William looked over at the large patch of forest that he had seen earlier. The trees were still and he saw a small trickling stream that he hadn’t noticed before. He could almost hear the water bubbling inside its banks, traveling to wherever the water was draining to. He thought he saw a wolf but that might have been a trick of the light. He wondered how many wolves lived there in that unknown acreage of forest.
He thought about what Jacob had said about Ares, ‘his native wolf form’. If Ares ever gave him the option of asking another question, he would have to ask his teacher what that meant.
Inhaling the scents of the underground city he started walking down the ramp that led to the street. He had no idea what time it was but he assumed by the lights in the houses and the dimming of the light that lit the whole city, that it was probably night time. He was only wearing his deer skin pants but he was comfortable, he wasn’t hot or cold. His legs were not nearly as wobbly as they had been when Ares first took him down this path.
William entered the bathroom. He placed his toothbrush and baking soda on the sink and sat down on one of the toilets. The fact that the whole bathroom was an open bay room that was missing an entire wall was something that would take some time to get used to. There was no wall on the street side of the room. Anybody could just walk by and not even meaning to see him sitting on the toilet. For some reason he was embarrassed by that thought.
He finished as quickly as he could and for the second time in years, he cleaned himself using real toilet paper. For some reason the white paper was still a little awkward to use and ripped easily in his hands. He was going to have to relearn how to use the stuff. After some trial and error, he was satisfied and got off the toilet. He pulled his pants up and flushed the toilet.
He walked over to the sink where he had left his toothbrush and washed his hands. The frigid water made his hands go numb. He dried his fingers that didn’t do what he wanted them to do. Feeling returned quickly though and he was able to open his new toothbrush and brush his teeth. The feeling of having a toothbrush after all this time was an intense but comfortable feeling. It was like he was brushing his teeth for the first time. He didn’t even notice the bitter taste of salt in his mouth. He was amazed at how the brush against his teeth felt. He had been brushing his teeth with sticks and large twigs for over a year and the sound of the bristles as they moved back and forth over his teeth was a sound that he had almost forgotten. He couldn’t help it and a smile spread across his face. He knew he looked like an idiot, but he didn’t care. Right then he felt happier than he had any right to feel.
When he was done, he rinsed off the brush and placed it back into its packaging. He wiped his mouth clean on a nearby towel and walked back to his room. The streets were quiet and there was nobody outside. The whole city was quiet. There wasn’t even the song of crickets to break up the silence. The familiar sounds of night that he had grown so accustomed to in his valley were absent here. He felt cold and very alone. This place could have been a dead city, inhabited by nothing more than ghosts. He found that his pace had quickened. The only thing he wanted to do was get off these empty streets.
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He was almost running by the time he reached the relative safety of his room. His breathing had become ragged, and he tried to calm himself down. He walked over to the dresser and placed the toothbrush and baking soda down on the polished wooden surface. He didn’t want to look at the open entryway, but the gaping black maw seemed to draw his eyes, no matter which way he was turned or where he was in the room.
The dark entryway stood open like a wound in the glossy black of the surrounding obsidian walls. The dim light from the city made just enough of an impression so that the void was not a perfect black but it wasn’t grey either. The void was a murky darkness with textures and depth. He closed his eyes to the opening. He turned toward his bed and abandoning all façade of self-control he dove under the furs. He knew he must look ridiculous, but he didn’t care. He pulled the furs over his head and tried to ignore the fact that just anyone or anything could walk into his room at any time and kill him while he slept.
He was awoken by his furs being thrown off his warm body and a gruff angry voice yelling at him. “GET UP, PUP.”
William’s brain was clouded by the cobwebs of sleep and he wasn’t quite sure what was happening. He rolled out of bed as he tried to jumpstart his mind and grasp what was happening. He blinked his eyes and saw the eight-foot tall, frame of Ares standing over him with claws clenched into fists. Ares glared down at William, and he barely had time to raise his arms in front of him before Ares' powerful leg swept up into his abdomen. The force of the kick knocked him back against the wooden frame of his bed and his head exploded with bright stars. The wind escaped his lungs, and it took him several second to regain the ability to breath.
He managed to stand up even before he was able to fill his lung again. Ares threw the furs he was holding at William. The heavy fabric slapped William in the face and he was almost knocked backward by the pure force and weight of the furs. William was able to recover from the blow and he threw the furs back onto the bed.
William stared hard at Ares as the werewolf towered over him. There was no anger in Ares’ glare. It was strange but when he looked into Ares eyes, he didn’t feel the intense weight or power that he had felt when he looked into Jacob’s or Ansuya’s eyes. Ares’ stare held a certain amount of power but it was nothing that made looking into those golden eyes uncomfortable.
Ares inhaled and William knew that Ares was checking for something. He had noticed that when Aceso and when that other white werewolf had healed him, just before they had bitten him on both occasions, they had sniffed at him. He was reminded of that now, that or how a dog sniffs at something.
Ares stood up straight. “You are ready to begin. Do you have any pain anywhere in your body?”