Fire Moon

1

THERE'S DUMB.

And there's stupid.

I was doing something fucking stupid.

My cold fingers clasped together and then apart and then together again. My cold bones creaking.

Feeling the inner warmth.

I shouldn't be doing this.

I felt an urge to move towards the house, it felt like a rope was around my waist and tugging me forward. Almost magnetic in nature.

The house was nothing like I've seen before, two buildings intertwining with each other, white rectangles laying horizontal on the ground, twisting at the ends. Sloping windows followed the sloping of the roof, both ends of the rectangles were walls of windows and one of the walls were open, from the open windows I could see a sunken dark lounge in a U shape and I could also see no one was in the house.

Except I knew they were watching us.

The house stood alone on its block, with a generous garden and single pond to the side, backing onto trees that separated the town from them and us.

They definitely knew that I was already here.

My eyes moved to where Sam was standing by the car, and he was looking at the snow fall into the steaming pond.

The pond being warmer than the surrounding land, creating a foggy haze around the proud standing house.

His orange hair aflame atop his head as the sunlight caught it.

As if he could feel my gaze, he looked at me with his all-knowing warm brown eyes, and I watched as his fingers word the sentence, "What are you waiting for?"

Imagining the tone, I couldn't hear and I rolled my eyes, knowing he wasn't scared of anything and I signed back, "How about you come with me?" my fingers red from the cold, "If it's that easy."

His smile showed and he shook his head while signing, "Go."

Sam was the only dead Tau you would ever meet.

After a devastating fight with another Tau he met on his travels, he has to experience the world silently.

Sam was a member of my close-knit pack. My minuscule pack. Created by distrust and betrayal.

Recently, our pack has been getting some heat from the other surrounding packs, much larger packs.

With the threat at our heels, my father had asked me to request help from our neighbouring pack.

Something no one would dare to do.

Stepping into another's land without permission is suicide.

My father told me that August's pack was one of the largest in our area.

That August could kill our inferior pack by himself alone.

I turned to face the towering house, patiently waiting for me to gain the confidence to step up to the door. The pack already knows we're here, but I hesitated entering past the garden gate.

I swung it open as a figure came out of the shadows of the twisted house.

The tugging got stronger.

Standing on the threshold was August.

Ironically, placed at the base of the stairs was two large bronze lions, sitting and waiting.

Giant cats guarding the house of dogs. I would've laughed not given the pressure of this moment.