So you lot are really giving me food for thought with those reviews, they make me type faster and with a big smile….This chapter deals with Jake learning a little about who he is and where he comes from…things are discussed in this chapter which do not follow cannon but that is a deliberate move by Sam to oppress and twist some of Jake's history, it's not me getting it wrong again…That said conversation in italics are thoughts between the wolves…So read on and as always let me know how you're finding it. Love to all. Tink. XX
La Push- Some hours earlier.
I stared in the mirror hoping for some flash, even a flicker of recognition towards the stranger staring back at me but there was none. Twisting this way and that I studied my reflection, appraising my human self, surprised by what I saw. This was beyond weird. For as long as I could remember, though yeah, it wasn't all that long, I had been a wolf. Furry four legs, liked to growl and snarl.
But now, impossible as it was, I was something else, I was human, like the other members of my pack. I couldn't deny my human side; it was there before me in the mirror. I pictured my face as I had seen it in the memories and thoughts of my pack; the face, which had constantly recurred, the face I had not recognized, was my own.
Not bad looking for a human, even if I did say so myself, I thought with a wry chuckle, and then I paused fascinated by the sound coming from my chest. Laughter. That simple sound evoked another memory, chasing through the shadows of my mind. Laughter like bells tinkling, like a rainbow shattering into a thousand perfect crystalline pieces. A memory stirred inside me at the sound of my own laughter. Yet no matter how hard I tried to recall where I had heard that laughter, that golden, perfect laughter, it remained elusive.
Turning my attention back to myself, I frowned at my reflection. I looked different to how the pack remembered me, even I could see that. The face of their memories was laughing and smiling, my hair trimmed neatly and my body primed, ready for the heat of battle. What stared back at me in the mirror was not the man they had known.
My skin was still a dark russet, but the hair on my head now a long untidy shaggy mess, an inky blue- black color. Good looking I may have been usually but today I looked a mess. My face was coated with a layer of stubble, and grime, my hair knotted and matted. My face scrunched up as I caught a whiff of myself. Ugh. Rank. I smelled like dog, which in my natural wolf form was never a problem but I discovered as a human, my sense of enhanced smell remained and I stank. Showering suddenly moved high on my list of priorities, higher even than finding out just what the hell was going on here.
The thing I found most disturbing about this situation was the fact I wasn't more disturbed by this turn of events. While in my human form it was surprisingly easy to think human thoughts, to act human, so maybe I was human? Maybe I was not a wolf. Maybe I was just crazy.
Lost in my thoughts I still heard the bathroom door open behind me and I turned to see my alpha watching me somewhat warily, as though he still expected me to lash out at any time. Did I really appear that unstable?
"How are you holding up Jake?" he asked his eyes meeting mine in the mirror.
Jake. That, apparently, was my human name. And though it should feel familiar it did not. I shrugged, not sure what he wanted me to say.
"Have you remembered anything? Do you know where you are? Do you know what you are?"
"Well as sure as shit I'm not a wolf anymore" was about the only response I could muster up.
"You are still a wolf but you are also Jacob Black… you are two parts of the same person"
"How is this even possible? I mean just what the hell is going on? Am I fucking crazy?" I asked him, knowing that as my alpha, he had all the answers. I turned away from the mirror to look at him and he smiled just barely.
"You want to take this outside? I think Emily is a little worried that you're spending so much time in this bathroom…I've told her you're house broken but I don't think she believes me"
I chuckled despite myself, understanding the humor. Another surprise. I guess I was more human than I had first thought. Following my alpha, Sam I think he said his name was earlier, I studied the house as we passed through it. Pictures of the pack decorated every available surface and I managed to match faces with wolf forms, their colorings and body language were similar, making spotting them easy. They all looked so similar to me that it was almost eerie, all dark skin, eyes and hair in variety of shades and shapes.
We headed out the door, Sam bestowing a quick kiss as he passed his mate, his wife, the humans called it. Emily, I think I heard him say.
"How are you feeling?" he asked her, resting his huge hand on her ever expanding stomach.
She grinned up at him and then looked down at her belly with a gentle smile as she rubbed it slowly. I watched mutely.
"Like I can't remember the last time I saw my toes…seriously Sam if I get any bigger you are going to have to roll me out of here when the time comes" she giggled gently and then stopped abruptly, a frown appearing on her face, the scar puckering one corner.
"Are you okay?" Sam asked sharply and I recognized his alpha tone immediately, hearing the concern for his mate.
She nodded and a smile appeared again but it was forced "Just think this little one is using my internal organs as a football, we all knew shifter babies are big… I'm okay really"
Despite what she said I could hear the tiredness in his voice, take in the fatigue in her eyes, the slight droop to her posture. Carrying her young was a hard task.
"You sure? That's been happening a lot recently…maybe you should see you ObGyn" he said softly, his tone changing in a heartbeat as he tenderly kissed the side of her badly scarred face.
"Sam, it's fine really, I mean there can't be much room left to move in there now, anyway it's just a little niggle, perfectly normal, everything is getting squished up inside me…go on you and Jake have a lot to talk about…tell him will you Jake, he'll listen to you"
"He will?" I repeated and then rolled my eyes at how dumb and childish, I sounded. Still it was a shock that my alpha would listen to me over his own mate. Interesting. Maybe the dynamics of our relationships and hierarchy of our pack were not as simple as I'd first thought. The times when the rest of the pack deferred to me suddenly made more sense.
"Emily" he chastised but leant down to kiss her anyway "Take it easy, and if you need me send Seth… We're going for a run"
Neither Emily or I could miss the excited glint in his eyes, his broad grin, that shifted and settled as he stared down into her eyes.
There was something about the look that passed between them that stirred an echo within me. A feeling of longing erupted in my heart, so powerful that it shook me to my core. It was as though I was missing something, as though I had forgotten something vital. Seeing them together reminded me of someone but I couldn't say who, someone who should be in my pack but was not here. It was an uncomfortable feeling, nagging at the front of my brain but it passed as we headed out of the house and towards the beach.
I could hear the roar of the waves, the crash as they broke against the sand, smell the salt in the air. All seemed peaceful.
"So how is being a human again?"
"It's a little weird but then it feels… right at the same time, I don't mind telling you, it's fucking bizarre" I mused and he chuckled again.
"Yeah I can imagine" he paused and we walked a little further," so, you don't remember anything about where you've been for the last year…or who we are or where we came from?"
I shook my head "All I know is that one minute I'm a giant fucking dog and then the next I'm a human, how the fuck does that happen?"
"You remember those bloodsuckers who caught you?" he said bitterly and I could hear the hate and anger in his normally level tone.
I nodded, a vague recollection of the people who'd brought Sam to me, I couldn't see their faces really, more like a misty memory of their scents and I felt a warning growl rumble in my chest. The animal in me warred to be free at the thought of them. In this whole mess there was one thing I was clear about, they were my enemy and they had to be destroyed.
"Well those are the Cullen's," he spat out "they've lived in this area a while now-"
"-So how does that explain what happened to us?" I interjected, impatient and anxious to know what part they played in my duel reality.
"…Our people believe that we are descended from Wolves and for a long time everyone thought it was just a legend but when the Cullen's moved here… it became more than legend… To put it simply we exist… because they do" he told me and I couldn't miss the undertone of bitterness in his voice.
I briefly wondered what had caused it; I could only see the advantage of being an animal, of being my wolf. It was living as a human I was going to have trouble with.
"So because those filthy bloodsuckers live nearby we have to turn in giant dogs?"
He nodded, and smiled humorlessly.
"That's about the jist of it…our duty is protect human life…protect people from the Cullen's and their kind"
I scanned the area around us and a thought occurred to me. They hunted in the same way we did, it was their nature to hunt and to kill humans, in the same way mine was to hunt and kill them "Why haven't we spotted them when we've patrolled?"
"We have a kind of treaty with them, we don't tell people what they are and they don't come on the res…usually"
"Usually?" this intrigued me, there were times he had let those fucking bloodsuckers onto his land? And they had left unscathed? He hadn't killed them? He hadn't torn them limb from limb when he had the chance?
"There have been times in the past when they have had to come here but that doesn't matter anymore…they won't come here now, I've made sure of it"
I digested what he had told me "How do you do it?"
"Do what?"
"Know that they exist but not kill them, they're blood suckers, killers, murderers… they should all be wiped off the face of the fucking earth" I snarled, angry that these abominations, these creatures should be allowed to go about their lives while innocent people could be in danger.
He grinned broadly, looking absurdly pleased with himself but I didn't understand why "The only thing stopping me wiping out every fucking last one of them is that damn treaty…if we kill even a one of them, they can start a war and it's not worth putting the pack in danger…they say their different and not like others of their kind… but if it looks like a bloodsucker and acts like a bloodsucker then it's a bloodsucker"
"The pack can handle itself… we could take them Sam I know we could…we've done it before…haven't we?"
He looked me at with surprise and if I wasn't mistaken a little bit of fear on his face, his tone was cautious, wary even "You remember?"
I shook my head but I knew instinctively, we had killed bloodsuckers before; I could almost taste their blood on my tongue, feel the satisfaction of the kill surge through me " No but I know we have, I can feel it…maybe it's something I picked up from the pack"
"Yeah we've killed them before…and I know the time will come when we can kill them again…then we can be normal again" he assured me, a glint in his eyes.
I felt my wolf then, restless inside me and I felt as though I could shift in a single instant. My body begin to tremble and shake. Beside me I felt Sam's eyes on me, watching me warily.
"You need to shift?" he sounded defensive, almost growling the not quite question not quite command at me.
I nodded but completely unsure as to what to do. It must have shown on my face as I trembled and shook, my body filling with energy, I felt about ready to jump out of my skin, literally.
"Just follow your instincts Jake, you were the fastest of us all when it came to phasing on the go…it should be as easy and as natural as breathing to you" he told me with a feral smile and only a second later, a wolf stood beside me.
It was almost a challenge, as though he were provoking me to shift quicker than he had, and I was more than ready to face it.
I felt my body shake violently but rather than resist I let it happen, hearing the familiar hissing sound as my clothes tore as I took on my wolf form. Sam had been right, it was easy when you knew it was meant.
"See Jake, easy as breathing" he thought and I could have sworn his tongue hung from his mouth in a doggy grin.
"Take me to those blood sucking bastards, take me to their lair… I want to get their scent, so when I see them, I can take them down one by one"
"Jake I don't think that's a good idea…yet…you're still getting used to your human form, exposing you to the Cullen's could stop you shifting back"
"So?" I almost growled in my head, amused by the notion Sam would not want to be a wolf permanently. At the moment it felt more natural than in my human form, as though I had been born a wolf and had shifted into human rather than the other way around.
"So we just got you back Jake, the pack would kill me if you went Feral again…besides we've got plenty of time to get those bloodsuckers…trust me, they will come to us"
"How can you be so sure?"
He grinned again, his tongue lolling out of the corner of his mouth
"Because we have something they want"
"Yeah? What's that?"
"You Jake, a long time ago, a very long time ago…you were …acquaintances with one of them but all that changed when they did"
I digested this new information; I had been friends with a bloodsucker. That seemed as impossible to me, as the fact I could change into a human at will.
"It was years ago now Jake and they mean nothing to you now...the one they call Bella chose to become a monster and you chose the pack instead"
I rolled her name around in my head, waiting for an accompanying memory. There was nothing. Nada.
"But soon there will come a time when they will make a mistake and then-" Sam began, his thoughts victorious.
"Then we can have them?"
"The treaty Jake"
"Fuck the treaty, isn't the preservation of human life more important than some treaty written hundreds of years ago?" I snarled inside my head.
"I agree with you Jake but not all the pack will, lets keep this quiet for now"
I wanted to laugh, the pack mind was a shared mind, and how he planned to keep this from them was beyond me.
"There are ways Jake," he told me laughingly. "Now are we going to hunt or sit here talking all night?"
I growled low in my throat to show my approval and I sprinted forward into the shadows. Being human was okay but nothing compared to this, the strength the speed, being at one with the earth around me. The animal in me broke free, all thoughts of the bloodsuckers forgotten…for now.