Chapter 32

"Discernment"

I am still dreaming. There was no other way to explain the sudden shift of my surroundings. The creatures coiled within the Doom Seers' minds had wrapped around my consciousness and pulled me into their own. It was a very curious place, made to look like the outdoors. Mountainous, but not of this range. The rocks were steeper and shaped differently. The trees, thinner, but densely spaced. A low lying mist curled around the ground. It rose in the distance like a fog, preventing me from seeing too far ahead.

The small patch of mossy grass I stood upon led to two heaps of rocks that resembled man made mounds. Most of the edges were smooth and slick with age. A large red gate made of wood rose up behind them. One post for each mound with a stairway into the mist between them. A second gate mirrored it behind me. It marked the portal that led back to the void of the dream world where I came from. They were old and faded gateways vital to maintaining the threshold of this place. I was trapped here until the creatures released their hold or I freed myself.

The blue and red strings that ensnared me came out from the gate behind me and ended at the posts of the gateway ahead of me. Talismans dangled down from their threads. What they meant, I did not know, but my captors probably did. There were two of them. Nine tailed foxes. One reclined on each of the stone beds. They stared at me as I arrived, mirroring one another in poise and form and beauty like living statues. Fraternal twins. The female had red eyes and beige fur shaded in varying undertones of gold. The male had blue eyes and grey fur highlighted in silver. All of their nine tails were long and luminous, dipped in fire and ice respectively.

The foxes had to be old to have such tails. Very old, for it felt and sounded like a great old forest when they moved. Their red and blue eyes turned purple when they focused on me at the same time. Their spiritual pressure was enormous, but light, like the mist around us. Mysterious and unknown. Yet again, I found myself standing before a High Spirit.

"We are the Gate Keepers of Sun and Moon," they said simultaneously. "Are you the new Key Master?"

Foxes and their riddles. They were far more cunning than the Mighty Hena. It was unwise to engage them. Especially when their mouths did not move when they spoke. In my silence, the woods and mist began to whisper. I dared not listen too closely. The foxes continued to stare at me. Heads turning as they heard something in the gossiping woods about me.

"How many tails do you have?" the Blue Fox of the Moon suddenly asked, eyes returning to normal as his thoughts separated from his sister's.

More tricks.

The Red Fox of the Sun suddenly appeared beside me, circling and examining me in ways only creatures with psychic inclinations could. I tensed, but otherwise remained still, letting her come close.

"Seven. Maybe more. Four at least," she observed.

The blue fox also materialized beside me, falling into step on the opposite side of his sister's circle. He too came close, looking and watching and probing with his senses.

"Seven," he affirmed, and I suddenly felt like a trophy of some kind.

An object who's worth was equal to the number of tails it had. Nine reaching divine proportions, of course. I turned my face away as their tails brushed against me in an unwelcomed embrace.

"What a clever cloak you wear," he went on. "It veils your secrets, even from us."

"Shall I pull the hood back a little?" the red fox asked as the two came to stand in front of me, forgetting I could hear them, thinking I could not stop them.

The red fox suddenly appeared face to face before me with a hypnotizing look in her eye.

"May I take a peek?" she said, not asking.

I replied with a vision of snapping teeth, the burning black death, leaping from my red eyes into hers. The foxes startled away, laughing and dancing and disappearing into the mist. They reappeared on their mossy thrones a few moments later, pleasantly amused with the touch of my bite. Foxes treasured mystery and elusive truths. The darkness their psychic advances had no effect on made for a playful mistress. I had no time for games.

"Let me pass," I said, referring to my physical body and this so called gate they were keeping watch over.

"And why would we do that?" they asked, lazily twirling the tips of their tails.

"Because I let you live."

The red and blue threads passing through the gate behind me twitched, still feeling my jaws at their necks. The blue fox tilted his head.

"You regret it," he observed of the decision I made in the void.

No matter how much I tried to contain my heart, my hooded cloak still rippled when the pressure of the two foxes blew against me. It revealed glimpses of my inner most thoughts and feelings.

"Such remorse," the red fox commented, having watched more closely. "But not for yourself or for us."

And then she saw something I could never hide, the shadow on my back, and it changed the way she looked at me. Her tails drifted around to lay at her paws.

"You have no sun," she softly realized before she looked at her brother, understanding my heart without the aid of my thoughts because it was a feeling she herself dreaded. The shadow of death I carried was the very same one she feared the most, which made me her living nightmare.

"A moon without a sun neither waxes nor wanes," the blue fox picked up, meeting his sister's gaze and coming to understand. "It is nothing but darkness."

Their eyes turned purple as they looked at one another, sharing something. Their connection was a blessing they could boast before me. An attack that did more damage to my heart and mind and Spirit than a single one of their psychic advances or burning tails. Their eyes returned to normal again as they broke contact to look at me.

"And yet that is not what weighs your heart," the red fox added.

These ancient ones were powerful indeed. They could tell I thought of Father, as I did every day, but especially of his death in this moment. How Exile challenged Father for his rank so greedy was his desires for power and Spirit and love. They fought. Father had Exile by the throat, but instead of closing his bite, he pulled back. Father did not want to kill Exile because he already killed so many in the Bone Wars. The pack lost many then too. Those times stayed with him even when they were over.

Father could not bear to kill one of our own, especially when Exile was so strong in Spirit. He was Blessed. Back then, we still believed Dark Star was capable of bringing light. But Dark Star perverted his gifts. He drew upon dark forces and killed the last of his light when he capitalized on Father's mercy and mortally wounded him in return. It was an unclean bite. A slow death.

Mercy did not belong in the wild.

It killed my beloved. I never understood why Father chose mercy, the unbalanced way. He knew the risks. Yet he decided against all law and luck and logic of the wild. It cost him everything and the pack suffered for it. I suffered. And here I was having done the same for less. Sparing these foxes and Doom Seers. The Red Fox of the Sun was right. It was not the danger I was in or the grief of Father's death that troubled me, but the realization that I, too, had shown mercy. That I was no longer balanced.

What would become of my pack because of it?

"Let me pass," I said again.

"And if we don't?" the foxes chimed together.

I thought of My Cub now. Runner and the pack down in the valley. The threats that would cascade down the mountain into the grasslands if I did not stop them here and now. I lowered my head, teasing a glimpse of my long luxurious black mane and tail. The shadow on my back.

"I will kill you."

The mist behind me began to condense. It darkened to stormy proportions within the confines of the gate. The blue and red threads wobbled with the winds of the growing storm beyond. It was my domain, knocking at the gate. The foxes lost their smiles. They abandoned their playful postures.

"Why have you come?" they demanded of me.

Such insolence.

"Because you brought me," I barked back.

As obvious as my statement was to me, these foxes never saw things so clearly. They looked at one another with the great wonder of unexpected enlightenment. The titles they called themselves and asked of me suddenly came to mind. Gate Keeper. Key Master. I could have been no simpler, my message no clearer, and yet, I knew I triggered something within the foxes' dreamy workings because their eyes turned bright purple again.

"Catcher of the Sun." "House of the Moon." They exchanged between one another more to the mist around us than to me.

This would get us nowhere.

"I come on behalf of Bear Country," I said to better explain my purpose.

"Expect a bear." "Greet a wolf." They bounced back and forth.

Was I this wolf?

"Ask for an army." "Receive a warrior."

Were they disappointed?

"Look for a Key." "Find a lock."

They were even worse than Doom Seers and Brown Owls.

"Enough," I barked.

I would have to stoop to their level.

The foxes paused, red and blue gazes meeting mine once again.

"Where you have failed, I will make right," I said, matching their rhythm of speech, telling them everything and nothing in true fox fashion. "What you have washed in water. I will clean in blood."

In a great grace of Spirit, not only did the foxes understand, but they adapted to the Mighty Hena way of speaking.

"You come to claim the moon altar?" "To clear away the curses?"

"Big Sister." "Little Death." They quickly reverted.

I lifted my head and relaxed the darkness of the gate, lowering my tail. These foxes were not the object of my hunt. The enemy still lay ahead. But I would never reach my goal if I let them continue like this. I must gain something from this to aid my hunt. I looked to the silver fox with blue eyes. My kin under the moon.

"How did you lose the altar?" I asked for it might help me reclaim it.

He was not offended by the condemning nature of my words.

"I am the Gate Keeper. My strength lies in my boundaries," he explained because it was a matter of fact, not a matter of weakness. "Inside is just as free as the outside. I merely mark the in between."

Which meant nothing but a headache.

"We were betrayed," the red fox added, bristling at the treachery her twin brother so coolly acknowledged.

"By who?"

"Shadows of sight." "Prophets of darkness."
Doom Seers. Of course.

"Then the prophets I am with," I began, referring to the state of my physical body and the two Doom Seers who were undoubtedly keeping a careful eye on me while I conversed with the foxes."

"Will do you no harm," the foxes quickly joined together.

"They are no master." "But our eyes."

Spies more like it. I shuddered to think of the mental damage inflicted to make them such useful puppets. The foxes probably thought it a great triumph and challenge to defeat a creature of darkness, their greatest enemies.

"Then you know of the war in the valley. The treachery in bear country. The coming of the full moon," I said.

"We know all," they answered, dreamy and cloudy and so very annoying.

At least they knew what I must do.

"We will let you pass," they said, cutting my criticism of their failings short, "but you must take our hounds with you."

I dreaded the thought, so I deflected it.

"Why not use them to clear the altar?"

"They are not strong enough to fight alone."

They were not alone. They had each other. Which told me the Spirit of the pack did not exist within them. Probably because of the nature of Seers and the foxes' influence.

"You will need them in this quest," they tried to convince me.

Two Doom Seers imbued with the power of tricksters and mystics following me around offered no comfort or reassurance.

"We are confined by a curse," the foxes explained, "but if you break it, we can resume our rightful place."

They said nothing of taking responsibility, but I was in no position to argue. My physical body was their hostage. So I turned away to return to my self. The foxes did not stop me. At this point, they could not. I had regained my energy. I wanted to leave this place as soon as possible, but there was something here that tickled my paws. I looked back. The foxes' words remained with me despite my defenses. It was probably an after effect of their soul readings.

"Seven tails," I said, referring to the special way they appraised me.

Like bears and color, Mighty Hena and howls, horses and heat, it was their way with the Spirit. Another way to understand it. Of which, I was always willing to learn.

"What do you mean?"

"Seven tails." "Seven secrets." The foxes started up, enjoying the chance to look and guess and tease me again.

"You were born with the blessings of light and dark," they counted as one.

"Then, long ago" "you were given the gifts of grass and ground."

Two more.

"You countered the curses of poison" "and poltergeist."

"Received the rite of the river" "and fostered the festival of fire."

"Seven tails." "Seven teeth."

"Use them wisely."

Their amethyst eyes flared once more. I turned away and trotted into the portal. As the mist swirled around me, I flicked my tail for good measure, showing the unblinking foxes exactly what I thought of their riddles.