by K. V. Wilson
But perhaps it’s no use searching fer the great beast anymore. I’ve spent over a decade returning to the landmarks of our past lives, but to no avail. If he really wanted to see me again, he’d have returned centuries ago.
If Nwyfre wants to stay hidden, that’s fine, but he canna’ ignore his own flesh an’ blood. Mayhap if young Flint takes a stand, Nwyfre will finally emerge. ‘Tis worth a try. The Great Dragon can’t ignore his descendent forever.
When I return to the pub, I enter through the back door. I don’t normally do so; I enjoy making an entrance – and a ruckus to boot – but today is different. I want young Flint to know that I fully intend on securing his help with my latest shenanigan.
“Hey, Flint!” I call out to the lad as I push through the swivel door to the bar. He’s pourin’ a drink for some hooded figure. “Oh. Mornin’, Mr. Ross. Didn’t see ye there.”
“Mornin’, Mac Tíre. What’s the special?”
The old gentleman smiles bleakly, taking a swig of his ale. He’s one of me finest, most loyal customers, that Mr. Ross.
“Ah, apologies. Haven’t had the chance to update the menu in a few days. Er, let’s see. Oi, MacLarty! What’ve they got back there?”
Mr. Ross grumbles a little at MacLarty’s response to me question – an annoyed grunt and a “one sec.”
Since the Battle of the Ritual, the old ex-beta, Duncan, had ordered his son to take on a position at me pub here. Said to him, “Ye better get a job, boy, cause it’ll build character.”
In me own opinion, it’s Duncan that needs to build character. The man’s a joke, he is. Constantly gettin’ on everybody’s nerves and thinkin’ himself the highest of the high. He’s got two sons – twins – and the second one is off frolicking with Skye in the New World. Don’t know why the Yeva’si insisted on takin’ Skye out there, but apparently, it’s important that the Ru-Yeva meet with her people. I regret not getting a chance to talk much with the new member of our Spiritborne circle before she left. If ye can call it a circle. Until we locate Nwyfre, it’s more of just a straight line. Just the two of us.
Anyways, ol’ Duncan MacLarty’s kid calls himself Ace and dresses in rather goth-style clothing. I just learned the word ‘goth’ meself from what Greg told me of current teenage language. To me understandin’, it means he’s got dark hair and eyeliner, coupled with a disgruntled and semi-disinterested outer appearance, while he’s dying on the inside. Seems about right. The lad’s damn smart, though, and that’s what really counts. If he chooses to use those smarts, that is.
After a few moments, the goth Lycan returns with a forced smile.
“Cook’s got the soup on. Cream of Broccoli.”
“Ah, me favourite,” I say to Mr. Ross, who promptly tells us he wants the chicken stew. I nod and relay the order, excusing meself and Flint so we can talk in private.
“What is it?” Flint inquires once we head into the back supply room – more of a broom closet if truth be told. This building hasn’t changed a bit since Nwyfre and I built it centuries ago. Well, apart from the peeling paint and the odd truss collapsing. The city’s constantly on our arses about safety and whatnot, but it’s nothin’ a complimentary mug o’ Lycan’s Head can’t remedy.
“I got a proposition for ye, lad.”
Young Greg stares at me as if I’m a bloody alien. “Where have you been? Cook can’t run this place without you for long.”
“Ah, I’m fully aware o’ that.”
“So…?” Flint’s chestnut eyes shine with curiosity.
“I’ve been out looking for yer ancestor again, Flint.”
“I figured.” He rolls his eyes in a very characteristic sixteen-year-old way.
I’d best get talkin’ to him about that attitude. Don’t want the descendant of the great Nwyfre to tarnish his reputation. He’s been spending too much time with MacLarty, he has.
“Aye. So,” I continue, “I need yer help.”
“Well, why didn’t you say so before, Mister Mac Tíre?” he says. “Er, with what? Do you know where he could be?”
“If I knew, I’d be there,” I tell him, stroking my beard in thought and concealing a smile in its hairy depths.
“You told me if we stayed here he’d eventually come looking.”
“That was the idea. This place has meanin’ to him, ye see. Sentimental value.”
Flint nods. “You two founded this place.”
“That we did. An’ I hoped that would mean somethin’ to him.”
“Maybe it did. Maybe he returned during one of his past lives, and you just missed him,” Flint says carefully, not meeting my gaze. Something tells me he’s wanted to tell me that for a long time but figured it’d just be bad news for me sorry soul.
“Truth be told, lad, I’m beginning to think you’re right.”
Flint glances past me, out into the bar, and notices that Mr. Ross is ready to leave. He excuses himself from our conversation and returns a few minutes later. “Funny. Ross didn’t order the steak like usual.”
“Ah, he probably had it this mornin’. That fella’s been out hunting where he shouldn’t be, lad. Ye can tell by the odd bit of hay caught in his beard.”
The boy’s eyes widen and he takes another glance at the elderly patron. It takes a few seconds for Flint to realize I was tryin’ to be funny. He lets out a forced chuckle.
“An’ back to all seriousness now, Greg. I want ye to go home tonight and do more research on yer family tree. See if there’s anyone – however distant – who might have a trace of dragon blood in them. I know ye were orphaned, an’ I’m sorry, but think beyond that. Anything at all?”
“I’ve done all the research I can – you’ve seen it. But there’s something else,” Flint informs me. “I think I found a lead.”
Me face perks up at his hopeful words. “Ye did?”
“Yeah,” he smiles, “I’d just been waiting for you to get back.”
“Ah!” I throw my hands up, mentally cursing meself for being so stupid as to leave without talkin’ to the lad first. “All this time ye had somethin’ important to tell me, and ye never thought to?”
“It was just after you left that I’d found it! And you don’t exactly have a mobile on you, Mister Mac Tíre. How was I supposed to tell you without flying over there myself? Supposing I’d known where you’d gone in the first place?”
“Heh, heh. Ye know I hate those newfangled devices kids are glued to these days. Just pulling yer leg, Flint. Can’t ye take a joke?”
“Apparently not. Just one request though.”
“Yeah?”
“Can Ace come too? He’s been looking extra gloomy lately.”
“Well, I don’t see why not. Cook can manage with only the two ladies remaining to tend the bars. He’s done it before.”
Greg winces at the thought, but we both know that our mission is more important than keepin’ this pub going strong. Besides, nothin’ can happen to it that I can’t fix upon our return.
I sigh, scratching me head. “MacLarty’ll slow us down, though, lad. Lycans ain’t got wings.”
“I can carry the both of us. He’ll be more help with us than he is in here. I don’t know what’s gotten into him.”
“Lovesick, I’d wager.” I wink at the young man. “Just needs to get some fresh air.”
“Lovesick? Ace?” Flint wrinkles his nose, stealing a glance at the dark-haired teen who’s busying himself with wiping down one of the tables whilst muttering to himself rather angrily.
“A certain Yeva’si girl he misses. Ah! Don’t tell him I told ye. I’ll go pack me things. We’ll head out at closing time.”
“Aye, sir.”
5
WILDFIRE
Skye
In the hours after Xáan announced his hatred of the Ru-Yeva – and that she had caused his father’s death – I sought to be alone. I had to find out what really happened.
When I’d tried to make Xáan answer for his ridiculous claim, Xunnu had held me back. Pe
rhaps it was because he knew his brother’s words to be lies, or perhaps he was trying to protect Xáan from my wrath. And so I withdrew from the rest of the world in an attempt to connect with my past life.
The icy water of the stream tickles my bare feet, but I pay it no heed. I stare at the constellations as transient memories trickle into my mind. I focus on my breathing as I lose myself to the all-too-familiar grasp of Sejka’s thoughts and feelings from long ago.
I could transform since the day I was brought into this world.
Such a phenomenon was unheard of, and it certainly spelled danger for me right from the start. Yeva’si – and Lycans, for that matter – are not born with the knowledge of the transformation. Rather, they grow into it. They have to learn the forms just as a person would learn to read and write or to ride a bike. Some never fully mastered more than two or three such forms.
“Your aunt fainted when she saw what you could do, Sejka,” Father told me when I was old enough to understand. “But I know who you really are. And so the name I chose for you reflects your last life – a glorious chieftain called Sitka. Someday you shall remember his experiences and gain some of your own. You will be our Ru-Yeva.”
He kept this between the three of us: himself, my mother and me. He had begged the others not to say anything about my shapeshifting abilities to Sehwen, for surely I would be put to death if our chieftain found out. But the members of my tribe had been reluctant to keep such a secret.
“She has the Sickness, Sajnu,” they had told him. “She shouldn’t be allowed to stay here.”
Father had shaken his head. “No. She is just more attuned to nature than the rest of us. Give her a chance. I will raise her well. I will teach her.”
They agreed to give him one chance. Any sign of a feral nature and justice would prevail. The raven tribe – or Yáahl, as we called ourselves – would not allow any of its members to become dangerous. Life was dangerous enough as it was.
As the years went by, I soon learned of my…talents.
I knew I was different from the others. I could do things that they could not. Father told me not to use my many forms until others of my age had accomplished their First Transformation. I had asked him why. I wanted to brag about my abilities, and I let them slip to some of the other children. He forbade me to speak of them until I came of age. He would not say why, and whenever I pressed for answers he would grow silent.
It was one summer, far in the past, that the memories all came back to me.
I had seen eight winters, and my younger brother Koyah had seen four. I was a disobedient child, and Father had caught me once again. He had imprisoned me for five sun-downs already. I was forced to spend all my time in our little dugout home. Father wanted to punish me for running off the night before with Xunnu.
Xunnu was three years younger than I, and he already had a love for adventure and a thirst for trouble, perhaps fueled by my own disobedience. We hadn’t gone far, but it was not the length of the journey that was the problem.
It was Xunnu’s heritage. He was the chieftain’s son; he could not be seen fraternizing with a child of the Sickness. Either way, I had done wrong in the eyes of my father. He was determined to set me on the right track.
“Make dinner,” he had told me. “Do it the way Mother taught you.” Then he had left with the others. Tears had come to my eyes at the mention of Mother. She had died just after my brother Koyah was born. She had died of the Sickness.
Intent on pleasing my father and perhaps gaining an early release from my imprisonment, I set to work preparing a meal for when Father returned from the hunt.
Koyah was stretched out on one of the furs, playing with some wooden toys an elder had gifted to our family when I was an infant. I had no idea why the elder had given me the toys, as none of the others were willing to come anywhere near me. But she had, nonetheless. And I had passed on the toys to my brother when he was old enough for them. The objects were carved into the shapes of animals: a wolf and a rabbit.
“Die!” Koyah yelled, smacking the wolf against the rabbit with a loud clunk.
For some reason, a sharp pang had formed inside my stomach at the sight of his antics, and I’d almost dropped my bowl of spices. I didn’t know why a wooden prey animal would have anything to do with my physical well-being, so I dismissed it, turning away and continuing with the meal. I sang to myself an old tune passed on from my ancestors:
“Da se yeva moru xa
No wyletthen da re maa
Reddqen si de eban se
Za de Ru milooqen keey”
It was a short rhyme about how nature flows on, never stopping. It changes with the seasons and only the Guardian may have any influence over it.
If only I’d known I was that Guardian.
“Sejka, quiet! Trying to concentrate!”
“I’m the one working, brother. I can do whatever I want,” I said nonchalantly, skinning the scales off a salmon. “Besides, you’re just clunking wood together.”
“Raar!” was all Koyah said in response, flinging the wooden wolf across the room with such vigour that it hit the wall and broke completely in half.
“Koyah!” I squealed, nearly tripping over the basket of raspberries as I raced across the room to examine the pieces. “What have you done?!”
My little brother let out a whine, backing towards the far side of the room to evade my wrath. “Wolf got the Sickness,” he said softly.
I gasped at his words, unable to say anything in return. I picked up the pieces and pressed them together as if that would repair them. My eyes filled with tears.
“Koyah, no. There is no more Sickness,” I choked out.
My mind sprang to life with images of Mother in her last moments, of Father pushing me away and telling me to go out to the woods for a time. I knew there was something wrong, but I was only four and could not understand what. Mother’s eyes had been wild and her arms had been swinging around her like some animal. She had been trying to harm the ones she loved.
“Rabbit said—”
“Rabbit did not say anything! Wolf is not sick. He is dead! You killed him,” I accused my brother, my eyes burrowing into his.
Koyah burst into tears, running to the centre log to climb out of our dugout.
“No, Koyah! Wait! You can’t leave!” I shrieked, grabbing his ankle and pulling him back down.
“Mmm,” my brother moaned, tears still flowing down his cheeks. I wiped them away, carrying him over to the furs. I picked up Rabbit and gently placed the wooden creature in his hands.
“Rabbit wants you to know that your sister is sorry. She knows you didn’t mean to upset her.”
“Sorry,” my brother said, not meeting my eyes. His voice was small.
I turned away and continued to fillet the salmon. I then cut up some sprouts and raspberries to add to the dinner. Placing the pan on the stones, I began to light the fire pit to roast the fish. I rubbed the firestones together, attempting to do the same as Father did. After a long time of this, there was still no spark.
“Ugh!” I yelled, making Koyah jump. Rabbit slid off the mattress onto the dirt floor below, but Koyah did not pick him up.
“Where is Father?” he asked me.
“I don’t know! But he’ll get here soon, and I still don’t have this fish cooked!”
I tossed the firestones to the ground with a growl, kicking the pan with my toe.
“Stupid, stupid fire!”
Suddenly the fire pit began to glow red, making my eyes widen.
“What...?”
The stones in the pit grew hot and flames begin to lick up the sides of the pan, causing the fish to sizzle. I stepped back, and not a moment too soon. Within seconds, the flames grew to the height of my knees and did not stop there. They began to ignite the log in the centre of our home – our only means of escape.
“Koyah! Climb out! We have to leave!” I managed to holler over the sound of crackling flames. I grabbed his arm and shoved him towards the
burning ladder.
“No! Fire!” Koyah eyed the ladder. Flames were already engulfing the bottom of it. I lifted him up at the waist and thrust him as high as I could so he was able to clutch the log above the flames. “Sejka! Rabbit!”
I lifted Rabbit from the dirt floor and pressed the toy into Koyah’s tiny hand.
“Go! Go! I’m coming!” I called after him as he climbed out the top of our dugout. The smoke was clouding my vision and I struggled to catch my breath as my lungs continued to fill up.
A memory suddenly came to mind despite my incapacitated state. It was not my own memory, however; this was different. I saw myself standing at the edge of a clearing. A wildfire was engulfing the forest in front of me. I was running towards the fire…
“Sejka!” A new voice broke through my consciousness, and I recognized it as my father’s. “Grab my hand!”
I jumped onto the ladder, crying out as the flames caught hold of my bare feet, singeing the skin. “I can’t see your hand!”
“Here!” he gasped through the smoke. I reached up to grab Father’s hand but screamed as the flames licked even higher and my clothing caught fire.
“Help!”
My vision grew cloudy with the smoke, but my mind continued its journey. I was sprinting towards the burning forest, glancing up at the reddening sky. I raised my hands above my head and called out to the clouds. I stopped running as I willed the rain to come. I twirled my fingers above my head.
The vision ended and I slumped down onto the furs, losing sight of Father. I coughed, the effort ravaging my lungs and making me weak. My mind and body were numb, no longer able to feel the burns on my feet and thighs.
In one final effort, I raised my hand above my head, making a circle in the air with my finger like I had done before. Many times before…
