Chapter 3 – Chap 3

Hello to everyone that reads and enjoys my recollections. I apologize for taking so long to post this. I am away for work and have been for a while. And I’ve had to shake off a rather persistent imp. But that really isn’t important. You came here for another of my memories, so on to that.

This next creature is as beautiful as it is terrifying. They are usually indifferent to those affected by them, but they can be very tempermental. One thing that Ihave found strange about these creatures, though, is that they are fairly common, but even I rarely see them. I first saw them in my late teens; sometime between graduating high school and beginning college.

Have you ever wondered what creates, moves, and controls weather systems like thunderstorms, tornadoes, hurricanes, cloudbursts and lightening storms? Of course they don’t control them all. Earth is a living, wild being.

I call them weather wolves. From what I can tell about the ones that I have seen, they vary greatly depending on the type of storm and region of the world. For example, I saw one of them in the midwest United States howling with a tornado that seemed more akin to a very large coyote. I have seen whole packs of silver and blue and white wolves drive a hurricane forward. I have seen a lone blue wolf growl bolts of lightening across the sky.

This memory isn’t just a recollection of the different types of weather wolves that i have seen, but a specific encounter. During this encounter, I found out that the wolves are governed. I learned that there is apparent order to the chaos of weather systems. The beasts by themselves can be as large as a minivan, but the creature that controls them all is something else entirely.

The first time that I saw a weather wolf, it started out as the telltale shimmer in the air just before a cloudburst in my home town. I was walking from my college building to the library across the street on a cloudy day. I remember looking up asnd seeing the shimmer and then seeing what appeared to be a white wolf gliding through the sky. Of course I didn’t say anything or ention it to anyone because they couldn’t see it so why bother.

At the time, I sisn’t know what it was or what seeing one meant, so I decided at that time not to stay and find out. Up to this point, I had only seen fear imps, Piri, and a few other strange creatures that no one else seemed to be able to see, so I hurried to the library and went about my business. Just as I got inside the doors, the rain started. It was a cloudburst, so it didn’t last long, but it did raise a few questions for me.

Seeing the wolf in the sky just before a short, hard rain made me think that the two were related but there was no way for me to know unless I was able to see another one for confirmation.

On the news that night, I saw that there were severe thunderstorms projected for the rest of the week, so I remember making the decision to try to spot another wolf.

I remember that day very clearly. It was a friday afternoon and I had decided to cut class because I made a fair few bad decisions in my younger life. It was about 4:30 in the afternoon when the thunderstorm began to stir up. I could hear the thunder in the distance and I could see the clouds begin to grow darker. I was sitting in a local coffee shop by the window so that I could look out the storefront window and watch the storm unfold.

As the storm got closer, I began to see the lightening that usually acompanies thunder in storms such as these. So far, nothing seemed too out of the ordinary. Until I started to look closer.

The lightening seemed to cast a shadow among the clouds and the thunder seemed to sound more like the growling of a huge dog. As the rain started to come down, light at first, I saw it; a monstrous blue-grey wolf that seemed to be made entirely out of the clouds that it was commanding. As I stared in amazement, I hadn’t noticed a girl come sit by me at my small table in the coffee shop.

“Mezmerizing, aren’t they?” She asked me.

I just stared at her, taken aback. Could she see them too? “I love thunderstorms,” I replied, “I find them calming.”

The girl just smiled and turned her attention to the storm that was beginning to grow stronger outside. She made me feel a little uneasy, but the world is full of strange people, so I didn’t let her bother me too much. I just continued to watch the storm and even with the heavy rain coming down in full swing, I remember seeing the huge wolf clearly. It was running around as if it were a puppy playing in a field, directing the clouds and lightening and thunder.

At this point, I felt pretty sure that the wolves and the storms were connected, but I thought that that was the end of it. I had no idea that the wolves themselves were under the direction of something greater. I had only guessed that they were just old spirits doing what they were cosmically designed to do. Feeling confident in my assumption, I decided to leave it at that and go home; I see strange things every day, so I didn’t think too much into it.

As I was driving home in my beat up old pickup truck, the storm began to get worse. It wasn’t unlike weather that I had driven in before, but I kept seeing that huge wolf in the sky ahead of my truck as if it were following me. I knew I was in trouble when I was about a mile away from home. I heard the distinct snarl of a wolf and lightening struck the road in front of my truck. I veered off the road and wrecked in the ditch. I remember feeling dazed, but otherwise unharmed. I had banged my head off of my steering wheel, so I had a busted lip but nothing serious.

Looking aroud, all I saw was the torrential downpour around me; the storm was in full swing and I seemed to be in the middle of it. I decided to stay inside my truck and try to call for help, but of course I was in the only dead zone between town and my house. Frustrated, I dropped my phone into the center console and looked up through my cracked windshield. That wolf was standing no more than ten feet from the front of my truck.

It. Was. Huge! It stood at least seven feet tall at the shoulders with its hackles raised, teeth bared, and long fur blowing in the tumultuous wind. It was staring directly at me with its huge, blue eyes. Then I heard a voice as if it were inside my own head.

“Out of your metal box, human.” The voice was deep and gravelly.

I was astonished. I had no idea what I could have possibly done to offend such a creature, or why it had taken such notice of me. Surely it had seen humans before; hundreds if not thousands or more. I was, understandably, hesitant.

“My friend said get out of the truck.”

I nearly jumped out of my skin! It was the girl from the coffee shop! She was sitting comfortably in the passenger seat of my truck.

Of the million thoughts that were racing through my head at that moment, I can only remember thinking: ‘What in the hell have I gotten myself into?’

I stared at the girl for a moment, really taking in what she looked like. She had dyed blue hair down to her shoulders and bright green eyes. Her face was round and friendly but she wore a serious expression. For some reason, her nose and lip piercings stuck in my mind. Her septim piercing dangled a small lightening bolt, and her lip ring was a rain cloud shaped stud.

The graevlly voice came back. “Out, human. Now!”

I didn’t really seem to have much of a choice, so I tried to control my shaking hands and open my door to step out. The wind was whipping and the rain was coming down in sheets, but it felt calm. It felt more like a summer breeze and a light drizzle. To say that I was shaken to my core would be an understatement.

“What do you want from me?” I addressed both the girl and the wolf. “What have I done?”

The girl giggled. “You can see us, stupid. you’re going to have to come with us for a bit.”

Before I had the chance to respond, an invisible force swept my feet from under me and I was soaring through the rain clouds. The rain wasn’t touching me and the lightening seemed as if it was being directed away from me. In that moment,i couldn’t stop myself from remembering Piri. Were these ancient spirits that were going to make me disappear or were they just genuinely interested in the fact that I could see them?

Thousands of thoughts began racing through my mind.I couldn’t decide wether I should be absolutely terrified or amazed. On one hand, I was in the presence of incredibly powerful creatures that control storms. On the other hand, they caused me to wreck my truck and were now flying me away to some unknown place, presumably to find out why or how I can see them. I remember looking down and seeing the storm below us, dissipating now because its conductor was busy escorting me and the girl to wherever we were going.

We flew for what seemed like forever and every time I tried to speak to the wolf or the girl, my voice was rowned out because of the wind. Obviously, I had no power to return to my truck or even the ground, so I gave in and let myself be swept away. But just as suddenly as we took off, we landed in a clearing atop a hill. It looked like Stonehenge.

When I found my voice again after we landed, I turned to the girl. “Who – what are you?” I asked, still shaken.

The girl regarded me curiously, “We are the ones that keep the storms from wiping out all humanity. we have been a part of this world for longer than most can remember. And because you can see us, we need to know why and how.”

The giant wolf stood at distance and stared at me as it projected its telepathic voice. “No human has been able to see us for thousands of years. The last one tried to hunt us.”

I just stood where I was, shaking. I obviously didn’t want to hunt these beasts, but if the last one did, I could be in trouble.

The girl sat down in the grass by the wolf. “Here she comes.”

Before I could ask her what she meant, a heavy mist began to swirl around one of the stone pillers on the hill. It couldn’t have been naturally occuring fog, and it was much too dense; almost solid looking. With a heavy gust outward from the center, the mist vanished and revealed an absolutely massive white wolf. This one had to be almost twice the size of the one that brought me there.

Her telepathic voice was much softer than that of the other wolf, but no less serious. “Human. My children have been watching you. They know that you can see other spirits and beings of the world. But until now, you have not shown that you could see us.” She paused to stare at me with her almost-glowing yellow eyes. “The last human that could see us, befriended us and then began trying to kill us. Humans die in the storms that we direct every day and every night. You can see us, so naturally we are… concerned. You may speak.” She finished.

Obviously, I was dumbfounded. All I wanted to do that afternoon was to see if I could make a connection between the one wolf that I had seen and storms. Now, I was being interrogated by some storm diety if they should be concerned that I could see them because the last person that had been able to see them had tried to hunt them. How did he even do that? How in the world was someone supposed to hunt one of these creatures, much less kill one?

I stared in awe for a few moments before speaking. “I’m just a regular guy with a very strange ability. I don’t even know what you really are, and I have absolutely no interest in hunting your kind nor do I know how that would even be possible.”

The massive white wolf stood tall and regarded me with her intense stare for a moment before looking to the other wolf. The wolf that brought me to this place wiht the girl got up withought a sound and took flight into the mist.

For the first time in a long while, the girl giggled where she sat before a mist started to appear around her. Was she about to tur into a wolf too? At this point i didn’t think that I would really be surprised. As the mist began to thin out, I could almost make out the shape behind it. It wasn’t a wolf, but a huge raven.

The raven stretched its wings before addressing me in the girl’s voice. “We are the conductors of the happenings of this world, human. We are the gods of the animals and masters of the sea, earth, and sky. We answer only to The Old One. We hear him at all times and at all times we obey. To disobey is to die. Most of us have been alive in this realm for thousands of years. We will not be threatened by some… human.” The giant raven finished.

I wasn’t dead yet so my curiosity was began to get the better of me. I was still terrified of course but I figured that if they really wanted to kill me, they would.

“I don’t want to hunt your kind.” I began truthfully. “I truely mean you no harm and even if I did, I have no idea how I could. I only ask why I was given a chance if the last person to see you tried to hunt you and if I could possibly ask a few questions about your kind.”

I noticed immediately that all sound around me was muted. I couldn’t hear the wind, or my own breathing for that matter. The air was dead silent. It stayed that way for only a moment before a booming voice resounded inside my skull, dropping me to my knees.

“FOOLISH HUMAN.” The voice began. “YOU ARE ALIVE ONLY BECAUSE I WILL IT. I SEE ALL AND I KNOW ALL! STOP ASKING QUESTIONS!”

Just as quickly as the voice came, it departed. I could hear again. “What in the hell was that!?” i almost screamed in panic.

The raven cocked its head sideways and stared at me.

The wolf mustered what I assume to be a grin before standing up. “It must have been The Old One. And I assume, since you’re still alive, you are meant to be that way.” The wolf then changed her focus to the raven. “Thalia, return this human to where you got him. Have your family keep a watch on him.”

The raven, Thalia, rustled her feathers. “Of course, Lya.”

Before I could say a word, Iwas soaring through the air again. This time, though, the flight seemed to take only a fraction of the time of my first flight. The next thing I knew, I was standing in the parking lot of the coffee shop next to my now unwrecked truck. I remember being absolutely bewildered. There was a regular-sized raven perched atop my truck, and when I looked through the storefront window of the coffee shop, the girl with the blue hair was sitting alone, enjoying her coffee.

I remember thinking about everything that had transpired that afternoon. I felt as if I had been gone for hours, but the time on my watch was the same as it had been when I left the coffee place the first time. I had met and been abducted by gods of the earth and been spoken to by ‘The Old One,’ as they called him. I do not know if it was God that had spoken to me or some other diety. But I do know that every time I leave my house, there is a raven waiting atop my truck. Since that incident some ten years ago, I have never been anywhere where a raven wasn’t visible to me.

I know this one was kind of long so my apologies. I also apologize for this part taking so long, as I said, I’ve had to rid myself of a tougher-than-usual imp. It has been a trying time. But the next time you look up at a gathering storm, look for the wolf. You may be lucky (or unlucky) enough to see one.