Greetings new readers, and hello again to those who have enjoyed my works in the past. If you read the others and hated them, well, I'm surprised you bothered to read this one. As will all my other works: the standard disclaimer applies, and you can check out my profile page for more details on that if you want.
I also want to state (since it's been pointed out to me) that yes, the title is somewhat similar to a naruto/potter-verse story, but they have nothing to do with each other. As far as I know there aren't even really any similarities.
Also, as always with my stories: If you don't like it, don't read it. This story does contain more than slightly suggestive themes, but I don't think it's anything too graphic. There may be some triggers later on in the story, but I will try to mention in the chapter if there is anything I think will be too triggering for someone. Just in case, read aware.
That being said, if you are still with me, please enjoy the story!
Chapter 1 – The First Curse
A crisp breeze blew over crystallized snow, freezing the people crunching their way up the mountainside despite the sun shining down from the blue, blue sky. One young woman carefully picked her way around the regular trails, keeping a wary eye on the other people. The breeze blew her long black hair in the wind. The hair had been carefully braided at one point, but pieces of hair were coming out of the braid here and there. Leaves decorated the frizzy hair, but didn't seem to bother the girl. The cold didn't seem to bother her either, as she wore only a tank top and capris. A long tail protruded from a hole in the back of the capris. Her bare feet and hands had the slightest suggestion of pads, and claws like those of an animal sprung forth from the pads and tips of her fingers. The girl lifted her nose into the air every now and again to test for scents, much like a dog. She panted lightly, the run to get where she stood raising her temperature higher than it already was. To the young woman it felt like a scorching heat licked through her veins, lighting her sinews and muscles aflame. Suddenly, the girls' nose flared and she darted behind a large tree surrounded by bushes on the edge of the trail.
Only a few seconds later, a big group of young men passed. She watched through a break in the bushes branches as the guys, joking and laughing passed by without so much as glancing at her. They didn't even seem to notice the footprints in the snow leading towards her hiding spot. The girl found this odd, as the footprints seemed to glow with indigo flames. Her emerald green eyes narrowed on the footprints thoughtfully. She'd wished to hide, so perhaps something had happened to help? The thought quickly left the girl's mind, as a final young man crunched across the snow while gazing at the sky above with wistful brown eyes. He lagged behind the big group of guys quite a bit, but was still within sight. The girl waited until the bigger group passed around the corner before she exited silently from behind the brush. The guy in front of her didn't seem to notice her presence, so she took the chance to sneak up behind him.
From behind the girl admired the male. He had light purple hair, more of a lilac color than true purple. The male was slender, but not skinny. The girl frowned slightly when she noticed he was taller than her. He was just tall enough to make her task more difficult.
With an internal grumble, the girl jumped and struck out with a foot at the back of the young mans head. Her foot connected with a force greater than should be possessed by one of the young girls size, and the young man crumpled to the ground. Quickly the girl picked him up and spirited him into the brush. No one came running back to find out what had happened to their friend, and her keen ears could still hear the other young men joking in the distance. The girl grinned ferally, exposing slightly elongated and sharp canine teeth. She lay him down on the ground, and knelt next to his side. Carefully she unzipped his jacket a little and pulled the collar of his tee shirt aside. She bent down over his prone form, and bit into the juncture between his neck and shoulder. Despite being unconscious, the boys entire body bowed upward in pain. The girl did not notice that as she bit him, an amber flame poured from her body and surrounded both people.
After a moment the girl released her grip on his shoulder, revealing four bleeding points where her canine teeth had left their mark. She gently licked the wound. The bleeding stopped almost immediately, and steam began to rise from the snow on the ground around the young man. The girl lifted him into her arms once more and stood. Her instincts screamed to get them out of there before someone came after them. Faster than the human eye could follow, she sprinted like a gazelle across snow and foliage. Once more the girl did not notice as flickering flames surrounded her, though only her feet this time. The purple flames at her feet didn't melt any of the snow she passed over, but the indigo colored fire at the edges remained in the footprints she left behind. As they were almost out of hearing range, she heard one of the other young men call out.
"Giuseppe? Where did you go?" The same person said something else, but she was too far to hear anything else.
When the young woman was about two mountains away, she finally slowed to a walk. Lifting her nose into the air, she scented her way forward. Soon she came across her own scent trail, and she followed it back to a small rock wall. She walked straight through the wall, which rippled in her passing and then solidified once more behind her.
Carefully the girl placed the young man on the ground inside a small cavern. She adjusted the leaves and detritus underneath him, trying to make him as comfortable as possible. There was quite a bit of old leaf litter, so her job was relatively easy. Gently she brushed some hair off his face before she stood once more and exited as quickly as she could. Her task wasn't complete yet after all, and she did not know how long before he woke up. Following a similar pattern, the young woman collected one young man from an empty quiet suburb and one more from a ski resort. She bit both of them before returning quickly to the cave each time and placing them in the start of a circle around the outside of the cave.
A driving sense of time passing too quickly drove the girl to move even faster. Unlike before, when the purple fire only surrounded her feet when returning with a male, purple fire and indigo fire covered her entirely as she ran. Other people didn't even seem to see her. In a risky move, the young woman hunted down the final young man from the town at the mouth of the canyon the cave was located in. Once the final male was bitten and laid on the floor, the girl sat down to wait. The waiting seemed to take forever, driving her insane with impatience. Heat scorched through her, and amber flames liked the air around her. Even her eyes were ringed in amber flames around the natural glowing emerald irises. She regarded each male in turn, feeling satisfied overall with her work, but most proud of the first male.
"They will make fine mates." She thought happily. She took longer to look at the other three, sizing them up. The second male was of medium build. Not overly tall, the second male was shorter than the first but still taller than the girl. He had chesnut brown hair, but she had yet to see his eyes. His pale skin had a dusting of freckles across this nose, but they weren't so dark as to be completely obvious. The third male was of a similar build to the second male, and also had a similar complexion. He only lacked the freckles of the second, and had longer eyelashes. She still couldn't see his eyes, as like the others he was unconscious. As she turned to regard the third male, the first two started to twist and writhe in pain.
"It's almost time." She thought absently. The third male was the tallest, and the most muscled. Something about him seemed to irritate her slightly, but the force which had urged her continually faster soothed her fears and they were soon forgotten. This male had dark brown hair, and tan skin. She couldn't study him closely after noticing his skin, for the last two males started to writhe as well. The girl grumbled to herself, laying down on her side and watching the males through intent eyes.
When the young man awoke once more, his thoughts were strangely muffled. It was almost like his higher functions of the brain were being suppressed. Not that he consciously realized this, but his subconscious wasn't happy with the fog that seemed to surround his mind. His mind now functioned more like that of an animal. The first thing he noticed was the throbbing of a place between his neck and shoulder. That, and the presence of others like him. The male could not have told you how he knew they were like him. It was just obvious. Mostly in the way they smelled, thought something about the way they moved said kindred to him. He bared his teeth at the three males he saw, sizing them up as potential rivals.
As he stood to confront them, a different scent filled his nose. Turning slightly so all three males remained in his sight, the young man finally noticed the fifth person in the cave. A young female stood before him, and his nose flared repeatedly as he took in her scent. The scent called to him, teasing him. A strange excitement filled the young male, and from the way the others tensed when they caught sight of her, he knew they too could smell her. He didn't bother to speak, the thought never even occurred to him. Instead he took a step forward, then froze for a moment. It was like two forces pulled him in opposite directions. His subconscious mind wanted the male to run away, as far away as he could get. The excitement, however, drove him to pursue her and that delicious smell. Although none of the young men consciously translated the smell to pheromones of a female in heat, their bodies did, and the pull proved too great to over come. Not that the young man in question wanted to. He shook off the strange reluctance and flung himself towards the female, who was also on her feet by now. She watched him with amber-ringed eyes, excitement and challenge in her own eyes. He was just over an arms length away when the girl turned and dove deeper into the cave. At the same time the other males, driven by competition and the pheromones, also gave chase. The young man ran faster, chasing after her diligently. The cave wasn't too big, So he quickly caught up to her.
When he reached out to grab her, however, the female spun around and hit his hand away with her own clawed hand. Feeling even more excited, the young male licked the blood dripping from four scratches she'd left behind. He kept chasing her, attempting to grab at the female every now and again, though he didn't get scratched after the first time. The other males caught up to them and helped try to pen her in against the wall. Finally they managed to encircle her, with a wall at her back. The male on the far-most right dodged in to try and grab the female, getting a scratch for his troubles. The young male snorted, but came up behind her while she was distracted and tackled her. The female fell to her stomach, but the thick detritus on the floor absorbed the worst of the fall for both of them. The young female almost seemed to purr as she rubbed her back against him as best she could. A low growl slipped from his lips, and he pressed down on her more heavily. Panting, the female lowered herself so that she was lying almost submissively on the ground underneath him.
The male hummed approvingly, then sat up slightly. He reached down to her back and used his own claws – since when did he have claws, a distant part of his mind wondered – to rip apart the tank top that hid her from him. When the shirt fell to tatters on the ground, he did the same to the capris and underwear. The girl turned over between his knees and returned the favor. She shredded his pants, his coat, and t-shirt. Even his boxers did not survive the assault, though he neither noticed nor cared. All the two of them cared about at that points was getting as close as possible. With one big hand he reached under her back and flipped her back over. The girl keened as he rubbed up against her, and then they began to mate. As they mated, a heat seemed to fill the young male. Claws burst from his finger-pads, now more canine than human digits, as well as his toe-pads. He could feel his canine teeth elongating and sharpened to those belonging to true carnivores. His sense of smell, sight, and hearing became even sharper than they were the moment he awoke. His skin prickled, and he felt something soft start to protrude from his body in different places. A fierce pain on his lower back made him howl, and he could feel his ears gradually move up the side of his head until they were mostly on the top of his head. Inside and around his ears started to prickle as well, and the soft stuff sprouted in all those places.
Around him he could now sense the other males crouched, though they were silent. They seemed to be enjoying the sight before them, and impatiently waiting. When the two came, it was together. An irresistible force bore down on the young male, and he bit into her shoulder in the same place where his own throbbing came from on his shoulder. Amber flames burst from the female below him, and purple flames burst from his own body to intertwine sinuously. None of the caves occupants paid any attention to the flames, too preoccupied with what else was going on. When the young male and female were done, they broke apart panting. The young man knew what the female wanted know, for her thoughts seemed to pass directly from the female to his mind. He stood and stalked towards the other males, snapping menacingly. The purple flames flared around him, creating a fierce halo. The flames seemed to sink into the young male's hair and eyes, staining them permanently a vibrant purple. The three other males growled back, trying to break past the young purple male, but failed. The female stood and began to run in the opposite direction to where she'd been pinned, the young purple male deliberately shepherding the other males away so she could make a break for it.
Once the female was far enough away, the young male stepped aside and let the others chase after her. The same dance as before repeated itself, except that the purple-haired youth did not join in. Instead he used the time to look his new form over. He found, to his surprise, that he now had a furry wolf-like tail, and that soft fur covered much of his body, though it was so light as to be invisible against his skin in some areas. Looking back to the female, he noted that she too seemed to have gained fur like him.
As he watched, the tallest male finally managed to pin the female down. This time the female did not submit to the male at all. Their mating was more of a fight to the very end, and the male with purple eyes watched with pleasure, knowing he was the only one so far whom she had even come close to submitting to. He frowned, though, when the second male to mate bit into their females shoulder on the other side of her neck and two amber flames flared from the different bodies. A burning jealousy flowed through his body, but the male suppressed it fiercely for now. He had a job to do, after all. He was first mate and first beta. Unless one of the others managed to get her to submit, that is. He strode forward to where the second mating took place and helped the second beta to force the remaining two males away. This pattern continue, with the last two males sharing the same color as well.
The purple-haired youth found himself extremely pleased he was the only purple flame. The last two young males turned out to have green, sparking flames that seemed to snap and crackle off of them. The fourth male seemed to have the hardest time pinning the female down, being the only one left. The purple-flamed male thought this was appropriate, because he was the one who kept rushing her and leaving an opening for the others. When all of the males had mated the female once, she bore two bite marks on each side of her neck. Suddenly heat flared in all their marks, causing every member of the pack there to howl in anguish. The marks flared in each person's individual flame color, surrounded by the pure amber of their female mate. When the flames receded back into their bodies, swirling black, almost tribal-looking tattoos remained behind where they had been bitten. Impishly the female sashayed up to her first beta and gently stroked her hand over the mark on his shoulder. His mark, the largest of all of them, sprawled from where he was bitten and part way around his collar bone and across his chest diagonally. The pattern repeated on his back as well.
As his mate touched the mark, heat and excitement flared inside him once more. Before he knew what was happening, they were mating once again. A couple days passed in this fashion, with one or other of the pack stroking their mates mark. It was always a male stroking their female's mark, or the female stroking one of the males mark, though. Strangely sharing their mate didn't seem to bother any of them, and no fights broke out over mate or position. From time to time the fire would flow unintentionally from them when they joined as mates, and they began to find that the flames being present made mating feel even better. Slowly they all learned to purposefully loose their flames whenever they wanted, because they wanted them during their matings. That was the extent of their conscious thought for a week, as the heat filled her and urged her on. Her pheromones and need in turn spurring the males on.
At the end of the week, the heat receded and their flames drew back into their bodies. All five of them felt exhausted. They curled up with their female-amber-mate, their alpha, and fell asleep. Well, all except for the male who was once Giuseppe but now was simply the purple-haired and purple-eyed young male. He watched the others, and contemplated getting rid of one rival he could not stand, even after the very few hours they'd spent together outside of mating with the female. He still could not stand the second beta, who had the honor of sharing fire color with their mate. He feared that mate might draw closer to the female than himself, despite their respective ranks in the pack.
The first beta sat up, looking over to the tall sleeping second beta, and intended to leap over his mate to get rid of the second beta. Just before our young male pounced, the female rolled over and made a small noise of complaint. She reached for her purple mate, her eyes opened slightly. As he met her mostly-asleep gaze, and she reached for him, he knew that he could never harm her. Loosing one of her mates would definitely harm her, his instincts blared this at him. Instead of pouncing on the possible rival, he reached back for the female and pulled her into his arms. The two fell asleep curled as closely as they could, leaving a small gap between them and the others. That is how the male who would become Skull first met his Sky and fell under a curse with her. It was the beginning of everything for him.
Well, thanks for reading those of you who got to the end. This story sort of struck me over the head while I was sleeping, in the form of a dream. I've edited it and fleshed it out some, because I thought someone out there might enjoy this story as much as I did when I dreamed it. I'll probably write a few more chapters on it, depending on if anyone likes it. Please let me know what you thought. I especially like questions, insightful comments, etc.
Till next time:
Wingzrooke