As the three teenagers wash off the blood and dissolving wolf flesh, they put on their threadbare clothes. Their shoes are worn down to a fragment of a sole. Besides that they are more than just foster children living together, they are pack.
Mariah looks up at the sliver of a moon, seeing that it has moved to be above them now. “We might miss our curfew. Fingers crossed they will not notice us coming in.”
The squat tubby one known as Benan, “Sure, Alpha, that is going to happen. And maybe the pigs will learn to fly.”
Standing behind Mariah is the lanky Ruairì, a quiet sort who goes out of his way not to waste words. Mariah rolls her eyes at Benan. “You know we refer to each other as our names, not of pack rank.”
“Yeah, I know but wish we had more people in with this secret.” Benan whines.
“Enough, Benan,” Ruairì scolds. “We can’t talk about us turning into wolves. We’ll either be locked up or killed.”
“Yes, oh so serious Rory…”
Before the two fools start up again, Mariah steps in between them. “We need to be going, as we are already late. I understand the frustration. We have these new instincts with no outlet until tonight.”
Ruairì, in his deep voice, contradictory to his slight body. “The chase and kill felt good. When do we hunt again?”
Benan bounces up and down. Being a large boy, his boundless energy surprises many. “Yeah, Mariah, can we go out again tomorrow?”
Scratching at her mop of curls. “I don’t think so but next weekend. If you two are having any issues with part changing come and find me, okay.” Both nod, “Good, we have a bit of a jog to get back. Let’s go.”
Benan grumbles under his breath, “Would have been easier to get back home as our wolves.”
Since their first change only days ago, the three foster children have noticed a few things. As their senses sharpened since the attack, their strength, speed and endurance have increased tenfold.
As the pack bound over fallen logs and rocks the three stay in the same formation they run as wolves, it took them no time to get out of the forest to the large farmhouse their foster parents live. The journey in the past would have taken them over half an hour, now they arrive back in less than ten minutes.
It has been ten days since the attack. It was when their foster parents, Glenn and Marcy Smith were out with their own children. They were supposed to be doing their chores but decided to bludge and lounge around the barn. Suddenly the animals started to go wild, bucking and kicking at their doors. Mariah was the first to see a large wolf standing at the barn’s entrance.
Not wanting to get in trouble, Mariah picked up a rake while the boys following her example, grabbed hay pitchfork and shovel to drive the wolf away. The boys, Benan and Ruairì who look towards Maria as a big sister following her lead.
As they approached the wolf, it looked undaunted by these three teenagers with farm tools. As they make moves toward the wolf thrusting out the ‘weapons’ hoping to scare it away. The wolf started to shake and grow, it’s flesh started to expand and rip. This image assaulted their minds, their sanity rebelling to what they saw. Dropping their improvised weapons, they all fell back in fear from the growing monster. Then blackness came to all three.
Hours past and they were woken by Glenn. Mariah, Ruairì and Benan could not explain what happened or why they all had four scratch marks on their shoulders.
After a week of fever and sickness, the three of them felt the need to leave for the forest. In the darkness of night, their newly acquired wolf form ripped out of their soft human shell. Which brings them to today and their first hunt.
Breaking free from the forest and moving over the cow paddock, Ruairì could see the lights of the homestead. This might be the last foster house they will all live in when they reach adulthood. Mariah is only six months away from her eighteenth birthday, Ruairì a year and Benan nineteen months.
What are they going to do as people or wolves? A troubling time indeed.
Samuel Colbran 