by Sam Hall
The words came easier now, the meaning somehow coming to me as I sang in fits and starts. It was part ode to the Great Wolves, part description of the wind in your fur and the land under your feet as you run. Part description of the love a mother feels for her cubs, part burning passion that brings mates together and potentially tears them apart. I no longer tripped over the words as we sang them faster and faster, the sound growing and growing until the light could no longer be contained. I worked out all too late what the shape was for. It was a conductor, it shot beams of light out through the room, hitting the stone walls and us.
I didn’t sing the words, they sang through me. Those and a million others, a massive torrent of information streaming through me as my mind struggled to keep up.
People were using the crystal to open a gateway, a panoramic view of the city I’d visited briefly winking into view as others came through it. Locals came down at the exact time to greet them, with much dancing and singing as a result, and the crystal was shining like a beacon throughout. More rituals, so many rituals, over and over. People painting scenes on the walls to commemorate the different events. People going through the gateway, in human or Tirian form, bringing food and goods, trading materials, long scrolls and important visitors. A constant stream of people doing a million things at the gate, their individual actions blending into one whole. Then came the calamity.
The gate was opened by smiling locals, obviously expecting more of the same, and why wouldn’t they? There were records everywhere of the continued good relationship. Except this time when the gate opened, it did so on devastation. For unknown reasons, smoke billowed from the tall buildings, now smashed as if by an errant child. Chunks of stone were torn asunder, bodies strewn about the mosaic paths like discarded toys. But not all. People staggered through the gate to the dismay of the locals, then they were rushing forward to assist when the shock wore off. An impromptu field hospital was set up around the crystal, the faces of the injured were bleached white by the singing crystal, the red blood standing out all that more starkly for it.
And then he came.
For a moment, I thought the memory had come to an abrupt end as everyone went completely still, even the injured. They all watched from where they sat, lay, or stood as the Great Black Wolf padded through the gate.
He hadn’t escaped unscathed either, which put the whole catastrophe into perspective. What the hell could hurt the god of the Tirian? He limped through the portal, attendants at his side, dragging one of his rear paws behind him. He didn’t stop until he was directly in front of the crystal cluster, sitting down on his haunches slowly and with difficulty. The portal shimmered closed behind him. If he’d come through, the Great White Wolf hadn’t. Perhaps that’s why his head was thrown back, a mournful howl coming from the depths of his chest, filling the building. The crystals flared terribly bright, the main cluster and the ones worn by those who had accompanied him.
The howl still rang in my ears when reality returned, and perhaps that's why we were slow to detect the threat. And why would we? We’d just participated in some kind of 3D vision of the past in glorious Technicolour, not exactly the most guarded time. I blinked as I heard the sound slowly fade away, but it was hearing it start up again that sent shivers up my spine.
“What the fuck was that?” Slade asked.
“We need to get out of here,” Brandon said, staring at the podium behind the cluster of crystals. I shifted sideways and saw that somehow, we’d managed to open the goddamned portal to Wolflantis. Just as it had in the vision, the crystal cluster still shone, singing to itself in a much more muted tone, low enough that we could hear the howl of other Tirians.
“I think I know what that black landscape we always see is,” I said, backing away from the cluster and edging towards the stairs, because all you could see through the portal was a large expanse of unrelieved deep charcoal grey within. The water I’d always seen lapping at the edges was the sea not a lake, but this was not a landscape we could run freely on as a pack. It remained torn and broken, and I could dimly make out the shapes against the slightly lighter sky, but it appeared some saw us much more clearly. A long eerie howl filled the air, closer now.
“We need to close this and go. Sylvan, how do we close this?” Brandon asked.
“No!”
The Volken seer’s voice was almost as much a howl as our mysterious brethren, his face a mask of horror and grief. I watched his eyes burn phosphorescent blue, shining with the weight of unshed tears, his face twisted in a rictus of agony. He continued to sing, forcing out the words as if trying to create a different result.
The guys all moved to cluster around me, guns raised, eyes on the gateway. “We gotta go,” Hawk said. “Jules.”
“We need Sylvan,” I said, taking one of the steps.
“Fuck this,” he said with a shake of his head, and then strode towards the seer.
“Hawk!” Jack shouted as his mate grabbed Sylvan, slinging him over his shoulder in a fireman’s hold, then brought his rifle to his shoulder. As did everyone else, because in they came.
Could we still call them Tirian? They were definitely wolf-like, though that stream-lined form had become something twisted and mutated in whatever was left of the former city. The flame like drifts most Tirian sported flickered and spiked in erratic fits and starts, and their eyes glowed a sickly green—the colour of putrescence.
“No, no…” Jack muttered as he ran over to the portal, gun pointed at the newcomers.
“Fucking hell, we don’t just rush in!” Aaron snapped. “Brandon, stay here with Jules and see if you can take them out. Clean shots through the skull if you can. Slade, Finn, back me up.”
“On it,” they replied.
I stood there, helplessly, watching those I loved approach something that looked like a gross distortion of what we were, and then heard the guns fire.
The beasts slunk closer, their lips curled back in angry snarls.
“No!” Sylvan said, recovering now. He thrashed within Hawk’s grip until the other man was forced to dump him on the ground.
“You’re coming if it takes all six of us to drag you!” Hawk said, giving him a shake, unaware of what was sneaking up behind him.
“Oh no, you fucking don’t,” Jack said, sending a spray of bullets into the stalking wolf. Which should have been the end of it. The beast crumpled, its yelp piercing as blood bloomed on its flanks, but that of course, was not it. The bloody thing pulled itself to its feet, shaking its body as it struggled to stay upright. Then everything got weird.
I’d always wondered why our fur was all wispy and smoke-like, and now I knew. The thing seemed to…shift somehow. Bullets clattered noisily on the stone floor and the wolf stood, whole again.
“What the fuck…?”
I ran down the stairs as the two beasts stalked my men, only a hand on my collar yanking me back, stopping me from blundering in.
“Jules, you need to stay safe,” Brandon hissed.
“No, we need to stay safe! The pack stays together!”
And they did, in a way. Jack just stood there, aghast, staring at the beast as it stalked closer. Its eyes flashed brighter for a second, then it attacked.
“Fuck!”
Jack’s voice rang out through the ruins as he was slammed onto his back, the wolf’s jaws slavering as it fought with all its might to rip out his throat. I jerked free of Brandon’s grip and ran forward as I saw Jack’s arms shoot out, hands closing around the animal’s windpipe. He held it off, but even I saw the effort it was costing him.
“Brandon, get her back!” Aaron snapped.
“Jack!”
Hawk’s shout was scored by fear and anger. He turned his back on Sylvan and the other wolf, then darted towards his mate, grabbing his rifle as he ran. His gun was at his shoulder, and he looked down the sight, firing off one shot as he moved with terrifying precision. The bullet blasted through the brain of the beast, and made it instantly go limp, having no capacity
now to turn to smoke. I had to fight my body to breathe. The animal’s head had been thrashing. A few centimetres to the left and…
Jack scrambled to his feet, eyes going wide.
“Hawk!”
He’d ignored the other wolf, and so had we in all the fighting. Now everyone’s head swung around. It sent up a mournful howl, answering ones coming from deep within the portal, and then it attacked.
Hawk seemed to move so slowly. Time decelerated down to a crawl as he turned, as the wolf launched itself at him. I got a frame by frame view of the animal’s terrible arc towards my love, his arm going up instinctively, which of course, was where the wolf’s jaws connected.
Hawk was thrown to the ground, the animal’s growls muffled as it chewed into his flesh. I ran down the steps two at a time, no idea what I was about to do, but doing it anyway.
“No, you’ll shoot him!” Jack said when Aaron lifted his gun.
“Get back, princess,” Slade said, lifting up a fallen stone bannister and striding over to the two of them. The wolf didn’t see him coming, too caught up in its own bloodlust. He swung the chunk of rock, connecting with the beast’s head and sending it flying.
I dodged between the guys, running forward as they shouted, and grabbed Hawk’s shirt to drag him back to the stairs.
“Come on, you fuck,” Slade snarled. “You want a piece? Take it from me.”
I wanted to watch, see what happened, make sure my mate was OK. I cursed his fucking bravery under my breath, but my eyes jerked down to Hawk.
“Fuck…” he said, his voice starting to waver. “That doesn’t look good.”
He was right. The wolf hadn’t hit a major vein or anything, but blood was running in rivulets down his arm. I just looked at it blankly for a moment, seeing the blood and him and that he was hurt and knowing I needed to do something soon, but unable to make my body move.
This was my Hawk. I listened to his breath come in rapid, irregular pants, saw his eyes widen in ways I’d never seen before. His hand shook as he held the injured flesh away from him, his eyes tracking the drops of blood as they fell to the ground. He was always such a big strong figure, my mind fought to digest the fact he was indeed able to be hurt just like anyone else.
“Fucking move!” Jack snapped, pushing me to one side, getting his shirt off in one second and wrapping it tight around Hawk’s arm with the next. His face bleached white when he saw how quickly the blood seeped through. “Gotta stop the bleeding. Gotta make it better,” he muttered, yanking the fabric tighter, flinching when he heard his mate groan. “It’s alright, love,” he said, bending down and placing his forehead on Hawk’s. “I won’t let anything happen to you.”
I sat there, watching the two of them and wanting to move away. They were mates now, you could see it in every line of their bodies, and while I was accepting of that, right now, I’d never felt so far on the outer edge. Jack shouldering me to one side stung, even though I knew he was right to do it. I was just sitting there like a stunned fucking mullet. But watching Hawk’s hands tremble as they tangled in Jack’s hair, his lips going to the other man’s, I’d never felt less like they were members of my pack, which made me feel worse. I pushed those feelings away. This was not about me.
No, it’s about your pack. Reach out.
This is their time. They need—
Reach out, my Tirian insisted.
My hand landed on Jack’s shoulder without thinking, and it all rushed in. Desperately chaotic emotions careened through me with little thought, smashing through my emotional landscape and filling me with flashes of anger and frustration and desperation and relief and guilt, but mostly fear.
This is the core of Jack, I thought.
The mouthy one is a cornered beast. He is always ready to fight to the death. His mate has not improved this. He now has more to lose, she replied.
I sat there, feeling the warm weight of my lover’s shoulder, feeling the muscles tense as he looked out across Hawk and saw where the guys were fighting off the remaining wolf. They wound further, tighter when they saw the green lights appear in the darkness of the portal, as Sylvan was still mumbling the words to the song, keeping the crystal glowing. Jack shook my hand off, got to his feet, snatched up a gun, and drove the butt into the back of the seer’s head, dropping him like a stone. Immediately, the crystal dimmed and the portal wavered, then closed. The guys yelled at him as he looked down the barrel of the sight. They had some sort of plan, but Jack was not to be dissuaded. He fired one shot after another, caring little for anyone else that was in the room.
“Fucking stop, Jack!” Aaron shouted, barrelling across the room, ready to put him down. The wolf capitalised on the distraction, phasing to shadow and passing through everyone to leap at Jack.
“STOP!”
Finn’s voice carried with it the momentum of a glacier shearing, the sound of the earth breaking apart during an earthquake. This was a true alpha voice, something you could no more argue with than you could the wind. Everyone in the room froze at the sound of it, unable to do little more than breath and move their eyes. His will beat down upon us, a huge and terrible thing, forcing all independent thought from our minds. We were merely offshoots of him.
Including the wolf. It fell like a stone to the ground, and Finn stepped forward and said, “Stay corporeal,” before shooting a bullet into its skull. He then surveyed what he had done, his grey eyes blazing. He blinked, shaking his head slightly as he looked around, the crystal having flared brighter behind him. “I’m sorry,” he said, his voice much softer now, but we all felt it, deep inside, that wrench of regret and shame. “Let’s see to Hawk.”
And then everyone moved.
“I’m going for the med kit and Smithy,” Brandon said.
“Good idea,” Finn said with a nod.
Suddenly, they were all clustered around us, inspecting the wound and the blood flow until Jack shouldered his way in.
“How’re you doing, love?” he said, cradling the man’s head in his lap.
“Pretty fucked,” Hawk replied. “Not sure if a beer’s gonna fix this one. The fucking bastard got me good.”
“It’ll be OK,” Jack said, and I heard the tears in his voice as he swallowed madly to try and contain them. “I won’t let it be anything else.”
He might be fear, but Jack was also love. I could see that formalising their mate bond had done that, had given him something to push past that cage of anxiety he was locked into, allowing this Jack to come out sometimes. I shook my head. He was my pack, Hawk was my pack, and they were hurting, so I reached out and placed a hand on his arm. Just as I had done with Finn back at the alpha’s residence, I paid little attention to the torrent of emotions that came and pushed out my own.
I hammered Jack with a million tiny memories, of Jack holding Hawk’s hand, loose and cradled within his, of passing him a beer and watching that full mouth drink from it. Of shoving each other in fun, of a thousand laughs and jokes and jibes. Of grumpy faced Jack being cheered by Hawk with a touch when he’d just woken up. Of holding him and loving him, of that moment when Hawk held him in his arms, tender as a child, and bit down into his lover’s muscle and made him his.
“What the fuck?”
My eyes jerked open, and I saw the same old glow in our chests had erupted. Jack looked at me in wonder, his eyes burning phosphorescent green in the radiant light, all his carefully constructed barricades brought down for one moment. The crystal behind us flared with an answering glow, bolts of green light shooting from the tips and joining with all the ones on podiums around the room and up to the mezzanine level. My hand burned bright when I reached out for Hawk, my other grabbing Jack’s hand.
“Join up,” I said, not understanding why. Instinct road me hard right now. I needed us to link. There were some disconcerted looks, but everyone did so, and I heard that note sing within me.
It wasn’t quite right. Brandon was missing, which soured the pitch slightly, but as it was, we were enough. Hawk ga
sped as the wounds on his arm glowed bright red under the shirt, and then slowly, they got smaller and smaller until with a snap, they were gone. People pulled away from me, and I didn’t like that, but they moved to untie the makeshift bandage, hands falling away when smooth brown flesh was revealed.
“The fuck…” Slade said, but Finn just looked across the circle at me and nodded. There was a whole lot in his gaze, but the thing I grabbed on to with both hands was the peace, however fractured. But I didn’t get to dwell on that.
Jack scooped up Hawk and tugged me close, his arms wrapping around the both of us as hard as his considerable strength could manage. I fought it for a second—breathing was a bit difficult—but then laid my head on his shoulder.
For a moment, I just was. I just breathed, just drew in their musky masculine scent along with the metallic aftertaste of blood. I just felt their hard, strong bodies, complete again. I breathed when they breathed, I felt what they felt, and then it all fell away.
“What the hell is this?” Jack said with a start, looking around him.
This time, the psychic space was formless, a never-ending golden expanse, filled with shifting rays of bright light.
“It’s OK,” Hawk said, moving closer and putting an arm around him. “Jules showed me this. It’s a pack thing, some kind of psychic space we can go to with other members.”
“So, no one else can see?”
“Not that I know of.”
Jack nodded, staring down for a second before throwing his arms around the other man. I watched in awe as Jack’s shoulders and whole torso shook. There was no sound, but I watched the tears fight their way out of the man, painfully by the look of it.
“Jack…” Hawk said, helplessly stroking the other man’s back. “Jacky boy.”
“Don’t fucking ‘Jacky boy’ me,” Jack growled. “You’re never doing that shit again. You sit tight with Jules and keep her safe.”
“And are you gonna do the same?” Hawk pulled back, looking into Jack’s face, brushing away the tears there. “You think my heart wasn’t in my throat when you shot that fucking thing and it got up? This place is dangerous, we knew that before we came.”
