Past Secrets – Version 2 – Nov 2016

Janus watched as his brother struggled against the draconic female’s grasp. He thought of a plan for a moment, then just figured best to plan later. He popped out from behind the hedge, and lunged at her.

As best he could anyway. The ground was still incredibly slippery.

He managed to thrust his shoulder into the back of her legs, which sent her forward enough that Adian’s feet touched the ground again. He was then able to break free from her grasp.

“Finally!” his brother exclaimed. Adian turned and looked to Janus, who now was attempting to pin the avizon to the ground. “Keep her busy! I’m going after that asshole!”

“Who?!”Janus questioned.

“I’ll have to explain later, but he has Snowhawk! Just keep her there!” Adian shouted as he spun around and sprinted off.

The avizon went still under him. “He’s probably going to regret that…” she almost purred as she craned her neck back to look at Janus.

He could feel the fur on the back of his neck raise as she looked at him.

“You might as well,” she continued. “You know, usually, I like to at least find out the name of whoever is on top of me. Or who I’m on top of. Which ever.”

Janus gave her no reply, other than an uncomfortable stare.

“I’m Anya,” she grinned.

He still wouldn’t reply. What he didn’t realize was he was slowly withdrawing from her, leaning back and not really succeeding in keeping her pinned down. He did, however, realize this when her tail snapped him to his side and suddenly, she was on top of him. “Get off!” he demanded.

“Why should I? Your brother wanted me to stay near you, right?” she again purred, now pressing her weight onto him.

“Not like this! Get off!”

“Look, wolf. I need you to stay put for a bit. I really can’t let your brother fuck this up.” She leaned toward him, opening her mouth and he saw, just for a moment, a longer set of fangs swing down. She bit into the fleshy part of his shoulder, near his neck, and he felt the area around the bite turn to fire.

She leaned back, grinning, and he tried to reach and move her off him, but his arms would not respond.

“What did you do?” he growled.

She shrugged. “Nothing much, you just won’t be able to really move for a few minutes. Hope you have your winter coat in, it’d be a shame if you got frostbite and died.” She giggled and stood, then left him struggling in the still falling snow.

Janus could only watch as the avizon trotted away. He fought against the heaviness in his limbs, but they responded less and less the more he struggled. “Son of a bitch,” he fumed. “At least Adian went after them.”

He resigned himself to laying in the snow until the avizon’s venom released it’s hold on him.

*********

Adian struggled to remain upright as he ran after the two delphin. The male’s hoof prints were being quickly covered by the heavy snow, but there was still a faint scent to follow. He was taking her outside of the city, on a more south eastern route. Is he heading to Di’aru? he asked himself.

Despite the Delphin Empire’s reach, the port city of Di’aru remained a haven of slavery. When said Empire fell, not much changed there. While the southern-most city of Juv fortified it’s borders, Di’aru’s ever-existing population of slavers had simply shrugged at the fall of the delphin, then once again when the slaver rule in Ametition ended.

Still, this delphin didn’t strike him as being a slaver. Sure, delphin slavers existed, but this stallion seemed to have another motive. And those fangs he had… But barring all that, if she was being taken there, nothing good could come of it.

Adian did say a quiet thanks to whoever would listen for the location of the estate. Their home was on on the north western edge of the city, and Ametition was large. It was a not-insignificant amount of time to travel north to south, much less the diagonal. Tracking over the urban area would be easier than out in the forest and fields between the cities for him.

The scents of the stallion and Snowhawk both grew stronger and the set of large hoof prints he’d been following grew more defined. He finally caught up to them. Adian slowed his run to a trot, and strained his ears for the sound of hooves crunching ice and snow. His trot turned to a cautious walk as he followed the scent and prints into a small, wooded park.

The pea gravel path he was on wound around and through the trees. He stopped when he reached what seemed to be the center of the park where several benches were arranged around a large tree. Sitting, or rather propped, on one bench was Snowhawk’s cloaked figure. Her head was lowered, chin resting on her chest, ears drooped forward, and the silver spiral of her horn glinted in last rays of the short day’s sun as it filtered through the tree branches above. He could see her head slowly bob in rhythm to the small puffs of steam from her breath.

Adian glanced around him, looking for any sign of the unicorn stallion, but seeing none. Not even hoof prints leading away. He cautiously moved toward Snowhawk.

“Snow?” he began.

An ear twitched in response.

“Snowhawk!” he continued as he hastened his pace toward her.

Her head inclined ever so slightly. Adian now hurried toward her. As she turned her head toward him, he felt a sharp pain through his side, where his still fresh-healed wound from the scuffle with Legacy was. His hand instinctively went to his side, before he had even seen the area himself. When he did look down, he saw crimson flowing from him. “What the fuck?!” His head snapped up and he looked frantically around him.

The pinto unicorn was behind him. There was no weapon in his hands or near him, but his fingers dripped with blood. The nails looked like daggers. “I really didn’t want to have to do it this way, young wolf.”

Adian looked back to Snowhawk, who was now slumped to her side on the bench.

“Stop worrying about her,” the stallion continued. “I unfortunately can’t get my dear Emerald back just yet, so I’ll take her back when I’m done with you.”

Adian staggered back a step. Then another as the unicorn approached him. He had to be at least 7 feet in height, tall even for a delphin male.

“I was quite serious when I said you have some potential. I’ve been watching you almost as long as I have her. The way I see it right now, we can either work on exploring that, or you let it go to waste. Basically, this past month for you is for nothing since you’re going to be dead soon, and I’ll have a much easier time getting her when Emerald is fully awakened.”

Adian moved back another step, but his legs wobbled under him. The wound had not only been reopened, but seemed to be losing blood much faster this time.

“You’d at least have the option of fighting back if you cooperate for now. I’m sure you’re going to hate me even more soon enough.”

His legs buckled under him, and he found himself crumpled on the ground. He looked again to Snowhawk, who had not moved from moments earlier.

“You can have a lot more than just revenge on me,” the unicorn stated. “Most anything you want, in fact. I’m sure you want more than just to sit in a dark room and be jealous.”

Adian turned his gaze to the unicorn stallion. “And her?”

The equine shrugged. “I’ll leave her be for now. Things need to… settle, as it were.” His tone was more sincere than earlier in the evening. “I’m sure Anya will be along shortly, she will return her.”

“What are you?” he panted.

The unicorn grinned. “Well, that’s almost asking who I am. I am a Chernomor. One of the first. Some call us vampires, but we’re no more that than avizon. We’re just created.” He knelt next to Adian, and leaned uncomfortably close to him. “You’ll learn soon enough. You’ll pass out in a moment, then things will be very different when you wake up.”

Adian knew he was right, be he fought the darkness trying to overcome him. “Who…”

“There it is. I am Kieran. Now sleep.”

He continued to fight the dizzy feeling and the heaviness of his eyelids, but soon the darkness over took him.

*********

Snowhawk willed her eyes open. They hesitated to do so, but they did. She felt herself wrapped in several heavy blankets. Once she adjusted to the dim light, she found herself back in her room. She winced and whined as she sat up. Every muscle in her body ached, like she’d been exercising, or fighting someone, for too long. She looked to her left, and saw Janus, similarly bundled in several blankets. She freed an arm, and gently touched him, stroking the thick fur along his neck, near his jaw. He was cooler to the touch than he should have been. Wolves should not be cool to the touch.

She freed her other arm and laid herself on him, bringing the blankets with her. She reached up to pet both sides of his neck as she had earlier, and tucked her muzzle under his. “What happened?” she whispered, closing her eyes.

She felt him grow warmer in her hands after a few short moments and he gave a soft groan. “Snow?” he asked.

“How did…” she began, sitting up and looking at her hands. She touched them to her own face, and found them warmer than normal. But they had been in his fur.

“What the hell happened?” he continued, trying to sit up, fighting against the blankets he was wrapped in. “Where’s Adian?”

“I don’t know. I woke up in here just before you. And you were cold to touch.”

“I feel fine now. Better than, even.”

“You warmed up very quickly,” she replied, trailing off and looking back to her hands. She then shook her head, trying to clear a disturbing thought. “We need to find him, to find out what happened to us. I don’t remember much after blacking out in the garden.”

The two unbound themselves from their blankets, then stepped into the hallway. Just outside, apparently on watch, sat one of the more recent security hires. The long-furred, roman-nosed, sitehound typed male stood as the door opened and turned to face him. He was generally a light cream color, though his back, shoulders, hips, fold of his ears, and the top of his tail were marked with tan, and a darker sable splotched over that. His build was light and slender, almost appearing underweight. His dark blonde hair was pulled back in a pony tail, and his eye color reminded Snowhawk of Janus’s eyes: an extremely pale blue. On top of being one of the less common types of lupino, he was also missing his right arm. He wore a mechanical prosthetic in it’s place, which allowed him to work as if he wasn’t missing a body part. He gave the pair a slight bow as they stepped from the room.

“Renner, have you seen my brother?” Janus asked.

Renner shook his head, then replied in the heavy accent typically found in the colder, northern regions. “No, we found Snowhawk just outside the estate, some hours after finding you in the garden. You were much like a wolf-sicle. We have not seen any sign of Adian since he left yesterday.”

Snowhawk looked to Janus, and found he was looking back at her. “That’s not like him,” she said, worry obvious over tone.

“Has anyone seen anything on the monitors? Especially regarding that piebald unicorn.”

Again, Renner shook his head. “Afraid not. Adian has the only set of keys, and we have not been able to get into the guard shack.”

Janus patted his sides, then frowned. “I guess I didn’t have my phone on me. I’ll go grab it and try to call him.” He turned and kissed her on the cheek, then walked away.

“Have you heard anything else, Renner?” Snowhawk asked.

“I am afraid not. The staff has been very light lately, so we are stretched pretty thin.”

Snowhawk sighed. “Thank you in any case. I might see if I can find a way into the guard shack. The delphin had to have gotten on one of the cameras.”

Renner canted his head to the side. “But the door is locked.”

“I can think of a few ways in that don’t involve keys,” she shrugged. “Though a couple wouldn’t make Adian too happy.”

She gave him a small bow, then turned and began to walk away. “Just a moment,” the slender lupino called out.

Snowhawk stopped and turned back to him. “Yes?”

He felt around in his pockets for a moment, then produced a few lockpicking tools. “I will give you a hand. Better than breaking down the door or putting a hole in the wall or whatever you were thinking of doing.”

Snowhawk smiled. “I appreciate it.”

*********

Adian peeled his eyes apart, then slowly sat up to look around. He found himself in a darkened room, decorated in dark, rich fabrics, woods, and colors. Across the room, a pair of glowing gold eyes opened.

“You were out longer than I anticipated,” Kieran said, standing from his chair.

“What did you do?” Adian groggily replied. He didn’t hurt, far from it, even the wound on his side felt healed. But he still felt… “off.”

“Do you really need to ask?” the piebald delphin returned, stopping at the edge of the bed.

Adian’s lips curled into a snarl. “No.”