Seeds of Autumn: A Dark Shapeshifter Urban Fantasy (Echoes of the Past Book 1)

by H B Lyne

  Her sense of smell was of little help to her here, she sniffed the ground but it was almost devoid of any scent she could identify. Not that it didn't smell of anything, just nothing she was familiar with. There were no people, no animals, no shifters, no rot, just the strange mixture of nameless scents that had to be unknown fae.

  They jogged down the middle of the street, under the orange glow of the street lights, which on this side of the veil gave the streets an even more eerie quality. The orange was bright and the shadows much darker, contrasts seemed exaggerated here, angles more severe and as Ariana turned her eyes to the sky she was shocked to see thick, purple storm clouds rolling over one another in no discernible direction. They weren't driven by wind, the clouds were alive and tumultuous, Ariana could feel their power even from so far below them. Somewhere in the distance lightning flashed behind the clouds and a moment later the rumble of thunder reached them. Ariana watched as the clouds shuddered, the ripple of sound was visible in the reaction of the clouds as they fought with each other. As the wave passed by, the clouds settled again into their hypnotic war dance.

  As she gazed upwards, Ariana had slowed to a walk, and as a heavy rain drop landed on her face she stopped and shook her head. Another drop followed, then another. She looked up again and the clouds had darkened, they were heavy with rain and were about to unleash it on the city. She looked ahead for Shadow and Grins-Too-Widely, they had just turned a corner and she dashed after them, cutting the corner and darting into the shadows.

  The moment her paws touched the black pavement something snatched at her from the darkness and a tightness wrapped itself around her leg. She let out a yelp as she struggled to free herself from the thick, formless shadow.

  A moment later Shadow was by her side, his teeth bared and a threatening snarl trembled from his chest. Ariana felt the grip on her leg tighten for an instant and then it slipped away. She leaped backwards into the safe pool of light and felt her heart rate start to settle.

  Shadow looked up at the sky and then his amber eyes met hers. Run, he urged and set off at a gallop, Ariana followed, sprinting along behind him. Grins-Too-Widely seemed to glide along silently just ahead of them. The rain drops felt heavy on her fur and caused large splashes on the street. Puddles formed far too quickly and soon Ariana was leaping over and skirting around them as they reached out to her from the sides of the road. She suspected that a wrong paw could mean being dragged down and drowned if the rain elementals were in a wrathful mood.

  Before she could get her bearings, they were skidding to a halt outside the betting shop. Shadow launched himself at the door, and it opened of its own accord to admit them.

  Grins-Too-Widely slipped silently in through the front door and Ariana followed. The shop was silent and Ariana felt unease seeping through her body. Grins-Too-Widely stood still next to the door into the back of the building and Shadow shifted form smoothly. He bowed to the fox, Ariana shifted form too and also gave the fox a respectful nod. Grins-Too-Widely cocked his head and nodded back, but that eerie voice of his that came from him without his teeth so much as snapping caught Ariana off guard.

  'Cross over now, you are needed.' His voice was almost lazy and he slipped back out through the door without another word or backwards glance. Shadow and Ariana exchanged worried glances and the two shifters crossed the veil into the human world.

  Ariana heard the commotion first and then she felt it. Her pack mates were in a state of panic. Fortune was shouting and there were other voices. She and Shadow looked at each other before sprinting through to the kitchen.

  'Do NOT ask me again! You are staying here!' Fortune was shouting and he slammed his hand down on the table as Ariana and Shadow burst into the kitchen. Fights-Eyes-Open was snarling at their Alpha, his shirt and tie loose at his neck.

  'What's going on?' Shadow demanded. Ariana looked around to see Stone sitting at the table with her head in her hands. Flames was standing by the back door, his arms crossed over his chest and Wind Talker was talking rapidly at him.

  'Where's Teri?' Ariana asked. There was too much noise in the room, no one heard her. She asked again, louder this time and she felt Shadow's warm hand on her shoulder, trying to calm her.

  'Still your head and your heart, feel it,' Shadow whispered at her ear. Ariana's head snapped to him in frustration but she did as he told her and the room began to go quiet around them. She could feel Teri, the bond was still there, but she was far away, beyond the reaches of their telepathy. Ariana could just about tell that her pack sister was afraid. The rest of the pack felt panic, fear and anger and she caught a snatch of a thought from Wind Talker, the need for a plan to “get her back”.

  'She's been taken,' Ariana whispered and Shadow's hand on her shoulder tightened momentarily, telling her she was right.

  Fortune looked at her for the first time since they entered the room, he sighed. Eyes was backing down, he paced the kitchen a few times then slumped into a chair opposite Stone.

  'The southern perimeter is secure.' Shadow's Step spoke softly into the silence. 'We were in Hepethia and didn't sense it until we crossed over.'

  Fortune nodded solemnly. 'Where was she taken from?' Shadow asked, his voice still calm and quiet.

  'Redfield,' Stone replied, lifting her head. 'I deliberately didn't take her into Crossway, we went north to patrol Northgate and Redfield. I thought that the Wrecking Crew would provide a nice buffer so that the Witches wouldn't get near Teri. I was wrong.' The Wrecking Crew were the pack to the north of the Blue Moon's territory, the rivals who marked their border so strongly. They too shared a border with the Witches.

  'We ran the park, which I realise now was the mistake. I think the Witches may have fae allies there.' Stone's voice was heavy with responsibility and Ariana felt so sad for her. 'They appeared from the south and ambushed us. Teri lost control and ran, they chased her and herded her over into Fenwick.'

  Ariana frowned, her mind racing across the territory trying to figure out the geography.

  'But that means they came right up through St. Mark's,' she said softly, all eyes turned to her. 'They must have come right into the heart of our territory and tracked you north into Redfield in order to come at you from the south side of the park and to have avoided the Wrecking Crew. At least I assume we would have heard about it if The Wrecking Crew had got into a fight. They'd have warned us the Witches were coming. Right?' She looked around the room at the downcast faces of her pack.

  'Not necessarily,' Fortune said sadly. 'But it is hard to keep a large scale fight quiet enough not to reach neighbouring packs one way or another, be it through howls carrying or through other communication. And you are quite right, we heard nothing from them. They will have heard Teri though. Shadow, go to the rooftops, see if you can find Sky Runner and liaise with the Wrecking Crew. Ariana, come with me, I need your tracking abilities. Stone, you're with us. Flames, Eyes and Wind Talker will stay here. See if you can summon some supernatural allies to help find her.' The pack stirred into action, Shadow was already gone when Ariana looked for him and she felt a little pang of disappointment that he had left without saying goodbye.

  As everyone started heading in different directions Ariana caught sight of Fortune taking Eyes firmly by the elbow and muttering a warning to him.

  'I mean it. I know you're worried about your family, but the best way to protect them is to stay here. If I get the tiniest hint of you disobeying me there will be consequences.' Ariana looked away, embarrassed that she had overheard and moved quickly down the corridor after Stone. Fortune was behind her in an instant and she glanced back to see Eyes disappearing into the basement.

  Ariana stepped back out into the cool night air with Stone and Fortune. It was the first time she had been alone with these two pack mates and she felt nervous, almost like she had to prove herself to them, she knew Fortune was counting on her.

  The rain was normal on this side of the veil, just another wet night in Caerton. She must have experien
ced hundreds just like this.

  They moved into an alley a few houses down from the shop.

  'I want you both to change. Stone, you scout ahead from the sky, Ariana, use your fox senses to pick up what you can. I'll stay in this form, a wolf and a fox together is an odd sight.' Fortune explained and Ariana gave a little smirk of agreement, thinking of the times she had seen him and Shadow together. She did as she was asked, shifting smoothly into her fox form. Beside her, Stone twisted in on herself and disappeared upwards, she hovered above them, flapping her owl wings briefly before soaring away up over the rooftops.

  Stone set off on the route she and Teri had taken earlier in the evening, Ariana glanced up to check which direction to go in and followed the silent owl gliding above. Fortune walked a short distance behind. Ariana soon picked up Teri's scent, though she had been in her human form and the scent was less pronounced than it would have been had she been in her cat form.

  They retraced the route slowly, giving Ariana all the time she needed to follow the trail carefully. It was near the telecoms tower that she picked up the first foreign scent and she indicated to Fortune that she had found something. She wasn't one hundred percent sure, but she thought it was probably the same wolf that had tracked and bitten Teri the previous night.

  'Can you trace it back to where it entered our territory?' Fortune asked her and she nodded. She set off at once. Following the trail towards Crossway. Where she thought it would lead them east she was surprised to find her nose turning south. With a small whimper she followed the trail, though it was growing cold now, too much time had passed since the intruder had come this way. Stone followed a little behind and Ariana picked up traces of guilt and frustration from her owl mind.

  Fortune walked briskly behind and didn't speak when Ariana led them south. The trail was becoming increasingly difficult to follow, but she kept hold of it right to their border. The Witch had crossed over just south of Fenwick, trying to avoid the obvious places that the Blue Moon might expect an incursion.

  'What about the rest of them?' Fortune looked out across the border, it was just another street in a vast city, nothing remarkable about it, but this was the point where the Blue Moon could go no further, an invisible line that Ariana knew instinctively not to cross.

  She turned north and set off into Crossway, searching for the second breach, the place where the other Witches had followed their own tracker into enemy territory. Ariana knew it must have been closer to Redfield Park, it had to have been close enough to where Teri was so as to avoid detection before they reached her. So she ran quickly, but made sure not to leave Fortune behind. She skidded to a halt when she smelled it, it was overpowering.

  At least half a dozen of them had been here, just south of the park. They would have made a bee line straight up the main road that came out at the south eastern tip of the park. They must have been seen, a big pack like that must have been seen by humans. She sniffed the air carefully, she put her nose to the ground and tried hard to distinguish the different smells. Soon it was clear that the strength of the smell came down to the number of intruders. They had been in their human forms here, she was sure of it, each individual had a more faint smell than the wolf who had slipped so stealthily into their territory before. That's how they escaped human attention too.

  Fortune gave her head a scratch and she rubbed against his legs, enjoying the contact and his affectionate sign of gratitude. Stone gave a small hoot and set off towards the park. Ariana and Fortune followed her and Ariana kept her nose to the ground, waiting to come across some sign of where the Witches had changed.

  It wasn't until they entered the park that she sensed it, in the cover of the trees that lined the green space in the middle of dense urban brick and smoke. She hated the smell, everything about it screamed “enemy”, “intruder” and it grew overwhelmingly strong where they had shifted into their beast forms and attacked her pack sisters.

  She snarled and Stone landed on the ground a few feet away, seamlessly shifting into her human form. Ariana smelled blood and dashed to where Stone was standing. Teri had been wounded in the attack, that was how she had lost control. She felt sick with rage, but she could feel that her pack sister was alive, for now.

  Fortune stepped silently to her side and bent to touch the blood soaked ground, he sniffed the blood on his fingers and wrinkled his nose.

  'We need to cover this,' he said, standing up and gesturing at the ground. Ariana started digging, burying the bloody earth under freshly turned soil. Fortune paced the area, examining every tree and stepped out from under the cover of the bare branches and into the open space of the park beyond. Ariana stood and watched the Alpha move carefully into the open.

  The clouds above cleared and Ariana looked up to see the slip of a waxing crescent moon in the sky, a crooked smile on an invisible face.

  She followed Fortune into the park, Stone just behind her. Cautiously they crossed the open field.

  'We don't come here in Hepethia,' Fortune spoke softly. 'The fae that claim this park are mad, wild beyond control and as we have now seen, in league with the Witches.'

  A gust of wind carried a flurry of dry brown leaves across the park towards them and Ariana caught the scent of a shifter. Her senses sharpened and she let out a short bark, catching Fortune's attention. The leaves swirled around them in an unnatural spiral and Fortune stopped still to watch them. A whisper reached out from the leaves, sending a shudder through Ariana, though she couldn't pick out any discernible words.

  'You want permission to enter?' Fortune asked the disembodied voice. 'Granted.' He looked out across the park and Ariana followed his gaze as the leaves dropped to the ground around them.

  Out of the dark cover of the trees on the opposite side of the park three figures emerged. The heckles on Ariana's back rose, but she knew the smell, it wasn't the Witches, this was the Wrecking Crew, or some of them.

  A tall, wiry man with short reddish hair led them, he had stubble all over his chin and jaw and wore loose clothing. He was flanked by one male and one female, both of whom looked as hard as nails, though the female was painfully thin.

  Ariana felt Fortune tensing up as they approached and could hear the rumble of a growl in his chest. Stone was equally rigid, her thoughts a tangle of aggression and apprehension. This was the first real contact Ariana had had with shifters outside her own pack, she couldn't feel their thoughts like she could her pack mates, she wasn't bonded to them. But she could smell them and read their body language just as well, she could smell the adrenaline and knew that these newcomers were anything but friendly.

  'Fortune,' The Wrecking Crew's Alpha snapped, as the two groups drew level in the middle of the park.

  'Rust.' Fortune returned the curt greeting. 'What can we do for you?'

  'One of your bitches rampaged through our territory tonight,' Rust snarled, his eyes darting over Stone and Ariana. Fortune's chest puffed up and Ariana saw his fists curl by his sides.

  'In case you didn't notice,' Fortune growled. 'Witches invaded our territory and pursued one of our own. She was fleeing for her life.'

  Rust let out a bark of laughter.

  'Then your youngsters need to be taught to control themselves.' Rust's pack mates started laughing cruelly.

  Stone lurched forward, growling and snarling at the skinny female. The Wrecking Crew took half a step back, pausing their laughter only for an instant before breaking into renewed jeers. Fortune held a hand out to tell Stone to back down, though Ariana could feel the anger rolling off her Alpha in waves.

  'Get out.' Fortune's voice was barely more than a whisper but it carried the threat of a defensive alpha wolf on his own territory. The Wrecking Crew flinched and without another word turned and walked briskly from the park. Ariana felt the tension prickling over her skin and in the air around them for several long minutes as they watched the Wrecking Crew members leave and waited for all of their tempers to settle.

  Fortune's fists relaxed, he tur
ned and stalked past Ariana and Stone. The two of them fell into step behind him, not a word or direct thought was exchanged all the way back to the shop but Ariana felt the thirst for payback pounding in the veins of her pack mates.

  Chapter Eleven

  18th November

  It was a restless night for the Blue Moon. They could all feel Teri's fear, and pain. Fortune paced the attic all night, Flames and Wind Talker had gone to the petrol station, having summoned supernatural allies to help protect the border. Shadow and Stone were patrolling while Ariana and Eyes were expected to rest.

  Ariana couldn't sleep, she sat in the kitchen waiting for something to happen. She felt useless and confused, but her feeling paled in comparison to the frustration she felt from Eyes. He was taking it out on the punch bag in the basement. Ariana only caught fragments of unguarded thought and feeling, their human forms were the least communicative in so many ways. It was only when Eyes shifted into the monster and started shredding the punch bag that Ariana picked up more of the picture. A toddler, in yellow pyjamas with gorgeous curly hair, she was being put to bed by a beautiful young woman with long red hair. Eyes had a family. Ariana knew where they lived, she had smelled Eyes in Crossway on that first trip out with Shadow. If she had smelled him, so had the Witches. Tears welled up in her eyes and she rubbed them away with frustration.

  As dawn broke Ariana's eyes were fighting sleep, the others were in mixed states of exhaustion. She couldn't feel much from Teri, she was still there so Ariana knew she was still alive, but there were no strong emotions coming from her. Ariana hoped that meant Teri was asleep, rather than unconscious or broken.

  The pack sleepily assembled for breakfast, though it seemed Ariana wasn't the only one with no appetite. Fortune burst into the kitchen, grim determination etched on his face.