by Kayla Wolf
“I don’t know yours,” she retorted, eyes narrowed. What did he want from her?
“Samuel.”
Something about his smile disarmed her, just a little—just enough to let the suspicious scowl on her face lighten a touch. “I’m Jessica.”
“Jessica. Good to meet you. You’re in safe hands, I promise.”
She watched him go, an uneasy feeling running up and down her spine. Safe hands? That was rich, coming from a dragon.
Chapter 3 – Jessica
After the stranger left, Jessica turned her attention to the space she was in. It was a long, narrow space between craggy rocks. She craned her neck up at the sky, trying to figure out how high up the surface was—it was at least twenty feet, maybe more, but at least the rocks weren’t sheer. She could see a handful of easy footholds from here. It would be easy enough to simply climb back out. Or at least, it would have been if she hadn’t been so badly injured by the fall. Enough procrastination. Time to have a proper look at the leg.
Jessica bared her teeth as she carefully placed her hands on her leg. From the feeling of it, the dull way the pain was radiating up her body, it was the shin bone that had broken, not the femur. That was good. She knew from experience that one would heal faster. As children, she and Angela had been climbing trees once when her little sister tried a branch that wasn’t quite strong enough to support her weight. Somehow, she’d managed to fall on rock, not the soft grass that made up the majority of the area around the tree, and her femur had broken. She’d been bedbound for almost a week, the poor thing.
On television, people took a lot longer than a week to heal from broken bones. It had actually been the first time Jessica had realized there was something different about her, about her family, about the people around her. She’d been watching some silly show with Angela after school, trying to cheer her little sister up—she’d missed a party at school because of her injury and was almost inconsolable. But in the show, a girl had fallen and broken her leg. Angela’s eyes had widened when the doctor announced that the girl would have to wear a cast for at least six weeks.
“Six weeks! She must have hurt it so bad! How come it’s gonna take so long?”
“That can’t be right,” Jessica had said, frowning. And then, as small girls did, they had called their mother for her insight. Jessica could still remember the way her mother’s back straightened, the careful way she sat down beside Angela’s bedside and looked at her daughters. It was the same expression she’d worn, years later, when it came time to tell her children about the birds and the bees. This was important, whatever it was, and Angela and Jessica had instinctively fallen silent.
“My darlings,” Mom had said, her voice oddly formal. “The people on the television aren’t like us.”
“Well, yeah, duh,” Angela had said, unable to resist—Jessica shot her a warning, but it was too late. “They’re actors, right?” Angela had recently gotten a role in her school’s nativity play and was telling anyone who would listen that she was going to be an actress.
“Not just that. They’re not people like us. You will learn, in a few years, exactly what that means.”
Jessica had frowned. She was ten years old, and she knew that in a few years, she would start the process of Becoming A Woman. There were a lot of books in the school library about it. They’d even had a special class at school where the boys and girls had been split up and told about how their bodies would change, hair would start growing in strange places, they’d start feeling interested in boys in ways that they hadn’t felt before… it all sounded pretty terrible if she was honest. Especially the period part. But what did that have to do with the people on the television? Did they not have to go through all that, somehow?
“You see, my darlings, here in Fallhurst… we’re not the same as regular people. We have some things in common with them, yes, but we’re not like them, deep down. In fact, none of us here are human.”
Angela had snorted. “Yeah. Like Jake. He’s not human, he’s a gross little snot monster—”
“We are wolves, my darlings.”
That had silenced Angela. Jessica had stared at her mother.
“Wolves?”
“Our people have had many names over the years. Werewolves, skinchangers, shapeshifters… there are thousands of us, spread across the world. Some of us live amongst humans, pretending to be like them, following their ways. Fallhurst was founded by wolves who did not want to pretend. That is why nobody visits, why nobody leaves. We keep to ourselves. We keep the old ways. You will learn more about it in time.”
“Seriously? I’m a wolf?” Angela was sitting up in bed, the pain of her broken leg forgotten, her eyes aglow. “I don’t look like a wolf.”
“You don’t look like a wolf,” Jessica added, staring at her mother.
The woman had sighed. She lifted her hands as though to pray. And then, so quickly that Jessica would have sworn she’d imagined it, her eyes flashed brilliant silver—and fur spread across her upraised hands, the same dull brown color as her hair. Jessica had recoiled, shocked beyond belief—Angela had whooped in joy, then yelped as an injudicious movement jarred her injured leg. Their mother put her hands back in her lap, the fur gone as quickly as it had spread, her eyes slowly returning to their usual dull gray.
“When do I learn to do that?” Angela was demanding.
“When you’re older, my love,” their mother said, smiling a little. “In some wolf packs, children start shifting when they’re very young. We don’t. Your wolf shape will come to you in a dream, and you will wake up with the power to shift between these forms. It will take practice. But once you’ve mastered it… why, then you’ll join the pack.”
“Why didn’t you tell us?” Jessica asked, hardly believing any of this. Had she fallen out of the tree too and struck her head?
Their mother smiled fondly. “It is best to grow familiar with the body you are born in, my darlings, as though it is the only one you will ever know. It’s tradition to keep the full knowledge of our nature from the young, at least for a while. But you are both growing into such fine young women. It’s time you knew. You are stronger, faster, more powerful than any human being on these television shows,” she continued, nodding towards the scene on TV, where the main character was looking bored in a hospital bed. “And your wounds will heal faster, too.”
“I want to go visit the humans,” Angela had said, grinning. “I want to show them how strong I am!”
“No.” Their mother had looked very serious. “You will never leave Fallhurst, Angela. Do you hear me? Any wolf who leaves the pack can never return. And there are more dangerous things than humans out there.”
It had been the start of a much longer conversation—one that they had returned to again and again in the following days. Their father, too, had provided his insight, mostly in the form of dire warnings about the evil things that humans had done to their kind. The importance of secrecy, the logic for the way the village was run and organized. No visitors, no outside contact. They were completely self-sufficient for a reason. But it was that sentence that Jessica couldn’t help coming back to, again and again, even as she tried to plan out her escape from this crevasse once her leg had had the time it needed to heal. Any wolf who leaves the pack can never return.
Where was she going to go?
“I wasn’t sure how much you wanted to eat, so I brought as much as I could carry—”
She jumped, yelping as the movement jarred her injured leg. The dragon was back, his arms full of things—including a huge bowl of what looked like roast meat, still glistening with oil. The smell hit her like a freight train, and her stomach growled and gurgled. She could feel the dull pain behind her eyes and the itching in her gums that meant her body was trying to change shape. God, she must have been hungrier than she thought if her wolf state was trying to take over—
Samuel, was that his name? He was staring down at her, and his eyes were full of wonder.
“Si
lver,” he breathed. “No dragon I know has silver eyes. Are you from beyond the Valley?”
Jessica blinked hard, trying to reassert control over her treacherous body. She felt the odd feeling in her eyes fade—but Samuel didn’t seem to notice. He was kneeling beside her, staring at her as though she’d just come down on a spaceship.
“Seriously. We’re such a hidebound little community here, nobody’s left the valley in hundreds of years—we thought there must be others, but we didn’t know for certain! This is amazing. Where are you from? Did you come as a messenger?”
“No,” Jessica said, her mind racing.
He thought she was a dragon. That was good, in a way. It certainly explained why he hadn’t just killed her on sight. But she knew she was in great danger. Dragons were the sworn and ancient enemies of wolves. Centuries ago, the founders of Fallhurst, facing persecution from humans, had decided to found a village in the depths of the Rocky Mountains, as far from human civilization as it was possible to be. Their first year had almost been their last, as an emissary from a nearby dragon colony had visited to inform them that they were trespassing on dragon territory. But they had had nowhere else to go. A short but bloody war had eventuated. The wolves of Fallhurst had miraculously been victorious, and an uneasy truce had been struck between dragon and wolf.
A truce she violated by her very presence here.
“I’m so sorry,” Samuel said suddenly, shaking his head. “How terribly rude of me. We can talk when you’re not starving. Please, eat.” He handed her the bowl of meat—and unable to resist, she plunged both hands into the bowl, devouring the food as quickly as she could get it to her mouth. It was absolutely delicious—tender and perfectly cooked, spiced deliciously, and still warm.
Samuel cleared his throat. She looked up—he was holding a knife and fork out to her.
“I mean, you seem to be making do without them, but—”
“Thanks,” she muttered, feeling embarrassment flare in her chest. She took the knife and fork and set about eating at a more sedate pace. Samuel picked up a pillow from the pile of things he’d brought.
“I thought—rock’s not very comfortable to lie on. And if you’re not willing to let me move you to a more comfortable room…”
“No,” she said quickly, swallowing a mouthful of food. “Here is fine. Thank you.” She hesitated. “I’ll be mended in a day or so, and I can move on. Is that okay?”
“Of course.” He put the pillow behind her, wedging it between her back and the rock to give her a more comfortable seat—she had to admit, it was a lot better. “I’d love to introduce you to our King—he’d be fascinated to know—”
“No!” She felt her voice drop into a warning bark, and Samuel flinched. “No. Please. Don’t tell anyone I’m here.”
“Why not?”
Who was this guy? Why did she feel like she could trust him? All she knew about him was that he was a dragon—she could smell it on him. It was the smell her father had taught her about when she came of age and joined the pack. It was clear as day—she’d recognized it the instant Samuel had stepped into the space she was trapped in. The stink of a dragon.
There was a church in the center of town, and on the day she joined the pack, her father had taken her there. In the back room—a room she’d always thought was just an old storage room—there was a trapdoor, and a ladder that descended into the gloom. Jack had left her waiting as he descended, then returned holding a folded piece of cloth in his arms. The way he had unfolded it had frightened her for a reason she couldn’t quite articulate. Her father, so strong and powerful, one of the toughest and most revered wolves in the village, handling a piece of cloth like it was going to burn him.
But he’d unfolded it, and she’d stared down at the artefact inside. It was about the size of a relay baton, slightly curved, and covered in some kind of iridescent, metallic material—dull and tarnished, but gleaming still in the low light of the room. Jack stared down at it, and Jessica recoiled a little at the expression on his face.
“Take a deep breath,” he told her, his voice as low and taut as she’d never heard it before. “Know the scent of our enemy.”
“What is it?”
“A dragon horn. Torn off in battle. A single dragon would fill the entire town square. They have savage claws, enormous wings, and jaws full of teeth. Their bodies are covered in this armored material. They are living weapons, Jessica.”
“How did they fight them? How did they tear off this horn?”
“Our strength is in numbers, Jessica. Our greatest gift, and our only weapon against them, is this.”
She felt his mind then—the mental presence brushing against hers. She’d only recently begun her mental training, learning how to occupy the same thought-space as other wolves in order to move as one body. It was hard, exhausting work, and she hated it. Her instructor—tiny old Mrs. Henderson—was relentless. If the young wolves didn’t move through the sequence of movements in perfect harmony, she’d bark at them to start again. It was like the worst dance class she’d ever been to.
But as her father’s mind brushed against hers, she saw an image—an unfamiliar memory with strange edges. A dozen wolves, all standing together in the town square. But was it the town square? It looked different—older, somehow—the stones were different, the buildings surrounding it somehow more old-fashioned. But in the center of the town square stood a dragon. Enormous as her father had said, its head crowned with half a dozen horns like the one in her father’s hands. And as she watched, the wolves moved as one body towards the dragon, launched themselves through the air towards it as it roared defiance, its serpentine neck whipping around to sink its fangs into a wolf’s neck—but just before the wolf could be struck, another wolf leapt to its aid, striking the dragon’s head just in time…
“This is why we train,” her father said. “Not for fun, or tradition. For survival. All we have is one another, Jessica. Do you understand?”
Jessica had stared down at the trophy, the scent of dragon filling her nose as the ancient memory, passed down from wolf to wolf through the generations, raged behind her eyes. Yes. She understood.
“I’m not a dragon,” Jessica said softly to Samuel, now, looking him right in his golden eyes. If he was going to kill her, she was going to go out fighting. “I’m a wolf. Of Fallhurst.”
“Oh! Great!”
Jessica stared at him, completely taken aback by the cheerful smile on his face.
“I’ve never met a wolf,” he continued, now picking up the splint and bandages he’d brought for her leg. “My brother has. But I understand if you’d prefer for nobody to know you’re here. Are you okay to set your own leg? I can get someone to help.”
“I’m fine.” Her mind was reeling. Was this a trap? Was he just pretending to be okay with her being a wolf? Was he about to kill her? Why bother messing with her head first, though? “Yes, I’ll—do it. Don’t worry.”
“I’ve brought a few blankets, too—it gets cold in this crevasse. I’ll leave you to rest, now, but I’ll be back in the morning with some breakfast, okay?” He left the blankets within reach of her. The last glimpse she got of him was his bright smile from the end of the crevasse—then he was gone.
With the food in her belly, she was feeling an instinctive urge to sleep—her body wanted to hibernate to accelerate the healing process, she could feel it. Even when she was surrounded by enemies, trapped, and in a considerable amount of danger. Why was that? Surely her fight or flight reflexes should be raging, keeping her awake and alert? She kept trying to summon the image of Samuel, his glowing golden eyes—kept trying to visualize him transforming into a huge winged monster, ready to bite and tear at her and everyone she loved. But she couldn’t. All she could see was that bright, friendly smile—and the way he’d dropped everything to help her, even though she was clearly trespassing on his territory, a member of a species that had been at war with his for hundreds of years.
What kind of a dragon was h
e?
She looked down at her leg and narrowed her eyes. Working quickly, trying not to think about the jolt of pain that was coming, she lined the splint up alongside her shin, wrapping bandages loosely around the leg and the splint. That done, she took a deep breath—then as quickly as she could, pulled the splint taut, biting down hard on the scream that tried to force itself free as her broken leg moved into alignment. There. Now it would heal truly. And once she was back in fighting shape, she could deal with the dragon issue.
When she woke, there was sun filtering down from the crevasse, and her leg was already feeling better. She was tempted to try her weight on it—perhaps she could even get out of this crevasse, start figuring out where she was going—but when she shifted it, there was a warning throb of pain that told her that was a terrible idea. The last thing she wanted to do was re-break the leg. And besides—Samuel had said he was coming back with food for her. A meal would be useful before she set off again. And she had to admit—she was curious about him. Not many Fallhurst wolves had ever actually met a dragon. But was she still a Fallhurst wolf?
She smelled the food before she heard him coming through the split in the wall that functioned as a natural door to the crevasse. She took the opportunity of daylight to get a closer look at him. He was a huge man, taller than her father and built like a fighter, with a wild mane of curly black hair and glowing golden eyes that set off his olive-toned skin. She was scanning him for weaknesses, strengths, tactical information—and surprised herself by realizing, abruptly and overwhelmingly, that he was incredibly handsome. Magnetic, almost. And the smell of him—the smell of dragon, she reminded herself, still shocked by the strength of this realization—there was something intoxicating about it. Something—
“How are you feeling?” he asked, kneeling beside the shelf of rock she had slept on. She felt the warmth of his body and almost recoiled at the strength of that sensation. Did he know he was—doing that?
