Third Dream

Of all the races, only lycanthropes had complete control over their dreams. Gailinn had never been able to explain it though Lan-tenth had a theory. He believed it was owing to their dual nature. Gailinn was inclined to agree with his theory.

“Are you sure you won’t join me,” she asked him that night when they arrived in the realm of dreams. “They can’t actually kill you, and I’m confident you’ve learned enough control by now to avoid being eaten.”

“The pain was very real,” he squealed. After clearing his throat, he spoke again in a slightly firmer voice, though it still quavered. “It was very real. I know what they always dream of, and I’d rather not tempt them with my presence.”

Lan looked terrified, and she wondered how much of it was feigned and how much was genuine. He’d been spending more time alone in the realm of dreams, observing events throughout Severia as per her instructions. But she knew he was enacting some secret plan. She’d trusted him so far, but her curiosity couldn’t be contained forever.

“I’ll come and find you when I’m finished,” she said.

As he whipped away, tail flashing he shouted back at her, “I’ll be in Core!”

Gailinn skimmed many of the lycanthropes' dreams, hardly even slowing down. Some luxuriated in rivers of blood beneath a full moon. Others smiled with fierce glee as teeth like steel traps sunk into flesh. They were lost to their animalistic urges, and Gailinn left their dreams after nothing more than a regretful glance.

The greatest portion of lycanthropes embraced their change. Recognizing it as neither curse nor blessing, they understood balance. Society might not welcome them, but they had accepted themselves. They spent their dreams in caves or beside babbling brooks, lounging with lovers or friends. Werecats chased each other across rooftops in cities real and imagined or competed in games of picking pockets and cracking safes. Werebears and werewolves met to trade news from around Severia, then engaged in contests of their own.

Most nights they dreamed of hunting on legs swifter than any arrow, energy thrumming through a body that would never tire. Joy came from the chase, not the kill, though all those gathered wanted to be the one to bring down the night’s game.

She watched from outside the dream, unseen until the hunt ended. When she entered, they sensed her immediately. Few could stand in a ring of lycanthropes while showing not an ounce of fear, but Gailinn was a singular being. Impressed with her fortitude, they heard her invitation, yellow eyes glittering like fallen stars.

Chapter 5 -- Cursed Detective

Gailinn watched fishmongers hawk their wares at the burly men and women marching in a tight knot down the lane despite the group’s collective scowls. Vendors were never a group to be intimidated–not when they saw an opportunity for profit. Such sturdy customers would surely eat a heavy purse’s worth of fish. She wondered how the packed lane of the Shambles would react if they knew a group of werebears walked amongst them.

Aside from their size, nothing about them hinted at their hidden natures. Travel-worn clothes in soft greens and browns weren’t out of place, even if the garments were mud splattered with bits of foliage clinging in spots. They wore no visible weapons, their cloaks flapping freely open in the soft breeze, blowing in from the nearby river. Still, patrons gave them a wide berth, though the group hardly seemed to notice, all their attention focused elsewhere.

The werebears’ noses twitched, no doubt following Gailinn’s scent. They’d yet to spot her at the end of the long lane. She’d led them a merry chase that morning and while she’d been confident they’d be able to follow her scent from the woods into Breeze Tower, she’d worried they would lose her in the Shambles’ cacophony of odors.

They reached Gailinn in her quiet corner of the market, sitting at her sturdy writing desk. It was a single pristine tooth in a mouth otherwise plagued by rot, out of place in the row of fish-gut and salt-covered tables. As the werebears spread out before her, their heads cocked ever so slightly at sounds beyond the Shambles’ bustle, and their eyes never stopped shifting to one side or another.

“You don’t smell of fear,” the largest of the pack said, large being an understatement.

Some of those who accepted the lycanthropic gifts, who found balance between the animal and human sides, gained enhanced attributes over time. All the members of the werebear pack were tall and muscular, but the speaker would have stood only a head shorter than most of the hobs Gailinn had recently interviewed. His shadow eclipsed the broad table.

“You don’t smell of anything,” he continued.

“That’s not true,” Gailinn said. After a quick scribble across her parchment, she looked up at the group, but not at the speaker. Her eyes swept across the gathered men and women, pausing for a moment to weigh each as a long moment of silence unfurled like sails in a lazy wind. “If I asked, I’ll bet any of you could tell me what kind of soap I washed with this morning.”

“Lilac and gooseberry," one of the women said, fixing Gailinn with intense scrutiny. Of the two females, she was the larger and of a size with all but the two biggest males. Long hair hung loose past her shoulders, its color a brown bordering on deep red reminiscent of leaves wearing their fall colors. “But you don’t smell human.”

There was an unspoken question in the woman’s claim. Gailinn ignored it and asked, “What did I have for breakfast?”

“Sunfruit and a fish,” a young male answered, contempt in the avenue’s of his broad face.

“No, cub. That was her lunch,” the largest of the group said, offering instruction. “Beneath that smell is another.” He presented himself as the alpha, but Gailinn still refused to look at him. By now the others should have responded to the obvious disrespect, but they showed no sign. She focused on the smaller of the two women, who met her eyes with no emotion.

“Breakfast was the same, except the fish was a tendertail,” the woman said.

The unassuming female stepped forward, the others giving way without a thought. She moved with a deadly grace, and her eyes burned with an even deadlier intelligence. Gailinn had known she was the alpha but was impressed with their subterfuge. The alpha stood a head shorter than most of the pack. Civilized races always assumed the largest, nastiest member to be the alpha--a fact this one used to her advantage.

“Impressive,” Gailinn said. She acknowledged the alpha with a nod then readied her quill above the parchment. “Your names, please?”

“Whisper of wind around a rock, behind a tree, then at your throat,” the alpha said. She pointed around the semicircle, and each member of the pack followed her example.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

“Moss in the early morning set upon by a single bee,” the other woman said.

“Claws which split tendons cleaner than an ax.”

“Drinks marrow after a clean bite through bone.”

“Mountain enduring all storms.” That came from the largest werebear.

“Chains coated in the blood of one once loved.”

They weren’t birth names, obviously, since lycanthropes always took a new name upon their transformation and inclusion in a pack. The names were poetic, and despite the painful images woven into some of them, Gailinn had enjoyed this part of her meetings with lycanthropes the most. She listened to each name, a look in her eyes suggesting some part of her mind was taken to the scene described.

“Wonderful,” Gailinn said, attending her parchment. With simple outlines, she sketched a picture to represent each name in a matter of seconds.

“How did you know?” Whisper asked. There was a challenge in her stance though curiosity ruled her tone. Her sable hair was tightly bound in a dreshen’s tail, not a strand out of place. Like the members of her pack, Whisper’s clothes were fashionable trousers and a cotton shirt in good repair.

“You were the alpha?” Gailinn asked. “Wasn’t it obvious?”

“To some, but not to most,” Whisper said. The pack grunted support.

“Fortunately, I’m wholly unique in all the world, though I daresay each of us is in our own way,” Gailinn teased. There would be no easy answers for this group. Best they accept it now.

“There’s great truth in your words, but not the truth you would have us believe,” Whisper countered. “As Moss said, you don’t smell of anything underneath all the camouflage. Not druí, human, wodenlang, or any other humanoid race.”

“Perhaps I’m something else,” Gailinn said. She gathered her parchment and quill in one arm as she stood. With her free hand, she tapped the table and chair. They disappeared into the realm of magic. The lycanthropes marshaled their surprise well, but they couldn’t help widening their eyes, and the youngest of their pack allowed his mouth to drop open for a bare second before he resumed his stony expression.

Gailinn said, “Perhaps I’ve used magic to mask my identity. Perhaps I’m but a figment of your imaginations.” None of the lycanthropes responded to her jest, merely watching her like an animal whose role they were still determining--predator or prey. “Walk with me.”

Gailinn and Whisper took the lead, the rest of the pack following in no discernable order. They walked in silence until they turned a corner at the market’s far end.

“Joining us in the dream we share was risky,” Whisper said, “no matter what manner of being you are. We do not dream as others do. But, you showed great respect waiting for the hunt to finish before revealing yourself. You know our ways better than an outsider should.”

“Others might view your kind differently if they had more information,” Gailinn said.

“The moon might fall from the sky,” Whisper said. Yet, she had seen glimmers of hope in the eyes of the pack’s younger members when Gailinn had first approached them in the dream. Though they had found peace with their change, they still struggled to reconcile with a world afraid of their gifts.

“Your employers will only ask for results,” Gailinn said. “Nothing more.”

The next street was full of more blood and guts, every animal from farm, field, and forest butchered in slaughterhouses. To one side a wrinkled woman skinned rabbits with deft flicks of her wrist. Beside her a man with arms as large as his trunkish torso chopped thickly marbled meat. Vendors rubbed salt in pink meat still oozing blood. Thick cuts splashed into barrels of pickling juices beside waiting carts.

“What did you think of our meeting place?” Gailinn asked, leading the pack deep into the market’s maze of side alleys.

“Did you have second thoughts about meeting us in the wilds?” the youngest of the pack asked, drawing scornful looks from all the others. He was massive, almost on par with Mountain, but he wilted beneath their stares.

“You speak of our original meeting place,” Whisper purred. “You stayed in the woods long enough for us to know you had been there, where you had come from, and where you were headed. You set us a fine chase.” A few of the pack seconded Whisper’s praise, but others gave half-hearted sneers of derision. Lycanthropes were nothing if not proud. “Tell me, are you interviewing other packs?”

“Yes.”

“The same job?”

“Similar.”

“Did they pass your first test? Did they all find you?”

“All but one. They were the least experienced, a werecat pack of little more than kittens, and I fear my initial exuberance about these interviews led me to make their test much too difficult.”

Nearing the center of the meat market, Gailinn glanced over her shoulder to consider the pack. Whisper followed her gaze.

They licked their lips, but their tongues barely peeked from between their lips. Whatever rivers of drool accumulated in their mouths, they swallowed with large audible gulps. They didn’t bare their fangs or succumb to animalistic bloodlust. Overall, they appeared to be a group like any other, restrained as they threaded their way toward a goal with brief sidelong glances at each stall.

Gailinn nodded respect to Whisper, and in the same motion, indicated a shadowy doorway to the side. She entered, the pack close on her heels. After a quick motion from Whisper, the pack spread out in a circle around the room’s edges. Mountain’s head brushed the slaughterhouse’s ceiling, but he didn’t show any discomfort nor did he lower his head. His demeanor suggested the world would be forced to accommodate his size.

The killing room had been cleaned but not as well as some. Traces of countless animals killed and drained showed on every surface, including the ceiling. Chains and a pulley system for raising large carcesses looked near to being rusted beyond use. Though the pack was used to a fresh kill, the casual and wholesale slaughter which had taken place in that room had an effect. They growled at the chains, which despite popular lore of the times, didn’t have to be silver to restrain. They only needed to be thick and heavy.

“Excuse me a moment,” Gailinn said. She ducked into the realm of magic, retrieved her table and chair, and reappeared in the slaughterhouse already seated. The lycanthropes shook their heads, as if already bored with her tricks. Gailinn frowned but took up her quill and spread a fresh parchment on the table. “What can you tell us about the blood shed in this room?”

“Tests upon tests,” Whisper said. She pointed to one of the pups, Chains, a fresh-faced man barely out of his teens. As his name might have suggested, he had the most visceral reaction to the room, afraid to take his eyes from the chains dangling from the ceiling lest they strike like a snake. He was the same male who hadn’t understood the earlier question about the meeting place. His blood still ran hot as it did in all youths, but lycanthropes couldn’t afford such weaknesses.

Brow furrowed, he closed his eyes and inhaled shallowly. Hands held before him, his fingers waggled as if he were leafing through the pages of a thick book. His fingers stopped, and he inhaled more deeply, holding the breath, then rolling his tongue across the roof of his mouth. Whatever he sensed, his face scrunched in disgust.

“Human blood was spilled here,” he said.

“Knives slip,” Whisper said with a shrug. Behind her nonchalance, an anticipation shone in her eyes. A few of the others leaned forward, all attention on their newest member.

“No,” the youth said. “There was too much, spilled all at once.”

“When might that have been?” Gailinn asked. She barely looked at the parchment, her hand finding its way across the page with ease while she watched Whisper lead her pack with the same confidence and skill as any Shield led the units under their command.

“Well done, Chains,” Whisper said. She looked at the other female. “Moss?”

“Three nights ago,” she said. An intimate spark passed between her and Whisper when their eyes met.

“What of those who were here?”

“Tobacco smoke,” Moss said. Eyes closed, she spoke from far away as if some part of her had returned to the past. “A burrower blend, but that’s common enough.”

Whisper gave each of her pack a chance to answer, to show their value as a reflection of her leadership. They pulled back each mystery like another garment until the truth lay naked and exposed. Gailinn scribbled notes the entire time. By the end, she merely watched, a smile on her face like a crescent moon.