Wolfen

The black wolf seemed to smirk as she
looked down on her writhing victim. All human eyes were fixed to her murderous figure as she suddenly tore the throat from the human beneath her. Blood sprayed over the dirt at her paws and her head lifted in an earsplitting howl that shook the very souls of all who could hear it.

I jump awake, my breathing unregulated and fast. That dream...there is nothing new about it-I have it often, yet it still startles me.
I try to calm my breathing as I think over the dreams content for what must be the 100th time this month. I know that the black wolf I dream about is me. I am a Wolfen. We are people whom can transform at will into a wolf they had lived as in a past life. As hard as this is to believe, it is true. Barely half a year ago I discovered that I and my two best friends, Malika and Beryl were all Wolfens. It’s something that was hard to grow used to, and yet somehow we have.

The moonlight shines in on me, and I am instantly drawn to it. I've always felt like I had a connection to the moonlight, even before I learnt about my wolf. I still find it faintly unreal, being able to turn into one just like that, even though it has been one of my wishes when I was younger. I am still confused as to why I can do this, and why my best friends can too.
I find an urge coming over me, and I instantly recognize it as the wolf's demand to be released. Sometimes I can't control it.
I try to focus on suppressing the urge-and finding I can't. I step down from my bed and quietly head to go downstairs and outside. I can't see any harm in having a quick howl at the moon.

I walk slowly onto the dew ridden grass and stand, listening to the spring breeze through the leaves. I lift my gaze to the full moon. A howl leaves my throat, becoming more and more wolven as I morph into my hidden self. Within seconds, I am a black wolf in its entire splendor.
I blink my wolven eyes to adjust to the sudden sharpness and sniff to grasp the increased sense of smell. I glance around the familiar surroundings of my back yard, noticing scents I never picked up as a human. It is amazing how little humans can really sense.
The human side of me is forgotten as I howl emotionally at the moon, the sound seemingly natural to me. I do not expect an answer-there is only one other wolf living in my area, and that is Malika.
We are here for a reason...but for what I do not know. My confusion intensifies.

I wake as warm sunlight touches my skin. I stir, feeling a wolf’s tail shift and swish behind me. I open my eyes, finding my vision to still be incredibly sharp and my head to be resting on two black wolf paws. I jump up in alarm-I’m obviously still in wolf form. Did I forget to return to my room and change back? I must have been asleep out here all night…

I quickly jump up on my hind legs, releasing a long howl, slowly returning to human form. My howl becomes a human’s interpretation and I am once again the fourteen year old I am commonly known as. I hastily rush back into the house, locking the door behind me and creeping quietly back to my room. Luckily, no one is awake and my parents are still asleep. I sigh with relief as I shift back under my bedcover and settle down for a few more hours of sleep-it is early in the morning and I don’t really want to stay up and wait for Mom and Dad to get up.

However, I find sleeping to be hard, especially when early sunlight is filtering into my room. And my mind is far too busy to rest. I’m always trying to solve the reason why me and my friends were created to be Wolfens and to have those wolves inside of us. It’s hard to understand. It’s also a challenge to stop my family from figuring out what I am. I act unusually dog-like from time to time, and most dogs growl at me, or roll on their backs in submission. I think they can see what is really hiding beneath my human self. Dogs and wolves are closely related animals, right? Should I ever growl at a dog, or get on all fours, they either bark even more furiously at me or they come up to me, heads lowered in respect and lie down in front of me. My family and family friends don’t seem to find this particularly odd-after all, most dogs lie down in front of their owners when they are being scolded. But what bothers my parents most is my time to time howling.

Indeed, a human’s howl sounds nothing like a wolf’s howl. But Wolfens have uncannily similar howls, barks and growls to those of dogs and wolves. I tend to go outside and howl no matter what time of day. And when I do, dogs all around the neighborhood start howling in response. I’m sure I heard a wolf howl back a few times (the two canines have different howls.) It surprises my mom and dad, if not frightens them a little bit. Sometimes they find it amusing how well I can howl, and persuade me to show it off to others. They don’t get the fact that their daughter is actually a wolf on the inside and that is the reason I can imitate canine noises so well. But I suppose if they found out, it would only scare them even more. And, I’m quite sure I should keep it to myself anyway. My friends aren’t scared of being Wolfen-they consider it a blessing that they can transform into a wolf at will. I suppose it is in some ways. And at least they don’t misuse the gift, by killing people they don’t like in wolf form and using it as a threat. That has got to be against the rules, if there are any that is.

The black wolf’s eyes shifted to see an opposing canine-a large grey wolf with crimson eyes stared back at her, growling viciously. An echoing growl erupted from the ebony furred wolf as she leapt for the opponent. The rivaling creature sprung for her throat, catching the flesh between its jaws and eliciting a snarl of both anger and pain from its enemy.

I am shaken out of my reverie in shock for the second time. My heart is beating wildly again and images from the dream flash through my head. I haven’t ever had that dream before-that one was even scarier than the other one…but the same black wolf was in it-my wolf.

But that wasn’t the only one I recognize. The other wolf is my boyfriends-Zayd’s wolf is grey with unusual ruby colored eyes. Oh…I didn’t mention him earlier did I? Zayd is my boyfriend and he is also, by some miracle, a Wolfen. It seems all of us were drawn together by either chance, destiny or just some sort of mystery reason.
Yet…why on earth did I dream about attacking Zayd? I would ever use my wolf form to hurt him and I know he wouldn’t do that to me either. Well…we have argued once or twice but what couple doesn’t? He never used his Wolfen abilities to try and hurt me when we did. So why would I dream about it? Is it supposed to be some view of the future?

No…it can’t be…can it?

“Rana! Get up-it’s 1’o clock in the afternoon!” My mom. Is it really that late? I yawn and step down from bed and head downstairs. I can’t be bothered to change out of my pajamas-its Saturday after all.
“It’s about time-were you up late on your laptop again?” Mom asks as I walk wearily into the kitchen. I rub my eyes to get rid of sleep and shake my head.
“No. I guess I just…didn’t sleep very good last night.” Well, I wasn’t going to tell her I was out howling at the moon all night, was I?

“Why not, honey? Did your father’s snoring keep you awake?” She questions. I snigger slightly-dads snoring usually does keep the whole house hold awake.
“I just keep having these weird nightmares, that’s all.”
“Nightmares? About what?” Mom asks, suddenly serious. Maybe I shouldn’t have said anything…
“Oh…um…I uh, can’t really remember.” I lie. She frowns at me.
“Are you sure? There’s nothing you’re hiding from me is there?” She demands. I sigh. There’s a lot of things I’m hiding from her-but how do you tell your mom that you can transform into a wolf without her thinking you’ve completely lost it?
“Mom, what the hell could I be hiding from you?” I mutter, walking into the living room and slumping onto the sofa. Mom quickly follows me.
“You aren’t being bullied or anything are you?” She insists. Honestly, how can saying you had a nightmare or two lead to this? Are all mothers like it?
“Don’t be ridiculous-I can take care of myself mom; any bullies come near me, I’ll soon take care of em.” Not hard to believe really. If anyone did bully me, I could quite easily kill them in seconds. And I wouldn’t even have to take blame for it-after all, how are they going to catch a wolf that’s actually a human with powers, and for that matter how will they catch me?
Not that I’ve ever had to do anything like that-no one actually bullies me. But it’s nice to know that I am definitely well protected.
“Are you sure?”
“YES!” I say irritably, unable to stop a little wolf growl escaping me at the end. My mom jumps and then starts laughing. My ‘noises’ have always had that effect on her.
“Calm down my little wolfy. Ok, I believe you.” She turns to walk out the room.
“It always amazes me how wolf-like you can be, you know.” Hm. She hasn’t seen anything yet-and hopefully she never will. I don’t intend on ever showing her my wolf side-it would only scare her if I did. Of course, sometimes it’s hard to keep something so big a secret, and it’s even harder to keep the Wolfen urges from taking over and transforming when unwanted. Most of the time me and the others have to change while at school, making sure to stay on the field and somewhere in the bushes. At least then we can’t be spotted.

Well…saying that, someone did spot us the once and they rushed off to tell their friends. We transformed back immediately and when we came out everyone was running towards the bushes and us, asking if we’d seen the wolves. We said we didn’t know what they were talking about and stalked off. It was the talk of the school for a few days-no one would go near the bushes for a while. And as for us, we made sure we weren’t discovered so easily. It could be incredibly dangerous if we were.
And I have to say it’s tempting to just lunge and attack whoever annoys you (and there are A LOT) especially when you know no one could catch or blame you. But that’s going against the rules, I’m sure. But it’s really hard to ignore that little urge that tells you to shut them up…possibly forever. I suppose that’s just the human instinct, right?