Whiskers

Giant

(Welcome to the fourth book of the cross-shifter series. This is the intro chapter to the twins' story. It can be read as a stand-alone and is bxb.) 

Darkness was always what he saw when he opened his eyes. It hadn't been such forever, but at least for several months at a time over the last few years. He'd most recently been locked up for killing his new owner and, per the contract, had been returned to his previous one. It was a twisted, sick cycle that had driven him mad years ago. He was a rare animal, and a shifter, as it were. He was worth his weight in gold, according to the auctioneer when he was originally sold. 

He cared little about his situation because it was exactly what it was, and he could do nothing to change it. He sat, day in and out, inside of what he thought was a metal container. It was likely from a semi-truck, used to haul items to and from different places. It only locked from the outside, and there was no way to open it once stuck within.

Every day, the temperature rose and fell with the sun, worsening the smell of his own fecal material that was slowly building up in the corner. The owner's workers were supposed to clean his container with one of those high-pressure hoses once every three or four days, but they were late this week. 

He could move very little with the strong metal chain fastened around his neck, and if he tried, the rusty spikes dug into his skin.

Huffing, Palace settled down in his corner and squinted his eyes open, only to close them a moment later. The ammonia burned terribly, and he had no doubt that they would eventually be damaged beyond repair if he was left to rot within the container for another year or two between sales and returns.

The only positive thing, so far at least, was that he did receive some form of meat at least once a week. It wasn't much, but it was enough to keep him going. Licking his lips, he gave a quiet growl. He often heard animals sauntering around the outside of his enclosure, but again, he was useless to do anything but defend the space inside. The metal container was his home, and even if it was terribly hot during the day and often too cold at night, and smelled horrible, he would defend it. Because it was his, and no one would take it from him.  

It was some time later, clearly in the early evening because he could feel the temperature dropping and humidity rolling in with the faint sound of thunder in the background, that he began to hear footsteps approaching his container. At first, his ears perked slightly at the sound of several dog's paws tracking through the field that he knew surrounded him. There was no shortage of deer, boar, and other forest dwelling creatures that came by at random times during the night, so he had decided that they had to have come out of the woods to feed while it was safe under the cover of night. 

Granted, he wasn't sure how far away the forest was to his container, but judging from the sound of the animal's feet over the years crunching on leaf litter, then switching to dry or damp grass and weeds, he couldn't have been far. 

Tilting his large head as the dogs got closer, then began baying just outside of his container, Palace snorted and forced his aching eyes open. They had likely come to sell him, again, which would mean another strong dose of tranquilizer, evidently twice that of which is used on a horse, from what he'd heard them say while they were getting the dosage ready outside of his container last time. 

Hunkering down, he allowed his mixture of dark brown feathers and fur to lift along his hackles as a deep, rumbling growl vibrated through the worn metal. The dogs outside immediately started quieting down. A few whimpered before falling completely silent, then most began heading back the way they'd come judging from the sound of their retreating paws. 

Palace could just see them in his mind's eyes, tails tucked running back to their master. He'd bet they got treated far better than he ever would. He wasn't jealous anymore, though. It had been years since he'd seen anything even close to kindness, so he'd hardened himself to the point of being an aggressive murderer... and nothing else.