Arooo…7

Chapter 7

I get my arms around Justin and they lead us to their vehicles. How is it that the bad guys can always seem to afford better vehicles than I’ve ever owned? One of them opens the door with a feral smile on his face showing some teeth.

There’s enough alpha bitch in me that it really pisses me off. And part of me would love to reopen the can of whoop ass I was serving up but I can’t. I’m on a mission for Stevie and I’ve got Justin with me so it’s a quiet, quiet hard stare no growl but all the hard female ire that I’ve learned or been learning to channel.

He smirks at me and closes the door behind me.

I look at the one driving. “Take me to The Alpha.”

“Quiet bitch, know your place you’ll see who you’ll see.”

I keep my mouth shut for now. I in fact close my eyes and breathe, inhale slowly for ten, hold for ten, exhale for ten repeat and repeat and don’t be what you are just be the breathing, don’t be where you’re at just be the breathing, inhale and let the breath inside you swirl like a gust of wind, dust devil inside your heart as you hold let it gather the bad, the negative let it go out with the exhale.

Inside my mind there’s a skip in my mind’s eye...a flicker-flash of light behind the dark of my eyes and slowly another then another as images collect and form. It’s sort of like going from the dark to being in the lights of a darkened train passing a bright place.

I see Stevie and she’s home, at the lodge and she’s sitting on the floor in just panties and a slip one strap hanging off her shoulder some kind of circle there on the floor. Serious majik she looks up at me and I can feel her eyes.

~I’m off to see their Alpha of alphas, somebody named Fang. ~

~Good but you feel off center, what’s going on? ~

~Things are a lot more complicated here than we had any clue of. I guess I had to announce myself her for his court and stuff and there’s magic over here that all really complex. ~

~Like? ~

~Like guilds and stuff and councils, like serious game playing politics here that’s as bad as anything I’ve seen in the government or the agencies only Harry Potter it up.~

~Excuse me? ~

~Sorry bad reference but seriously it’s like almost a complete and really thriving culture here. ~

~Sub-culture.~

~Hell no, from the little that I’ve been learning is the ones with the majik here have been running the show here for a long long time, they’re pretty much the ones that are in charge the rest of it’s just to hide it all from the rest of the world.~

~Hmm, that’s interesting. Open up to me Erica and let me read and feel everything. ~

~Uhm…okay just be gentle this Vulcan shit scares the panties off of me. ~

~I promise, I’ll be less invasive that your last debriefing. ~

~Thank fuck for that. ~

I relax and I breath and everything is different and we’re together under the full moon so bright and gleaming and we shift and we run together and every time we stop it’s at a clearing where in the rays of moonlight we can see the things that had been happening with me since I’ve been here and the things that I’ve learned about the mages and the power struggles here and the connection to the fae.

Through Stevie I learn why we are Were; and why we are forbidden magic by the old laws. Her ears flicker back and forth in confusion and disappointment when I sort of agree with the fae.

We were made from union of man and beasts and the man side of us is not to be trusted.

I’m a former U.S. Navy Seal Operator, both in the field and home I’ve seen plenty of reasons why mankind shouldn’t be trusted with power.

But we have it anyway, Stevie and me through her.

~Show me more? ~ I ask her.

~I thought you agreed with them? ~

~I do that doesn’t mean that they aren’t any better people than we are just different. I’ve got no illusions about these dark fae and what about the fae they don’t talk about. ~

~Fae that the fae, don’t talk about? Like? ~

~No race or even collective of races is perfect, or even close to it Stevie. ~

~Meaning you agree but you’d still rather learn magic. ~

~It’s the condom principle; I’d rather have it and not need it then need it and not have it. ~

~Exactly and if you’re going to track down the other crystal and the priest then you can’t rely on the guilds there to help you or even to stop infighting to help you. Its best I show you while I can before I have to go. ~

~Go? ~

~I’m meeting the one person that might be really able to stop green eyes from jumping up out of hell. ~

~Oh, big mojo then? ~

~Oh yeah makes me think that Merlin might have been a girl. ~

~Oh that’d get me hung here saying that. ~

~Andrea said she fought two major demons already just in like projected form. ~

~Oh, and she’s really…~

~Yeah…let’s get started. ~

For those who have no idea who Andrea is she’s sort of the protégé of the Queen or something like that she’s a fed and FBI agent and she’s also supposed to be the Goddess Athena here on earth.

So seeing as she’s all impressed with this girl then I should show some respect or at least pay attention with her being involved.

I mean Kelly died to help stop all of this…and if this girl can stop him?

Yeah I best get to work…time works differently like this but it’s still finite and I’m not sure just how long a drive it is.

We’re out in some neighbourhood that I have no idea anything about only there’s lots of walls along the sidewalks and gates and ivy and we’re pulling in through a gate to this free standing house that’s about three stories high and has this whole Victorian gothic look and feel to the place. Fire stained old bricks and things that are replicate mismatches that are old now.

Definitely some old English in the city manor estate that mostly survived the war. I see a lot of people around here too. Some look like regular folks but a bit edgy, some look like gang types or punk types and others have that biker and para-military look down.

Justin is staring at me. “What were you just doing?” He whispers.

“Running with my queen.” I don’t bother whispering I just talk normally. I mean the advanced senses will pick up everything we say anyway.

“From all the way over in America?”

“Yes?”

That’s getting me a few looks. I wait until they open my car door and I slide out as girl like as I can remember and as messed up looking as I am I walk toward the house holding Justin’s hand.

I call up mana and run it through me…even non shifted apparently it enhances us just not as potently as it does when we use our shifting powers but I learned from Stevie, use the shifting itself to move it through me…Hair…skin, muscles, breasts, scent…

I feel the changes…I’m not bigger but firmer, more cut with muscles…a red headed Jessica Rabbit meets Red Sonya in torn and tattered clothes and smelling like an angry dominant she-wolf…the ones that aren’t scattering are staring.

I feel like I’ve never felt as just sort of plain Erica.

They even open the doors for me…

I feel out the strongest source of power here in both mana and essence and I make my way there.

I’m stopped a few times…challenged…snarled at and threatened…stare them down just me and who I was as an Operator and pushing power to my eyes.

There are whines as most back away.

Holy… if I can do this what the hell is Stevie like in person now? Oh this is addicting too, feeling like this, being this potent and sexual and attractive…

I try and suck it up and not fall for the power high, I stop in front of this hall and there are several wolves there two in warrior shift and they take my scent and they stare at me and there’s only this reaction of the baring of teeth and snarls.

So much for my impact…

“It’s because we’re old…long in the tooth as it were.”

I spin…shaken that voice was accent for the UK but I’m not sure where from but it was this soft, soft velvet that ran down my spine like nothing had before.

I can’t help but get caught in these golden eyes, not hazel or brown that can look like gold but gold eyes and the rest of his looks…like that guy that played Tim Riggens on Friday Night lights only with a two day scruff going and this beat up leather biker’s jacket a Motorhead t-shirt whoever they are but it says “The Wolf” on it and faded jeans.

“How…how’d you know what I was thinking…?”

“You’re the American Werewolf in London then…”

“Answer the question please.”

“Erica is it?”

I semi-shift adding muscle and fangs, claw hard nails and glare at him.

He side steps me and I smell…?

I’m not sure what I smell but I want to rub my face in it.

He heads down the hall and the ones there are moving with deference out of his way.

Oh…

Oh That’s Who He Is…

Fang?

He opens the door at the end of the hall and gestures for me to come and go through. I bite my lip; push my claws into my palms until I can focus…

Better…

“C’mon Justin…let’s get this over with.”

I’d almost forgotten that he was there.

I’m in trouble aren’t I?