by H B Lyne
Shadow moved into the middle of the room and sat down on the floor. He laid out a small dish and a selection of herbs, which he set light to with a match. Thick smoke immediately spiralled up from the dish and the air filled with a strong smell. Ariana wrinkled her nose against the unusual fragrance.
'The incense will help to focus your mind. First you must learn to look inside yourself and draw the power from within. Look into the smoke.' His voice was faintly hypnotic and Ariana felt compelled to do as he said. Her eyes drifted out of focus as she stared at the smoke and the vague thought occurred to her that the incense was fogging up her mind rather than making anything more clear, before everything became a blur.
She blinked a few times and the room came back into focus. Shadow was still sitting in front of her, on the other side of the smoking incense. She felt calm, but her thoughts seemed sharper. Her mind latched onto each fleeting thought and seemed to take an instant to absorb every nuance.
'This feels strange.' Even as she said it the words punctured her mind, sharp and deliberate, each leaving its mark within her.
'Everything is clear now, isn't it? You know your own thoughts with a clarity you have never felt before.'
'Yes.' She wasn't really seeing the room, she was seeing her own thoughts. She pictured herself, as she was days ago, normal, and as she was now. She saw herself as the ginger fox, a beautiful lion and a soaring eagle, then as the monster; tall, powerful, dangerous. 'I know myself.'
She saw herself at the Caerton Martial Arts tournament in the summer, winning another trophy, her face smug, she saw herself with Rhys. She was boasting about her victories. There was something in his face that she hadn't seen at the time, just a hint of reservation towards her as she casually glanced at the trophy in her hand.
Her thoughts returned to the present and she focused on Shadow, sitting before her, watching her carefully.
'You saw something about yourself that you didn't like.' It wasn't a question.
'I can be, well, kind of smug and annoying.' She grimaced.
'I have observed this too.' There was a trace of a smile on his face and Ariana had to laugh.
'Okay, so what now? I have seen my own soul, but I can't go into a trance like that in the middle of a fight.'
'You won't need to do that again. You have tapped into the ability within yourself and will be able to recall it at will now.' He pressed his fist into the smoking dish and snuffed out the burning embers of the herbs without flinching. He stood and tidied up briskly. 'On your feet,' he barked as he put away the ritual tools and Ariana did as she was told. Her head felt clear, the bizarre sharpness had left her and her normal senses returned, still sharper than they had been before she changed, but manageable.
She moved into the middle of the room, still thinking about what she had seen, yet she saw the attack before Shadow struck and she blocked his fist easily. He spun around her and ducked below her arm as she tried to land a blow. They danced their dance, neither of them taking a hit. Ariana evaded him easily, jumping over a sweeping leg, rolling across his back and ducking under an attempted strike. But he evaded her just as smoothly and she began to feel frustrated. As she twisted under him and blocked a strike, she allowed her body to change, she needed an advantage and so she took the biggest one she could muster. Thick hair sprouted instantly all over her body, she shifted form and became enlarged and empowered as the monster inside took shape on the surface.
Ariana leaped up and out of their tight dance, changing the rules in an instant and went for his shoulder with her massive jaws. As her teeth sank in, he shifted to match her and her mouth met with fur and sinewy tissue. Shadow snarled and recoiled away from her bite, then leaped in low for his own attack. Their dance resumed, but this time it was vicious and feral and both of them tore flesh with claws and teeth. Shadow had the advantage as the larger and far more experienced beast, and he sank his teeth hard into her shoulder and pinned her firmly to the ground. As one, they shifted back into their human forms, Ariana was panting hard and her body shook with pain. Shadow drew a deep, steadying breath as he continued to hold her firmly to the floor, and Ariana watched in amazement as the open wounds on his shoulder and chest healed before her very eyes.
Her hand shot out to touch his near-black skin where seconds before had been a gaping wound from her teeth.
'So fast,' she murmured and he glanced at the spot where her fingers rested. He cleared his throat and jumped up, releasing her.
'Yes. You too.' He gestured toward her and as she sat up she looked herself over, her flesh and skin were sealing themselves up. The blood stained her skin and a little had got onto her clothes where she had continued to bleed for a moment after she shifted back into her human form and exposed her clothes to the blood. 'I wasn't expecting you to shift. Did you forget the lesson?'
Ariana stood up and met his eyes.
'I must have.'
'Well, remember it later. You may need it. Perhaps it was too much of me to expect you to use it in combat right away.' Shadow turned away and reached for a large bottle of water in the cabinet.
Ariana watched his back and focused her thoughts, she reached into him, not just his mind, but into the very essence of her mentor. She saw him watching her, she felt his thoughts and feelings as he had fought her and knew that he had been working very hard to keep up with her. Like a knife, the truth penetrated her mind: that he hated how hard it had been to beat her. He should surpass her easily at this stage and his jealousy was almost tangible.
'Huh,' the sound escaped her lips before she could stop it and Shadow's attention turned back to her as he held out a bottle of water.
'What?'
'I had better not let that go to my big head.' She smirked and took the water from him, turning and leaving him to ponder her words.
She returned to the kitchen, where Teri sat with a pile of books and notes, reading and scribbling while idly playing with one of her necklaces with her free hand. Ariana sat down opposite her new friend. She noticed the necklace Teri was toying with was a silver-coloured Celtic knot with a gibbous moon at the centre. Ariana smiled and glanced over the books on the table, all science texts and totally lost on her.
'That's pretty,' she said, pointing at the necklace.
'Thanks,' Teri smiled at her and dropped the charm. 'Fortune gave it to me. It's not real silver, obviously.'
'It's not obvious to me,' Ariana said, stifling the sting of her own ignorance.
'Silver hurts us, just like in the myths about werewolves. It burns the skin. I think this is nickel.'
Shadow placed a careful hand on Ariana's shoulder and gave it a light squeeze. She startled, having not heard him follow her.
'I will see you later.' He was gone through the back door before Ariana could react to his warning tone. She shrugged it off and returned her attention to Teri.
'What's all this?' Ariana asked, gesturing the books and papers.
'Before I changed I was in the middle of a PhD.' Teri explained. 'I want to finish it.'
'I can understand that,' Ariana replied. She too felt that she had unfinished business with her old life. With a sudden stab of guilt she decided that the following morning she must call Ron at work and excuse herself, take some annual leave to come to terms with all of this, it was too late in the evening to call him now.
'Seeing as Fortune won't let me leave the betting shop right now, I am trying to get something productive done. I was supposed to meet with some other new friends tonight, but he won't let me go. It's so stupid, it's in the city centre. The Witches are hardly going to get right through the city to get to me.'
'Why do they want you, anyway?' Ariana was suddenly struck with the question and as she asked it, a dozen more flooded into her thoughts.
'I don't think it's me in particular. Is it? Fortune thinks they just want to be able to track the pack to here, to find out where we live.' Teri looked at Ariana with confusion in her eyes.
'Then why did you say th
at? About them tracking you into the city centre?'
'I don't know.' Teri's brow furrowed. 'It just popped out. I guess on some level I am afraid that they might be after me. I grew up in Fenwick. Even though I've lived here for over a year maybe they still see me as theirs.'
'I think it is really important to listen to our gut instincts about this stuff. Especially now. I mean, that's what this is all about isn't it? Our gut, animal instincts. We are closer to beasts than humans, after all.' As Ariana spoke she felt the truth of her words acutely, realising it consciously for the first time. Teri and Ariana looked at each other in silence for a long minute.
As night fell, the pack reassembled and Fortune gave out assignments for the night over a dinner of yet more meat, which Ariana felt obliged to eat with some salad, for the sake of variety. She felt thankful that she had never been inclined towards vegetarianism.
Flames and Wind Talker were planning to continue Wind Talker's training in rituals, while the rest of the pack were to patrol the border in pairs.
'I'll take Eyes East, to the Fenwick border. We are the most physically capable, if we encounter the Witches.' Fortune gave Eyes a pat on the back and Ariana cocked a sceptical eyebrow at the be-suited Eyes. Sure, he looked lean, but she had yet to see him fight and couldn't remotely imagine this straight guy being up to much in a serious fight. 'Stone, you take Teri north.'
Teri sat up straight in her chair, her eyes bulging.
'I can leave the shop? Really? Can't I go to...'
'No, I need you on pack duty.' Fortune pressed firmly. Teri's face sank a little, but Ariana gave her a reassuring smile. At least she was getting out to patrol and be of use to the pack. She knew Teri would be pleased about that at least.
'We'll take south then,' offered Shadow's Step. Fortune nodded in agreement.
'What about west?' Ariana asked.
'Our territory borders the river, we have no pressing concerns on that side, but we will check it tomorrow. I need Flames and Wind Talker here tonight.' Fortune finished as the pack began to move out.
Shadow took Ariana south from the betting shop, they walked briskly as their human selves and Shadow was on edge, his gaze darting around, his fists clenched at his sides. They approached a small independent petrol station on the main road south into the city centre. Shadow led her across the forecourt and into the little shop. A buzzer sounded their arrival and a spotty young man at the counter behind the glass looked up from his magazine expectantly. He took one look at Shadow and gave a wary nod of recognition. Shadow swept through the shop with an air of familiarity, scooping up a packet of nuts and bottle of water before stopping at the counter. The young man behind it gave them half a smile, but he looked as though he were fighting the urge to back away from them. Ariana frowned slightly, bemused by this reaction to them and she wondered if this was going to be typical.
'Thank you. Are you working until midnight?' Shadow asked, his voice sounded odd and Ariana stifled a laugh when she realised that he was trying to be friendly.
Ariana backed off and wandered around the shop for a minute while Shadow engaged the poor boy in conversation. She felt a prickle over her senses and looked out onto the forecourt. She could feel power reaching out to her. She stood staring out of the window, breathing deeply and feeling everything. Her senses were deeply diminished in this form and it frustrated her slightly. She wanted to bask in the sensation but it was like feeling sunlight through a tinted window. With a sigh she went back to Shadow just as he was turning to leave. Together they left the shop and Shadow spoke softly as they crossed the forecourt, between the pumps.
'Can you feel it?'
'Yes. What is it?' she whispered back. Shadow glanced at her and then disappeared, it was as if he had stepped around a corner. With a cautious glance around at the deserted street and petrol station she followed him across the veil. To the boy in the shop, it would look like they had stepped behind one of the tall pumps.
When she steadied her feet and looked around she gasped. The pump next to her was a twisted pillar of metal with cables flowing from it like tentacles and petrol pooled around the base. The smell was overpowering. Ariana looked around at the rest of the station. Right in front of her in the centre of the forecourt was a spiralling column of fire. Ariana screamed and leaped backwards, bumping into the pump behind her. The column of fire seemed to move towards her and she scrambled around the pump. Shadow stepped between her and the fire and Ariana watched open mouthed as the fire diminished and in its place was a roughly human sized fiery shape.
Shadow took her by the elbow and helped her to her feet, his other hand held up towards the fire creature, commanding it to keep back. Ariana stood and stared open mouthed at the flaming thing as it twisted and flickered before her.
'How goes the night?' Shadow asked loudly. The flames flared and died again and a soft whooshing sound escaped it.
'Quiet,' it seemed to say.
'Good,' Shadow replied as he politely bowed his head. 'Ariana, this is a fae, a fire elemental, to be precise. It guards this property for us,' Shadow said authoritatively.
'But it's fire!' Ariana exclaimed. 'Isn't that really dangerous?' A fire elemental at a petrol station seemed like utter stupidity to her. Shadow chuckled.
'Yes. Yes it is, but this being feeds off the potential for fire, not the flames themselves. It's more of a danger sprite really. We allow it to feed on that danger in exchange for keeping an eye on this part of our territory for us.' As Shadow spoke, the fae lost interest in them and drifted away, sinking into the ground nearby, leaving a small puff of smoke. Ariana raised a sceptical eyebrow.
'Okay,' she whispered. 'I thought we were patrolling the border?'
'We are,' he replied. 'We need to do regular sweeps on both sides of the veil. This side of our territory doesn't share a border with any other shifters. From here to the other side of the city centre is unclaimed. We have little to guard against in the human world. But Hepethia needs our attention.'
'Couldn't the Witches circle south then, and come in over our southern border with no interference?'
Shadow chuckled, an odd sound from him, and he shook his head.
'No, they would have to get through the Glass Wolves. They hold Burnside.'
Ariana took a deep breath as her thoughts leaped back to her old life. Burnside was the financial district of Caerton, but it was also where the main bus station was and she had had cause to pass through the area more times than she could count. It was so strange now to think of all of the times she might have passed shape shifters in the street. The Blue Moon had sensed the change coming in her, they had smelled her shifter blood in passing, as would almost any other shifter she had encountered. How many times over the last few months had a shifter caught her scent and tracked her back to St. Mark's? Would they have been relieved that she was not their problem? Or disappointed that she would be embraced by a rival pack? Knowing now that the city was full of these hidden creatures caused her to re-frame everything she thought she knew.
Shadow gave her a considered look, but asked no questions, nor gave any gesture, he simply waited for her moment of realisation to pass. There would be weeks ahead of her, if not months or years, when these moments would capture her briefly. He knew it too and wasn't going to baby her, he would simply let her deal with the memories in her own way.
After a minute, Shadow led Ariana off the petrol station forecourt and onto the street. The buildings around them were darker, taller and more oppressive than in the human world. They were twisted and the corners seemed to stretch into deep recesses with shadows as black as pitch. Ariana felt a shudder run through her and she looked about cautiously. She felt the eyes of unfamiliar beings all around them, darkness and fear demons peered at them from their shadows, urban constructs of brick and glass twitched in the windows of the buildings.
Shadow walked cautiously ahead of her. He moved down the middle of the street, keeping to the pools of light cast by the orange street lamps
, and seemed to cast his gaze everywhere at once. Ariana kept close behind him and her eyes darted in the direction of every little noise.
'Shadow?' she whispered. 'If Hepethia is our world, why is it full of these things? I can feel them everywhere.'
'The fae are as much a part of our world as the trees are a part of the human world. Try to think of it like that, they are part of the wildlife. Usually harmless to us, sometimes totally unaware of us. Every once in a while something sentient manifests and can cause us a problem, or a demon will find its way here from one of the demon realms, but we are perfectly able to handle it.'
'Have you told Fortune about my strange ability yet?' she asked, keeping her voice very low.
'No, I haven't. I honestly don't know what to make of it and I would rather take him something concrete. This attack on Teri has taken over the attention of all of us. I apologise for that. You need our attention, our time and our experience and that has been taken from you.' He gave her such an apologetic look that Ariana was almost moved to tears.
'It's absolutely fine. It's no one's fault. We just have to get through this and then there will be time to consider my stuff.' Ariana waved a dismissive hand in front of her face.
She meant what she said and was surprised at her own humility. There was the strangest look on Shadow's face, though, just for a moment and she wanted to ask him what he was thinking when just ahead of them a silent figure slipped out of the shadows into the street. Grins-Too-Widely sat down and waited for them to reach him. Ariana felt a little calm settle over her at the presence of the strange ally. The fox cocked his head to one side, regarding her in that same, careful way. Without a sound, Grins-Too-Widely stood up and trotted away down the middle of the street. Shadow shifted into his fox form and broke into a jog and Ariana followed suit to keep up.
The three of them ran swiftly and silently through the twisted streets of Hepethia. The buildings resembled the red brick terraces of St. Mark's, but they were a twisted maze that Ariana couldn't dream of traversing alone.