“But why? You’re only now learning who and what you are, my girl. Don’t you think you should explore that?”
“I should certainly explore it,” she said. “Just not here. There are things that I want to avoid, and people I don’t want to see.”
“Don’t want to, or think you shouldn’t? The two are quite different beasts.”
“Look, Ranach. A man — a very odd one — pretended to be someone else so that he could get me alone, and then tried to kill me. I don’t know why. But he seemed to think that I’m somehow a threat. Meanwhile, a man who’s got everything in the world going for him seems, for some insane reason, to want to date me. But if he knew what I am…”
“If he knew what you were, he might just want you all the more.”
“I sincerely doubt that.”
“Ashling,” said Ranach, his hands on the table before him. “If someone is after you, you need to stay close to home. He will pursue you.”
“Who is ‘he?’” she asked. “Who will pursue me, and why? I don’t even know who I am, what I am. I don’t understand why anyone would want to go after me.”
“Well, perhaps you’ll find out soon.”
“So let me go so that I can figure it out. I’ll be back. I just need a break from everything. Maybe if I go spend some time with nature I’ll find out what this all means.”
“Fine,” he said, surrendering. “I take it you’re not going to inform young Mr. Turner of your whereabouts?”
“No. He’ll be better off if he doesn’t know.”
“And what about me? May I at least know where you’re going so that I don’t worry?”
“I’m going to camp,” she said. “Not far away. Please don’t ask me more than that. I just need a few days to clear my head and process everything.”
“Fair enough. But please, Ashling — be safe.”
“I’ll do my best.”
11
The pack that Ashling transported was heavy, but manageable. She’d assembled clothing, a small tent, and a pile of food which she hoped would last her a few days. In a pinch it would be enough to sustain her for a week, and she could only hope that would be enough time to settle her mind and to understand what it was that she might become.
Her goal was to conceal herself deep within Running Deer National Forest, hidden away from prying eyes. In truth she’d wanted to run much farther away — Bali might have been a good start. But there was only so far that a young woman with no car and little money could go. And the woods were as good a place as any, when it came to sorting her mind out. They’d always helped her clear out the negative thoughts and to appreciate all that was positive in the world.
But now as she walked, nothing seemed to settle. A man had attacked her. Another man was intriguing her more and more each day, and she found herself drawn to Hawke, caring for him so, so much.
Both were dangerous, but she suspected that Hawke was the more dangerous of the two. He could really hurt her if he wanted to, and it wasn’t like her to open herself up to such vulnerability. How this could even have happened with such a man was still a mystery. Her entire world had been flipped on its head over the course of mere days.
After a time she put her pack down and perched on a fallen log, thrusting her face into her palms for a moment as she thought about the bombardment of information that had rained down upon her over the last days.
Shifters existed. Not only that, but she was one. Someone, or possibly more than one person, wanted her dead because of it. Her parents had no doubt left or been killed in part because of who and what she was. Ranach was a wizard, and there was a man in her life who seemed genuinely to like her.
And none of this information was compatible. None of it made her life easier, made her care for Hawke any less. If they were together, her only option would be to lie to him about who and what she was. It would be better simply to stay away from him forever.
* * *
As the day wore on and Hawke didn’t hear from Ashling, he tried her cell phone several times, to no avail. His texts weren’t going through and attempts to call went straight to her voicemail. At first his assumption was that she was cooped up in Ranach’s basement, its thick walls preventing a signal penetrating.
And so, when filming had wrapped for the day, he walked over and knocked on the old man’s front door.
“Hawke Turner,” said the wizard, unsurprised. “Let me guess: you’re looking for our common friend.”
“I am. Is she here?”
“No, she’s gone away for a little.”
“Gone away?”
Ranach studied the young man’s face, which showed genuine signs of sadness. It was clear already that he cared about her.
“You should tell her,” Ranach said, his tone commanding and serious. “It’s not right to keep it from her now. She knows what she is.”
“I suspected as much,” said Hawke, stepping into the house. “And she’s hiding it from me, just as I’m hiding things from her.”
Ranach closed the door, sealing them away from the outside world. “I see no reason to keep your information from her. If she were a normal young woman, some blabbering twit, then fine. I could understand that your career would be at risk. But this is Ashling we’re talking about. She’s nothing if not reserved.”
“I know. For so long I’ve preserved my anonymity — ironic, isn’t it? I’m anonymous and famous at once. If anyone were to find out, my career would end, as you say. But it’s not only that. I would risk the lives of others.”
“Others, like that jackass of a man who assaulted her?”
“That man is a traitor to our kind; paranoid, a lunatic to boot. But he doesn’t want shifters discovered any more than I do. That’s why people like him are so frightened of Ashling’s potential. She’s amazing, Ranach. And I’m not sure I’m worthy of her.”
“Worthy? That young woman has been convinced all her life that she’s worthy of nothing. Not worthy of love, friendship, trust. It’s time someone gave her a little of it.”
“So are you going to tell me where she is?”
“She’s in Running Deer. That’s all I can discern. Her location is hidden from me. But I’m afraid that she’s in danger. Of course, she’s only trying to protect herself. She doesn’t care about pursuers so much as about you and what you symbolize. As far as she’s concerned, you’re a very normal young man who would judge her as others have.”
“I would never…”
“But she doesn’t know, Hawke, unless you tell her. Unless you open up to her. Allow yourself that.”
“You’re right, of course. I suppose it’s true what they say about wizards: you are sort of wise.”
“We’re idiots, really,” said Ranach, grinning. “But we know the simple things, like when a person needs someone else. You are the only one who can protect her, Hawke. Whether from others or from herself. She needs that.”
“I’ll find her.”
“See to it that you do — and soon. I have a bad feeling that she’ll need you before the day is through.”
* * *
Deep in the woods of pine, beech and birch trees, Ashling came upon an old ruin. It seemed to be the stone foundation of a house, though who might ever have lived in these woods, isolated from society, was a mystery.
“Then again, I’m here,” she muttered aloud. “This seems like the perfect spot for someone like me to settle down.” Maybe it was a shifter who’d occupied the house; one who, like her, wanted nothing more than to escape society’s judgmental eyes.
She set her pack down once again and wandered around the structure. One wall and chimney stood, windows staring like vacant eyes into the woods. Adjacent to that wall was another which remained intact only in part. It looked like a fine place to set up camp; the trees weren’t growing too close so a fire would be a possibility.
By now late afternoon was setting in, and she began to gather pieces of dry firewood from the nearby forest floor, carrying armfuls to th
e place where her tent would soon stand. It was impossible to transport stacks of wood without thinking of that awful night years ago when she’d put the nail in her social life’s coffin. But these logs would only ignite for the purposes of warmth, or at least that was what she told herself.
Carefully she cleared away stray pine needles and dried leaves from a large circle of earth, then with her hiking shoe, dug a small pit into which she laid the wood. This was the act of someone who’d learned to control fire, who respected its power. And for now, the fire would wait until the cold of evening set in.
Ashling stood up straight, bending her neck back so that she looked up into the treetops, inhaling the fresh air as she took in the deep blue sky above. This time there were no vultures, no eagles. Only her, very much alone. But this was what she’d wanted, wasn’t it? Solitude; a chance to think.
And as she unpacked the tent and began to set it up, that was just what she got.
She thought of Hawke, of his seeming affinity for his “muse,” and caught herself smiling. There was something special about him; he was unlike any man she’d ever met. And it wasn’t fake charm. Every ounce of feminine intuition told her that she could trust him when he spoke sweetly to her. Perhaps it was because he spoke the same way of Woodland Creek, of the air and the trees. His voice in those moments was so like hers, and in him she had a kindred spirit; a lover of all things wild and untamed.
But that was the thing: she was wild and untamed. And a film star who lived in New York wasn’t the man to tame her. She could only bring him down. And she was too generous to do such a thing. What was that frustrating saying that people used all too often? If you love someone, set them free…oh, yeah. That was it. She wasn’t sure about love — it was too soon to conceive of all the meaning behind such a word, even after all these years. But she liked him. A lot. And ruining him wasn’t in the cards.
Maybe by the time she headed back to Woodland Creek, he’d be long gone. Away, off to find another woman who could be his muse. One without so much literal or figurative baggage.
* * *
Hawke cancelled the appointment he was meant to have that evening with his co-star, an actress named Virginia. She seemed nice enough; young, naive, sweet. She’d approached him, wanting to run over the lines for their next scene together, and at the moment the only woman with whom he wanted to exchange words was somewhere deep in the woods. If she wasn’t actually lost, he had no doubt that she was at least a little troubled. And he could help.
Shifting had always been a bit of a pain, particularly the part when it came to concealing one’s shed clothing. He always ended up leaving garments lying here and there, and over the years he had gotten quite good at hiding it.
Woodland Creek was the only place where he could really be free. Here lay a community of others who, like him, concealed the truth. And many of them were well aware of each other; some were even aware of what he was. But he knew that he could trust them, as not one of them wanted the secret of their abilities revealed.
Unfortunately, this secrecy also offered a sort of protection for those of their kind who were less than savoury characters — the ones who got away with offences. These were generally petty acts — the odd bit of bullying and nastiness, acts that were unregulated by the human population. But an attack like the one perpetrated on Ashling was a rarity. Shifters weren’t psychos, after all; they were simply humans with extraordinary abilities.
He didn’t know why the man had attacked her, but he could guess. She was special, miraculous. And Hawke had known it even when they were children. He’d seen it in her eyes, in the way she moved. She was fluid, like liquid, as though her body were made of the air that surrounded her.
His gifts meant that he moved in strange ways, as well. He’d always been quick, faster than most people, and he hid it well while working with those in his field. Hot young actors weren’t meant to have what amounted to superpowers, after all; he was supposed to seem more like a boy next door than a fiction. And in all probability, if it weren’t for the fact that he was a shifter himself, he wouldn’t have recognized Ashling’s own special qualities.
But even so, he didn’t yet know what she was at her core; what creature she would transform into. And if she didn’t either, it was no surprise that she was confused, frightened. She couldn’t see her own potential, her own beauty. Not as Hawke did. She had no idea how admired she was, how drawn to her he’d always been.
When he’d seen her that first day back in Woodland Creek, he’d found himself circling in the air above her, his eyes fixed on the girl of fire whose hair shone reddish in the sunlight. She was an adult now, and yet still had that look about her of a girl, lost, but enthralled by the sky and the trees. Somehow in the setting of nature she seemed confident; perhaps it was that nature didn’t make her feel as though she were being scrutinized for the way she was.
But it was time now for Hawke to help her. To show her what he was, and that she had nothing to fear from him. That he could help her escape her past woes. He was her ally.
And so, leaving his clothing concealed within the folds of a tree’s roots, he took off into the air once more, counting on his eagle’s eyes to find the woman who’d come to dominate his thoughts.
12
The fire was warm and reassuring, like an old friend who’d come to curl up at Ashling’s feet.
The vastness of the wild was the only place where she welcomed flames, and even then it was only rarely that she did so. These were her allies, these dancing orange shapes, and she’d summoned them with nothing more than her own thoughts. Maybe it wasn’t so bad, this — this strange magic of hers. But Ranach had told her there would be more surprises to come, and she felt at times like a child anticipating Christmas. Only she didn’t know what sorts of gifts it would bring; it could be that she would receive a teddy bear or a pile of flaming charcoal. And that was the scary thing.
She knew that after the attack by the water, it was probably a bad idea to run off alone. But this was what her assailant had wanted, wasn’t it? To have her leave, to cease existing, at least in Woodland Creek. All her life she’d felt expelled from society, so maybe it was time that she do it herself.
Inside her, emotions were churning: sadness, loss, confusion. She looked for happiness but her search came up short. Each time she came close, it was only Hawke that brought her there — Hawke, whom she would lose soon, if she hadn’t already done so by leaving without a word. Maybe it would be better for him to hate her. To think she was inconsiderate, fickle. She couldn’t explain to him what she was; after all, even she didn’t know.
Night descended from above as the glow of the fire illuminated the tree trunks in the distance, its reflection bouncing off the stone walls around her. Here was another of those moments that she would have loved to share with someone. No, not someone — with him. With Hawke. He would, no doubt, love to sit under the cover of trees, the cool breeze wafting by as it tried to take the fire along with it. But each time a spark threatened to move through the air towards a nearby leaf or twig, Ashling directed it back to its home in the fire itself with the flick of a finger.
Never in her life had she taken this odd power for granted. Rather, she’d always wished it far, far away, gone forever to leave her in peace to a normal life. But in moments like this she wondered what potential lay beyond, if she could manipulate flames. Would she become like one of those fictional heroes she’d seen in comic books, throwing fireballs like a mage?
It was no wonder people seemed to want her dead.
The sounds of crackling from the fire seemed for a moment to grow, and this time it wasn’t her doing. But no, it wasn’t the fire that made the sound. Somewhere behind her, twigs were snapping underfoot.
Ashling rose, looking about at the shapes moving against the distant bark and brick. She listened again, and again it sounded as though a foot was breaking through a dry twig.
“Who’s there?” she asked, recalling the strange man who
changed voices with such seeming ease.
“It’s me,” the voice said. Hawke? That wasn’t his voice, nor was it Ranach’s. But it was a man’s, without question.
Into the light stepped the same man she’d seen in front of the bar; the one who had tried to attack her. But this time Hawke wouldn’t be around to help her.
“You,” she said, noticing for the first time that he grasped a long, pointed knife in his left hand. She wondered if she could find a way to melt it, as she’d done with silver so many times. “Why are you here?”
“To find you,” he said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. “You were foolish to come here alone, but you know that, don’t you? A young woman, out in the woods like this.”
“I’m not alone,” she lied. “My boyfriend just went to get some more wood.”
The man laughed. His yellowed, crooked teeth seemed eerily apt for such a creature. “You think I’m stupid,” he said. “That’s fine. It’s a fair tactic, that. But no, your boyfriend is nowhere to be found, because he doesn’t exist. You are alone and vulnerable. It’s almost as though you want to die, coming here unprotected as you did.”
“I don’t,” she said. “Not at all.” She tried in vain to hide the fear in her voice as she spoke.
“Well then I’m sorry for what’s about to happen. But if I let you live, you will destroy us. What we are, how we live. I can’t allow that to happen. If I don’t kill you, someone else will.”
Ashling backed up as the man advanced towards her, the knife glinting in the firelight.
She continued to retreat, her hands out, grasping at air and unsure what to do with themselves.
“I can manipulate fire,” she said, once again attempting to sound brave.
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