Loch Song (2017)

A/n: This is a rewrite of my story Loch Song. I loved the other one, but reading over it, I know I can do better. You know, the usual perfectionist author B.S. :)




Sunset on the Loch. The colors of the sky reenacting one last battle in the time that remained. They faced off with their own reflections, fighting and then making peace before dying slowly, ushering in the night.

It had rained earlier in the day, but now the sky was clear. The smell of it still lingered in the air and the dirt was damp underneath her. Valerie didn't notice the moisture seeping through the bottom of her jeans, though. Why would she care even if she had? This sunset was her whole world right now. Just as it should be.

Once it began to fade, Valerie dug her feet into the soft dirt and giggled. Her shoes lay by the tent where she'd tossed them on arrival. The warm tingle of energy spreading over every inch of visible skin made her close her eyes and angle her head so that her face received the full dose.

The moon was already breaking through the top of the mountains. Its light warmed her in spite of the cool breeze that blew in from the lake, carrying with it the scent of fresh water.

“Well, Miss Connor. Ya aren't still searchin' fer tha' grea' beast, are ya?”

Old Ed's voice didn't surprise her. She'd been expecting the old man at some point. Ed had always been very consistent in finding her every year that she came to the Loch from that very first vacation. Every time she thought she'd found a place where she wouldn't be bothered by anyone, there he was shambling along the shore for a quick chat.

He knows, she thought. It was paranoid more than anything. A thought someone with a deep, dark secret thinks.

But...the night she met him was the first night she heard the Song. It had drifted out from the lake itself as if the water was singing. Notes wrapped themselves around her arms and legs, pulling her into a truth she'd never known about herself. Valerie could hear the Song now, but it wasn't so strong that she couldn't resist. Not yet. Every bit the Moon climbed in the made it a little louder.

His eyes smiled at her even though his mouth wasn't so good at it anymore. “Lost?”

Valerie's smile turned into a grin and she shook her head. She stood and dusted off her jeans. “Not anymore.”

Ed laughed and it was a sound straight from his throat, full and alive and strong. It always made her wish that she'd had someone in her life like this man when she was growing up. An uncle, maybe. Maybe a father. Valerie would have traded her mother for an intelligent, strong, kind man like Ed in half a heartbeat.

“Five years, I hope no'. Abou' time ya find a home.”

With the moon rising higher, the tingle evolved into a gentle burn over her face and neck. Valerie stared out over the lake with its alternate moon shimmering above the mirrored mountains. “Maybe I will, Ed.”

“Ya be careful ou' here. Ne'er know what'll happen.” Ed gave her back a gentle pat and there it was again. The feeling that he knew everything that went on out here. His hand had landed exactly where the mark was under her clothes. When she made eye contact with him, his eyes jerked to the lake. Valerie knew it was the most confirmation she would get.

Even though he apparently knew more than she'd ever thought, Valerie still waited until she was completely alone on the bank. Her shirt came over her head and went flying at the scrawny tent. The moonlight burned over everything she revealed. The scar on her back burned even hotter than the rest and she knew it wouldn't be long.

Valerie quickly shed the rest of her clothes and grabbed a heavy bag of supplies. She heaved the bag down and into the water as the change began to itch over her back. With the help of the water, the bag came a little farther into the lake before she abandoned it to dive into the cool water. Submerged, the change flowed smooth and fast. It took over, changing her into something more at home here.

It barely even hurt anymore.

Valerie curved back to the surface and hooked one strap of the once too large sack around her elongated neck. It came along easily behind her. No strain at all. As Valerie glided through the cold water, the old fear came back.

Being human, the water stretching out as far as her blurred vision could make out.

Sharks and other monsters suddenly appearing without warning before fading away. Her imagination taking full control with nothing else to see but darkness.

Gasping when it became too much. Drinking in the water around her. Searching for escape. Searching for air.

It was gone as fast as it started. She was safe in this lake, her size rivaling anything other than her own kind. The Song drifted through the water around her. One long neck after another left the water that night. One second Valerie was staring at things that obviously shouldn't exist anymore and the next they were people. People who knew about the Song.

Then came the blow that knocked her out.

Now, she followed that tune like a beacon through the water to the opening. There was another guarding it as she neared. He bowed his head to her. The entrance to the caverns was larger than her because she was on the small end of their sizes. Valerie swam through a long tunnel that opened into the nearest of the massive caves.

Her head broke through the surface and she gulped in the much needed air. Having lungs instead of gills was a pain, but she would survive. Valerie added her voice to the Song bouncing off the walls. A man and a woman greeted her at the bank.

The man took the strap and dragged the bag away as her body changed again. The air underground was freezing cold and she gratefully accepted the long blanket the woman wrapped around her.

“Back again, are ya?”

Valerie couldn't help smiling at the sound of Sean's voice. He was a Shoche male about her age. In Shochen fashion, he pulled her into a tight hug when he was close enough. They were always touching and hugging. Valerie was naked beneath the blanket, but she was still more comfortable here than anywhere. Sometimes it shocked her how quickly she'd adapted to all of this.

Valerie laughed into the embrace. “I probably wouldn't have been back if you'd just let me go that first time. But you just had to involve me.”

“Ya were hearin' the Song before he hit ya and ya know it.” An old man with a thick gray beard stepped up to them and Valerie hugged him as well. “Unfortunate that ya were not born with the rest o' the clan.”

Valerie patted his arms when they parted. “You have no idea how much I wish I had been, King Ronan. Now that I know the joys of the Loch.”

“Spoken like a true Shochen.” The king smiled and bared his worn down teeth. He looked at Sean and leaned in close to Valerie. “Ya know, my son has less and less time to look for a mate.”

Sean's face turned several shades before settling on a red bright as his hair. Valerie would have laughed, but her own face went hot.

“Da,” he said, pleading even thought it wouldn't do any good and they all knew it.

“Nonsense, my end is gettin' closer and I would like to know my people are being cared for by both incarnations of the Gods. Duality ensures happiness, Sean.”

Valerie had to find something else to look at and her eyes ended up on the edge where the stone met the dark water.

Valerie woke up with one word in her head. The word repeated over and over until she was awake enough to understand.

Run.

She was alone on a hard bed in a house made of stone. Valerie ran. She didn't stop until she hit the edge of the water. There wasn't anywhere else to go. If she had been a different person, then she might have dove into that dark water to get away. Her odds were closer to drowning, though, so she had to stop.

Valerie turned to face the people that had chased her from the stone city. She dropped her head in defeat and realized that she wasn't wearing a shirt. Valerie covered her chest and only now did she feel the burning cuts in her back. What the hell had they done to her? What were they going to do?

The guy who called himself 'Sean' tried to explain, but it was insane. Impossible. And then the woman stripped out of her clothes. She stepped beneath a silver beam of light that fell through a circular hole in the cavern. She turned her back to Valerie and stood with arms outstretched.

Thick scars made a shape in the curve of her back. It was something with fins and a long neck that Valerie recognized even before the woman's body began to change. Her skin turned grey-green first and then her body began to change as if shaped by some invisible artist's hand.

She flopped into the pool and when she reappeared, it was with the head and neck of something that was supposed to be extinct. The Song poured from her open mouth, making Valerie's head swim.

Valerie touched her own back and felt the cuts. They were wet and her fingers were smeared with fresh blood when she pulled her hand back. Valerie swayed on her feet before dropping to the stone.

“Still in there?”

Valerie nodded, raising her head to look at Sean. “Present and accounted for.”

Sean had the brightest smile Valerie had ever seen. It faded when he became aware of it, ducking his head uncomfortably. He glanced at the pool behind her. “Father's changin' now ta lead the pod into the Loch. Ya were driftin', but he wanted ta know if ya made yer decision. Yeh've had five years...are ya goin' ta stay with the clan?”

Valerie tried to come up with one reason, but she couldn't. Her obsession with the Song had taken away all of them. Her fiancee accused her of being distant. Her boss had found her distracted. Her mother had passed two years ago. Nothing and no one was going to keep her from staying here.

The Song began again from the pool and Valerie looked to find two large green eyes staring at her from the inhuman face she knew belonged to King Ronan. The sound sent a chill over her that wasn't from the cool, underground air. She shivered and Sean touched her arm through the blanket she huddled under.

“If it helps any...I'd like it if yeh'd stay.” His eyes were the same green as the rest of the clan. It wasn't just the mark that helped them revert to their ancient forms. The blood flowing in their veins – in hers, too – belonged to something older than humanity. Something that adapted to survive no matter what came.

Valerie smiled and moved closer to him. She wrapped the blanket around him, too, so that her naked body pressed against his clothed one. Sean smelled like water and fish and this cave they were in, a world apart from the one she'd been born into. More than anyone in her life, he felt like home.

Valerie nodded. “I am Shochen.”

The volume of the Song grew as more of the clan changed. Valerie rose onto her toes to kiss Sean. His hands slid around behind her under the blanket, pulling her closer. He moved them back under the light of the Moon Well.

Valerie helped him strip out of his clothes. She dropped the blanket and slid her fingers over the rough scars on his back. They were so much older than the ones on her own. Fire burned over their skin as the shift began. The others had left and together, they slid into the pool. Valerie entered the tunnel first, knowing he was close behind.

For the rest of the night, the loch was their playground. The air rang with the Song coming from over a hundred voices to tempt anyone who hear it.

Ed stood in the door of his little home. There were three nights of the full moon when the Song would come the loudest and usually they ran in different shifts, a smaller number coming out each night. They were so loud tonight that he could almost feel the sound coming through the air. Loch must be full of them tonight.

Ed smiled and headed inside.

Le Fin.