged for a pale face donor to come and take
care of my needs. That was both good and bad. The good part was
that I would be able to drink blood and heal my damaged body. The
bad part was, Pau obviously knew I’d graduated to feeding on human
blood and that animal blood no longer satisfied me. Despite that,
he said he was sorry several times while we were on the phone. He
just felt that my eternal heart and I needed to end our
self-imposed separation.

Pau believed that as we could overcome all
obstacles in our way. Love healed all things and overcame all
things, even destiny and death. Ever since he and Waylon fell in
love Pau got it in his head that he was cupid and was constantly
interfering in everyone’s lives. This time however he seemed to
forget that I could die during his match making games.

In his haste to have us accidently bump into
each other he forgot that my eternal heart is a skinwalker and that
skinwalkers are deadly to me. Someone either my eternal heart or
his little fox girl friend called the troops down on me. Chances
are it was my eternal heart. He made it clear that he hated me and
what I stood for. I’d barely gotten away with my life and I blamed
Pau. In the least I was going to blame him until I felt better.

Sometimes, it just galls me that Pau likes to
act like we chupacabra are indestructible. That’s not exactly
correct. I understand he and a few of the children born to him and
other original nagual like my eternal heart are somewhat invisible
but chupacabra still have four major weaknesses. I am very aware of
each and every one of them and in fact almost died of all of
them.

The easiest way for an enemy to kill me would
be to simply sever my head from my shoulders. Now that might sound
easier than it actual is. The truth is I am very strong and I have
mastered the art of fighting over the years. If you want to remove
my head from my shoulders you had better take me by surprise and
get it right the first time because no other creature alive is
stronger than a chupacabra and very few chupacabra are my equal in
battle.

The second way to kill me is to remove my
heart from my chest and completely destroy it. This recently
happened to me and thankfully the skinwalkers missed a tiny little
piece and I was able to completely regenerate my heart with the
help of Pau my nagual brother in arms and his newly found second
chance love a male shaman named Waylon.

Thankfully, like most people they
misunderstand and thought simply tearing me into bits would get the
job done. Perhaps next time a tribe of skinwalkers try to kill me
they will make sure to eat every single tiny bit of my heart,
because if like before they leave anything behind I can be
regenerated and I can completely recover.

The third way I can die is direct sunlight.
While I can tolerate a little sunlight, prolonged exposure causes
me severe burns, and eventually death. Generally by prolonged I
would mean days of exposure not hours. That however can change
based on the kind of sunlight. Like earlier today when I was stuck
in the desert. The sand amplified the effects of the sunlight and
increased the damage. Ultimately, I would have only needed a day at
most for my blood to corrode and severe damage to occur.

The final way, and most deadly way to kill me
would be for me to drink Ulric’s blood. See the truth is we
chupacabra keep it a secret but the consumption of skinwalker and
nagual blood for that matter is deadly. Ulric was born a nagual
despite his mother appearing to a run of the mill non skin walking
Navajo. Still, she carried Pau’s genetics and when she married the
Spaniard Emilio and got pregnant with Ulric, she triggered the
nagual DNA that laid dormant in her blood. In order for me to
become immune to my eternal hearts blood, it would require me to
undergo a very painful and long process of developing immunity.

Given that my eternal heart hates me and the
things I’ve done in the past I really don’t see that I would ever
go through the immunity process. I live in enough pain every day
that I walk the earth knowing that my eternal heart could be… but
has chosen not to be with me.

I turned on the bed and meant to punch the
pillow just to let off a little steam. No harm no foul type of
thing but of course instead of just taking my punch I managed to
completely annihilate the feather pillow. It burst on impact and
hundreds of little feathers scurried from the pillowcase and flew
around my room. All I could think was it so figures! It’s typical
and the story of my life, if it can happen it will.

I’d barely slept last night thinking about
Ulric choosing her over me. I didn’t really understand how he
didn’t know we were eternal hearts in the first place but the idea
that he would actually considering being with the camazotz who was
once a chupacabra totally baffled me.

My eyes and face burned from the amount of
tears that I’d let slide from them. My nose was clogged and
probably looked bright red. I sat up on the pillow and felt my body
quiver. I was so on edge and was ready to start crying all over
again. This was supposed to be the happiest day of my life. I
should have woken up this morning as Mrs. Ulric Nukpana. I should
have spent the night in a warm bed making love to my eternal heart
not crying alone in a cold bed with nothing to comfort me but a
stupid lumpy pillow.

I was so upset last night I’d called everyone
I could think of and cried in their ears. I called all my friends;
college and nursing school. Then, I called his mother Kealoha.
Kealoha like me was disappointed and was a little in shock that he
behaved that way yesterday. She swore she wasn’t going to allow
Ulric to throw his life away on his no good selfish two faced
eternal heart.

She said she was getting on a flight and
coming here with the intention of putting the kibosh on this whole
thing before it got out of hand. She cursed more times in our
twenty minute call then I’d heard her say in the past sixteen
years. The bottom line was she was appalled that the woman had the
gall to be in the United States of America none the less the same
State as our Ulric.

His mother and I talked the entire time that
she made arrangements to come to Vegas. Every now and then I would
hear her say something to her husband but I really didn’t hear his
reply. Her tone and attitude helped me to feel a lot better but I’m
still really upset that he didn’t want to be with me last night.
She told me how Taini aka the camazotz was evil and selfish. She
told me how she had kidnapped Ulric as a baby and nearly got him
killed. Then she told me how Taini swore to never contact Ulric.
She said that she and Emilio would make sure that everything was
okay.

I hoped she was right because I knew that my
fox and I couldn’t live without our eternal heart. I needed him
like a fish needed water. I would wither and die without him in my
life. Somehow I needed to get him to comingle his blood with me so
that he could finally recognize our connection. I just know if he
could feel the connection like I do that he would never consider
the camazotz. He would choose me and the future we could have
together over a nasty camazotz that killed women and children.

He and I were perfect for each other. I was
the yin to his yang. I could give him skinwalker babies and the big
loving family he always wanted. She could do nothing but get him
killed. She brought nothing to the table and did nothing to earn
his love or respect. I’d changed my entire life to suit his. I’d
done everything I could possibly do to earn his love and
respect.

Hell, I’d even changed my education major so
that I would be more compatible with his choices. I’d studied my
entire life to be a lawyer and gave it all up the moment I saw his
little baby cheeks. Then, since he wanted to be a doctor I went
back to school for nursing. I’d done everything so that I would be
the perfect eternal heart for him with just one look at the
camazotz he was ready to throw it all away.

I growled deep in my throat and allowed the
tears to roll unchecked down my cheeks. I felt my world unraveling
and just didn’t know what to do. Maybe his mother was right; maybe
she could help him see reason. Maybe everything would be okay and
Ulric would remember that he loved me. In the least is was high
time that I pressed the issue and tried to make him see the
truth.

My fox and I have known since the moments we
laid eyes on him we just assumed since he was a nagual he was
unable to realize we were eternal hearts until we commingled our
blood. I was sure his life essence would figure out that we were
eternal hearts. I was going to have to try to talk it out with
him.

Ulric was smart and always believed he was
more skinwalker than chupacabra. He would want to be with me if he
believed we were eternal hearts. He would never choose a camazotz
over a skinwalker. I’d wondered if he even knew who his eternal
heart was. I would bet the entire farm that he had no idea his
eternal heart was the infamous camazotz that exclusively stalked
skinwalkers. Hell, he would probably reject her just based on who
she is and what’s she’s done in the past.

Besides, Ulric trusted me and would want to
be with me. Then once we commingled our blood he would see that I
really was his eternal heart. I just needed to reason with him and
he would come around to my way of thinking. Then again, if he
didn’t see things my way, with some encouragement I knew that I was
prepared to do whatever it took, even if it meant that I’d to find
a way to eliminate the camazotz myself and make Ulric mine
again.

Dinner with Pau and Waylon had been
unpleasant and useless. It however seemed to go on for hour after
endless hour. Neither Pau nor I ate real food and watching Waylon
shove bites of cooked food into his mouth over and over again did
nothing but make me feel ill. By the time he finished shoving huge
amounts of cooked meat into his mouth I was ready to snap.

I could tell my cold energy was driving both
Pau mad and Waylon was becoming flustered and excited in not such a
good way. For a moment I found it interesting that I was affecting
him a normal run of the mill human more than Pau a nagual with a
skinwalker side. I couldn’t help but wonder if my eternal heart
would appreciate my cold energy or would hate it. Because of the
Nazi’s experiments, I was different than any other chupacabra. More
specifically, for some reason I developed this cold energy that
came off me in waves. Everyone is affected differently. Chupacabra
find it difficult to be in the room with me since it irritates
them.

To the skinwalkers, and many humans my cold
energy is like an aphrodisiac. I’d escaped the concentration camp
twice during the war. Both times, the Nazi’s used my cold energy
against me. The released a few of the skinwalkers they were also
experimenting on and said they could do anything they wanted to me
if only they found me. Both times they found me in no time at all.
Back then, I’d been untrained and helpless. If they had just
attacked and killed me I might have never grown my hatred for them.
What they did was far worse. They played with me like a cat plays
with a mouse. They chased me off and on for days. Each time they
found me they would torture, rape and injure me then leave me to
heal. On and on this went without end an in sight. I was only
twelve years old in human years and didn’t understand why they did
this to me day after day week after week. These were grown
skinwalkers, they knew I was helpless and just a young child and
didn’t care.