When the cold wind is a'calling
And the sky is clear and bright
Misty mountains sing and beckon
Lead me out into the light
I will ride, I will fly
Chase the wind and touch the sky I will fly
Chase the wind and touch the sky
Where dark roots hide secrets
And mountains are fierce and bold
Deep waters hold reflections
Of times lost long ago
I will read every story
Take hold of my own dream
Be as strong as the seas are stormy
And proud as an eagle's scream
Touch the Sky, by Judy Fowlis, from the album Brave, released in 2012
We were pretty far north. The meeting point was just beyond the river, where the border of snow met with the luscious grass. The weather, despite everything, was holding up, even if the sky was a blanket of grey that looked tumultuous at best. I was taking the role of Alpha to heart, even if it had cost me a lot.
Although perhaps I had caused myself to lose a lot of what I held dear, through lying and keeping things from Bella in an attempt to protect her, like I failed to do before. Shaking my head, I watched in wariness as three people walked through the trees, dressed in ragged like clothing, a contrast to me and Bella: we had hastily changed after the completion of the ceremony.
We stepped forwards as they did, and I, as well as who I assumed to be the Alpha, stretched our hands out, shaking them firmly in a sign of union. Bowing my head in recognition and civility, Bella echoed my movement, standing strong by my side. There were no visible signs of the discord and stride between us, and to everyone outside the know, we were a joined and united ruling couple, where that was so rare.
"Hello. We hail from Africa. Shadow tells us you are in need of aid, that one of the laws have been broken?"
His English, although heavily accented, was fairly understandable. And if there was a language barrier, then we would just have to communicate using that Alpha to Alpha bond that we could do. Although I was curious about the 'laws' thing, considering that we had no knowledge about them.
Sure, I had mentioned unspoken laws, but that was more of a fact than something we actually had to obey. Loyalty meant a lot to us, as you could no doubt guess. Bella stepped forward, addressing the assumed Alpha... Leader?.. of the... Pack? Tribe? Of elephants. There was none of her normal timidness, in fact, most of her feelings were invisible behind her facade, her portrayal of a strong and independent Alpha Female.
"It is nice to meet you. As you stated, we are indeed in need of aid. I am afraid that our knowledge about the shifter laws is rather impertinent, but myself was taken and severely injured by one of the blood-drinkers. They also murdered an elder of our tribe, who we are still mourning for."
The formal and respectful tone was one that surprised me quite a bit when it came out of her mouth, and a part of it made me uncomfortable. It was foreign to me to hear her speak so stiffly- cold, I was familiar with, but not the formal and almost weird tone that she spoke with now. I wished she went back to speaking normally.
The leader, grey with age, skin tight over his skeleton, nodded slowly, a rueful smile on his face as he looked over the two of us. He turned over his shoulder, and said something in Afrikaans, before turning to face us once again.
"I forget that the laws are seldom heard of now. It has been a long time since I have been near tribes outside of our own."
He nodded his head, murmuring something again in Afrikaans. This gave me time to look at the other two people who were with him. One was young, looking about mid-thirties with dreadlocked hair, very much a stereotype. On his cheek, there was a star, painted in a vibrant red that another part of my mind wanted to describe as 'painted red with the blood of his enemies'.
I highly doubted that was what it was though, because that would be pretty dark. The woman was definitely significantly younger, looking more about the early twenties. Of course, as per our usual ageing rules, we had no idea how old they were, other than their physical appearance which didn't tell us much at all.
"These are my son-in-law and my granddaughter: Hanno & Kandula. They have come for their rite-of-age."
I had no idea what a rite of age was, but I nodded. We all had our own customs and I wasn't about to pry into theirs. He bowed ever so slightly, an action which disturbed me quite a bit because I didn't want them to appear subservient- and a small part of me was reminded that they could easily kill me by standing on me in elephant form- but I kept myself quiet, letting Bella handle the situation.
"My name is Hathi. Now if you will please excuse us to our accommodation, we tire after such a long journey."
Clearing my throat, Bella took the weight of showing them off my shoulders, as she set off, guiding them to one of the many lodges we had cobbled together. I had a bit of reprieve for now, but with a million and one things to organise and fix, where did a wolf start?
The words were a jumble of letters, dancing around the page and taunting me like it did back in pre-school. I couldn't grasp the simplest of things, the words becoming a trudging mud that was intelligible, no matter how hard I tried. The words were either cold, careless or without the feeling that I wanted to put behind them.
It sounded as if I didn't know Harry, didn't think of him as my Uncle, didn't grieve at all for the loss. I rubbed my head, the pencil tight in my hand as the tip of the lead tapped repetitively against the table, leaving little scratches of grey all over the table. Harry was my uncle- I scratched through that hard, nearly tearing the lined paper in half with the ferocity of the gouge.
Like many boys, I had never been any good at English, and I hadn't been particularly good at stringing words together to make something coherent. It was even more difficult to inflect the tone I wanted into what I was trying to say. I slammed my head against the table hard, as if the pain would somehow send the answers into my swirling mind.
The door creaked open ever so slightly, and I didn't bother looking up, instead focusing on the fine-grained table. There was the soft footsteps echoing across the floor, before the chair next to me dragged as it was pulled out.
"Are you alright Jake?"
It was Bella, her voice as soft as can be without all that eerie formalness that she had prior. For a minute, we were together as equals, and she was reaching out as a concerned friend. Despite all the bad blood, the break between us, she was there for me as I had tried to be there for her, and I was glad. Even if I didn't always show it. I sighed heavily, my head still remaining planted against the table firmly.
"Depends. I've been trying to write something for the past half an hour, but it all comes out like shit."
I snapped, with a flash of anger that surprised even me. Bella seemed to take it her stride, replying not with anger but with the everlasting patience that she was known for. Had I been paying attention, I would have noticed that her side of the bond had opened ever so slightly, allowing the brief surface reading of her emotions.
Of course, I wasn't paying attention, too exhausted and frustrated to do anything more than close my eyes pathetically. Bella hummed, the sound of moving paper becoming audible as Bella reached over and grasped it. She seemed to skim over it quickly, before putting it to the side, in favour of tearing a new clean sheet, untainted by my attempts to tear it.
She didn't poke or prod, just sat there for at least two minutes, before I finally lifted my head up to look at her, momentarily awed by her beauty. Still, I pushed that thought to the side, ignoring my heartstrings twing a little at the thought.
"What were you trying to say? Tell me?"
There was no sense of anger, or betrayal, or any other emotion in her voice other than concern. She was the epitome of calmness, and anyone would think we hadn't had a huge argument just a few days prior. I took a moment to collect my thoughts, trying to compose what exactly I wanted to say about Harry. But how were you supposed to write a short paragraph about a man you'd known all your life?
"He was my Uncle, someone I knew would support me, even if I messed up somehow. He was like.. someone I could go to if my dad was unavailable. I could trust him with anything, and he wasn't afraid to tell me if he thought I was fucking up. He taught me a lot about our history, stuff that I might not have known had he not mentioned it, and I wish I had spent more years with him as I'd grown up. He was, to me, like your grandad, who you used to spend all your time with because he was cool, only to stop growing once you were older. He looked after me a lot.. like Charlie did after my Mom died, and I never thanked him for it. Never thanked either of them for it. And I regret that because he died without me ever expressing my graciousness."
My eyes watered a little, swimming and threatening to fall. I shook my head trying to clear it, as Bella scribbled furiously on the sheet of paper, her hand moving fast. Despite that, she somehow managed to keep her handwriting legible and interpretable, a skill I had never managed myself. You could get it neat or done quickly, but never both concurrently.
That had gotten me yelled at several times in English. Bella hummed, resting her hand a little as she turned her attention to me, rather than the paper. Her hair had been swept into an interlocked plait, far neater then I know she could have done herself. It was done in a tribal style, beads swimming through her hair like fish in a sea.
It was beautiful the way it was styled, and it almost distracted me long enough for me to finally get control of my emotions. She looked at me briefly, before returning to scribble.
"There wasn't much we could do for him..."
I turned to face her, a weird look on my own face. To contrast, she had a measured one on hers, her eyes downturned in sadness, and her eyes shining ever so slightly. There was a downtrodden look on her face like she had been through hell and back, and then I realised: oh wait, she had. She looked up at me, and the look on her face reminded me of when she had been injured, timid but still unafraid to fight back if crossed.
"I know that look on your face Jacob. It's one I see in the mirror."
This time there wasn't confusion on my face. She was trying to alleviate my guilt, which was the last thing I wanted. She had enough on her plate without my emotions, and besides, there was no point burdening her with my emotions, especially when she had just ascended to Alpha Female, was currently grieving for both Harry and dealing with the betrayal I had inflicted upon her. The wound I had given her, was raw in my own heart like she had given it to me.
"I should have had more people running. She got through a gap, a crack in our patrol, and Harry would have been here! Leah and Seth wouldn't have lost their parents!"
The end of the sentence came out as a whisper, my voice twisted and bitter, the undercurrents of an annoyed growl being barely heard over the brass tenor of my voice. Bella stopped scribbling- I wasn't even aware she had resumed scribbling- before laying the pencil down, and sliding the sheet over.
She fiddled with her hair, draping it over her shoulder, and absently flicking the end of it. I didn't bother to look at the paper as Bella redirected her attention to me, her eyes hard yet somehow sympathetic at the same time. I could practically see her wolf within her, like she was sitting alongside Bella, watching me with analytical eyes.
"If you did that Jacob, the Pack would be exhausted. We wouldn't be prepared for Victoria, and it would bring strain within the pack. One crack, does not a weakness make. Again, refer to my earlier point. Additionally, you weren't even Alpha at the time, and while I'm not saying it's Sam's fault either, the blame isn't wholly on you."
She looked away for a brief moment, sighing heavily as the back wall became interesting all of a sudden. Rubbing her temples, her eyes swivelled to mine, dropping ever so subtly to the floor. I checked myself- I didn't want to be imposing any Alpha authority on her, not right now. But unless it was some ability I'd picked up, I didn't think it was me.
"He... wouldn't have lived long.. He had been talking to me a lot, stories and legends. But he'd also been setting up contingencies."
Tears were beginning to drip down her face, and I made to get out of my chair to comfort. Her chair lurched backwards fairly quickly, as she moved forward towards me, a step at a time. As she leaned into my arms, my grasp, I rocked from side to side trying to soothe her, despite being confused about her cryptic message about contingencies.
I murmured various things under my breath, trying to croon and warble as wolf-like as I could, in an attempt to soothe both her and her wolf. She gathered a shaky breath, rubbing her brown eyes with the back of her hands.
"He... Harry had a heart disease... He had wanted to tell Sue, and Seth, and Leah.. but he didn't want to until his contingencies were put in place. I don't know why he confided in me, I don't know, and I wish he didn't and told Sue, or anyone else, but he did."
She sobbed, and amongst her sobbing tears, I rubbed her back, trying to soothe her once again. It was obvious that the secret had been eating her up from the inside out, and it had weighed a lot on her. The whole scenario had done a 180. It had gone from me being angry to Bella being anguished. While I was still confused and conflicted and grieving, I held her close, letting a few tears of my own fall as I comforted her.
It took several cups of coffee, hugging, scenting one another, and breathing for us to get our emotions under control. At least, for now. Neither of us was quite ready to part just yet, so we did something we had done many times over the years: watch a movie. An act fairly simple and familiar for the two of us, but since Bella had practically banned me from doing anything associated with loss and the pack, there wasn't much else I could do.
According to Bella, there was no point in worrying about Victoria until she was attacking us, a philosophy I didn't quite share. Of course, in order to watch a movie, we had to have the proper equipment, which entailed a quick drive to the store. For the first time in what seemed like forever, Bella's foolhardy truck was what got us there, parked expertly in a small space.
We swung out of the red monster in disguise, and walked into the shop, armed with a shopping trolley. We'd need a lot to be able to sustain the two of us, and Bella needed some groceries so she could feed Charlie anyway. Plus, she wanted to do some baking, or so she told me, to help out Sue, Seth, and Leah.
"How's being a leader treating you so far?"
I asked, fully aware she hadn't been in the role for more then a couple of hours. I looked across the shelves, before tossing a few bags of minstrels into the trolley. It was on that aisle at the front of the shops, where it displays all of the 'deals' on offer. Realistically, it was a way for the shop to get more money as people spent money on sweet items that they would be saving money on.
It wouldn't stop me from buying them though. Bella looked at some M&Ms, before throwing those in too, her eyes meeting mine for the briefest of seconds before returning to the sweet section. She shrugged, eyes scanning over the large bars of chocolate that were looking particularly nice.
"I feel more connected with everyone. Sam is like my brother I never had, and so is Jared. The others... I feel maternal with them. Like my sole purpose is to guide them and to protect them."
That was what it felt like for me, except on a paternal side. That was what the pack was, a great big family, loyal to one another, to the point where we would die for one another. After tossing a few more bags of goodies, including some caramel popcorn, we moved onto the dairy aisle, aiming on picking up some cheese, butter and several assorted yoghurts.
"Especially to Shadow.. but I don't know why he's different."
I shrugged. There was an odd connection between myself and Shadow, but I couldn't place it. Whatever it was, our wolves couldn't place it either. Only that they felt the same pull, but stronger. With everything going on, I hadn't paid much attention to it, but it was something that I'd think about, maybe ask Shadow about once I had time to have an actual conversation with him.
"I feel it as well."
She smirked a little, as we grabbed various blocks of cheese and four tubs of butter- looking like we were going to feed a small army- before progressing onto the meat aisle. Could you imagine how much we could make if we went into hunting as a business venture? We'd probably get a lot.. provided we didn't maul the pelts, or damage them with our claws. We were natural-born predators after all.
"I know. We are imprints after all."
We moved along to the next aisle, where the various baking ingredients were being held, as Bella grabbed several bags of assorted flour, and several bags of sugar and powdered sugar. I had no idea what she was planning on doing, but I was sure it would be nice all the same.
We walked around for a little while, talking about several different things, as our mountain of goods became taller and taller, almost towering over us. As we queued up to pay, with me absently wondering if it would have been cheaper to buy in bulk, she reached her right up to my cheek, her eyes staring deeply into my mind.
"I.. I'd like to give us another try.. if that's okay?.."
My response was silent, as I threw open the doors to the bond, and answered her question with a pulse of my emotions, and a squeeze of her hand. A smile grew on my face, as I shyly pecked her on the cheek. Despite all of the bad things that had happened, things were beginning to look up- and I hoped it continued.
Author's Note
Sometimes, I think I should probably plan things out before I write them. Because I end up winging it, saying I'll do one thing, and it never happens. And then I feel bad.
But anyway, theoretically, next chapter, we will have Shadow's arrival with some more people to join the shifter army, which is what I'm totally dubbing it now.
So, how has everyone's week been? Mines has been pretty stressful between tests, parents evening, sorting out a new job, and a birthday party. I'm amazed the chapter is as long as it is, considering my lack of time to write.
Speaking of which, I have some maths homework to do, so I'd better hop to it: so QOTW is something random. Always the best kind of questions. What makes someone a hero?
Is it doing a good deed? Possessing a good character? I think they have to have a strong sense of morality, and a desire to do what is right. A bit cliche, but then again, I think they also have to have a flaw, because otherwise, they won't understand certain things.
Anyway, I really have to do my maths now.
See you all next week!
~Cait