MYRA
A golden sunlight beam is burning my eyelids as I try to sleep— irritation filling me to the brim.
"Micheal," I groan groggily. "Close the curtains. The sun; it burns." I say short and clipped, burying my face further into the pillow.
The rock hard pillow.
Something that made me suddenly aware that I was not in my home. My pillows were always fluffy. Not to mention you and Micheal aren't a thing anymore. I cringe and open my eyes to find everything blurry.
Grogginess fills my senses and the smell of sage. I squint and rub a bleary eye with my hand, confused and disoriented.
What in the world?
Then a second later, I'm smacked with memories.
The beautiful lion of a man, the vicious wolf chase, the pain in my calf— my hand shoots down to my leg as I glance at it. It's naked and sticking out from under linen sheets, no bite to be seen. I frown as I inspect my entire leg, but nothing is there.
As I sit up, my back groans in protest making me feel like an eighty year old woman; I wince from the bed that feels like a slab of stone.
Did I dream the bite?
I hear humming nearing the outside of the tent I'm in and I immediately raise the linen sheets to cover my chest, aware of my nudity.
Then, like an angel drifting in, the woman from before comes in with a wicker basket full of luxurious items.
"Hey there, stranger." She muses, her almond eyes crinkling in the corners as she smiles at me.
"These are for you, I had an inkling that you'd wake up soon." At my cautious look she clarifies. "You've been out for a day."
"Oh." I say simply, not knowing what else to say. God, I had so much running through my mind, but all I could manage was a simple but blunt sentence.
"That man... he bit me." I say cautiously, not wanting to reveal too much at once. She rifles through the plastic sealing the gift basket, lavender soaps and chocolate turtles filling it. I even manage to spot an assortment of chocolate covered nuts and berries and my mouth starts to drool a bit. I quickly avert my eyes as she hums in response.
"Ah, yes, Cairo. He's a mean brute." She says sighing.
"He claims you ran from him... we— well, let's just say we like the chase all too well."
I inhale sharply as I press my back against the wall, watching her closely.
"We? You— you're like him." I state.
"The wolf man." I whisper, fear engulfing me. My mind flashes to a movie clip I'd seen as a child, a woman's body half eaten and crawling out of the forest— a victim of a werewolf. It was a horror movie, go figure.
"Oh, don't say it like that." She looks up a bit disappointed.
"We aren't complete monsters you know. And around here, we're called wolves; no man or woman in front of the wolf part." She grins at me, her human teeth gleaming. I furrow my eyebrows.
"Yeah well, where I'm from—like a couple miles away, you guys are called werewolves." I say shakily, a little shook from the concept of the conversation.
She snorts.
"Babe, you aren't a couple miles away from home— you are from earth, yes?" She asks, intrigued.
I stare up at her blankly, my mind not processing well.
"I don't understand." I say calmly, not trying to lose my cool.
"We're in Hailstone. Not earth. Although I've been to your dimension quite a few times, I can confidently say that it isn't as beautiful as around here." She pushes the basket toward me, urging me to go through it with childlike excitement in her eyes.
I pull it onto my lap, still eyeing the chocolate covered nuts.
"You're saying I'm in a different dimension, but I've gone nowhere, just my typical route of hiking, I—" the words get caught in the back of my throat as I flash back to when I noticed the trees were orange and wilting instead of the healthy green they usually were. I swallow slowly, processing.
She nods in confirmation.
"Whatever you've just realized— it must be the same as us. You somehow triggered a portal open, a rip through the fabric of two worlds and came to us." She says to me softly.
"I can show you around if you want. My... mate doesn't get here for another couple of hours." The way she says mate is in such distaste that I pause through my observation of the items in the fanciful basket to give her a questioning stare.
Even though we'd only met, I felt as if she was someone I could open up to. A safe space in this— Hailstone. A wolfs world.
"Is he–?" The question is left unfinished on my tongue as she looks up at me kindly.
"No, he isn't like Cairo. He's a fair man of all trades, not a brute warrior. He acts off of thinking, not wolf impulses. He's the chief of the pack." She seems to understand my question and answers me thoroughly.
"Yet you seem to have a distaste for the guy." I say, a bit too bluntly. She blinks up at me in surprise and then shoots me a grin.
"Yeah well, we were mated against my will, so I don't really enjoy his company." She stares at me as I pour out some chocolate almonds and offer her some, she gladly accepts with a small laugh.
"Against your will," I tread carefully. "They do that around here?" I feel the hairs on my neck raise as she grimaced.
"Rape? No. But well... I suppose on high ranked wolves it's acceptable. The chief chose me because he found me to be appealing to the eye, not as muscular as other she wolves. He mated me against my will and left me to warm his bed while he's gone. No emotional connection— no sexual connection. Just short lust that doesn't last long enough to become anything." The way she mutters the last sentence makes me a bit sad, but I try to steer the conversation in a different direction.
"I thought— you know in wolf books, there are soul mates." I say matter of factor, crunching on an almond and relishing in the chocolate goodness.
She raises an eyebrow with a smile.
"I wish that were the case. Over here we choose who to mate— who to bond with and mark and make ours. In a sense, we make our own soulmates, and Leia help us all if we choose wrong." She combs her brown hair out of her face as I study her. Leia? Must be a god or something that they worship over here. I push it to the back of my mind, promising to ask about it later if I live long enough.
"Is—" I hesitate as she pauses in her crunching on almonds to stare at me. I suddenly feel embarrassed.
"Has Cairo been mated...?" I finish asking, and immediately regret it.
"Actually, I don't even know why I asked—" I laugh to myself as I shake my head.
"It's a valid question." She pops another almond in her mouth.
"I mean, many have tried to fight for his attention— me included, but he's just not found who he wants I guess. Trust me, I've literally bared myself naked and he looks at me as if I'm maggot filled trash on the bottom of the bin." She giggles to herself as I raise my eyebrows in question.
"But the chief?" I ask.
"The chief has other conquests while he's away, I'm sure. I have males warming my sheets as well, searching for a connection. I just... I want—" she hesitates, searching for the right word.
"Someone to care?" I offer up as she perks up.
"Yes! You get it." She says victoriously, and I find myself oddly liking this she wolf.
"Although, I don't know why I even try with Cairo." She shakes her head. "I have no feelings for him or even lust... he's just the only one who hasn't offered himself up to me yet. I guess it all comes down to the chase." She says, shrugging carelessly.
I don't know why, but a bit of ease tugs at me, at the thought that he'd be so uninterested in others. I blink away my thoughts and glance at the rest of the goodies. A silver hairbrush, some hair ties, cookie tin full of chocolate chip cookies, a bottle of wine and soaps of different scents. At the front of the basket there is a small folded note, and my interest peaks.
"Who is this basket from?" I murmur the question as I read over the note, a tickle in my funny bone starting up.
"No idea," she says. "One of the guards handed it to me saying it was a gift from someone to the 'human'." She smiles. "Don't worry, I smelled for any poisons." She puts her hands up.
But I don't pay her any attention, the small note bringing a tiny smile to my face.
"To Myra, the woman who doesn't need a husband in a camp full of 'crazies'. "
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