“He was accepted, Erik. For a better life.”
“He still needs a full recovery.”
Daniel gasped like it was his first breath; he dug his fingernails into the mattress and ground his teeth together. The damp cloth slipped over his eyes and he gasped harder.
“Mum? – Dad?” he called out from his aching throat.
“Oh, baby.” His mother threw her arms around him. He hissed and tried to wriggle out of her grasp, until she pulled away taking the cloth off his head. “You’re okay now.”
“Just try not to move too much,” his father added.
“We think it was the change.”
“Change?”
“Full power – adolescence.” His parents spoke, one after the other.
A shiver rippled through him and he sighed. “Really?” he asked with a huge smile. He pushed himself up in his bed. “Can I go out then?”
“Where are you going? It's almost midnight,” his mother asked.
“To tell Jac.”
His parents shared glances and then looked at him. Daniel knew that look a little too well; they were out to disappoint him.
She shook her head. “Get some rest. Okay.” She smiled and kissed him on his forehead. He nodded and they said ‘goodnight’ then left him, closing the bedroom door.
He settled back into bed and flipped his pillow over to get the cold side. He closed his eyes but the candle light kept waking him. He turned away from it, and closed his eyes again. He started to count how long he’d been holding them shut for before needing to start again. “Stupid,” he groaned and opened his eyes.
He pushed the duvet off and forced himself sit upright again. A slow throb jabbed at his jaw and another started to gnaw at his joints and hammer at his pain threshold.
His organs knotted inside himself as he threw his legs over the side of his bed. He touched the concrete floor, and hesitated before putting pressure on them. The cold ate into the soles of his feet, and slowly numbed the pain.
He closed his eyes and a breeze trickled down his spine. He glanced up to the open window and his head spun from the tilt. He sat in the spot, dazed for a moment, and then he drew a breath and stumbled over to his wardrobe. He bit down on his lip as he held himself up on the wardrobe.
He pulled out a black hooded jacket and put it on; a t-shirt wasn’t worth the effort. He hobbled over to the washing basket and took a pair of grey jogging bottoms out. He froze as his mother shouted from the bottom of the stairs. “Honey, do you want something to eat?”
His throat went dry and started to ache like two pieces of sandpaper rubbing together. “I’m gonna sleep.”
“Well I’ve left some in the oven, for when you get hungry.”
He sat on his bed, and put on the grey jogging bottoms that he’d wore that morning; pitied with dry blood with a tear at the left knee. Quietly he changed, and then blew out the candle and climbed on his bed. He glanced at the small rectangle window above his bed and cursed; before today he could’ve shifted into a bird and flew out of the window.
It happened fast. Strange but familiar. He felt his muscles constrict and then his throat tighten. He wriggled on the spot, and when he opened his eyes, he was another form altogether, an eagle; the follicles of his skin, now thick illustrious feathers, and his bones has turned thin and hollow.
He flew from the ledge of the window, and before soaring over into the Lowerlands he noticed his landing spot and the dark discolour of his dried blood. He looked down, and swayed closer to the ground, dropping. He landed, shifting into his normal form.
“What happened?” he whispered to himself.
The feathers that had fallen from his wings and coated in his blood were now stuck to the ground, squirming in the wind. He knelt to take them back, but they disappeared at his touch; turning into a fine powder and escaping into the wind. He creased his forehead and stood, staring up into the sky. The recall of events happened in slow motion. He jumped backwards, watching himself fall from the sky to his chin. His stomach tickled up to his chest. He swallowed hard and pushed at his abdomen with his hands.
He pulled his hood up and shook his head, then took a few too many steps backwards, as he looked to his left and noticed the candle in the front window glimmer against the glass. He pushed himself over the cliff headfirst from his shaking legs. The up gust combed back his hair and choked him, keeping him shaken as he tried to shift. He covered his face with his hands and felt the air now glide with him. Swooping across the tree tops trying to find a clearing.
Each night was darker and harder to find the right spot to land. He dropped from the sky in mid-shift; his legs formed and dangled, touching the floor while the rest of his body elongated and thickened, absorbing feathers, and rippling out in his own clothes.
“Jac!” Daniel shouted.
He kicked a few rocks with impatience, and then called out for his friend again. He headed out of the clearing with a map inside his head to Jac’s hut. A snap sounded close by. He stopped, and turned around, several more sharps sounds followed.
“Psst. Dan. Psst,” Jac’s voice came from behind him.
“Jac, what are you doing behind there?” Daniel grinned, looking at the bush where Jac was. “Come out.”
Jac cocked his head, and the hustling bushes hushed. A soft purr rose from an animal behind Daniel. He turned his head and caught a glimpse of a pair of bright green eyes emerging from behind the bush. He coughed slightly, trying to inhale at the dryness in the back of his throat. His chest trembled as he attempted to take another deep breath, trying to reassure himself that Jac would have a plan.
“Stop turning,” Jac whispered and gestured for him to come closer.
His feet shivered in the dirt as he walked towards Jac. His ears pricked as the soft purr became a loud and coarse growl, and then snapping its jaw into a howl.
“Run!” Jac shouted jumping out from behind the bush and reaching out for Daniel’s hand.
Daniel turned his head and stumbled at the sight of the huge panther, its claws dug in the ground and its body poised to pounce. He tried to push himself up and run away, only pushing himself along the ground, backing up into the base of a tree.
“Dan?” Jac gulped, rushing back to the bush.
Daniel jumped to his feet, but not his feet. He was swollen inside something foreign, something thick and yellow with clumps of orange fur. On all fours, his hands were thick paws. He cooed a light growl and flexed the claw feature of his animal, glancing up at the panther; it was mid-jump and landed on his back, sinking its teeth in.
Daniel was in the form of a lion, and Jac watched in awe as the lion gnawed the air in pain and bucking its back legs. The panther lost tact and swung by its claws, flying off into a tree, smacking its back. Jac cursed at the panther and enveloped his hands in fire, pelting flames at it that and singeing at its fur.
Daniel roared and cut them both off. He charged at the panther and chomped down on his leg, he let go as the blood touched his tongue, and he was unsure whether he liked the taste. The panther yelped as the fur started to erode around the wound. There was a shared gasp, with the only movement coming from the whimpering panther as it escaped. Daniel shifted back, now sitting on the floor with blood on his lips.
“What was that all about?” Jac asked, flailing his hands around in the air.
Daniel cracked his jaw and wiped his lips. His jacket had been ripped around the bottom. He was about to take it off when he realised that he wasn’t wearing a t-shirt. “That’s new,” Daniel snickered, “and I thought you might be able to tell me about
that
.”
“I heard you,” Jac replied, “then I heard somethin’ else.”
“You mean you weren’t hunting?”
“If I was stupid enough,” he grinned. “Y’know me, I only go after birds, rabbit and the occasional deer.”
The smile on Daniel’s face faded. “Maybe it was hunting you. You have been taking its food.”
“But it shifted back after you bit it, so it wasn’t a panther.”
“Then you must’ve pissed someone off.”
“First I’ve heard.” Jac shrugged. “Best head off though.”
Jac lived in the forest, more specifically, he lived in a tree. He’d declared emancipation from his parents when his adolescent energy came through and they were somewhat relieved considering the several other children they had. He rarely ventured out to visit his family, or even society, the only person he talked to was Daniel, and it had been like that since they were little and Jac had caught Daniel’s hand before he slipped down the trunk of a tree.
Daniel fanned himself with a large leaf. There was a rule within the forest, and that was the taller the trees, the thicker the forest you’re in, and Jac had built his hut in some tall trees. Although Jac knew where he lived, he’d planted clues on the forest floor, for when he got lost, or he had to venture out at night.
“It looks different,” Daniel said watching Jac pat tree trunks. “You sure you haven’t moved.”
“It looks different because its night and I don’t travel at night,” he said. “So, why are you here?” he asked admiring the trunk of a tree, and then patting it.
“I got my full power.”
“Shit. Really? That’s awesome, and you can still shift?”
“Looks like it.”
Jac nodded, and then turned to face the tree. He rubbed the trunk with both hands and hummed in concentration. He pulled away a few flakes of bark, revealing grooves in the trunk; several rectangle holes. He cracked his fingers and then pulled himself up the first, bouncing up the rest of them until he settled on a branch at the top.
“I can’t see them,” Daniel said feeling around for the grooves.
“Instinct. It’s what energy is based upon,” Jac called down, then disappeared into the silhouette of the tree around him.
Daniel closed his eyes and pulled himself up from the first hole, finding his fingers reach to the next and then clawing up the rest, slower than Jac had done it. “I can’t see. Where now?”
“Up the next branch and then along until you walk into the door,” Jac replied.
He reached up and grabbed the next branch, pulling himself up and trying to stand. He centred himself and started to walk along holding on to a branch at his side with his other hand feeling around in front for the slate of wood; Jac’s door. He smacked his hand against it, and the door swung open.
“Half of me hoped that you’d have moved, but no, this is pretty much the same place,” Daniel chuckled.
“What are you gonna do now – with the change an’ everything?” Jac asked lighting a lantern and smiling into the growing orange.
“I came here to tell you about that as well.”
“If I know your mum, she’s gonna push you into school, and your dad, well he’ll follow,” Jac continued.
Daniel glanced to the floor and nodded, he picked up his head and met Jac’s gaze. “In fact I am going to school.”
Jac bit the inside of his lip. “Thought as much. Which one?”
“Croft’s Aca-”
“No!”
Daniel tried to object and defend himself, but each time he opened his mouth he paused.
“If you go to the Upperlands, you might as well sign your name in blood and hand the deeds of your body over. They’re disgusting.”
“But – but, you’ve never been, and my dad works in the Upperlands.”
“No, he doesn’t, he works in the country. It’s not like the centre. I heard that one in ten people are in jail.”
Daniel shook his head and creased his brow. “That’s the inner city, Jac. I thought you’d be happy, at least my
friend
would be.”
Jac shrugged. “You’ll change, I know you will. So go.”
“I kinda just saved your life.”
“And I’ve always been saving yours,” Jac retorted. “And already your life is starting to become about what you’ve done. So just go.”
Daniel shrugged and then left. He opened his hand to see the faint line of a memory reflected back in his eyes; the night they’d cut their hands open to become brothers. Jac had told him they could be blood brothers; something he’d watched his older brother do with his friends. It was later that night when Jac stole a knife from the belt of an officer and some fabric from his bed linen that they cut their palms and pressed them against each other’s. They cursed about the pain and swore that they’d always be brothers.
Chapter Three
Aryna usually slept in the bliss of her imagination, the hub of her subconscious. She laid, sound asleep, emitting a faint glow as her energy levels peaked. However, she’d woke a few times in her so far short life, knowing that nothing would be the same again, tonight was one of those nights.
Her eyes opened wide and glittered green, she fought for air in her lungs, her body turned stiff and her face started to flush. Her eyes flashed blue and burnt orange until they faded to a dark brown.
“He’s alive,” she said as her glassy eyes broke open and tears glossed over her cheeks.
She lay still in her 4-poster bed for half an hour, watching the soft chiffon drapes tousled by a breeze. She scrunched up her face, the sticky tears cracked like a dry facemask. “It’s him,” she whispered to herself, sitting upright.
“Miss Bernstein, shall I serve breakfast now?” a posh British voice startled her; it was Martha, the housekeeper.
“No, I’m okay for now.”
“Just shout when you do.”
She smiled to herself, holding her hand out and fabricating a piece of cream coloured cloth. She ran a finger diagonally across it and it became damp. Her smile turned to grin as she dabbed her face clean.
I doubt it will be as simple as this to find him,
she caught herself thinking.
Aryna tied her blond curly bunches into one bunch at the back of her head. She slipped into her blue, silk nightgown and walked over to a single glass pane. She pushed it at gently, opening the door to a balcony.
Another beautiful day
, she smiled, watching the waves roll on her beach of golden sand. The sun was rising and intoxicating the sea with its orange dye.
She gripped a hold of the balcony fencing and pushed herself up to her tiptoes, embracing the first gust of wind. She opened her eyes and the sun was already twinkling at her, she glanced down and noticed the tinkling coming from her left wrist. She held it up and clenched her hand into a fist. The symbol of the Roman goddess Venus was embossed on a silvery line, refracting rainbow colours.