by P. L. Smith
"There are ancient stories of great battles, great civilizations, and then of war and the land itself being torn apart. As with all stories, I'm sure there are threads of truth spun within tales of fantasy. But most of our ancient stories come together and speak of the time of hiding, millenniums ago, when there were very few foresters to speak of, and Yumans ruled over the Earth. Some catastrophe brought ruin on the Yumans, and the Earth was changed. This was the time of darkness. The foresters and what was left of the Yumans, struggled to survive until Mo-Na was able to heal herself. Little else is known."
"That's nothing like what my teachers have told me."
"No. Correct me if I am wrong, but the Yuman version of history is much shorter and tells of a holy spring in which Mo-Na planted two seeds, and from those seeds grew the first male and female child not four hundred years ago?"
"Yeah, it always sounded a little silly to me. I've never seen anything like that."
"Don't discount your history, my young lady. As I said, there are always threads of truth within the fabric of the tale, and Mo-Na works in mysterious ways. However, I am quite sure the Yumans and the foresters have been around much longer than four hundred years. When I was a young bull, I traveled around quite a bit. I saw sites that prove to me a very, very long time ago the earth was a much different place, and that we have lost untold amounts of knowledge since."
Jak was excited.
"Where are these sites? Can you take me?"
"Very far away, I'm afraid. Maybe after this Firejack business is over, I can show you."
Jak was disappointed, but the prospect of seeing the ancient places still thrilled her.
"Lethan told me about the death of your parents. Do you have any other family?"
Jak was silent for a time, and finally she spoke.
"I had a little brother. He died a few years ago."
"Oh, my dear. I'm quite sorry. If you don't mind my asking, what happened to him?"
"He was taken... by a Lycan."
Lethan stopped. A blade of ice slid up his back, and his heart froze. Jak strode ahead, her face flushed, putting distance between them and her.
"Lethan?"
"Yes."
"Was it you?"
"There was no one else."
****
"Lethan, Lethan wait a moment. I have to rest my leg."
Dagan mopped his brow with the back of his hand as he sat upon a great fallen log. Lethan sat beside him, his own fur matted with sweat. Dagan pointed his chin toward Jak, who was just disappearing into the brush far ahead.
"I think she's determined to make it back before nightfall."
"I think she's just determined to keep her distance from me," said Lethan.
"Can you blame her?"
Lethan ground his teeth together.
"No."
"Do remember the boy?"
"How am I supposed to remember? There's been dozens."
Dagan grimaced.
"Do you think she knows it was you?"
"I don't know. The Yumans seem to think there's lots of us left. They thought I was setting a trap for them, trying to lure them out to place them at the mercy of my pack. But she's smarter than any other Yuman I've met."
Dagan laughed a bit, more out of irony than humor.
"Well, whether you decide to tell her or not, is up to you. But that there is a strong girl with a good heart. You owe her more than you can give."
Lethan stared down at his clawed toes working their way into the dry pine needles.
"I know."
"Perhaps she'd take solace in knowing that you've stopped feeding."
"But I haven't. Dagan, before we made it to the highlands, the demon was calling. I was going to kill her. I only stopped because a Firejack attacked us. I can't stop. I've let it go on too long. The demon has more control over me than I do."
Dagan sighed and looked down at the ground.
"Lethan, do you want to stop?"
"Yes."
"Then you still have the power to. It is that simple."
Lethan's eyes burned and threatened to fill with tears.
"That's what Lina used to say."
Dagan nodded.
"She was a good soul."
"Dagan... the night before she died, I fed. That's why they came. That's why they killed her."
"No..."
Lethan sobbed into his palms, and Dagan's massive hand squeezed his shoulder.
"No wonder you've tortured yourself so much. Killing more isn't going to bring her back, Lethan."
"You think I don't know that? It may not bring her back, but it... but it kills the pain, however short the relief is."
"You said you wanted to stop. Start now."
Lethan huffed.
"If only it were that simple."
"But it is Lethan. Even the longest trails are started with the first step. When the Luna comes, you can go up into the mountains, far enough that you won't be able to come down to any of the villages. Keep yourself away from temptation."
Jak appeared through the trees coming back to check on them.
"There's only one problem Dagan; the Luna is tonight..." Lethan nodded towards Jak. "...and temptation is right there."
****
"Really? Hivelace?"
Lethan's brows were furrowed in disgust.
"Why not? It held Dagan pretty good. All we have to do is tie you to a tree,” Jak said.
Lethan looked up. The sky was already beginning to darken. They were running out of time.
"It's a good plan, Lethan. About the only one we have at this point," said Dagan.
"But it stinks."
"The rope or the plan? Better to put up with a little stink than to murder someone’s child isn't it?" said Jak, folding her arms with the roll of Firejack rope draped from her fist.
Lethan still wasn't convinced. He knew that during the Luna he was much stronger. During his frenzy he was capable of nearly impossible feats, feats that his body paid for once the Luna dropped out of the sky. On multiple occasions on days following the Luna, Lethan was unable to lift his sore body off of the ground. He knew that there were few restraints strong enough to hold him. Still, at this point, it didn't seem like he had much of a choice.
"All right, fine. But I'm sure I'll be able to break free, and if that happens, Jak isn't going to be safe. As soon as you tie me up, I want you to get out of here. Get downwind so I can't smell you, and then run as fast as you can."
"All right," said Jak.
"I'll be fine as long as I can keep it controlled through the first frenzy. It'll all be downhill from there."
"Is there anything else we can do, Lethan?" asked Dagan.
"No, just make sure she is far away."
Lethan turned and sat against a large oak. He cocked his head a bit, thinking.
"It's too bad we didn't kill a boar... or an elk, maybe. Lina used to feed me fresh meat to control the frenzy."
"Did it help?" asked Jak.
"Sometimes. Too late now though. It's getting dark. Get me tied up before the Luna rises."
Jak and Dagan worked the hivelace around Lethan, tying him tightly against the tree, binding his arms down.
"Make 'em good knots, Jak," said Dagan.
Jak nodded.
The hivelace stretched a bit as Jak pulled the last knot tight. Lethan struggled against the restraint a bit to test its strength. Wherever he pushed out, it stretched, but the loops above and below grew uncomfortably tighter around his chest and torso. He nodded.
"Good enough. Now you... uhhh... get out of here, Jak!"
Lethan's chest moved up and down in great gasps. Each breath coming out deeper and more labored. His eyes narrowed, and Jak thought they looked red and milky.
"You better get going, Jak. I'll watch him," said Dagan, not taking his eyes off Lethan.
Jak hesitated.
"Maybe I should just..."
"Go!" Lethan screamed.
Jak winced, but then nodded an
d turned, running away into the night. Dagan eased himself down a tree near Lethan, pushing his splinted leg out in front of him. He glanced up through the canopy and could see the sharp slivers of moonlight piercing through.
"Dagan? If I get free... kill me."
"What? No, I..."
"Promise me Dagan. Promise me that you'll do it. I don't want to kill again. I can't. If I found Jak... promise me Dagan."
Lethan turned his head trying to wipe his eyes on his shoulder.
"Alright. I promise you, Lethan."
"Thank you."
Lethan's eyes squeezed tight, and his face turned into a contortion of agony.
"How is it, Lethan?"
"The demon... hasn't come yet. Just the pain... of the hunger."
"How will you know when he comes?"
Lethan clenched his jaw and his chin dropped to his chest. His whole body tensed and strained as though he were a mother trying to push through the pain of childbirth. Then he was still.
"He is here.”
Lethan's voice was hollow and lifeless. Dagan shifted uncomfortably against his tree. Icy shivers crawled up his back, as he watched Lethan's body stiffen and expand, almost as though he were growing. Lethan's head lifted slowly, no longer encased in a grimace of pain. Now his face was calm, his eyes vacant.
All at once Lethan, or the demon within him, exploded in a rage, snarling and straining against his bindings.
Dagan hauled himself up, nervously. The eyes, in what used to be his friend, glowed a milky red, or maybe it was just the moonlight making them glow. Dagan couldn't be sure.
Lethan was thrashing against the tree, straining against the hivelace, but Jak's knots were holding.
"Easy Lethan. Easy now. Don't hurt yourself. It'll be over soon. Try to relax."
The demon howled up into the night. Dagan had heard wolves howl, and he had heard Lethan howl, but this... this was something else, something evil. The demon struggled again, pushing and straining. The hivelace dug into its body. Dagan could see blood running down its arms and chest from where it struggled against it. Its body bulged out between each wrung of the yellow cord.
The demon thrashed on for an hour, testing the strength of the rope everywhere it could, howling, screaming and snarling. Dagan watched in mute sorrow at the change that had overtaken his friend. Eventually he settled back against his own tree, resting his leg, doing his best to not gape at the creature.
The demon seemed to quiet itself after a while, breathing heavily full of rasp and spit. Dagan noticed that Lethan's eyes had taken on some of their original color. His breathing began to return to normal.
"Lethan?"
The Lycan blinked, looking confused.
"Dagan?"
Dagan's shoulders sagged in relief.
"Thank Mo-Na. I was beginning to think..."
An ear-piercing cry interrupted Dagan as Lethan tried curling into a ball, but the hivelace held him tight.
"It hurts. Mo-Na it hurts. Please let me free!"
Dagan started to push himself up.
"Let me go so I can feed. The sweet flesh is the only thing that can stop this pain. Please!"
Dagan stopped and eased himself back down.
"I'll not let you loose, Lethan. Work through it. Work through the pain. You don't want to harm anyone. Feel it. Feel the pain ease as each moment passes. You are strong. You can fight this urge. That demon is nothing. You can beat him."
The cry that came from Lethan's throat turned Dagan's stomach. It was the most gut-wrenching noise he had ever heard.
"Please! Let me feed. Just a small one. Just a taste. It's all I ask. Just let me make the demon go..."
Lethan's head snapped sideways. Then Dagan felt it. The wind had shifted. Lethan sniffed at the air, in the direction Jak had gone. Dagan watched in horror as Lethan's eyes turned bloody again. The hair on the Lycan's neck and shoulders stuck out like needles, and a low grumble ushered from somewhere deep inside him.
"Lethan? Lethan, fight it!"
Another blood-curdling howl shattered the night, and he thrashed more wildly than ever. He worked at the loops; this time more methodically. He worked what little slack there was down each loop, down to the one holding his hands. Lethan strained, pulling his hand up under the hivelace. The skin on the back of his hand shredded off against the rope. Blood trickled down, pooling on his thigh.
"Lethan don't!"
Then the hand was free. Lethan smiled a toothy smile. The hand reached back for the knot. Dagan pushed himself up quickly and hobbled towards the tree. Just as the knot came loose, Dagan dove for the ends of the hivelace, catching them and winching Lethan back tight against the tree.
Lethan thrashed and screamed. Every muscle in Dagan’s arms, neck, and chest burned from the strain.
"Lethan, no. Fight it!"
But Lethan did not stop. With each lurch and convulsion, Dagan felt himself lose a little more ground. The hivelace sliced his hands as it slowly slid through his grip.
"Lethan... stop... please!"
Dagan felt the end of the hivelace sliding up his palm. Wet tears streamed down his face. He saw a large rock lying next to him. He knew what he had to do. He'd have just a few seconds while the Lycan freed himself from the hivelace.
There was a moment where time stood still, as the end of the rope slipped from his fingers. Dagan dove for the rock. His fingers wrapped around its rough edges, and he turned and stopped. Lethan was already standing over him. His eyes, glowing deep blood red; seeming to almost pulse with excitement, excitement and anger.
Any other day Dagan could whip Lethan from one end of Redtree Forest to the other, but this... this wasn't Lethan, and he knew he didn't stand a chance.
Lethan reached down and tore the heavy rock from Dagan's grip with one hand. There was nothing he could do. Dagan merely sat and watched as Lethan lifted the rock high above his head to deliver the death blow, the same he had planned to deliver to Lethan. This was it. The end. Killed by his friend possessed. It wasn't dying that struck him with sorrow; it was the knowledge that Lethan would remember this. He'd remember murdering his friend. Having to watch and being able to do nothing. He'd have the burden of living with that sorrow.
Dagan closed his eyes and took one last breath. The thunk scared him so badly that his whole body convulsed. But he felt nothing except for the heat of the blood pumping in his ears. Was he dead? He slowly opened his eyes.
Lethan was still standing over him, the rock still high above his head, but his head was turned, looking somewhere behind him.
Another thunk, and Lethan dropped the rock next to Dagan and turned, lurching towards the source of the sound. Dagan pushed himself up and could see him on his haunches gnawing on a hunk of meat. A deer leg, it looked like. Lethan quickly devoured it and snatched up a second one. Then Dagan saw another chunk of meat fly through the air and land with another thunk next to him.
As Lethan reached for the third piece of meat, Dagan saw him sway on his haunches, nearly losing his balance. His hand reached out to steady himself. Lethan reached again for the piece. As his claws wrapped around the bloody morsel, Lethan, like a falling oak, slowly fell to the ground and landed in a mass of crumpled fur.
Dagan pushed himself to his feet and hobbled over. Lethan's chest was slowly rising and falling. He was still alive. Dagan kicked the meat out of Lethan's hand with his hoof. He bent and sniffed it. There was a strange scent mixed with the flesh.
Something crashed through the brush and Dagan spun. The pain in his leg causing him to wince. A slender shape appeared, silhouetted in the moonlight.
"Jak? What are you doing here?"
She smiled.
"Showing up just in time by the looks of it."
"You did at that. But... what did you do?"
"Dream thistle."
Dagan scratched the patch of hair between his horns.
"Huh?"
"Dream thistle. I put it in the meat. Took me all stinking night to find a bush."
She held out her blood crusted palms and displayed the prickly vine. Dagan sniffed it and blanched.
"Ah. Thought that's what it was. Except we call it goatsbane. It's toxic to the Yali."
"It's not toxic to werewolves... or Lycans is it?"
"No, no. At least... I don't think so," said Dagan.
They both turned and stared down at the sleeping form.
"How did you know it would put him to sleep?"
"The healers of my village use it to put people to sleep when they're sick or in pain. Me and my... brother both caught pneumonia one winter. I had a bad cough, and I couldn't sleep. They made make drink a cup of dream thistle broth. I remember it tasted like snot, but I slept. The dreams I had were like nothing I have ever experienced before. I traveled across the sea, then up into the stars and flew through the heavens. When I woke up, I felt like I had slept for ten days, instead of just two."
"Powerful stuff."
"Very."
CHAPTER V
Jak could smell the smoke from the cook stove before she even opened her eyes. Her mom must be making breakfast. She curled up under her blankets, savoring the warmth and the comfort before she had to get up. But something wasn't right. Her bed was cold and hard and her pillow rough and uncomfortable. She lifted one eye and could see the fire burning in front of her, and she could see her breath. The familiar heart-wrenching realization flooded back. She had no mother, because her parents had been murdered by the Firejacks, and she was outside, in the cold and the wild.
She closed her eyes tightly and willed herself back into her memory. Her mother in her yellow dress, wiping her flour-coated hands on her stained apron, sliding a pan full of honey biscuits into the cook stove. The sizzle of the iron pan as she laid in thick slices of bacon. She could almost smell it. No, as a matter of fact, she could definitely smell it. It made her stomach ache with anticipation. The smell of the smoke and the pork hit her again in a wave, and she even felt the heat from the cook stove.
"Hungry?"
"Hmm?"
Jak lifted her eyes a bit, expecting her mom ready to push her out of bed. Instead, she saw a wide set of smiling teeth, sharp teeth. Her eyes snapped all the way open, and she sat up.