by Cheree Alsop
Ceren had followed me into the woods. I had assumed she would vanish to wherever ghosts went when they were through indulging their curiosity in things better left unknown, yet she stayed.
I didn’t know what to say. I wasn’t one for conversation starters; I had never understood the need to fill silence with talk. Life at the Lair had been a quiet one except for growls, screams, arguments, and the occasional talk about strategy or guard routes. Small talk didn’t exist at all. I had gone weeks at a time without saying a word.
The fact that the ghost didn’t speak either filled me with relief. Perhaps Ceren appreciated the sounds of the forest as well. The chirps of crickets loath to go to bed mingled with the question of an owl. Serenity filled me.
I followed the sound of paws on the soft forest floor. The rabbit darted onto my path. It paused at the edge of the trail and stared at me. I breathed in its scent of dewy grass and rich, clean soil. The breeze shifted, taking my scent to the small animal. Its nose twitched once before it darted back the way it had come, leaving a trail filled with the pine aroma of surprise.
“You want to chase it, don’t you?”
I twitched at the sound of Ceren’s voice. Somewhere along the way, I had forgotten the presence of the ghost. It was an easy thing to do when her feet didn’t touch the ground and she didn’t need to breathe; so why did I feel so stupid about being startled?
“What?” I asked to hide my embarrassment.
She pointed. “The rabbit. You wanted to chase it.”
I didn’t understand the point of the question. “Of course. Why?”
The look she gave me was searching and a little fearful. It wasn’t one I had seen from her before.
“You really are a werewolf, aren’t you?”
I felt as though I was confessing the truth to Isley all over again. Despite a few runs at night, the elemental had found solace with her family and a life to live that didn’t include a monster like me. The look of betrayal she had given me when she found out I was the wolf who haunted her nightmares was one I couldn’t get out of my mind.
Afraid I was about to experience a repeat, I nodded without speaking.
Instead of pressing the topic, she said, “That means I’m really a ghost, and those were really witches.”
I nodded again. “Yes, to all of it.”
She stopped moving beside me. I turned to find her hunched over on the path with her head in her hands.
“Ceren?” I asked tentatively.
I reached out a hand to her, but drew it back because it wouldn’t have done anything anyway.
She shook her head without looking at me. When she spoke, her voice was muffled. “That means I’m dead. I’m really dead. I don’t exist at all.”
“That’s not true—” I began.
She held up a hand to stop me from speaking. I was glad to comply. Giving comfort wasn’t my strong suit, which was excruciatingly obvious at that point.
“Don’t,” she said quietly. “Just don’t. There’s nothing you can do. There’s no reason to even try. I’m dead. That’s why my family won’t stop crying. And I can’t change it. I’m gone and I can’t help them. I-I miss them.”
She began to sob. Watching the ghost’s shoulders shake as soul-wrenching cries tore from her made me feel more hopeless than the time two demons nearly ripped me apart. I paced from one tree to the next. It may have sounded absurd, but I couldn’t leave her there by herself. There was nothing I could do, but it felt wrong to leave her alone with her sorrow.
I found a flat spot on the path and sat down. Her sobs eased as the light from the rising sun pierced the leaves to make small patterns on the ground. The shapes danced back and forth in time to the gentle breeze overhead.
The warmth of the sun eased the tightness of my muscles. I didn’t know when the stick appeared in my hand or when I started drawing in the dirt. It was a rough medium, but calmed my thoughts just the same.
“Is that me?”
I started at the ghost’s voice and made a mark across the crude drawing.
I blinked and looked at the sketch again. The outline of a girl bent over with her head in her hands was achingly painful to look at.
“I’m sorry,” I said quietly.
I lifted a hand to wipe it away.
“Don’t,” Ceren said.
I paused with my hand inches from the dirt. When I glanced at her, the look on her face stopped me.
“You really do see me,” she said.
I watched her closely when I replied, “Of course I do.”
She shook her head and looked away. “No,” she said. She rose silently to a standing position. “I mean, you see me, really me.”
Unsure what she was getting at, I smoothed the errant mark from the sketch of her arm.
“People didn’t see me when I was alive. I guess…I guess I’m surprised someone does now.”
Her confession was pained and something inside of me twisted. I felt like a young werewolf again ganged up on by four other werewolves, my food taken, banished from yet another small cave in the Lair wall I had claimed as my own, and left to curl up in a corner near the kitchen where I was kicked awake to begin my shift. I hadn’t been more than a nuisance to them, something to torment, a child to pester in the hopes that it would wither away and die like so many of the others. They hadn’t seen me as an individual until I learned to fight and forced them to do so.
“You need to make them see you.”
I didn’t realize I had spoken aloud until she said, “You don’t even know.”
Her angry, accusing tone spurred me on. “You think so?” I replied. I lifted my shirt to show the burns. “How do you think I got these?”
She reached out a hand. I shied back out of habit even though I knew she couldn’t touch me.
“You don’t like being touched,” she said, lowering her hand.
Being caught like that was embarrassing. I shoved my shirt back down without saying anything. I turned away from her searching gaze to add detail to the strands of hair on the sketch. My cheeks burned and it was all I could do to keep from snarling. I felt idiotic.
“Fine,” she said after a moment. “If you don’t like to be touched and those burn marks are related, I want to know why.”
I shook my head.
She stomped a foot. Even though it didn’t make a sound, the action was endearing. It was as though the sad little ghost had let down her walls enough for her true self to show. I didn’t want to let that go, especially when she looked a little less sad at the moment.
“It’s not a pleasant story,” I said.
“I’m a ghost talking to a werewolf while trying to believe that I am actually a ghost talking to a werewolf,” Ceren replied in a bemused tone. “I could use any kind of story right now.”
I sighed and sat back. I didn’t know where to begin. The Master and rules and guard rounds were so far away from where I was that it felt like a different life.
A bug fluttered against my cheek. I ran my hand over the spot to chase it away.
“Tell me about that one,” Ceren said.
I followed her gaze. My shirt had lifted enough to show a burn just above the hem of my pants on my left side. A slight, wry laugh escaped me at the fact that she had chosen that one.
“I didn’t think the story would be funny,” she said.
I shook my head. “It’s not. It’s just, well, ironic.” I took a steeling breath and let the memory settle over me. “That one wasn’t my first, but it might as well have been.”
“Why is that?” the ghost asked.
I gave her a half smile. “Because that is the day they started noticing me.”
Chapter Five
The smell hit me first. It was filled with the odors and aromas of my youth. Fear, pain, fresh meat, blood, bats, wet wolf fur, unwashed bodies, the questionable food from the kitchen, anger, mossy stones, damp corners, and the underlying determination that came from surviving tremendous odds enveloped me in the m
emory.
I opened my eyes to the sight of werewolves brawling outside of the Lair. It was an unsanctioned fight, the kind that would get you thrown into solitary for a week; but sometimes the rivalries couldn’t wait for the practice ring. The older werewolves would oversee the fights and commanded us younger ones to watch for the experience.
I couldn’t have been more than eight years old. Only a few brands had been burned into my body as a result of a food stealing incident and one involving arguing with an elder. I was told both were against my instincts and could lead to death if I chose to pursue such unwolflike endeavors.
I sat at the edge of the fighting circle that had been marked before my time by massive stones. Werewolves fought first in human form and then phased at the command of whoever was in charge of the fight. It was daytime, the only time such fights were held because the Masters were sleeping in their cave and wouldn’t overhear.
It was harder to phase during the day. It took more strength and it was difficult to keep the wolf form. Practice was required to reach such mastery. Many of us younger werewolves had never tried. Such attempts were forbidden until our twelfth year because of the drain on the body and the risk of not having enough strength to phase back. I didn’t know what happened after that, but hushed stories hinted at a very painful death.
Four werewolves brawled in their human forms. The simple shorts they wore did little to ease the pounding of fists on flesh. One werewolf was flipped onto his back. Two others took advantage of the fallen one and proceeded to beat him senseless until the last one pulled them free. The two turned on the one until he was also unconscious, then they fought each other.
I didn’t turn away from the brutality of their battle. The wounds of the survivors would heal. Very seldom was a lesser werewolf left dead in the ring. The Masters frowned upon the needless wasting of a life if it wasn’t lost protecting the Lair. Fortunately, I was never involved in explaining the loss.
I studied the battle, watching the way each werewolf moved, blocking and attacking, stepping back to draw the other in, then pressing their advantage against an unwary opponent.
Even at eight, I vowed to do it better. I would watch for the draw, fake my opponent into thinking I took the bait, then dodge the expected attack and land my own. It was easy to see how the slight angle of a foot, the rotation of a hip, and a practiced drive of the shoulders could enhance a punch into something far more lethal, especially with the strength of a werewolf behind it.
The fight master barked an order and the four were escorted or dragged from the ring, to be replaced with four others. This time, blades were handed out. I perked up. Weapon fights were always my favorite. The rule was no mortal wounds, but fighters weren’t shy about leaving their opponents bloodied enough to remember them.
It started out as an ordinary fight. A few swipes were taken, the first blood drawn. A werewolf on the sidelines shouted creative curses about the moon and someone’s questionable mother. Others chuckled because none of us really knew who our mothers were, and so the insults could apply to all of us or none.
A werewolf held a bleeding gash across his thigh as a result of a particularly swift attack. At the fight master’s command, he was taken from the ring. With three left, the slash of the blades became more intense. Blood showed bright red in the sunlight and dripped freely from several wounds. The weakest werewolf was ganged up upon by the other two, as often happened in the ring. The strongest quickly took him down until he, too, was dragged out.
With two left, I sat forward in anticipation. I already knew the one with the dark hair to be a savage fighter. I had seen him bite an opponent’s calf clear to the bone, and that was in his human form. The other was taller, skinnier, and had the advantage of a longer reach. The battle was as well-matched as one could hope.
In the fury of a heated attack, both knives were swung at the same time. They connected with a shrill crack. The dark haired werewolf’s knife handle met the other werewolf’s first and he lost his grip. The knife spun end over end straight at me.
I grabbed it out of the air. The motion happened so fast I didn’t even think about it. One moment, it was whirling on a straight course to embed into my eye, and the next it was in my hand feeling as natural as if I had been born with it.
“Nice catch,” the hulking werewolf who sat next to me said with a glimmer of respect.
“Lucky you’ll survive today with both eyes,” the fight master said. Answering nods and a few chuckles rounded the ring. “Toss the knife back.”
The fight master’s command was supposed to be gold no matter what arena we used. Instincts told me to obey him. I was eight; I had never trained with weapons and hanging onto it would reap severe consequences.
Showing the same stubbornness that would eventually send me fleeing the Lair for my life, I did the one thing none of them expected. I rose with the knife clutched in my hand.
“Come on, little lobo,” the fight master said. “You can’t be that stupid or brave. Both will get you killed just as quickly.”
Without anything close to a real plan, I climbed onto the dividing stone.
“Seriously, mutt, get back here,” the werewolf I had been sitting by growled. “You’ll get yourself killed.”
Eight years old was too young for a death wish, so I don’t know what made me do what I did next. With every werewolf’s gaze locked on me, I jumped down into the ring.
“Try me,” I said.
The two werewolves exchanged surprised glances.
“You’re kidding, right?” the dark haired one asked. He glanced up at the fight master. “This is too dangerous.”
With all the bravado my small self could muster, I said, “I’ll take it easy on you.”
The werewolf’s eyes widened, then narrowed. “No whelp is going to make a fool out of me,” he growled.
They both advanced. I could tell by the taller one’s stance and reluctant steps that he wasn’t keen on the fight. Disregarding him as the lesser threat of the two, I kept my focus on his companion.
The werewolf switched his knife from hand to hand. I held mine tightly in my right where I had caught it. Later, I learned to loosen my hold to give greater speed and flexibility by not limiting the muscles to the singular task of gripping the blade; but at that time, all I knew was that it impeded my movements more than I thought it would. I tried to wield it like my opponent who passed it back and forth with the grace of a deadly viper ready to strike, but my motions were jerky and lacked any sort of the finesse he had trained to perfect.
“I’m going to enjoy this,” he said when he was near enough to speak quietly for only the two of us to hear. “The sand can keep your lifeblood. Nobody will miss another zev, least of all one as stupid as you.”
I growled at that.
My outburst angered him. He lunged forward so quickly I barely saw it coming. When he danced away before the tip of my blade could so much as stir a breeze past his chest, he left a line of fire along my cheek.
The werewolf lifted his blade so the others could see the red coloring its tip.
“First blood!” he hooted. His tone turned taunting when he turned his gaze back to me. “And the only werewolf’s blood who will be spilled in this fight.”
I was fed up, tired of the bullying, worn out from the endless fight for survival, hungry, thirsty, sore from the intensity of our training, and just plain done with being at the bottom of the pecking order with the other young werewolves. It all added up to one very important thing in my mind. If I didn’t prove myself in that ring at that moment, it would never stop.
I let out a roar of such rage the werewolf took a surprised step back. I threw my knife to the sand, leaped at him, and willed my body to phase.
The sun flashed in my eyes for a blinding second and then I was at his throat fighting with the fangs of a wolf to tear into the delicate tissue that protected his jugular.
The werewolf had done one thing right and had shoved his arm between my jaws
and his neck when I tackled him. We rolled on the ground, my paws scrambling for purchase as he yelled for the others to drag the beast from him.
It took six of them to pull me panting and growling away from him, and two more to hold me there as others took him from the ring for stitches to repair the severed muscles in his arm until the moon could do the rest. Three others, including the fight master, ended up needing medical care as well by the time I had calmed down enough to phase back.
The wide-eyed look the others gave me when I was escorted down to the Room of Retribution was enough to tell me how far I had crossed the line. I didn’t fight when they chained my hands and pulled them over my head, and I didn’t shy away from the brand the tall, skinny werewolf carried over.
He paused with the red glow of the silver brand inches from my skin.
“Truth be told, if it was up to me, you wouldn’t be receiving this brand,” he said in a whisper the watching werewolves couldn’t hear. With his back to them and his head bowed, he continued, “That was the bravest, craziest thing I’ve ever seen. You might not have planned to make a ruckus, but you definitely left a mark the others aren’t soon to forget.” He held up the brand of the two half-circles for the other werewolves to see. “A penance for acting against your instincts and attacking someone beyond your skill level.” He lowered his voice and said, “Carry this one with pride, you savageq little beast.”
I might not have been able to stifle a yell of pain at the angry burn of the silver that would mark my skin forever, but later on in my small cave, I couldn’t help the rise of satisfaction when I looked at the scar. It hurt with an ache even the moonlight didn’t ease, but the werewolf was right. The others had given me space the rest of that day. I truly had acted against my instincts, but the hazing let up and the older werewolves started to pick on the younger ones less.
It felt surreal to break from the memory and find myself back in the forest with the ghost at my side. The satisfying crunch of leaves beneath my bare feet was the only sound that met my ears for a few minutes.
