The Fever
1036 Words
I left the cliffside behind, but the storm couldn't touch the fire in my veins. By the time I reached the house, the rain wasn’t cooling me anymore. It hissed as it hit my skin, steam curling off my shoulders like I was a piece of forged iron pulled fresh from the coals.
I went straight to the kitchen, my boots heavy on the linoleum. I didn't stop to think. I just wrenched the faucet handle as far as it would go and thrust my hands into the stream. Freezing water surged over my knuckles, but it barely registered. I stared at my hands, watching the droplets dance over my calloused skin. They looked human. They looked normal.
But the pressure building behind my ribs said otherwise. It was a rhythmic, pulsing heat, waiting for a c***k in my composure to spill over. I tightened my grip on the edge of the porcelain sink, trying to ground myself.
CRACK.
The sound was sharp, like a bone snapping in the quiet room. I froze, my heart hammering against my teeth. A jagged fracture webbed out from beneath my fingers, splitting the white sink. I hadn't even squeezed.
"Easy," I whispered, my voice sounding like gravel grinding together. "Just... be Kael. Just be normal."
"Dinner’s getting cold."
I went rigid. Papa.
His voice came from the table behind me, low and steady. But I didn't just hear his words; I heard the friction of his sleeve against the table. I heard the wet slide of his pulse in his neck. My senses had been ripped wide open, and the world was flooding in too fast.
I shut off the water and grabbed a towel, frantically pulling my sleeves down to hide the coarse, darkening hair beginning to sprout along my forearms. In the reflection of the dark kitchen window, my eyes caught the light. They weren't brown anymore. They were molten—sharper, predatory, like something else was looking out through my sockets.
I turned and walked into the dining room. Papa sat there, his hands folded, a plate of untouched food in front of him. He wasn't eating. He was hunting for the truth in my face.
"Sit," he said.
I pulled the chair out. The wood groaned under me, a sound that felt like a scream in my heightened ears. For a long moment, the only sound was the rain lashing against the siding.
"Jax called," Papa said finally. "He said you threw him across the dock. Said you didn't look like yourself."
"He shoved me," I snapped, my jaw tight. "I just reacted."
That was the lie. The truth was that it hadn't felt like a reaction—it had felt like an awakening. "I went to Blackrock after. I needed to breathe." I leaned forward, the heat in my chest flaring. "There was a girl there. A yellow coat. She stood in the middle of the gale like it was a summer breeze. And when I got close, she was gone. Just... a print in the mud. A paw, Papa. Bigger than anything I’ve ever seen."
The silence that followed was heavy, suffocating. Papa didn't look surprised. He didn't call me crazy. He just stared at his folded hands.
"There wasn’t anyone there, Kael," he said quietly.
"I know what I saw!"
"The fever makes you think that. It colors the world."
The word felt like a physical blow. "The... what?"
"The fever," he repeated, finally meeting my eyes. "The heat. The strength. The senses. The visions."
The room felt like it was shrinking. "You knew," I whispered. "All those years telling me to stay out of the Ironwood... you weren't worried I’d get lost. You were waiting for this."
Papa exhaled, a sound of ancient exhaustion. "I was hoping it would skip you. I prayed the blood would run thin in your generation."
"What blood?"
"The kind that doesn't belong to this town," he said. "The kind the forest doesn't let go of."
A cold shiver raced up my spine, clashing with the internal fire. "What am I?"
Before he could answer, the kitchen door creaked open. Mom stepped in, carrying a plate. She looked pale, her eyes darting to my hands instead of my face, as if she were afraid of what I might do with them.
"Eat, Kael," she said softly, setting the food down.
Usually, the smell of her cooking was home. Now, it hit me with a sickening intensity. My stomach twisted with a low, unfamiliar hunger that had nothing to do with bread or stew.
"You both knew," I said, my voice trembling. "You’ve been watching me. Waiting."
"It was to protect you," Mom whispered.
"From what?" I stood up, the chair screeching against the floor. My hand clamped onto the fork beside my plate. The metal groaned and then snapped like a twig.
Mom gasped, her hand flying to her mouth. Papa stood slowly, his shadow stretching long across the floor. "How hot is it?"
"I'm burning," I said, the air in the room suddenly too thick to breathe. "And I'm done being lied to."
"Kael, wait—" Papa reached out, his hand closing around my arm.
The moment he touched me, a violent jolt shot through my nervous system. I ripped away from him with a speed I didn't recognize. For a split second, even Papa looked startled.
"I’m going back to the cove," I said, backing toward the door. "If she’s real, she knows what this is."
I turned and bolted. The rain hit me like a wall, and steam rolled off my skin in thick white plumes. But the heat wasn't wild anymore. It was focused. It was a compass needle pointing me toward the trees.
I didn't slow down. I ran, my feet hitting the mud with a rhythmic power I’d never known. My family had spent twenty-one years keeping me in the dark, but the girl in the storm? She was waiting.
- Writer
