Build god, then we'll talk - Ever-

[rumour]

She scuttled back under the bed when he moved, reversing up and into the middle, away from the sides in case.... she did not know in case of what. Just in case. Centred, she cowered as he yelled and tore at the sheets above her, curling into a ball as small as she could, away from his anger and his frustration, away from the man whose wrath was heightened by the grief she could make out in his voice. Rumour longed to answer him, to call out and tell him that she was there and she was alive, that she wasn’t dead, but the vixens mouth was not capable of forming those words. Instead, she only trembled, soft sounds of her fear and of her stress escaping her throat.

Once more, she tried to change back. She tried to shift back into the form she knew, the girl the man who loved and who loved him back, to escape the beast and its fur – the monster that was her truth and one she had denied for the greater part of her life. She had feared it and she had hated it and she had done her best to hide it from Ever... but now he had seen it with his own eyes. He had seen who and what she really was, the evil of her blood right. Despite herself, Rumour lay in wait of a second death this day... for the transformation to jump start the amnesiacs memory, and bring back the past she had suspected from the day he had told her about the pentagram tattoo... since he had started telling her of his monster filled dreams. It was a suspicion that she would never voice to him of course, one she never wished too. She knew hunters. Hunters wished for her life on a platter, and now she feared the realisation of these truths in his dark eyes.

What she feared came, groping hands fisting the fur at the back of her neck and dragging her from the safety of her shadows and out in the garish light of a sun that was dying with the waning hours. It threw a halo of light around Ever that the vixen found both beautiful and terrifying, squirming in his grasp for the freedom of solid ground.

She stopped when he shook her, looking across at him with her big dark eyes, caught halfway between her real blues and the vixens amber. She whimpered softly and looked at him, willing him to see, willing for her body to be under her control, to turn back into her. Squirming again, she barked, pawing at the air. She had his answers if he would only see... if he would only believe what his eyes had told him.

[Ever Goodman]

Ever’s heart was pounding so fiercely he was sure it was going to break through the walls of its cage and come crashing through, leaving him with a gaping whole in the center of his chest. What the fuck did he need with it anyway? It was so damaged it was bound to be useless now.

How could he possibly come back from this? The thought of getting over the loss of someone that had become his everything seemed unfathomable. Impossible. She was his heart. His breath. His strength and his world. And he had never even had a chance to tell her. Though they had meant so much falling from his lips, those three little words did not seem like enough now.
Besides the loss Ever couldn’t grasp getting past the guilt that plagued him. He could have stopped this. If he had been man enough to disregard the threats from Rumour and done something about Devlin, he would have never been able to find her; to come here and rip her so easily from his life.

The vixen in his hand begun to yip and struggle, and Ever cursed, looking back and forth in its vast eyes. For a moment he was struck by an odd pang; a sensation that was strangely comforting as it was unsettling.
Those eyes. This fox. His fox.

And somehow the sensation transported him elsewhere, to a place deep within the recesses of his memory.

It was night and the air held a chill that belied the usually balmy summer season. Ever was watching the scene as if -he- were the one standing over a creature on the ground; its crimson stained maw open to reveal a mouth full of bloody pointed teeth; more blood and tissue coating its silvery fur. Blood and tissue that were not its own. This monster had done horrible, horrible things to those that had not deserved it. The young man could sense this so adamantly in his chest he felt no pain for the withering wolf lying there.

Two adults; a man and a woman, looked on at him with pride glowing in their familiar faces, and a teenage boy beside him clapped him on the back. Ever looked down to find a weapon in his hand. He could feel the cold steel of the hilt in his palm and the weight of the blade was almost tangible.

The creature moved and Ever, or the person whom Ever was looking through their eyes, panicked, suddenly bringing the gleaming silver dagger down into the chest of the massive monster. It growled and whined, twisting and jerking until it went still and silent.
Ever could feel the heavy staccato in his own chest quicken as he watched the wolf transform into a lifeless, bleeding human male.

He let out a gasp, suddenly back in the darkening hotel room and still clinging to the scruff of the vixen’s neck. Ever shuddered, letting go and panting as the realization of the flashback hit him like a Mack truck.
The fox. Rumour. The fox was Rumour.

“No… its not…it’s not real.” Ever choked out and shook his dark head in disbelief. “It can’t be you. You…you can’t be Rumour.”
He dragged his tongue across his bottom lip and furrowed his brows, reaching out a trembling hand towards the creature. “Rumour? Is that you?”

[rumour]

Rumour continued to squirm in her love’s grasp, the fingers in her scruff not painful, but uncomfortable in the way that it pulled at her skin. She longed for the floor and the safety of darkness that she knew rested beneath the bed – but more than anything she longed for her body back. She longed for the feel of being tall, of being on control – to be able to talk. And as she looked around the blood stained room, taking in the carnage of the night with wide, frightened blue eyes, as she watched the man she loved look at her in disbelief, Rumour longed for the naivety of blindness.

Rumour dropped the floor with a yelp when he let her go, backing up with her tail tucked firmly between her legs until she hit the drawers, and then she made herself as small as possible, unwilling to turn her haze from Ever long enough to work out in which direction the bed lay, the shadow she knew lay underneath.

Cowering against the chest of drawers, Rumour trembled and waited, unsure of what was coming next... if he had realised what she was. Somewhere, she hoped he had. In many ways, it would make what was to come next...easier? There lay in the next few moments the promise of darkness or light – life or the indefinite return to death and solitude. It was truly in Evers hands – how he reacted to her secret. There had been a reason she had never told the man the truth about why her father had wanted to her dead, why he had believed her to be the essence of evil. She had always been terrified that the dark haired man before her would agree with the ideals of her father – but given the choice she knew by whose hand she would rather die now.

At his words, Rumour flattened her oversized ears flat against her skull and ducked her head low between her shoulders, and when his hand came out towards her, the instinct of the animal fighting in her won over as she bared her teeth and growled at him, fear of being grabbed overruling the otherwise peaceable gesture of the dark eyed man looking at her.

Realising though, that the gesture was not one of ill will, Rumour fought back and let her gums drop, a small, pink tongue, (complete with a spider shaped tongue bar piercing its length) darting over her maw a moment before the vixen took a shaky step forward. She paused a second, after this first movement, before she took another, advancing slowly until her head bumped against his fingers. Again, she flinched back, ducking her head and tilting it too look up at him for a moment, before she pushed the crown of her skull into the palm of his hand.

Yes. It was her.

[Ever Goodman]

When the awareness finally collided with him, it was with the force of the world upon his shoulders. Ever didn’t know how he knew it, but he understood that the fox was indeed his lover; that she had willingly (or unwillingly) transformed her feminine human form into that of a tiny white vixen. The amnesiac couldn’t fathom the existence of creatures like her in the world, but he couldn’t really deny it…not when this animal was standing mere feet from where the woman had laid lifeless just minutes before.

He winced at the fox’s sharp little teeth bared in warning, gasping quietly when the threatening pose vanished into a more yielding one. He had not missed the brief flash of tiny pink tongue and thus, the spider tipped bar that pierced it. It was undeniably his best friend. It was Rumour and she was alive.

When the small animal came forward to stroke her head against his palm Ever couldn’t help but let out an exhale of relief. Despite the size and shape of the being under his hand the man saw the girl whom he had grown to cherish in the short time they’d had with one another. Unbidden, he swept the creature from the ground and held it to his breast. His pounding heartbeat still threatened to come through his chest and the position which he held the fox permitted him to feel the hummingbird hammering inside her as well.

After holding her until the violent tremors in his hands subsided Ever lifted the creature from his chest in order to look into the golden tinted azure eyes of the fox; seeking some sort of awareness in that quixotic gaze. Could she comprehend him while in this form? She had approached him after his inquiry, but so does a wild kitten that sees an outstretched hand and finds a smell upon it enticing.
Blinking, he narrowed his gaze in the blue one and felt a twinge of disenchantment. He knew it was her despite the lack of audible retort and he couldn’t help but feel let down by it.

Why? Why hadn’t she told him?

Ever set the animal down and swept a hand through his hair, dragging his tongue across his bottom lip again.
His heart ached at the sudden insight that had filled him, a renewed pain inside an organ he had before thought was so broken it had gone numb. But such was not the case.
The amnesiac had often wondered why Rumour’s fathered loathed her so. He had asked for an explanation more times than he could remember…the inquiry always dismissed by the same answer. Evil. She was evil.
But he had never really accepted this. He knew her; this blind woman with the guarded heart. Knowing she had been prohibited love and kindness the man had given her everything inside of him; had confessed it all; each and every fear, dream, hope and regret.

So…why had it been so easy for her to keep something so profound from him?
The young man felt a stifling weight upon him again. He was Atlas with the world on his shoulders.
Had everything been a lie? Ever lifted his hand to clutch at the raw and throbbing place in his chest. Those three words she had spoken before her sightless eyes had slid closed and that last shuddering breath had escaped her…it had been a lie…

“You…you kept this from me.” He uttered the statement and tugged absently at the material of his tee-shirt. “After everything…you…didn’t trust me enough to tell me?”
The flame of anger that had subsided before was relit, and his face became pinched and hollow. “Didn’t bother to tell the man who actually loved you what you really were…why he was protecting you from someone who wanted you dead?!”

The anger within him grew until he couldn’t see the little fox before him, instead he saw a deceitful woman that had used him for…for…well, he didn’t know why she had really stuck around but she had to have some cunning reason!

“You’re a monster!” He yelled hoarsely, fisting his hands at his sides. “You’ve been a monster all this time!”

The words spewing out of the man were as dishonest as the truths Rumour had kept from him. He really didn’t hate her; had not suddenly become afraid of her, but he was speaking from a place inside of him that was wounded; fragile.
Of all people SHE was the only one that knew him. Ever had believed he had known her as well but it had all been a lie. She was a stranger.

[rumour]

His words cut deeper and hurt Rumour more that her father’s blade ever could. Her father may have killed her, for those few brief moments she may have truly been dead, but she never truly felt that till now. Each syllable was knife driven straight through her soul, more deadly than the wounds of her kin.... more poignant because they came from the man she loved, and so at odds to the brief moment he had clung to her as if life itself might depend on the two sharing but a beat of one heart. Or the first time this evening... in her life, the vibrancy of life she had begun to cling too was extinguished, and she felt truly dead.

This was what she had feared. This was the very reason she had never told him the truth. Once more flattening her ears against her skull, the vixen backed up and away from the man who was realising in a single burst of anger her worst fear. Her eyes darted around the small motel room, looking for escape, a way to flee the words tumbling from his lips. She knew what she was. Her father knew what she was. And now.... Now Ever knew too. And the fox knew what came next – what always came next. Despite earlier feelings, now the potential of true death lay before her once more, she realised how much she did not want to die – how much she wanted to live. Panic widened the vixens eyes, and instinct kicked in, a terrified mewl escaping her throat. When faced with the man she loved accusing her of her worst fear, the only thing that that entered her mid was to flee. She had to get out of there. Now.

Her eyes found what she was looking for behind him, the door still open from where he had come in, groceries littering the floor just in front. Crouching, the vixen tensed her muscles and sprung, sprinting around Ever’s legs and the fallen groceries, reaching the door and slipping through the gap, Rumour ran... and she kept running.

She didn’t stop when she reached the road, when the cars screaming past on the tarmac was loud enough to make her fur stand on edge... she didn’t stop when a little girl pointed out the “hurt doggy” as she raced past. She ran until her paws bled and then she kept going, drawn towards the last place on this earth she still found comforting – the ocean.

She stopped, finally, when her paws hit the surf and the salt water stung them. She slowed to a walk and finally she sat in the crest of the waves and cried, soft mewls of pain, of anguish.... of the betrayal she felt washing out into the darkening skies with each of the vixens wails. The animalistic sounds died slowly, changing into the quiet sobs of a young woman who sat naked in the water, the pain filled sound lost to the ocean and the deserted beach in which she sat, her head buried in her knees.