chapter eleven - lycan
song of the chapter ; changes - H.E.R.
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DÉJÀ VU IS an eerie experience that the majority of the population has encountered at least once in their lives. It is typically caused by being put in a certain situation or entering a conversation that triggers intense feelings of uncanny familiarity. And although you know for certain you had had never been in this conversation, or situation, the feeling is so severe despite the fact that you know it's impossible.
Although not for the same exact reason, or even the same hospital bed, Farah felt déjà vu weakening her limbs and weighing them down with figurative lead. She lay hearing the steady beeps of her heart rate on the cardiac monitor and her first instinct was to turn her head and look for any signs of Noah. But he was nowhere in sight, and the quick rotate of her neck caused a searing pain to remain evident across her collarbone.
And then the pain wasn't only in her neck, it burned all over her body. She was straining for relief but none could be found. Every single part of her body that Noah had touched previously was aching and throbbing, she could suddenly feel every forced caress or strike on her skin. Her chapped lips fell open and she let out a whimper of agony, but that was all that she could do.
Her throat was too dry and tender for her to do anything else. It felt like she hadn't drunk a sip of water for countless merciless days like she had swallowed spoonfuls of sand that had quenched any remaining moisture. Farah swallowed hard in hopes that it would provide some sort of alleviation but it was to no avail, it just felt like thick molasses sliding down her throat.
She croaked out again, awakening Israfil beside her.
That, too, was a contribution to the déjà vu.
He looked up suddenly, his silver eyes scanning the room and then landing on her.
It looked like she was drowning in bedsheets, her figure so minuscule it was almost as if there was no one there at all, but Israfil could sense her from miles away. Her head lay pressed against the cushioned cotton pillows, her black hair a contrast to the white of the fabric. Her skin looked deathly pale and more gray-toned than it's normal golden hue.
"Farah?"
The cardiac monitor's beeps grew at a rapid rate.
She could barely turn her head to him, but her eyes were wide with alarm. "What are you doing here?" She could barely even scream, and the crack in her words was incredibly evident.
"I-"
"What are you?!" She asked, her tone tremulous.
"I can't tell you right now," Israfil responded in a contrasting voice. "I need you to calm down, please."
"Don't tell me what the fuck to do, Israfil!" Her hands shook atop the blankets. "You're not human. You can't be. And neither is Noah. I don't even know who you are! I can't trust you."
His teeth ground together with withdrawn emotion. "Yes, you can!"
"You bit me." Farah breathed. "You fucking bit me!"
"To save you, Farah!" He let out a heaved sigh. "His bite would have killed you."
She let out a sardonic laugh, "What are you guys, werewolves? "
The room fell dead silent and his lips pursed shut. It was so quiet you could hear a pin drop. The only remaining sounds where his heavy breathing. "Yes."
"Okay, I'm done here." She reached for the nurse call button, but Israfil moved her hand from it. Her eyes were set in a glassy scowl, tears threatening to pool over. "You need to let me go. I need to forget about you and Noah and just leave."
"You can't leave," He whispered.
"I have every right to," She winced when she turned her body to him, her breath hitching in her throat. "You won't fucking tell me anything." The intense scent of the lemon disinfectant and hand sanitizer was making her stomach feel sick. It was so familiar because of the amount of times she had been in this situation. It was pulling her apart, thread by thread. But his reassuring presence was there with his smell of fresh linen, and it was there to weave her back together, all over again.
He pulled her back together, every single time.
"I will," He gulped. "I promise I will, but you can't freak out. You have to believe me."
Her eyes narrowed, "Fine."
"I'm a lycanthrope."
She raised an eyebrow.
"A werewolf, to simply put it. I can shift from my human form to a wolf at any given time."
Farah didn't know whether she wanted to laugh hysterically or hide under the blankets and cry and pretend this was all a figment of her imagination. She wanted someone to tear away every single horrid memory so she could start fresh. Away from all of this. Away from haunting anxiety that hovered over her head, leaving her fretting over whether she would make it out all of this alive.
"You're bullshitting."
Israfil sucked in a sharp breath, "No, I'm not. I am the Alpha of this pack, of this territory. Which means I'm the leader. I have a second in command, a beta, who assists me with my tasks. An assistant, if you will. The system goes according to the order of the Greek alphabet. Alpha, beta, gamma, delta, and so on. The lowest rank is the omega, the last letter in the Hellenic alphabet."
Farah didn't say anything.
"Now I'll talk about the concept of mates. You humans have adopted a similar idea in your society- soulmates. But ours are different. We believe in the Greek deity system, and we follow the goddess of the moon, Artemis, or Diana if you want to use Roman terms. The moon goddess has decided the fate of any and every future lycanthrope, there is a very small percentage of werewolves that are mated to another species."
He sighed again, "And that's where you come in. I'm part of that small percentage. You're my mate. My counterpart. I complete you and you complete me." Her face was indecisive, he couldn't tell if Farah believed him or was trying to process this all.
"And I understand that this might be overwhelming but it's the truth. The reason Noah's bite would have killed you is that he is not your mate, and when you are marked by another who isn't destined for you, it will kill you prematurely. That's why I had to counter his bite with my own. I didn't plan on marking you like this, it's typically an intimate action that requires consent from both parties, but because it was lethal, I had to act quickly."
Farah waited for multiple long minutes for a camera crew to jump out and point a lens in her face, telling her that she was on their new prank show, that it was all some sick joke. But it never happened. She looked around, her eyes peering through her lashes for some type of hidden camera or microphone, but there weren't any. It was
"You're crazy." Was the first thing she said. "This can't be real, there's no way."
"It's true," Israfil confirmed.
She didn't want to believe him. "This is a load of shit." Farah wondered how he could come up with such an elaborate lie, she wondered if he stayed up at night planning it all. It was her instinct to question and observe. It was better that way. To blindly trust is to be vulnerable. To be naive. And she didn't want to be taken advantage of. Not again. Not this time.
"If this is true, does the government know about you?"
"Yes," He answered. "They're aware of the supernatural species but retain such information from the public to keep peace and order. With awareness of supernatural beings, comes chaos. Global and international wars would start. We'd be hunted and most likely kept in captivity like zoo animals."
"Prove it to me." She was smug now. Farah was now sure she had caught him in his deceit and he would have no choice but to confess the truth.
He raised an eyebrow, "Right now?"
"Yes, right now." A smirk grew on her lips but quickly fell when he stood up and shrugged his broad shoulders and began to remove his shirt.
"What are you doing?!" Her cheeks burned.
Israfil let out a guffaw when he saw her eyes covered and her face evidently blushed albeit her deep skin tone. Her bottom lip was drawn between her white teeth and it took just about all of her self control not to peek.
"Open your eyes." He ordered, any traces of humor now gone.
When she followed his instructions, he was crouched on the ground, only in boxer shorts. Farah didn't even have time to gape at his muscles and bronze skin, before the sound of cracking bones resonated. His body structure began reforming, the positions slightly off but the movements fluid. They seemed ethereal in an eerie way, she couldn't pry her eyes away from him when dark fur began to sprout from his skin.
For a moment, a small voice in the back of her head was questioning why he was doing this in a hospital room, in public, but she guessed that perhaps it could have been because they were on his supposed territory, surrounded by supposed werewolves.
Only, they were very much real.
And in his place stood a very large wolf with inky fur and piercing silver eyes.
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i wrote this in an hour and it turned out decent somehow??
what yall think ? lmk in the comments (:
-s