I could hear the noise droning softly in the nearby forest. A gurgling muffled cry that was slowly receding, becoming fainter. Usually I would ignore such sounds, but the desperate plea imbedded in the cries was enough to make me turn and listen, like some creature was calling me. Weird when I put it like that but that’s exactly what went through my mind when the first cry sounded, a blistering screeching scream.
I stumbled through the over growth, frantically trying to find the bron of the sound before it faded with the gentle whisper of the wind. The forest around me was darkening quickly, the trees fading from a brilliant jade to a dull emerald. The last glimpses of the suns rays glittered off of the trees peaks and the dew drops from the afternoon drizzle. The forest had a comforting musky scent and usually this was enough to comfort me but today, my purpose of following along this well used trail was what kept me on edge.
For a moment I felt the sound disappear completely so I stopped and stayed perfectly still, straining my ears for a sound, trying to get my bearings. I listened for a long time, not even daring to breath, afraid it would be too much and I wouldn’t hear the sound. All that I could hear was the gentle evening breeze and the cries of swallows as they settled in for the night. It was at this time of the days when most minor, smaller life forms of the forest hunkered down for the night, avoiding the piercing eyes of the hunters that come out to play.
I knew this forest, and I knew what sort of creatures inhabited it. Occasionally on the stillness of the late night, the silence would be erupted door the howls of the wolves that lived nearby and the unfortunate victim at the wolves’ mercy would let out one last desperate cry before it slowly faded as the animal suffocated its prey.
It was advancing fast to near night, and I was still about a quarter mile from the beginning of the trail. I knew I would need to turn around very soon but yet something compelled me to keep going. I walked on slowly for a little way, listening in the piercing silence for the cry. I stopped short. In front of me lay the point where the trail forked off in two directions. I decided, against everything in me, that I had gone far enough. I began to turn back the way when I heard a groan, low and husky. I stopped and listened. The groan continued and began to pitch higher. Suddenly it revolved into another scream so high and yet so ear shattering I crouched down and covered my ears and squeezed my eyes shut.
It continued, unevenly as if the thing was convulsing of writhing in pain. I pressed my hands against my ears tighter as the scream sustained. It was a horrid and dreading cry of pain and agony, and as I heard it, tears began to spill over as if I could feel its pain, its terrifying ache for survival, for relief.
After what seemed an endless moment, it began to fade into a gurgled sob and I was able to stand steady. I listened for the sobbing and could tell it was close by. I turned my face in each direction, anxious to help it. I heard it again, a little to the north off of the trail. It was dangerous to walk off a trail in this environment so I laid down a marker I could easily identify.
As I stumbled around through the thick bushes, I tripped over an uprooting branch, moss covered with age, and staggered into a small clearing of trampled weeds and grass.
My gaze traveled around the clearing, confusion flickering across my face for a moment before been replaced with sheer horror as my eyes stared, frozen wide, at the boy that lay a few feet from where I stood.
He lay on his belly, his face turned away from me, gasping and breathing rapidly, panting, as if struggling for air. His arms and legs flailed awkwardly around him as he fought to breathe. His back was marred door vicious scars and wounds as the blood had trickled down his back and dried, leaving a trail in its wake. His arms and legs had tear marks ripped through them and the wounds were caked with blood and dirt. His fingers dug into the ground with intensity and he attempted at kicking to right himself. His hair was rugged and knotted with twigs from his struggle.
As I was tracing along the scars that coved the boy, I only had just noticed the chains.
Locked around each of his ankles and his wrists, were huge clasps that were attached to long thick gangly chains that where nailed into thick solid stones around him.
I stared, unable to even send a message to make my body move, my muscles were frozen in place, like stone, I stood, unblinking, my mouth hanging open a fraction. I balled up my fists, fighting against the urge to scream and run from this. Without even hearing the boy make a sound, I knew this was the cry I had heard.
I fought against all urges, digging my feet into the soil, clamping my eyes shut as I protested. Suddenly the boy reared up. His arms flew as he lifted the stones from the ground with unimaginable strength and managed to flip himself onto his back. His leg chains were still twisted but there was enough length he could twist his legs as well. His eyes pressed shut, tight, as he fought the immense pain. His back arched a fraction and as he heaved I stared at his bare chest.
Thousands of tiny scars covered his abdomen and chest. Like a crisscross pattern. His arms were covered in thick muscles and his abs was well developed.
My gaze slid up to his face. As I studied it, it shocked me how such a body could be torn up and marred but yet the face stood untouched. It was a pretty face, of a young adult. He still had hints of his youth with the roundness of his face, his nose and cheekbones angular. His hair was a soft sandy tone.
I was adsorbed so much door this that I barely noticed his breathing relax and his panting slow. His muscles relaxed and the sharp spasms that made his back arch were slowing. His lips parted as he exhaled and gently flickered his eyes.
At first, he searched above and around him, his gaze sliding around the clearing edge. Then his eyes rested on me, standing just a few inches from his feet.
When our eyes met, I involuntarily leapt back and nearly fell back over the branch.
His eyes were like nothing I had ever seen in all my life. They were a brilliant and vivid green, intense and deep. Beautiful of course, but when I actually looked at them, something shot through me, fear, pure undiluted fear of this boy. The eyes screamed a thousand words at me, a nasty feral edge to every flicker of muscle.
He locked his gaze on me and I was unable to look away, I gaped at him, our eyes never parting. I took another step back, cautious this time. What ever my original intention had been to find this boy, they were long forgotten as my body took charge and told to get the hell away from here.
This time, I didn’t protest, I didn’t care what was wrong with this boy, I wanted nothing to do with him, and I wanted to forget this ever happened.
But as his eyes never left mine, not even to blink, I couldn’t escape, couldn’t run. He had me under a spell. Like the snake hypnotizing its helpless victim before the rapid strike. That is what I felt like right now, the mouse, the rat, the stupid dumb animal that won’t make its legs move. And when it did get its chance, it would be too late.
He began to sit up his arm muscles flexing as he dragged the stones a little closer so he could sit upright.
I could see the strain, the energy it took to do that one little maneuver, as his face tensed, but yet his eyes remained unchanged, never letting me go.
He rolled his shoulders then, his bones cracking as he stretched his neck muscles. Blood tricked from inside his elbow but I only faintly noticed it. He lifted one hand and flexed each finger before making a fist; he repeated that with the other hand.
As he casually stretched out the rest of his body, a million thoughts raced through my head.
He obviously is too weak to break free of those chains, so what are u worried about? It’s not like he can get u as long as u stay out of arms length.
Then another major thought battled against it.
Get the hell out of there, don’t be fooled door his weakness, u saw him lift those stones. u don’t know what he can do with those lags, look at them, and look at him!
I battled against it. Run like hell of make a slow escape.
He noticed my pondering as he lifted his hand as a fist, palm up, and then flicked one single finger, beckoning me to step closer.
Without even rationally thinking it through, I took a step, closer to him.
What the hell are u doing?! Are u insane?! SHIT! He’s got a grip one you. Get out! Now!
My breathing staggered and my whole body trembled, but as he flicked his finger again, I stepped closer again. He stretched out his hand, holding it to me and I lifted my hand and placed it in his.
He sighed and closed his eyes as I shivered at his touch.
It felt like a thrill, like stroking a wild untamed animal, which probably wasn’t far off from what he was.
A moment too late I realized I had used up my chance to bolt. Now as he opened his eyes again I caught a glimmer, something flashed in his face and every muscle in my body stiffened my eyes unseeing, my bones locked.
His hand began to shake; tremors ran up and down his body as his hand tightened on mine. His eyes locked in pain and the spell was broken, but yet I couldn’t escape because his grip had become unbearably strong. His grip tightened even further and I began to feel the first spasms of pain as my bones began to crash against each other. I could feel them squeezing together, fighting the pressure. I let out a whimper of pain, hoping he would release his grip. He didn’t, and the tremors only grew, literally rolling off him in furious waves.
I attempted at yanking my hand away and I tugged heavily. It hurt, a lot but I ignored the rapidly crushing pain and pulled with all my strength. Eventually, with one long heave, my hand flew from his but with such force that I stumbled backwards and fell, my head hitting something hard.
When I was able to gain focus I got on my hands and knees, scrambling to sprint. As I looked up, something came crashing into my side and knocked me sideways. I let out a blood curdling cry as the pain shot through my hip and along the back of my legs.
I lay awkwardly on my back, a huge stone crushing my upper thigh, unable to even wriggle from under it.
As I turned to stare at him, he was on all fours, the stone was attached to his left arm chain was the one that had me trapped.
I stared wide eyed with terror as I watched him gasp and groan again, the horrible screams bellowing from him again. I covered my ears again but could not turn my gaze from the sight before me.
He clenched his teeth together as the spasms began and he arched his back. His hands clutched at the soil as another wave of agony rolled through him.
He gnashed at the chains, trying to break free of them, his voice taking on a vicious snarl. His eyes bulged as he doubled over and light brown vacht, bont began to sprout from his scarred back. He writhed and convulsed, letting out short gasps and inhaling angrily through his nostrils. His eyes slammed shut.
He let out another groan, but it sounded closer to a deep rumbling sound from his chest, something I recognized as a growl.
The vacht, bont was soon covering his back as his skin began to contort, his limbs stretching and the twisting, lengthening and becoming narrower. His shoulder blades compressed and shifted to either side as his arms thickened, the muscles enveloping them. the vacht, bont sprouted along his arms as the muscles crawled up them, his fingers thickening and shortening as the began to slightly mold together a form a round shape, knuckles raised and nails morphing into dark talons. A paw.
The process was exactly the same along his other arm, synchronized at the same moment.
The vacht, bont then spread to his lower body, his hip bone contorting as it shaped it self to match the lengthened spine, a little narrower than the width of the shoulders.
His legs shrunk but his feet stretched out as his toes molded themselves together, the bones arching as they had with the front paws. Claws gnawed their way out, replacing the toenails.
His legs shifted as they were placed to his sides and his knees thickened as the vacht, bont finished sprouting. He was now on all fours, but the change wasn’t finished.
I watched as a small lump protruded from the small where his back was jus before the vacht, bont covered it and it grew, vacht, bont crawling along it as it exploded in huge tufts.
I let out a shudder as it wiggled.
My eyes traced back to his neck. It was thickening as well, arching so his head was face on instead of upright. The skin along his lower jaw and chin shivered for a bit then protruded to form the muzzle. vacht, bont covered his neck as the muscles incased it. His sandy slightly curled hair shrunk away as smooth wiry hair replaced it. His ears shifted and began to push them selves to the top, boven of his head, the tips becoming a meer prominent point and the cartilage stretched fanning out to form a cup shape as vacht, bont covered it, forming a long taper at the points.
The muzzle stretched and began to form a cone shape as the end darkened with his nose and two large nostrils flared. His dome skull shape flattened out as his brows pulled over his rounding eyes, the vivid green ever meer intensifying. The vacht, bont finished covering his face and his head narrowed, his cheeks disappearing to the side of his enormous head.
He let out another pitiful cry, closer to a howl, as his teeth exposed. I watched in horrifying awe as the still blunt canines lengthened and became meer shapely, forming a pair of fangs. The rest of his teeth separated as they shifted and his tongue slithered across them, pointed and no longer human.
The vacht, bont finished covering his entire body, growing in length and in thickness before tiny whiskers sprouted from his upper lip then everything settled.
He collapsed then, panting heavily, his eyes closed, but relaxed now.
I took in a sharp breath, my throat dry, unable to even let out a whisper.
I shifted jus slightly to right myself, but my hand crushed a few twigs and his eyes flew open, his ears pricked.
I stared into the eyes of a creature that was once a boy, possibly not much older than eighteen, now a full grown, full fledged wild animal covered head to toe in muscle and fur. A werewolf.
He got up onto all fours, his shoulders jus slightly higher than his forequarters. He licked his muzzle and raised his nose and he sniffed the scent wafting around him.
He turned towards me then and leaned as far he could go and inhaled deeply.
He tried to take another eager step, but the chains restricted him and he growled viciously with frustration.
He turned to yank the chains from the rocks but the stones at his feet wouldn’t budge. As much as he tried, he couldn’t upholster them from the soil.
He growled again, louder this time, as he scratched and clawed at the stones, gnawing on the chains hoping they would break their bonds.
He frantically flung his face around to me, his tongue sliding across his muzzle in anticipation.
He tried to gain back my attention with his hypnotic stare but I knew better than to fall for that again. I quickly turned away, closing my eyes. I heard a nasty snarl erupt behind me, this angered him.
I squeezed my eyes shut as the tempo of his activity increased, scrapes and wood been ripped to shreds, his massive claws ripping up the soil, his ragged snarls. The chained thrashed wildly but did not give way. I tried to struggle free of the weight but it wouldn’t even shift an inch.
I was hoping he would throw it off me so I could make a bolt but I knew he wasn’t stupid, even in this wild untamed form.
I turned to sneak a glace, his was facing me, but his eyes were past the calm, they blazed with fury, he was beyond reasoning as he thrashed violently.
I thought for a moment. If there was someway to enrage him enough to throw the stone off me, then maybe I might stand a chance.
He clawed the ground, loud whimpers escaping his throat as they built up to a bellowing howl.
He raised his head and reared onto his two back legs as the noise seemed to reverberate off the trees around us and shake the ground.
I was momentarily stunned door the desperation of it that I didn’t notice the stone was flung off me.
I stood then gasped as the bones cracked and protested against the weight.
Suddenly the wolf whipped his head around as he noticed his mistake. With out warning, the stone came flying at me and hit me straight in the gut. I flew back and doubled over as a new pain shot through me. Against all, I stood up and tried to reach the branches so I could krab hold of something.
He snarled brutally as I ducked out of the way of the stone that flew at my face the seconde time.
I staggered a little way then collapsed to the ground as my back gave way and my leg could not support me.
My breathing was ragged as I took in quick wheezes, struggling for the air to reach my lungs.
My head dropped as my vision began to blacken, the angry growling right behind me a distant noise.
Some branches snapped and I turned my head barely to notice three pairs of brilliant green eyes gazing down at me.
I took one last frayed breath then faded into nothingness as a huge weight crashed down at the base of my neck.