Preface

The wind rushed over me and made the hairs on the back of my arm straighten. My whole body tingled.

“ Are you cold ? If you want I can give you my jacket,” I’d nearly forgotten that Zack was standing next to me. I moved slightly away, trying to be inconspicuous about it, before he could try and wrap his arms around me"to warm me, or what ever he intended when he leaned in. He didn’t seem to mind, rather, he looked confused by my shying away from him.

“ I’m not cold,” I said as an explanation, turning away. It was not true, of course. My arms were probably frozen, but I could imagine being shielded from the wind because it felt part of me. It would have felt wrong being in Zack’s jacket. Then I closed my eyes and inhaled, the scent of the hills filling me. I could clearly distinguish the pine trees, three miles north, in the crest of some other hills. I tried to focus, to listen right, to catch the scent right, though it wouldn’t work if I didn’t change shape. He was staring at my face, watching as I tried to concentrate.

“ Can you feel anything ?” I noticed his voice had dropped to a whisper, worrying on whether he was distracting me or something.

“ No,” I replied, opening my eyes, as I frowned. Then I turned towards him with an expression that showed clear frustration. I caught his sent and sighed. It was as I had thought. “ I can’t have anyone close when I’m doing this sort of thing,” I pinched my lips hard together, doing my best to look remorseful, but by now I was more annoyed than anything else.

“ You want me to leave ?” he didn’t seem to put off about it, and just shrugged when I stared into his eyes, turning away and starting his way down. I wanted to go after him and tell him to stay, but I knew it wouldn’t work and we had less than a day in front of us to find him, before things got worse. I turned back to the north, staring at the hills on the horizon, the forest, every detail. Then I closed my eyes again and focused, focused on sending out radar signals, pretty much like a bat does. The contact of those waves with the person I was looking for, would reflect them, sending me a reflection of what I sent out. That was my specialty, I was the one who tracked, Zack was the one who trapped. We were the most gifted of our little company, and we always ended up together. So we had known each other for quite a while. The others sometimes grumbled about it. Thought it wasn’t fair that they weren’t like us. I didn’t care. I wasn’t overly smug about by capacities. Sometimes it infuriated me, because things like this happened. Going out for weeks at a time, looking for only one person, wasting so much precious time and for party, having Zack. Zack wasn’t particularly disagreeable. Rather he was calm and set, and that sometimes relieved me from the anxiety I lived with. That broke my concentration and I hope he wasn’t going far. I still had to turn around and make sure he wasn’t far. He stared back at me from where he sat, unsmiling, on a tree-root down the hill. I bit my lip to keep from smiling. He was easily aggravated, however, when I always told him to go away. I turned my back to him and rubbed my arms, trying to be subtle about rubbing my naked arms and shoulders. Why, oh why had I not brought my jacket ? I pushed away the thought, and shoved the cold feeling to the back of my mind, reasoning that I liked the wind anyway and that I was wasting time. The waves I had sent still hadn’t come back, so I supposed that the boy was probably deeper in the forest. I was trying to think at the same time of how we could stop him, otherwise that by force. I hated to compel people into our service, moreover because they had to be “all pure of heart”. Our rules to find new fighters. Rules, of course, created centuries ago. And as usual, Fox would never, ever let us let one, just one potential fighter get away. And as usual, Zack and I were sent to track and trap. I sighed, waiting for the signals to come back. It was irritating. I whistled as I waited and I heard Zack shift on his root, but he didn’t try to come up. He knew I would motion to him once I was done. I squinted at the hill where the forest swayed and stopped my whistling immediately. I heard Zack become still and I ignored that. Something was dragging me down the other side of the hill, pulling my feet along, nearly forcing me to run. I controlled myself and came to a stop, staring up ahead. There was something wrong. Just as usual, when the intuition of something wrong was at hand, I fell on all fours, and began grow fur on my arms and legs. I started to change. My jaw lengthened slightly and my ear shifted higher near the top of my head. My eyes became wider and my nose flattened as whiskers grew on the sides. My teeth grew and sharpened quickly, slightly uncomfortable and then was less so when my jaw was fully set. I looked down at my hands and saw that they were quite big paws. Strength and excitement rolled through me, and I tried to rule my emotions. I succeeded as Zack appeared at the top of the hill. He didn’t look very surprised to see me changed, though I knew he wondered why.

“ What’s the trouble ?”

Forest doesn’t…smell nice. We’ll travel much quicker in this form.

“ Interesting choice,” he grinned, looking over me and then I got a really nasty thought about what he might do, and so I bared my teeth and growled at him. He raised his hands as in “no harm” and then threw his head back to laugh. I hissed and spat. As soon as he saw what I was going to do, he stopped, but it was too late, and there was alarm in his eyes. I was careful, as I extended my body into a leap at him, not to extend my claws. His breath was knocked out at the impact and when I looked into his eyes, he seemed quite sorry. A last warning growl escaped my lips and I stepped off.

Hurry. I said urgently as a wave of wind drifted over me. I was sure by now that the waves had gone through the whole forest. I watched as he morphed into a mountain lion, something I didn’t do quite often since we mostly morphed under the most critical situation. It was weird, weirder than feeling my own body shift. I was still gaping at him when he was done. He laughed in his head, and flashed a sharp grin.

I thought we were in a hurry.

Try and keep up. I challenged, the muscles in my body rippling and I sprang forward with so much force, that I thought I would trip over myself. But one of the world’s big cat can’t be so easily outbalanced. It was erroneous to think about having fun while something was happening in the forest that couldn’t be good. I tried to survey myself and my too wild mind, trying to rein the cat side in. Zack, out of courtesy, let me in front. Anyway he would have to follow. We were in the forest not long after. It was easy, but I was tiring and the forest was tightly packed so we slowed down. I could hear the birds becoming quiet as we passed and the branches creaking in the breeze. My eyes adjusted rapidly to the dark. We didn’t make any noise, but our presence made the pine woods restless. We were careful not to walk on any twigs that might snap and scare our “prey”.

So, what is really the matter ?

I sent out the signals, like I always do. He wasn’t much ahead of us. He had parked the car on the side of the road, remember ? He doesn’t walk real fast, and we were taking too much our time, I added, and he felt my accusation directed at him but didn’t say anything and waited for me to continue. Well, we were climbing the hill when he was already in the forest, and when I stopped to send out the signals to know where he’d gone, I couldn’t.

That’s when you told me to go back downhill. I could almost hear his eyes rolling. Zack didn’t believe that he was a trouble to let the waves go"he thought, or mostly teased that it was his presence, but he really was a trouble. He had the effect of a magnet, deflecting everything, and so my waves would have gone somewhere else. Still, I ignored his reaction.

Yes. And only then could I send out the waves. I noticed it was more agreeable to be coated with fur, at least, I wasn’t cold and wouldn’t be for a while. I came to a halt and sniffed the air. Too much trees, I thought. I turned my head around to see Zack sniffing the ground. He was useless, though, when it came to tracking, and I knew that on most of our hunts, he was way more bored than I was. Before he lifted his cutting gaze to meet mine, I turned my head swiftly away.

Well, I continued, wondering if my cat body looked as thoughtful as I was. The waves still haven’t come back.

Then he can’t be in the forest.

Zack, where do you think he would have gone, there’s only the cover of trees here and that’s the forest. We would have seen him.

You know, I was very surprised that you were so caught up in this hunt. Don’t you think it’s a little weird that a sixteen years old goes on a hiking trip on his own, that he has a huge car to drive. Can you even imagine that his parents would let him drive that ?

His parents ? I thought he was an orphan. My cat thoughts were getting muddled up and my human self was getting dizzy within my cat form.

Even better, he said scornfully. I whipped my head to look at him, something he had been doing all the while"staring at me. Something came in place. Then a helpless whine escaped my throat.

And I could already hear the helicopter engine above the tree.

Author's Note

I'm working on the first chapter and it's going to be pretty long...I'll put it up soon