The lonely rogue

Sixteen

I stayed up all night talking to Rylie, Jaime-Lou, Gabe and Robbie had gone to bed a couple of hours ago.

I explained to Rylie everything that Tungi had told me, she appeared to be just as confused as I was. "Do you feel any different? I asked her, I could feel her thinking, "Well, I suppose I feel bigger, but other than that I feel the same." "What time can we shift?" I asked, "Well i think traditionally we have to wait until the moon is up, but we could always try sooner if you would like." Rylie suggested, "I'm not sure how much it will hurt you though." We agreed to try, everyone was still asleep so nobody would know if it went wrong.

I quietly went out to the garden and straight to the weeping willow, I pushed my way through the leaves, and removed all of my clothing. "So what do I do now." I asked, feeling very self-conscious about standing out here naked. "I'm not actually sure" Rylie admitted, "Maybe try concentrating on shifting." I stepped out from under the tree, closed my eyes and thought about becoming my wolf. Nothing happened. I shook out my body, trying to relax, cleared my mind and really concentrated on shifting. I pictured my body bending over, fur sprouting from my skin, my face elongating and teeth growing large. "I don't think this is working, maybe we do need to wait for the moon." I sighed, feeling disappointed. "Gwen look at your feet" Rylie gasped. I looked down at my feet and saw paws. Big, white, furry paws! "Rylie, we did it!" I shouted excitedly, I could feel a new found playfulness bubbling inside me, "I need to run" I could hear Rylie laughing at my excitement, "Let's go then" She said.

I launched myself forward and ran, I ran so fast it was incredible. Rylie was in charge now, I just sat back and enjoyed the ride. I felt a new sense of freedom, of power, of energy. "Rylie, this is amazing, what's our top speed?" I giggled. Rylie gave a surge of energy and we were going even faster, it felt like we were flying. I could see everything so much clearer, I could see every speck that floated in the air and smell so many amazing scents. I would live like a wolf forever if I could. "Gwen, I want to see myself" Rylie said, "I can smell water, so I'm going to head there and try to see myself." Rylie took a sharp left and headed in a different direction, I could hear a steady drip from the water and smell the freshness of it. We slowed down as we broke through some trees, and found a beautiful big pond, there was a small waterfall behind it and some gorgeous shrubs all around it. We slowly stepped towards the pond, we were a little bit nervous about what we would see, but as Rylie looked into the water, I gasped. " Rylie you are beautiful, you are literally breath taking." I had never seen such a beautiful wolf in my life.

Rylie was huge, she had an amazing thick white coat, and it had light blue streaks running through it. Her eyes were like bright blue sapphires. I was so proud of my Wolf, I had never seen a wolf with blue fur before, I knew my Rylie was special. "You are amazing" I whispered to her, making her purr with happiness. I don't know how long we stayed there, just starring at Rylie's reflection, we were mesmerised, but I could hear someone calling me from a distance. "Rylie, can you hear that?" I asked, she chuckled "I sure can, let's give them a surprise" She had a quick drink from the pond, then turned and ran at full speed back towards our new home. It took less than 10 minutes to get back, and we could see Jaime-Lou, Gabe and Sarah looking around the garden for me. We crouched low in the shrubs, planning on jumping out on them, but then we saw someone move in the doorway. Tungi stepped through, looking very frail, "Somebody find me a seat" She commanded, she was quite a grumpy old woman really. Gabe rushed off and came back with a garden seat, Tungi sat herself down and looked into the direction that I was hiding. "There's no point searching in the garden for Gwen" Tungi snapped. Gabe, Sarah and Jaime-Lou stopped and went over to her looking confused. "Gwen isn't here at the moment is she Rylie." she wisely stated. The others looked in the direction that Tungi was looking, and we stepped out of the shrub. I heard three people gasp loudly "oh my goddess" Sarah breathed out.

I walked towards them, part of me scared of their reaction, but most of me proud to show off Rylie. "G-Gwen, is that you?" Jaime-Lou whispered, the shock was evident in all of their faces. We nodded and walked closer, "You're blue!" Jaime-Lou suddenly squealed excitedly, running towards me. We laughed at her reaction, it came out like a strange sounding kinda of panting. Sarah and Gabe then came up to us, "Can I touch you?" Sarah asked, I nodded and she reached out her hand to feel our fur. "Oh my goddess, you're so soft, like touching a cloud" She whispered in awe. Next thing I knew, both Jaime-Lou and Gabe's hands were on me, touching my fur, stroking me and scratching behind my ears. My tail started wagging, it was a strange feeling.

Tungi cleared her throat, "When you all finished mooning over Rylie, I would like to talk to her" she grumbled. three sets of hands left me and I walked over to Tungi, sitting at her feet. Tungi just starred at me for a few minutes before speaking. "Well, you are a beautiful wolf. Did you run?" I nodded, "were you fast?" I nodded again. "I knew speed was one of your powers, did you discover any more while you were out?" I shook my head. I knew we were running fast, but I didn't realise that is was a power. "I would like to try something if I may?" Tungi asked, I c****d my head to the side, "Gabe, give me your knife." She held out her hand, and Gabe passed her his knife with a confused look on his face. I jumped back, why does she want the knife, is she going to hurt me? She held up the knife, "I don't heal so fast anymore due to my age, so I would like to see if you can help me" She said while slicing her hand with the knife. Everyone, including me were taken back by what she had just done. She looked at me, "Rylie, I want to see what you clan do about my injury"

I slowly stepped towards her, and sniffed her hand, the coppery scent of blood filling my nose. "What should we do I asked Rylie?" Rylie seemed to know already. She licked the old ladies hand until she could no longer taste the blood, then sat down at Tungis feet. Tungi held out her hand and everyone looked. There was a small white scar on her hand, but the wound was completely healed. "The power of healing" Tungi said. " That will do for now" she said, "shift back, get dressed then have some breakfast, we will talk more later. Oh and happy birthday" She smiled.

I went back to the tree and imagined myself as a human, when I opened my eye's I was back to being me. I got dressed and followed everyone inside.

As soon as I sat down for breakfast, Jaime-Lou started bombarding me with questions. "How did you shift before the moon came out? How badly did it hurt? How fast did you run?" Thankfully Sarah saved me by bringing me a huge stack of pancakes, "A big stack for the birthday girl, and because you're probably starving after that little adventure." She laughed. I was able to dodge most of Jaime-Lou's questions by stuffing my face full with pancakes. She sat patiently for me to finish eating, not giving up on the chance to question me. As soon as I had swallowed my last bite She started again. "Slow down Jai, ask me one question at a time and I'll try my best to answer it" I told her. Jaime-Lou took a deep breath. "So how were you able to shift before the moon was out? You always have to wait for the moon for your first shift." I thought about my answer, "I'm not sure to be honest. Me and Rylie were talking, and we thought it would be a good idea to try. Neither of us thought it would actually work, but it did." She nodded seemingly happy with my answer. "How much did it hurt? If I knew you were going to do it I would have come to support you, I remember how painful my first shift was." She looked a bit sad as she asked, thinking about my pain. "Actually, it never hurt at all" I told her, " I just closed my eye's and when I opened them I was a wolf." "What! how is that even possible, every bone in your body was broken?" She shrieked. "Heeling power" Gabe said quietly. "What?" we both said to him. "Tungi said you had the power to heal. You must have healed yourself while you were shifting, that's why it never hurt." I looked at him, that would make sense I suppose, "when did you get so wide?" I laughed, making him smile.

We sat like this talking, questioning and coming up with suggestions for a little while until Robbie came in for breakfast. "Happy birthday Gwen" he sang as he sat down, "ready for a race tonight after your first shift?" s**t. I had forgotten that I told Robbie I would run with him first. Nobody said anything and an awkward silence hung in the air. "What's wrong?" Robbie questioned. "Um, well, you see" I started, not sure how to get the words out. "Gwen already shifted and went for a run." Jaime-Lou huffed out. "Oh, OK, cool." Robbie sounded disappointed. "I'll still run with you tonight though, if you still want to" I added quickly. "Yeah, sure, sounds good" he said as he walked off to find breakfast. I knew I had upset him, I felt so bad. "Don't worry, he'll get over it as soon as he see's Rylie, I guarantee it." Gabe said kindly. "I sure hope so" I sighed, "I hate upsetting anyone".