"Jerr has informed me you don't have much experience as a wolf?" Dell inquired. He leaned back in his wooden chair, tossing a small item he'd been holding on the table in front of him.
I tried looking for it, but I didn't sense any condemnation in his tone. "I have only been able to shift once, due to circumstances," I confirmed with a small voice.
"I will oversee your first wolven training, then."
"There needs to be an Alpha present to subdue your wolf if you lose control," Jerr clarified, probably after seeing my slightly confused gaze.
"Oh," I muttered.
"I can probably shove aside some of my duties this afternoon," Dell continued. "If all goes well, I won't be needed much in the coming days, so one of my men will be supervising your training. You will train in human form in the morning, wolven in the afternoon. In between, you will be assigned duties in camp."
"Okay," I agreed.
"I will have to discuss it with my men first to confirm, but I think Loic would be good for the human part of your training, and perhaps Reuben could take on the wolven part of it."
"That sounds wonderful," I concurred, even if I had no idea who those two men were. I didn't really care, either, but I was curious about what the training would entail exactly.
"Then we are agreed," Dell breathed, a polite smile pulling at his lips. "I will go get everything in order. I will see you in the training field when the Sun is halfway through her descent."
"Yes, Alpha," I said, bowing my head and exiting the tent after his unspoken dismissal.
I had been eagerly waiting, nervously dwelling around the camp, keeping my eyes on the Sun like a hawk. She moved down eerily slowly, denying me my second shift.
But then she neared her halfway point, and I had made my way over to the training field. I had found the people here were far more helpful than they were in Rahas. I hadn't even needed to ask someone for directions: as soon as someone saw my lost face, they offered me help.
I quickly found the training area, a large open field, where the ground was raw and brown, and all the trees were cut. Three wolves were training their combat skills, fighting each other until they drew blood.
To the side, just in front of the tree line, a small, wooden wall was placed, resembling the one in Rahas, where I had taken off my clothes before I had my first shift.
My legs were jittery with the anticipation of finally shifting again, unable to stand still.
I still tried my best to compose myself. I didn't want the Alpha to see me as this nervous, uncontrolled little pup. But I didn't want him to think of me as indifferent, either.
So when my legs weren't moving with excited anticipation, they were trembling with nervousness, caused by my own sunburned mind.
"Well on time," I heard from behind me.
I lowered my head as I turned around, and the dark-blonde-haired man joined me on the edge of the field. He was accompanied by a relatively young-looking man, with dark brown hair and a stoic face. He kept his posture straight - he looked stiff, yet oddly at ease at the same time. He had his arms crossed behind his back, standing closely behind the Alpha. I somehow found this man - who I assumed was Reuben - to be more intimidating than the Alpha in front of me, whose posture was relaxed and soft.
"Yes, Alpha," I said, only allowing myself small, subtle peeks at the man behind him.
"Reuben will supervise this training. I will shift first, so I can intervene right after your shift. My power over you won't be as strong as Aven's, since I am not your Alpha, but I am trusting that you will accept my supremacy as Alpha nonetheless. I will force it if I have to," he warned.
"Yes, Alpha," I agreed.
"If you're more comfortable, you can change clothes behind the wooden panel. After you're shifted and in control, you will focus your attention on Reuben. I will be here monitoring, but do not pay me any attention if I do not demand it."
"Yes, Alpha," I repeated.
He nodded his head, first at me, and then at Reuben, before he made his way over to the wooden panel at the tree line, and came out the other side in his wolven form.
His beast was as magnificent as it had been on the night of my Ascension. Seeing the tundra-colored wolf in front of me, his eyes intently on me, I immediately renounced my earlier claim. Dell was easily the more intimidating wolf here.
He took a few steps to the side, clearing the wooden panel for me, and I felt his status stomping through every pace. The three wolves in the clearing had also sensed the mighty presence, and they were upping their pace - as if they were proving to their Alpha how much they had been progressing.
But he was unbothered by them, keeping his brown eyes on me, nodding his wolven head to the wooden panel.
I hastily made my way over, and it wasn't long before I found myself without clothes, barren in the wind.
For a moment, I feared I wouldn't be able to shift, but I soon learned that shifting into my wolven side was as easy as it had been to shift back to my human body the first time. I simply willed my body into twisting and turning, shaping my anatomy until it fit that of my beast.
And soon I felt the barren ground under my paws - a few small rocks poking at them. I had shifted! It felt so incredibly liberating, and I longed to run. I needed to run, my wolf had been caged for far too long.
But before I even finished my first step in the forest's direction, I heard a loud growling to my right, forcing my head to spin. Instinctively, I bared my teeth at my foe - the wolf who was denying me my freedom.
Dell stepped closer to me, looking at me through his fierce eyes and forcing me to keep my squeamish legs in place.
But I needed to find an escape for all this piled up energy - I needed to release it.
The growling intensified when I tried peeping at the forest behind me - trying to distinguish all the smells I was experiencing, locating all the sounds I was hearing.
But the sight of the exposed, white canines, covered in spit, forced me to leave the forest where it was. Dell was now practically hanging over me, physically forcing me down with intimidation. I felt his power crashing over me in waves - forcing every inch of me to recognize who was truly standing in front of me.
I had no choice but to lower my head - and hope that this training would somehow involve some running. My ears twitched, trying to rid themselves of this constant growling hanging over me, but I knew that the only way to make the growling stop, was to fully submit.
I barely dared to look up at him, but I could feel Dell's overpowering presence near me - fearing that merely any movement would be enough to set him off and make him snap at my face.
My wolf whimpered, in fear, in submission, in regret of not being able to run.
The growling only stopped once my entire body lay on the ground, and I had fully submitted to Dell's power.
"Good, we can begin now," Reuben spoke. His voice was raw and harsh, and I found it fitting for him. He didn't seem all too pleased with his newest task, but just like me, he had submitted to his Alpha.
He crossed the field, slowly walking around us as he observed my wolf. Dell moved to the side, leaving me entirely exposed to this field. I felt naked and intruded as Reuben steadily finished his circle around me, looking for Moons know what.
"Your color seems easy enough to hide," he finally concluded. "You're in luck."
He seemed to have forgotten I couldn't speak in this form, and after a short silence, he resumed talking again.
"You don't have Kima's gift, I suppose?" he asked.
I tilted my head looking at him, confused at how he wanted me to answer any questions.
His eyes squinted a little, overgrown with frustration as he sighed, "You can answer yes or no questions."
Sun burn me, I cursed myself. I had just made a fool out of myself, in front of the Alpha out of all people.
I shook my head no, and Reuben didn't let me finish the movement before he continued talking, clearly impatient. "Okay. I suppose you also don't have any other experience with Kima's gift?"
Hadn't Dell informed him about this? I shook my head again.
"I will start from the beginning, then. To train with Kima's legacy, it is important to understand it. Our power has a rare attribute, you see. We can extend it to others. It is not the same as the other packs - their magic merely affects you, but with our power, you can actually utilize it yourself."
Reuben had caught my attention - but with the Alpha still watching me intently so close by, I wouldn't have dared to direct my focus anywhere else. I felt his presence in the back of my mind, even as I tried ignoring him as he had ordered.
"We create shadows. Others can play with those shadows too, which is what we will be teaching you. Of course, it is easier for a blessed wolf to wield this magic, seeing they have control over the shadows. They can will the shadows into their want, making it so that the shadows can also play with them. They can also retract the shadows from you, and that is something you always need to be mindful of. Never settle in feeling safe and hidden. Once you stop trying to hide, you get found."
I subtly nodded my head every now and then, signaling him I was following his talking, and urging him to continue.
"One of the first important things you need to know is to recognize the difference between a real shadow, and Kima's shadow." He shot a quick glance at Dell's wolf after he spoke, who I saw nodding his head in the corner of my eyes.
Reuben didn't show any emotion on his face as he continued talking, his lips steady in a straight line, his face rid of frowns. "Kima's shadows are deeper, more intense. Sometimes they exist without an origin - although that would only be executed by a poorly trained wolf. That's the biggest tell. Most of the time, it will not be that easy. Kima's shadow is consuming. Things disappear. A regular shadow is just a place where the light doesn't touch, but Kima's is much more than that.
"But the shadows aren't the only important part of hiding - everything matters. Your scent, your sound, the trail you leave behind. If you are close to a Hidden Moon wolf, they can extend their magic to you and hide your scent and sound in that way, but more often than not, unblessed wolves have to rely on other methods to mask themselves."
Reuben nodded his head at Dell, who didn't move an inch. But suddenly, I felt an unexisting weight leave me, like a piece of me went missing, but it was a piece that was never even there in the first place.
"I am currently masking you. Try walking around," he ordered.
I didn't hesitate and immediately jumped on my legs, eagerly taking my first steps into the field. My paws felt light - barely touching the underground. It felt like they were floating, hovering just above the soil, refusing to connect with it in sound.
"Try to remember how it feels to walk like this," Reuben continued, as I walked around the field, exploring this strange, new feeling. And then it suddenly vanished, as my paw connected to the ground in a thud that suddenly seemed louder than it needed to be. "Now, without my powers, try to move soundlessly. Keep your weight evenly distributed, and watch where you're placing your paws. Without magic, you don't have the luxury of recklessness."
I tried following what he ordered me to do, but every step I took was accompanied by a thump, echoing in my ears. I got so focused on it - I heard it echoing in my ears with every pace, drumming in my brain at every movement.
"Try not to frustrate yourself," Reuben warned. "That will not help. No one succeeds on their first try. Now, masking your scent is the easiest part. Without magic, you can simply use the ancient technique of covering your fur with mud, or feces, or whatever pungent smell is strong enough to cover that of a wolf."
I was glad to hear I didn't necessarily need to train that part right now because the thought of rolling in animal feces horrified me to my core.
Reuben kept ordering me to walk around the field, sometimes getting closer to the trees and trying to spot which shadow was his and which wasn't. If I recognized it correctly, he ordered me to hide in it - to experience the difference between his shadow and the regular one.
It was a lot easier to disappear in Kima's shadow. As soon as I stepped into it, the shadow did all the work for me. The challenging part was when Reuben moved his shadow, and I had to move along with it. I needed to anticipate where the shadow would go to, and try not to make myself known so Reuben wouldn't retract it altogether.
Hiding in the normal shadows proved to be more difficult in a way - I had to play with the shadows, hiding myself in uncomfortable ways. But these shadows remained, so once I was hidden, I was relatively safe to stay that way.
All the while, Reuben kept masking me and exposing me again, enticing me to mind my paws, reminding me not to forget about the silence of it all.
And by the end of it, when the Sun nearly reached the horizon, I felt exhausted and drained, and I longed for my bed.
I had eaten in the camp with Tymen and Jerr, updating them on how my first session went. Reuben had confirmed it went well, but I didn't get the impression that he was very impressed with my performance.
Dell had left the training early, saying he needed to resume his duties and Reuben seemed to be handling me quite well. I guessed he had also noticed my tiring body, and had deemed it safe that I wouldn't have the energy in me to run.
So later that night in my tent, when I let myself disappear into Jerr, the darkness of the slumber found me quickly and securely, as I was wrapped in furs and blankets, and a pair of strong, warm arms.