by Olivia Harp
“No, we have medicine and antibiotics in case you need them here, doctors won’t be able to cure the Rot if you have it”
“The rot? What—?”
“Don’t worry”, he said in not quite a convincing manner, starting to walk uphill, “you’ll be fine”.
***
The Rot is here, Damien thought. He would have to check again for new traces of it, see if the Shadowlands had made any other punctures in the forest and seal them. Once the punctures were dealt with, the shadow creatures would lose their connection to their homeland and die soon.
But he had to warn everyone else. Zoe was weak, she lost some blood, and the adrenaline rush drained her, she was feeling dizzy soon after they started towards the cabins, and fell asleep in his arms.
She actually held a shadow cat at bay, a freakin’ shadow wildcat. Most of the time, the shadow creatures dealt with humans easy and silently. She used all her available tools, and herself and... Well, if he wasn’t near there to help it would’ve ended in tragedy, but still...
Mate. Strong. His Grizzly said. He didn’t debate that. She was strong. He looked at her leg and the stings turned to black dots in her skin. Hang on, he thought, we’re almost there.
***
Franklin was the first to see them through the comms tower window. Damien was carrying someone —a girl— to the base. She seemed hurt, she had blood on her at least. He stood up and ran to them.
“Enzo! Enzo we need you here!” Damien yelled.
Enzo’s head peeked from the Lab, when he saw them his eyes grew wide.
“What the hell happened?” he said. Franklin was near them, but there wasn’t much he could do.
“We got attacked, Lab clean?” Damien said.
“We? Who’s the girl?” Franklin said.
Damien looked at him square in the eye, furious. He was in no mood for explanations.
“Franklin, bring Mav here,” Damien said, holding back, “We have an emergency meeting right after we make sure Zoe is safe, Raiden back yet?”
“Not yet”, Franklin said, shaking his head, “what about you Damien, are you okay?”
They were entering the Lab now.
“Get Maverick, man, I’ll deal with this”, Enzo said.
The Lab was a place for Enzo’s chemistry equipment, herbs and plants. He wasn’t really a chemist, if Damien was honest to himself, Enzo was more of an alchemist: he knew some basic medicine, but he was mostly combining this element and that element with weird ingredients, conjuring some old shifter powers so the beer was more potent, for example.
When it was brought by the men in black it was supposed to be a meds station. Shifters never have a need for them, so all of them were intact. It had a small single bed, gauze, alcohol and other human stuff. Enzo mostly used it to cure wounded animals, he liked doing that kind of stuff, and although Zoe was not a wild animal, he seemed to know what he was doing.
Damien put her in the small bed, she was still half asleep, the wounds black, some of them still pouring blood. He kneeled besides Zoe and took her hand, placing his other one on her forehead, caressing her hair.
“You’re going to be okay”, he whispered, “I won’t let anything bad happen to you”
Enzo brought cleaning supplies and started treating her wounds.
“What happened?” he asked.
“Shadow thornbush, she got stuck in it”.
Enzo stopped and looked at him, his eyes a mess of confusion.
“I dealt with it, and the damned shadow cat that came in”, said Damien, holding back anger.
“You can go now, I’ll deal with this.”
“I’m staying with her. I’m positive that was the end of it, my bear didn’t smell any other puncture, we’re fine for now.”
Enzo was the group’s healer, each of his movements was determined, exact. He cleaned the blood and took care of the stings putting some kind of greenish, semi-transparent balm on her leg —it smelled like a sweet summer flower— bandaged her leg and hands, and slowly looked up at Damien.
“Should I...?”
“Do it, we got to be sure”
Enzo pressed his hands on Zoe´s wounded leg and hands, softly growling, his eyes turned black, black fur crawling out of his skin. Suddenly, Zoe’s eyes opened, not fully aware of what was going on, she just looked around and Damien met her eyes.
“What, what’s happening?”
Damien got close to her ear, “He’s helping you, you’ll feel better now.”
Enzo stood up, his face an ugly mixture of bear and man, he seemed to be struggling with something inside him, tripped on one of the fixed steel desks in the Lab, held himself against the wall and jumped outside, where he finally let out a growl and shifted. He was a big black bear, a beautiful wild animal, looking inside. Zoe and Damien watched him.
“Go, I’ll fill you in later”, Damien said, and the bear got up on two legs, roared and then went off running, its footsteps a heavy thud in the forest.
Zoe’s hand was pressing hard on Damien’s, as if holding on for her life. He looked at it, he’d never felt anything so soft, so delicate. She realized what she was doing and loosened her grip. Damien almost wished for her to hold on to him forever.
“What happened?” she said.
“You were stung by a thornbush”, he said. “I don’t know how I missed it in the first place, it’s my fault. I should have known something was wrong, my instincts flared but I couldn’t see why. I’ll be more careful now.”
Zoe looked at him, then moved her hands and leg.
“I feel much better now”, she said, “The pain is almost completely gone.”
“You still need to rest, you’ll be fine soon, I promise.”
He stood up beside her, releasing her hand. After a moment of silence, she spoke.
“I didn’t know this was shifter territory, I wouldn’t have trespassed if I knew it was.”
“It’s not your fault, it’s not trespassing if there are no signs, right?” he told her smiling. “Besides, you’re under my protection now, it’s not like the government’s gonna say anything about the incident”.
“What’s a thornbush?”
“Well... it’s like a poisonous plant, the first one to come through a puncture.”
Her eyes widened, not fully understanding.
He continued. “You might think we shifters only do ranger, trail blazing and firefighter work in the forests... most of the time you’re right, but we’re also looking for intrusions from a place we call ‘The Shadowlands’, which is like a dark mirror image of our world.”
“We call those intrusions ‘punctures’, the dark energy coming from the Shadowlands spreads through them, like a cancer that feeds on life. Thornbush is the first thing that comes through it, a sort of natural defense system”.
“If the puncture stays open, the dark energy, the Rot, starts affecting everything around it. That’s why we have to seal each intrusion —each puncture— we can’t let it grow. Bear Shifters are the only ones able to stop it, due to our attunement with nature”.
“So you’re saying a cancer plant stung me and I’m going to die?” she said in a trembling voice.
I’m never good at explaining. “Nothing’s going to happen to you, I promise, Enzo made sure of that”.
“I should go.” She said.
“You can’t”.
She looked at him, angry.
“So I’m your prisoner now? That’s why you can tell me all this? Let me tell you buddy, there’s just no way you can stop me, you’ll have to—”
Damien laughed hard, interrupting her monologue.
“I can tell you’re feeling better, all right!” he said, “don’t worry sweetpie, you only have to stay here until the wounds in your arms and leg heal, then you can be on your way. Unless you want to risk it...”
Zoe was embarrassed, she was already thinking of ways to make a diversion and escape. But she didn’t want to risk it —whatever that meant. She felt kind of
silly now.
“How long is that going to take?”
“You’re gonna have to put up with us for a few days, then you’ll be on your way, deal?”
She had to comply, she had no other options.
“Deal”, she finally said, and shook his hand as if this was just business.
Chapter 6
Voices came faintly from outside, waking her up. It was dark now, only some light came in through the closed glass door. The room was cold, almost completely covered in silence, except for the buzzing sound of an electrical light outside. She sat up on the bed and looked around, noticing the diversity of aromas now that she felt better.
Someone was pacing out there, speaking. She concentrated and could finally recognize Damien’s voice.
“You’re sure, then?”
“Yes, boss, all areas have been patrolled, no sign of it,” a younger voice replied.
“Tomorrow I’ll go back and check again, just to make sure, everyone will make their rounds in bear form. Franklin, did you alert the other clans?”
A man replied in the distance, she couldn’t hear what he said.
“Any word from Raiden?” Damien asked.
The voice said something, longer this time.
“All right, keep trying for Raiden, we must warn him.”
A silence.
“You think we should go look for him, boss? Maybe he needs help,” the younger voice asked.
Damien laughed, “If Raiden needs help then hell has frozen over. That man is indestructible, you know that.”
The young man let out a laugh, “You’re right, he should be back soon, anyway, always takes his time.”
“He left,” Damien said, his voice now louder. Then a shadow appeared at the glass door and it opened, “but the man knows his job”.
Zoe looked at Damien, silhouetted in the dark. She couldn’t believe how big he was, broad linebacker shoulders, all muscle, no fat.
She’d been a fan of shifters since she was in junior high, everyone was. There were fighting leagues, and some human sports even allowed them in their ranks, provided they were countered by shifters. She had posters of fighters, athletes and artists in her room when she was little, but she never met one.
She always wished she had that kind of metabolism: not for the health benefits it brought them, she just wanted to eat anything she wanted without caring about her hips growing wide. Shifters turn their food to muscle and any extra fat gets burned when in animal form. Some people are lucky, she thought.
“Hey,” he said softly, “you’re awake.”
She didn’t remember falling asleep, but she must have been out for a few hours, it was dusk now, and she got there at least three or four hours earlier.
“Yes, I just got up,” she said.
“How are you feeling? Enzo said you are a fast healer.”
She smiled, kind of embarrassed for all the attention.
“What did he do to me? It was... like a warmth that—”
“—that got hotter and hotter and then stopped, taking away the pain.”
“Y-yes... what was—”
“Enzo’s got a special connection to nature, combined with medicine it can do great things, but it takes its toll on the patient... and him”.
“That’s why he shifted?”
“And that’s why you fell asleep, your energy reserves were almost completely used for that. He doesn’t suffer, but the bear always comes out when you channel nature like that. Don’t worry about it, he’s in his cabin, came back a few hours ago.”
She smiled.
“I like to see you smile, do you feel better?”
“Yes,” she said, then turned to him, “how can you see in this darkness?”
He sat at the base of the bed, took her hand and raised it, bathing it in a gleam of light coming from outside.
“We can’t see in the dark, but there’s always light, somewhere, you just need to find it. Like right now, this glint illuminates more than you’d think. Moonlight, or even starlight can help, that’s how I can see you smiling, even in this darkness.”
“So what happens now?”
“Well,” he said, standing again, “one of two things: you can stay here for the night, I’ll bring you blankets so you don’t get too cold, or you come to my cabin—”
She jerked, surprised by the offer, Damien saw her and laughed.
“You come to my cabin and sleep in my bed. Don’t get too excited, little miss, I’ll sleep on the couch.”
She was smirking now.
“Oh really, and I can count on you being a gentlemanly gentleman?”
“You can be certain of that,” he said with a ridiculous British accent, “I wouldn’t dare to be anything less, especially not to a damsel in distress.”
“Let me think about it,” she replied in a playful tone, “Do you have A/C?”
“As a matter of fact, I do.”
Her mouth grew wide open, “Are you serious? I was just kidding! How can you have A/C up here?”
“Oh, sorry? We have most of the benefits of electricity, thanks to the magical power of solar panels, batteries and good logistics, who would’ve thought so, right? A band of dirty forest rangers... and they have A/C in the middle of the woods!”
She snorted at that, “Okay, you’ve convinced me, dirty-forest-ranger-bear-guy, there is no way I’m staying here by myself!”
She put her leg on the floor to stand but instantly felt a shock of pain.
“Ow!” she jolted
“Wait, wait, I’m turning on the light, don’t try to get up.”
He flipped a switch and there was a moment of blindness, then she saw the lab in its full splendor: it was a biggish room, about ten by fifteen on its sides, with two steel tables and lots of chemistry equipment on them.
What caught her eye was the shelves filled with meds in them, jars with multi-colored fluids, and covered glasses full of leaves, tree cortex and all kinds of weird components she couldn’t name.
“You ready?” Damien asked, smiling.
“Ready for wha—,” she said, but Damien rolled his eyes and picked her up again. His strong arms felt hard and warm. The muscles well-toned, his grip soft, almost as if he thought she was made of the finest crystal.
“Wow!” she laughed, then patted him on the shoulder, his face close now, his scent a combination of sweat and nature. This was a kind of man she thought only existed in movies. He carried her out of the lab and took her to his cabin, where she was sure she was going to be safer, than in any other place in the world.
***
“That is your cabin?” she said, surprised, “You didn’t tell me the government builds mansions for you guys out here in the mountain!”
The cabin was still a few paces up ahead, but it was plenty visible now. Lamp posts here and there lightened the way back to his house.
“It’s just a two story house, it’s not even that big, come on,” he said.
“This is a huge house, how much did it cost? This is tax payer money you got here, bear guy, my tax money,” she joked.
“Well incredible as it sounds, it actually isn’t. We built our cabins ourselves.”
Surprisingly she didn’t emit a word, her jaw just hung open.
“Careful, unless you wanna eat a bug,” he said
“Oh stop it! Are you for real? You built this thing yourself?” she said as he approached the door.
“Not alone, the guys helped me, as I helped them.”
“Believe it or not, we bear shifters do like living like real people, not forest nut jobs. The government gave us trailers to live in, but since we were staying here for good, and we had some time available, we decided to build something a bit more spacious. Franklin even got us an Internet connection.”
She admired the wood work, it looked professionally made.
“You must have worked for a long time,” she said.
“We did, but nothing beats enjoying the fruits of your labor.”
&nb
sp; “It’s beautiful,” she said slowly.
“Thanks,” he said as he opened the front door.
Inside, he flipped a switch and soft warm lights turned on. It had a cozy, rustic design, the living room to the right, to her left, the kitchen.
“And your kitchen has an island, seriously? This must be a joke. This house, in the forest, is bigger and more equipped than any other house I’ve been in.”
“If it makes you feel better, we do get bored easily.”
“And you built this.” She laughed happily. “Did you hire an architect? It’s like taken out of a—”
“—Magazine, right? Actually, Raiden, another one of us helped with that. He’s into all kinds of weird stuff, like architectural design, gardening, all kinds of stuff. He bought the design and floor plans online, we reviewed them, made some changes and built it. It’s not really that hard once you get the hang of it.”
She rolled her eyes. “So, any more surprises? Do you have like, a cave where you slide down a fire tube to change clothes and fight villains in the night or something?”
“Hey, that’s a good idea, I’m going to think about it,” he said going upstairs, passing two rooms and entering the master bedroom. He had a big screen LCD TV, some electronics connected to it, a Blu-Ray player, and a love seat.
“Cat got your tongue?” he asked as he put her in the bed.
“Oh, no. I’m just judging you in silence,” she said smiling.
Damien looked around, got a remote and turned on the A/C, “I’m setting it a seventy-five, that okay?”
She nodded.
“There’s the remote, Internet is fiber optics so it’s always on, there’s a Wi-Fi router there... I don’t know the password, it’s written on it somewhere, if you need anything, just ask, make yourself at home.”
She was looking at him smirking, nodding at everything he said. Damien avoided her eyes, his bear roared mate! mate! inside him and he wasn’t sure he’d be able to control himself if he stood there for another moment.
“I guess that’s all, see you tomorrow.” he said quickly and went for the door.
“Damien,” she said. He stopped in his tracks.
“Yes?” he said without turning to look at her.
“Do you mind if I slept downstairs with you? I mean, not with you, I mean, I don’t want to sleep alone.”
