"It what?" Vulpe said seriously to Tamsin.
"Came screaming gibbering through the wards like they was paper," Tamsin said. "Didn't you feel it fall in through a crack between here and Nowhere?"
"I did," Jack said quietly, rocking back and forth slightly as he perched on the edge of a chair. His face looked thin and wan, deep bruises of sleeplessness under his piercing eyes. "The wind wailed its sorrow."
"The earth quivered with terror 'neath our feet," Nuala said, the two wolves curled close around each other, petting and soothing the other with smooth unhurried movements. If they were not so dissimilar in colouring, it would be hard to see where one left off and the other began. As it was, black and white fur merged in a living yin yang symbol. "Mother was afraid, so deathly afraid..."
"And magic stood heart still for a moment, before it breathed again," Vulpe sighed. "It has begun then." Her eyes gleamed as she stood. "I think I may have to leave this place."
"We two will stay," Nuala said.
"This is our territory, we will protect it," Malguant added. "And your two little wizards too."
"All the children," Jack said faintly, staring through the window to a darkening sky studded with stars and swept with cloud. "Old blood runs strongest now. Like calls to like. The Old Ones are awakening, and the wizards will not be able to contain them. Even now, the Hunt stirs and the Horned One snuffs damp rich air. The Seelie and Unseelie Courts stir under their hills and mounds, their stone circles and still pools, their forests and wild places. Creatures long forgotten, peoples long lost awaken to face this threat, this doom upon all magic everywhere and everywhen. What is now, must pass away to what once was. Better, maybe not. But fauns will once more pipe, the Lords and Ladies have their Rades on heath and hill, changelings walk the world of men, centaurs gallop 'cross the unfettered earth, Leviathan stir beneath wild wave. Man has failed the earth, and she will not forget nor forgive." He blinked, and turned back to the group.
"So, the time of Man comes to an end," Tamsin said thoughtfully.
"And the time of Gramarye, Chaos and Eternity once more come," Jack said gravely, putting one hand out to stroke the stone near him. "This will all fall. Many will die. Or change."
"Change into what the earth demands they be," Vulpe said thoughtfully. "What we are."
"Creatures of magic untamed," Malguant sighed. "I thought not to see that time again..."
"Nor did any of us," Tamsin said. "And for now, this must stay between us. No wizard to know. No human. Nothing that is not like us. We swear, in blood." The creatures looked at each other and nodded in accord, before using sharp fang and claw to slice through their skin. Five hands met, blood dripping to join as they swore not to mention this before any one of the wizarding or mortal world, to any who would contravene the oath, any who would tell the chainers of magic that their time was ending and an older time coming back to the fore. They knew, that if it got out, that it would be stopped. The wizards would fight to keep their world as it was, and the critical time where there would be nothing able to stop it had not yet come.
And if Voldemort learned of the power contained in the Abyss, who was to say he would not be so insane as to seek to harness it?
Vulpe crept back into the Slytherin male dormitories and then padded to Draco's bedroom. As a prefect, he had a room to himself. She crawled up onto the bed and shifted back into her human form, completely. No fur, nor hint of fangs. She ignored the slumbering girl next to Draco and leaned down to kiss him on the cheek.
"My Dragon, awake." There was that slide glance of blue beneath closed eyelids, and then Vulpe pushed the girl out of bed. "Get out, fucktoy. There's serious business to be talked about now." The girl hit the ground and opened her mouth to scream.
"Out," Draco said coldly as he sat up
She shut her mouth and scurried out, grabbing her clothes from the chair where they'd been flung. Trying to dress as she ran. Vulpe lay down next to Draco, crawling under the sheets and curling her legs around his.
"It has begun, and more then begun, ice child."
"What has begun?" Draco stroked her hair, running his fingers through the firered strands down to the thin strip of downy near-fur that ran from the nape of her neck to between her shoulder blades. It was just another one of those things which made her unique. The scent of cinnamon and gamey wild animal surrounded his senses as she cuddled into him, all soft curves and flesh overlaying hard muscle and bone. He had met few people as comfortable in their bodies as Vulpe was in hers, but that was the thing, wasn't it? She wasn't people. She was animal, playing at being people and laughing her head off at their collective foolishness as she did so.
"Everything." Vulpe cupped his jaw between her hands and leant in to give him a lingering kiss, fangs nipping delicately at his bottom lip. "I'm leaving to go walkabouts, yarp. Got people to find and new scents to smell. Things to do, me."
Draco could taste the coppery sweetness of his own blood in his mouth. "But...won't you be caught?"
"Me? Pshaw, no! They won't catch me twice. The snake's not quick enough for that, and I know soon he's going to be fried alive by the lightening." She ran claws down his chest, admiring the way red streaks sprang up against his white, white skin. Draco hissed and stretched, lean body toned to a peak of physical fitness by his Quidditch. He placed his hands around the bedhead and she giggled, before leaning down to nip sharply at the curve of his ribcage. He growled softly, as she lapped busily at the blood she'd revealed before looking up at him again. "Consider this a farewell gesture."
"Won't keep me warm enough while you're gone..."
"You'll keep well enough, Ice."
Draco knew he wouldn't. It would be a hard thing to keep his soul alive and his connection to the wild magik thrumming. But he banished those thoughts for later as she gave him a sly look from under her lashes and licked her lips.
Later would be soon enough.
Jack perched on the edge of the ramparts, blank bird eyes staring outwards into the sky. He watched the clouds drift, and fell deeper into them.
Blood. Fire. Running. A brown haired girl raising a sword, her stance determined and her face hidden by a helm of Grecian design, eyes cast into darkness. A white dragon rampant, wings spread and mouth open to reveal gleaming daggers of bone. A black dog chasing a red fox, her tail trailing wildfire on the ground as she went and the dog blackening further as he chased her through them. A glimpse of a grinning face in a thicket of briar roses, red blossoms as scarlet as blood freshly spilled. A snake coiling around a skull, venom green body fat and bloated as it yawned, exposing puffy white dead skin in its mouth. The sound of hooves on the earth, beating, beating...
He straightened as the skies opened up above him, thunder rolling through the clouds. He shook off the rain with a displeased croak, spreading his wings and hopping inside through a window. Carefully, he stepped down, drawing the edges of his cloak closer to him. His hair coiled lankly across his face and he shivered slightly.
There were things coming, great happenings being birthed. Whether they would turned out foul or fair would remain to be seen. Oh yes. And he would see them come.
Whoo! Vulpe's a FOXY lady. As always by now, you should know the drill. Read? Then review!
Also, I messed up a chapter. Tsk. Chapter 8 was put in at chapter 7. Sorry, folks.