Unfamiliar Territory - Chapter 5 (Early Access) (Patreon)

They walked in a semi-comfortable silence for about an hour, Tove leading as though she were connected to her home by a piece of string buried in her chest; completely sure of every step. The further from magical civilisation they hiked, the busier the environment became. Crowded trees, bushes and weeds climbed over each other, growing untamed and entangled without outside manipulation. No neat and tidy topiaries or carefully arranged orchards, the woods got wilder the further they got into them. Despite the fuller coverage from above, the heat of the afternoon pressed against Chloe’s skin, urging her to stop exerting energy.

Tove broke her thoughts of dropping everything and laying out under the widest tree. “Aside from being kept close to you, is there anything else I should know about this pet situation?” said without nearly enough concern.

“Familiar,” Chloe corrected politely. “And, yes.”

Tove spun on her toes, walking backwards but continuing to lead. Her head tilt beckoned explanation. It almost made her appear puppy-like.

“It depends on the divinity of the witch." Chloe began counting off on her fingers, tapping the tips as she went. "And the species of animal, and the strength of the bond between them, but special spells and skills can be learnt.”

Tove's grin brightened, excitement alighting her eyes. “We can create our own secret magic tricks?”

It was so multi-faceted and complex that Chloe couldn’t find a starting point to explain familiar-specific magic. Her mother could see through her raven’s eyes, and Nyx could do the same back. Agnes, Professor Vlahos’ cat familiar, could shift through solid matter on the command of the tender-hearted teacher. How to put that into words for someone who knew nothing of magic?

“Kind of,” Chloe answered. “At this point it’s more important that I avoid imperatives.” Said slowly, suddenly overly aware of her speech. “As you’ll be inclined to…” She looked away and fiddled with her backpack straps. “Obey.”

Tove snorted into laughter.

“It’s not funny!” Not even a little bit. Maybe she hadn’t made it clear enough just how dire the situation was. Or maybe Tove truly didn’t care. Chloe wasn’t sure which option worried her more. “You’re a person, I don’t want to accidentally force you into something you don’t want to do.”

“How considerate,” Tove teased, still backing her way through the forest, weaving between trees she could sense approaching. “Do I get belly rubs, too?”

Chloe choked on nothing, which Tove took as her answer and turned away again, smile still in place. Whatever gave Tove her intense inner peace, Chloe desperately craved a slice. Silence fell once more, and on they trekked.

If Tove was bothered by the stale pace, she didn’t say as much, but Chloe knew if she tried to hurry she’d end up scuffed and scraped. Brambles and branches reached for her clothes, roots rose underfoot, and despite the hot and dry weather, her boots still managed to slip a little on leaves.

“Can we stop for a drink?” she gasped.

Tove chuckled. “Of course." She spun again, this time letting her back fall against a nearby tree trunk for pause. She crossed her ankles as she leaned. "You’re not the one on a leash.”

Chloe could tell she was teasing, but guilty flutters filled her stomach regardless. Her water jar was tucked into the side of her backpack, easy to root for. After a few gulps, she offered it to Tove, who declined with a gentle wave of her hand. It was far more difficult to get the jar back in the pack than it had been to get it out, but eventually they were on their way again.

Within just a few minutes, hunger set in. Chloe was grateful for Tove's back being to her so she could grimace at her own body's inconvenience. Compared to Tove, she was a toddler, needing constant care and attention. Why couldn't she just walk in a straight line for a while without her body needing something? It didn't feel like her body needed this much attendance usually, but she supposed living alone in the cabin had allowed her to follow her own schedule without tracking how often she was eating and drinking. At the academy these things were scheduled for her.

Loudly, Chloe’s stomach betrayed her.

Tove's footfall slowed. “Want to stop for a snack?” Asked with far more patience than she deserved.

“I put all the food at the bottom of the pack,” Chloe admitted, sheepish. “I didn’t think we’d need it till we set up camp and had dinner.”

“It would be a waste to end the day so early, we have a lot of ground to cover.” Tove paused, as though considering her next words carefully. She decided to proceed. “And your legs are short.”

An indignant squeak caught in Chloe’s throat. Her height was average, thank you very much. For magic folk, that was. If Tove considered her short, she was a little intimidated at the thought of the average werewolf height.

“Come on, let’s find something to eat.” Tove turned from the straight direction they had been following, her internal compass true and strong, and detoured into the brambles. With her superior leg length she was able to step over the spikes easily. Chloe followed very carefully.

“I should probably mention that I’m a vegetarian,” Chloe announced. “I don’t eat any animals.”

“I noticed,” Tove chuckled. “Don’t worry, we’re not tracking bunnies.”

Even the thought hurt her heart. Poor bunnies.

When Tove paused, so did Chloe. When Tove sniffed at the air, Chloe did, too. She didn’t smell anything new, though. Nature had a wonderful scent to it, but it tended to be the same in every part of the forest she ventured into. When Tove’s face split into a grin and she took off again, Chloe returned to her heels.

“What did you smell?” Chloe asked quietly.

Tove appeared excited to share. “The sweet scent of rotting fruit.”

“Oh.” Chloe cleared her throat. “Yum.”

“Where there is fallen fruit, you will usually find ripe fruit on the tree.”

Chloe made an 'o' with her mouth and nodded her head. “I see.”

Tove gave her a strange look, but it quickly dissolved back into a grin. “I can smell plums and apples, any preference?”

Plums sounded sweeter, but they wouldn't fill her grumbling stomach. “Apples, please, if it’s all the same to you.”

Tove pointed out in a direction that was not clear to traverse through. A wall of bush. This was not Chloe’s place to question, she simply waited for Tove to stomp through and create a path. Off Tove went, trampling through without concern, and on Chloe went, following through bent and battered branches.

After a few minutes of walking, Chloe could smell their target, too.

An enormous tree blocked all the light in a wide circumference around the thick trunk. The bark was dark and cracked, ancient. Chloe wondered what its exact age was, how many people had eaten from it, if a witch or wizard had even seen it before. The pungent scent of rotting, sugary fruit permeated from the ground, littered with green and brown apples in various stages of decay. Up high, fat and bright apples sprouted haphazardly from the branches with the most cover.

“Make sure to check for bird nips,” was all the warning Chloe got before Tove hoisted her up towards the lowest branches. Long fingers pressed divots into the flesh of her thighs, and the further they lifted her, the more certain she was that Tove could see up her skirt. Would she look? At least one of them was wearing panties. The grip was secure, despite the light layer of sweat Chloe knew she had over her skin. Partly the summer heat and partly the burn of a woman's hands so close to her crotch, squeezing her bare skin as though it was an ordinary occurrence between them. There wasn't a grunt or a groan at her weight, no shake to the arms supporting her.

Chloe’s own arms flailed, unable to discern a nipped apple from a non-nipped apple. If she got her fingers around any of them it would be a monumental success.

"Got them?" The voice definitely came from under her skirt. She felt the puff of breath that came with the called words, it brushed her between her legs.

"Um, almost!" She finally landed a solid grip on a huge apple. It was misshapen, but firm to the touch, and no nips in sight. With a hard tug, it came free, sending the branch ricocheting up into the sky. Her skirt became her basket, the hem held up by one hand while the other snatched at apples wildly. With four viable options knocking against one another in the crease of her skirt, Chloe called down, "I did it!"

The fingers tightened as they slowly lowered her. The back of her skirt was caught on something and bunching in her descent. Tove's voice was muffled through the fabric. "Good job!"

Her legs were released a moment too soon, boots not quite planted in the mushy earth yet. Chloe stumbled back into Tove's crouched lap. The apples jumbled about in her own, but didn't spill. A laugh tickled her ear.

"Sorry!" Somehow she was breathless, although she wasn't the one who had been performing an acrobatic stunt.

Tove just laughed again, and stood them both up.

"Here." Chloe offered her stash, pulling out the hem of her skirt like a market stall. "You take first choice."

Tove inspected them closely, although there was that teasing glint in her eye again. "This one has a worm in it," she said, plucking one from the bunch and pointing out a tiny hole on one side. She tossed it away to join its brown brethren.

Chloe pouted, her sensation of success quickly fading.

"The others look good, though. I'll take this one." She grabbed the smallest of the three.

"You should have the biggest, you did all the heavy lifting," Chloe insisted.

"We can split the biggest one, and you're not heavy." The second part said with a chuckle.

Chloe flushed and took her own apple. She gave it a wipe on her skirt to clean off any pollen and took a bite. It was crunchy, and sweeter than she'd expected. Her lips were quickly coated in juice. Tove was the same, it ran down her forearm to her elbow and dripped off onto the ground, adding to the sweet scent that coated the area. Every one of her teeth were sharp, and the points shone every time they were exposed to the sun. They made Chloe's tummy squeeze.

When she reached the core, she threw it into the mulch. Tove ate hers.

Chloe cleaned the last apple before handing it to Tove. How would they split it? Her knife was at the bottom of her back, along with her fork and spoon. Would they take it in turns to bite? Hold it between their mouths and eat at the same t-

Tove split the enormous apple with her bare hands. The crunch sound reverberated in the cove that the tree created around them. Each half was wider than Chloe's palm. No wonder she didn't consider Chloe to be heavy. They ate their halves while they picked their way back out from under the tree, narrowly avoiding mouldy apple carcasses being picked at by flies and hornets. A frightened gasp when one approached her almost had Chloe choking on her last bite of apple. Tove swatted it away with a laugh.

All that effort for one and a half apples. Chloe wanted to laugh, too, but with incredulity. Tove lifted the tight tank top to scrub her face with the bottom half of the material, flashing Chloe in the process. Chloe sputtered, looking in every direction and stumbling with every step until Tove's breasts weren't staring at her anymore. Dry-faced and red-faced, the pair continued on their journey.

The silence brought a realisation to Chloe. This was her opportunity to learn about another species, probably the only opportunity any witch of her generation would ever have. And she was wasting it by only speaking when she had another silly need. Chloe hurried forward, closing the few steps of gap between them.

“You said that I wasn’t the first witch you’d met," she said.

“True." Not the response that Chloe had been hoping for; she wanted detail.

“I would assume that was quite strange for you and the witch both," Chloe hinted, hoping for a story, an anecdote, anything.

Tove's grin became a little feral. “Am I that strange to come across?”

Naked with a knitted blanket wrapped around her butt? Inexplicable. But Chloe didn’t feel the need to say so.

“Was it an accidental meeting in the forest?” The idea sparked hope in her chest, that the natural magic divinity wasn’t fading out. Others were interested, too. “How recently did you meet them?”

“A very long time ago,” Tove answered. “My one and only introduction to magic folk was as a child.” She shrugged. “I don’t remember it.”

“But… how?” Urging her to remember something.

“My parents needed advice, and they couldn’t get the answers they needed in the pack. They went outside to investigate. The witches weren’t any help, so we all came home.”

Chloe scrunched her mouth and Tove laughed again.

“I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I was this-” She crouched to hold her palm a foot above the ground. “big at the time, I remember nothing.”

Chloe was disappointed, but she did her best not to show it. She nodded to herself, turning over all the possibilities for werewolves requiring magical input. What could be worth crossing their kinds for? And had the magic folk been truthful in not having the answers the werewolves needed? She was deep in her own thoughts, letting her legs follow Tove instinctually, when that unladylike feeling from the morning returned.

"Um."

"Something wrong?"

Chloe sighed. "I have to pee."

Tove chuckled, but Chloe wouldn't blame her for wanting to strangle her.