Wolf By Night
Vampiresswolf
CH. 1
Since the time he was small, he knew he was different. His mother hid him away where no one would find him, tried to make him learn not to use his talents, not around the town, his friends, not even within his own home. He knew that they would try him. For to have talents outside the realm of normalcy, in the realm of Witchcraft, was a death sentence. For Percy Jackson, for anyone to know about his talents with water would be a direct link to the Gallows.
Which is why he really had hoped this day would never come. He had tried to hide it, he really had. He went around water only when the time of the bi-yearly baths came. He never went to the ocean. If he was hurt, he did not allow his healers to wipe him with a watered cloth.
However, the time had come when they had found him out. He had been in a fight. It hadn't even been his fight, he had just been in the middle of it. And to his dismay, when the shot went into his chest, it blew him backwards into the Tavern's horse trough. Not the feed, but the drink. And once the other townspeople saw how the bullet left him and his skin stitched up, not a drop of blood dirtying the water, well. That was it. He was carted away.
That was how he found himself in the courtroom, his mother crying for him as he was unfairly tried for being a witch. That was when he was carted away to the small, dank cellar-like cell where he awaited sunrise, and the town gathering for the hanging. He and another were to be hanged together. The other person was a lighthearted imp-like boy who had apparently struck a barn on fire without using matches. His trial had been right before his own. He found it quite ironic, two witches being tried, one for using fire and the other for being a water user.
"Hey Perce?" He heard a whisper through the hole in the wall, and he stood, padding over to it.
"Yeah, Leo?" for that was the name of the impish boy who he could hear but not see as they waited.
"Remember when we were little? We would play together in the woods even though our mothers told us not to?"
"Yeah?"
"Remember that time a couple years ago you came back saying you found a wolf with human eyes, and I didn't believe you?"
"You said I was insane, yes."
"Well. If it didn't eat you, maybe that means it liked you."
"Even so, I cannot have a pet now."
"No… That's not what I was thinking…" He grew silent and Percy stared out of the barred windows at the night sky.
"What were you thinking, then?" he finally asked.
"Well, if it didn't eat you, and liked you, and had human-like eyes, maybe it will come save us."
"Wishful thinking, Leo. It would have had no hands to open the doors."
"Maybe it does?"
"Werewolves don't exist, Leo. I think it is time for you to put your fantasies away and wait for morning. It will be a beautiful sunrise."
"Our last sunrise."
"They say the last sunrise a person sees is the one that is the most beautiful, the one that shows them their lives."
"Maybe. Misery loves company, and I am glad to have company, though I wish it hadn't been you."
"Me too, brother. Me too."
They fell into a fitful silence, both looking out at the moon for a while before they heard a low howl.
"That sounds like it is nearby…" Leo whispered.
Percy smiled sadly, thinking of that dark wolf, and wondered silently if that howl belonged to him. There rang a second howl, even closer, and they heard the guards outside of the jailhouse shout, moving toward the sound. Percy frowned, looking down at his hands where they were chained to the ground and then sighed heavily as he looked at the door. There was no way he would be able to get out of this himself, so he just lay down, enjoying the sound of the wolves howls ringing through the night.
When he heard a key in the lock, he sat up once again, peering through the darkness as the door opened. He thought that he must be dreaming, for in the doorway, a ring of keys hanging from its mouth, was the dark black wolf with the red nose from his childhood. It looked at him with what appeared to be sadness, before bounding forward and dropping the keys at his feet.
Percy took no time in fumbling the ring, finding the key that unlocked his cuffs, and standing.
"Thank you, wolf." He whispered. The wolf looked nervously at the door, and seemed to gesture for him to follow it.
"I have to get Leo." Percy stated. The wolf gave a low whine, pacing toward the door again, but Percy turned his back on it and began trying keys until he found the one that opened the door. He rushed inside and, as quickly as he was able, opened Leo's cuffs.
"Looks like you were right. The wolf came for us." He grinned as Leo's eyes widened at the wolf as it tugged on Percy's shirt, egging him forward.
"Lets go!"
"We can't just follow a wolf into the wilderness, it might eat us!"
"If we stay in any city we'll be dead. Come on!"
"Good point!" The two boys ran after the wolf, who kept looking around nervously, pushing them into corners when people came around, until they reached the safety of the woods.
"Thank you, wolf. You have saved me again." Percy bent to pet him in farewell, but the wolf shook his head and instead took Percy's hand in his mouth, biting down hard. Percy yelped, turning toward Leo to run, but the other boy was already unconscious, a chocolate colored wolf above him, his hand in it's mouth. He looked into the black-brown eyes of the wolf he thought he knew as he fell down into oblivion.