“You did that on purpose,” I said, pushing Jacob’s hand away as I got to my feet on my own.

“I would never.”

“Never my ass. You couldn’t stop before you rammed me in my womanhood?” I inquired, walking a bit stiff.

“I was prepared to lift you to the top, not spin you like one.” Then I heard the crack in his voice and knew he was trying not to laugh.

“I dare you to start laughing,” I glared back, “I dare any of you to start laughing, cause when I can walk right again. I’ll get ya…really, I will.”

That statement alone was all they needed to burst out at my expense, and why not, I had burst out laughing at many of theirs. If one bad thing at the wall wasn’t enough, another was just waiting to happen. The second time I ran at Jacob, I flew into the air, way above the wall and just to the side of being…too far over. As soon as I realized that I was going to go over and crash to the ground, I began reaching out for Derek’s hand, that he was reaching out to me. He got a hold of my fingers and my body, just as they made a solid impact with the outer wall. The vines were thicker and the foliage helped to keep me from hitting the roughest part of the stone with my head, but it hurt like the dickens none-the-less. Derek tried to pull me up, but I shook my head to stop. I didn’t have enough air in my lungs to speak, and my arm was ripping out of the socket. “Let go,” I tried to say the first time, and then took what air I could and yelled, “Drop me!” How my little brother could enjoy leaping into the air and missing my arms, I would never understand. That had made my stomach meet the bottom of my throat.

Derek did as I had asked and I dropped down as far as my grip on the vine allowed. I rolled to my back so I could see where I was going to drop and let go of the vine, crashing into the shrubbery that circled the estate. I stepped out waving my arm, letting them know I was alright. A few minutes later Garvin came flying up in the air and landed right on top of Derek, grabbing the vines on my side and making his way halfway down before dropping into the thick foliage. Derek was almost to the ground when Fala’s feet landed behind us. We turned to check if he was alright and saw his werewolf form rising up and looking back.

“That was enjoyable,” he said in his werewolf growl, raising one side of his jaw.

“What about Jacob?” I asked, getting no response from breeder or werewolf so I went to the gate to watch.

Jacob backed up and ran at the wall, jumping up and kicking off, getting higher and higher. When he stopped and dropped back down, Cates got on his stomach cross ways with his legs hanging over on our side, and his arms on the other. Tammy lay across his back, and Cates called out, “You can do it young Jacob, just like you did when we climbed the wall in Italy.”  Jacob laughed, saying it was a few feet shorter and then ran straight at the wall, kicking off the ground about five feet out, landing one foot on the wall then the next as his body moved skyward. Cates stretched as Jacob moved his feet faster, flinging his self forward toward the upper wall. At the last second, before his body gave into the call of gravity, his hand shot upward and grabbed the one that was waiting. Jacob put his feet on the wall and climbed the rest of the way up, using Cates to hold on to. Jacob and Cates helped Tammy down, dropping her sooner than they should of, but she, too, landed in the thick shrubs and once she realized she was okay, stopped complaining.

Jacob moved down with a graceful skill using the vines to his advantage; whereas Cates had to use his thighs to grip the vines since he only had one hand to lower himself. Yet he still managed to break the vine from the wall. He landed in the arms of Fala, missing the shrubbery all together. I think we all got a good laugh as we made our way to the edge of a place that I had heard stories of, back in my neck of the woods. The darkness of the ruins of the old part of the city that had been abandoned when the plagues hit London, stood like jagged teeth in the paler background of the night sky. A foggy mist covered most of the lower lying areas. I was pleased to see it, no matter how sad and forgotten that it looked, since it was above ground where we could breathe fresh air and use the light of the stars to keep us out of  darkness that had no possible light of its own.

“Stay close once we reach the Narrows. It has been more years than I care to remember since my last venture into a place such as this,” Jacob spoke as we made our way down a rocky slope, and through a small group of trees. “The buildings were falling down then, so watch your step on the broken stones under your feet. The tunnels have been known to collapse right out from under the one walking above it.” ***

An hour later we were winding our way through a broken-down, two-story building, that was made from wood, not stone as I thought it would have been, since everything standing tall that I had seen so far had been. It was as gray as the street was black. The wood crumbled under the weight of my shoes as I followed the others over the fallen debris. The deeper we made our way into the fallen depths of the city, the darker it became and the thoughts of my walking in the fresh night air with the open sky above my head disappeared. The stench was nothing like that of the enclosed tunnels but it held the hint of death regardless. Rats scurried across the broken cobblestone streets, as we showed a force of power walking in a group as big as the one we had.

Derek bumped Jacob on the side and lifted his head toward an alleyway that had four young youths standing lazily about, watching us as we passed. I thought I heard the faint sound of purring and turned my attention to Fala who was still in his animal form at Jacob’s request. He said he thought it would be best if those who lived in the Narrows saw our group walking with a beast that they were used to seeing and one that they knew better than to mess with.  Fala paid no attention to the four, letting me know they were no threat to us, but I could swear the purring sound that I was hearing wasn’t coming from the wolf behind me, but the four youths watching us from the alley. I looked over, staring for a long while as we moved by. Two of the boys looked at each other and started laughing. It was then that I knew where the purring sound was coming from. Their teeth were just like the teeth of the dead men hanging on the lowest dungeon walls of Cheree’s estate. They were cat people, and the first I had ever seen alive.

I had asked Jacob why he called this area the Narrows, and he said because he knew no other name for it, and it was what they called the ruins of the city around France, a place that he and Cates knew well. “We are being followed,” Fala said in a voice as low as his large stature would allow. When I whispered back asking if it was the four standing in the alley, he just shook his massive head once, replying that it was not. Jacob stopped, turning his head to the right, and gripped the blade on his hip. Each of us followed suit.

“The elder’s assassins have found us,” he hissed through clenched teeth, sliding his blade from its sheath. Tammy and I both squatted to the ground spinning out to the side looking for any signs of movement, while Fala and Derek put their backs to us, looking in the direction we were not. Jacob and Cates took a fighting crouch. Jacob turned his blade in a figure eight motion, as Cates popped his neck to the side. Garvin mimicked their stance, holding his blade out in front of him with his back to theirs.

An ear piercing scream rang out, raising every hair on the back of my neck. It didn’t sound like a normal or breeder; it was far too high pitched. Several more rang out; with loud hissing and roar sounding howls much like Fala’s, but with nowhere near the embodiment of his deep guttural outburst. These were more like the cries of two wild cats fighting, only these wild cats sounded twice the size and like they were fighting for their lives. The four youths must have stepped out behind us at the wrong time. Abruptly, everything fell silent.