Rejected - The Enchantress

When we stop for gas, they decide to just pick up snacks so that we can finish our trip without any further delays, but I cannot bring myself to eat. The smell of the burning flesh from my dream is still ever present, a phantom scent that only I can smell. The last part of the trip is fairly quiet aside from a few random and brief conversations between Gregory and Syrus. Syrus remains in the seat beside me, likely out of fear that I will scare them all with another of my dreams, but sleep eludes me, not that I am bothered by that fact.

Crossing the border to Syrus’s pack lands shows me just how poorly Alpha Daniels had his territory patrolled as we pass by a group of nine men just entering and see several more groups during the drive to his pack house that sits almost twenty mile beyond the border. When we arrive, they focus on getting Gregory out and take him to his room while I remain in the car, lost in thoughts of a rust colored wolf being swallowed by flames.

“Hey, are you alright?” I blink away the unwanted images to see Syrus standing at my now open door. Did I seriously not hear him open my door?

“Um, yeah. I’m fine.” He clearly doesn’t believe me, but thankfully, he doesn’t push it.

“Come with me and I will show you to your room. I assure you that my people are more accepting than Alpha Daniels were. They also knew you would be coming.” I don’t bother asking how they knew, instead I focus on a single detail that seems more important at the present moment.

“You said you have a healer? Could I meet them?” His brow furrows, but he nods.

“I will have her come to your room.” I climb out and follow him through the doors and up two flights of stairs to the room he has assigned me on the third floor. I had always thought the top floor was the alpha’s private quarters, but it seems that Syrus runs things a little differently than the alphas I read about in my books. After almost half an hour in the room, there is a soft knock on my door and I open it to find myself standing face to face with an elderly woman who I know immediately is a witch.

“You must be Caitlin. My name is Lauren. Alpha Syrus said you wished to see me and he mentioned that you had been injured.” I step aside and let her enter the room, watching her every move very closely and noticing the black bag she is carrying.

“My injury I not a concern. I…I’ve been having these dreams for as long as I can remember. They feel so real and it is starting to freak me out a little. The dream was always the same, but a few days ago it all changed. It feels almost like I am seeing memories, but they are someone else’s memories. It makes me almost too afraid to even fall asleep because they seem to linger. Like on the way here, there was a smell in the dream, something awful and when I woke up, I could still smell it for several hours.” She listens to every word, nodding now and then as she digests the information.

“Well, let’s take it one step at a time. First, let me see your arm.” I hold out my bandaged arm and watch as she unwraps it and inspects the injury. The puncture marks are deep, it almost looks worse today than it did yesterday. She opens her bag and pulls out a small vial of some clear oily substance. She pours some over the open wounds and rewraps my arm.

“You will live. It is going to be sore for a while though. Now, about those dreams. Do you recognize anyone in them or the location they are taking place in?” I shake my head as I pull my arm to my chest.

“No. The woman has long, dark hair and her skin is almost like a statue that is cracked everywhere. In the first dream, the one I had the longest, she was fighting a woman with long white hair and bright blue eyes. The white haired woman was some kind of wolf, but something more. The woman with black hair, they called her a dark enchantress, she throws dark energy at the other woman, but a man jumps in front of her and is struck instead. The second is the same dark haired woman, but she is trying to save a man from a wolf. I never get a good look at the man until after he is dead, but he is covered in so much blood that I can’t make out his features.

“The one in the car on the way here was the worst. This time it was me, but I wasn’t really me. It was like I was stuck in someone else’s body with no control over what the body did or how it reacted. I found a village burning to the ground and I ran into a building where I found a little girl who had her throat torn out. A wolf showed up and the little girl’s blood got sucked into my skin and I released an energy that made the wolf burn to ash. I…I don’t understand what the hell is wrong with me.” When I finally meet Lauren’s gaze, I notice that her face has paled slightly, but before I can say anything more, she begins digging through her bag while speaking in a firm voice.

“I will give you something that you will need to wear. It will prevent you from dreaming until I have some time to consult with my books in my library. This seems very familiar, but I can’t figure out why.” She pulls out a necklace with a strange gemstone hanging from it.

“Wait, what seems familiar? My situation or what I am seeing?” I see her brief hesitation before she responds which makes my stomach turn.

“Both. Keep that on at night and I will do my best to be quick, but I do have many books to sift through.” I lower my head and give a slight nod.

“Yeah, okay. Thanks.” She gets up and quickly leaves the room, leaving me alone with the thick tension in the air.