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lordragoon
I sat behind the wheel, music blaring in my ears. It was a long road, stretching further than I could see. The heat of the desert blurred the road's outline, wavy images hovering in the torch of the sun's glare. It could be a highway of possibilities, a path of chances and odds beaten, but since this was New Mexico, I doubt it. Instead, it was just a road that linked two cities, the past and the future, together. One way showed what could be, new developments and opening doors. The other was full of closed photo albums and decisions all ready made. In life, all roads lead to the future.
Unfortunately, I was driving the wrong way; visiting the past. There were things that had to be done.
Another road sign passed by. Mile markers, one a minute, swooped past, telling me what I already knew. All roads are long roads, from the right viewpoint, but four hours is insane. Of course, to get anywhere in this state, you had to be on the road for hours. I just thought to myself, letting my reactions take over the driving and my mind wander while I stared down the road. Music washed over me while the wind from an open window hit. It wasn't a particularly catchy tune, but it wasn't bad. Outside, heat blazed against the only vegetation left, broiling the dying bushes. Next to me sat a sheaf of papers. They might help with the death shown outside. Duty called, telling me what I had to do.
I'll admit I wasn't paying attention. Even though I haven't driven or even been in a car much, when I drove, I just let reflex take over. The time flies by, and I don't even notice most of the things I do. That's one of the reasons I didn't like to drive. The second reason is that I don't like to hurry. I don't see the purpose of rushing to get anywhere. If you hurry through life, you just get to the exit sooner. But I only had the weekend, and there were things that had to be done before Monday. The third is that a car going sixty doesn't like to stop.
First, it was only a vague feeling of ill-ease. The air itself felt thick for a few seconds. Then I felt the hairs on the back of my neck spike out. That's the point where I swore and hit the brakes. A flash of movement at the edge of my vision was the last hint. I pulled the parking brake and swerved as an animal ran onto the highway. Tires screeched out their protest as I turned, doing what the car wasn't supposed to do.
I woke up, a flash of bright light as a car passed by the house. I looked at a clock, its glowing hands telling me that it was far too early to be up. My head hurt. An indistinct memory of blood, pain, and loud music in the desert ran through my mind right before I slid back into the darkness of sleep.
A moment later, I unbuckled my seatbelt. A clink of metal as I pushed the door open and fell out. What happened? I thought. I tried to remember the last few seconds. A flash of brown and white fur and a pair of horns. An oryx. If I hit that, I wouldn't have walked out of the car. I picked myself off the asphalt as I thought. I didn't hit the oryx, but I remembered a thump right before the car stopped. It was another few moments before I could stand up. Then I walked to the front of the car.
I let out a whimper. I wasn't a deer or an oryx. He had been a coyote, thick red fur covering graceful muscles. The impact wasn't pleasant. A gash down the coyote's left side went from foreleg to tail. Blood pooled on the road, leaving a rusty scent in the air. I kneeled down next to the animal. He looked at me, its eye staring at my own. Then he yipped, twitching its legs. I closed my nose, fighting what the smell of blood was doing to my stomach.
The fourth reason I don't like to drive is what two tons of metal moving at thirty miles an hour do to both the car and what stopped it.
The injuries were bad. Too bad for the animal to survive, even though few of its bones were broken. I stood up, ignoring the blood soaking the knees of my shorts. I turned around, going back to my car, opened the door and pulled the trunk release. Another few steps saw me standing behind the car, searching through bags. I found what was needed. I would do what had to be done.
A club symbolized power, and demanded it. A gun was a tool that used the gunman, and I don't trust them. Any fool could pull a trigger and the concept behind a wooden stick won't tax anyone's mind. But to use a blade required skill and thought; no blade is used without the wielder thinking his or her actions through. An idiot would cut their own hand off, while a master could slice a square in steel. I'm not a master. I just learn.
I pulled the dagger out of its sheath. Starmetal, the person who gave it to me had said. It shimmered in the dry air, a beam of light flashing off the bluish metal. The blade was thin, only one side of it sharp. That's why I used short blades. Most swords have two edges.
Not all of a weapon is the blade. The grip was what made this dagger special. The grip was cracked, an unpredictable pattern; like tree bark in both appearance and texture. It would stick to even an open hand. At the end was a wolf's head, its mouth open, its teeth bared.
I stood back up and closed the trunk. A yip echoed the sound of slamming metal. Off on the roadside, a second coyote sat, howling into the sky, mourning loss. I looked down at the weapon. A slash of the blade could make the world so clean, and the wielder so vile. I kneeled down next to the coyote, looking into the eyes of an animal. He stared back, pain and fear in its eyes.
"End the hurt," the coyote growled, his voice weak, his speech wolf.
The last reason I hate driving is because werewolves don't like being stuck in a metal box on wheels. Running�s more fun.
I made a few motions, showing my agreement to the canine. The brown orb and black pupil of its eye glared at the sky, losing focus. I closed my eyes and steadied my breathing.
Myth puts werewolves as killers, murderers who care not about their actions, consumed by some bloodlust. Legends calls us evil, destroyers and corruptors. The bite of the wolf corrupts anything the teeth touch. The weretiger was the guardian; the werebear the healer; the wereraven the teacher; werecoyote the trickster who helped those tricked. But the werewolf could only kill, never create. Only destroy, never mend.
I pulled the blade up in my right hand, bringing it to my face. It brushed my nose, between my eyes. I raised my left arm to my chest, right above the coyote. I took a deep breath and opened my eyes, dropping the dagger into its familiar backhand hold. The blade flashed again.
I brought the dagger to my left forearm, pushing it gently down. A drop of dark red blood painted the dagger tip. I held the dagger over the coyote's side, the red on the tip gathering over muscles shimmering with wet blood. Then it fell.
Myth says that we can not heal others. But, of course, the name myth implies that it is not true.
The coyote gasped, shivering in pain as a drop of dark blood hit his own. His eyes unfocused, almost clouding over. I took a few steps back and look down at the animal's pain, trying to remain distant from the thing I was. On my arm, blood poured a rivulet downward; dropping into the coyote blood onto the highway. Then the cut sealed, a pinprick scar left over. It would soon fade. The coyote shuddered again, his tail between his legs. The metallic taste of blood in the air and the apin I could see in the animal's eye pushed against my human mind. I fought with naseua and something worse. The coyote laid on the road, his chest rising and falling as he struggled to breath. He was in shock.
The jagged cut began to seal. At first it was slow, as blood stopped seeping from the open wound. Then it sped up. Muscle threaded itself back together, flesh flowing from jagged skin and bloodied hair. Fur began to sprout from black skin, sparse red growing at speeds far faster than normal. I shrugged off my shirt and wiped the rest of the blood off the blade with it. The coyote laid on the road, his chest rising and falling as he struggled to breath. He was in shock.
I walked back to the car and shrugged off my shirt. A splatter of blood crossed the front window and steering wheel. I reminded myself never to drive like that again, then wiped my blood off the glass with the shirt, then brushed the drying red flakes out of my hair. The cut on my forehead had healed before I had recovered from the impact. A fresh breeze from the north was cooling the desert.
I kneeled down next to the coyote. He was trying to get up, to run away. I sighed and growled, "Never hunt near the flat stone path again." I glared at the coyote. He struggled onto his feet and ran off, barely limping. The healing ability I gave him would fade as his body cleared the werewolf blood from his system, hopefully after his leg healed. I sighed and walked back to my car, pulling myself in.
A whir as I started the engine and pulled the car under a tree. I pulled the keys out of the engine as the singer sang about having somewhere to belong. Then I rocked the seat back and closed my eyes, waiting for time to pass. I was so tired I couldn�t stay awake. I guessed that the sudden exhaustion was from the injury and payback for the rush I had used to dodge an oryx.
I woke with a start, sitting straight up in my bed. I glanced at my clock again. Still too d#$@ early. But I wasn't tired yet. So I rolled out of my bed, reflexively grabbing for a weapon I wasn't carrying. I shook myself mentally and walked into the living room, booting up my computer. It was time to write what I thought was true, and what was real. Reality is relative... The semicircle bruise that covered my forehead was easy to explain; I must have fallen out of bed sometime during the night. It was the dime sized bloodspot on my left forearm that was hard to talk off.
- Oryx- n. A large mammal in the elk family, characterized by two large, sharp horns. Native to Africa, these hardy animals can also be found in most of the American Midwest.
I woke up, the sound of a howl echoing in my ears. In front of the car, maybe thirty feet, stood the two coyotes. The male, the one whose life I had almost taken, then saved, yipped at me. He offered to join in the hunt. That is the standard return for any great favor among the wolfkind, the gift of a chance at life. Behind me, the sun sank past a cloud. I thought for a moment. A once-white shirt sat next to me, crusted with dried blood, thin flakes coating the car seat and a folder full of papers sitting on top of it. The papers reminded me of a duty that had to be done, a life I couldn't run from. I couldn't postpone my work for long, but it had been months since I had last let the wind flow through my fur. The coyote howled again, and inside me, the wolf howled back. Why not? There was always tomorrow for work, and to the wolf, only today mattered. I lurched out of the door, letting the wind blow over me and the wolf take over me. That was all that had to be done.