Transformative Nights

Caged Desires

The quiet of my study, once a sanctuary, now feels like a cage. The memory of last night’s encounter with Jonathan is a festering wound, a self-inflicted punishment. My meticulously crafted world, built on centuries of control, has been shattered by a single human. His admiration for the lie of Isolde Laurent, and my own bitter jealousy led me to an act of base, petty revenge. I cannot, will not linger in this self-loathing. Work is the only antidote. A new distraction, a new puzzle.

I call for Asa, his presence a comfort of old routine. The door opens silently, and he stands there, a stoic shadow in his immaculate suit. “Yes, old master?” he asks, his voice a low hum.

“I will be away from the manor for a while,” I state, my voice firm to mask the turmoil beneath. “If Jonathan asks for me, tell him I have business to attend to. No more, no less. Oh, and here, ” I said rummaging around my desk, “are a couple of things I’ve prepared for him, and should he want to go somewhere over the next couple of days, let him. The bond for the Sacred eating companion is complete, and I’ve already laid ground rules.

Asa inclined his head, while taking the items, a silent acknowledgment of the unsaid. “Yes, old master.” He leaves as quietly as he came, and with his departure, the last thread of my routine snaps.

My hands move instinctively, grabbing the nearest console to pull up the list of new recruits. I need to be somewhere else, doing something else. The students are an investment, and I cannot allow my personal failings to compromise my work. I shift into more durable clothing, the dark fabric a familiar comfort, and check the list. The furthest recruit is a young woman, residing in a small town to the south. Perfect. Distance is exactly what I need.

I make a quick call to Rose, my confidante and right hand, my voice devoid of the usual pleasantries. “Meet me in the south. I’m sending the coordinates now. We have a missing student.” Her voice, always so warm, is replaced with a sharp, professional tone. "On my way."

I shift into my raven form, the feeling of my body becoming something wild and free a welcome change from the confining flesh I'd worn last night. The wind is a rush against my wings, a clean sweep of cold air that carries away some of the bitter shame. I fly south, the landscape blurring beneath me, the scent of the city replaced with the rich, earthy smell of forests and rain.

We arrive at the home, a small, two-story house nestled in a quiet neighborhood. The air around it is thick with despair. The young woman we are looking for is gone, vanished the day before. The family, a mother and father with eyes red from weeping, sit with us, their hope barely a flicker.

"We just want her back," the mother sobs, her voice a raw, broken thing. "We don't know what happened. She was just... gone."

I offer them what little comfort I can, my words feeling hollow and inadequate. I give them a card, a piece of gold-edged paper that promises resources, a silent vow to find their daughter. If they find her first, they are to have her call so we can tell her about the scholarship, about the world that waits. The lie feels so easy now, a well-worn coat I slip into without thought.

We leave, or at least, we appear to. The moment we are out of sight, Rose and I slip into her daughter's room. The space is a portrait of a girl on the cusp of adulthood, posters on the wall, books on a shelf, clothes strewn across a chair. I see no sign of forced entry, no struggle. It is as if she simply walked away.

I move to the closet, a place where secrets are often kept, and find a worn journal. Inside, the pages are filled with frantic, looping handwriting, her words describing a recurring dream. The same dream night after night, one that called to her, compelling her to go to a location in the woods near her house.

"Prophetic dreams," Rose murmurs, her fingers tracing the words on the page. "She was meant to be there. Whatever is happening to her, it's not random. This place, this destination... it was waiting for her."

A fragile hope takes root in my chest. "Then she is still alive. We have a chance."

We leave the house and head for the woods, moving quickly but staying on foot, our senses honed. The trees crowd in, their branches a tangle of shadows. The path is narrow, the air growing colder with each step. We talk, filling the silence with our quiet speculation, analyzing the energy she left in her journal.

The woods eventually give way to a clearing, and beyond it, the rugged ascent of the mountain. We comb the area, our eyes scanning every shadow, every rock formation. Finally, we find it, a small, dark opening hidden behind a cluster of thorny bushes. It's a cave, and it feels like the only option. I glance at Rose, and she nods, her expression grim but determined.

We enter the cave. The air is still, heavy with the scent of damp earth and something else, something ancient and wild, like a forgotten magic. The stone walls are cold against my fingertips as we descend deeper, away from the fading light of the world above.

The cave stretched deeper, the ceiling pressing down with a weight that even my centuries of resilience felt keenly. Rose’s lantern cast trembling shadows that seemed to lunge ahead of us, only to retreat when we drew near. I was about to remark on how unnaturally silent the passage had grown when the air split with a guttural snarl.

We halted as two shapes prowled from the dark.

The first was a jaguarundi the size of a stag, its fur a living storm-cloud. Shades of charcoal rippled across its body as though smoke curled beneath the skin. Its eyes burned with silver light, and when it hissed, I saw fangs that glistened with frost.

The second was its twin in rage if not in hue, a rust-colored beast streaked with veins of molten copper, as though a forge’s fire had been hammered into its hide. The heat rolling off it singed the cave air, and its eyes glowed with embered fury.

I froze, every instinct telling me this was impossible. Magic-born beasts had been erased from the earth long before even my turning. Their bones belonged in forgotten texts and ruins, not before my eyes. Familiars were the last thread of their legacy, but even they drew power only through witches. To see such creatures untethered, alive in the wild…

Rose and I shared a glance, each of us reading the other’s disbelief.

The beasts weren’t alone.

Their claws, sharp and long, detached mid-swipe, slicing through the air like silver darts. A lone woman stood cornered, her gourd-shaped talisman raised high. Each strike stopped inches from her flesh as a barrier flared around her, shimmering like glass. Still, she faltered under their relentless circling. Each time they lunged, she raised the gourd again, and they recoiled, pacing in agitation. Her eyes never wavered, but her arms trembled.

They hadn’t noticed us.

Rose’s fingers twitched toward her satchel; I let my shadows stir at my feet. We lunged as one.

The battle that followed was raw, savage. The grey beast’s claws gouged stone where I had stood moments before, shards flying. The rust one lunged at Rose, molten heat radiating so fiercely the cave air warped. I moved between them, striking with centuries of honed strength, while Rose’s spells tangled the air with binding light. Their roars shook the stone, echoing with the fury of creatures who had outlived extinction itself.

At last, with every ounce of restraint, we subdued them, not slain, but pinned, their massive chests heaving.

Rose’s voice trembled with awe. “They’re real. Extinct… yet here.”

I kept my boot pressed to the rust cat’s flank, feeling its power thrumming against me. “Study them later. For now…” I turned my gaze to the woman still clutching her gourd.

She lowered it cautiously, relief flooding her face.

She looked relieved, “You guys saved my life.”

“We saved you by chance,” I told her, voice low, carrying in the cavern’s hush. “But chance rarely acts without purpose. We came to see you in order to give you a test to see if you had special abilities. Imagine our suprise when your family tells you you were missing.”

“Yes, I’ve been having these dreams for months. This cave and these 4 gourd-like objects kept calling to me. I came here after I had had enough of the dreams and was trapped here by the cats before I could leave. I was already clutching one when they attacked, and it created a force field on its own. That’s how I’ve been safe these last couple of days.” The girl finished staring at the gourd.

Rose stepped forward, the confidence of her years softening into a smile. “Your journal revealed more than words. Its energy, shamanic. That’s what you are.”

The woman’s breath caught. “Really? One of the witches that just came out? You can tell?”

Rose nodded. “Yes and no. Shamans are different than witches. Usually, there is a trial that I, youre acting shaman would guide you through but for you, there’s no need for a trial. I will tutor you myself. On one condition, you serve Chai-Hao for ten years. Not in chains, not bound from your life. But when he calls, you will answer, as I have done.”

The woman bowed her head without hesitation. “Gladly. You saved my life. I owe you both more than years.”

Then she lifted the gourd, eyes glimmering. “There are four such things. I’ll keep only one, the black one with silver speckles. The others, I entrust to you.”

Her honesty rang true. I stepped forward, selecting two: the blue one dusted with silver, alive with stormlight, and the bright yellow one that radiated warmth like a second sun. Rose claimed the last, a pink-and-gold relic so delicate it seemed spun from dawn itself.

The subdued wildcats watched with eyes like burning coals, their chests rising slow and wary. I could still feel their magic resonating in my bones, an ancient song of power once thought silenced.

The world was shifting. Extinct beasts walked again, shamans revealed themselves, forgotten relics returned to mortal hands.

I tightened my hold on the gourds and thought:

Perhaps eternity has more surprises left for me after all.