Just tell me what you're thinking. At this point, the story is just about over. Too bad. No more sequels or anything after this. Possibly going to be at the most, four more chapters. Plus an epilogue.
Chapter 17
Shape shifter in the Crater
So I was holding Lin, my eyes on the hands groping on the edge of the ledge, with a growing sense of horror. I started to realize what kind of situation I was in. I could abandon Lin, something I would never do, and climb up after Aurelias. Leaving Lin would slow down the Yetis, but I could never, ever bring myself to do that. So with a moment of thought, and dread filling my stomach, I called out.
"Aurelias!" I yelled brashly, the wind whipping away my words and making them echo around the mountains, "If you help us, I'll let you go!"
But I wasn't so incautious and brazen. I didn't say exactly when I'd let him go. And I hoped he didn't notice.
He turned to me, his pink eyes narrowing in confusion and wariness. He hesitated – but soon he seemed to come to a decision. He stopped climbing – and threw himself off the face of the mountain.
His shape wavered as he fell, becoming distorted and blurry, until he was a white streak that landed on the ledge without a sound. There was a roar, a bit like the white bear he was, with the same hints of scorn. But it was crueler and louder and higher pitched, turning into a shrilling snarl that made my ears hurt. Aurelias was a white, spotted cat.
But not just any cat. He was a leopard, a snow leopard, one that threw itself at the Yetis, clawing at their faces and scratching at their eyes, screaming out his triumph as his enemies fell. The pack of supplies was still on his back, but now that he was much smaller than a human, the straps hung loose. I watched as a Yeti pulled at it, ripping the straps. And I watched as it fell off, down on the rocks below. That was our last bag of supplies.
Aurelias seemed not to notice. He jumped onto the back of a Yeti, his back claws tearing off the think fur, digging in to the skin underneath. He savaged the throat of one, and it fell off the ledge, a scream on its wrinkled lips petering off into a whimper when it hit the bottom with a loud, sickening crunch.
And after he attacked and killed every Yeti, did he sit down and lick his fur, pushing the bodies off with a disgusted face. Then Aurelias turned to me, his pink tongue licking at the Yetis' blood staining his bright white fur.
"Now that's done. I expect you need her fixed,"-he nodded at Lin, his tongue fixing a patch of fur into place,-"I'll be right back." He leapt up, his tail swishing from side to side, and jumped from rock to rock, until he was out of sight.
I cradled Lin's head in my arms, sighing. We huddled behind a rock, out of the bitter, blasting wind. I closed my eyes, ignoring my common sense which told me that those who went to sleep in the cold never woke up again.
It was a clicking sound that woke me, like a hammer gently tapping a nail. There was a crunch, and then Aurelias was standing, in leopard form, on the rock that I was crouched behind.
He held a bawling kid in his mouth, a baby mountain goat, its eyes dilated with fear. There was blood trickling down its legs. And Aurelias shook it in his jaws, trying to make it shut up, but all it did was make it cry louder. It was piteous bleat, and it made me look away.
Aurelias jumped in front of me, the goat dangling from his jaws. He dropped it on the ground. "This is for her. You want to get to the Roof, right? It has enough life force to heal her wound. Are you just going to sit there and stare at it? Take the life before it dies. It'll be food when you're done. Do you want me to kill it for you?" He pushed the goat forwards with his black padded paw.
I nodded, a lump in my throat. I had never purposely killed a mammal before, and didn't intend to start. Aurelias sighed, and a single claw popped out his paw.
"Put her hand on its neck, on the jugular, yes, right there." He requested, a look of superiority on his face. He lowered his paw.
As I arranged Lin's hand on the neck of the goat, his claw swiped down like a tiny dagger, cutting a two inch incision next to Lin's fingertips. The blood started to drip down, forming puddles on the ground which quickly froze in the cold.
As Lin's fingers lay in the blood, a white misty substance drifted from the cut. The goat had stopped twitching, and its eyes were rolling around its head. It moved less and less, as more the white stuff emanated from it. The stuff was absorbed by Lin. It twisted around her writes and forearms, to form a white cloud around her midsection, where she was impaled by the stalagmite.
Aurelias and I watched, but his attention was more on the goat, which had stopped jerking and lay still, in death. The cloud was forming thicker around Lin's stomach.
"All the life is gone now," Aurelias declared, "We can't cook it, because other Yetis on the mountain will be alerted of our presence; they've probably found the bodies of their comrades by now. We'll have to eat it raw. No problem for me, or her, either."
His claw, stained at the tip with blood, went to the dead goat's stomach. "As neither of you mortals are in a condition to skin and gut it, I will have to do the honors." He grinned, showing off a menacing set of teeth. Was that a strip of Yeti fur in there?
Aurelias sliced a neat, straight cut with his claw. The offal fell out, landing on the ground with a soft squelch. He grinned, a strange looking face for a cat. He began to gut the goat; pulling out the intestines and cracking the ribs open to remove the heart and lungs. His once immaculate fur was now stained with red blood that matched the color of his crimson eyes.
After he was done, there was a pile of guts and other internal organs on the rocky, frozen ground. The he started pulling back the pale white skin of the goat, revealing the dark red meat. He sliced off square chunks, which he placed with care on a flat slab of rock. They landed with a plop! and dripped blood.
"This'll be your dinner. Enjoy it." He turned away, tearing at the remnants of the goat, and coating his white whiskers with blood.
"Lin!" I looked over to her, and I saw that the white mist that had surround her abdomen in a ring was now gone. She smiled weakly at me, and crawled over the small pile of meat.
"I'm so hungry. There's only this meat, right?" She poked it with her index finger, and a few drips of blood oozed out. She cupped her hands and picked it up, biting in deeply, the blood trickling down her chin. I was reminded of someone eating a very juicy orange, but this was way more disgusting.
"Yeah, Aurelias lost the last pack fighting the Yetis. I guess we have to eat it. I mean, if we have to get to the Roof of the World." And so I steeled myself and ate the horrible squashy meat. I gulped down the wet squares, wincing at the taste of iron, and wishing I had some water to wash away the taste. I felt the blood, and tried to ignore it, wiping it on my sleeve before it could dry on my face and leave me with a red goatee.
After we were done, Lin buried the bones and offal of the meat, and we set off. We moved faster than before, because we weren't burdened down by the heavy packs. But we had no food either. Our feet tramped over the snow, leaving deep footprints.
I wished we had snowshoes, because we were using so much energy, and we didn't have food. But our feet indented the snow, and sun started to set, stretching our shadows till they were a hundred feet behind us, making us look like giants, not two kids and a cat.
In a way, I envied Aurelias. He could eat what he wanted with ease, and his thickly padded furry feet made sure that he didn't sink into the snow. Even though he was a prisoner of the gods and in exile.
Lin's breath clouded the bitter air. "We can't keep going like this. It's sunset. And since we're in this little glacial valley or whatever, there are no rocks big enough to get behind to get away from the wind that's picking up. We have to get to the Roof. It's set in a sort of crater in the top of the mountain. Or else we'll freeze to death."
"Aurelias!" She called, over the voice of the howling wind, "we need you!"
He padded over, his feet leaving light, feathery imprints in the snow behind him. He scowled; disdain was dripping almost visibly from his mouth. "What do you want now? I saved you from the Yetis, I brought you food!"
"We need to get to the roof. There's a cold wind here, and in a few hours, it'll start to freeze us in our tracks. Walking is too slow; we need to get out of this valley. I need you to turn into a mountain sheep or what ever indigenous creature with sure feet." She demanded, blowing on her hands for warmth.
"Whatever my mistress commands." Aurelias bowed, and his voice was cold, even more frigid than the wind. "But remember, my mistress promised to set her faithful servant free. I hope you'll be remembering your bargain." And with that, his legs started to stretch, and horns burst from his head, curling around and around. They formed a tight spiral, and his spots started to disappear, leaving him with shaggy white fur.
But the think that stayed constant about him were his eyes: flat pupiled, but still the dark pink in all of his forms. He also kept his personality – his calculating viciousness, and his cruel hatred for the gods and everything related to them.
Aurelias got to his knees, burying them in the snow. Lin got on first, her fingers clutching the curling ram's horns. I mounted with hesitation; I was afraid he'd try and throw us off. But he didn't. He just got to his feet, heaved a sigh, and began bounding over the rocks.
The wind tore at us, making our teeth chatter and our fingers numb. But we were moving, faster than we ever could make it walking. Aurelias leapt from rock ledge to overhang, from clumps of ice to patches of sharp, slippery, solidified snow. He never lost his footing or slipped, and propelled us higher and higher to the Roof of the World.
I fell asleep on his back, so tired. I had been sorely stressed, and hadn't slept in a day of carrying Lin and climbing rocks. I kept a firm grip around Lin's waist, and closed my eyes.
I fell on the ground with a thud. My eyes fluttered open, and I saw Lin on her knees, her chest heaving, trying to get her wind back. I lay on my back, and propped myself up on my elbows.
I surveyed my surroundings. There was a ridge enveloping this shallow pit; it circled this flat piece of earth. The sun was weak and high, and the sky was a bright blue; no clouds were in sight.
"We're too high up, that's why there aren't any clouds." Lin noted, casually looking around us. "We're in the crater, at the Roof of the World. There's supposed to some kind of 'Root of Time' thing here. In other words, a time machine. Father Time created it years ago, linking the present to the past and future. I wonder if it's still here."
"Aye, it's still here." It came from the right of us, where there was a bear with a chain around his neck. Aurelias.
"It's around that rock pile, over there." He indicated with his snout. "I saw it earlier; I am not sure if it's still functional after millennia of silence and nonuse. But theoretically, it should work perfectly fine. Better hurry up and let me go; I hear some of Kronos's minions trying to climb up here; they'll be on you in a few minutes." His round, white ears twitched in the direction of the ridge.
Lin and I ran forwards, closer to the center of the crater. And set in the exact middle, surrounded by the walls of the crater, was a glittering round loop made of ice.
It was a twisted loop, more like a Möbius Strip than anything else. And it was made of clear, flawless ice. It was about twelve feet tall with enough room through the middle for a single person to walk through.
"Hurry up!" Aurelias growled, "You promised!" He loped toward us, his huge paws sending up flurries of snow. "They'll be on us in less than a minute now!"
There was a roar that came from the ridge. And then there was a huge explosion, and a part of the ridge was gone, turning into rocky rubble that slid down the mountain, bringing down sheets of snow that would turn into an avalanche near the base.
Monstrous soldiers with beaten bronze armor and rotating points on their spears bellowed, shaking their horned heads. Large, yellow, pointed teeth jutted out from their bottom lips; their cloven feet made them surefooted over the uneven ground.
Valkyries, clad in heavy furs, handling battle axes with ease, stalked forwards, tossing their blonde hair in the wind. And more monsters followed, entering through the gap in the crater ridge.
"Set me free!" thundered Aurelias, pawing the ground. He pulled back his lips in an annoyed growl, and his claws popped out with a schick! "Or we must fight. But to what end?"
Author's Note: Don't worry, I'm not going to quit writing after this. I have a few ideas for another PJO fic. Or two.
One thing about me: I don't really like using canon characters. Because then I'm restrained to the original author's personality for them, and I'd rather not have that. So, most probably, my other stories will feature original characters.
And once again, I'm too lazy to just finish this chapter and not leave this as a cliff hanger. But my hand hurts, because I slammed a window shutter closed on my finger, and it bled and partially cracked a nail. So I'm obviously not writing this for just my own benefit.
But this is a forty percent extra text chapter, and you'll just have to make do with what you've got.