CHAPTER 1
Somewhere in the middle of Kensington, the gay laughter and interminable conversations that filled Riddle's chicken crib evaded the calmness of the night conversation in that area of the city. The bristling wind rattled windows slightly, but didn’t pose an unbearable cold or chaos to the city’s occupants. At a table in the corner, marked table 12, a crowd of seven people were seated, drinking rum and Scotch and water, chattering and releasing frenzied laughter into the already boisterous atmosphere, all at the same time. At a counter, the owner of the restaurant, Greg Riddle, shuffled through drinks at the portable bar behind him, in search for a particular bottle of gin. The air at his restaurant was rowdy by that time of the day, but that was a normal occurrence.
Abruptly, the conversation at ta
ble 12 died down as everyone stopped talking. Their focus was aimed at the man that walked in through the wooden double doors of the restaurant. His thick, long, brown hair bounced on his shoulders as he waltzed in, he was clothed in a black leather jacket, blue jeans that were just his size and a pair of black sneakers. His presence attracted the stares of the opposite gender at other tables, he gave out a mature oomph that was irresistible, he was a handsome figure of a man. His steel-gray eyes surveyed the restaurant till they fell on the people at table 12, and a smile crossed his thin lips.
“Hey! It’s Loki!” A man at the table cried and got to his feet, a glass of rum in his hand.
“Loki!” They all chorused.
“Loki, you badass!” the first man exclaimed as he punched Loki on the shoulder when he arrived at the table. “You still got this stinking habit of being late!”
“Drunk already, Cyrus?” Loki grinned.
“Why, of course not! It’s just 10 PM. If I got drunk now, I'd miss out on all the fun.”
“It’ll only take a matter of time.”, Elena, one of the three ladies at the table, remarked. She was a beautiful red head of twenty-four.
“Nonsense!” Cyrus dismissed her words with a wave of his free hand. “Here, take a seat, Loki.”
The meeting between these eight people was a seldom held event that occurred only four times a year. They had formed their own clique out of the pack as its youngest members. The meeting’s purpose was to entertain each member of the pack, so they could meet, hang out and generally create an intimate relationship between them as a ritual. The ritual had been established by Alpha Adolphus, the founder of the Shadow pack, some thirty years ago. Alpha Adolphus was a powerful werewolf who had mastered his werewolf abilities to perfection and had absolute control over them, even during a full moon. This was a marvel to the other werewolves that formed the pack, as they had little or no control over their transformations during a full moon. They worshipped Adolphus and, without a doubt, his son, Cyrus, was next in line to be crowned the next Alpha of the rapidly growing pack.
Cyrus was a young man of twenty-five years, with ginger-colored hair and a full beard. Unlike his father, he was unusual. Unlike, but tall. He was inducted into the pack when he was seventeen, three years after he started developing his werewolf features. There was something peculiar about Cyrus's wolf that even his father didn’t possess. When ever he transformed, the fur of his wolf was a glistening white, instead of the usual black or deep brown the others possessed. He had prided himself on that special feature of his, until the day he met Loki. It had been at a house party, three years ago, on a night when a full moon had been predicted to occur. Only two reasons had made Cyrus decide to take the risk of going. The fact that the party was at night and the house where the party was being held was right in front of a dense forest. He was sure that at the slightest sign of trouble, he could slip out of the house and into the forest.
Loki, on the other hand, had completely miscalculated the appearance of the full moon. It was the first time he had ever been invited to the various parties held by his course mates and he felt obliged to honor the invitation. The error he made was thinking the full moon was due to occur the next day. Up until that point, Loki had never experienced a full wolf transformation, whenever he had the urge or heard a shutter go off in his head. The only noticeable transformations were his eyes that took on a golden shade and his hands that morphed into claws.
On the night of the party, at about an hour to midnight, by chance, he had stared out of a window and had caught sight of the full moon, staring down ominously at him. With morbid horror, he had dashed out of the house, bumping into people and apologizing as he did so. Loki was aware of the two things that triggered his incomplete transformations, a full moon and his emotions. When he was too sad, raging with anger or shivering with anxiety, a shutter would go off in his head and a new power seemed to overwhelm him and, the next minute, his hands were claws and his steel-gray eyes golden. At the first sign of danger that night, which was the snap in his head, Loki had looked around anxiously, his eyes desperate to locate a secluded area around the house. With a sigh of relief, he saw the forest behind and raced towards it. By the time his feet had left the concrete and onto the detritus of the forest, his hands had transformed and he was sure his eyes had too, but it didn’t end there.
Loki felt his body enlarging, his clothes were suddenly too tight, there was a ravaging ache in his head and the moon fueled the fire that spread throughout his body with its plethora. He was unsure of what was happening, but the feeling was incredible.
What’s happening to me?
He stared at his hands, covered with a layer of glittering hair. Next came a sound of violent ripping as his growing body tore through his clothes. He glanced at his feet and held his breath. They were no longer human feet but those of a beast. His clothes had been ripped to shreds and he stood magnificently, towering at a new height. As he stared at the moon, a force burst through his throat and the next second, he was howling at the moon.
“It’s time.” A voice in his head, filled with satisfaction, said.
Loki had turned around and peered into the darkness that surrounded him, searching for where the voice had come from.
“Do not embark on a futile search, my dear Loki. I’m with you, so look no further. It is I, your wolf.”
Loki stood star struck as he realized what the voice meant by ' It’s time'. He had transformed completely for the first time! His breathing was heavy and his heart pounded against his ribs. It felt so good! He had never experienced such a feeling of euphoria in his entire life, and he basked in it. For almost six years, since he had developed the strange, sporadic and incomplete transformations, and had carried out tons of research on werewolves, he had finally transformed! He was an actual werewolf.
“Who are you?” A hoarse voice had called from behind him, causing Loki’s heart to skip a drastic beat. The voice was so deep, Loki wasn’t sure it was that of a human.
He was frozen to the spot, and couldn’t turn to find out who was behind him. Fear had gripped him firmly and his body refused to respond. He had been discovered! On his first actual transformation, someone had discovered his biggest secret.
In the current sense, Cyrus had been watching Loki's transformation the entire time from behind a cluster of trees with awe, his curiosity growing as Loki’s body grew. What had stricken Cyrus was the glistening white fur of the other werewolf. None of the other members of the pack, both the older members who held important positions in the pack, nor the younger members who could be referred to as the rank and file of the pack, possessed such white fur.
“Who are you?” Cyrus repeated.
Slowly, Loki turned and his eyes widened as he was made tête-à-tête with the red eyes of Cyrus’s wolf.
“Woah! You… you have red eyes!” he had exclaimed, the weight of his voice surprising him.
“Duh! I’m an alpha wolf .” Cyrus replied, then asked out of sheer curiosity. “Do you belong to a pack?”
And that was the key that paved the way to Loki’s membership in the Shadow pack. Being a member of a pack gave him a sense of belonging. He had finally found his way.
