Chapter 7 - Facing the Darkness

Maddy, run! Although they were both in wolf form, Rhydian's thoughts screamed out to Maddy and she heard. Heard but ignored him. As the hurtling shape of the red-eyed wolf bore down on them, Maddy did the unthinkable. She changed into human form even though she was just barely able to do it. Trembling, with black veins still threading up and down her arms, she took a deep breath, bowed her head, and used eolas.

Rhydian barked beside her, impatience and terror twining together. Maddy we don't have time for this! The wolf was almost on them. Its huge paws churned the flaky dirt as it hurled forward, an unstoppable force of nature, of blood-red eyes and fur. It had to be at least four times the size of a normal timberwolf.

Now Maddy's head snapped up, her eyes morphing to that mesmerizing yet eerie yellow, and she changed back. She turned and ran. Rhydian kept up right beside her, sprinting as the tall grass whipped past their eyes. They could feel the pounding of the earth right behind them. They could feel the black wolf gaining on them. Then Maddy felt its voice speaking in her head—just a terrible whisper, unmistakably there…

Lost…lost forever…do not lie to yourself…you long for them…you long to join them. Don't fight it, little cub. Embrace it. Maddy's wolfy face scrunched up with total concentration. She fought down the other emotions tearing at her like hyenas going after a wounded animal. She had no time to even check to see if Rhydian was still beside her. She ran and ran, her paws flying until there was nothing except air.

The grassy meadow ended at a cliff, and suddenly she was flying over the edge. Her stomach did somersaults. Her wolf's instincts jolted her heart until it should have burst free of her chest. She was flying—and then she was falling, and way too fast. Below her a wide river wound back and forth like a glimmering rope. She was going to make it. Yes. The watery surface rushed up to meet her—and Rhydian too. There was a loud SMACK as both fur-clad bodies punched through the water.

The shock of freezing water overwhelmed her so badly that in her panic Maddy changed back to human. Maddy was spluttering as the sluggish current tugged her along. She'd just come up for air when Rhydian snaked his hand out. He caught her. The two wolfblood teens slammed together, arms going around each other. They looked up in time to see the ravenous black wolf leaping off of the cliff behind them.

Its red eyes glared with envy and despair as it leapt directly for them. It was far too strong to fight it, Maddy knew that. She and Rhydian couldn't defeat it—not head-on.

But, the thing was, they didn't have to. The blood-curdling wolf had been so intent on its prey that when they'd leapt, it had leapt right after them. But where Maddy and Rhydian had put on a final burst of speed as they flew out over the cliff, the bulkier, black wolf had just rumbled forward. Even with inertia, it hadn't had the speed built up to clear the gap. It landed—true enough—on a solid boulder of granite just before the river's edge. There was a sickening crunch of shattered bones and eviscerated organs as the black wolf smacked into the boulder like an inky paintball.

"Wait, don't go near that thing, Mads. What are you doing?!" Yet Maddy had already pulled out of Rhydian's grip. She waded through the current and heaved herself up onto dry land. Rhydian was right behind her. The two of them stared. Disbelieving. More than a little horrified. Rhydian's eyes were like big saucers as he looked at her. The body of the black wolf with the red eyes had reverted to human form…

It was Jana.

"What the hell."

Suddenly Maddy was sobbing, going down on her knees as she did. Before Rhydian could comfort her, though, she morphed into her wolf. Her wolf howled and howled a lament that seemed to still every creature in the woods and beyond. Rhydian just stood there, patient while Maddy's wolf finished pouring out its grief to the dark skies and the moon. He waited patiently until she'd changed back. She sniffed, wiping at the tears beneath her eyes. Then he couldn't help it any longer.

He took her by the shoulders and then cupped her face.

"Maddy, are you all right?"

Maddy smiled weakly, but her eyes shone with new strength.

"I'm fine, Rhydian." Rhydian frowned at her.

"After what just happened, you may be many things, Maddy Smith, but 'fine' isn't one of them. Talk to me. Tell me…why did that thing change into…Jana?"

The two teens walked over to sit down at the water's edge. Rhydian put an arm around her shoulders and looked at her carefully. "Oh, and before I forget to ask, what were you THINKING back there? Leaping out over that cliff?"

Maddy shrugged. "I used eolas to scan our surroundings so I could figure out how to get us away from that thing. When I saw the edge of the cliff and the river that far out from it, it gave me an idea. I thought we were probably faster than the lumbering black baddie, so I thought we could probably make the jump…and I was counting on the big monster wolf to, well, not be so lucky." She shrugged again, as if this were completely normal. In any less serious time or place, Rhydian would have rolled his eyes. Instead he cupped her face and kissed her with a passion he didn't know he had in him. For a few heartbeats he could forget they were in a strange, dangerous world, and all he knew, all his wolf knew, was that this was his Maddy, his mate. He would keep her safe, somehow, even though that seemed impossible half of the time and the other half of the time the reckless she-wolf made it even harder. Finally, with a groan, Rhydian came up for air. Maddy's bruised lips and the unsated hunger in her eyes made her look especially cute just then.

"So. Spill. Or do you even know?" He glanced at the broken body of the beast behind them. "Jana?"

Maddy shuddered. "I…could sense it. That thing was two of my wolf's greatest fears rolled up into one."

Rhydian rubbed Maddy's back gently. He thought he could guess the first one. "Was one of them…grief at the loss of your parents?"

The girl nodded. "Yep, and part of me expected that. I knew we'd have to face it, I just didn't realize it would be this aggressive or come this soon after we arrived here."

The blue-eyed wolfblood boy frowned. "OK, so that one I do get…your wolf had never fully grieved and that huge shadow-demon of a wolf was, huh, the accumulation of all that grief and bottled-up rage inside your wolf. But again…Jana?"

Now Maddy's face turned sheepish and she looked away. Rhydian slipped his arm around her waist and pulled her closer. With his other hand he cupped her chin and coaxed her to look at him.

"What don't you want to tell me?"

"It's complicated," she murmured, her eyes shifting evasively.

"Oh? Try me." Rhydian eyed her expectantly.

"You already know the answer," she sighed with exasperation and feeling. "At least you should know. I mean, boys are dense, so maybe you don't…" She sighed again when he just kept staring at her. "My wolf has always been jealous of Jana. She's always viewed Jana as a rival. We're both alphas. You like both of us. Jana is from the same pack as your parents. You two are very close. It would be the logical thing, the two of you becoming…you know." When Maddy's soft brown eyes tightened as she said those words, it hit Rhydian, exactly what she was implying. His blue eyes flew wide with shock.

"I thought we were past that!" he surged to his feet and brought Maddy up with him. "Maddy, I've told you, you're the only girl I want to be with. You're my one true mate. After all we've been through, how can you seriously doubt how—"

"I don't doubt!" Maddy cried. "That's the thing, the human side of me knows what you're saying is true. It was my wolf's stubborn side refusing to really believe it, Rhydian. That's over now." She gestured at the crumpled-up form of the dead wolf. "We've put that female-alpha jealousy to bed permanently now, OK? Cedren said that by coming here we'd have to deal with the unresolved issues of my wolf. It looks like that means not just the big things, but the little things too. Please stop being mad at me."

"I'm not mad at you," Rhydian huffed.

Maddy's eyes narrowed as the chemistry between the young wolfbloods shifted completely. "If you weren't mad, why were you hollering at me not two seconds ago?"

"I wasn't hollering at you."

"Then what do you call shouting with your face close to mine? Because I call that hollering."

Rhydian gave Maddy a martyred look before his façade came tumbling down. "Forgive me?"

The feisty she-wolf managed a smirk. "I'll think about it."

The two of them kissed again, and Maddy pressed her body up against Rhydian's as the boy's hands slid from the base of her spine up along her back. He loved the shape of her back, the smooth softness of her skin. He even loved the way she smelled right now, with her damp hair…he could almost forget that they were both on the verge of shivering in the cold. The two were still soaked from the river, but they didn't care. Maddy was nuzzling the side of his neck now, her soft lips creating a trail of warmth that made the cold around them totally irrelevant. Then Maddy abruptly felt something stiff brush up against her. With the furious need to survive right after entering the dreamworld, the two teens had forgotten something…

In the dreamworld, neither of them was wearing clothes.

Maddy sprang back and Rhydian looked sheepishly down at himself. Maddy bit her lip, her face going from mortified to laughing-out-loud as she put a hand over her mouth.

"Someone's a little excited," she observed.

Rhydian threw her a furious look. "You're not helping. We might get attacked any moment here, and you're making fun of me."

Maddy's laughter just grew and grew, but Rhydian was smiling now too.

"We need to find some clothes," he complained. "If this place has seasons, right now it's definitely winter. It feels like just above freezing."

Maddy bit her lip and nodded, but her gaze lingered on his body, as if clothing was highly overrated. "Agreed. Let's find shelter first. Maybe we can build a fire."

The two wolfblood teens turned away and began to walk along the river, peering at the sides of the cliff for any sign of a cave. Clouds swallowed up the moon, making their job that much harder. Suddenly Rhydian went rigid in front of Maddy. She nearly bumped into him as he whirled about and grabbed her hand.

"Did you hear that?"

"Hear what?" she whispered.

The slender wolfblood girl looked up as her boyfriend's face stiffened. Through gritted teeth, he said the one thing she'd never expected to hear.

"Mads, I'm so sorry."

"Sorry?" she hissed. "What are you on about?"

He seemed to be staring fearfully at something behind them, though with the deep pools of shadows thrown out by the cliff, she couldn't see much of anything.

"I thought that by coming with you, I was helping you. But I didn't know…"

"Didn't know what?" she all but growled, her eyes darting to look for whatever he was seeing among the rocks that she wasn't seeing.

"I didn't know that my wolf has its own emotional baggage. I didn't know that by coming with you into the eyethwyd, I'd be attracting danger to both of us too."

"What is it, Rhydian? What are you sensing?" Maddy asked. Rhydian tugged her behind him and took a step forward. With fear and pain dovetailing inside his yellowing eyes, with blackening veins racing up both arms, he urged her.

"Think of home, Maddy. Get out now, while you can. Wake up!"

Maddy protested, with a classic Maddy look as her adorable face morphed into this expression of unyielding determination.

"Rhydian, I'm not leaving you."

And that's when it struck.

A/N - Hey wolfblood friends -

Our favorite wolfblood couple has faced down the grief and jealousy in Maddy's wolf, but can they overcome the challenges from Rhydian's wolf too? That might just be coming up in the next chapter as they explore the dreamworld. I hope you're enjoying the story. Throw out a comment or suggestion if you want to, please! :)

And here's a bonus question related to the next chapter: What do you think are Rhydian's wolf's greatest fears?