A/N: I've been really sick this past week and I got my wisdom teeth pulled so this chapter is a bit on the short side

Thank you to Mizuna Kurenagi for review last chapter

Chapter XXVII: Escaping the curse

Down the hall

Through a room where a long hall awaited her. That lead her outside

Down the face of the cliff the attack building was on.

She followed him silently through the nearby town.

Despite the air around it being filled with the scents of life the roads were empty. Had everyone ran away from the chaos like Mahina was?

...No

Pausing in her walking, Mahina glanced to the side at one of the building nearby her in time to catch a flutter of curtain cover the glass. People were here, they were just hiding. The sight of Mahina's blood covered form probably didn't help matters either. No matter, paying no mind to the curious stares she got from people hiding in their homes Mahina walked on all the way to the other end of the town.

Her body was weary by now and she was barely keeping on her two feet. The white wolf seemed to notice this and slowed down for Mahina slowly growing closer and closer. Now, as Mahina find she had no strength to walk on, she find herself standing a deep forest. The sounds of explosion and chaos were muffled by the stillness of the woods and the animals that lived within it. It's here that Mahina dropped to her knees exhausted from her long journey.

Her vision is spiraling and hazy.

Her body is starting to feel heavy again. She groaned softly as the white wolf finally turned to face her.

'I didn't think you could do it… find your way back here to your body.' The wolf slowly makes his way towards Mahina before carefully sitting down before her. 'no one has ever managed to return to their body after I have taken it… but then again no one else had help like you did...did they?'

Help?

Mahina didn't know what the wolf was talking about. She wanted to say this to him, even ask him what he meant but her strength was failing her. She couldn't hold herself up anymore, she tipped sideways and falls to the ground.

The wolf made no moves to help Mahina or do anything for her. He remained where he sat and watched her panting for air.

'It is your curse after all… I almost found it ironic justice that you would fall to it but I suppose you can't truly fall to a curse you created. No matter.' The wolf stood at his full height now but his body was beginning to faded to the point Mahina can see the forest through his body. 'I've pulled you far away from your precious flower maiden, no one will save you this time.'

Save her?

Save her from...what?

Mahina didn't have the strength to ask the question and the white wolf that lead her from the chaos soon faded from sight completely. Mahina's eyes rolled back and she felt herself slipping into nothingness.

Falling and falling and falling until she couldn't feel the warm ground under her skin. The darkness was coming back for her again, she would slip into it once more. As she fell images and feelings seemed to just slip from her being as well.

That building she had fled from and the man who call her his precious key.

The flowers in the green water

The deep sleep

The lady with the blonde hair and the white lab coat

Everything…

The darkness was taking everything.

Her essence

Her body

Her everything was falling away

She would fade to nothing here

...no.

No?

Mahina

Who…?

Come back to this one, Mahina…

Cheza…?

Live

Live

Live for this one.

Live for him.

We must go back...

Go back… they must go back...back to where? Why? There was nothing for her to go back to. But Cheza...Cheza was calling. Mahina couldn't leave her behind when she called so desperately. But this darkness was holding tightly to Mahina. The wolf said he had taken her once and he seemed keen to make sure the second attempt was final.

But Cheza was calling and Mahina had every intention of answering her call.

Her fingers clawed at the earth under her and in that moment, struggling between reality and the darkness trying to claim her Mahina felt her being reach out and grip onto the nearest source of life around her.

The forest.

Her fingers wrapped around it and when she had a firm grasp she pulled. She pulled the source of life towards her, absorbed it into her being, buried herself in its light in an attempt to scare off the darkness still trying desperately to claim her. But it would not have Mahina.

Cheza was calling.

Mahina pulled and pulled and pulled at the life of the forest around her until there was all but nothing left to grasp for. Suddenly the forest came spiraling back to Mahina and she woke with a hard gasp for air. Her eyes snapped out and she threw herself upward.

The once lively forest was no longer that. The deep brown trees had faded to white masses that went on farther than the eyes could see. The once peaceful sounds of forest life had still to an erie nothing.

The forest looked dead.

But Mahina had survived?

She was… alive?

Yes… yes but just barely

Her body felt weak, exhausted from the fight to stay in her body once more. Mahina was only granted a moment to stare down at herself and take in a sudden change in her body.

The long black trail of hair she had when she left the keep was suddenly shorter brushing her mid back rather than the back of her calf. The white gown she had stained red was now jeans and a blouse and jacket and her bare feet were granted reprieve by sneakers. That was all Mahina had the strength for, her body gave out on her and she collapsed once again.

Not to darkness this time, but sleep.

It felt like Mahina stayed on the ground forever.

Like she had fallen into a deep sleep and was only now waking from it.

She stirred just a bit and slowly opened her eyes to her surroundings. The ground was cold and foreign against her face and as she groaned and pushed herself up to her hands and knees she was met with utter confusion. Where was she? She looked around at the surrounding shrubs and bushes and scattered trees but found nothing she felt was familiar to her. How did she get here? And where was here?

Pushing herself so she sat on the ground Mahina ran a hand through her hair gripping her head with both hands. She closed her eyes and tried to remember how it was she had gotten where she was right now but she found nothing.

Literally nothing.

It was like looking into a black pit, there were no memories of anything in her head let alone how she got here. Who was she? Where had she come from? What happen to her? The strain of trying to recall these things made her head throb and she winced slightly letting her hands drop from her head before slumping completely in her place. She needed to relax, if she sat here panicking she'd never get anything done, she'd never learn anything.

So Mahina stopped and she breathed and she calmed herself.

Her hands went from being limp at her side to being pressed against the ground, she stretched her fingers out and clawed at the ground dragging up lines of dry dirt but the marks she left on the ground didn't look like that one would leave behind with the hand she was looking at.

The prints of the ground looked like that of an animals, it was a paw print. Mahina raised her hand to her eye level and gazed at it curiously, her digits were coated with a light layer of the dirt she had just dug up but with their shape and length they couldn't have caused such a print on the ground. Not unless she was a…

Something tugged at the back of Mahina's mind in that instant and instead of staring curiously she pressed her hand against the ground and started clawing again. It felt so natural to claw at the earth like this- no she wasn't clawing she was digging, following some natural instinct she was digging and as she dug she felt a change. Her skin prickled and her hair stood on end as if a cold chill had washed over her and she dug harder than before.

Before Mahina knew what she was really doing she was nose deep in the nose throwing dirt behind her with absolute abandon. It went everywhere, stained her face and her fur until she felt a shockwave of realization hit her and she stopped digging.

Raising her head she backed up from the shallow hole she had dug moving to a nearby body of water she now took notice to. Walking on her hands and knees, she inched closer to the edge before gazing down at her reflection. She was met with fierce looking silver eyes on face covered in grey fur dusted with specks of brown, a modest jowl and pointed black ears.
That's right, Mahina was no human, she was a wolf.

Turning away from the water she looked up above at the glowing orb in the sky over her head. The moon was so full and bright and she reveled under it glow closing her eyes to taking in its light. The wind picked up gently and with it a scent that circled her upturned nose. There was a scent and a sort of pulling coming from it like she needed to follow it and find the person the scent belonged to.

But who did it belong to? Did Mahina know this person? It didn't matter; before she knew what she was doing she had turned in the direction of the scent.

'….Cheza' the name came to her so easily and something called back airy and light as breeze

Mahina

...Mahina…

Mahina, was that… her name?

Someone was calling to her, but this voice… it wasn't airey and light. It was deep and rich.

It felt warm and genuine. Mahina's nose was being flooded by scents

Of snow and fresh pine

Of wilderness

Of blood.

"Mahina!"

Mahina's eyes snapped open and she suddenly found she wasn't alone in a dead forest anymore. She wasn't even outside, no. She was in a lab, a dark depressing looking one at that and she was wet, half submerged in cooling most of all Mahina wasn't alone.

"Mahina, please." A pair of hands carefully cradled Mahina's face and this deep voice spoke her name so lovingly, with such care she felt herself instinctively whining for the owners comfort, nuzzling against the hands that held her face so gently. Her vision was coming back to her perfectly now and she found she was staring into pure azure eyes.

"... Kiba."