Hungry Heart - Book #4 - Ch. 7 (Patreon)

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Chapter Seven – Through Fog and Blood

His head was so heavy his neck couldn’t hold it up, making Toru fight through the sensation until he could finally open his eyes and look around. He was inside a cave with low ceilings, and shadows were thrown upon the walls outside, shivering in the light of a big fire. Now more in command of his own body, he struggled to straighten up, although his ears were still ringing. The sight of the enclosure he was in tilted for a moment, but then, as his inner tiger took over, his eyes cleared and he could look around.

The shadows on the wall stilled and someone walked in hurriedly. It was a young woman, her body covered in furs, but there was nothing of a wild animal about her. Toru’s nostrils flared; she wasn’t a shapeshifter, therefore not a wolf.

She smiled at him, with her whole face, holding nothing back. Toru commanded his tiger to wait, as much as he wanted to lunge at his jailer and break free. This girl couldn’t be the one who had imprisoned him, and, after all, this cozy cave felt nothing like a prison.

“I’m glad to see you awake, Toru,” she said in a deferential voice and inclined her head in greeting.

He growled for good measure, but that didn’t seem enough to stop her from walking toward him.

“We had no time for introductions. My name is Hesaia,” she offered and touched him gently on the shoulder.

So much lack of fear in a human was flabbergasting.

“Can you stand? I can give you a potion to make you feel better.”

“What did you poison me with?” Toru asked and refused her offer to help him up. He felt almost in complete control of his body and power.

“It wasn’t poison, just something to make you sleep,” Hesaia explained.

“You know I could easily break free from here, and teach all of you a lesson,” Toru said, his tiger eager to repay the humiliation of being struck down so easily by a bunch of young wolves and a human girl.

“You are Varg’s friend,” Hesaia said simply. “That means that you’re as brave and generous as him.”

This girl clearly had a way with words. Toru couldn’t lie to himself; he felt flattered. “What did you do with him? Where is he? I saw him being dragged down into the depths of the earth by some creature.”

Hesaia’s eyes grew wide. “You did? You have the power of insight? The mistress of the marshes took him with her, but… you weren’t here.”

Toru pursed his lips and pondered. “Some strange mirrors showed me everything,” he admitted, deciding to be honest. “And then threw me here, where you--” He didn’t continue, still a bit miffed over being overpowered by this puny pack of youngsters.

“We apologize,” Hesaia said hurriedly. “We’re just very frightened,” she admitted in a low whisper and stole a furtive glance over her shoulder. It was most likely that every word they uttered was being listened to by the shadows outside the small room.

“What happened to you?” Toru asked.

Hesaia leaned forward. “We went against the mistress of the marshes,” she began saying in the same low voice. “And she punished us by taking our parents away. She says that she had them killed, all of them, and then, she asked us to find a lost alpha. That is why we brought your friend here.”

“Why was he taken by this mistress you’re talking about?” Toru asked for more clarifications.

Hesaia munched on her lower lip and frowned. “It was all very strange. She said she would forgive us and lift the curse cast upon our pack, but that Atlaz - he’s our alpha now – needed to prove his worthiness in battle and defeat this lost alpha.”

“Why would she need that?” Toru asked, more and more confused.

“But in the end,” Hesaia continued, “as Varg goaded her into taking him right then on the spot, she gave up and took him with her. I can only think that it was all a ruse; could it be that she hoped Atlaz would die in that battle?” She shivered and her eyes became moist. She looked away from Toru.

“You’re the alpha’s woman,” Toru said.

Hesaia looked at him, blushing, her eyes widening again. “No, no, it’s not like that,” she protested. “I’m only a servant, a humble servant--”

Someone else stepped into the room. By the combination of cautiousness and forced arrogance in the youngster’s eyes, Toru concluded that the newcomer had to be Atlaz. “Why did you come here?” the wolfshifter asked.

“I came for Varg,” Toru said. “And I will fight you all to get him back.”

Atlaz sneered and showed his teeth. His inner wolf had to be itching for a fight, too. “The good that will do. The mistress took him with her, heavens know where. He’s gone.” He paused and his voice wavered. “Just like our parents.”

“So?” Toru said and crossed his arms. “Let’s go get them all.”

Atlaz scoffed. “As if it’s that simple. Or possible. She killed them all, you hear me?” He got in Toru’s face, challenging him from his shorter height. “She just does what she wants, she--”

“Atlaz!” Hesaia’s voice was strangely firm compared to her willingly meek demeanor from before. “She’s fooling us,” she added, forcing her voice down.

“But she won’t fool me,” Toru intervened. “Take me to this mistress of the marshes, and I’ll show her what it means to mess with my friends.”

“I don’t think that will work,” Hesaia said.

“Nothing works,” Atlaz said morosely. “We cannot fight her.”

Hesaia hesitated, but slowly turned toward the head of the pack. “Your father believed,” she said softly.

Atlaz scoffed and looked away, but Toru could tell his resolve wavered, whatever he had to be resolved about. “And that got him killed,” he said quietly.

Hesaia cast her eyes down and added nothing. An unbearable silence fell upon the room, and even Toru didn’t dare to tear it by saying another word.

Atlaz walked out of the room, his shoulders hunched in defeat.

Hesaia eventually spoke. “He’s within his rights to say it is my fault,” she began in a strained voice. “If only I hadn’t told father about that voice. We would all still be together.”

Toru considered her words. There was something there; no string of events happened without a cause. From his experience with the world, with fighting Hekastfet, and traveling all over Eawirith, he had understood that things occurred for a reason.

“What fault would that be?” he asked. “What voice?”

Hesaia clasped her hands and released them a few times. “I’m not afraid of this mistress, as she calls herself. She’s only a weak witch, without even a name. I’ve always known it; don’t ask me how because I don’t know it myself. Her fog never hinders my steps. And Osion, our father… Atlaz’s father, he believes that I ended up here, with them, because I was destined to.”

Toru observed her carefully. She was struggling with the belief inside her heart, and with the affection she had for this pack that must have adopted her despite being a human girl. That much he gathered from what she was saying.

“One day, while I was searching for herbs, I heard a voice calling for me, telling me that I could lift the curse.”

“What curse is that?” Toru asked.

“This witch,” Hesaia said and her face darkened, “has held this pack in her clutches for many centuries. She demanded the wolves to give her their firstborns… and they obeyed her, until Osion was spared by his parents and hidden from her. Osion didn’t give away Atlaz. And no one from the pack had to obey her harsh demand anymore. But that made her mad. On a whim, she’d make a fog so thick descend from the marshes.” Her eyes wandered, pulled toward sights that weren’t there. “The fog would stop the pack from hunting. It would make the wolves ill--”

“But not you,” Toru said.

“No, not me. But she would make me so mad with this curse of the deep fog thrown upon my pack,” she said passionately. “Maybe I just wanted father to be right, and that’s why I heard that voice.”

“What did it tell you? What do you need to do?”

Hesaia rubbed her hands together in frustration once more. “Something this frail body cannot do. It said to me that I could make a strong potion from the fruits growing in a bush guarded by a thicket of thorns. When I couldn’t get through the thorns and only ended up bloody, I told father about it. He tried it to. But we couldn’t reach those fruits. And, if he tried to get through as a wolf, the thicket just rejected him.”

Toru rubbed his chin in thought. “Let me try and reach that bush.”

Hesaia looked at him. “Would you do that? For us?”

“Varg isn’t dead. Even if that witch without a name took him with her to the depths of the marshes, it doesn’t mean a thing. Varg is too strong to die so easily. I know it. If all it takes is for me to grab some fruits so you can make a drink I’m going to stuff down her throat, I’ll do that. After she drinks it, she’ll cough out Varg right away. Your parents, too.”

Hesaia’s eyes filled with gratitude and hope. “You don’t think they’re dead, do you?”

“If Varg let himself be carried away like that, it must be what he thought, too. And he is very wise. You don’t meet many wolves as wise as he is,” Toru said with determination.

“I didn’t get the chance to know him well, but he seemed so to me also. Not that I have any right to judge someone,” Hesaia added hurriedly. “If only I could prove myself to the pack,” she said and her face came alive with timid tenderness.

“You’re grateful to them because they raised you,” Toru said gently.

“It’s not only because of that.” Hesaia looked down. “If I could do something to lift the curse, maybe then mother… maybe she’d think better of me.”

A human raised by a pack of wolves. She had to be an orphan, and Toru’s heart went out to her, as someone who shared the same cruelty of the world cast upon them, children believed to be unwanted. To soothe his anger, he had turned his back on the world for most of his life, but this young woman hadn’t done the same. She had continued to yearn for the affection refused her.

“Take me to that bush. And don’t worry; the puny witch of these marshes will pay for what she did to your pack.”

Hesaia nodded and touched his elbow lightly. “Osion is the strongest wolf of our pack. He couldn’t get through it. So, if you cannot reach the fruits--”

“I’ll do it,” Toru interrupted her. “And if your potion doesn’t work, we’ll think of something else.”

Her smile told him she only needed a true ally.

***

“What sort of magic fools my nose?” Claw mumbled under his breath as they climbed a steep hill, in an effort to see their surroundings better.

“Don’t take it all upon yourself. I don’t seem to be of much help, either,” Duril said while following as quickly as he could.

“First Varg, then Toru. I’m really beginning to feel annoyed. And to my nose, they have disappeared from the face of the earth,” Claw continued to mutter, his steps heavy and precise. “I might as well cut it from the middle of my face and be done with it.”

“Don’t even think about it. We’ve been through so much. It somehow feels unlikely that we would now fail at finding our friends when powerful evil is no longer at work.”

“You make a fine point,” Claw admitted. “The voices that call for me out of the blue for this and that are just choosing to be silent now. It makes me humble. I appear to be completely useless.”

“That is not true,” Duril combatted Claw’s negative self-talk. “I’d say that we should stop for a moment and have something to eat. I still have some leftovers in my bag. We might not be too good at finding solutions on an empty belly.”

Claw nodded and sat on the ground. They were at the top of a hill and could look around and take in what lay as far as their eyes could see. The trees had started to lose their foliage for about a week or more, so the colors of the fall blended into golden and red hues at the top of the trees. A forest stretched at the horizon, thick and dark, making Duril wonder what lay behind it.

“They could be far as easily as they could be near. I’m telling you, it’s like they’ve fallen off the face of the earth,” Claw repeated and shook his head.

“Could that mean that they’re underground?” Duril asked while handing his companion the remnants of a meal that should stave off their hunger for at least until nightfall.

Claw stared at him. “That must be it! How come I didn’t think of that? That has to be it!”

Duril smiled as he watched Claw jump to his feet, energized by a new surge of happiness. However, he didn’t quite understand how that would be too helpful, given the circumstances.

“We need to find a way to get underground,” Claw said as he sat back down by Duril’s side. “Then my nose will be able to tell us where they are.”

“Do you mean that we should find a cave of some sort?” Duril asked.

Claw nodded. “Yes. Or any hole in the ground for that matter. If we don’t find anything like that I’ll dig a hole myself.”

“If it comes to that, I’ll help,” Duril offered. “Let’s just replenish our strength and then we can start looking for a way to our friends.”

***

Varg rattled the cage, hoping that the bars would come undone if he shook them hard enough. What kind of magic could conjure something like that out of thin air? Being restrained made him feel restless, a feeling he didn’t usually experience.

“The more you fight, the more it takes out of you,” Osion warned him.

Varg stopped despite the urge to howl and grab the bars in an attempt to force them apart. “Why don’t t you tell me more about this witch and what makes her so powerful?”

Osion rested his forehead against the iron bars keeping him incarcerated. “Over the years, we could tell that her force was waning. Without our firstborns to feed whatever need she had, her thickest fog didn’t appear as bad as it had before.”

“And yet, with all her power waning, she captured you and brought you here.”

Osion admitted this with a short nod. His eyebrows furrowed in thought. “Yes, that she did.”

“We egged her into it,” Nesta intervened. “She must have caught wind of our efforts to bring her down.” As much as she disagreed with her alpha and husband, Nesta assumed responsibility along with everyone else for what had happened.

“Which means we were on the right path,” Osion continued. “She must have gotten scared to do such a thing.”

Varg looked at his right hand. It was trembling slightly and he could see it trying to turn into bone, fur and claws. Was he shifting without being conscious of it? For the moment, the trembling stopped as he grabbed hold of the bars with both hands. “She’s hungry,” he said quietly. “She could barely wait to get her hands on me. That means that she has no time to spare.”

“And yet, she leaves us here for days and nights,” Nesta said. “It doesn’t seem to me like she’s in a hurry.”

“Then why doesn’t she do anything? You’re all alive and well.”

“She must need us for something,” Osion mirrored just what Varg thought.

“She said as much. She needs the pack to continue nourishing her powers.” Varg thought it to be more than this, but he couldn’t see what.

“Yes, and we refused to feed her appetite with our firstborns. She hopes to convince you to kill me in battle, and then to return to the old ways by forcing you and the rest of the pack to do her bidding.”

“I’m not easy to convince.” Varg could tell by the change in his voice that he had turned into his wolf.

The others didn’t seem surprised to see him shifted.

“She’s already using you,” Osion pointed out. “You didn’t mean to shift just now, did you?” he asked.

Varg wanted to reply, but instead of words, only animalistic growls left his mouth. And with them, hunger came, deep and searing. Everything was obscured by a red fog and he bashed his head into the bars holding him, again and again, until the fur on his head was matted with blood.

Outside the cage lay a cave, and inside the cave shadows gathered, threatening. They wanted… what did they want? They wanted to kill him! To take his pack away!

Maddened by the realization, Varg struggled against the bars, over and over, and stopped only when his nose caught a whiff of something, a soothing smell that made him drop his muzzle and whine. Where did that scent come from? What did it mean? It awakened in him lost feelings, memories that had turned into scars and fading marks on his skin. It reminded him of home, a home forgotten and left behind for no reason that made sense.

“Who are you, Varg of Whitekeep?” a voice, feminine and pleasant, called to him. “Don’t you want to see your true self?”

He wanted to answer eagerly but the only sounds leaving his mouth were growls. He couldn’t talk, not anymore.

“I’ll show you,” the voice said. “I’ll show you, and then you’ll become all powerful. Nothing and no one will ever stand in your way again.”

Varg made the cage swing, trying to see whatever the owner of that voice was trying to show him. That made his world tilt and tumble, and his eyes finally caught something, down on the ground. Where everything else around him shone through the dark in tones of red, a patch on the floor was pristine white. It glinted like a mirror streaked with tears of rain, but Varg knew instinctively what it was.

His power grew under the upside-down reflection of his goddess. How could the moon shine so brightly in this cave? Because it represented the strength of the wolf, the primordial spirit from which he and others like him came.

The shadows around him grew restless, and he could hear voices. No, they were more like murmurs, a buzzing sound that bothered his ears. He growled and threw himself against the bars of the cage. They finally gave way, and he toppled down, right onto the floor, in the circle on the ground in which the moon rested, calling for him in her pleasant voice, as he believed that representation of her had to be part of his goddess.

The shadows trembled around him, and Varg rushed toward the nearest. The shadow jumped away and he found himself crashing into a stone wall. His bones cracked, and his joints heaved, but pain was nothing compared to the revenge he would rain upon the heads of those who dared to come between him and his pack, his home.

***

“It is so dark, but I know the way,” Hesaia said as she moved quickly in front of him. “I’d be able to walk down this path with my eyes closed.”

Toru looked up. He didn’t like all this darkness. He could still see just fine, but even his vision was dimmed. For a moment, he stopped and looked at the sky. Stars peppered the dark canvas. “Where is the moon?” he asked.

Hesaia stopped, as well. She gasped in disbelief. “Let’s hurry. I don’t know what this is, but without the moon, the wolves will start losing their power.”

“Good thing I’m not one, then,” Toru said.

“Indeed,” Hesaia agreed. “You don’t feel your strength waning in any way, do you?”

“Not at all. Could it be that your witch without a name has snatched the moon from the sky?”

“I don’t know,” Hesaia replied honestly. “But it seems like a bad omen, and too much of a thing to happen just like that, when she has taken away your friend and all our parents. We’re almost there.”

Toru followed silently, glad that the girl knew her way in the dark. When she stopped, he stopped, as well.

“The bush must be in that direction,” Hesaia gestured. “I don’t see it myself, but I can tell this is the place.”

Toru saw it and quite well. On top of a small mound of earth, stood a single solitary bush, and its red fruits shone brightly. At least, it seemed so to his eyes because Hesaia was as good as blind and couldn’t tell where the bush was.

Around it lay a thicket of thorns. Some of them looked small and prickly, others were wide and tall, as dense as the bodies of trees, with sharp ends pointing in all directions. Now he understood why Hesaia and the alpha of the pack hadn’t been able to get through the thicket and grab those bloody fruits.

He didn’t even consider going through. Maybe that was how wolves thought, but he was not like them. He shifted into his tiger and silently jumped to land in the high branches of a nearby tree. For a moment, he tested the strength of the branch to make sure it would hold him, picking the one that stretched over the thicket of thorns the farthest.

Hesaia understood what he was doing, more or less. “Be careful, Toru,” she whispered.

Before she could finish her words, Toru had already lunged, flying through the air with the grace and force granted to him by his forefathers and foremothers. His tail caught on a sharp thorn and he growled deep in his throat, pulling himself free.

He was by the bush, and to pick the fruits, he needed to turn into his human. Only then he realized that he had nothing to put the fruits in and take them to the other side. Could he hold them in his mouth? But what if his fangs went through and ruined them for the potion Hesaia needed to make out of them?

If he had been wise like Varg, he would have thought of such things already. Now, he had to find a solution to the problem on his own and fast. He shifted into his tiger, not because he was wiser as a tiger, but because he had claws and could dig with them at the roots of the bush to unearth it from its place.

“Hesaia, be ready,” he announced. “I will send the whole bush your way.”

“The whole bush?” Hesaia asked, shouting to cover the distance. “Maybe throw some of the fruits, instead?”

“What if you need them whole for your potion?”

“You’re right,” Hesaia shouted back. “But I’m not sure if I’m able to catch the entire bush.”

Toru wanted to laugh. Hesaia was a bit silly, just like he was sometimes and made his friends laugh. “Just step out of the way,” he told her.

The roots weren’t very deep and soon he could grab the thickest root in his mouth. And then, he started turning, faster and faster, until he believed that it would be enough to send the bush flying over the thicket. The bush cut through the air with a swish, and by the sound of it, it made it to the other side.

Hesaia’s excited shouting also let him know that he had succeeded. “It’s here, it’s here! Thank you! Hurry back, Toru!”

He would, but jumping back on the branch wasn’t an option. It was broken in the middle, hanging loose and low over the thicket. “It might take a bit,” he warned her and attempted to go through the thorns, steeling himself against the pain.

He growled as the onslaught of a thousand needles cut through his fur and reached the hide beneath. He was supposed to be thick-skinned, so what was happening? As much as he wanted to push through and ignore everything, the pain was too great.

“What is happening?” Hesaia asked, her shouts carried by the wind.

“I can’t just jump back,” Toru explained. “And these thorns are even cutting through my thick hide.”

“What should we do?”

“You go on and make that potion, while I think of something.”

“I don’t want to leave you here alone,” Hesaia shouted at him.

It was an endearing thought, but Toru found it a bit silly, too. “I’ll be fine,” he assured her. “Do what you need with those fruits. I’ll be back to your cave before you know it.”

***

“Is it deep enough?” Duril asked after throwing more lumps of dirt out of the hole they had been digging for hours. The night was already there, and it was a dark one, too. Wiping the sweat off his eyebrow, he stared up at the sky and frowned. “Claw,” he called for his companion.

Claw stopped his digging. “What is it? I still think we should dig a little more. My nose is still playing tricks on me and doesn’t want to tell me where our boys are.”

“Look.” Duril pointed at the sky. “What do you see?”

“The blackest night I’ve seen in a very long time,” Claw replied. “Do the stars inspire you to create some verses and indulge me in poetry, Duril?”

“Nothing of the kind, and I’d make a bad poet anyway. I asked the wrong question. What don’t you see?”

Claw paid attention more closely. “Where is the moon?” he asked the same question that was on Duril’s mind.

“Have you ever seen anything like it?”

Claw shook his head. “If my time spent under the house of merchants in Shroudharbor doesn’t count, never.”

“It can’t be a coincidence. Toru and Varg disappear, you cannot sense them, and--”

“And the moon is gone from the heavens,” Claw concluded for him. “I don’t like it at all. Wait,” he said all of a sudden. “I think I’m sensing something.” The bearshifter moved closer to the wall of earth and sniffed. “I wandered through a labyrinth for ages, and I think--” He stopped abruptly, and using the metal plate that had served as a digging tool, he began to scoop lumps of dirt from the wall, quicker and quicker.

Duril joined him right away. If Claw could sense something, there was a chance they were on the right path.

He felt the dirt giving way a bit more easily, and he was about to shout his victory, when he dug a bit too energetically and the earth collapsed. Both he and Claw found themselves stumbling and falling down a slope into the ground.

***

All this thinking was making Toru’s head hurt. He hoped that Hesaia could handle herself and the rest of the pack of puny youngsters for a while, because his head wasn’t that good at doing this thinking thing. He had attempted to go through the thorns a couple more times but to no avail, and the possibility of not jumping far enough to avoid those thick spikes was slim if it existed at all.

He continued to look around for branches that could be used as a way back, but it looked like he had destroyed the only one that could serve such a purpose. He sat for a moment to do more thinking. What would Varg do in his situation? What would Duril do? Or Claw? They were all wiser than him. “Duril, Claw, Varg,” he called out loud, “how do I get out of here?”

He had barely uttered the words when the ground under him gave way and he fell in, crying out in surprise. Even more surprising was that he didn’t fall on a hard surface, nor did he continue to fall. Instead, he was in someone’s arms. “Calling for us, kitty?” a familiar voice asked.

“Claw,” Toru exclaimed. “Is it really you?”

The bearshifter laughed and put him down. “In flesh and blood.”

“And I’m here, too.” Duril hurried to embrace him. “Both you and Varg disappeared without a trace, and we started to worry.”

“Yes, we worried,” Claw confirmed, “so much that we started digging a hole in the ground, just so that I could sniff you.”

“Sniff me as much as you like,” Toru offered, now relieved that he was no longer alone. “But wait, did you really dig a hole up to here?”

“Not exactly,” Claw explained. “We ended up sliding on this slope until we hit rock bottom. From there, we climbed, and here we are. Quite an astonishing thing.”

“Like many others,” Toru confirmed. “Varg was taken by a witch with no name that, probably, stole the moon.”

“How do you know so much? And where exactly are we?” Claw asked.

“Varg was taken by a pack of young wolves under the orders of this witch. She’s the kind that eats children,” Toru said. Seeing the look of horror on Duril’s face, he reconsidered his words. “Maybe not exactly eats them, but she thrives on the souls of wolves. That’s why she took Varg, although the young ones couldn’t tell me very much. We need to get to him, but to do that, the disgusting witch needs to swallow a potion that Hesaia is going to make.”

“Who’s Hesaia?” Duril asked.

Toru took a deep breath. With enough patience, he would be able to tell Duril and Claw everything he knew.

TBC

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