Exile Empire, Exile The Second

Chapter 9 - Sorin

Wolf was like a puppy on the trip to Vancouver. We could have slipped through the fabric again, the tightly woven magic cover keeping our world safe from those beyond, but it took a lot of energy. I could recite the spell and teach Kairos how to write the glyphs for a short jaunt, but then we'd hit the ground exhausted.

At least I would, I wasn't sure how her body would handle it. She was most likely more adept at taking on magic and performing spells. Her kind had been created for it and bred for it over the millennia.

Smells everywhere, wolf said as we moved along the ferry deck. Kairos walked with me, but every time we paused to look at something, she'd stare into the distance as if haunted. It wasn't so much that I got the feeling she was avoiding me, but she was avoiding something.

Wolf wasn't helping much by attempting to take over every moment he caught something on the breeze using my nose. I'd lean into the invisible wall Kairos had built around herself, thinking of something brilliant and life altering to say, like a humorous observation about seagulls, and wolf would smell hamburgers cooking in the cafeteria on the passenger deck and almost force me overboard with his enthusiasm.

Food, he moaned, and I felt the tug of his consciousness digging into my brain to dive into the olfactory system.

"Settle the fuck down," I muttered and caught her sharp look out of the corner of my eye. I pretended to cough to cover it up, but it was too late. She watched me carefully for a moment longer, then went back to staring out at the ocean waves the ferry pressed surging in its wake.

Great, now she thought I was a lunatic as well as an inconvenience. I'd have to watch myself with wolf and stick to mental communication.

Too bad, wolf said inside. I like hearing your mad voice.

You're an asshole, I thought to him.

Yes, he replied, and I felt the smug satisfaction he held close to his presence. He was distracted quickly, and I felt him shoot off to the side when the intoxicating aroma of french fries floated up to us.

"Are you hungry?" I asked Kairos.

I felt wolf rumble in my chest and howl, YES.

Not you, I thought to him. Her.

"Not yet," Kairos replied. "We can grab lunch in the city."

Shut down again, I simply stood near her and soaked in her presence. I couldn't force her to open up to me, and I couldn't force her to love me. But I'd learn about her by being with her. Prepare myself for when she did open up to me and we could start our future together.

It was inevitable, which is why I didn't mind the wait. She was worth it.

Fuck, wolf growled as she brushed up against me. Want now, no wait.

I know but we have to, I thought, sending him the image of shutting up and going to sleep. He was going to make me act like a fool in front of her and I couldn't have that.

Wolf was about to do just that when he caught the smell of a dog, a small one somebody had smuggled on in their backpack, and he whined inside.

I saw the woman and her male companion walking towards us and I felt wolf tremble inside, desperate to get out and chase the terrified little beast until it either died of fear or was devoured by wolf in one chomp of his massive jaws.

Settle down, I thought as the woman passed by.

Wolf vibrated with anticipation inside and from the backpack, I heard the sounds of a high pitched whine. The woman pulled the pack off her shoulder and unzipped the top just an inch. The whine got louder and rose to a high pitch squealing bark.

"Tossy, what's wrong with you?" the woman asked, desperately shoving her hand inside to calm her little rat dog. "Calm down, we'll get you treatsies."

"Let's get him back to the car," the companion said, drawing in an irritated breath.

Wolf finally lost interest and settled down inside, but I watched the two people with the sneaking suspicion that Kairos might feel the same way once she realized I was carrying around an annoying little pet of my own.

I held my breath waiting for wolf to react, but he didn't. He was sleeping again, as he would until we moved closer to the full moon and his time.

Which meant I had less than three weeks to prepare Kairos for the inevitable shift into wolf, and what to expect from both of us when it happened.

I couldn't imagine how it'd look from her point of view, me exploding into a bipedal wolf beast, then falling onto all fours and turning full wolf before running off into the night to feast and kill and eat.

If I was still in Vancouver at that time, it would be a night of coyotes and any deer I found in the trees. Stanley Park was the largest around, so that would be the best place to start. I'd never killed or eaten a human, even when I'd lived in London, and wolf didn't have a taste for domestic animals so they'd be safe around us.

He said they were too fat and tasted bland.

When I thought about the times we'd killed them, I had to agree.

"And so we'll have time to explore the area before we dive into any magic or spell casting, okay?" Kairos said, finishing up the end of something she'd been telling me.

Fuck, I'd been too consumed with worrying about wolf to catch that she was talking to me.

Balancing everything was going to be difficult, it was already proving nearly impossible.

I nodded vigorously to her suggestion and blanket agreed to whatever it was she wanted to do.

I had to get my shit together soon or this was going to be a disaster.

And I didn't care what would happen to me or wolf if things fell apart and we were harmed, but I fucking cared what happened to Kairos Empire.

Daydreaming about eating coyotes wasn't going to save her.

Focus, I told myself, feeling wolf rumble inside. Fucking focus.

So I tried, I did my best.

* * *

Getting some insight into her world proved invaluable. I gained more information about her the longer we spent together, and something struck me as we walked towards her old apartment, the one that'd been burned the night before.

She was scared.

She didn't act like it and she'd probably clock me in the chin if I ever dared to suggest it, but Kairos Empire was afraid and I didn't know why.

It wasn't surface fear, like the acrid scent of her sweat when she thought about confronting the demon in her sister's body. It wasn't even fear of me, like she suspected. She wasn't afraid of me or commitment; she was afraid it wouldn't work out, perhaps, but that was it. We'd deal with that when it came.

But Kairos Empire had this underlying pungent reek of nervous, anxious, all-consuming fear that was ever present in everything she did.

To get to the source of her fear meant a lot of patient conversation and donning the role of therapist for the time being, but she had to unlock the hidden trauma that had created the dark knot in her chest before she could open up and be herself.

She'll open, wolf kept insisting the entire time we were around her. She's ours.

I believed him, but the balancing act would be difficult enough as it was, but little did I know the scope of the battle we had ahead of us.

Would I have tucked my tail and gone full feral? No, not a chance.

But I would've prepared myself better had I known.