Harden
What are you doing?
The question went unanswered as he headed down the trail. Sometimes he ignored himself. Most often when his inner-self began asking ridiculous questions. Things like, “what are you doing?” when it knew damn well what he was doing. It was part of him. It could read his mind and see his sights.
Harden Archer was walking down the street, one arm over his shoulder, finger hooked around a piece of curled metal, the hanger that held the contents of the long, slim protectant sleeve currently draped down his back. What wasn’t there to understand about that?
Okay fine. Why are you doing this?
Ah. Better question. One he could really sink his teeth into to answer. He was doing it because it needed to be done. Not necessarily because he was comfortable with it. Possibly because it made him completely uncomfortable. It got him out of the resting house where he’d been staying. Recuperating, really. Recovering.
With some of his energy back, he’d begun to feel penned in. This might be taking things to the extreme as his first excursion but then again, Harden had never been one to half-ass things before. Why start now? He’d gained his reputation for being fearless by simply charging ahead, and he wasn’t about to stop now. His friends had stayed behind, but he couldn’t blame them. Some of them had suffered worse than he had. He’d been lucky; they’d saved him for last, and so he’d had to endure it for a shorter time than the others.
Shaking his head away from that line of thought, penning the darkness back up inside of him, Harden began to whistle a jaunty tune as he strolled down the path. Roads really weren’t a thing in Cadia, just like any other shifter territory. Cars weren’t welcome, and only tolerated when they didn’t have any other choice. The bus he was to take wasn’t being tolerated, hence the walk with all of his belongings.
Harden snorted. All of his belongings didn’t really amount to much. He had a knapsack over one shoulder containing several other changes of clothes, in addition to the suit bag he held over his other, the metal wire hanger bouncing against him with every other stride. Even all of that had been donated, since he’d come to Cadia with nothing to his name.
Stop it. Tonight is not a night for moping about. You can do that tomorrow all day, if you truly feel the need.
Done. He was going to need the pity after the night was over.
Oh for fuck’s sake. STOP IT. I’m the one that’s supposed to berate you…not…you.
“I’m going crazy,” he said aloud, slowing to a halt as he shook his head once more, trying to get the other voices out of it. “I must be. I’m talking to myself, and arguing about which one of us is allowed to insult me. That can’t be normal.”
Overhead the sun slid behind some dark gray clouds, sending the late afternoon gloom into a deepening pitch. Harden didn’t think it was going to rain, but it certainly was going to be an overcast evening.
“Perfect for my mood,” he joked to himself, resuming his walk. The bus was visible now, parked off to the right opposite the woods that approached the cluster of buildings that marked the town of Cadia, namesake of the vast sprawling territory that surrounded him.
Glancing over his shoulder, Harden frowned. There was no one else around. He’d expected there to be other shifters making their way out as well. Was he late? He didn’t think so. He’d checked the time before setting out, and had left plenty of time to take the twenty-minute drive.
“Where is everyone?” he asked aloud. The bus was there. He could see it; it was real.
“We asked them politely to wait a few minutes,” a voice said from his left.
Harden started as a shadow detached itself from the forest and emerged into the middle of the road.
“Do I know you?” he asked, confused.
“I know you,” came the reply.
He eyed the speaker. Tall, lithe, with the animalistic stride of a rangy predator. Wolf, perhaps, like himself. He wouldn’t be positive until he could catch his scent, and currently the wind was working against him, blowing downwind toward the newcomer.
Harden farted.
A second later the other man’s face twitched, and he tried not to grin widely. He wasn’t afraid of this man, and he wanted it to show. After all he’d been through, one measly shifter was not going to ruin his night.
“Can I help you?” he asked after trying to pass gas once more and coming perilously close to something else.
“Yes.”
“Awesome. Spit it out and let’s get this over with, shall we?” he asked, bored. Harden had no idea what was going on, but the easiest way to speed it along would be to anger the other shifter by constantly keeping him off guard.
“Enough.” The other man spoke in what he was sure he hoped was an icy voice, but really didn’t come out that way. The squeak certainly didn’t help.
“Oh please,” Harden said, starting forward again. “Look, buster. I don’t know if bandits on the trails are a thing in Cadia, but seriously, you don’t want to do this. Get out of my way.”
The kid—and he was a kid he realized now—tried to stand his ground, but Harden could see him fighting not to move as he approached. He had him now. The damage had already been done. A few more steps and the kid would shuffle back, or to the side, and that would be that. He would allow Harden to pass unharmed, and as a result, Harden wouldn’t rip his throat out.
He should begin to waver right about—
The youthful shifter spread his legs wide and steadied up, glaring at Harden with renewed confidence and strength.
What the hell? Harden focused, and saw the kid’s eyes focus over his left shoulder a moment before a hand clamped down on it and spun him around.
“Bandits aren’t a thing,” a deeper, much calmer voice said. “But I can assure you, I do want to do this.”
A fist drove into his stomach as the other shifter struck first, not waiting for Harden to make a move. The blow was immensely powerful, blasting the air from his lungs. Harden fell to one knee, gasping in an attempt to suck in some oxygen, his eyes bulging as his lungs refused to follow his commands.
“That’s for mouthing off to my brother,” he snapped.
A knee took Harden in the mouth, splitting his lip and spinning him to the ground. He flung both hands out in front of him to slow his fall. He stayed there, spitting out blood for a few seconds.
“That was a mistake,” he growled as air finally rushed into his system. Harden was not even close to submitting. Not to this punk, at least.
He lashed out with a foot, driving his foe’s leg backward. Dropping the fancy clothes and knapsack, he rolled backward out of range of a retaliatory leg kick and right into range of the young shifter. The youth was slow and clumsy. Harden caught his blow, twisted it aside, and dislocated his elbow with a vicious chop, the only attack he had time for before big brother arrived. Spinning, he sent the kid stumbling into his brother, buying him some more time.
“What the fuck is your problem?” he snapped. “I didn’t do a damn thing to you.”
“My problem is you,” the bigger of the two raged. “You come here, you use up our resources, and now you think you can just waltz in and take our mates?”
Harden blinked. This was not what he’d expected to hear. “Your mates?” he said with a laugh. “I didn’t realize you had a claim on all of them.”
“We do,” came the snarled reply.
“What, the two of you?” he laughed. “Look, I get that Buster here is young, dumb, and full of, um, energy and vigor. But I think you have to admit that’s a stretch.”
“Not us, but us,” the taller one said, gesturing with an arm to mean he meant all of Cadia.
Ah. Now it made sense. Harden had to admit he was surprised. He’d not expected everyone to sympathize with his plight. That was going too far. But to have a violent response to the presence of him and his friends? That was…unexpected.
“Look,” he said, addressing the older brother, staring into his cold brown eyes, noting the freshly shaved head and constantly flaring nostrils. “We don’t have to do this. I don’t want to hurt you.”
Truth be told, Harden wasn’t sure he could hurt them. He was still weak, still recovering. His body had been stressed far past what it could take, and it hadn’t been allowed sufficient time to heal. Not that he was about to let them know that.
“Hurt me? You? Oh please. Now there’s a laugh.” To emphasize his point the bald-headed older brother tossed his head back and laughed, a short barking sound.
Harden didn’t wait. He surged forward and took him in the stomach, driving his shoulder in and up with as much strength as he could muster. Air whuffed from the other shifter, and he flew backward, bouncing twice off the ground before he came to a halt. Harden’s hand shot out, fingers tightening around the scrawny younger shifter’s neck. They were wolves, he knew now, like himself. Powerful, but prone to extreme bouts of anger. He would be in tough if he was fully healthy. Now he needed to be careful.
“Get out of my way, or I snap his neck,” he said icily, brooking no argument. Harden didn’t want to do it, but he’d done worse. He’d do it again. It wasn’t as if he’d started it. They’d sought him out, acting like he wasn’t welcome in their little “Club Cadia.”
Assholes.
“Fine,” the bald one spat.
“Start running then,” Harden said, gesturing back down the path behind him, toward Cadia. “Once you’re out of sight, I’ll let him go.”
The glare he received could have cut through solid steel, but Harden just shrugged it off. He wasn’t afraid of the power behind it.
“I’ll be waiting for you, just follow the path,” he said, then took off.
“Wait!” the youth called out, struggling to get free.
Harden held him still.
“I’m no threat to you,” he said as the kid subsided. “Why does he hate me so much?”
“Fuck you!” The kid spat at him. Or tried to, but Harden saw the action coming from a mile away and jerked his neck back so that he almost choked on the loogie.
“Get out of here,” Harden said, tossing him to the ground and then placing his foot on his ass and giving him a shove back toward town. “I don’t ever want to see you again.”
The wolf shifter took off after his older brother, pausing for a split second to allow his wolf to emerge, and then booking it down the road at a pace his human form could never have matched. Harden stood straight and tall until he was out of sight of even his superhuman eyesight, and then he fell to the ground.
His head was pounding, and every muscle in his body ached. But there was something he needed to do. Something he had to see. Crawling across the ground, he snatched up the hanger and held it aloft.
“Excellent.”
A grin spread across his face. The clothes were still intact. He could still attend the party tonight. No, not a party. A ball. The ball.
The shifters’ ball.