A quick author's note:
This is the original Vision, not the rewritten version. I am currently in the process of rewriting this book, although the rewrite is not yet complete it can be found on my profile.
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I can remember it all so clearly; the frightening events of that night will surely be stuck with me forever.
That night was the first time it happened.
I was only six years old at the time, I was happy. I fit in well with my packmates; I couldn't have asked for better.
My pack, the Stormhounds, was a little old fashioned. Nowadays most packs had strayed from the idea of a moon goddess, but my alpha still had a firm belief in her input to our lives. He kept the pack in excellent condition to please her.
Not that I believed it.
I had always been an outsider in my beliefs, of course I acted as though I was invested in her image, maybe it was my lie that cursed me.
On that first night, the air was still, stiller than I had ever witnessed it. Everything felt different, the very atmosphere had changed.
It was pitch black and completely silent, but all of a sudden everything was full of noise.
The instant change is perhaps what scared her the most.
It was still night, yes, but now I was outside, where moonlight shone through the trees and lit the path. All I could see was madness, wolves coming from every direction, they all ran like their life depended on it, and merely a second later, new wolves emerged, they had matted, thin fur and eyes that shone a deep orange. Rogues.
I had never come across one before, but I immediately saw that they weren't after me.
They were chasing the other wolves, the pack wolves.
And then they caught them.
Everything went red in that instant, the sound of bones crunching between jaws shattered through my ears, the rigid screams of un-shifted wolves rang out into the air.
It was like nothing I'd ever seen before.
The rogues were everywhere, killing every wolf they saw, and not hesitating about it either.
It was a complete bloodbath.
I heard another scream, piercing and high pitched. It took me a moment before I realised it was me.
The rogues didn't notice, but that didn't matter because then I was gone.
I was back in my room, curled up in a soft duvet that no longer felt so comforting.
I was still screaming, and that was when my parents came in.
They immediately rushed to my side, "Charlotte? Charlotte what happened?"
I was vaguely aware of my dad lifting me, checking me for signs of pain.
But they had no idea it was all mentally.
"The wolves... dying... rogues attacking..." I shuddered as I mumbled the words.
My parents gave each other a horrified look before they turned back to face me, "Charlotte what are you talking about?" My dad asked me, looking bewildered.
In all honesty I didn't really know myself.
I wasn't sure what had happened, I assumed it had just been a nightmare, so that's what I told my parents.
But then it happened again.
Frequently, actually.
It happened at least once a week, usually more, and only lasted for a minute. But a minute was enough for me to have seen countless murders and attacks, enough to scar me.
My parents began to get concerned when my daydreams turned into abrupt nightmares, it was un-natural, they had said.
That's why they took me to the alpha.
At first he was accepting, believing the visions to be figments of my imagination. But one day, in one of the meetings my parents took me to have with him, I had a vision.
I knew what I was seeing, the neighbouring pack, Moonshine, was being viciously attacked.
I immediately told my alpha, Derek, and he was disbelieving, and then the phone rang.
"Alpha Derek of Stormhounds pack." He declared, and listened to what the other person was saying. His gaze turned to face me with shock evident in his eyes, "Yes... okay thank you."
When he put the phone down he stared at me for a long time. His calculating eyes making me want to bow my head in submission.
"That was the Moonshine pack beta, calling to warn me that they were being attacked." He stated, no emotion in his voice.
He was clearly trying to keep his expression composed, but I could make out the disgust seeping through.
Had I done something wrong?
He was still staring at me, but not really seeing. I suspected he was talking to someone through the pack link.
And that is when the pack doctor knocked on the door.
"Come in." Alpha Derek ordered, maintaining eye contact as the man walked in.
I had only met the pack doctor, Kent, a couple of times, mainly for vaccinations and that one time I broke my wrist.
"Charlotte here," Alpha said gruffly, "Has been having visions."
The doctors eyes widened significantly as he turned to stare at me.
"I want them gone. Do whatever you have to do, just make them stop." He ordered.
"But Alpha-" The doctor began to plead.
"Now!" He yelled, and the doctor gently led me out of the room.
That was the first moment when I truly realised the extent of the curse.
I not only had to deal with watching so much death, but I was now being shunned for it.
The doctor was very curious about my visions, and I told him all that I knew.
He called it a blessing, I told him it was a curse.
I worked with him for an hour every day, unless he had other business to attend to.
For months our sessions did nothing, he tried to get me to try out different techniques to block it all out.
In fact, if anything the visions had grown.
When I had my visions, instead of just being a spectator, now I could actively move around, I was able to control what I was seeing.
But I couldn't turn away from the horror.
My sessions with the pack doctor made me see that it could be turned into a blessing.
And so, whenever I had a vision of a pack I recognised and could name, I went straight to the alpha to tell him.
A couple of times, he humoured me, calling the packs only to find no one would answer.
I was always too late.
It seemed that in my visions, whatever I saw, was only a couple of seconds ahead.
I could do nothing to prevent the attacks.
I was just cursed to watch them.
It was better when my younger sister Melany was here, she was kind to me, when I had a bad vision she would console me, sit with me and keep me calm.
She would convince me that it wasn't my fault it was happening, there was nothing I could do to prevent the attacks.
But that didn't mean I believed her.
It was easy to believe that when she was still here.
But then she met her mate, David of Falkland pack.
He was the beta's son, which meant Melany had to leave with him.
She visited us sometimes, but from what she had told me, it was unbearable to leave her mate, and he couldn't come with her because of his duties, having taken over the beta position a year ago.
I still had hope though, I still ran to the alpha with news, just in case I could make a difference.
It never worked, and eventually he began to yell at both me and the pack doctor, yelling that nothing was working.
That made me feel guilty, and a month later I began to act as though my visions were becoming less clear.
Of course that was a lie, if anything they were getting clearer.
The alpha was finally pleased we had made progress. I had expected the doctor to be relieved, but he seemed ashamed, guilty even, to have stripped me of something like that.
It made me feel guilty in return, but it was better than the guilt at seeing him get yelled at because of me.
A few months after that, when I had been keeping up the appearance of my visions disappearing, I finally told the alpha and pack doctor that I hadn't seen anything in over a month.
He kept me under surveillance, asking me every week if I had seen anything.
I told him no, and he believed my lie.
He was pleased of course, but my life in the pack had already changed for the worse.
My packmates had seen my relentless sessions with the pack doctor and knew something was up, they demanded to find out what it was, and so the alpha told them what I was, that I was a freak.
They all believed I was tarnishing their pack, and even when I told them It was over, that I didn't have them any more, they still treated me like an outsider.
I missed the days when I fit in with the pack.
But even from the start, I had always been lying to them. I told them I believed in the moon goddess, and I told them my visions had gone.
It took effort to hide it, but from my sessions with the pack doctor, I had learnt to control my reactions, to not scream at the sight.
You could say I became a shell of a person.
I was isolated from the pack, no one wanted to befriend the weirdo.
I learnt to block out my emotions, the torture of what I saw was too much to handle. And now I had no one to support me.
My parents tried to help, but they barely saw me as a daughter anymore, I was unresponsive to them, and a burden. The family name was now tied down with my presence.
Even when I had my first shift, at the age of sixteen, I didn't realise what was happening.
At first I thought it was a vision, waking me up in the middle of the night, I held in my screams, I didn't permit myself to cry.
I thought that perhaps I was dying, and in that moment I wanted to.
Most wolves wake up the entire pack with their screams, which alerts the authorities that deal with first shifts. Which usually entailed the alpha, gamma, the pack doctor, parents and a few of the most recently shifted pack members.
For me, it happened all on my own.
It took hours of endless pain before I eventually shifted, seeing myself as a wolf was nice, to see myself growing to fit in with the pack again, to be part of the intricate system.
But I was wrong.
When my parents found me in the morning, I had figured out how to shift back, but they could tell from my scent that I had shifted, and they could probably figure it out from the horrendous state my room was in followed the reaction of my crazed wolf being caged in the room.
They took me to the alpha, who was surprised I had not screamed, even the rest of the pack thought it was weird.
And this meant that once again, I was considered unusual. I didn't have my first shift in the same way everyone else had. I had my first shift like a rogue. And alpha was not pleased.
As a wolf, I was treated pretty low. I took up the job of an omega despite the fact my wolf was strong.
But I learnt to live with it.
To hide in the shadows and ignore everything that happened to me.
I had to be strong in the situation, because no one else would be strong for me.
I was an outsider, but that was okay.
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A new book! Updates will be more frequent when my other two books 'To love a demon' and 'Ember' are finished (which should be within the month hopefully). While you're waiting for an update why not go read them!
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Cover was made by me.
Copyright 2015 Lauren Sophie (Lauren_Sophie_)
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