Chaos and Confusion

Ezekiel led both his family and the Elder along with her escort, out of the main mansion at the center of their Lands, and together they all trekked some 11 miles out into the Southwestern side of the pine forests encircling their home.

The mass burial of the ghouls had not been planned, with much of the natural earth having to be disturbed and even one or two trees with too deep of a root needing to be cut down and removed to make disposal easier.

There was also the fact that the bodies having such poisonous properties made it very apparent to Mantilo and the rest of the Guardians that the Ghouls couldn’t be left to rot near any bodies of water, villages, or in an area where it could lead to disease for the local wildlife.

The fetid stench of death lingered on the soil where the ghoul’s corpses had been placed almost two months prior following the invasive attack by Hovel and Jacob. There was an unnatural eerie silence upon the twenty or so feet in either direction of the mass grave that had been dug and filled with the poisonous gangly dead bodies of what had once been the men, women, and possibly children of the Rat Clan, so long ago.

Ezekiel took the lead, more because he understood that in some unspoken way this situation because it so closely involved his Mate, both his parents and even Walter the future Clan head were differing to him and allowing him to be the main one speaking with and addressing the Elder.

Ezekiel crested a slight rise, the mulch of the dead pine needled crunched beneath him as he reached out to one of the slender trees beside him, and he let it support him as he made a small hop down into a more even-footed side of the forest trail. And just before him his sharp eyes alighted on the large rectangle of earth that had been dug some 12 feet deep and six feet wide by his brothers and other Clansmen to hold the dead.

Elder Bonsa, assisted by one of her escorts, a tall, dark-skinned man, with brown silken pants and a shirt and pointed white shoes. Now that Ezekiel was less stressed out and willing to observe the men in the Elders’s routine, it was clear to see that all of them were dressed in the same silky brown materials, and shoes and that ll five men were decked out in clothing that was stitched and covered with lace that had obviously been embroidered with the crest of the Elders.

Unlike the Elder Bonsa and even Elder Balder who carried the crest as a golden tattoo burned into the forehead, these men could only sport the crest of the Elders on their clothing.

But in this case, these men’s crests were slightly different than the ones displayed prominently on Bonsa’s head because there was a small symbol placed on the clothes that looked like a wicked and stylized EB that that melted into the symbol for Elder.

EB? Her initials?

Ezekiel mused as he watched Bonsa and her men draw close. Ezekiel couldn’t be sure if that meant that these men were her servants, bodyguards, followers, or an even more disturbing idea of her slaves.

Do the Elders keep slaves?

The thoughts were pointless questions that he didn’t really care to have answered.

He swept them away and centered his mind on more important matters.

Bonsa’s face was stern, but there was no denying the disgusted lift of her lip and the flash of fangs as she was violently assaulted by the stomach-turning scent of putrid, poisoned, rotted carcasses in the sunlight. It was obviously a scent that her inner Lion did not find aggregable, but Ezekiel couldn’t really blame her....his own Leopard was crawling around in his skin in discomfort at the otherworld stench.

Following behind the Elder, both Drin and Erin looked positively green, both young Guardians covering their mouths and noses in an attempt to blunt the scent. To Ezekiel’s sensitive ears, he caught the soft sound of Erin holding back her vomit.

Ezekiel wanted to go to her as he sensed her fighting to hold back her food. It was obvious that in her condition, she and the baby were getting far too sensitive to be involved so heavily in all of this. Drin was closer to his mate, though, and he led her to the far end of the path so that they were downwind, and Erin could catch her breath.

Ezekiel felt horrible that his cousins were even dealing with all of this when they had a child to worry about, but perhaps sensing his worry both his cousins looked to him, nodded at him as if to convey their determination and Erin even flashed him a small queasy smile, which Ezekiel returned.

At this point all of the Guardians were gathered in the clearing and Bonsa took a second to look around her, fand a hand at her face in open displeasure and then she snipped at him. “So? Tell me of what exactly transpired here.”

Lander hissed, his green eyes flitted around in an obnoxious roll as he crossed his arms. “Uhhh, can’t you smell that shit! Its pretty clear what happened here...death.” Lander pointed to the space a few feet before them. “It’s a grave yard for the things that tried to kill us all.”

The Elder looked from his brother back to Ezekiel. “I want to see it. And I want to know why this happened.”

Ezekiel frowned, lifted his hand and directed her closer. “After you...” he drawled.

Bonsa waved at her men, signaling to them to remain, before she looked at Ezekiel, and then walked past him towards the mass grave. Ezekiel followed, even as his Leopard whimpered at the thought of stepping even an inch closer.

The cavern that had been dug deep into the earth buzzed, and hundreds, if not thousands, of insects hummed and droned over the feast of rotted flesh below.

The light that could cut down past the forest canopy alighted on the unmoving elongated limbs, thick vicious talons, grinning horrific fangs and the large milky eyes of the ghouls stacked inside. Bonsa looked over the grisly sight, her face showing little, even though the small point of her fangs over her bottom lip quickly ousted just how disturbed and uncomfortable she was.

“I...see. The Rat Clan lives.” The Elder took a moment and started again. “Boy, this is something I never thought to see again in my lifetime. Dead piled up in ditches and left to rot, and the Rat Clan... savage shifters lost to insanity... it’s almost too horrible to be real, but I see it is...”

The stench gave Ezekiel an instant headache, and he drew back but didn’t retreat as he looked to Bonsa. Paused, and said.

“You sound like this brings you pain to see it, but you clearly have dealt with these things before. Elder Balder told us that the Elders were tasked with killing off the Ghouls almost 800 years ago. Do you feel sympathy for them? Or are you just upset they managed to survive?”

Bonsa touched at her lips and glanced away. “We had once hoped that such unfortunate creatures had been eradicated from the world for everyone’s safety....”

Ezekiel watched her and then he simply hissed. “They weren’t. In fact down in some twisted little zoo far under the earth there were hundreds of these abominations living, and breeding and feasting....and one of the men responsible for that is the one you say we killed.”

“The Lions Clan Head? But...why?” The Elder snatched her hand down and she looked at him. “To be clear, I accuse you by the testimony of another Clan boy....if you would see that testimony challenged, then tell me what you know about what happened to Jacob Ellicist.”

Ezekiel stood up straighter and clasped his hands behind his back. “I have told what became of Jacob and why he died. I have expressed to you that he hurt me...and he hurt those that I love. I have told you how he attacked my home and I have shown you the proof of that failure...Jacob died attempting to hurt Brandon a mortal that he believed he had some claim to and we did not...”

Bonsa cut him off. “Yes Yes! You said before that Jacob came here to take back a mortal man. And in the final struggle he was killed by the man. And...you expect me to just leave it at that? You expect me to believe that this monstrosity of bloodshed and all of the attacks and secrets and accusations of treason is all because of one simple mortal?”

Bonsa continued as she pointed to her left at all the dead ghouls. “You want me to just take for granted the secret cultivation of a condemned race, as well as the single most damming loss of a Clan head in over a millennium...and you want me to just accept this weak explanation as the full explanation?”

Ezekiel glared at the Elder. “What more do you want from me?”

“What more do I want? I want you to stop playing coy! How about...the whole truth? This man Brandon and all that you know about him I want to know it too...” Bonsa cut her eyes at him as she turned a small circle, and grunted.

Then she walked up to him and she put a hand against his right shoulder. He wanted to draw away, but he didn’t have the time to before she moved her hand to his heart, and she hummed to herself. Quizzical and unyielding, her eyes captured his, and she leaned into him.

“Don’t play with me boy...I want you to tell me what unnatural monster it is that has been feeding on you...and upon this land...”

Ezekiel’s entire being reacted as I it had been burned and he snarled as he pulled back.

“What are you talking about...!”

“I am talking about the thing you hide, the thing that sits in the shadows of your words and looks...that THING you want so desperately to hide from me!” The Elder roared over him, a sound unlike anything he thought she could summon from her slender frame. “The secrets in you...There is a residue upon you, this land and even in the air, Boy! It clings, and it is not of any natural origin either. It is unnatural in its nature...and it is not a shifter.” Bonsa’s eyes flattened.

“Elder please you don’t understand...”

“Stop this you are asking for something the boy cannot tell you!”

At that moment both Glen and Mantilo tried to step in and intercede, but with a full on snarling hiss the Elder sent a vicious glare at the Clan heads, that seemed to stall them in their tracks. Then, as if for good measure, Bonsa looked at the other Lion shifters she had brought with her, and almost in an unspoken command, they moved to block his brothers and parents from attempting to get closer without having to get violent and physical.

Nate’s face crumpled into a livid rage, and he snapped his fangs at one of the men; his eyes gleamed pure white like opals as the wolf in him went wild, but Walter grabbed him around the middle and held him from lunging.

“Get away from Ezkeiel! Stop forcing him to do this!” Nate shouted. He sounded so upset that Ezkeiel knew he definitely did not want Ezkeiel to have to do anything more that would make him feel even worse for violating his bond with Brandon.

"Look at me not to your family!"

Ezekiel was snapped back to the Elder as the woman put a clawed hand at his chin and forced him to look into her eyes. Talons scraped his cheek as she released him, the wet hot liquid of his blood danced down his chin as her hooks opened his skin.

A moment later Ezekiel's skin burned as his leopards hot energy rushed to the wounds and sealed them up as he glared into Bonsa's eyes.

“Boy listen to me....did you know that as an Elder, I am afforded the eyes and senses of ones much more powerful than myself? My Kings can see souls, through the flames that burn in all living things, we can feel and sense the spirits of others, see it burning with our own naked eyes....” Bonsa tilted her head at him, then she looked around herself. “Do you want to know what I see when I look at you and at this land in certain places?”

Ezekiel was terrified of her answer, but he didn’t let it show as he asked. “What do you see...”

Elder Bonsa chuckled. “Half your soul is missing Boy. That’s what I see. Your essence has been deeply and dangerously diminished, feasted on but not entirely devoured. ”

The Elder crossed her arms, and glanced around. “Honestly, there is this vacuum of emptiness I sense in your home. It is like a god came through and just wiped across the canvas or took vicious little bites out of the world.”

Bonsa lifted an eyebrow and glanced at him. “I can hear your breathing and heartbeat going crazy... and your family always gets especially tense whenever I start probing into this mysterious mortal. You want me to believe Jacob Elicist was willing to start a war over just to have him...?” Bonsa smiled, but it was all sharp fangs, and it made Ezekiel’s skin dance with goosebumps.

“Tell me more about this man, this Brandon, and tell me WHAT he is because something tells me he is not just a mortal...is he? What are you hiding!?”