The lull of night

Curiosity

Part I: Curiosity

I loved not the night but he drew me,
With dark whispers beckoned me near
His shadows I thought would subdue me,
Enslave me in chains made of fear.

I wished not to look but he wooed me,
His strong, gentle hand turned my face
I opened my eyes and saw beauty,
Where I'd seen but a desolate place

I fled from the night but he chased me,
He caught me in arms of dark steel
I sighed as I let him embrace me
In his touch, at least, I could feel

I turned to the night and he kissed me,
On his lips I tasted sweet wine
I opened to night's sacred mystery
He took me, and whispers, "You're mine."

The night has become my dark lover
By day but a dream, bittersweet
At sunset I run to no other
My surrender to night is complete.

-Dark Love by Maggie Shayne-

"This is the worst idea ever," Scott mutters, scaling up the trunk of a tree.

"The best of the worst," Stiles says, grinning from where he's already in it. It's the only tree close enough and big enough to the Wall that they can get close enough to jump onto the top of it. Stiles and Scott have done it before, but only to ever sit up top. This time they have a dead body to find. Stiles' father is head of the day patrol, so he knows whenever anything suspicious shows up.

Scott sighs. "The worst of the worst, and that's why I'm here. Hurry up and jump."

The Wall is easy to get up to by the tree, maybe, but the difficult part is getting past all of the patrolmen on top. Night patrols never go out of the city (that's dangerous and stupid, which is probably why Stiles and Scott are doing it), so they all just make sure the city is secure from the top. (Usually that's what the day patrol does, too, but there are also the hunting parties that go out to get the city food, and that's when the patrol gets down on the ground.)

The Wall is the protection of the city of Beacon, circular so that the enemies outside-that is, the werewolves-are more confused. Being that it is a circle, the members of the city all chose to divide things into sections like that of a clock. Twelve is at the top since it signifies the beginning/end of the day, and that's where the city counsel is located. It's cut into pie-like slices after that, with the middle of the city known as the courtyard since the slices all meet in the middle. Residential homes are in section one to three, and while Stiles lives in one, Scott is way over in the back corner of three, which is annoying since they're always sneaking out to meet up with each other.

The tree they used is in section four, but Stiles and Scott have to run all the way to section eight to get to the section that the dead body is in. Of course, section eight has more patrolmen now, so instead they're just going to seven. They have to duck and sneak a lot, but they've done it before, so it's no big deal.

About twenty feet all around the perimeter of the Wall is kept as dirt so that nothing grows up to give the werewolves a way to somehow get inside, and there are rope ladders to get in and out, but Stiles and Scott don't use those since they can't just leave the ladders hanging when they get to the bottom (there's always somebody to pull it up or put it back down for the patrolmen since they're following rules, but Stiles and Scott are most certainly not following the rules). Instead they use their own devices, which are really just ropes that are tied to the same stakes as the ladders. The only thing that makes it better than the ladders is that they're painted to blend in with the wall and also that Stiles and Scott have to use complete upper-body strength to get back up the ropes (which they have since they've both been training themselves to be patrolmen since they met each other; they're only seventeen now, but you can't be a patrolman until you're eighteen since it's so perilous).