Existence 2. The Gryphon (tf)

The girl barked with laughter and fell over thrashing, and clutching her sides. Red mist streamed around her, small and olive skinned with narrow black eyes and long twisting dark hair, dressed in her usual little orange dress.

Ollie harrumphed and looked away, his hand feeling his scalp in disbelief. There was no hair except light fuzz, the colour he couldn’t be sure of, but it certainly wasn’t his usual black locks.  The rest of his body felt wrong too, his build was broader and shorter than usual, than how he was meant to be, just like had happened to Karen when she took the veil potion and changed human. Jess found the entire thing hilarious, she hadn’t laughed all day, but now she was rolling on the floor in a fit of giggles at his sour expression.

“Can’t you make a potion that doesn’t make us baldy? You’re a wizard, you’re meant to be good at magic!” He complained, looking at the mage-boy who was sitting on a rock in the cave’s alcove. Lorcan was pretty tall at fifteen and looked Native-American, tan skinned with dark brown hair and eyes, and a big nose. “You did this on purpose, didn’t you!?”

“No, relax. It’s just because you’ve never had veil before and the first few times mystics change to human form it takes time for the disguise’s hair to grow. Most mystics like Bull change when they’re small children so they grow hair over time, but you’re older. You’ll grow hair in time in this form, don’t worry.” He explained and yawned in exhaustion.

“What colour? It’s not black is it? This isn’t me-me!” He said in frustration, “I thought I’d change back to the old me, not some random boy…”

“It’s what I can do just now, I’ve barely got anything in case you haven’t noticed.” The older teenager snapped. “Just think, you can talk for a couple of hours, okay? Make good use of it, I don’t know how long it’ll be before you can be human again, and if you’re just going to complain then it’s not worth wasting veil on you.”

Ollie closed his mouth grudgingly at the threat and lashed out at Jessie, still laughing. His foreleg- no, arm now- passed through her glamour’s body without damage, only making a faint puff of red mist before the illusion repaired itself. She only giggled louder, tears rolling from her glamour spell’s eyes somehow, and choked out a word, “Bal… baldy…. Bald eagle!”

“That’s not clever, I came up with that when Karen was bald!” Ollie snapped and hunched forward. This still felt odd, bipedal and so simple, no tail or wings giving his back that nice weight, he couldn’t even move his ears. “See how Karen could shapeshift back to normal? I’ll be able to do that right, Lorcan? We’re the same.”

“Probably, but not as much. We don’t have the magic stone she uses to give you enough magic to shapeshift. I suppose I could try and leech some magic off the dragons to turn you back, but it’s hard to say, you both have very dominant gryphon halves.” He yawned and leaned back against the cave wall, “On your own you should be able to store up enough magic to shapeshift, but only once and that’ll probably take over a week.”

“What about Hana? She can shapeshift on her own.” Ollie pointed out, glancing over at the girl. Or, statue of a girl right now. She had been voluntarily petrified by Miranda the gorgon, leaving her as a solid lump of black marble, the image of a girl hunched over, hands and long hair over her knees, face hidden. It looked a little funny, still dressed up in her normal clothes, you couldn’t petrify clothes.

“She’s a youkai. A jurogumo.” Lorcan said, as though that passed for an explanation, “Look, that’s just something her kind can do, like the dragons breathing fire, and Jess can glamour even though she’s only seven.”

“I’m eight now!” The kitsune informed him sharply, her laughter stopping suddenly at the supposed insult.

Oliver nodded in understanding, there wouldn’t be shapeshifting or veil for a while then, “So I’ll be a gryphon for most of the time. That’s okay, I like it.”

“You’re happy like that?” Lorcan asked, his brows rising.

“It’s… it’s comfy, and big and strong, and I can learn to fly like Karen and hunt like Hex. It feels like me as much as I normally do, it’s only…it’s only this.” He swept a hand over his human disguise. “This doesn’t feel like me, this is like a stranger.”

“And… what about being here?” He gestured out through the cave they had found, a twisting rocky cavern that had been the den of the dragons, and a dozen youths over the years before then, judging from the broken glass and old papers. As much as Ollie disliked the enclosed space, and had worries of the entire hill collapsing and burrying them, it was warm and stuffy at least. Plus it was a secret, hidden and twisting and turning before it opened up into this cavern where the couple of dozen survivors had built a fire and spread out their blankets and clothes. Most were moping around the fire, satyr, naga, phoenix, gorgons, while others sat silent except for shaking.

They had all lost someone when the hunters appeared and started shooting. They would have shot Ollie too, he had been rooted down in fear and panic, he had lost control and changed into a gryphon, and even then, clawed and winged and big and strong, he had been too scared to move. There had been deafening gunshots, and fires that lit up the slaughter as the myths were decimated. He had only been saved by a screech, and his sister appearing as a huge dark gryphon, lifting him and Jess onto her back between vast wings.

“I miss them. I miss Mum and Dad, and I miss Karen, and I miss Lily and Norman and Roberto and everyone.” He admitted, looking down. That showed human toes, and he closed his eyes, trying to imagine a big wing covering him, keeping him safe. The memory only hurt even more. Where was she?! She had been there, she had saved them, and then she’d flown off and left him. “I hate them all. Stupid hunters, you guys didn’t hurt them and they’re all angry and horrible! Why!? It’s not fair! It’s not fair at all, they should be getting shot, not us!”

“Shut up!” A fist smacked him in the side of the head suddenly, and he fell over with a snarl. Tears were clouding these weak eyes, so it took him a second to see Jess glaring at him through black eyes, tears running down her face. “Shut up, shut up shut up!”

“What was that for stupid?!” He yelled back, rubbing his head.

“Shut up, I’m not stupid! You’re the birdbrain, you don’t know how it feels!” She squealed and swung her fist at him again. Ollie grimaced and swept his larger hand up to block it, but the fist vanished into red mist, and then reappeared past his hand to smack him in the face. “No idea! No idea!”

She punched and kicked him again before Lorcan’s hand plunged towards her feet and the glamour faded. Red mist spiralled out of the shape and the small three tailed fox kit hissed and squeaked and whined at them for a second, before turning tail and scampering across the cave. Ollie grunted and rubbed his head, trying to get to his feet, but the mage pushed down on his shoulder. “Leave her alone.”

“Leave her alone!? She’s the one that started hitting me!” He growled back, trying to pull the older boys hand off him. He was weaker now though, he didn’t have the power of a gryphon anymore…“Why’d she do that?!”

“She’s jealous. She’s lost both her parents now, remember? And you’ve not lost any family to the hunters, you don’t have any idea how much the others hate them. She thinks you’ve not lost enough to claim to hate them like she does.” He brushed his hair with his other hand wearily, “Basically, you’re lucky; your family aren’t mystics so they should be left alone and alive.”

“But they still killed all the mystics, I was friends with them! Can’t I be mad at them for that?!”

“Yeah, look, we’re all upset, you’ll have to be patient with everyone.” Lorcan groaned and sat back down. “Just… try and help your friends more than hating the hunters. And don’t go trying to find hunters, you might be stronger now, but you still wouldn’t stand a chance against them.”

“I would too!”

“No you wouldn’t, Alastair got hurt fighting one earlier and he’s far stronger and faster than you are. He didn’t even land a scratch on him.”  He rubbed his hands together, “Well, hopefully the hunt will stop in a few days. We’re going to send a couple of people into somewhere to get news and food, but you need to stay here until then, okay?”

“Can’t I try and hunt? I caught a pigeon and a racoon, and then I can eat that and I won’t need to take your food.”

“You’re actually keen on hunting? After less than a day?”

Well, I killed someone within a minute of changing, Oliver thought, back, two months ago on Halloween when everything had changed. Him and one of Karen’s friends, Caleb had just meant to go look for Hex after he ran off into the mist, calling his name. Then it had gotten scary, with pigeons and monsters in the trees, and then the wretched siren had sprung out and stabbed him, and the boy had found himself as a gryphon. The forest had seemed even darker then, he had lost Caleb and the only thing he could see in the fog was the Siren. He had just lunged at it wildly, and gone straight through like you did with Jess, instead his attack tore Caleb open. He had run off in fear and changed back, but the boy had died still, on Karen’s back of all places.

That was his secret though, that was just because of the pigeons and the Siren, Karen had told him. The pigeons and the Siren were as bad as the Hunters, it was good to kill them.  It was like practice, one pigeon yesterday, two tomorrow, and one day he’d catch up to the Siren…

“Yeah… I guess I wanted to cos of the dragons and Al, they hunt and they say it’s fun. It is too, it’s like a game of tag or a treasure hunt. And the pigeon was tasty when I closed my eyes, I think it was the wing-“

“Yeah, that’s enough detail, thanks. I wouldn’t think you’d like it, Karen never wanted to hunt. She showed the signs though, watching birds and stuff, but she never gave in to it. I suppose you’re just different there. You can hunt if you stay near the others and don’t go too far. But don’t fly okay? I don’t know if you can, but you’re too obvious a mystic; there’s no way you’d pass for a bird.”

Oliver nodded, “Do you think Karen’s alright?”

“No. You guys had a fire last night, easy to track down, if she was okay she would have found us then.”Lorcan wiped his face and sighed, “I don’t know what was going through her head, flying off like that. Probably thought the siren was around and she could kill it on her own…. Don’t do the same thing.”

“Fine, I get it.” He snapped back furiously and climbed to his feet, pulling a nice big blanket over his shoulders. It was reassuring, like having his wings, and he scampered over to the fireside, looking at the others. Maddie and Bo were nagas, girls with long serpentine tails in place of legs, the brown coils wrapped around either sister. Bull was a shaggy young satyr, goat legged with small horns sprouting from his skull. Diana was a red bird, a phoenix in amidst the flames, her head hidden under one crimson wing, though the other one, John was veiled as a tall human teenager, sitting chatting with the male gorgons.

There were seven so called gorgons in all, though only the girls, Miranda, Catriona, Mellissa and Amelia had petrifying snake hair. Vincent, Jason and Alexander looked almost human, the only sign of being half human was the scaly birthmarks that were almost always covered up anyway, save for a coppery patch on Jason’s hand.

“… the sun was amazing, it was so warm there, the sky was just this perfect blue with barely any clouds. Absolutely brilliant to fly in… for you guys, I guess it was like relaxing in a bubble bath and closing your eyes, but a ton more exhausting. It only rained a couple of times, and that was pretty cool too, the clouds just came out of nowhere and all the tension and humidity in the air, it all just came down in ten minutes. There was even thunder and lightning, but it stayed light out, with massive rumbles in the distance, utterly incredible.” John was telling the boys, a far off look in his brown eyes, “That’s how rain should be, warm and fast and dramatic, not drizzling all day like it does here.”

“Where was that?” Ollie wondered, “Texas?”

“Who a- Wait, you’re Oliver, right? You don’t look like you, you look like an egg!“ Alex frowned, then gasped and laughed. He was the eldest of the three at thirteen, Miranda and Amy’s brother, dark haired and short, with cracked glasses sitting on his nose.

“An egg? Brilliant, more bird puns, just in case I forgot what I was.” He groaned and resisted the urge to pull his blanket over his scalp like a hood. They’d only tease him more, and then they wouldn’t when he changed back.

“Get used to them mate, I’ve had the bird gags for ages, and I get all the fire jokes too.” John chuckled, “Nah, wasn’t Texas, was in Greece last year. Word of advice, learn Greek first, I had zero idea what anybody was saying! It’s just a good thing some of them spoke German, and my English was coming on too or else I would have been completely lost.”

“German?” Little Jason asked curiously, wiping his running nose with the scaly back of his hand. Tear tracks stained his face, and he had sleepy eyes, struggling to stay focussed on the veiled phoenix.

“Yeah, I was hatched and raised in Germany. Wasn’t as cold as here at least, and well organized, but I didn’t know as many mystics. There were sanctuaries in the woods, and communities, but I was brought up human and kept out of those. I just came here wandering and flying, landed slap bang in the middle of the emergence.”

“Why did you leave home? You’re only fifteen, that’s like Alex running off!” Vincent was a chubby boy with dark eyes, a year junior to Ollie, but big boned.

“We have run off,” Alex put in.

“That’s…that’s different, home’s gone now, and we’ve still got some family. He just flew the coop!”

“Yeah, I did. I mean, every day since I was hatched I got up and saw the exact same landscape! It was just boring me, and I’m nearly full grown, so I decided to take a nice big trip! I was meant to go home, but, things just changed so much that that plan sort of fell apart. I’d still love to phone my old man, I meant to ring him and say happy new year.” John said cheerfully. He was good at being cheerful and funny, even though he must have lost as many friends as Ollie had, the smile and laughter stayed with him and spread from there. “My plans never seem to work out, I’ll just wing it from here on out, it’s safer.”

“Are you going to go buy stuff tomorrow?” Ollie asked.

“Yeah, but I’ll have to walk the entire way, can you believe it? Think they just want someone to carry stuff and get shot.” He smirked, and put on a falsetto voice, ““Oh, don’t worry John, you’re a phoenix, doesn’t matter if you die.” Honestly, such speciests.”

“You didn’t have sisters who petrify you every half hour.” Alex complained, “It’s not fair at all. They’re immune to being petrified too, we ought to be immune as well, but nope. Some ancient greek sorcerer was really sexist, let me tell you.”

“There’s lots like that. Spider girl, gorgons, kitsunes…” Vincent noted, “I thought you guys were only females too Ollie, since Karen was a gryphon, but I guess that’s not right… how come you’re a gryphon now anyway?”

“We’re part gryphon. One of our great grans was a changeling, so we can be gryphons too. I just panicked and changed, my mum’ll be mad when she’s got two gryphons to deal with.” He explained, and noticed the boys faces fall a little at the mention of his mother, no doubt missing their own kin. Anyway, the discussion died down soon and Miranda appeared and bossed them to try and get to sleep, not that they had any sense of time down in the cave, and John claimed that the fire would burn for as long as Diana remained hunched in it. Twice as a long as that if both phoenixes were in it.

Ollie hugged his blanket around himself and wandered towards the edge of the cavern, and then up and around a bank that gave access to a small ledge. He still had a while left before he changed into a form comfy enough to sleep as, and he needed a little privacy in this corner to strip and not get in trouble for ripping up the clo-

“Who are you?” A fierce girls voice demanded, and he jumped. Sara was there, rubbing reddish wet eyes to look at him in confusion. She was a Tengu Karen’s age, an Asian looking girl with huge black wings stretching from her shoulders, and half of her face covered by a blotch of thick red scales like a mask.

“I’m Ollie, the stupid veil didn’t turn me into me.” He grunted, waiting for the bird pun. Or cat pun.

“Aw, that’s the bad part of being a beastie I guess, having to change all the time. I only ever lose my wings and that hurts like hell, but the rest of me looks normal.” She brushed black hair out of her eyes, “I guess you’re just unlucky turning bald, you’re a black cat now aren’t you? Need to make sure you don’t cross people!”

“I’m not just a cat, I’m a gryphon.” He objected hotly, “Only half cat.”

“Don’t walk past them twice then.” She smirked, the smile twisting her red features, “Unless you want them to trip on their laces or miss their bus or spontaneously combust.”

“Can you teach me to fly?” He asked suddenly, looking at her wings. She could fly, he’d seen her do it, and she had six limbs total, the phoenixes only had four.

“I dunno, maybe. I saw Karen fly lots, so I remember a little. We can always try. As long as you’re not an idiot or incompetent or lazy!”

“I’m not, I want to fly! You don’t need to shout!”

“I’m your coach now, it’s part of my job, you can’t fly without being shouted at. Trust me, my dad kept throwing me off stuff until I managed to glide! Sometimes he even did it while I was veiled and wingless, come on!” She jumped to her feet and smiled, jumping off the shelf and around the caverns edges. Ollie frowned and followed, trying to stay quiet as a few curious eyes looked their way until they entered the narrow tunnel.

“What do you mean? Right now!?” His whisper echoed in the twisting stony passage, and again he felt a surge of fear. There was a hill above their heads, all of that weight, with this hole just waiting to bury them….

“We’re going outside, to start teaching you while it’s dark. Don’t be a chicken, it’ll be fun. Right? You’ll enjoy it beastie, won’t you?” Sara had shoes and a longer stride, she was ahead in seconds, her wings folded up around her like a feathery cloak.

“Yeah?” The tunnel twisted and turned again, and then it was a slope, opening up with roots around from the trees above, and cold snow on the bank.

“This isn’t about fun! I don’t care whether you enjoy it or not.” She snapped, and then laughed, “Hey, I can understand why dad did this so much! It’s great!”

Ollie whined and hunched down, tugging the tshirt and shorts off quickly with the blanket for cover. He was just in time, as he finished he felt a surge of burning pain and flailed, smashing his hand against the ground in silent agony. His entire body began to grow and enlarge, his torso lengthened and altered itself, the shoulders and hips snapping and cracking into a quadruped set, while his chest deepened and neck thickened. His fingers spread out and grew longer and bonier, topped off by black talons, while his feet did the opposite. The toes grew and swelled up against each other, curling together with small claws hidden there, and his foot lengthened with tough pads forming on the sole.

“Hey, you there? Beastie? Oh…well, hurry up, I want to sleep after this!” Sara berated him, and Ollie opened his mouth to snap a retort only to gasp in pain. His skull was adjusting, growing, and in an instant it turned rounder and smoother and he lost his face as a sharp pointed black beak bushed out in place of a mouth and nose. Within his tongue lengthened, and he braced himself as his spine burst out of his rear in a long feline tail. His back bubbled and burst apart to unleash expanding wings, wider and wider, and he felt prickles as his coat finally grew in. Black fur and midnight feathers covered the young gryphon, black scales on his forelegs too, although his eyes were yellow and bright as he flapped the blanket off of his back.

His cat-like ears twitched, listening as he looked around, glad to have these eyes back, they saw so much more. His night vision was still poor as his human forms, but somehow sharper too, he could see the shape of Sara just out of the tunnel, under trees and rocks. “There, done now? Are you done? You’re black and its dark, it’s a bit hard to tell.”

He nodded, then blinked and let out a positive squawk, scampering up the bank to her side. His talons were a little weak and hard to grip the snow, but his hind paws kept him upright, long tail waving behind him gently. The chill bit through his coat, but it was still comfortable to be this way, he would have been cold veiled too.

“Okay, I’ll take that as a yes, I really need to learn bird-speak, now open these wings up buster!” She tapped on his shoulder-limbs, and he stretched them out as wide as possible. He was fairly big this way, not near the four foot standards of his sister, but he guessed his shoulders were nearly a metre high, and his main body was the size of a tiger already, level with the girls stomach. She danced around him and patted the wings, a nice sensation, before declaring, “Yup, those are definitely wings. Good and big, they’re larger than mine aren’t they? Yeah, of course, well, you’ll be heavier.”

She stepped back a few yards so he could just make out her winged outline, and cocked his head to ninety degrees, waiting impatiently and stamping on horrible snow. “Okay, I think you guys take off by crouching first, all the power comes from your rear legs, and you need to get enough height to bring your wings down without brushing off the floor. Then you just keep flapping and forget about your feet until you land. You need to flap hard, and avoid bringing your wings up too high, or you’ll start falling.”

Ollie listened and obeyed, squatting down on his haunches, four legs bent, tail writhing excitedly. His wings rose up to nearly perpendicular positions, and then he kicked hard off the earth and went flying forwards. Sara squealed and leaped out of the way with a gust of air, “No! No! You’re trying to jump up, not forwards!”

The gryphon landed with a startled shriek and rolled over in the snow before springing back onto his feet eagerly. This time he changed how he pushed off, using his forelegs too a little bit, although he forgot to use his wings in time and fell on his belly on the ground. The third was similar, he braced himself to land on his feet and forgot to try and fly, but on the fourth jump he managed to flap his wings in time. They pushed him up farther into the air, and he squeaked in surprise, then narrowed his eyes and pushed downwards again, and again, feeling himself go flying forwards haphazardly.

“Tree!” Sara warned him after he hit it and dropped ten foot to land in a painful heap. “That was good! You’re strong enough to fly, just need to teach you how, woods are no good for it unless you want to hit every tree within five miles. Now come on, see if we can get you gliding, climb that tree!”

She drove him hard for half an hour, up trees to see if he could jump off and glide on stiff wings- something the tengu claimed was an essential lesson. Holding his wings firm wasn’t the hard part, Ollie learned quickly, instead steering himself, and avoiding trees was far, far more difficult although he didn’t need to learn to land, Sara gleefully told him that that would only be needed if he got near the ground without hitting anything.

“You’re doing good, beastie! Karen’s gonna be dead proud when she sees you, and Last’ll be so jealous!” The tengu laughed as she found him again. Ollie chirped as he climbed onto his paws and claws again, flapping his wings out as if that would get rid of the pain. The trees were tough, even little branches hurt when he flew into them, and the trunks were like buildings on their own!

“Aw, are you sore? Tch, that’s nothing you big whiny cub! Dad shoved me out a window when I was seven. Landed on my head. No big deal.” She recalled cheerfully, rubbing the back of his skulls feathers. “I suppose we can call it a night, I’m getting tired and cooooold. Come on, Miranda’s probably going to petrify us for being so careless, poor girl.”

He nodded and yawned, opening his beak in a deep gasp as they started to trot back to the cave’s hole entrance. His sharp eyes flickered through the trees, looking out, in case there were pigeons, or… or…. Some big dark grey winged shape limping towards them with bleeding wounds. Sara seemed to think Karen was alive after all, Lorcan was wrong.

But that one was dead. Ollie blinked and shook himself, wheeling around to look for the weaselly teenager again, the one with shaggy black hair, glasses, and a torn belly, lurking under the trees. No, that way was clear; there was just a sapling which he had mistaken for a human.

CRACK

The sound came from above them, and Ollie screeched and jumped to look up, before a branch hit him in the head.  A scream came with it, and only grew louder as Ollie shook his head and blinked stars out of his eyes, then hissed and glared at the intruder. He had pale brown skin and bright red hair over shiny eyes, and he was about the size of Alex, Ollie guessed, then noticed the feet and lurched backwards. The things feet and legs were broken beyond belief, reversing about halfway down as it some hunter had twisted them, so the shoe he wore on one foot was backwards, and the other was bare, the heel at the font and the heel at the back. His hands were the same too, flailing and curling into fists, but the thumb on the outside, and fingers coming from the inside.

“Hey, calm down, calm down! We’re mystics too, we’re nice, we’re not going to hurt you.” Sara squealed through the din, “Although I might punch you if you don’t shut up.”

He clacked his jaw shut, staring at Ollie with wide terrified eyes for some reason. “Just, please, don’t hurt me, sorry, I didn’t mean to hurt you, I just needed to see if you were…”

“We’re mystics, don’t worry about beastie here, he’s a big kitten. Unless you’re a pigeon, which you’re not, thankfully. You’re one too aren’t you, or a really weird human?”

“No, I’m a Curupira! I’m sorry, I’m sorry, the branch broke, I didn’t throw it!” He stuttered, scrabbling backwards until he was against a tree. Ollie narrowed his eyes anyway, shaking his head as though that would get rid of the pain from the impact.

“A Chupacabra?”  Sara asked.

“N- No, a Curupira, a forest spirit.”

“Aw. Shouldn’t you be better at climbing trees?” Sara teased, and extended a hand, “I’m Sara, a Tengu, and this is…um… I forget. Just call him beastie.”

The gryphon screeched indignantly, making the green teen jump back again, eyes wide as saucers. Sara clucked her tongue, “Behave beastie, I’ll get your name off one of the others. Oh! Oh, are you on the run too? We were at a mystic camp on new years eve, but then tons of hunters came and we ran away.”

“Yea..ye…” He sniffed and clasped his backwards hands over his face, choking and sobbing. Sara bent forward and hugged him fiercely, her wings beating around them.

“There, calm down, for goodness sake don’t start wailing again that racket hurt my ears! This way, you can hide with us, we’ve got some clothes and food and it’s warm. This way, carefully! And quickly, I want to get back to the warmth.” She instructed, putting an arm around his shoulder to guide him forwards through the trees. “Whats your name anyway kid?”

The backwards boy sniffed but managed to croak, “Grant. Sorry, I was just scared, there was… there was a scary guy earlier, really pale and creepy and cold, and his skin was completely white…”

“Pale and creepy huh? Well, we’re all cold, come on, we’ve got a phoenix fire!” She encouraged him down the bank and into the cave, while Ollie followed quietly. Grant’s tracks were creepy themselves, his footprints in the snow faced the opposite way from where he was going, and his hands were freaky too in the bird-lion-human hybrids opinion.

The two bipeds paused just out of the tunnel ahead of him, and Ollie smiled a little, soaking up the warmth with his black coat. Grant gave an audible gasp at the assortment lying around- only the older survivors looked like they were still awake, and they had paused to look at the newcomer in silent confusion. Sara apparently took no notice and just marched forward again, tugging him by the arm and declaring, “Guys, this is Grant. He’s a Chupacabra I found, can we keep him? Please?”

“Chupacabra?!”

“You found a random mystic?”

“No, sorry, Curupira, not Chupacabra….”

“I don’t recognize him….”

Their discussion came quick fast and hushed, like snakes hissing, and Ollie flattened his ears in annoyance. Sara sat the boy down by the fire to meet the others, while he scrambled around the cave walls, up to his shelf. It was so warm and stuffy in here, it was wonderful he thought, and circled for a second before laying down. His limbs curled up and he spread one wing over his limbs, head and tail, a black feathery ball. The pose felt almost right, not far off from how he slept normally, on his side and curled up, except…. Except…

He was alone. The wing covering him was his wing, not Karen’s, not big sister’s. She was gone, flown off on her own, and she’d get hurt then, she always got into trouble when she was on her own. He was just in a random cave, not home, he couldn’t go home, had to stay away, away or else his parents might get hunted too…

He felt a low shaky whine emerge from his beak, and something wet in his eyes. Alone, alone, just like he deserved, for being a monster, a murderer. All the others, they were being hunted and they hadn’t hurt anyone like he had. His talons twitched, remembering the blood, maybe that was why the hunters had come, because they knew about Caleb…

“Sorry for hitting you.” A quiet voice said, and he lifted his wing curiously. Jess had climbed up, her outline hazy and red tinged. “Lost my temper. Still friends right?”

Ollie nodded slowly, bending his neck and wing to rub the stupid tears away. The kitsune smiled, “Good, good. You share this bit then, since we’re friends, none of them are sharing blankets…”

He nodded and she dropped down to reappear as the small red fox and scrabble over. Ollie smiled to himself and curled up again, spreading his wing farther so that she could huddle underneath the feathers, wrapping her three thick tails around herself. It was comfy, nice to have someone there, like a teddy bear to a toddler, maybe that was why Karen had put up with him for two months. Although she had had a nest, he remembered as he started to drop off… he could try and build a nest, a bird one, with lots of sticks and leaves, up on this shelf… his shelf.