Gravel King -- King of the Gravel

Aragorn had no idea where he was, meaning he was completely and utterly lost. He probably should have turned around when he originally felt that he was lost but no, fuck that, he had to tell himself that he knew exactly where he was going. He was overly stubborn when it came to these sorts of things.

"Blast it all, how did I get myself lost again? What country am I even in anymore?" He spat, grumbling and kicking a rock in the dense undergrowth that surrounded him.

Oh yeah. That's what had clued him in that he had been lost, right? The countryside had gone from soft, lush neighborhoods and friendly plants to angry creatures and wild, over populated forest area. Yes. This was how he knew he should've gone back instead of going on. It certainly wasn't anywhere he'd ever been.

But no. As the stubborn teenage wizard he was, he felt that he knew exactly what he was doing. As usual, he was completely wrong. But to him it really didn't matter right now that he was wrong. It was that he was lost and very much so confused.

Night was coming soon, as well. He didn't like to think about the creatures that came out at night, especially since most of them scared the hell out of him.

Vera Parker, since her rough beginnings, had made it her own personal goal, to never let what she had become - her 'disease' of sorts - be the defining figure of her life. It was true that she had made a place for herself in the world as a werewolf, found a home amongst fellow lycanthropes, but that was different than allowing her 'wolf' to define her life. Before she had understood what was happening to her, she had allowed the change to get the better of her. In those moments she had lost herself, and something else, some other being had taken her place.

She had not been Vera Parker any more; she had been some monster instead. Vera had never wanted to be that again. That was, she had thought she had never wanted to be that again.

Until now.

Now she had found a wonderful magic in allowing that monster to take over her emotions, her being. When the moon died, it would die with it, Vera knew that, and in that moment she'd have to deal with not only the consequences that had driven her to seek this sort of comfort, but also the ones that she might later cause. But it was easier, it was easier than thinking about the pain, the trouble, the fear she was causing.

This couldn't be happening, not again. After the last time she had found that she couldn't take it again, if something were to- she meant... It had been highly unlikely, that's what they had told her last time; there had been too much damage, trauma that hadn't been able to heal properly, her body just wouldn't be able to support another. Well, they hadn't said wouldn't, but Vera knew the truth about 'unlikely'.

It meant the same thing.

So, it was easier to be a monster. Monster's didn't care about human life, didn't care about desires, pain, tears. The monster just wanted one thing and one thing only.

Her wolf just wanted to play.

So leaving the positive pregnancy test, the proof of things she had been denying for a little over a week now on the small table, completely open for anyone in the building to find, Vera forgot about it completely, and instead bounded out of the house, into the early twilight, the wolf inside her dancing eagerly to get out, whispering distracting words of excitement into her ear, leaving no room to think about her human life.

A boy the purely imagined voice seemed to say as she caught a scent after more than an hours wondering. A unnerving expression of malicious excitement crossed her features. There's a boy.

Looping around the woods silently - not that it mattered much, the boy was making enough of a racket to cover for anyone else, she popped up in front of him, as attractive as she ever was in the late light, leaning on a tree that stood directly in his way.

"You know it's not safe to be out so late, especially in a place like this," her tone was light, full of what sounded like genuine concern. Perhaps a part of Vera, the human, the girl... the mourning mother, was still alive in there. Or maybe she was just good at pretending. "Never know what kind of spooks can find you."

Aragorn jumped when she spoke, his gaze jerking up to focus on the voice. He had been watching his feet at the time when she showed up and now realised that probably would've been a bad idea if she were someone else. He laughed nervously, rubbing the back of his as one of his 'nervous ticks' that he had developed over the years.

"Yeah, I should've stayed in town," He admitted with a slow and slightly ashamed nod. "This happens to me when I'm not accompanied by friends." He grimaced and looked back down at his feet, "I suppose it's too much to ask that you're not lost too. Unless luck came through for me!"

He looked back up hopefully, a small smile forming on his face.

"Oh yes," she stead slightly, straightening herself before gracefully leaping on top of a near by boulder as if it were nothing more than pebble, "You definitely should have stayed in town."

She stood about him, looking down up at the sky, watching the sun sink, and the light began to reflect in her bright blue eyes, dancing for a moment before she looked down at the boy again, a deep dark red - blood red she had always thought it looked like - began to seep from her out from her pupils, and take over the formally blue iris. The first of many changes.

Her pulse spiked with excitement.

"I am not lost, Little one, but I can't say you're in luck either." Crouching down on her perch, still towering above him, but closer, she raised her now red eyes to meet his, a smirk spreading across her face. "Its a full moon tonight. Do you know what comes out to play during the full moon?"

Aragorn's smile faltered but it grew again when she said she wasn't lost. His hope was reforming and tightening around his heart. He really didn't want to be stuck out in this wild land without anyone around.

"That's fantas--" He started, cutting off as she kept talking.

What she said next ripped the hope right out of him and his heart skipped a beat as he watched her above him, fear filling him up to the brim. If he hadn't had it under control just enough he would have been frozen. However, his fear was at the highest point it could possibly be and he quickly forgot that he was a wizard.

He gave a small squeak-- which was a rather funny noise coming from Gorn as it was surprisingly deep-- that sounded faintly like an 'oh no' and quickly turned on his heel. He shrieked, terrified, and stumbled into a run, trying his hardest to get out of there.

She loved the way the hope just drained from his face. There was something exciting to that tiny wolf voice that was still prodding its way at her mind. It was magic.

All because she existed.

And then he ran. A smirk crossed her features, red eyes brightening, "Smart boy."

Looking over the shoulder, ears still tuned to the sound of the boys slowly stumbling feet, she gave the rising moon a wide grin in greeting. A slight incline of her head.

"Evening, Charming. Come here often?" The laugh that she made at her own joke echoed around the wood before it was cut off my a snarling as the women leaped from her boulder, changing form mid lung as if it were the most natural thing in the world. Feet landing on the ground soundlessly, she sniffed the air and then howled.

Anyone looking could have sworn there was a smirk on her snout.

Her feet were soundless as she run towards the boy, passing him along his right side with nothing more than a slight wiggle of a branch - intentional of course- and then circling back around in front of him. Before he even hand a chance to stop she had come out of the air, jumping down upon him, holding him down with her impressive weight and strength. Her snout sniffed him with something almost like curiosity.

It was always fun to get to know your play things before you got started.

Aragorn listened to her cackling, the terror fully taking over and turning him wild. What had convinced him to do this?! He only just been let out of that damn hospital after the car crash with Daniel. He had a permanent scare across his forehead that would show off just how bad the city of New York was.

He was a fool, said a part of his mind that wasn't heard above the rest that screamed at him to run the hell away. He wasn't stupid enough to turn and fight a werewolf, that's something his idiot younger 'brother' would try to do. As his thoughts flashed to his family, he tripped over his own foot and slammed into the ground, scratching up his face.

He pushed himself off the ground but found it was even harder than ever to do so. His sister would never forgive him if he died, and she would surely become a very angry woman that despised everyone. His brother was already an irritating little shit that he didn't care for, but he regretted treating him that way. His father, the scared old man that was too drained to leave the house for work most days. The most important faces flew to the front next, his friends. Casey and Kat and Danni. Danni would likely fall into a fatal and unfortunate depression. Kat would possibly care, he didn't know her well enough. And Casey... She'd find his body and pummel it until she jump started him back to life. Crazy broad.

With all of the faces of his loved ones on his mind he let out a ferocious roar and forced himself up one last time. He knew he couldn't just give up. One last attempt at this and he would try to protect himself as much as he could. His face was bleeding again, his heart pounding as he forced himself to look ahead.

He really needed to just be in another one of his books, dreaming up that he really was part of the story. This time, though, the character was all too real.

Fear was a great thing, it kept the body going. It also helped point out just the colossal mistake one had made.

Her claws, partly by no concious effort of her own had already sunk into the boys flesh. Painful to be sure, but hardly detrimental to his over all health. It wasn't a scratch from a werewolf that was problematic. It was the bite.

It was a real shame then, that although help was going to come to the boy - someone would stop poor broken Vera Parker from getting too carried away; the boy would live - it was not going to come in time for this to be nothing more than a bad memory.

As her jaw sunk into his shoulder ready to drag her prise away to somewhere else, his fate was sealed.

Vera's screw up would make another persons life just like her own; when she awoke the next day, back to herself, the fact that at least he had someone to tell him what happened would be little to no comfort at all.

She had lost control.

She had continued the cycle.

Hope was a terrible thing.

If he hadn't been hoping that she'd regain control, that she'd vent out her emotions by playing with him, if he hadn't thought she'd stop before biting, maybe the boy's fate would have been different.

But hope was, perhaps, Brock's fatal flaw.

A blur of white fur was suddenly a wall of solid wolf, hitting Vera off the boy and standing over him. There was a moment, brief, in which the Alpha seemed to simply stand there, a low growl growing in his throat. Dead silence descended upon the forest, and he was leaping forward, toward the other wolf, and giving a sound that most humans - and admittedly, most wolves - never heard.

Jaw widening, teeth gleaming in the moonlight, the almost-roar burst from his throat, directed at the insubordinate, every ounce of Alpha power thrown in, every scrap of humanity gone, the wolf was simply thus; an Alpha.

Cutting off abruptly, the white wolf tilted its head up, looking down at the other wolf as if it were nothing, the worst of disappointments, the outcast, cut from the pack, and if he had wished it, Vera would have become thus. Luckily for her, he hadn't quite lost control yet. He hadn't decided to abandon her.

He never would.

Throwing his head back, he gave a deep bellied howl, one that was echoed around them in many different voices. His pack had come as well. Feeding on his disappointment, his anger, his-

Turning back to the prey- boy. the boy. - he nudged it- him - with his snout, snarling to stand, to get a move on, before the wolf appeared gave up and turned away. The bite would not kill him, and as long as he was bitten, he would not come to any harm.

Aragorn's scream of agony rang through the night as the she-wolf's claws dug into him. He gave into fear then, writhing as if it would do any good when it was only contributing to the pain. His scream climbed in volume as the pain escalated. He could hear nothing but himself.

Finally he stopped writhing and cried, a lot, as he tried to be as still as possible. He was losing some blood, it wouldn't do him any good. His wounds felt numb as he ground his teeth, looking up at the wolf with blurred sight and an attempt at pleading for the human that he knew was inside all wolves. It apparently failed as the she-wolf slammed her teeth into his shoulder.

He wailed and blacked out for a moment as howls tore through the air again, though not his own. He came back up to reality only to find two wolves, an obviously alpha male and the original she-wolf. He cringed as the alpha growled at him, taking it as a 'move-your-ass' order. He listened, moving to a wobbly stand.

The boy had lost his interest; she had been forced to lose her interest, but even before that, the force pushing off him and rattled her mind blurring the line between herself and monster so that she wasn't entirely sure which was in control any more, what she was even doing.

The other voices swirled around her, suffocating her mind with judgement, feelings, disappointments. But they didn't know, they didn't know. What did they have to deal with, what kind of pains had they suffered? Had they been where she was? Had they thought they'd loved one man only to find his affection turn to violent rage, the mark of his 'love' marring her skin on a regular basis.

The mark of his love killing the only thing she had ever wanted, stopping her from every trying again.

Unlikely.

Unlikely.

Unlikely.

The word was like a horrible chant that her wolf mind couldn't block out. Perhaps if she had lost control completely, forgotten a potion instead of merely behaving like she hadn't then she could have...

Vera wanted to run, to hide away - to find some hole to throw herself in and never come out of - but she was stuck where she was, forced to follow the law of their magic. Her gaze met his for a moment, half a moment and then she couldn't bare a second more. Lowering to the ground, tail folded between her legs, she ducked her head into the ground, covering her head with her paws.

A low, but constant whimpering was the only sound the woman-turned-creature made until she finally fell asleep. And even in unconsciousness the one thought kept haunting her.

What had she done?