Dragon Chasers [Nate]

[♔ Jericho ♔]

It is nighttime in Ponta Delgada. The hour approaches two o’ clock and the city grows quiet. Few other than the hardworking nightshift employee or the dedicated party hound walk the streets. Sunday service will take place in six hours and in a civilization rooted within religion, the seventh day is treated with reverence. The sheep will flock to their shepherds where they will listen and nod, and utter Amen. Preachers will shout about the evils of the world, about the dangers of sin and the devil. What they do not realize is how true those words ring. Among the flock wander the wolves in sheep’s clothing.

Sea salt and ocean brine permeate the harbor’s atmosphere. The burning lights of Ponta Delgada’s heart catch and burn atop the black water. Fishing boats travel the distant horizon and their bells ring like a far-off thought. Near the harbor’s edge sits an old facility. The perimeter of the property is surrounded by a rusty barbed wire fence and the face of the building itself is chipped, faded and worn by years of ocean weather and lack of upkeep. The city record books will show that a man by the name of Hubert J Watts purchased the area nearly a month ago. He is known only by name, not by face or by voice.

Outside and stationed behind stacked metal containers sits a car – the same vehicle Micah loaned Nathaniel days ago. The immediate territory is abandoned save for the stray animal looking for shelter or food. It is quiet, solemnly so, and the shadows of dilapidated buildings stand as forgotten pyres of civilization. The gate to the facility is locked, and it is access granted only to those who know the correct numeric code. Micah was the master, Nathan was granted the key. He was given a time and a place, and nothing more.

Inside the largest building are the remnants of a warehouse. Empty crates stacked ceiling high create narrow corridors, a maze of paths that all filter out into a sparse middle. Electricity buzzes overhead through old and stressed wiring. Light flickers, sputters, and fades in and out like the glow of a firefly. The majority of the area is lost to the dark, but what few working bulbs survive, manage to illuminate the middle.

There at the center, lay two beasts. Both wear the crown of a silver mane and they are of similar size, but one wolf is predominately white while the other possesses a dark-brown coat. The white animal sits awake, head held up, eyes fixated to a spot on the dusty concrete floor. Its companion lays with its back turned to him and with its chin rested on two front paws. The brown creature’s breathing is shallow, the rhythm of a slumbering animal.

They seem peaceful but it is not serenity in the white wolf’s body. There is tension throughout its entire frame, expulsed periodically in near-seizure like shivers. Foam gathers at the corners of its mouth and two wide eyes are dilated to the point of almost vanished pupils. Something is not right but the other animal appears uncaring or oblivious.

He is his brother’s keeper.

[♥ Nathan ♥]

A corroded iron gate stands locked and barred by Ponta Delgada’s harbor, as neglected in appearance as the decrepit buildings it hides away. Whether the latch is to keep trespassers out or its contents in is hard to say; the yard behind the rusting fence is devoid of life and still, and it is only within the walls of the crumbling buildings themselves that the shadows stir with secrets and danger. A black wolf rises amongst the darkness, human thought and desire left far behind in a foreign world of men, and it shares little in common with the beasts that are its namesake. It is wolf in concept, perhaps, but not one drawn out of reality; the sloping lines of its body and the curves of its wicked teeth and claws are more reminiscent of nightmare than dream.

Some demon, then, come to claim the shadows for his own.

The sea calls to it, and with it the risen moon and the untamed night, but the animal’s nature is refused. Where it would choose to run loose, to explore the world that now belongs to it and stretch its legs beneath a starlit sky, it is instead confined – and for the first time in many years. Agitated and uneasy, the wolf stalks the perimeter of this section of its prison, nose pressed into corners and cracks and crevasses for passing whiffs of clean outside air; compelled by a need to master its territory and understanding the futility of its gestures, it is not long before the animal’s thoughts turn inwards. A crooked muzzle lifts; nostrils flare. There is a scent and concept lurking here that sparks feral thought into memory, that inspires motivation and instinctive drive. The wolf turns from the walls and stalks the twisted passageways, guided to the warehouse’s heart.

Hooked claws skitter and clack upon the cement floor, heralding its arrival long before it can be seen, and the animal makes no attempt to disguise its approach. The odors it follows are as strange as they are familiar, associated only with vague concepts but implicitly understood. In one stands curiosity and an inspired hunger. Its madness and feverish obsession are tempered only through lurking confusion, by the shift in roles thought certain having gone long unenforced. The second scent is more mystifying, ambiguous and without predefined notions – and yet the only sentiment it encourages is doubt.

Dust-strewn corridors widen and fall away. The hum of ancient electricity is a buzz in the beast’s ears that carries through to his blood, and the instincts that call to him cannot be denied. Rendered in wavering yellow incandescence, the objects of the wolf’s search are at last revealed – and in them, trepidation.

Like many wild things, it views what it does not understand with hesitance and uncertainty. The aura of sickness alone makes the scene worth avoiding, and the black beast draws up short at the edge of the flickering light, lips curled into a distasteful snarl and ears pinned to its ragged scruff. It balks, but not in surrender. The animal’s head is high, though tilted warily away, and there is a cautious threat drawn in the tense line of its spine and the hard stare of its pinpricked pupils. A tongue swipes across the pad of its nose, over black jowls and white teeth. Where the brown wolf should prompt both submission and obedience, there is only stubborn defiance; its white companion sews mistrust and anxiety with every trembling shiver.

An insolent growl cuts through the distant drone of machinery, shattering the spell of ambient silence. The wayward stray has come questioning, and shouldering answers of his own.

[♔ Jericho ♔]

From the shivering dark arrives a demon. His presence is heralded by a rumbling growl but he will find no immediate response. The young prince slumbers while the older continues to suffer through its mystery affliction. Muscles spasm and shake beneath a white pelt, denoting a caged but fierce energy. Tension builds palpable in the air until the white brother finally snaps its head towards the newcomer. Blue eyes shift to regard the black wolf with an impossibly human stare. The gaze is wide and wild, and the animal radiates its discontent.

Those human eyes reflect the horror of a man trapped. Micah’s control is so absolute that it renders the beast handicapped. He cannot speak. He cannot move. When the wolf breaks into the physical world, the man is thrust into a terrible waking dream that he cannot escape. A sturdy frame. A set of strong teeth made to rend flesh. They mean nothing. The animal body is not more than a cage.

Electricity buzzes until it gives a high pitched scream. Old wiring fails to contain the current and a surge of power sends a flurry of sparks raining down from overhead. Light cuts out but returns through a pitiful flicker. In the moment of dark, the brown wolf must have moved; he is standing now, feral eyes watching the stray with unknown intensity.

Fitful lighting continues to vanish and return. It is during the small windows of black that the wolf stalks forward. In each image captured by the building’s dying illumination are the manifestations of memories rooted in instinct. A noble head held high through arrogance. A pair of clever, seeking eyes that speak of hunger and challenge. This is the beast contained behind a charmer’s smile and his silver-tongued words. This is the brazen animal that called to Nathan’s and demanded it facilitate his ravenous needs.

The wolf stalls and its ears pitch forward then back. This is not his Kingdom, not yet, but the creature before him is claimed. A gaze wanders over a black furred body, seeking a hint of submission. When the stray fails to give indication that he understands, the would-be king realizes that it is a claim he must reinstate. Lips peel back to reveal gleaming teeth and a thunderous growl resonates hollow through rusted metal and cracked concrete.

The scream of power escalates until it strangles and dies. There is one last clear image of the able brother moving forward whilst the ailing falters in the background before the warehouse is plunged into lasting darkness. Nails skitter over the dusty floor, the wolf drives forward, teeth seeking flesh. The demon will be made to understand that once the claim is made, it is absolute.

Greed, desire, and an innate sense of entitlement create a volatile concoction. The beast, the self-proclaimed king, will not be denied.

[♥ Nathan ♥]

What horror the white wolf manifests and cages within its too-human mind is resolutely ignored by the interloping stray. A crazed gaze is held for but a moment before the light stammers and sparks pop, and in that moment the true rival rises, one that draws attention like a moth to a flame. The wolf freezes, pinned by a hauntingly recognizable stare that conjures up disjointed and flickering imagery, and it remembers.

It is not at home in this cement cell of human constructs, of abandoned industry and whirring motors. Though the animal has long made a den out of cities it grows wary amongst so much unfamiliarity, rendered uneasy by the tenuous glow of yellowed bulbs that sputter and flare, and by the atrocious whine of wiring and machinery that grows to a wail and sets his nerves alight with tension. What intelligence is reflected in those blue eyes is entirely feral. There is little of the man about the beast, only a facsimile of shared instinct and half-felt emotion. What he cannot recollect he must learn for himself. What conversations he has had with the green-eyed prince must be spoken again in a language of impulse and drive.

Muscles dancing beneath his black coat, the arrogant usurper is on edge and restless, his weight shifted between broad forepaws and tongue flicked out between teeth once more. He does not shy away as his opponent approaches, though his demeanor reflects that of a cornered animal, wild-eyed and dangerous and without choice. Startled by the failing power’s din, the creature huffs out a hot breath from flared nostrils and lifts his head as the world about them plunges into shadow. There is a sudden noise, a shifting in the dark, and beasts collide in a flurry of clattering teeth and scrambling limbs.

The animal requires confirmation. He has never been a gift freely given but a prize to be won – and his challenger fights for him, stakes his claim though teeth and claw and is ferociously rebuffed. Submission has never come easily. The demon pushes and tests, bites back when bitten, and sells his soul only to the highest bidder; crude treaties have been struck by the man in the past and have rendered it docile, but the nature of their close quarters makes anything other than absolute certainty hazardous. The brown wolf had been appealing for the challenge he had offered, for the stability found in his absolute authority, but the lines have been blurred. They must be redefined.

A weight connects with his side and a strangled snarl spills from the animal’s parted jaws. Hindpaws scrabble and claw for purchase on the unforgiving cement, teeth snapping around empty air in an attempt to land a decisive counterblow; the darkness is broken by a shadow of bronze and silver, by hungry green eyes flecked with gold, and the black wolf lunges. The questing fangs of his opponent secure dangerously at the juncture of his neck and shoulder, but he pays neither the blow nor any subsequent pain any mind; he writhes, twisting, and seeking recompense of his own in a matching hold. He will not, cannot, back down – not until he is sure.

Pride dictates he not bow before the unworthy. Jericho and his animal both had once been declared exclusively deserving; it is the truth in this point that the black wolf now tests.

[♔ Jericho ♔]

In the skittering dark, human predilections do not matter. What the wolf knows above all else is smell-taste-sound-instinct. He is driven not by the desire to awe and manipulate, but to communicate and to own. The world is a vast desert wasteland with few morsels to slake the beast’s immense appetite, but the black demon is his boon. Teeth glide through sleek fur and find purchase against flesh, but the wolf does not draw blood – he holds.

Behind those wide and feral pinprick-pupil eyes, fragments of memories bleed and mix with animalistic instinct. They form as a broken reel of film, shuddering and skipping frame to frame, creating an imperfect story. The cover of darkness, the slide of two bodies. Heavy, canted breathing, the salt-sweet taste of sweat tingling on his tongue. Pressure settles over the demon’s beating pulse and the crowned wolf presses its tongue against the haunting rhythm, and waits.

A mirrored grip bears down into his neck and though the action elicits animal fury, the creature does not retaliate. Violence is an intrinsic part of the wolf’s nature; it sees what it wants and is flooded with the need to tear it apart, to swallow it whole and absorb it within himself. The black one is different, set apart from the mundane. The wolf refuses to so much as mar what it perceives with a wild mind as perfect. He cannot destroy one of the few beautiful things left in the world.

He repeals his attack slowly and will only retaliate if met with harsh rebuttal. Teeth release their hold and a wet nose glides over the demon’s cheek. The following slide of muzzles is reverently affectionate on the brown wolf’s behalf. Theirs was never a game written by violence. The wolf remembers an offer and a subsequent chase. The prince cajoled, the knight-errant followed. Physicality is important but it is the willingness to partake in the game that has always been the backbone of their story. A shared need to see the tale to its conclusion, perhaps, but a shared need nonetheless.

It is not with hesitance that the brown wolf backs away, it is with resolve. Twin green eyes reflect what meager light streams through the windows high above. There is a question and a challenge lurking in the animal’s gaze. He continues to back away in a graceful sway; it is a dance reminiscent to his human half’s playful drawl. At the turn of a moment, the wolf is gone – racing down one of the various corridors built from stacks of forgotten crates.

The chase begins anew, the prize remains to be determined. Should the demon choose to turn the test towards savagery, the brown wolf will oblige, but only when caught. Trails of lingering scent create a labyrinth of possibilities. Sound resonates off of metal and stone and render the wolf’s location impossible to pinpoint.

In his bid for the game, the creature has committed the ultimate sin. His brother lays shuddering in the dark, alone and forgotten. Micah, locked within the beast’s cage, has his answer and it is a bitter pill to swallow.

[♥ Nathan ♥]

Equilibrium is reached in the apex of an animalistic struggle. The enveloping darkness serves to blot out the world, rendering the two wolves its sole inhabitants, and nothing outside their small and selfish universe exists. Humid exhalations dampen the coarse fur that now chokes the black wolf’s mouth, his grip secure, but his teeth find no play within tender skin; where he expects a retaliatory gesture, a flood of violence to paint the floor crimson and see them each torn asunder, there is nothing. Only the sound of broken and heavy breathing echoes hollowly down the rusted halls, the shuffling of uncertain paws scuffing on the cold cement ground.

Ghost imagery wavers in the shadows, elicited by touch and taste and scent, and is ushered into reality by impulse and sensation. The wolf is held still by the sole creature to ever achieve certain dominance over it, and the beat of his heart spikes wildly beneath a questing tongue. Jaws part in the smallest measure of acquiescence, encouraged by the perceived threat in his partner’s hold, but it is a motion matched – each yields to the other, advantages relinquished. The blue-eyed animal is frozen as the brown boldly sweeps the pad of his nose along his muzzle. He offers only a subtle cant of his head in response, an involuntary sway of his body that follows the gesture wistfully as the would-be king pulls away.

Mistrust is the animal’s hallmark. Paranoia is a way of life. Parading about in the guises of men, the silver-maned prince has always inspired recklessness and a willful abandonment of practiced routines, and the same holds true even now; where for another the black demon would retaliate viciously, here he responds with subdued interest. The fight is drawn from him in the fleeting comfort granted by touch and the instinctive memories held within. What is left behind is cautious curiosity, and he forsakes his hasty bid to defend himself to follow, captured by the invitation in that feral stare.

Anxiety and concerns are abandoned for an electric pursuit. Tension abates, forgotten. The stacks of discarded crates and mountains of ancient ductwork transform from an alien landscape to an urban jungle, a kingdom waiting to be conquered and claimed – and within it, the wolf’s prize, the heir-apparent he searches for with such obsessive fervor. His is no mindless desire to maul and to savage. The animal’s drive to own and possess is crafted from a need for systematic order, an intellect that requires comprehension, but the brown wolf manages to alleviate that craving. He stalks his panacea with single-minded zeal. Corridors and passageways meld and blur together; the world spins, and the renegade is lost amongst the chaos.

It is long minutes before the beast at last slows, heart pounding and chest heaving, and the thrill of the chase is exchanged for a silent game of hunter and hunted. Spectral echoes of sound and a patchwork quilt of scents lay the trail, and the hound takes to it fanatically, following a siren’s call; there is nothing but the search, but the twisted maze of passages and the fortune hidden inside.

Who finds the other in the shifting night is ultimately inconsequential. The prince lays a trap or the knight springs from shadows; the result is the same, a tangle of limbs and the clatter of nails, the demon’s haunches sinking lazily to the concrete in light of his apparent success. There is no danger held in those jaws, on the pointed ends of teeth that snap wildly at the air between them. A bottlebrush tail sweeps slowly over the dusty floor, a pink tongue lolls from a gaping mouth, and no matter the circumstances behind their meeting the wolf manages the pleased look of an animal lording over a hard-won and well-deserved reward.

[♔ Jericho ♔]

Brother is an important word. On the simplest terms it means family, but beyond that it speaks of obligation and a bond that runs blood-deep. Words hold impossible weight in the realm of humans, but to a wolf they are nothing more than nonsensical utterances, unimportant sounds and ideas lost to the nether.

He cuts through the dark like an errant silver arrow. Throughout the chase his counterpart lays forgotten, exchanged for the possibility of something better. Weakness is a grievous sin in the animal world and to be saddled with the burden of the wolf’s supposed partner has always been an insult. What the beast understands is that despite the illness radiating from Micah, he is needed – a necessary evil—and so he is granted protection and a thin sort of loyalty.

It is a loyalty abandoned as it was always a fragile thing. There is the prospect of a stronger, more capable partnership filling the air with its energy. The demon draws closer and the maned wolf knows this intrinsically, as if the black one’s proximity is something he can feel within the center of his soul pushing, pulling – not unlike the ebb and flow of the ocean calling from the harbor. The pounding of the animal’s heart is both from exertion and excitement; he is on the precipice of brilliant opportunity and though he may not understand it, what is about to transpire will be monumentally important.

The chase ends in a flurry of motion lost to the thick dark. A kingly head rises from the ground where a silver-crowned wolf lays with a heaving chest and burning lungs. Green eyes peer through the inky blackness and meet a wild blue. The pair regard one another and the champion inspires no ill-will from the wayward prince. It is with a lazy but graceful movement that the brown wolf reaches out. Air dispelled from flaring nostrils rustles through the black fur of the demon’s cheek. What follows is something as gentle as a nuzzle, and then the slide of teeth over flesh.

No blood is spilled on the brown beast’s part. He holds with a possessive air and a seeking mouth. The pulse beneath his tongue runs in tandem with his own, and the animal inclines his head, offering the demon a chance to mirror the grip. He will own, he will possess – but it will be a mutual contract. The black beast is quick and able, strong and healthy. There is no burden here, but the opportunity to become something greater.

He will own the demon. The demon will own him. Together they will own the island and everything within it. The creature is brazen enough to think that nothing will stand in their way. Unknown to the trio kept safe within the belly of the warehouse locked behind a fence, are the glowing and angry eyes of Sao Miguel’s resident wolves. They watch and they lurk in the safety of their own darkness. Cautious and meticulous, they fall away, unwilling to breach the barrier of chain-linked metal and barbed wire.

Inside the warehouse and comforted by the possibility carried between him and the black beast, the would-be king knows only glory and satisfaction.