Disclaimer:
~Big thanks to Enemyoffun for making this universe to play in, and helping me hammer out some of the details in this chapter.
Author's Note: I hope you all enjoy this chapter. A good amount of information is revealed for you to speculate over.
A very big thanks to my editor for helping with the edits.
Please comment on this, I enjoy reading your comments and learning from them immensely.

Chapter 9

9 October 2011

After looking around for that hooded figure, I came back to the fountain where Alex was waiting for me, after searching in the opposite direction. She shrugged and held her hands out to tell me that she didn’t know where the figure went.

“Damn,” I muttered, when she was close. I sat down on the edge of the fountain near some kind of plaque.

“Hey,” she said, putting her hand on my shoulder. “We’ll get him next time, okay?”

I nodded, but I wanted to get this guy who knew more about me than I did. He had answers that I wanted.

“So, what do you want to do now?” Alex asked.

“I don’t know,” I replied, sitting next to the fountain again. I put my hands over my eyes, and elbows onto my knees. I was utterly clueless and felt like someone was pulling my strings.

“Hey,” Alex comforted. “It’ll be alright. We’ll find him.”

I looked up at Alex, wiping away a couple of the tears that had formed from feeling bad. Alex grabbed me, and pulled me close into a hug. It felt good and seemed like just what the doctor ordered. I snickered as I thought that I would never get this close to another girl a few days ago. Now, here I was getting a comforting hug from a girl that I had found attractive. I wasn’t sure if I still did.

Eventually, the hug was dissolved as Alex held me and looked at me. She said, “Feeling better?”

I nodded and replied, “Thanks.”

I looked around and saw that there were a few other college students looking at us. I snapped at them, “What are you looking at?”

They turned around and went back to whatever business they were doing. Alex and I just laughed at them, and the notion that two girls hugging each other next to a fountain was enough to distract them. If we had been kissing that probably would’ve gotten us a lot more attention.

“So, you know what you want to do now?” she said, with a cute smile on her face.

“Get something to eat, maybe? The smell of the food coming from the UC is very appetizing right now.”

Alex laughed and replied with a smile, “You got it. It’s on me.”

The two of us went inside and headed to the upstairs pub to grab something to eat.

“So, what are you in the mood for?” Alex asked.

“Some kind of meat,” I replied. “Maybe a good burger or something like that.”

Alex laughed and replied. “Good thing the pub has burgers up there, as well fried and grilled chicken sandwiches.”

“I don’t care what it is, anything to quell this hungry stomach.”

We both laughed at that and made our way up. Thankfully, we didn’t have to worry about too long a line.

We were finishing up our hamburgers as we sat out on the ledge that overlooked the lake. The sun had long since gone down and the nearly full moon glistened off of the lake’s surface, and filtered through the forest. From our perch, we could make out the nearby small mountains. I heard that there was a trail that led up to the tops of those peaks that wove its way through the forest. I’ve even heard of a few people here that have taken the trail and said that the view was spectacular, and that you could see the whole town from up there.

I could definitely believe that, since the view from here was also amazing. As we nibbled on the rest of our French fries, Alex asked me, “So, have you given the journal much thought?”

I swallowed some of my soda and said, “Just a little bit.”

“And?” Alex prodded.

I smiled. I definitely thought Alex enjoyed the idea of a treasure hunt or an adventure.

“I think it has something to do with that fountain out there.”

“Oh?” Alex said, puzzled. “What makes you say that?”

“Because as I was sitting out there waiting for that tall, dark, and mysterious guy, I noticed that the fountain had on it a wolf, a bear, a fox, a coyote, and a cougar. Although, I’m not sure what would be that other figure.”

“Other figure?”

“Yea, the empty spot on the top of the fountain, there are five jets of water that come out. In between them, there is a broken off part of the statue, where there was a sixth figure at one point, but it was violently removed.”

“Interesting,” Alex thought, tapping her finger against her right temple. “Want to go check it out?” she added, sounding very eager.

“Yes, let’s go check it out,” I replied with a smile.

When we got back to the fountain, most of the other students that we saw earlier were gone. The only signs of anyone else were people coming and going to the UC to get a bite to eat, like we just did. No one was paying any attention to the two of us. The light from the nearby lampposts were the only source of illumination around.

“So, where do you think it is?” I asked Alex, with a great deal of wonder in my voice.

“You’re asking me?” she replied, “What makes you think I know anything?”

“You’ve lived in Ravencrest your whole life?” I answered with a hint of questioning in my voice.

She giggled, “Okay, I’ll give you that. But, I have never examined this fountain up close.”

“How about we start looking for something out of the ordinary then?” I suggested.

“Sounds like a good place to start.”

Alex and I started examining the fountain, looking for anything that could reveal a clue or a doorway. Alex was looking toward on the fountain at the top, while I looked around the bottom. My guess was that the previous lorekeeper would need to get in and out of the archive as quickly as possible, and if any one looked his way, that it wouldn’t seem too much out of the ordinary.

The outside brick circle that held the water in, and was as wide as a person, looked like it was the same design as the rest of the campus. Red bricks and lots of ivy crawling over the buildings. Whoever designed the buildings in the beginning, they wanted to design their campus like the nearby Ivy League schools.

Near the part of the fountain that was directly across from the library I noticed a small plaque. It read: “A Gift from the Class of 1951.” There were also some symbols in the corners of the plaque as well. They looked like they could mean anything. There was a symbol of a bat, a thunderbolt, a strange-shaped arrowhead, and a cat.

I just stared at that plaque for a while to try to decipher the meaning of the plaque. Alex hopped down from the top of the fountain after her inspection.

“Well, there’s nothing up there except for the remains of whatever animal that was up there. Did you have any luck?”

“I might’ve,” I replied, not looking up from staring at the plaque.

“Oh?” she answered, walking over to me. “It’s just some plaque, what are you thinking, Mikaela?”

“That this might be a clue to accessing the archive.”

I continued to just stare at the plaque, the words, and the symbols. My hair fell down in front of my vision, and I brushed it out of my face. I heard the jingle of the charm bracelet, and then it hit me. The strange arrowhead figure was not an arrowhead, it was the Starfleet symbol on my charm bracelet! How it was on the plaque that had been here for who knows how many years boggled me, but I didn’t let it distract me.

I tried taking the bracelet off to see if the charm fit in the symbol’s hole. It wouldn’t budge. That figures. So I maneuvered the bracelet and the charm so that it would go in the symbol’s slot on the plaque. To my amazement, it fit in the slot perfectly. I pushed it into the slot a little bit, and I heard something click into place.

I quickly jerked back up, and I saw the plaque go into some kind of recessed area. That action revealed a small spiral staircase that went down underneath the fountain.

“Whoa,” we both said in a low voice with awe.

“Didn’t expect that,” Alex commented.

“Well, what did you expect?”

“I don’t know, something with more hoopla, bells, and whistles.”

“Why? It would make sense to go in there as quickly and as quietly as possible. Don’t want the Norms to find out, would you?”

“Good point,” Alex replied. “Going to go in there?”

“Duh. No use opening it up and just walking away.”

I climbed back on top of the fountain, and made my way down the stairs. Alex was right behind me. The panel moved back into its position as soon as we were far enough away from it, leaving us in total darkness.

“Well, that’s just great,” I commented.

“Think about it, you wouldn’t want anyone to come down here whenever they pleased while the lorekeeper was down here, would you?”

“No, I guess not. Although, I wish he would’ve had some lights installed to help us see.”

“I don’t think he could do that without looking too suspicious,” Alex replied.

“At least we have our cell phones.”

We pulled out our phones and used the flashlight option to help illuminate the path down. The stairs continued in a spiral fashion until it straightened and leveled out. The pathway also widened a bit which made me feel a little better. I wasn’t claustrophobic or anything like that, but at least I know had some more wiggle room. Eventually, we reached a door. From the cell phone illumination, it was an old wooden door with a golden handle.

Trying the handle, I found that it was unlocked. I thought about that for a bit, and figured that only the lorekeepers would be down here, so why have a lock on it?

The room behind the door was also in pitch black darkness. Our cell phone lights couldn’t penetrate the darkness very effectively. However, a quick inspection of the room side of the door frame revealed a light switch. I flicked it on and was momentarily blinded by the sudden abundance of light. Once my vision cleared, I was struck in awe of the sight that awaited me.

There were gobs of books on the many bookshelves around the room. Tons of books that looked like some were many years old, while others looked like they were published within the last couple of decades. In the center of the room, there was a lamp and a table, with a couple of large stacks of papers.

Looking around, I could see there were a few scrolls on a few of the shelves. But, one thing did put me off a bit. For an archive for the weres, it was remarkably small. I wondered if this was it. This was all the material that the previous lorekeeper had collected through his life. I looked around for a computer, but I then remembered that the personal computer was in its infancy when the previous lorekeeper was killed. There was a good deal of dust covering everything in the room, but since I was probably one of the first people to even set foot in this room in about thirty years, it was to be expected.

“Well, this is definitely impressive,” Alex commented.

“I was thinking a little anticlimactic.”

“Anticlimactic? How you figure that?”

“I don’t know,” I answered, shrugging. “I guess I was expecting more here for some reason.”

Alex just shrugged and asked, “So, what do you want to look for first?”
“How to unlock my were form, of course. The journal entry mentioned that there was some way to do it.”

“And where do you suggest we start?”

“Does it look like I know?” I replied, shrugging emphatically. “The journal didn’t say anything about what’s held here. For all I know it’s not even here. But, I’m willing to ignore that possibility until we look first.”

“Okay, let’s get cracking.”

Alex headed over to one bookshelf, while I went to another. However, as soon as Alex pulled a book off the shelf, she felt a mild shock.

“Hey! What gives?” she exclaimed.

“What happened?” I said, turning around to face her.

“I was pulling a book off to flip through it, when I was suddenly shocked by it.”
I reached down and picked the book up off of the ground, expecting to feel some kind of shock, but I felt nothing. I put it back on the shelf, expecting to be shocked then, but again, there was no shock.

“That’s weird,” Alex commented. She reached for another book, and yelled as she was again shocked. “What the hell?”

“I guess only weres or the Were Lorekeeper can touch anything in here that is related to the weres.”

“Well, that’s not cool, but it does make sense.”

“How?” I asked.

“Because this is the sanctuary of the Were Lorekeeper. It would make sense that he would store things here that are related to the secrets of the weres. And he wouldn’t want anybody who wasn’t a were to get a hold of them.”

“Well, I guess that makes my search a lot longer than I thought it would be,” I sighed in disappointment.

She smirked. “Sorry about that.”

“I don’t blame you. If I had my way I would allow anyone who was a true friend of mine to have access to them, in case the lorekeeper needed help.”

“That’s nice of you, but I could see why the previous lorekeeper would have such security measures. After all, he did disappear without a trace thirty years ago.”

“That’s true. Maybe this bracelet knows where to look since it was a ring on his finger.”

I don’t know if the bracelet actually heard me, or was just responding to my wishes, but the two charms that were dangling from the bracelet began to move.

Alex was the first to notice it, pointing to my wrist. “Uhh…, Mikaela….”

“What?”

“Your bracelet. The charms are moving by themselves….”

“What?” I said, quickly looking at my wrist.

Sure enough, the charms were floating in the air and seemed to be tugging my wrist in a general direction. Not sure what it means, I decided to follow the charms and see where they led. The two of us walked toward a bookshelf along the wall. When we got to the bookshelf, the charms subtly changed direction and were pointing at a book on the shelf.

I pulled it off and looked at the cover. The green leather bound book didn’t have a title on it. Instead, embossed in platinum on the cover of the book was a crescent moon. I opened the cover and found a number of topics listed in the table of contents. Among them was a list of various were forms, but it was the top of the list that caught my eye. It was called, “Unlocking the Inner Were.”

“I think I found it, Alex,” I said, as I quickly flipped to the page.

“What’s it say?” she asked.

I read aloud:

“Most Weres unlock their inner Were form when they reach their first Age of Ascension, which is dependent on the type of animal they are associated with. For example, wolves usually ascend just after their sixteenth birthday.

“However, there are times when the Were form just won’t come out. These reasons are still a mystery, although one common belief held among some Weres are waiting for the right moment to emerge.

“One way to get around this is for the Were-to-be to make an offering to Lady Moon, and beseech her to grant them the Gift. To do this, one must simply light a green candle outside during the full moon, and pray to Her to ask for the Gift.

“There is no guarantee that this will work, however. She may decide not to grant you the Gift, preferring you to wait for the right moment.”

“Well, that sounds simple enough,” Alex commented.

“Indeed,” I answered. “So, all we need is a green candle and light it on the 12th. And then pray to this Lady Moon figure, whoever she is.”

“Yeah, it does sound simple enough. I can ask around and see if I can find out who Lady Moon is.”

“No, I will try to find that out for myself. It seems right for some reason.”

“Okay,” Alex replied.

“Well,” I said, closing the book. “do you think I should take anything else out of here to study between now and then?”

“Maybe if you can find something about the were clans of Ravencrest. It would stand to reason that the previous lorekeeper would have something on them in here.”

“You’re right,” I answered, and then I looked at my bracelet and asked it, “Do you know where I can find information on the were families of Ravencrest?”

The bracelet, as if answering my question pointed in the direction of the stack of books on the table. I looked at the stack and saw two leather-bound books there. These ones had titles on them, unlike the green book that I had in my hand. These titles were The Ravencrest Were Clans and The Were Council of Ravencrest.

While I wasn’t exactly looking for a book on the council, I wasn’t going to pass it up very easily. It could prove useful in the coming days, if I ever got a meeting with someone in the council. Maybe the book would tell me how to arrange a meeting, if Melissa couldn’t do it. I quickly looked over the purple book on the council, and placed it on top of the stack. I grabbed both of the books, and placed them in a large, leather book bag that was hanging off the chair.

The only things in the book bag were a set of five scrolls, which were of varying colors. I pulled one out and unrolled it. To my surprise, the grey scroll contained the family tree of the Harper family. But, that wasn’t the most surprising thing about it. I looked at the bottom of the tree and saw that it contained the information about people in that family that were alive now, but were born after the previous lorekeeper had died.

I rolled the scroll back up and replaced in the book bag, and then slung it over my shoulder. I definitely had a lot of reading to do.

“Well, shall we get out of here then, Alex?” I asked her after packing the bag.

Alex, who had been watching me all this time, replied, “Sure, I hope you remember to come up for air as you read all of that.”

I giggled at that comment. “Oh, I’m sure you will see to that.”

The two of us trudged back up the spiral staircase, pulling out our cell phones for light again. When we got close to where the plaque was serving as the trap door, the light illuminated a switch, which I guessed was below the level of the concrete sidewalk above.

When we got outside again, it was completely night now, and looking up into the sky, I’d say that we had been down there for quite some time.

“C’mon then,” Alex said, climbing out of the trap door passageway.

Alex led the way to her car and said, “I’ll drop you off at your apartment. Don’t bury yourself too deeply in all of that. You still have school to worry about.”

“Crap!” I exclaimed. “I complete forgot about that! How am I going to explain to the school that I am who I say I am?”

“I’m not sure, but I think the Coven will be able to help with that.”

“Okay,” I replied, breathing a little easier. “I think I will take the day off tomorrow just to be on the safe side. Unless the Coven gets back to me quickly.”

“All right,” Alex replied, pulling up to my apartment. “I’ll tell mom, and see what she can do. In the meantime, I’ll see you soon.”

I exited Alex’s vehicle and headed into my apartment. I looked around on the street to make sure that I wasn’t being followed. I hadn’t seen the raven since yesterday, but I was more concerned about that hooded figure that I saw earlier today. When I was satisfied, I headed in and took the moon book out first, and set it on my night stand for me to read before bed tonight.

I took out the nightie that we picked up today, and set it out for me when I got out of the shower. I thought I needed one, since being in that dusty archive. I looked in my bathroom and noticed that Alex had replaced all of my usual shampoos and soaps with their feminine counterparts. I humphed at that, but thought that it was nice of her.

After the shower, I took the time to put on one of my new bras that I picked up earlier today. The tag still surprised me at 38DD. I didn’t realize that my breasts were that big until they were measured and fitted. The same when I also had my hips measured at 40 inches, with my waist at 30 inches. Alex was quite jealous when I told her my new measurements. I slipped on the nightie after figuring out the bra, and went over to the mirror to brush my hair out, like Alex had told me to do earlier today.

After getting ready for bed, I turned on the lamp and climbed in bed with my book. I began reading about the different kinds of weres there were, and I even saw a reference to a type of unseen called nereids, but it said that they weren’t exactly a were even though they are similar to them.

I don’t know how long I was reading, but I eventually got up to turn off the light and close the curtains to that I could get some sleep. As I looked out the window, I could see that two figures down on the street. One appeared to be the hooded figure that I met with earlier today, while the other looked like someone wearing a trench coat.

I thought to myself, ‘Now there are two of them! What the devil is going on here?’ I quickly shut the curtain and decided to go make sure that the deadbolt was set along with the door lock. Whomever those two were, I didn’t want them getting in to my apartment. With those thoughts on my mind, it was difficult to sleep. Eventually, though, I did manage to make it to the dream world.