In the time it took to blink the shrine was filled with light again. However, this time, the light was emanating from Penn herself and not from the runes or from some celestial presence. This was so out-of-the-ordinary that, despite the pressure to return to the pups quickly, Penn took just a moment to examine herself. What had changed this time?
In the past, when strange things happened to her, Penn ignored it. Given that no one had seen much value in her since childhood, she had never taken an interest in herself. And then, after being expelled from the pack in such a brutal way, she'd been too busy surviving in the wild to even be curious about the radiant shimmering skin she saw under the moonlight from time to time, or the tinkling silver fur that appeared throughout her coat on the odd occasion. Only now that she had some small inkling of her true identity, for the first time in her life she was genuinely curious about herself.
This latest transformation was even more astonishing than the hybrid forms the elders and even herself had been given by the Moon goddess only a short time ago. As Penn examined her hair and her hands, she realized she resembled Siming, Master of Fate, more than she did herself. Like him, she appeared to be illuminated from the inside. Only, instead of radiating every shade of gold imaginable like Siming did, as if he were the sun incarnate, she glowed the colour of the runes - azure, cerulean and icy blue.
It dawned on her that her light source resembled that of a blue star. And then, the realization finally struck her, she really wasn't a shifter after all. And, she wasn't a hybrid biped wolf-human either. She was, as the elders had tried to explain a short time ago and as Siming had shown her, a soul-star from the Star Clan.
If open, if willing to listen, truth will resonate inside a person. And for Penn, it was doing just that right then.
"Guide me," she prayed to the Moon goddess, whom she trusted knew just how to help her find her true self, embrace her new identity and grow in a new direction. "I've chosen them," she whispered. "I'm going to live my days with them," she confessed. "Please, help me to help them?" she asked sincerely as her mind turned to the pups, the pack and the threat Codax posed. "I don't have time to waste," she tacked on as she opened her eyes and turned toward the little mouth of the shrine.
However, the moment she made a move to step forward she found herself instantly transported into the other cave where she met the stunned faces of the elders and Cassidy. A great collective gasp escaped their lips and all of them, including the wolves in their furs, bowed down immediately.
"Get up, get up," she gently called to them as she bent and reached for elder Ruuni's arm. "It's just me. It's Penn," she tacked on with a little laugh.
They didn't stir.
"Come on, please," she begged feeling embarrassed and a little perplexed. "Really, it's just me," she coaxed. "I'm a little altered," she admitted with a laugh, "but very much myself," she promised as she knelt down on the cave floor and gently pulled Ruuni up.
"You, you ..." Ruuni began but could not finish. She had never seen anything so supernal except for her brief encounter with the Moon goddess.
"It's the starlight in me," Penn explained with a soft smile. "Nothing to be afraid of," she encouraged the elder. "Besides, you knew it was there long before me. I'm guessing the pack and the pups did too," she offered with a little laugh.
"Penn," Cassidy whispered, "is it really you?" She like the others now, began to stir and sit up and inch a little closer to the glowing, iridescent woman who appeared quite without warning in front of them all in the darkened cave.
As much as Cassidy had wanted to be with Penn in the shrine and as much as she had wanted to meet the Moon goddess, she wasn't prepared for yet another incomprehensible transformation. Like the elders, she too felt she was looking at a god, or an immortal at the very least, and not the scruffy, cool tempered but tenderhearted she-wolf, who had lead her and her fellow orphans through the mountain pass to the safety of the Orthos pack.
"It's me," Penn said happily as she meant to move to Cassidy's side but found herself, in that same instant, right before the teen. She laughed a little nervously. "I think, I might be a little different from before." She was referring to the fact that she appeared to be able to move just by thinking of where she wanted to be.
"Fast as light," Nordin thoughtfully observed.
"Yes," Penn agreed. That had been her thought only a moment ago.
"Should we test it out?" He asked.
"Wait," Ruuni interrupted. "What are you doing here?" She asked Penn with confusion. "Why have you returned?"
"I chose you," Penn told her simply and honestly.
"Us?" the elders all breathed out together. Only they could fathom to some small degree, what this meant, what she might be giving up.
Penn stood to her feet and pulled Cassidy up with her. The elders followed and the remaining pack wolves in the cave all sat up giving Penn their full attention.
"We're pack aren't we?" she asked with a lopsided grin.
Cassidy threw her arms around Penn and hugged her tightly. Penn reciprocated gladly.
"Where's Jackson?" she asked.
"Still at the mouth of the cave," Cassidy replied.
And in that self same moment Penn disappeared form her arms. The girl fell forward unexpectedly and it was Lofgren who caught her arm and prevented her from tumbling to the stone floor. Cassidy quickly shed her her skin for her fur and raced out after Penn.
In the light of day, even a day clouded with heavy grey smoke, Penn did not glow as she did in the dark cave. Cassidy marvelled at this. She truly was like a star. In the dark, she was the brightest thing around, but under the cover of day, her light dimmed considerably. Still, she did not look mortal at all. Her hair was a dark shimmering fall of blue twinkling light, her skin was a hot blue-white that was hard to look directly at, and her eyes glowed like two moons.
She could tell Jackson was not sure what to make of her. He was in his skin and standing a few feet from her. He also had one hand outstretched in a motion clearly telling Penn not to come any closer.
Cassidy gave a little bark catching his eye. She wagged her tail happily and trotted right over to Penn. Then she rubbed her side against Penn's leg to show Jackson there was nothing to be afraid of.
"It's really me," Penn told him quietly.
She bent a little and lovingly brushed the top of Cassidy's furry head with her hand. "Cassidy and the elders recognize me."
Cassidy then shifted to her skin and grinned at Jackson.
"I know," she began a little breathy from excitement, "I know, it doesn't make sense but it's her. It's our Penn."
Jackson let out a pent up breath and then nodded. He was convinced. He just wasn't sure how he felt about this strange change in Penn's appearance. She looked more like some character from a video game then the fierce wolf who had killed a brown bear and taken down the third Orthos Beta, Arn, with a single bite to the neck. He wondered how Alpha Troy would feel about her transformation and if he'd still see her as pack.
"What's wrong?" Cassidy asked him. Sensing his reserve.
"Are we still your pack?" he asked with a frown.
"Always," Penn reassured him without hesitation. She then pulled him in for a hug, which he merrily accepted. He held on to her tightly acknowledging in his heart that he would be devastated if they lost her now.
"If Alpha Troy wont accept you," he whispered over her shoulder, "Then I wont accept him."
Penn pushed him back faintly and gave him a reassuring smile. "It wont come to that. If he doesn't like my new look, well, I'll just have to win him over by sticking to him like glue. I learned that from the two of you," she teased.
The two teens laughed and somehow it was all okay. This was their Penn.
"What's been happening?" Penn asked next as she walked out to the edge of the cave and looked down the mountain. She couldn't see more than twenty feet in any direction given that the smoke had now reached the mouth of the cave and was blowing on up the sheer rocks of the mountain still further. In fact, there was so much of it now that it had blackened out the sun.
"I haven't been able to see a thing for a couple of hours. So I've just been listening. I haven't heard anything unusual though. Sometimes there's some wildlife running on by but nothing else."
Penn looked to the sky. Every now and again a white disc appeared when the smoke thinned out. "It's noon, I think."
"Looks that way," Jackson agreed. "You've been gone several hours," he complained.
She looked down at him from the corner of her eye and smiled. She could see he'd been very worried about her. She gave his shoulder a squeeze.
"It's time for you to have a rest. One of the elders can take over."
"The elders?" Cassidy immediately questioned.
Penn chuckled a little. "In their new bodies they are feeling stronger than they did in their youth. I'm guessing lots of other things have improved as well, like their hearing, their eyesight, and their endurance." She paused and looked back at the narrow entrance to the second cave. "They aren't the old wolves who came up the mountain anymore."
She smiled and waved. The elders had come out to find them.
"What are you going to do?" Jackson asked next with a mixture of anxiety and curiosity in his voice.
"I'm going to find Alpha Troy," she told him with a gentle smile. "I need to start working on him now if I want to stay in the pack looking like this," she joked quietly.
His frown deepened. "I meant what I said," he reiterated.
Penn nodded and then confirmed, "I meant what I said too."
The elders reached them and the discussion was dropped.
"I don't know how far or how fast I can travel," Penn told the elders. "But, I'm going to go head to the pack house. If I'm as fast as the blink of an eye ..."
"I suspect much faster than that," Lofgren interjected.
Penn nodded, "well then, I'll be back before you know it. Will one or more of you elders take over for Jackson? He needs a rest." Penn asked.
"Yes, of course, " came Ruuni's swift reply. "You mustn't worry about us," she admonished Penn. "We can take care of each other here and we will wait until you return."
Penn smiled gratefully and then turned her eyes back to Cassidy and Jackson. She gave them a loving look before vanishing in a blur of light right before their eyes.
Penn couldn't be sure, but it seemed to her that she was almost instantly at the back door of the pack house. It was a bit startling, but also gave her this amazing feeling inside. She felt a thrill of excitement run through her. What else could she do? How would she know? How was she going to figure it out? It all felt a little daunting, but it also felt possible. Everything felt possible in that moment.
"Whose there?" a male voice called out from a window above her.
"Penn," she called back. She looked up and guessed that was someone calling down from Troy's office. "Hey," she called up. "Ah, don't panic when you see me, okay. I'm a bit different," she confessed. She stepped back several feet so that whomever was at the window could get a look at her.
"But you smell the same," she heard Troy say with a growl in his voice as he burst through the back door, made quick work of the distance between them, and immediately wrapped her in his arms. He didn't spare a moment for her new look. Instead, he buried his nose in her hair and breathed deeply.
"You're, you're crushing me a bit," Penn struggled to get out as his grip tightened and the happy rumblings in his chest deepened. He only held her more closely in response to her complaint. She would have laughed if she could have. But, instead, she chose to relax entirely until she was as limp as a rag doll in his arms. Only then could she find the space to breath a bit. And then she waited.
"Are you all alright?" Troy asked into her hair.
"We are," she replied. "Though, some of us are a little altered. In a good way," she tagged on. "But it'll take some explaining."
He pressed his nose further into her hair. It sent tingles down her neck and set off a flurry of butterflies in her stomach. She shivered in his arms.
"You don't mind the transformation, do you?" she asked. She wasn't sure he'd really gotten a good look at her before crushing her in this bear hug.
He responded by pulling back his head and looking her straight in the eye. His face was drawn and he had dark circles under his eyes from worry and lack of sleep, yet, those same beautiful eyes she had grown to love, were burning with longing for her.
"Do we have time for this kind of reunion?" the somewhat jovial voice of Arn teased from the window above.
Penn grinned at Troy, but he responded with a guttural growl and a partial transformation. His fangs elongated, his lips pulled back in a snarl and his claws grew out piercing her flesh where he held her. She gasped with momentary surprise, but she wasn't in any real pain. So she slapped him on the chest and said, "Stop that."
Lucas' familiar voice was heard from the door behind them saying, "He's like this all the time now. He can't control his temper or transformations." His voice was low and meek and full of worry.
Penn's heart filled with compassion for Troy. Clearly she and the elders weren't the only ones undergoing unexpected changes. And while their transformations had been strange and wonderful, his appeared to be wild and frightening. She slipped her hands up to his face and turned it down in her direction.
"My love," she called him.
The wild look subsided a little.
"Aren't you going to kiss me hello?" she asked quietly with a sweet smile just for him.
He startled her by letting out a howl. It was long and deep and made her blush as she tried to cover his mouth and couldn't help but laugh a little.
Next when he looked down at her, she saw the gentle Troy she knew. It was as if he'd exorcised the violent wolf right out of him.
Penn didn't wait to be kissed. She pulled his face down to her and pressed her lips to his as soon as his fangs disappeared. When he responded with more passion then in their previous kiss, she just sank her fingers into his short cropped hair and let him kiss her until he'd had his fill. The kiss was a hot mess initially, but then it became something sweet and full of yearning.
It ended with her wrapping her arms around his waist and resting her head on his chest. They stayed that way for a few more minutes. No one at the window or at the door breathed a word or disturbed the tender and peaceful atmosphere between the two. Penn, knowing this could not go on indefinitely, gave Troy a good hard squeeze and then she broke away from him. Standing far enough away that she was not in arms reach.
"Well, take a good look and tell me, what do you think? Am I still pack even if I'm not a wolf anymore?" she asked him. The question was put to him playfully, but her eyes were searching his sincerely. She was leaving the decision up to him. It was whatever he was comfortable with.
"Not a wolf?" he asked with confusion. He stepped closer to her, reaching for her, but Penn stepped back and shook her head.
"I'm not a wolf. But, even so, will you still have me?" She paused and looked down at the ground a moment, took in a deep breath, and then let it out slowly before saying, "It's okay if the answer is no. I get it. This is a big change. And packs have rules and ..." she was trying to let him off the hook. She would feel crushed if he let her go, but, at the same time, she didn't want him to feel trapped because he'd made her promises when she was a wolf and now she, well, wasn't.
"You're pack," he thundered as his body morphed right before her eyes. He was enraged again. But this time the transformation wasn't a partial one.
Penn watched with fascination as he transformed into his grotesque battle-form. She'd seen a couple other wolves do this during the games her pack use to hold. It usually happened when a wolf got out of control because of an unexpected loss or because two alpha-type wolves were going at it. Wolves were exceedingly dangerous and unpredictable in battle-form. They had even been known to injure their own loved ones when like this.
Penn had been terrified of the wolves she'd seen do this when she was a pup. But, she wasn't the least bit afraid of Troy. Instead, she was enthralled with his metamorphosis. Not only did he look like some creature out of a dark tale, but standing on two legs and all wolfed out like this, he reminded her of the elders in their new hybrid states. He was like a corrupted version of the elegant and beautiful forms the elders had now taken.
"You're pack," he repeated in a deep gravely growl as he took a step toward her.
Penn's eyes welled up with tears and she grinned at Troy. This was the best news she'd heard in days and he couldn't have made her feel more loved and more part of the pack by saying or doing anything else.
"I'm pack," she replied sweetly as she walked straight up to him, wrapped her arms around his thick chest and slid her fingers along his rough fur. His heavy thick gnarled arms came around her in response, but he held her ten times more gently then he did just a few minutes earlier.
She could hear and feel his heart beating erratically under her cheek and she squeezed him a little tighter. She finally had a pack. And this muscle bound wild creature in her arms, with razor sharp fangs and two inch claws, was her safe place. He was her home. She would never again be alone.