by Chanel Smith
He shook hands with the man, speechless.
“Come this way,” Luke said, and led him toward the curtains. More curious than anything, Raya followed.
It was quite the surprise when Luke pushed the curtains open and revealed an altar with fresh flowers on it and different crystals everywhere, including two large balls.
“Who the hell are you people?” Raya burst out.
They all smiled.
“You probably haven’t heard of us before. We call ourselves the Illuminated Ones,” Luke said with pride. “We illuminate all of life’s questions. As you saved Schmuel’s life, we owe you. One day you’ll need something answered. Even though your kind outlives our own by centuries, we’ll be here for you. Someone will.”
Christos, how much did they know of his kind? And how did they find out? If there were humans who knew of the wolven’s existence, Raya knew that he had to get back and warn the local packs. But, after the hellish trek back and once he had finally gotten out of the mountains, he never told a soul; hadn’t even thought of it in too many years.
Yet there he was, entering the forest again and he was ready to break through rock if need be to find the Illuminated and get his answer.
Chapter Two
Melina was growing more worried by the second. Petra was pacing back and forth, visibly disturbed. Something wasn’t right. Melina could feel it and it was getting increasingly worse by the second, too.
“I can’t stand it,” Petra almost shouted as she burst through the door into the night air. It was a relief, but only for seconds. Immediately, she began pacing around trees, to the tops of hills.
“You look like a dog lookin’ for a spot to lay down,” Melina remarked, right behind Petra at every step.
As though she’d been waiting for Melina to say those words, Petra suddenly headed to a low rise. At the top she sat, then rolled onto her side facing away from Melina.
“Petra? Don’t you want to come back and lay down on the...” Melina’s words stopped. She’d lived more than forty years and never had she seen or even heard of anything like this, outside of a movie, of course.
Right in front of her eyes, Petra’s form shimmered as if it were rolled in light. Once the nauseating visual stopped, Petra was gone. In her place lay a long silver wolf, who slowly gained her feet and walked toward Melina.
Melina backed away slowly and the wolf stopped; it only stared at her. Melina began to walk, the wolf advanced. Stopped. So did the wolf. Then the animal stood still and lowered its head almost to the ground. It closed its eyes and bared its teeth. Melina’s hand went to cover her mouth as she watched for any signs that the wolf was going to attack. That was when she saw it. The hole. Just like the bullet wound Petra had, was right there in the center of the wolf’s face, but it seemed to be steaming now in the cold night air. The animal gritted its teeth harder and snarled with the effort of it.
Suddenly a metallic object appeared at the opening of the wound. It eased its way through the flesh and fell unceremoniously to the ground before the flesh sealed itself and the skin and fur covered the hole and the wound was no longer visible.
“This ain’t happenin’. This ain’t happenin’,” Melina told herself as she stopped and abruptly sat, the energy finally having left her legs completely. Thunder sounded in the distance and lighting arced across the sky as drops of icy cold rain began to fall.
The wolf stood shivering, ears pricked. Thunder sounded a bit more loudly, and the wolf dropped her head. A massive crack of thunder accompanied by several bolts of lightning rent the sky in two and the wolf whined deeply in her throat, dropped to her belly before advancing toward Melina. Once she reached the woman, she climbed partway into her lap, laid her long silver head on the woman’s thigh and exhaled at length.
They remained like that for quite some time, thunder booming from time to time and the wolf quivering after each instance.
“No, Doc, I didn’t bring home nothin’ weird. Just your basic werewolf who’s afraid of storms,” Melina mused to herself.
***
After two weeks of solid trudging through thick growth, Raya knew he was far more out of shape than he’d thought. Either that or he didn’t give a shit enough to eat, as he’d dropped some twenty pounds and was now rail-thin.
It was true that food held no allure, he thought, as he shoved his way through a thorn bush. Rivulets of red ran from his arms, his face, wherever naked skin showed, yet he felt no pain. No physical pain, that is.
His entire being was centered around the mental agony of his unbelievable loss. It shouldn’t have happened, yet the hollow space where the Alpha link had been was proof positive.
He’d lay down right there and just give up if he wasn’t worried about the price his pack, and maybe all wolves, might have to pay. The ideas streaming through his mind were so dreadful that he got up and began walking again.
So distracted was Raya by those thoughts that he became oblivious to his surroundings and suddenly found himself in a frightful situation that he could have otherwise easily avoided.
He’d heedlessly walked within five feet of a bear’s den, and she was presently at home with her young cub. She growled loudly in response to Raya’s unwanted presence; ears pinned, body crouched and ready to leap by the time Raya became aware of her existence. He reached back in one smooth movement and pulled his rifle from his backpack. He cocked the gun loudly even as the bear leaped.
The weapon was aimed right at those furious eyes; no way he could have missed, but it was like slow motion. As she drew closer, he just uncocked the weapon and dropped it. He could have sworn that the expression in her eyes changed to confusion. She twisted in mid air and Raya felt the wind go by even as she flew so close to him that he could smell her fur. She landed right behind him, shook herself, then strolled around back to her cub and sat, ignoring him as if he didn’t exist.
Raya stood for a moment, staring at the two creatures. Then he turned and once more began pushing his way through the bushes.
That tribe had best still be there, he told himself wearily as he came up on the ruins of a rock shelter he knew well; he’d built it himself centuries before.
He located what had been the fireplace, then the second tile from the left. Under it was what he needed; a perfectly-carved spear head and an object he’d completely forgotten about until that moment. A token the strange villagers had given him, just in case he did need to find them again and would need to prove his identity to the later generation of Illuminated. A beautifully-carved bear, standing on its hind legs.
Just in case, he thought.
Surprisingly, several days later, he found himself no longer caring if he found the tribe. It had been days since he’d found fresh water and his system was beginning to completely shut down. Every pore in his body cried out for water, but there was none to be had.
His only option was to push ahead and that’s exactly what he did until the third day without so much as a whiff of moisture. A small glow of gladness lit his soul as he allowed himself to collapse unconscious into the bushes. He had his answer, just not how he’d expected it to come to him.
And certainly not any more than he’d expected what happened next. He hadn’t expected the loud, irritated growl just before he was bodily lifted off the forest floor. Neither did he expect to be dragged through bushes, thorns, and everything on the forest floor before suddenly feeling icy water as he was dragged into a mountain creek.
He opened his eyes when the cold water hit his face and looked up to see a large bear vanishing into the bushes.
In disbelief, he closed his eyes again and rolled his head to the side and drank. And drank. He got up and ran over to a nearby bush to retch painfully before returning to the water to drink more.
For an entire day he lay where he was, soaking up the water into his dry pores.
Chapter Three
The next morning, Melina pelted Petra with questions. How old was she? Did any other such creatures exist?
How many creatures like her existed?
Petra only responded with shrugs, and finally the questions stopped.
“Don’t know shit, do ya?” Melina asked.
Petra shook her head.
“Fine state of affairs.” Melina hefted her bulk to her feet and headed for the bathroom.
Within moments, Petra heard the shower running. She leaned back on the couch and closed her eyes, still exhausted whether it was physically or mentally.
“Can I ask you a big favor?” a small voice said.
Petra opened her eyes to see Riana, Melina’s eight year old daughter, standing next to the couch and staring at her through red-rimmed black eyes. The girl was a beautiful brown caramel shade herself, far more so than Melina, who was more café au lait colored. Father must have been black too then, Petra thought. God, what a beautiful kid.
She jerked, as that kid was waiting for a response.
“Ask away, but I can’t really say if I’ll be able to answer a thing.”
“You can answer this,” the small voice said with confidence.
“Go ahead then.”
There was a moment of silence, and Petra could feel the tension building as the child tried to get enough courage to ask her question. Finally, when Petra couldn’t tolerate it for another second, the girl exploded.
“Will you bite my mommy?” she all but yelled.
Petra’s eyes shot wide open. She hadn’t known what to expect, but this?
“Why on earth do you want me to bite your mother?” Suddenly the question went from strange to ludicrous and she found herself choking back laughter.
“You know why. So she’ll turn into what you are.”
Petra froze. Riana sighed.
“Yeah, I followed y’all last night. I saw. It’s cool, I won’t ever tell a soul. But please bite my mom!”
It was out before Petra could stop it. “You want to be tucked in by ears and a tail from now on, is that it? Or you want her to sit up and beg?”
“I want her to live so one day she can teach me how to drive,” the small voice said. “And to help me pick out a dress for the prom. You know, Mom stuff.”
Petra closed her eyes. Oh, no. No. But the child continued.
“She’s got the BIG C. That’s what she calls it. Breast cancer. She’s good now, but there’s a whole other year before she’s clear of it. Five years, you know, and she’s on four.”
“Shit!” Petra said.
“You got to put a quarter in the jar.”
“I’ll put in ten fucking bucks. I’m going to need it in the next five minutes, at the rate I’m going!” To her surprise, Riana erupted in laughter. Unwillingly, Petra saw the humor, and began to grin. The child laughed harder, breath coming in little squeaks and then Petra was lost, peals of laughter poured out of her tiny body.
When Melina opened the bathroom door seconds later, the two of them were rolling on the floor, clutching their stomachs and howling with helpless laughter.
“Have y’all done lost your minds?”
***
Finally, a weary Raya reached the bottom of the cliff and was filled with relief. Now the tree, the stairs, the corridor. He was so close.
He stopped walking and clapped a palm to his forehead.
The tree.
It was gone.
No one was there and it looked like no one ever had been. Just a bleak area below the cliffs with rocks scattered everywhere. He could no more find his way back to the village than he could fly! Christos, it was hopeless. All this way for nothing.
His head dropped with misery, and then he had one last desperate idea. It would never work but like his mom had said all those centuries earlier, “Can’t never accomplished a thing.”
“Schmuel!” He yelled at full voice; once, twice, a third time. “SCHMUEL! It is RAYA and I need you!” He ended with a protracted howl and fell silent.
He was just about to mount the cliff side when he heard a loud click, and two young men’s heads popped up out of the ground.
“Raya. What took you so long?” the shorter one asked, then tried to hide a large grin.
“Don’t listen to my brother, Aman. I’m Nesto, by the way. We’ve been waiting forever, generations of us. Our great-great-grandfather told this story of his own great-great-grandfather, and so on going back for generations. Where’s the token?”
Raya pulled the bear from his pocket.
“This?”
The guys grinned.
“Oh, yes.”
Raya followed them down the stairs to the corridor, then to the door at the end. The meadow on the other side didn’t seem to have changed in centuries, at first sight. The small village was still there, and if Raya wasn’t wrong, each house was exactly the same as it had been: small, square, simple wattle-and-daub abodes, some two-story, but most with just one. No telephone poles, satellite dishes, no evidence of technology whatsoever.
But as they drew closer, small details began to jump out at him. First, Raya realized that just before descending the cliff, he’d seen something glint high in the sky. A plane, he thought. But now he saw it again, in just about the same location.
“That wouldn’t be some kind of stationary satellite, would it?” he asked.
The younger guy winked.
“What on earth is a satellite?”
They were just passing a house, and Raya heard an unmistakable noise.
“A big round thing in the sky that sends Frogger to your kids.”
The brothers laughed.
“Busted over Frogger!”
It was then that they had to show him all the improvements they’d made, and Raya was beyond impressed. This was the most high-tech community he’d ever seen. The houses were all smart, in fact, the entire village was smart. Smarter than the most modern ‘green house’ concept design he had ever encountered.
Aman told him most of the improvements were due to Nesto, who’d gone to MIT and graduated summa cum laude. Raya was speechless. How was that possible?
“Nesto’s mom, Ludmilla, wanted to be sure her kids had everything the outside world did, so she got us connected with satellite services. They were bad, though, as you can imagine. But it got us educated, and that’s what counted. Turned out, Nesto is sort of a genius. Anything to do with electronics, that’s his thing. He invented a few things over the years. Patented them. Sold them into production to a few large corporations and suddenly we had more money than we could ever use. He created that too,” Aman said, pointing up.
Raya shook his head.
“That is truly fabulous.”
“You haven’t seen the best yet,” Nesto said in his soft voice. He hadn’t spoken until now, Raya realized. “Come this way.”
“Can’t wait for him to see this! It’s pretty rare that we get to show off,” Aman admitted.
“Yeah. As in never,” Nesto said.
They reached a small house, one of twelve that constituted the village. Inside, there was hardly enough space for one person to live. The brothers told him that families of six had lived there in past times. Now the village was about three times bigger than it had been, too.
“So how many people live here now?” Raya had to ask.
“Couple hundred, give or take,” Nesto responded as they passed by a table in the center of the room and opened a door leading to a small bedroom. So small that only a child could have fit in the tiny bed, but Nesto walked right to it and sat, pulling his legs up under him, facing the wall behind the headrest. “Raya, sit behind me just like me.”
Feeling more than a bit ridiculous, Raya pulled his large body onto the bed and attempted to imitate Nesto’s cross-legged position. His large, heavily-muscled thighs weren’t having it, so he wound up wrapping his arms around his knees. Aman barely fit on the rest of the small surface.
With all three men in position, Nesto said, “We’re dying to play a prank on you, but we sense all is not well. In such a case, we offer you a choice. Would you like to have a bit of fun
and move rather rapidly, or are you the type that prefers slow and deliberate?”
That one took no thought!
“Let ‘er rip!” Raya said with a grin, and damn near immediately regretted it as the bed dropped right through the floor as if shot out a cannon.
“What the… fuuuuuuuuck!”
***
As she walked through a slick of mud and greenery, Petra thought she was getting to know the bayou pretty well. Daily walks through it kept her calm, made her feel as if she had some small control over her world.
And it was so beautiful! She could only hope that at some point she had been able to see that low country before she had lost her memory. The wildlife alone was so wonderful! No sooner had that thought passed through her mind, than Petra heard a peculiar shriek. A bird of some kind, she figured, but she’d never heard one that made such a noise. It almost sounded human in its desperation.
I must be imagining things, she thought as she picked her way from one piece of solid earth to the next. But then she heard it again, closer this time. And it wasn’t a bird at all, unless it was an escapee pet parrot in anguish; because she distinctly heard the words, “Help. Please. I know you’re there somewhere, please help. I can’t hang on much longer. Help. Please.”
He fell silent and she suddenly felt as if hundreds of eyes were on her, watching from every direction. She backed up, and then backed up again until she came up against a tree. She stood for several moments in silence, straining to hear.
“Don’t… stop. Nearly here.”
He sounded so weak.
Then why was she so scared? And something smelled weird too. Not bad, just – different. She couldn’t recall ever having smelled anything like it.
“You’re close now. Due north,” the voice said, distinctly weaker.
Petra swiveled. North was no different than any other direction, except there was a tiny island at a good distance. Several trees hunched together on it. And was that something dark at the bottom?