The Message in the Rock
His life had been nothing but suffering for a long time, but there was something deep and humiliating about what he was experiencing right now. His sensitive wolf hearing had caught the conversation between the two companions he hadn’t asked for. They were talking in their usually inane fashion about sex.
Sex. It was so easy for them to discard it as a mere biological function, a pastime humans participated in with the only worry being the mild attachment that might develop from spending time with others like themselves.
It wasn’t the same for wolfshifters. Definitely not the same for an alpha.
For a wolf, it was mating, not sex.
It was marking, not something as inconsequential as fleeting emotions and physical pleasure.
And they had gone at it like mindless beasts, while Theodore struggled to ignore them. Still, the scent of the two humans, combined with their soft words and giggles, painted a vivid picture for him.
Darkness beckoned again, pulling a crimson-red carpet over Theodore’s eyes. His wolf growled, desperate to take his master through his door and straight through theirs.
No, he wouldn’t be that sort of beast. He would control his instincts and his wolf if he needed to. The alpha of Whiteflame would not mate with a human guardian, or a city clairvoyant, or both.
This suffering would soon be over. He’d decipher the message in the rock with the help of the two humans, and then he would put the whole world between him and them.
His knocking on their door and order to keep it down had worked. Silence ensued, and he could tell that the guardian and the clairvoyant were both fast asleep.
Great. Now he couldn’t rest anymore; his mind was plagued by images of the two indulging in tasting each other. His lower body pulsed, thrumming with unresolved release. Normally, if the need to copulate became too strong, he’d find a willing body to accommodate his needs. With the passage of years, such needs had been sublimated into his desire for revenge.
Ever since these two humans had appeared in his life, everything had gone wrong. Right now, Theodore Pembroke, the alpha of Whiteflame, had been reduced to nothing but a hormonal mess as if he were nothing but a human teenager.
His right hand slipped toward his crotch. He pulled it back, setting his jaw hard. Succumbing to such base desires didn’t do him honor. Or his wolf, although the beast wished for more and whined like a neglected puppy.
Theodore pushed it all away. He rolled onto his stomach and closed his eyes. This position allowed him, at least, to keep his manhood in check. Pressing down against the mattress helped and, while his mind was assaulted by his usual dark thoughts, he drifted into sleep.
***
“Do you think he heard us while we were doing that naughty thing?” Jack asked in a soft, troubled voice.
Vince shrugged. “He’s not like you and me. He must have enhanced hearing and--”
“And he can hear you two gossiping from a mile away,” Theo interrupted him, sounding rightfully pissed.
Jack swallowed hard. Ever since he’d tasted Vee’s beautiful cock, he had become a mess. It had only been hours since then, but it didn’t matter.
Jack was hard. And that was after releasing in his baggy jeans while tasting Vince’s delicious cum.
He was nuts. Officially, undoubtedly nuts. He hadn’t even thought about sex before. Now, he wanted to have as much man meat in his mouth as possible, and his little friend wouldn’t stop getting stiff.
“You know,” he murmured, clasping his crotch for a short surreptitious moment, “if you were really human, you’d be dead from how stiff you are.”
“Who are you talking to?” Theodore, who walked in front, guiding them to the mysterious rock that supposedly contained all the mysteries in the universe, exploded.
Jack stood straight and offered a military salute. “No one, sir,” he boomed.
By his side, Vee, the naughty ass, was snickering.
“It is here,” Theo said, not without throwing Jack one last murderous look.
Well, damn. Even that made him feel hot. Maybe if he found a bush to hide behind while Theo and Vee were busy reading those runes or whatever they were, he’d get the time to rub one out.
Did guys actually do that? The rubbing part?
“Vee,” he caught the guardian’s hand, “how do you jerk off?”
“Jack, as much as I’d like to indulge you in everything you need to know about sex, now’s not the time. Theodore looks pretty pissed. I can’t blame him, since he definitely heard us. Let’s not push him, okay?”
Jack still had a couple of things to argue about, but Vince took his hand and began pulling him along.
“Ah, so this is where it all happened?”
In the light of day, the beautiful glade looked like it had little to do with the dramatic events of the night before. There were no traces of the fight that had led to Theo and Vee being kidnapped by that evil witch.
Jack preferred to look on the bright side. There were no traces whatsoever of that evil witch, either.
“Okay, then let’s get to work,” he said, clapping his hands together.
He had no idea where to start, but getting the evil eye from Theo didn’t help him at all with his natural nervousness.
The huge boulder was right there.
“So, Vee,” Jack started, “I have one question. When you were strapped to that thing, almost as good as naked, were you thinking that it looked and felt a lot like a BDSM thing and stuff?”
A cold glance from Theodore convinced him that it would be better for everyone involved if he kept his mouth shut.
***
Vince stopped before the huge boulder and studied the smooth surface in disbelief. There was not a mark on it whatsoever. Whatever message had been there before, was gone.
“This can’t be,” he thought out loud. “They were here, those runes. I didn’t just imagine them. I felt them in my bones.” He ran one hand over the flat face of the rock. Nothing. No spark, no effect. It didn’t happen like in movies or books, where the hero only had to approach a mystery item and have it yield to their wish and command.
Jack was gripping him by one arm, most likely wary of Theodore and his unfriendly glares. He peeked at the rock, too, and blinked a few times.
“Are you sure this is the one?” he asked. “Maybe it was a different glade and a different rock. I mean, it was dark, and we were all a little confused and stuff. Because we had to beat that evil witch and everything. Especially I--”
“Will you stop already?” Theodore growled. “It’s not a different glade, or a different rock, or anything!”
“Ugh, okay, just don’t bite my head off,” Jack murmured, pulling back and hiding more behind Vince.
“It is the same,” Vince confirmed grimly. “Now, we need to figure out what to do to make it speak to us.”
Jack appeared to have already forgotten why he felt the need for protection and was eagerly taking center stage again.
“How about we just talk to it? I mean, it’s a start.”
“It’s stupid,” Theodore shut the clairvoyant down in only a few words.
“If it’s stupid and it works, it’s not stupid,” Jack argued. “Do you have any other bright ideas? Yep, I didn’t think so. Let’s just try it. Hey, rock, do you have a message for us and stuff? We’d very much like to establish if you could take us to this place where Theo’s pack still lives--”
“My pack is dead,” Theodore said in a somber tone. “I watched them die, all of them, until the last one.”
“That’s trauma, right there,” Jack said, biting his bottom lip. “And it practically absolves you of all the bad things you’ve ever done—wait, no, no, it doesn’t. Come on, Theo, you know that you’re here for a reason. Let me just lay the cards out, and we’ll see what happens.”
Without adding more – although Vince would bet that the clairvoyant still had many more things to say – Jack proceeded to take out his cards.
There was hardly any ceremony in how he proceeded, but Vince was genuinely interested to see if Jack’s actions would trigger a response from the mysterious rock or not. Guided by fate or instinct, the clairvoyant hadn’t been off the mark much since the start of their adventure.
Theodore, however, seemed to be of a different mind. He grabbed Jack by one shoulder hard to push him away before Vince had time to react.
“Stop with all this nonsense,” Theodore boomed. “This isn’t a game. It is--”
Vince’s eyes fell on the rock. Between Jack’s cards, he noticed glints of gold. “Hey, look,” he said loudly, making the two confrontational companions stop.
Theodore swiped Jack’s cards off the rock with one hand.
“Rude,” Jack commented under his breath and began picking his things up from the grass where they landed.
***
Theodore placed both hands on the rock and stared down at the runes that had reappeared as soon as the clairvoyant laid down his cards. By the expression on his face, they still looked like nothing he’d ever seen.
“Guardian,” he ordered, “come here. You need to help me understand the message.”
“Vee, you don’t need to do anything he says,” the clairvoyant piped up. “Tell Theo to stop being such a huge jerk. Being polite never hurt anybody.”
“Are you sure?” Theodore snapped his head in Jack’s direction. “Try acting cute and polite, and I might still strangle you on the spot.”
“Weirdo,” Jack muttered under his breath. “Stop choking people. It’s not nice.”
Vince sighed. These two were bent on shaving years off his life by acting like two porcupines. He decided to stop them from strangling each other by acting quickly. He walked over and stared at the glowing runes, as well.
The night before, he had understood they were trying to communicate something to him. He had known that the message was important. Only he hadn’t gotten a chance to understand it fully.
“What do they say to you?” Theodore asked impatiently.
Vince shook his head. “Unfortunately, they appear only as symbols to me. Symbols I do not understand.”
Theodore placed a heavy hand on his shoulder. “I don’t care. You will focus, and you will understand them.”
The simple contact burned his skin through the shirt, making his shoulder jolt. Vince gave Theodore a wild look. Something was going on all right. Theodore pulled his hand off him, and the sensation stopped.
“Let me try,” Jack demanded, jumping up and down right behind them. “After all, I’m the guy who can see things that are not here, such as the future.”
Theodore moved his eyes from Vince to Jack. His handsome face was entirely frowning, but it looked like the alpha of Whiteflame was made of more than the wish for revenge, piss, and vinegar. He took a step to the side, gesturing for Jack to approach.
The clairvoyant looked like he knew how to act strong, because he set his chin high and walked forward. After giving Theodore and Vince both a pointed look, he stared down.
“Okay, and these strange symbols say—well, I have no idea.”
A grunt of annoyance from Theodore followed promptly, as expected.
“Just as I thought. Move aside.”
Jack yelped when Theodore grabbed his shoulder. “Hey, fucker, that hurts!”
Theodore pulled his hand away in shocked disbelief. “Don’t be such a wuss. I barely touched you.”
“You think?” Jack struggled out of his t-shirt, revealing milky unblemished skin that made Vince hesitate between wanting to stare more and looking away. He pushed his shoulder forward, to show the red blossoming all over it.
Jack’s nipples were small and rosy, the kind that begged to be touched, licked, and pinched until they grew at least a smidge. Vince could see himself wanting to lick Jack from his chest down to his belly button and tease him to no end.
Apparently, he wasn’t the only one having such thoughts. His hair stood on end as he saw Theodore slowly transforming.
“Ah,” Jack exclaimed and threw his deck of cards in the white wolf’s face.
The clairvoyant barely had time to turn before Theodore pounced on him.
Vince acted quickly, throwing himself onto Theodore’s back and struggling to pull him away.
He wrapped one arm around the wolf’s large neck and pulled toward himself as hard as he could.
Thankfully, that action alone seemed to have snapped Theodore out of his sudden fugue. He reverted to his human shape and pushed himself up, shaking Vince off at the same time.
“The two of you,” he ordered, “come stand in front of the rock.”
***
How could he have lost control of his wolf so easily? Theodore’s arms trembled with the effort it took him to keep the beast at bay. All it took was to see that naked torso, and his wolf demanded that he lick that human all over.
It wasn’t natural. It had to be a curse. He had to get to the bottom of the message trapped in the rock before it was too late and he turned into a ravenous beast, bent on devouring that skinny field mouse.
At least, the clairvoyant had put his t-shirt back on. Theodore avoided looking at him, focusing on the flat surface of the boulder, while the two humans obeyed his order for a change.
The runes remained the same, even as they all continued to stare at the mysterious symbols.
This made no sense. The message was there, waiting to be deciphered. For the sake of knowing what had happened to his pack, Theodore had agreed to involve these two humans in his plans temporarily. The more time the guardian and the clairvoyant spent in his presence, the more at risk they were starting to be.
“I believe it’s in the touch,” Vince said. He turned his head to look at Theodore. “When you touched me and Jack, we felt the heat.”
“Heat? It was burning my frigging skin,” Jack protested. “Do you mean to say that we should allow ourselves to be branded like cattle so Theo can read what’s written there? Man, I really don’t think I’m okay with that,” he complained.
“I’m not saying that we should end up scarred,” Vince argued. “But the moment we touch, something happens. That’s the only clue we have right now.”
Theodore knew that the human guardian made sense. He nodded briskly and raised his hands.
“Wait, wait,” Jack shouted, “let me prepare for it. It really hurts, you know?”
“Stop being a crybaby,” Theodore hissed. “I will lick your wounds after.” As soon as the words left his mouth, he understood how they must sound in the others’ ears. Shame burned brightly in the middle of his chest but he said nothing more.
“Okay,” Jack agreed with a long sigh. “Go ahead. Burn me to ashes, why don’t you?”
That was as good an invitation as he was likely to get. He placed his hands slowly on the two humans’ shoulders. It wasn’t in his interest to hurt them. But the guardian was right to assume that his touch caused something to happen.
Jack whimpered, and even Vince, who was strong, seemed to waver. For Theodore, it only felt warm.
The runes glowed brighter.
“Guardian, can you read them?” Theodore asked through his clenched teeth. “I do not wish to harm you. Either of you.”
“This is really bad,” Jack moaned.
Theodore felt his wolf ready to pounce again. This time, it wasn’t with any unfathomable intent, but with the goal of protecting the suffering human.
It could only be a curse.
Vince acted first, again. “Jack, take my hand. We must touch, too.”
“Okay,” Jack whimpered, “here it is.”
Theodore sensed his entire body shaking. He wouldn’t be able to control his wolf much longer. His human suffered. He couldn’t allow that to happen.
His human?
“I see it!” Vince exclaimed. “I see the message!”
“What does it say?” Jack asked urgently. “Vince, please hurry!”
Theodore leaned forward. His muscles were stretched to their limit. But now he knew that he couldn’t sever the connection.
“What does it say?” he echoed the clairvoyant’s words.
Vince began reciting. It was a message written in rhyme, unveiling what Theodore hadn’t thought possible.
Beyond the silver veil, the moon so often weeps,
She mourns a hidden realm, so clouded as it sleeps.
You’ll hear the echoes of the lost and brave,
You’ll hear their voices from beyond the grave.
Only the wolf whose heart runs true and free
May walk the path where stands the wisdom tree.
There waits the pack, forgotten yet alive,
In twilight’s glow, their unbroken souls revive.
“Is that all?” Theodore asked, sweat dripping down his forehead and his back. “Where is this place?” he howled in his wolf’s voice.
“I can sense it,” Vince said. He turned his head to stare Theodore in the eye. “But you will have to take us along. You will never find it without us.”
TBC
Author's note: Well, I hope that was a clue!
@Derek - Theo will keep telling himself he doesn't feel a thing... The mystery, on the other hand, will deepen...
@Mark Mortland - Well, I really hope that the trio will keep you entertained... Vince is your typical guardian, lol. I know that Jack's aroace past is a disadvantage for him, but he's the kind of guy who's willing to learn...
@DavidB - you can bet Jack was very pleased :D
@FCW Reading - thanks a lot, and it will quite the story!
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