Dire Symbols

by W A Rowland

  Two khopesh swords appeared in her hands as she flew through the air. She used the blades with expert precision, drawing gashes across the giant wolf’s torso as she passed by in the air. He howled in pain, swinging his claws and biting in an ever more erratic fashion. Then, in an instant, Bast brought the blades together in a sweep, hacking off the wolf’s leg at the knee. She followed up by severing one of his arms and burying the blades in his skull. The wolf fell over motionless, its limbs still twitching.

  Liam gawked at the giant cat standing over the wolf’s still corpse as she turned and surveyed the scene. “That’s only going to keep him down for a few hours at most. We need to get out of here,” Bast said coldly, turning into her human form, and slumping against the wreck of the jeep. Liam thought he saw the hint of tears on her face, but she turned her head before he could really tell.

  He surveyed the scene once again himself. Bodies littered the road. The giant wolf lay in a roadside ditch, twitching madly. His friends. Gone.

  Motion next to Liam surprised him as Hand arrived with Cindy popping into existence almost on top of Liam. The big man gasped when he saw Sarah’s broken body against the tree and he started wailing something in Samoan as he sped over and picked her up. Bast knelt next to Michael’s crushed form, a grim look falling over her feline features. Cindy stood next to Liam weeping openly at the visage and speaking in Spanish.

  Tears burned Liam’s eyes as he wept.

  “Liam…” Lily tried to say something, but couldn’t find the words. There weren’t any words to describe what was happening.

  Liam sobbed and collapsed. He cried uncontrollably, uncaring of what else was going on. He wept into the ground next to where Cindy had appeared. This couldn’t be. It shouldn’t have been! And then, suddenly, Liam felt roaring wind on his head and looked up.

  “Shit!” Michael screamed and slammed on the brakes of the Jeep just before a ten-foot white werewolf jumped out of the woods right where they would have been. He was back in the Jeep, a split second after the wolf should have hit them, what was going on?

  “Reverse!” Thea screamed and the jeep sped backwards. Sarah and Jax fired at the monster barreling down the road after them. Everyone in the vehicle was screaming something. Kat in anguish, Rich in terror, Cindy in… well, Cindy was usually screaming something apparently.

  But what Liam couldn’t figure out was how they were here again. He’d just been on the side of the road after Bast had fought that giant white bastard. Liam tried to think, but was interrupted by Steven shoving a shotgun into his hands and yelling, “Keep them off the Jeep!” then pointing at the fast approaching were-pack coming from their current direction of travel.

  The white wolf was chasing their vehicle as it traveled backwards towards the were-pack they had been trying to escape. They were effectively surrounded. The wolves dove at the speeding vehicles and tried to latch onto the roll bars. Steven and Liam fired buckshot into the muzzles of any that managed to get a grip, knocking them off.

  They roared back past the clearing they’d come from in time to see Bast and Hand come running out onto the road, puzzled to see the Jeep going backwards, then understanding once they spotted the massive white wolf. Bast whispered something into Hand’s ear and he appeared on the roll-cage of the jeep, almost getting a face-full of buck shot.

  “Cindy! Get Hansen! Tell him we need an exit at mile marker 47!” he shouted at the girl huddled in the seat covering her ears. She cursed in Spanish and teleported. Hand held onto the roll cage, helping the occupants kick off any werewolves that still attempted to board. Liam looked over to see Bast racing along the road next to them in her full jaguar form before making a leap and landing on the cage where Hand wrapped a big hand around her.

  “Well?!” she shouted to Hand.

  “Should be any second!” he replied as a bright light shot through the forest and the jeep rolled into the big cement garage they’d started in that night. Michael slammed on the brakes, leaving a trail of black rubber marks and tossing those who were unprepared onto the concrete. Liam heard many curses and groans, but all seemed to be very much alive. Liam looked back towards the front of the Jeep in time to see a very pissed-off were-pack and a giant white wolf leaping and howling in rage as the portal closed.

  * * *

  “STOP TELLING ME TO CALM DOWN!” Kat screamed and backed away from the group. “Nobody touches me! Nobody gets near me until someone explains what’s going on!” she yelled, pointing accusing fingers at Steven and Sarah who were trying to get her to sit and take a deep breath.

  Liam saw her aura flash dark blues and green then grey and back to blue, her emotions shuffling uncontrollably inside her. He looked at Rich, and even his normally placid exterior was more than a little cracked, his aura also spinning rapidly. Liam turned back to Kat. “Kat, please, let’s get inside the house and then we’ll talk. You’re freaking out and you need to calm down.” Liam tried to succeed where Steven and Sarah had failed.

  “Freaking out?” Her aura flashed a dangerous emerald green. “Freaking out! You’re damn right I’m freaking out! First, my friend goes missing, then I’m kidnapped by men in masks, then I get eaten by a giant fucking wolf, and now suddenly it’s all fine!” Kat screeched, her voice breaking as she started to sob again and her aura shifted to a deep blue.

  “Kat, please, I’ll tell you everything, but inside. Please?” Liam said, slowly approaching his hysterical friend and reaching out a hand. She shied away and backed up against the wall of the garage shaking her head, then sunk down into a ball and wept, overcome by the uncontrollable emotions inside her.

  “Liam. Please let me,” came Bast’s melodic voice, though he couldn’t see the woman. He felt a brush on his leg and looked down to see a black cat strolling by and taking a seat next to Kat. She purred and rubbed up against Kat, startling the young woman for a moment before she swept up the cat and held onto it as she continued to cry.

  Liam deflated and turned, seeing Rich outside the open garage door puking his guts out, while a stoic Hand, patted his back.

  “Rich?” Liam said cautiously, walking up, but the man held out a hand for him to stop.

  “Not right now, Liam,” Rich said and then retched again. Liam nodded and backed away, Hand giving him a curt nod and moving his hand in a calm-down motion.

  Liam returned to the garage and saw the rest of the group milling about retrieving gear from the Jeep and checking on friends and teammates. In the corner, Thea sat with Michael and the two conversed in voices Liam couldn’t make out. Kat was still sobbing while holding onto Bast, and Sarah and Steven were now talking softly with Jax a few feet away from Liam.

  “Lily, what have I done?” Liam thought to his guide, but was surprised when there wasn’t a response. “Lily? Are you there?” Still no response. Liam was starting to panic a little when a groggy voice finally spoke up.

  “Hey? What happened?” Lily said, sounding as if she’d just woken up from a nap.

  “Are you ok?” Liam thought, jumping through questions, unable to decide on which one he actually wanted answered.

  “Not really sure. I just remember Bast fighting that big wolf and then. I don’t know, I didn’t even think my kind could pass out before yesterday,” she said shakily. “Liam, what happened?”

  “I don’t know, one second Bast was fighting that wolf and everyone else was dead, and the next, we were back in the Jeep just before it hit. I would have thought it was a vision or a dream, except that Kat obviously remembers it too. And from the look of the others, so do they,” Liam thought.

  “Did we do something?” Lily asked.

  “I don’t know. Maybe? We still don’t know our full power set. Maybe we do actually have some kind of time warping ability?” he mused.

  “I think I’d feel it though if we did, and I don’t feel like I can shift time. It must have been something else. But I don’t have any idea what,” she responded.

  “We’ll have to ask the others later, maybe
one of them knows what it was,” Liam said and looked up as a portal opened in the wall and a middle-aged man in a reindeer sweater and pinstripe slacks stepped through along with several other demis that Liam recognized from the common room.

  “Oh! Something is wrong, very wrong!” the newcomer said in a quick, sharp tenor as he looked around. Liam noticed his hand was wrapped around a charm that hung from his belt and he was running his fingers across it constantly. “Yes, something definitely happened. Bast? Where is Bast?” the man said looking at Liam. “You, you’re new. Where is Bast, she’ll fix things.”

  “Hansen, it’s ok. Bast is busy, but everything is fine for the moment,” Steven said, breaking off from Sarah and Jax and approaching the man.

  “No, something is broken. Everything is moving. Things aren’t right,” the man said, zoning out.

  “Hansen,” Steven said bringing the man’s attention back to them.

  “Did I do it again? I’m sorry,” he said quickly, looking surprised.

  “Just a little,” Sarah said then hugged the older man.

  “Bound to happen, I guess. Seem you all found a bit of excitement. I had a heck of a time getting the timing right on that escape portal,” he said smiling at Sarah and Steven.

  “Wait,” Liam said, “you’re Hansen, the—”

  “Yes, I’m the portal guy. I sign autographs at eight,” the man said sarcastically giving Liam a snide grin.

  “Thanks for the save back there. I’m Liam,” he said sticking his hand out to the man.

  “Touching, not really my thing,” Hansen said staring at Liam’s hand.

  “But Sarah just hugged you,” Liam pointed out.

  “Yes, and have you ever tried to tell her no? That’s what I thought,” Hansen said with a smirk.

  “That’s right!” Sarah said, wrapping her arms back around the man, eliciting a sigh of frustration from him.

  Sarah’s display of wanton disregard for Hansen’s personal space was cut off by Bast’s voice echoing through the room calling for their attention. Liam looked over and saw that Bast was back in her human form. She’d somehow gotten Kat to lie down on a stretcher and that she was relatively calm with an IV in her arm. Rich was likewise also being put on a stretcher. He gave Liam a sullen look, then closed his eyes and lay back, letting the demi next to him wheel him out of the garage.

  “I want the gear moved back to base and this location scrubbed off any sign we were here. I’m closing down this site until further notice. Also, for the foreseeable future, anybody leaving the base will have at least two others with them, one of those having some sort of forewarning or emergency movement ability,” Bast announced as conversations died down.

  Her requirement for an escort started them back up again, and Liam waited to see if she would explain, but like the cat she was, she just turned and walked brusquely through the portal back to the base.

  “You all heard Bast, let’s get this place cleared out!” Thea yelled, shocking people into action.

  “What was that all about?” Liam thought to Lily.

  “I don’t know, but her guide seemed really disturbed. Maybe something with that big wolf back there? She definitely knew who he was,” Lily mused.

  “Maybe we should ask?” He took a step towards Bast’s retreating form, but a small hand grabbed his arm.

  Startled, Liam looked down to find Sarah dragging him towards a pile of equipment against a wall. “You don’t want to know what’s going on in her head right now, and asking will just get you yelled at. Trust me, Bast will tell us when she’s ready,” the girl explained. “Besides, anything that had her that worked up, you really don’t want to have a part in.”

  “Yeah, only other time I’ve seen her that uptight was when one of her old boyfriends showed up and proposed after two centuries. Never seen her run faster in my not-so-short life,” Thea injected as they came within earshot. She grabbed a crate next to them, startling Sarah who had thought she was being discreet.

  “One thing you always need to remember about our elder there, she’s seen more shit go down in history than all of us combined. If she thinks something bad is about to happen, then you’d be wise to listen and do what she says. She hasn’t survived this long because she’s got nine lives after all,” Thea quipped with a chuckle.

  “How can you be this calm?” Liam said incredulously. “I mean, you died, I saw you die and I’ll bet you remember dying. And yet you all seem to be acting like it’s another Tuesday or something.”

  “I thought it was Friday?” Sarah said to Thea with mock sadness.

  “Me too,” Thea said grinning back at her.

  “Unbelievable.” Liam sighed.

  “Don’t take it too hard, Liam. We’ve all come close to death several times. It loses its ability to shock after two or three times,” Thea explained.

  “And as for the whole time jump thing? We’re demigods; weird shit happens,” Sarah said.

  “You’ll get used to it after a few hundred years.” Thea smiled and patted Liam on the shoulder, then turned back to grabbing her crate.

  “Wait, so how old are y’all then?” Liam asked, only now realizing that not only was Bast thousands of years old, but the others were probably ancient as well.

  “Liam, rude!” Sarah yelled and hit his arm. “Don’t you know it’s not polite to ask a lady her age?”

  “You’re only mad because you got stuck in a twelve-year-old’s body,” Hand’s jibed as he passed by.

  “Fifteen!” Sarah yelled back.

  “So, you’re fifteen?” Liam asked.

  “No, I’m two hundred and eighty seven, but that’s not the point. It’s the principle of the matter,” Sarah quipped, then tossed her hair behind her and marched off with her box.

  “What about—”

  “Four hundred and sixty,” came Hand’s reply, cutting Liam off.

  “197,” Steven called out.

  “2!” Yelled someone else.

  “47!”

  “Over nine-thousand.”

  “Now y’all are just yelling out random numbers,” Liam huffed drawing a laugh from those around him.

  “Hehe, don’t begrudge them a little hazing. You are the youngest one here now after Cindy,” Steven said, patting him on the back then continuing to move boxes. “And as the youngest, I vote that Liam get to move the rest of the boxes,” Michael called out.

  “Seconded!” Jax said as people laughed.

  “What?” Liam blanched and watched as several people left the room laughing.

  “Come on, there’s not that many left,” Steven said with a grin and handed a box to Liam, then grabbed one himself.

  Liam sighed and started walking. Despite it all, the levity in the group did make him feel better though. They’d seen a lot together; a lot more than he could even imagine. He mused on his new friends as he grabbed the last couple boxes and exited the garage.

  Once he and Steven left, the portal hummed closed behind them and they were left standing next to a pile of boxes and bags in the middle of the common room. Steven stretched and yawned, tired from their long day. “Well, time to get some sleep, bro. You should probably do the same. I have a feeling that we’re going to be getting one of Bast’s talks tomorrow,” Steven said, and slowly trudged off towards the dorms.

  “Guess so,” Liam said softly, but he didn’t feel like he’d be able to sleep. Instead, he headed toward the facility’s infirmary where he guessed Kat and Rich would be. He looked through the glass window set into the infirmary’s door and saw their figures sitting on hospital beds. Kat was curled up into a ball, rocking back and forth slowly next to Rich who was slowly stroking her hair as she cried. A couple of demis moved around the room, tending to others who were there.

  Liam pushed the door opened and silently stepped into the room. He walked slowly towards the two and Rich looked up when he was a few feet away.

  “I—”

  Kat screamed and lunged at him before he could say anymore. He caught
her hands without thinking as she tried to hit him. “Get away from me, you damn bastard. I hate you!” she said shoving at him, making him take a shocked step backwards as she collapsed to the ground again, sobbing.

  “Liam, I think you should go,” Rich’s icy voice said as he dropped down next to the hysterical heap that had once been their cheerful friend Kat.

  “I’m sorry,” Liam said dropping his head and turning.

  “Get out!” Kat screamed, breaking into sobs again.

  By this point, her cries had drawn the attention of several others in the room, a few of the demis caring for them moving towards the commotion.

  “Liam, she’s been through a lot. She probably doesn’t…” Lily said in his head, not finishing.

  “I know,” Liam replied sullenly as he exited the infirmary.

  REQUIEM FOR THE DEAD

  Julian looked down at the three whimpering forms before him. These were the whelps who had been responsible for guarding their hostages; they hadn’t even put up enough of a fight to be worth killing when that damn cat and her misfits showed up. He growled low, thinking of how she’d humiliated him. But he’d show her and all of her kind why they should fear the wolf.

  That started, however, with ensuring that his followers knew the price of failure. He growled again and one of the men wet himself. These disgusting creatures didn’t belong in his pack. He snarled and the wolves gathered around them and pounced. In a few seconds, the three groveling men were reduced to shreds and bones on the ground.

  “Send out scouts, I want to know where they’re hiding my prey by sundown tomorrow, or I will kill every last one of you!” he bellowed, finishing with a snarl that made the vicious were-pack cower.

  He would have his prey, and his revenge, and it would be soon.

  Black paced inside the cell. That animal Julian had screwed up. They only had one lead on getting back the core stone he needed and he’d wasted it on a fool’s errand. Julian was good at capturing exotic creatures and slaves for Black’s cult, but he lacked the finesse to really understand how demis functioned and it showed. Julian’s pack had been shown up by a small group of demis, less than a quarter of their number, and had lost all traces of the thief or his friends. It seemed that Black would need to handle this one himself since the dogs didn’t seem up to the task after all, but what could one expect from beasts?