Anji floated across a sea of utter void. She blinked, trying to focus her eyes on any source of light but failing to find any. Turning her head left and right had made thick and disgusting oily liquid pour into her ears, but not a single splash accompanied it. Control of her body below her neck was gone, and even moving a finger was an impossible task. Fear crept into her as the water soaked her fur, weighing to begin sinking her body.
“Anyone!” she tried to scream, but no sound escaped her parched lips. Not a groan, not a whisper, not even a breath.
Stillness. A perfect silence enveloped her. Am I in the Abyss? Anji wondered. The Abyss, the place where all sinners of the Wolf Tribe go after their demise. Oathbreakers, cub-slayers, incompetents, faithless, and cowards headed straight to its fiery and cold depths to suffer unimaginable tortures and endure lifetimes of torment before the Spirits allowed them to be reborn, tempered and wiser than before.
It felt… unfair to be here. Anji was still young and cubless; she chatted with Mom and Dad this morning, exchanging latest gossips, telling them farewells, and she was sure that she had done nothing to deserve to be here. Dad always taught her to treat others as she would have them treat her, and Anji lived by that rule, never harming a male in her life. Perhaps the spirits punished her for not stopping the dominations in her pack? But they were the ones who created them in the first place!
No, it had to be something else, and her mind wandered, searching for a reason. She always tried to befriend and help everyone. Big or small, she refused no plea for help. Whether it was bandits holding someone hostage or a need for tokens, she gave it her all, Normie or kin. It was a bit tedious at times and left her with dozens of scars marring her once-beautiful body, but the reward was well worth it. Joy of mothers reunited with their cubs. A gleam of hope in downtrodden eyes. Well, and friends. Tons and tons of them, all over the Outer Lands.
Maybe this is it! Vanity! She always prided herself on being perfection incarnate, never mopping in the darkness. That, and she dyed her hair. Changing her natural appearance must’ve angered the Spirits. Yes, this is it. Anji decided, looking around. Shamans told tales of the Abyss as a place of brimstone and fierce rage, or absolute cold, where the guilty were strung up in iron frames, their limbs stretched ad infinitum, cruel rusty blades piercing their regrowing skin and organs, and a firm grip on the conscience of the guilty denied them escape into madness.
Instead, the Abyss was far more insidious. The threat of drowning accompanied by utter silence. Anji enjoyed laughter and needed companionship. Never since her very birth, since her dear brother died, had she been alone. There was always someone by her side to keep her company. Could this be her sin? Could it be that she helped others not out of the goodness of her heart, not as a decent person, but as a frightened hypocrite, a coward unable to bear the thought of being all alone? Was that it? Was that all she was?
Well, the shamans spoke true about one thing. Helplessness. The true nature of the Abyss, an ultimate torment. No matter what you do, no matter how strong you were, here and for decades to come, you will be helpless, hearing only your thoughts, and even they will vanish in time, swallowed by silence…
“No!” Anji screamed, opening her eyes to the white light on the ceiling.
“She is awake!” Anji blinked, greeted by Wolfkins: eighteen soldiers from her own pack, Kalaisa, Bogdan, and Marco, standing on a chair.
A stench of antiseptic and medications assaulted her nostrils, forcing Anji to frown. She blinked twice, trying to believe that she was alive. Weariness touched her, threatening to drag the wolf hag back into the sleep’s embrace, but she forced herself to stay awake.
“How…” She licked her lips, gratefully gulping water from a flask held by Kalaisa. “How long?” Anji asked again.
“At ease, loser,” Kalaisa said smugly. She closed her eyes, ignoring the angry growls of the offended pack, and corrected herself. “Sorry. I was worried and ran my mouth again. Just a few hours.”
“We are in the Hall of Charity, Wolf Hag,” added the second in command of Anji’s pack. At a confused look, the woman quickly explained. “It is a place to provide basic medical necessities to the less fortunate in the city. The mayor commandeered it for the soldiers with non-life-threatening wounds in need of recuperation. At least that was the original idea.” Hearing a strained groan, a shadow passed over the scout’s muzzle. “Civilians are also being treated here instead of in a proper hospital, since there are too many injured. The rest of our pack is either back at the base or helping to clear the rubble.”
“Kalaisa stood by your side while you slept!” Marco added eagerly. “She called us when you began to stir! Doctor! Mr. Diego! Anji has woken up!”
She tried to stand up and found out that her wounded arm and leg were still numb and refused to bulge. Needles pierced her body, carrying both nutrition and medication through rubber tubes, and sensors littered her chest, sending data to a nearby terminal. Her cheeks flushed red at the sight of two tubes connected to... more private parts of her body under a blanket.
Stained glass was installed in the walls of this spacious hall. Each circular window was adorned with various saints of the planet’s faith and shone a pleasant kaleidoscope of light. Only a few patients, like Anji, had an abundance of space, and most beds were crowded together, with just enough room for nurses and doctors to pass by. Moans, screams, and the scents of fear, sweat, and blood permeated the air. Medical staff worked tirelessly, removing pieces of stone and glass from bodies, cleaning wounds, and trying to save limbs and organs. The medics didn’t share the same uniform color, but the red marks united them. Words of confessors and priests brought comfort to the patients.
A doctor, dressed in a stylish blue robe of a private medical clinic with a golden snake encircling it, came closer, checked her eyes and body, and declared that the worst part was over and her immune system had overcome the toxin. The man asked her to try to move the fingers of her numb limbs, and with some difficulty, Anji did, to the cheers of the Wolfkins.
“Good.” The doctor smiled, carefully removed the bandages, and whistled. Blood had long since dried at the edges of her closed and sewn wounds. “The bleeding has stopped. My, your kind truly is a marvel. It is an honor to work on such a magnificent body.”
“Planning on taking a patient to dinner, are you, Doctor?” Bogdan teased.
“Wouldn’t mind it going further one bit, but I was given an understanding that your people prefer a singular partner, while I belong to every beauty,” the doctor answered unabashedly. His fingers lightly tested her damaged limbs, sparkling a tiny sting of pain. “Apologies, lady. Your muscles are still partially compressed due to the poison. Although our catalog was unable to identify it, I assure you that the numbness and partial paralysis will last at least two days. Worry not; the worst has passed, and your heart and lungs are safe. I’ll schedule you for the scar removal procedure once your body has finally flushed out this filth.”
“Yeah, yeah, turn her into a real princess,” Kalaisa said with a shit-eating grin.
“No need,” Anji said quickly, blushing.
“All women are goddesses,” the doctor said warmly after finishing checking for inflammations and changing the bandages. “No matter their origin, they must be treated with reverence and care. Since the mayor has enlisted the help of our private clinic and entrusted you to my care, you will abide by my recommendations, Miss Anji. We cannot allow ugliness to persist.”
“You…” Kalaisa examined the man’s perfect facial features, his well-built physique, free of any wrinkles or imperfections. “You are an Iternian.”
“Guilty as charged.” Diego flashed a white smile. “But let’s not speak it too loudly. Officially, citizens of my homeland have no right to interfere in international affairs between the Reclamation Army and another country.”
“Going to be punished otherwise?” Kalaisa inquired.
“Indeed, and terribly so: a fine and a stern warning, accompanied by finger-wagging and perhaps a ban on practicing outside of Iterna for a few years, what a nuisance.” Diego rolled his eyes.
“Sucks to be you,” Bogdan said. “Doesn’t sound fair one bit. But you have my thanks for saving lives, sir.”
“Oh, please, if I get grounded, I’ll just pitch my sob story on the Net and earn twice my salary in donations,” Diego laughed. “Really, I don’t really give a fuss about it, and after your superiors rudely interrupted my morning routine, I feel obligated to return the favor. So don’t worry, relax; nothing will happen to anyone in my care.”
“What about Cordi?!” Marco tugged at the doctor’s robe. “My friend. She is an Ice Fang of the Sunblade household. No one knows where she went.”
“Well, that’s just no good.” Diego sat comfortably and produced a terminal from a pocket. “No woman should ever be abandoned. Cordi, Cordi… Ah, you mean young Cordelia Sunblade-Wintersong? She suffered a punctured lung and was escorted, along with the cubs... what a ridiculous name... from Houstad to the Sunblade family estate in the far west. No further information is available, but in the worst-case scenario, a Wolfkin should survive a missing lung fairly easily.”
“I can attest to that,” coughed Scout Mindy from a nearby bed.
“Diego! A patient is having a stroke!” A nurse called. “We risk losing him!”
“Coming, Najwa!” The stylishly dressed doctor jumped away to help treat the violently convulsing civilian. “Nobody likes a quitter, so you, mister, are staying with the team!”
Anji’s body itched intensely as it repaired itself, and her stomach rumbled with hunger. She could almost imagine the flesh moving under the dried crust of her blood, knitting itself back together. To distract herself a little, she surveyed the hall. Several Wolfkins and Ice Fangs rested here, kept in a healing coma, with oxygen masks on their snouts. Many lacked limbs.
So many wounded. And how many more died? And how many more have died? A pang of sorrow shot through her heart at the sight of a doctor shaking her head and covering a civilian’s face with a bedsheet. Two nurses rolled out the bed with the deceased. We failed you. I am so sorry. Diego was tireless, bio-enhancing technology of Iterna kept exhaustion at bay, and he was saving life after life, instructing his colleagues along the way. Anji forced the sad thoughts out and smiled, forcing herself to be certain and confident before her friends and subordinates.
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“That’s the Bootlicker I know!” Kalaisa grinned. “No paper cuts are going to keep you down. No way, no how.”
“Kalaisa, would it kill you to be… you know what? Fuck it. Thank you and Anji for saving my and Marco’s bacon back there.” Bogdan extended his paw to Kalaisa, who spat at it, hissing at the soldier. He shrugged, wiped his paw clean, and shook paws with Anji.
“Rot in the Abyss, male, stupid, idiot, piss-head!” Kalaisa patted Marco’s head tenderly. “I wasn’t trying to save you; it was my duty!”
“And Marco and his friends?” Anji asked innocently. She blinked the sleep away. Not now.
“The pipsqueak? Well, that’s personal. He gifted me a sweater. Ice cubs aren’t bad either. Offered me a pork pizza once.”
“Thank you for saving us, sister!” Kalaisa slithered from the embrace of the beaming Marco. “Uhm, why were you two even around? I thought you were assigned to clean the orphanage. Do you like comics too?”
“No! I have nothing to do with this degeneracy! It… was pure luck. I was going to… planned to…” Kalaisa mumbled, retreating another step back.
“Kalaisa was looking for Bogdan to apologize,” Anji said, smirking at the rage in her friend’s eyes. Nope, not letting you off the hook.
Kalaisa growled once more, pacing back and forth like a cornered animal. Her fingers twitched, releasing the claws’ tips, and Anji’s pack jumped to shield their wolf hag, only to be asked to move aside by Anji herself. She didn’t enjoy it. But Kalaisa had to keep going, to improve herself, step by step. There was no shortcut to take. Mom always taught young Anji that if you have done something wrong, you must apologize.
“Male… Bogdan,” Kalaisa corrected herself. “That little talk you and I had… you were right. I am sorry that I was angry at you.”
“Beat it.” Bogdan lifted his paw. “I was over the line.”
“No. I was… is an unworthy leader.” Kalaisa cracked one shoulder, then another, straightened, and seemed to grow taller as she pointed a finger at Bogdan. “No more. I will grow to be a proper leader for my pack. I’m going to become a warlord, and I’m going to take my pack to the very top, and I’m going to surpass Warlords Janine and Ashbringer; just you wait and see. But that doesn’t change the fact that you are a stupid, arrogant, stinking male!”
“Love you too.” Bogdan grinned. “Keep it up, and I just may end up naming one of my future daughters after you. Oh, I can see that: Little Kalaisa, stop being a killjoy like your namesake and let’s go eat that cusack.”
“T-try it, and I’ll rip out your still-beating heart!”
“Can you be quiet, please?” Diego returned, looking Kalaisa and Bogdan over. “If you are engaged in some bizarre mating ritual, take it outside. I am contractually obligated to respect all traditions, but I will not tolerate you disturbing the rest of our patients.”
“We are just comrades!” Bogdan and Kalaisa blurted in unison, and this time, it was Anji who allowed herself a grin of vengeance at their expense, ringingly giggling like a young girl straight out of the pit.
There was little doubt that Bogdan would find a way to get back at her, and she could already envision Kalaisa’s sharp tongue teasing the life out of her during their next spar, but by the Spirits, watching them slowly turn crimson was so worth it right now! Anji stopped giggling and roared with laughter, and her pack soon joined in. Bogdan shrugged, settled Marco on his shoulder, and the two brothers added their voices to the fun. Kalaisa swung her head suspiciously from side to side, sniffing the air, then chuckled, reluctantly relaxing and enjoying not being excluded from the fun, though Anji could bet her thumb that the woman would strangle her before admitting that side of her. Oh well, work in progress.
A buzzing noise stopped their laughter, and Kalaisa and the scout from Anji’s pack grabbed their terminals. Eyes narrowed, and the two women exchanged glances, the scout baring her neck in submission.
“We have a job to do,” Kalaisa said, putting the terminal back. “All of you, back to the base immediately.”
“Give me a second,” Anji asked, trying to get to her feet.
Kalaisa rolled her eyes and snapped a finger against Anji’s nose.
“You stay here and recover, B… Anji,” she said softly. “Seriously, we... care for you. This time I owe you lives. Besides, your warlord has arrived in the city; your pack should be fine.”
“We will, Wolf Hag. You have taught us well,” the scout confirmed, bowing. “Wolf Hag Kalaisa, the orders were urgent.”
“You keep her here until she is fully recovered; even if you have to chain her and sedate her to do it, do you hear me?” Kalaisa told the doctor.
“Planet, spare me from eggs teaching the chicken. Not my first rowdy patient.” Diego waved his hand.
Anji’s worried eyes followed her friends as they left, and even the pleasant relief of having the tubes removed from her body didn’t help to ease her worries. Who will be alive and who will be dead when we next meet? She fell on the pillows, crudely making prayer gestures with one paw, begging the Spirits to keep them safe. She wasn’t stupid. There could only be one reason for a sudden summon.
A call from the doctor’s terminal distracted her. Anji strained her ears, trying to learn anything, but to her surprise, she found herself unable to pick up even a single word, and Diego’s expression startled her. The once smiling and pleasant doctor had changed; an ugly scowl of pure, unadulterated hatred twisted his face, and his black eyes glowed, taking on a bright yellow hue. Anji was about to ask what was going on when fatigue overcame her and dragged the woman back to dreamland.
This time, the dream brought another familiar nightmare. It was always the same with her; if there was one thing Anji hated in her life, it was sleeping alone. This was the time when she was losing the iron hold of her dreams, and her mind always sucked her into the same memory of her being back in the womb again, hearing the tiny heart of her brother beating nearby and sensing the warmth of his forming body. Tic. Tic. Tic.
No. Anji pleaded, trying to wake up. I don’t want to remember.
She told no one. Anji remembered everything: every moment of her life, every second she was awake. She carefully asked other Wolfkins if they possessed the same trait, earning surprised looks at the mere suggestion that anyone recalling their time spent in a mother’s womb. Several soldiers whispered behind her back, thinking the woman was mocking them or going crazy.
But she didn’t! Anji remembered it. Conscience came to her at a very early age, and she was locked in the confines of Mom’s body, rejoicing every time a familiar paw proudly patted her belly. She floated in silence, unable to speak or even wave her paws. Listening to her brothers and sisters die. Stillborn. Their organs never developed. Years later, she learned that this was to be expected. The first litter was the hardest for all the females of the wolf tribe. Almost none of the cubs survived. But their deaths brought change to the grieving parent, and the next litter was full of healthy cubs.
Anji and her brother were the lucky ones. His faint heartbeat kept her sane and kept her company. Tic. Tic. Tic. The sound was faint, barely audible, but it was a sign of life in this prison. And then, one day, it stopped. The little heart gave out, leaving Anji alone in the darkness, floating among the bodies of her family. For weeks.
“I don’t want to be alone!” Anji yelled, breaking through the curtain of dreams, and Diego’s concerned face welcomed her back to reality.
“You are not alone, Miss Anji. Please calm down; focus on my face. Nothing bad happened to you; it was just a nightmare, a side effect of the poison; breathe easily, yes, like that,” the doctor said encouragingly, holding her by the wrist. How… how could she have thought that he had yellow eyes? The man’s eyes were perfectly normal black.
After checking her pulse, Diego called over a nurse, ordering the woman to help Anji eat. She half expected the usual medical nutrition paste, but to her surprise, the food the nurse brought her was something divine. She was served real crabs, mashed potatoes, a thick cusack steak, and plenty of juice to quench her thirst. Or drown a person. The smell of her unusual lunch turned the rumbling of her stomach into a wail, and Anji helped herself, forgetting her manners as she shoved the crabs into her mouth, breaking their shells on her fangs against the nurse’s insistence not to eat these parts. This was the fourth time she had eaten real seafood, and she found the food simply delicious.
After thanking the nurse for her help, Anji heard an Ice Fang fiddling with a terminal in her paws, furiously typing in request after request. The woman’s legs had been replaced by two sleek metal replicas, one ending at her knee, and her body was covered in severe scalds that had burned away entire swaths of her once fluffy, silken fur. Around her neck, the Ice Fang wore a medallion with the crest of the Summerspring Household.
“Hey,” Anji greeted the crimson-eyed woman. “Name’s Anji. Any idea what is happening outside?”
“Greetings, Lady Anji. Malerata Summerspring, a knight-captain in the service of the late Tancred Ironwill,” she said in a hushed voice. “Alas, I know little; the medical personnel chose to limit the patients’ ability to view the Net as I have learned to my dismay, and my comrades abide by that rule.” The woman extended her paw, and Anji shook it before realization hit her.
“The late? Does it mean?” Anji asked in shock, lowering her voice. Sword Saints were equal to Warlords. To imagine one fall in her lifetime… Surely she must’ve misheard…
“Forgive me, lady; I forgot you were in a coma.” Malerata bowed her head. “My liege was murdered today, and his killers are still at large.”
“You have my deepest condolences,” Anji said, meaning every word and clasping the woman’s paw. Truth be told, she had no idea how Ice Boys viewed their sword saints, but to Wolfkins, a warlord was another mother, an eternal monolith in whose shadow one could weather a storm, and a trusted friend ready to listen and help. That was part of her problem with Onyxia. When the warlord was around, she listened and gave the right advice. The problem was that Onyxia was rarely around, trusting the judgment of her wolf hags. “If there is anything I can do…”
“Thank you, Lady Anji. Your kind words are already enough. The constant positive propaganda in the news is the reason for my sour mood.” The knight put the terminal aside, irritated by the limited access to the Net. “Staying in here, unable to know about the situation outside, irks me.”
“No point in mopping about it. Say, how about a little game to pass the time? Let’s ask each other questions. The rules are simple: only the truth is allowed,” Anji proposed. Seeing the woman’s uncertain face, she pressed on. “Come on, what else are we supposed to do here? The first question is yours. Hit me with anything.”
Malerata pressed a finger to her lips, wondering, and then dared to speak: “A hundred apologies for the frivolous question, but why is your hair white? From my limited interaction with the Wolf Tribe, I have learned that your kind always bears either predominantly black, brown, or occasionally reddish fur. Do you, by any chance, have blood of our lineage coursing through your veins, lady?”
“Not to my knowledge!” Anji laughed, picking up one of her braids. “Call me Anji, by the way. My Mom once brought a dusty old comic for me to read. The heroine of the story was a woman with immaculate white hair. She was kind and smart and fierce in battle and never quit, no matter what the odds. I became a fan, and when my family visited a settlement, I bought a hair dye. Cousin, you should have seen the look on my Mom’s muzzle the next morning! She thought I was cursed!” Anji sighed happily at the memory. “My turn. Is it true that your kind needs cold to mate, and that is why you always mate in refrigerators?”
“What? No!” The knight-captain coughed. “Why would you even think that? What kind of degraded and depraved mind would commit an act of love in a refrigerator, of all places? I assure you, Ice Fangs, enlightened and blessed by the Twins and the Blessed Mother, will never stoop so low. We are simply too perfect for that; unrivaled excellence, restraint, and humility are in our nature.”
“Well, we didn’t see any of your kind jumping on the boys during the heat season, so we thought your kind couldn’t do it in a warmer climate.” Anji hesitated, unsure if she could reveal the second part. Oh, well, she promised the truth, right? “And there was this one time, a few years ago. I screwed up and was given cooking duty in the crawler. So there I was, opening the refrigerator compartment, and there were two of my cold-loving cousins, busy making new lives on top of the canned food …”
“I need not hear more, truly, Lady Anji.” The knight raised her paws. “On behalf of my order, I apologize a thousand times for the sight you have been forced to endure. It is disgusting in more ways than one. But… what is this ‘heat season’ you spoke of?”
Surprised that Malerata didn’t know, Anji began to enthusiastically explain the concept to the woman, curious as to why the knight’s face seemed to grow more and more horrified upon hearing the explanation.