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Cerise Hood, in her full white wolf form, sat sprawled across both Jay's and Mal's laps as they sat silently in limo heading towards Aurdon. Both of them could sense Cerise's magic like a physical thing. Even when she was not casting, it took up the entire space of a room, stretching out luxuriously, greedily, around and through whoever might occupy the same space. It was this that often had people scurrying away from her, scared of things that they knew were stronger and more dominant than them. They knew that Cerise was frustrated by her power. She had confided in them that she didn't want people to run away. She wanted people to go towards her, to think of her as someone to be loved and trusted. She didn't want to frighten people with her gifts. She just wanted her magic to go away and never come back. Cerise didn't want to be a wolf. She hated it. She hated how every month her body bends and breaks; every bone of her body breaking tell it's in form of white wolf. But Mal and Jay knew better, knew that would never happen. So they tried to help her. They tried to help her ease the mental , physical and emotional pain.
While Cerise and others were frightened of her power, Mal and Jay were not. They was unafraid not because they knew that Cerise's magic wasn't dangerous and powerful but rather a strength, something to be revered. Wolves like her always adhered to the leader of the pack. They could sense a force stronger than them and respect it while others were apt to run away. Cerise was a predator, and unlike prey, she understood the values of strength that lay within danger. Of power that could destroy but also protect.
They were unafraid and could sense and understand such a power better than anyone else, perhaps even better than Cerise herself. The gifts she inherited from her father had given her a way of sensing the world around her that was more hypersensitive and precise than most people knew, save for a few like Kitty, daughter of the Cheshire Cat, or even a fellow wolf. They were creatures of the wild that held onto instincts that humans had long buried. Creatures like her could smell a storm in the air even during the sunniest of days with nary a cloud blotting the sky. They could feel it in their bones like an itch or a whisper on the wind that caused shivers to run down Cerise's spine, nothing to do with cold and everything to do with magic and promise.
To them, Cerise was like a much-needed storm in the middle of a long drought, all fierce wind and heavy rain, dumping desperately needed waters onto parched and weary earth. Such a force of change could be dangerous that they knew, instinctively, like all living things do when confronted with forces much stronger than them, but they also knew something else. Sometimes harsh winds of change were needed. Sometimes dead and unneeded branches had to be torn down from their trees to allow newer and fuller branches of life to grow. Forces like these had their place too. Things had continued as they were for far too long anyway. They needed their newest change.
