Seconds later, the torches relit themselves, casting an even purple glow within the room. The figure was gone, and the drow lay unconscious on the floor. Ahead on the stone altar, three boxes had appeared.
Somehow they each knew which box was theirs, and the magic that filled the room now compelled them forward to open them. Without a word, almost as if in a trance, each stepped forward and opened their box.
Ruthrrien was suddenly back in the desert, and the fear she had felt before now increased tenfold. The dusty earth beneath her feet was stained with blood in every direction, and the moon hung in a dark red sky above her, a large bite taken out of it. The black spectral wolf rose from the ground and towered above her once more, grinning wickedly, fangs wet with blood.
“I will consume you,” it said in a deep, throaty voice that turned her blood cold, “everything you were, everything you are, and everything you will be.”
She started to shake uncontrollably, barely keeping hold of her axe. Somehow she managed to find her voice, which cracked some as if she hadn’t drank water for days. “I will fight against you,” she said weakly, “with all that I am.”
He sneered at her. “I smell your fear.” he said with sickly pleasure as its form began to expand like a shadow, swallowing the scene around her until she was surrounded by black, it’s face still hanging before her. He grinned all the more as she stumbled back and fell. “And I know exactly how to take you.”
“I. Will. Fight.” she managed to say, voice trembling. But at that moment a wind whipped up around her, the smell of blood filling her nostrils as dust swirled about her. Suddenly its face was nose to nose with her and massive clawed hands gripped her arms with searing pain, the spot where she had been bitten blazing white hot.
“I’m going to take you now,” it whispered with a growl, “and we will be one, and I will control you.” licking its lips hungrily.
With her last ounce of strength, she seemed to gain clarity. Something in her remembered her old self before her memories had been stripped away. Some instinct, some will, that she knew was as strong as the wolf before her. It was nothing more than vague sense, but it was enough.
As its jaws opened wider than anything natural, she screamed, “NO! I WILL CONTROL YOU!” just before it swallowed her whole as her world went black.
<Previous Next>
The Whitney Scott 