Dear Fellow Traveler,
His clearest memory of his past was his fickle, yet beautiful mother. How he had loved her, despite her strict behavior and arrow sharp tongue. Her redwood colored skin, almond shaped eyes, high cheekbones and shiny black hair woven in a braid, all such clear features that mirrored his. She was a fickle mother, but a good mother, and he remembered their time together fondly.
Though she had a nasty habit of playing tricks on him by unburying the things hidden away in the deepest corners of his vast memory. Especially when he entered the world of dreams. That was her favorite time to play her little tricks.
That night he dreamt of waves of fire as they spread about the land like hungry predators, devouring all in their wake. He dreamt of the men who had brought on the hungry flames, and their shiny sticks of thunder, which they used to first intimidate, then later to annihilate their victims.
He remembered the stream of questions that flooded his mind during that slow moment as he stood frozen in place, while others of his tribe ran away. “What had they done to deserve this?” “Why was his peaceful home being eaten by flames?” “For what reason could these strangers have to do this?”
If someone hadn’t pulled him to run, maybe he too would have been eaten by those flames, or struck down by those thunder sticks.
When he was finally able to move his legs and move, he remembered the sight of the full moon, as its pale light kept his attention ahead of him, rather than the sight of the red flames behind him. With the feeling of fear, anguish, sorrow, loss, helplessness, flooding his heart to the point of bursting, they made his legs feel like flimsy, flopping branches, but the hand pulling him away kept his legs from stopping. The hot tears as they rained down his face, and the inhuman scream, much like a wolf's howl that exploded from his throat, all carried the heavy emotions within him, to fill the night air.
Everything he had known to be safe was gone and he was scared. He didn’t want to die. If only he were strong. He wouldn’t need to fear if he was strong.
He then remembered the taste of his mother's heart, and how hard it was to swallow down. Each bite taken without chewing and forced down, the need to vomit beaten into submission until he took the final bite. He hadn’t wanted this. Really he hadn’t. But it only worked because of how much he loved her. It was only the ultimate evil because he loved her.
The next thing he remembered was feeling an unbearable fire spreading through his body, starting from his soiled stomach to the tips of his fingers. Holding himself tight as if trying to hold himself together, or maybe to contain the fire from exploding out of him. As the fire bit and ripped at each and every inch of his body, his bones felt like they were melting beneath the heat of his boiling blood, his teeth ached as his jaw clenched tight, and his lungs seemed to have forgotten how to take in air. But he was still able to scream. The multiple howls of pain mixing together in the night air, the sound was practically toxic to hear by those unfortunate to be within ear shot.
This pain was a punishment for the grave sin he committed. Choosing to throw away their humanity to steal the power of nature, and it’s beasts. The pain was too much to even allow unconsciousness to take them. It itched and pricked like hot coals as he felt the fur pelt he had wrapped himself in start to attach itself to his skin, becoming a part of him, remaking his body into it's inhuman image.
His tail started to grow from his spine, his teeth becoming jagged, and sharpened into fangs, his nails growing long and sharp, he could feel his body twist and stretch as his bones became longer and stretched his skin. His bones and joints popped and cracked as his skeleton was remodeled like clay within him, molding and stretching his flesh tightly to match the new shape. The pain started to fade, only leaving an unbearable ache. His stomach tried to expel the contents that had caused the pain, but his throat tightened, refusing to let it leave his body; it wouldn't reverse the process even if he had.
What he had done couldn’t be reversed, he couldn't take back his sin, the pain was his punishment, and the stolen heart was not to be wasted. He wanted this, it was only possible because he had wanted this. Revenge was in his heart, it was possible because he wanted it, and it only worked because of his love for his mother.
The sin of devouring a human, of devouring your own blood, of taking the life of the one who gave you yours. This was his sin, he stole her heart and now his life and hers were one in the same.
The fire within him had been the fusion of his soul with the wolf's, his soul accepted the wolf, and his body had been reshaped to match the soul it housed. As the joint locking ache melted and dulled as he became accustomed to the new shape, the overwhelming feeling of strength overcame him like being engulfed by a wave of water, it put his soul at ease as his mind obtained a clarity he had never known.
The smells that rode the winds, the sounds echoing around him, the sight of the stars in the black sky being lit by the half moon, and the living mother earth beneath his feet. Though the ecstasy clarity granted him when the pain subsided, the pale light that shone on his mother’s bloodied corpse entered his line of sight, her blood soaked the ground, her chest wide open, and her eyes as hollow as her ribcage. Such a sight was accompanied by the terrified faces of the remaining tribal members who had followed the screams. As they gazed at him, and the three others who had committed the same sin, for the sake of warding off the invaders who attacked them, they could say nothing at all, and only turned to flee from the monsters the 4 men had become.
Those memories were clear as the pale moon.
When the dream ended, Blue found himself being shaken awake.
It was still night time, and as his senses returned from the dream world, the first thing he saw was the glow of Jesse’s soft blue eyes. Blue drank in his mate's worried appearance with his royal blue eyes. “I am alright, my Jesse.” Blue smiled as he pulled the younger blonde down for a comforting embrace. “Mother is just playing her tricks again. No worries, no worries.” he insisted when Jesse started listing the things that had been happening while stuck in those memories.
Over his love's shoulder, he could see his mother's spirit as she stood seven feet away, her pale transparent form glistening in the dark. As quickly as she had appeared, she vanished when Jesse turned his head, his wolf sensing her heavy presence.
She was such a fickle person, even in death, after more than 300 long years.
Comments (0)
See all