I lay flat on my back, breathing hard as though I had been running. My body was stiff like stone, and my mind was dazed and slow.
I had awoken from a vivid dream with my hands pressed over my face, full of strange, colorful shapes—spider of Myrtle’s style, Ink-goblins and graceful new-half—swirled dizzily around the inside of my head. They were so vivid. The horrible and heavenly, all mixed together into a bizarre drama, the one melt into my life, where my feet couldn’t move fast enough…and there were plenty of masks, empty-eyes that sucked my soul with all ghastly hallucination. The dream was too ridiculous—I could even remember the eerie identity corresponding to each familiar faces. But the most ridiculous, strongest part of the dream was not the dramatic. It was the glaring golden light that was the most clearly.
Something fluffy touched my forehead with the softest pressure.
My hand flew up, trying to wipe it away. But the violent action only aroused a spasm of pain, which convulsed me into an agony ball. Something on my shoulder was burning beneath my tracing fingers as though someone had just pressed a white-hot wire to my skin.
“Eugh—” I gasped, wrenching back my eyelids.
Well, clearly, I had gone too far; it must have been a mistake to let my dream get so out of hand. Er…perhaps ‘let’ was the wrong word. I had forced it to get out of hand—pretty much staring at the new hallucination—and now my eyes snapped close.
It took less than half a second for me to realize that, as long as I was truly insane now, I might as well enjoy the delusion while it looked not so scary.
I opened my eyes again—and an enormous white wolf, the largest one that I had ever seen in my life, was still there, his face just inches away from mine.
So shock to be critical and so less time to be sensible about Mo’s absence…
I had only ever seen one thing as large as this wolf in my life, and that was the yak in Phoenix House; I doubted whether there was any normal thing happening today. Yet somehow maybe simply because I’d realized what I thought as a dream was that had actually happened and then continued in an even more unnatural way.
The large wolf seemed to feel my gaze, and he lowered down his head at me with familiar green eyes. I stared back at him, and there was a voice wandering in my head—“they’ve been living with your kind for a while”—it sounded a little mad while I was trying to believe what I might already informed, wondering whether he would be someone close to me.
The wolf’s muzzle suddenly fell open, pulling back over his teeth. It would have been a frightening expression, except that his tongue lolled out the side in a wolf grin.
I couldn’t help giggling. The pain oozed out of the shoulder again. “Ouch—”
The answering rumble deep in his chest sounded like a care.
I ran my fingers over the shoulder, forcing a flat smile. “It’s okay, I am just slightly hemorrhaged, give some time I will make a full recovery…” it was by then I’d realized the priority of the importance. My head snapped around and the dim picture of a darkened garden came to my sight…my hands shoot to cover my shaking lips. “Where…it… is?” But more questions churning inside were unbearable. It was such an urgent to get a clue about what happened to Mo and drunk Camel? How come I was separated with them? Somehow the last words I heard before fell apart sent me a very upset spasm.
A low whimper pulled the threads of my concentration back. I looked up, into his eyes. Clearly, this time, I found they were pale, emerald with a touch of shining watery hazel, so intelligently that I’d almost forgotten I was staring at a wolf.
The breezed went by, gathering up its silver hair, arousing a nostalgic smell to my nostrils.
I sniffed, pulling myself together. “Hum—do you…know…where I am?”
The wolf cocked his head to one side, staring.
It reminded me of Shawl, who was used to cock his head when he was wrapped in his thoughts. But I was not quite sure. After all, imaging he might be the legend one was one thing, but witnessing him strip his bare and leave him as a normal boy was another.
“Oh, I forgot you don’t speak Chinese.” I shook my head, feeling a little stupid to talk with a wolf. Then I straightened myself to the feet in a poor balance, rubbing the grass crumbs off my robe. “It’s glad to meet you, buddy. But I need to leave…”
The wolf took one step forward. His head just knocked into my forehead.
“Hey!” I jigged up.
The wolf’s grin widened over his sharp teeth.
Wondering, I reached my hand out, my fingers trembling slightly, and touched the snowy fur on the side of his face. “Do…I know you?” I muttered my thoughts.
The green eyes closed, and the wolf leaned his huge head into my hand. A thrumming hum resonated in his throat.
The fur was both soft and rough, and warm against my skin. I ran my fingers through it curiously, learning the texture, stroking his neck where the color deepened. “S-Shawl?” I tested, not realizing how close I’d gotten. Without a warning, the wolf suddenly licked my face from chin to hairline.
“EW—Gross, Shawl?” I complained, jumping back and smacking at him, just as I would have if he were Shawl. The wolf dodged out of the way, but the bark that came through his teeth was obviously angry.
I wiped my face on the sleeve of my robe, however not missing the sudden darkened glare from him. “Shawl?”
The wolf jerked his head up. The hiss rumbling in his chest was threatening.
I yanked back to keep a safe distance. “Well—my head must be knocked hard to mix you up. But I think you have his eyes!”
The hum that sounded like a snort breathed into my face. I coughed, took one step back again. “Okay, okay, yours are better—” I hesitated. What an arrogant wolf! “Er…wait—you understand what I said?” rolling eyes at his disdainful look, I scratched my hair and repeated. “You have his eyes!”
This time the unpleasant tone in his bark was 100%.
“Holly crap—you know what I said!” I cried, jumped up and braced his head into my arms. It was half of second for me to realize what I was doing and release him with some awkward cough. “Wow, sorry, I, I just a little over excited…Oh, let’s cut the craps. I need you do me a favor…Mo, he’s my…friend, sort of, might be in danger. There is something evil looking for us. Mo calls it as cold… thing or silence, whatever, it is just clutching the wheel of us, see, it bit my shoulder, and Mo took me to Old Camel for refugee. But something gets the wrong way, though I don’t know how. I mean I was separated with them, and I am afraid that thing will find Mo’s trouble.” I spluttered, even not caring whether comprehension sank into the mind of the wolf, whose eyes were abruptly cold at the word ‘silence’. “So I need your help…because you look as strong as it is—” while I was still wondering how to be more persuasive, the wolf had suddenly straightened up and disappeared, bolting like wind with powerful bounds, snarling and snapping, so loudly that my hands jerked up to press my ears. The awful tumult echoed in the forest for a long while.
The corner of my lips twisted at this change. Guess I was a sucker for a dramatic gesture. I sighed, withdrew my stare and then I found what had been ignored in the amaranthine sky—there were two moons, dangling in the air, both burning like twine flaming balls.
The numbness locked me in an attitude that looked as though I was on the brink of cliff, despite I was too tired to be shocked. Everything was going to be crazy, and I was close to that. Psycho yak, block of alien neighbors, dragon new-half and wolf…Was it able to run more wildly? Speaking of the wolf, I felt fury filling inside. Without wolf’s guidance, I was trapped. But on the other side of the meantime, Mo might be the one to die on my behalf. Somehow, I had a feeling if I didn’t make it back, I was afraid he won’t the last. There was more than just my life at stake. At the thought of that, I felt as though being slapped awake. Each drop of blood in my vein started to swarm. I jerked to my weak feet, running toward the direction the wolf left.