by Aria Ford
We talked at length, and once again I left there feeling like I was lighter in the inside. She didn’t say much and she allowed me to talk it out. It was nice to have that sounding board, even though I really didn’t think that she could grasp the concept of what I was. I don’t think that anybody could really put themselves in my shoes, unless of course they were the ones that bit me in the first place.
“This place is very special to me. I would think that you would be grateful for the chance to get outside your comfort zone.” I went down the gravel driveway, and I carried the go bag that I had in the back of the truck. It had everything that I needed to survive on my own for at least a week. I heard something, and I turned to see that he was looking around with his back towards me. “Come with me, and I’ll show you where you’re going to be staying.” It was getting dark and that feeling was starting to creep up on me very slowly. It was always like that before a full moon. I could hear everything.
He stopped abruptly, and I looked over my shoulder to see that he was looking winded like he was just in a marathon. “I’m just going to need a minute. All of this is starting to get to me. I’m beginning to realize that my life is never going to be my own again.” It had to be hard for him to let everything go and become somebody that he didn’t recognize. That was one thing that I could sympathize with, because every day that I looked into the mirror, I saw something looking back of me that wasn’t human.
We settled in and I sat back, listening to nature and the crackling in the fire in the fireplace. I’d chopped my own wood, and he was now sitting there reading one of the novels that I had in my collection. I was going to have to make myself scarce. I was hoping that I could put him to bed and go out on the hunt for fresh prey.
There was suddenly the sound of backfire and then one of the windows on the side of the house exploded inwards. Fragment of glass littered the floor, and I grabbed for Ryan, but he was not there. It was like he was some kind of Houdini, and then the door was smashed open with two men coming in with guns.
A man in a brown tweed coat that went down to his knees came through the door with a look that told me that he had confidence in his stride. “Maya, I regret that this meeting had to take place like this. I’ve heard of you and I’m quite impressed, but don’t mistake that for weakness.” I knew his photograph, and Joseph was not exactly out of the public eye. “I don’t think I have to tell you why I’m here.” He had found a way to get to him, but he had chosen the wrong time to pursue this matter. I remembered how Ryan had his back to me. Son of a bitch… he set this up.
I made this growling sound, and I fell onto my hands with my back arched. They were staring at each other and wondering what the hell was happening. “Get out… get out now, if you know what’s good for you.” My voice had changed and my eyes were now glowing red, until finally my limbs began to crack and my body began to shift in a way that was not normal. “Run… for god sakes… run… before it’s too late.” My senses picked up on something, but I couldn’t pinpoint exactly what it was.
“What the hell is happening to you?” Joseph’s voice was like it was coming through a tunnel. My vision blurred, and I felt like I didn’t have control. The animal instincts that I had feared for so long were now becoming a warm comforting blanket. I turned my wrath towards those that were threatening me. I was going to tear them apart limb from limb.
Stalking my prey, I circled them and watched them shake, knowing that this was not something that they expected to find. “You have no idea what you’re dealing with.” Those were the last words I said as I turned into a wolf with a black mane. All the hairs on my body were standing on end. I drooled at the prospect of sinking my teeth into them, when suddenly a gray blur came out of nowhere.
I watched, mesmerized, as this blur emerged. It was a wolf that had now latched onto the throat of Joseph. His men tried in vain to wrench him free, but all they did was make it worse. The blood loss alone was going to kill Joseph.
They grabbed for their guns, and I was on them in a second, slashing their hands. They ran away like scalded dogs. I felt bad about what I had done, but it was the wolf that had decided to protect itself.
Joseph fell with the wolf holding on to him the entire time. The wolf tore into his neck with a vengeance, and then it lifted its jaws from its prize. Blood dripped from its teeth and bits of flesh stuck to its mouth like a second skin.
We took off through the open door, and I lost myself. The wolf took over and was doing what it always did on a full moon. I was in this black abyss that swallowed me whole and left me a prisoner of my own mind. Everything that happened was so quick that it almost felt surreal.
I awoke with a start, lying in a field completely naked and trying to cover myself up. I was looking at the sun that was beaming down from above. Clothing was tossed my way, and I looked up to see Ryan. “I’m sorry, but the only way that I was going to get out from underneath this was to bring the enemy to me. I saw an opportunity to walk away from this and I took it.” I got up and dressed quickly, keeping my body hidden behind a tree. “It was never my intention to drag you into this, but the full moon offered me a way out.”
“You were the gray wolf.” I said it like it was a question, but I already knew the answer. “I didn’t know that there were others like me. I thought that I was alone. I thought that I was the only one that was cursed.”
“I know that there are the two of us and that one that made us. Other than that, I have no idea if we are an anomaly or an evolution of mankind. Either way, I’m leaving and I would really like you to go with me. There’s this obvious connection between us ,and I can’t say for certain what the future holds, but I want you there to share it with me.” I’d never had anybody offer to take me away from it all.
“I have no choice and I need to explore these feelings. We are both wolves and I think that we have a duty to find out what this means. I want you, and I think that I’ve always wanted you from the moment that I met you. That might sound strange, but I don’t think that it’s all that strange, if you think about it. We are the same and this attraction is bigger than the both of us.” He was on me in a second, kissing me with a full blown passion that made me swoon to his touch. This continued for some time, and then finally he broke free of my embrace.
I followed him back to the bronco, and then we drove away from my family estate with Joseph dead inside. There would be no need to testify, and his empire would come crumbling down without him around. He did not have any heirs to pass it on to. It didn’t mean that there wouldn’t be a vacuum, but hopefully the police would be able to cut it off at the pass, before somebody took up that mantle of responsibility.
I took Ryan’s hand, and I knew that we were going to find our way together.
Bear’in the Love
Chapter One:
I stirred from sleep, groggy and confused. A chill ran through my body, causing goosebumps to prickle across my skin, and I pulled the sleeping bag more tightly around me, trying to trap in as much body heat as possible to keep warm.
God, my head was spinning....
It took me a confused moment to register where, exactly, I was, lying on the ground, surrounded by a tent, and most baffling of all, all alone.... I'd sworn he'd been lying next to me just moments before. And sure enough, there were his sleeping things, his pillow and blankets, lying casually by my side. I placed my hand on the pillow. It was cold, but still rumpled from where his head had rested upon its surface.
I lifted the pillow to my face, closing my eyes and inhaling his scent. I drew my body into myself, letting thoughts of him fill me, his smell going even further in waving me along toward an inviting, dreamlike trance.
I missed his arms around me so badly, even in that fraction of an instant, and I needed to figure out where he'd gone as soon as possible.
It turned out finding him didn't take that much time at all. Upon lowering the pillow from my face, I heard the faint sound of grunting coming from outside, and instinctive
ly the corners of my lips began to push upward, into a knowing smile.
Of course, that was where he was....
I didn't even have to look to know it. That was why we'd come out here, after all. He'd been missing his natural element, and I, for my part, had begun to feel guilty about occupying so much of him. His time, his energy, himself….
He'd insisted, trying his best to make me understand, that it wasn't at all like that for him. That I was nothing but a positive influence over his life, and that he didn't know what he would do without me. He could think of nothing he would rather have occupying his time, and for that at least, I felt flattered, even though I still felt burdened with some guilt for having taken up more space than I, perhaps, deserved in his life.
Suffice it to say, he'd taken me up on my offer to come out here camping with him quite readily. It must have been nice for him, I thought, to be able to spend time in his natural environment in the midst of spending so much time caught in the rat race of the city. Or, at least, in one of his natural environments....
It was hard for me, honestly, to fully comprehend how things must have been for Jason. To be split between his two worlds, and equally capable of adapting to whichever he found himself in. I, for my part, was a city girl through and through, and though I could certainly see the appeal that the occasional retreat into nature such as this must have held for any soul in need of rest, I doubted whether a place like this could hold all that much appeal for me for a period spanning more than a weekend at a time.
Already, I was missing WiFi, cappuccino, the noise of the busy city streets....
But I wouldn't trade the time spent with Jason for any of that. Not for anything in the world.
I took in a deep breath, trying to still my nerves. I'd seen him in his transformed state of being before, of course, but it was always a lot to take in. I couldn't deny the fear that tended to well up inside me, in spite of myself, whenever I thought about what happened to him in the course of his transformations.
The loss of control.... The distortion of his body into such a powerful, hulking beast....
And yet, somehow - it was hard to explain, really - something about it aroused me.... Knowing that, beneath the surface, he consisted of so much power, so much fury, and that, if he wanted to, he could tear me up into little, tiny pieces....
God, my head was going light....
I slowly peeked out through the flap of the tent, knowing full well what awaited me outside, yet still feeling tentative about it all the while.
And sure enough, there was Jason.... Or rather, there was a massive, snarling grizzly bear, pacing with measured footfalls around the campfire. His breath steamed hot into the cold night air, his nostrils flared, and his pelt strobed with the intensity of his steps, leaving me with an impression of the utmost awe and disbelief.
This, I felt, was a sight that I might never grow used to....
I didn't want him to see me just yet, so I tried to remain as discreet as possible as I peered out toward him in the darkness. There was just so much beauty to be seen in him, even in this state of being, which a normal girl might have taken to be frightful or unusual.
My mind began to dip backwards in time, to the first time he'd told me about what he was, about his abilities and everything.... I'd laughed it off at first, as I'm sure just about any sane human being would do, and if I hadn't already fallen so madly in love with him, I might have called things off right there on the spot. It was, I felt certain, some form of insanity....
But then he took me off into the woods one day, and showed me his powers, shifting right in front of my eyes. I don't know what exactly it was that convinced me to go with him, honestly - if any other mad man had made such a claim, I think it would be safe to say I wouldn't have been caught dead going off into some secluded patch of woods with him as per his request.
The only explanation that I could really think of that explained it to any degree is that I actually did believe him, deep down, even as crazy as it sounded.
And it was true, once I saw the evidence revealed before my eyes, I was left quite taken aback - but not enough to let it diminish my feelings for him. It had been a pretty hefty blow but not a deal breaker, by any means. By that time, the two of us had become so close, our lives so dependent on one another in so many intense ways that ending the relationship would be too unbearable a loss for me. I felt as though I needed Jason, on so many levels, and the fact that he'd been willing to share his secret with me made me think I could trust him - for better or for worse.
Of course, though, Jason had had his share of conditions now that I knew the truth. He told me that there were certain lines our relationship could never cross, certain territory into which we could never have a hope of entering. And that, too, I'd accepted, because the love I felt for him was so deep, so intense, and I had a hard time imagining how I could hope to fill the place my love's absence would leave should he vanish from my life.
That's not at all to say, of course, that living this way was easy. Not by any means. For the most part, I could say with considerable honesty that I was happy being with Jason. Even sharing his secret was something of a special form of intimacy to me, something that united us even more thoroughly than the fact of our love itself.
But the baggage that came along with all of that.... Sometimes that could be difficult to deal with. For instance, sometimes I would see other young, happy couples, and I would envy how simple and carefree things were between them. They surely didn't have this magnitude of secrets forever looming over them, threatening to sabotage things without a moment's notice. Even worse, some of these couples would be strolling along happily with children in tow, and I would feel the acuteness of our strained dynamic beginning to get to me.
Jason had made it a clear stipulation that, were things to ever progress further in our relationship, he would be unwilling to have children due to his condition. He didn't know what would happen if a shifter such as himself were to have offspring with a normal human being, and he didn't dare to run the risk that such a child could wind up a freak for life, like himself.
I'd tried to talk him down from this line of thinking, trying to make it known to him that he wasn't a freak, but he refused to listen. And so I went along with him in silence, letting him believe what he wanted to believe, and convinced that I would be unable to change his mind about the subject, at any rate.
Oh well, I thought... I would just have to see how far along things progressed, and anyway there was always adoption. Hell, for that matter, I didn't know with the utmost certainty that I would have wanted kids anyway, with him or with any partner. It was just his manner of nixing the subject outright that troubled me, but for the time being it seemed best to hold my tongue with regard to the matter.
Besides, as difficult as moments such as these could sometimes be, they were only small complications, at least when it came to the grand scheme of things. They were nothing compared to the closeness I felt to him any other time, like now for instance.
For some reason, I loved seeing him in his shifted form, so powerful, so fierce, yet so in control of himself and his faculties. Presently, as I watched him, he was bucking back onto his haunches, lifting his body up toward the full moon, and roaring, like you might expect a wolf to do. The fierce boom of his vocalizations sent a chill through my body, and I watched, fascinated, as he slowly brought himself back down to Earth once again.
Lazily, now, he sauntered through the clearing, his massive pelt dragging across his bulk in the darkness, the sight astonishing to me, the wonder never quite wearing off. Suddenly the beast lunged upward once more, smashing his back up against a tree, and scratching himself up against it, in the manner that any other bear in the world would do, and I couldn't help but bust out giggling at the sight of it.
Immediately, his eyes darted toward me, and I froze, suddenly scared out of my wits.
He pushed his weight back down onto all fours and began to pace rapidly toward the tent
, and the primal, instinctive side of myself began to panic. I knew it was Jason, but I still felt so afraid all of a sudden. Maybe he'd lost control this time, and maybe this massive beast barreling in my direction was intent on devouring me as a midnight snack.
If I was indeed a midnight snack, though, I certainly must have proven myself an unappetizing one. For now, he stopped inches from my face, grunting as he breathed, and staring fiercely into my eyes, so that I could feel my blood running cold. His breath scorched me as it kissed my cheeks, and all I could do was wait, wait, and pray that the Jason I knew and loved still lingered beneath the surface of the animal.
But then, sure enough, there came that long, grizzly tongue of his, darting out and sliding along my cheek, and I burst out laughing. He was kissing me like a dog, hungrily lapping up my skin, but clearly there was no malicious intent to be found in his actions.
I was giggling, my face getting soaked, and I couldn't stop myself from swatting at him, crying, “Stop! Stop! Cut it out!” with a smile on my lips all the while.
At last, Jason showed mercy on me, withdrawing his long tongue and shifting back into his human self, his naked body bearing down on top of me and looking especially fine in the moonlight just then and there.
“Spying on me, I see?” he said, with a playful grin, and I smiled back at him.
“I just couldn't sleep.... I thought maybe I could use a late night bear hug....”