PreCursive

  Gruffyd led Fade and I all the way through the vilge, and to a gate that was set into the back wall of T?r Gronn. While it was guarded, it seemed more like a back exit than a proper entrao the vilge. The Chief exged a few words with the armed and armuards there, before opening the gate with one hand and striding through. I followed after him, aware of the curious gazes of the guard as I stepped through.

  They shut the gate behind us.

  Out in the grassnds that surrou?r Gronn, I was able to take in the night better away from all the light in the vilge.

  I couldn’t help but smile to myself slightly.

  Elys hung full and heavy in the sky, while the stars arouwinkled brighter than anything I’d ever seen oh. Wisping through the sky were what I had determio be a view of the gaxy that this p resided in. It meandered in a soft violet haze through the abyss, broken up only by the glisten of starlight, almost curling around the bright form of the moon that Grey so loved. I rarely had cause to stay up and take in Vereden’s night sky that I didn’t oftehis view. In fact, I’d say I’d never seen the night sky sht as it was now.

  For a moment, I loo go ach Sylvia, so we could admire this together.

  Later, perhaps. After I was doh the Chief.

  Speaking of, Gruffyd had stopped about te from my position and was waiting for me with a knowing look on his painted features. I had stopped in the middle of his tour in order to admire the night sky. I smiled apologetically at him, sure he could see it from the bright silver light of Elys. He merely gestured me forward.

  I did so.

  The Chief of the Thunderheart led me in the dire of the ring of standing stohat I had notiy approach to the vilge. From a distance, I could see that a series of small bonfires had been lit around it, casting deep shadows in the night. To my eyes, those fires were lit in such a manner as to cast said shadows into the ter of the ring.

  Directly onte, ft sacrificial stohat had been id in the ter.

  How did I know it was a sacrificial stone?

  Because there was a rge stag carcass bleeding onto its rocky surface.

  Actually…I think that was a hart. I could see the red of it’s coat flickering in the firelight.

  I felt a chill run down my spi the ce. I was sure that it must be one, because I don’t think ‘hart’ transted perfectly into Veredenese on.

  I stopped at the edge of the ring as Gruffyd walked further in. He approached the dead stag and id an almost reverential hand on its body. “I huhis myself, you know,” He said suddenly, turning to face me. The man was smiling almost peacefully. “That was the bulk of my preparations for tonight. In truth, Nathaniel Hart…your addition to this ceremony is st minute. A certain segment of the Thunderheart was always intending to beseech the A Oonight.” He chuckled. “As grateful as we are to you, we don’t typically put on traditional and important ceremonies simply fuests.”

  Steppiively into the ring with Fade following at my feet, I took a look around. The insides of the stones were painted beautifully, depig a creature that I retty familiar with by now. My eyebrows went up in surprise, while Fade perked up in sudden inteerest.

  It irit Wolf.

  It ainted all along each of the stones, seeming to tell a story. Oone a regur wolf painted in bck was curled in a ball, seeming to be almost sobbing. On the , he was howling to peared to be the moon.

  After that?

  A figure painted in blue desded from the sky, cupping the wolf’s head in her palms. With her hands, I could see her touch his forehead, from which she drew out a pair e, majestic stag’s antlers. On the and final stohe wolf was now painted in blue, plete with the ahat I had growo seeing on Fade. He was standing proudly in the middle of a forest, as peared to be a human man in yellow beseeched the new Spirit Wolf.

  I furrowed my brow, taking iire story from first stoo st. Was this…some kind of fable about how Spirit Wolves were created? I was startled from my iion by a rge hand falling on my shoulder. Looking up, I could see Gruffyd looking at the stones proudly. “The first of the Lis y Gwyllt.” He said in admiration, before looking down at me. “What we call the ‘Voices of the Wild’, and you knoirit Wolves.”

  My lips parted. “The first Spirit Wolf?”

  Below, Fade had grown incredibly still, eyes fixed o sto almost looked like he and the painting were locked in a staring match.

  “Yes, the very first, who we know as Taran,” Gruffyd firmed. “I have to say, young Hart, we were all very surprised to see your young Fade traveling with you. It lent a certai to your words, and made us take you more seriously. It is…beyond rare for a Spirit Wolf to choose a panion, as he has for you. Acc to the annals of the awr, it’s only happehree times in all of history. And,” He leaned in, winking. “Those annals extend from before the time of the War in Heaven.”

  “So…” I said slowly. “More than two millenia?”

  “More like four,” He said to my shock. He smirked at my rea. “We’ve been here for a very long time, far lohan any mortal Kingdom, and arguably before the long-dead gods.”

  Four millenia…

  You know, now that I thought about it, I had never heard Grey speak about the time before the War in Heaven. I k must have existed of, course. There must have been a long stretch of time that the most dead gods ruled. But here was someone saying that their had been around even before those gods had ruled Vereden and the six other phat had prised their now broken empire.

  I was, admittedly, a little curious.

  Before I could ask Gruffyd to say more about that, the Chief looked beyond me and urning around, I was able to see a number of other Thunderheart members approag the standing st. All of them, both the men and the women, were mostly bare-chested and painted in the same way that Bleddyn’s father was, stripped to the waist and wearing simple leather breeches. Thankfully, the women were at least wearing a modesty-cealing sling, even if it left little to the imagination. I fought down a blush of embarrassment at the sight of the mostly naked women, but even I could tell this wasn’t a sexual thing.

  I took a deep breath and decided to ig as best I could. Besides, I wasn’t getting any more than a few curious looks from the dozen or so people who had joined us.

  “Nathaniel Hart, if you and young Fade could step back?” I heard Gruffyd say to me. Turning, I found that the Chief was nodding in the dire of just outside the ring. “I and my pack must ehe ritual. If the A One deigns to meet you, then you will know when to e forward.” He paused for a moment, before affixih a serious look. “No matter what happens, do not be armed. I promise you, you are in no danger from us.”

  Danger? Pack? Man, don’t you think you’re taking this wolf thing a bit far? Still, I did as I was asked, stepping back. I had to actually nudge Fade with my foot to break him out of a slight trahough. The Spirit Wolf snapped back to reality and gnced around, almost as if he had fotten where he was. He followed me out to the edge of the ring just fihough.

  Meanwhile, everyone else here had gathered in a wide circle around the altar, including Gruffyd. He y a hand in the pool of blood that had gathered oone, and then y that bloodied hand on his face. Wheook it away, I could see a crimson handpri behind. Everyone else copied him, als themselves with the blood of the sacrifice. The blue of their paint trasted sharply with the crimson of the lifeblood, in the flickering of the nearby torches.

  Gruffyd raised his hands into the sky, almost as if he was trying to cup the full moon in his hands.

  He started speaking.

  Problem is, I couldn’t uand a word of it. I tilted my head in fusion before I remembered an offhand remark that Grey had made months and months ago, about how Language Adaptation worked. Acc to him, the talent that everyone had only worked if it was activated. You could turn it off if you wao, and from that point on, other people would only hear you speaking your native nguage without a transtion. It had been a pretty expnation about how distinct regional and racial nguages still existed, in a world where everyone could uand each other as soon as they had a Status. Luckily, children who were still Unawoken were still able to uand a person who didn’t speak their birth nguage, even if they didn’t have the tale.

  It seemed to me like Gruffyd and his ‘pack’ had disabled Language Adaptation. I don’t know why, maybe they didn’t wao uand the call and response ts that they had started, or maybe it was just part of the ritual. I don’t know. I could only reize a few of the words that were being thrown out. awr, Lis y Gwyllt, and Bidd.

  Taran.

  The gathered group of members slowly started to dance around the sacrificial stone, gradually pig up speed but opping their ting. Meanwhile, Gruffyd had picked up a nearby ritual dagger lying oar and plu into the chest of the hart, crag bone as he did so. In seds he had removed the heart of the stag and raised it above his head, dripping blood down onto him.

  He finished by screaming the name of who I was beginning to suspect we were out here to summon.

  “TARAN!” Gruffyd bellowed out into the sky, causing the other members to stop and do the same.

  The torches went out around us, all at ohe ring of standing stones sank into darkness, lit only by the light of Elyse above, as the gathered ritualists became eerily still.

  It almost felt like the world held its breath for a moment, as the chirping of is and night creatures died out pletely in the background. The wind stopped, and I swear I felt a brief huff of hot air bay neck. But when I turo look, there was nothing behind me.

  All of a suddeorches fred back to life. But this time, the fire was different.

  It was an eerie, flickering blue. The light of Elys above us grew brighter, as I saw a monstrously huge shadow rise from nowhere, just out of sight ich bess beyond the stones.

  I tensed up.

  When I say monstrously huge, I mean it. The shadow that had started to circle the ring of standing stones was easily rger than a city bus from bae. Whatever creature it beloo was by far the rgest living thing I had seen on Vereden, dwarfing the Frostbrine Abyssmother as the previest. The top of it cleared the tallest of the stones around us, allowio make out at least oure in the shadows that stretched out of sight.

  Twe, clear, crystal blue eyes that shihrough the dark.

  I had to stop myself from shivering as I felt the shadow circle behind me, from my position iweeones of the circle. I swear I felt it pause just behind Fade and me momentarily. Eventually, the creature stopped its cirg directly across from Gruffyd just outside of the ring. Everyone, including me, was still motionless.

  The heart in the Chief’s hands somehow began to glow in the same blue light of the torches, as it ingruously started to float into the air above us. It grew sht that it was almost ag as an artificial sun, pierg the gloom around us.

  The massive shadowy creature leaned forward into the light, allowio see it clearly for the first time.

  As I had suspected, it was a wolf. A Spirit Wolf, to be exact, giganti size. Its fur seemed to be pitch b color while its astonishingly huge rack of antlers was ivory white. Two wise blue eyes took iire circle at once, including Fade and I. It might just be my imagination, but I think they lingered on us for just a moment.

  With a slight exhation of air through its enormous he wolf bent down and swallowed the sacrificed hart in a single, delicate bite. I don’t even think it had to chew.

  When it was dohe Spirit Wolf threw back its head and howled, loudly enough that the sound echoed off of the distant mountains. I’m absolutely sure that everyone and everything in a dozen miles heard that.

  The gathered awr’s joihe Spirit Wolf in his howling. First, as humans.

  But that ged.

  My breath caught in my throat as the gathering began to shift and morph before my eyes. They grew taller and sprouted fur over their entire bodies, while their arms and legs lengthened. Cws grew from their bare feet and hands. Their knees ied, ahey still stood on two legs like men and women. The very shape of their skulls ged, as their faces elongated into snouts and their ears migrated to the top of their head. Long, furry tails sprouted from their behinds, stretg out behind them. A, none of their increasingly lupine howls sounded pained.

  Rather, they were filled with a wild form of joy aation in the bestial that was alien to me. One final ge came over the gathered smen and women.

  From each of their foreheads sprouted a set of sharp, , fresh antlers. Not so different than the kind that grew from Fade’s own head.

  Before long the transformation of the gathered smen and women had been pleted. Howling in front of me stood over a dozen wolves that stood as men.

  Werewolves.