Chapter 10

A/N – My apologies for the psychology lesson in here, but I hate loose ends and unexplained phenomena, so it was the best way I could think of to explain stuff!

(…)

"Ya know, most people would run the other way when they see a wolf." Hope smirked at Josie.

The two girls were seated bundled up against each other on a bench in the old mill, talking easily and catching up. Hope remained wrapped up in her blanket, not having bothered to find a set of clothes to re-dress herself after transforming back into her human form. Josie was happy to lightly shawl one arm around Hope's back over the fluffy material. It reminded her of the softness of Hope's fur between her fingers.

"But it wasn't just any wolf. It was you." Josie answered in turn, her gaze soft as it was cast on Hope. She could see every luminescent speck encircling the iris of the other girl's eyes and felt like she could spend an eternity counting each and every one of them.

"And you're not scared of my wolf at all?" Hope frowned, yet there was a curious smile on her lips as she looked back at the younger girl. She felt…touched, somehow. She couldn't quite explain it, but somewhere deep in her chest it meant the world to her that Josie held no fear or any other ill feelings towards her wolf. It was just so easy and so often that werewolves were labelled in a negative light and described as aggressive monsters.

"Should I be?" Josie shook her head, almost incredulously, then added in question, "Why would I be?" Something nagged at the back of Josie's head. She was confused, and rightfully so, as she thought. It was Hope's wolf that initiated the bond between them, and made it official. Why on earth would there be any sort of aggression from the wolf that Josie would need to be fearful of? This seemed strange, to say the least.

Hope shrugged and shook her head almost imperceptibly. "I try to stay away from everyone. I can't always control my wolf." She then averted her gaze and chuckled, but the sound was more bitter than humored. "I almost killed Landon when I came across him in wolf form. Besides you and my dad, he's the only other one who has seen my wolf."

The elephant in the room was utterly imposing in that moment.

Landon.

"Hope, I…" Josie started, but Hope quickly shook her head and wiped away the moisture that had started to accumulate in her eyes.

"I knew he was gone, you know? I don't quite know how or why… but when I woke up, I just knew." Hope uttered the words softly and with confusion.

Josie was very well aware of how Hope knew. She had told her while she was sleeping. It was that revelation to an unconscious Hope that caused her subconscious wolf-self to disappear in the forest of Josie's mind for nearly a week. That whole week she had felt like dying due to Hope's complete absence. But she knew Hope was grieving and that she had to do so. Now it seemed like it had helped, as Hope was more composed when speaking about her deceased love.

The fact that Hope was not aware of any of this at all, however, once again bothered Josie. There was something disturbing mixed into the vibrations of the air around them that the witch just could not quite place her finger on, but it was starting to make her heart drop slowly.

"Can I ask you something?" Josie finally spoke again after a small eternity in silence where they both simply stared into the trees in thought, the sun slowly setting behind them. Hope slowly came back from her reverie and turned her gaze back to her companion, nodding. "What is it like when you're in your wolf form?"

Hope paused and looked down at the ground, clearly searching for the right words to try and accurately depict what it was like to be a wolf. "Well… It's amazing." She sighed happily. That would always be her first description. "It's so liberating. It feels like there are no chains, literal or metaphorical, in the world that are strong enough to hold me back – to chain down my spirit." A broad smile crept across her lips as she spoke and Josie couldn't help but follow the beautifully curved lines as they stretched further, enthralled by their exquisiteness. "It is like the deepest part of my soul is set free to just… be everywhere at once." Hope giggled, seemingly giddy as she relived the feeling in her memory. "Does that even make sense?" She asked when she refocused on Josie, seemingly amused.

Josie just smiled softly back at Hope. Even without the verbal and overt description, the feeling perfectly matched what Josie had thought. It also described perfectly how she herself had felt when she was enraptured by Hope's wolf every time in her subconscious. It was a feeling that she could only describe as pure magic.

"And what about, like, memory? Or conscious awareness? How much can you control when you're a wolf? And how much can you remember?" Josie eventually got around to refining her question to what she really wanted to know. She needed to figure out how much of what happened in her mind-forest was Hope, and how much was Hope's wolf.

Hope thought for a moment, searching for a way to best explain as much as she herself understood. It was something that had always been a bit of a mystery, even for werewolves themselves. "Well, how much do you know about Freud's personality theory about the id, ego and superego?" She arched a brow at Josie, whom just shrugged in turn, so Hope continued. "Well to really simplify it, we each have these three aspects to our personality that are constantly vying for dominance over our psyche. There's the id, which is like the deepest, most intuitive part of yourself. The id contains your deepest desires, your unspoken fears, your base instinctual needs, and so forth. The id is always out for instant gratification."

Hope paused for a second to make sure Josie was following her, and when she nodded, the tribrid furthered her explanation. "Then there's the superego, which is like the opposite of the id. The superego is always striving for the greater good. It's the little voice in the back of your mind that tells you when something is wrong, or when you shouldn't do something because it might be damaging to someone else. It's your conscience, essentially. The superego will always sacrifice your needs for the needs of others. And it loves putting you on guilt trips for just about anything."

Josie smirked, then nodded again to urge Hope to carry on. "Then finally we have the ego. The ego is the aspect that is basically just your conscious self. The ego is the one that has to strive to create balance between the id and the superego. Your conscious self, your ego, is the one that says – I know you need money, but stealing is wrong. Rather ask politely for the money you need. Or work for it and earn it in an honest manner."

Josie chuckled at her companion and arched a brow. "This psychology lesson is really fascinating and all, miss smarty pants, but what does this have to do with you and your wolf?"

Hope laughed and shook her head at the jest. "Okay okay. So think of it this way then – I'm the ego; the little voice in the back of my head is my superego; my wolf…"

"Is your id." Josie finished for Hope and the older girl nodded.

"My wolf is all about instinct. It does what it wants and it takes what it wants, whenever it wants." Hope's expression seemed to be one of guilt as she admitted to this, and yet there was an excited gleam in her bright blue eyes that contradicted her expression otherwise. Josie figured this must be what Hope meant about the different aspects always vying for dominance and yet having to strike a balance. She understood that Hope enjoyed her wolf and the fact that it did not understand the meaning of 'NO', but she also knew that Hope's conscience wouldn't just allow her wolf to run rampant like that when it could cause damage if it did.

"So, how do you control your wolf?" Josie asked softly, trying to start piecing the puzzle pieces together in her head of what exactly it might have been that had happened in her subconscious with the wolf.

"Well, the id is completely unconscious. It's actually quite amazing – the id is made up of all the basic building blocks that makes us who we are: our wants and needs and fears and aversions and preferences and desires and delusions… It's the very essence of who and what we are, but it's all subliminal. We're mostly not even aware of any of it, and yet it will influence our behavior to a vast degree."

Hope took a deep breath, her fingers twisting the edges of the blanket she was holding tightly around herself. "The ego stretches across both the conscious and subconscious, though it mainly functions in the conscious, it can access the subconscious to a certain level. When I'm in my wolf form, I can be completely conscious – I can be in the ego-state while I'm wolfed out. But I can also switch it off, almost like a vampire can switch their humanity on and off. I can choose to be conscious in my wolf and then I'm in full control. Then I can also choose to just let the wolf take over completely and…well…lose control."

Hope sighed deeply, fidgeting some more as she tried to get down to the nitty gritty of the whole operation. "When I switch off and the wolf takes over, then as much as I can't control what it does, I also can't really remember what it does. Vague images here and there, some sounds, some smells… but nothing anywhere near concrete. When I'm conscious in my wolf I can control and remember everything."

Hope glanced up to Josie who was both clearly fascinated by the older girl's explanations and hanging on her every word. Hope could not help but admire how beautiful Josie seemed in that moment right then. There was something so child-like in her curiosity and so absolutely pure in her search for answers. Yet…her eyes…those beautiful chocolate eyes just seemed so unbearably sad…

"The other thing is also that the longer I stay in my wolf form, the more my ego-state falters and my consciousness starts to slip away. The longer I'm in wolf form, the more wolf I become." Hope added finally, tentatively.

That's when Josie understood it all. When Hope turned to stone, her ego was frozen as well and her wolf took over. She was in her unconscious wolf state for weeks on end. Her wolf was acting out on every basic instinct that Hope had and Hope herself knew nothing. It was only once her wolf felt like it had been satisfied that Hope was able to revert back to her conscious ego-state.

The realization was painful. Oh, so incredibly, brilliantly, beautiful. But oh, so very torturous…

"You don't remember much from while you were asleep, do you?" Josie almost whispered in question, afraid to hear the answer even though she was already anticipating – and dreading – it.

Hope shook her head, then her eyes went wide and her mouth fell open, her one hand shooting out towards Josie's arm. "Please don't tell me I hurt you!" Hope knew she'd never be able to forgive herself if she hurt Josie in any way, yet little did she know how much she was doing it at that very moment without even realizing.

Josie quickly shook her head and covered Hope's hand with her own, her head bowing low as she fought back tears and swallowed hard. She couldn't tell Hope what happened. At that very moment she wasn't even sure whether it really happened or not. Maybe the whole bond creation was just another figment of her own subconscious playing tricks on her. Maybe it was a dream.

"No, but you did kind of almost kill Jade…" Josie chuckled a bit bitterly.

"Oh god I heard… I'm so sorry." Hope bit her lip and retracted her hand from Josie's arm, though she immediately and inexplicably missed the contact. She wanted to reach out to Josie again. She wanted to pull Josie into her arms and hold her. She hated how dour Josie sounded and how broken she looked. Something within Hope just…cracked, at the sight and sound. She couldn't quite fathom the feeling.

Josie shook her head quickly. "She's fine, I'm sure she'll understand. I'll talk to her."

"So…" Hope smirked, but for some reason, as she uttered the following words, she instinctively felt like she'd rather snarl instead. "You and Jade?" Something was immediately profoundly restless within her. Her wolf felt ridiculously angry at the thought and Hope had no idea why it would be.

Josie herself wasn't expecting the quip and it caught her completely off guard. She stuttered nonsensical syllables and blushed. Hard.

Hope smirked, trying her best to keep her incisors from growing as she could feel them itching at the front of her gums. She leaned into Josie and hugged her with one arm as she quickly said, "It's okay. You can tell me another time when you're feeling more comfortable."

Hope was about to pull away when a certain very distinctive scent caught her attention in Josie's neck. She paused and allowed her face to linger in the crook between the witch's throat and shoulder and inhaled deeply. "You smell like…" She huffed again, not moving her face away from next to Josie's cheek. "Like a wolf…"

Hope knew it was not her own scent, despite the fact that she had brushed up against Josie when she first saw her. This scent was different. It was original. It smelled of innocence and obscurity all at the same time.

She slowly pulled away and locked her gaze with Josie. Josie gasped softly, but felt a certain warmth flush through her chest, up her neck and across her cheeks at what she saw.

Hope's eyes were glowing brightly. Her wolf wanted out.

"I… I have to… go run…" Hope stuttered, confused. She felt like an excited and uncomfortable pup rolled up into one nervous bundle of pent up energy.

It took Hope about 5 seconds to leap from where she had sat next to Josie, as a human, to hit the ground running on all four paws, kicking up dirt and leaves as she shot in a white flash through the trees. Her chest ached as she held onto her consciousness. Her head near-pounded in confusion at the tumultuous feelings coursing through her veins. She just had to run, had to place some distance between her and Josie, had to shed the weight she felt pressing down heavily upon her shoulders. So she ran…and ran…and ran.

Instinctively Josie understood why Hope had to run, even if consciously she was struggling with it. She stood slowly and stepped forward as Hope swiftly weaved through the trees and out of sight, though Josie continued to watch, staring into the darkness, with a dark and intense golden glow to her own eyes…