[SRP] Come, Lonely Hunter (Metawa and Erasmus)

[Geyser Eelborn]

((Takes place before "His Morning Messenger." Content warning for blatant racism against shifters and milder racism against Kalonas.))

On the hunt again for her father. Metawa wondered how much of her life she had spent looking for the beast. Each time she caught up with him, hoping he’d be a father now instead of…whatever he was. What a waste of time, she thought. I keep looking for something I know I can never get from him! Why do I keep doing this?!

He wandered around so much it was impossible to guess his next movement. But for the most part, he stuck to forests and plains, rarely straying into mountains or onto the coast. He was at least predictable in that respect. It was unusual, then, for him to go into a swamp. Maybe he was in one of his phases, where he was just trying to get away from her. Maybe I should take the hint and stop following him. Every time she caught up with him when he was in his chased phase, he’d turn on her and attack her. And no matter what form he was in, Metawa was no match for him.

But Metawa was nothing if not stubborn. She slogged through the water and the moss and the mud, her ears pricked for any sound of the shifterlona stallion, her nose held to the air to try to catch his scent on the breeze. All around her, the swamp was alive with life. Insects buzzed through the air, a constant hum all around her, midges and flies gathering around her. She had to constantly swat them away with her tail and wings every other second. Curious dragonflies hovered around her face as if trying to make eye contact with her or communicate with her. Birds called in the treetops and from logs floating in the water; turtles stared at her, unblinking, as if to ask her what she was doing in the swamp. But there was no sign anywhere of a wolf.

The buzzing stopped.

The birds fell silent.

Metawa stood still. She didn’t need to know much about swamps to know that this was a very bad sign. Something was nearby, but she couldn’t smell her father anywhere. Was he just hidden by the smell of decaying vegetation? Was he watching her, at this very moment, stalking her, ready to attack?  

[Geyser Eelborn]

Erasmus liked visitors.

He knew most folks would have considered it unusual, but most folks didn’t know much. Gators were more social than most people knew, and even a pureblood like him was half-Soquili. Besides, he was just generally…friendly. He’d never had any reason to not be, after all. He could take pretty much anyone he’d ever met on in a fight. And most people didn’t want trouble from him anyhow. Maybe it’s my teeth. Or maybe it’s just my winnin’ personality. Either way, he could afford to relax—what was going to attack him, anyway? Especially in a swamp where he had the clear advantage?

So no, he didn’t mind seeing another Soquili in the swamp, even if it was one of them. And when a mare came in right after him, chasing him into the swamp, well, might as well go find out what that’s all about, eh? Most folks didn’t try to go looking for ‘em, after all. So he abandoned his nice, warm spot in the sun and swam towards the mare as she struggled through one of the channels. It wasn’t deep enough to cause her trouble, just comin’ up to her knees, but it was deep enough to give most folks pause. Hard to run away in that kind of channel, and with all the critters going silent when he was on the move, he could hardly blame her for the way her ears twitched back and forth and her body tensed up.

He could live here a thousand years and most animals would still be nervous of him. Not just because he was a gator, but because he was very much not a gator. Again, hard to blame ‘em. Wasn’t their fault they knew a predator when they saw one. And sure, he’d eat critters, though generally he tried to avoid eating the ones he knew could talk. They’d settle down again when he stopped moving, but for now, he might as well be on the hunt as far as most of his neighbors were concerned.

He glided through the water towards the mare, waiting until he was in her line of sight before assuming what he always thought of as his taller form.  

[Geyser Eelborn]

When Metawa saw the alligator swimming towards her, she readied her wings to help her escape. The water was deep—not so deep she couldn’t run, but deep enough that she couldn’t outpace a swimming predator in its native environment. And it was a big alligator, as big as a Soquili. She’d need all the help she could get, and if she started flapping her wings as she ran, she might be able to get into the air before the lizard dragged her down and drowned her.

Then, to her horror, it changed—no, shifted. Where an alligator had been swimming, there now stood a Soquili stallion, his face and body obscured by the pelt of an alligator fused to his skin.

Flight was impossible. Fight took hold.

Metawa turned and reared, screaming obscene words of defiance, her hooves clawing at the air, her sharp fangs bared. If she was going to go down, she was going to go down with a fight. She lunged at the shifter stallion, her hooves slashing at his shoulders and head. She couldn’t outrun him, he had the terrain advantage, and she couldn’t outfight him, he had the build and the teeth. Judging by the scars all over his body, he had the experience, too, to win the fight against her. She saw an opportunity to sink her teeth into his shoulder and she took it, biting deep to inflict pain.

“Ow!” His voice was gentle, his accent lilting. “That hurt.”

She released him and stared, ready to continue the battle. Her heart pounded in her chest, and there was a ringing in her ears. But as her eyes swept over the stallion, she realized with a jolt that he hadn’t moved at all. He was completely still and unmoving, other than his head, which was tilted to the side. “Who are you, and why are you following me?!” she hissed.

He smiled, revealing a mouth full of alligator’s teeth. She swallowed hard. She knew what that meant. Her father’s teeth were still the fangs of a Kalona, even after all these years as a shifter. The only shifters who had the same teeth as the animal whose pelt they bore were pure-shifters, the ones who had been born with their curse. They were supposed to be stronger, faster.

More vicious. So why wasn’t he attacking her?! Was he toying with her? The blood boiled in her veins. How dare he. How dare he stand there and let her win, all to lure her into a false sense of security!!  

[Geyser Eelborn]

She attacked him! What had he done?!

He knew that his breed had a bad reputation amongst Soquili, but really? He’d tried to advertise his approach, make sure that he wasn’t transformin’ in her blind spot, and she still got mad at him?!

He took a deep breath. She had every right to get upset. He was a shifter, and there were so many bad uns that it was no wonder most Soquili thought they were all monsters. Besides, in a swamp like this, he had an advantage in a fight. He looked down at the bleeding wound on his shoulder. Kalona, eh. He’d never met one before, and today, two Kalonas came wandering into the swamp. Just his day for ‘em, he guessed. They bit hard, and the mare’s hooves had left scrapes as well, ones that would form bruises around them. Ah well. He could take a couple injuries.

Erasmus flashed the mare a smile and bowed. “My name is Erasmus Lafayette. I’d welcome you to my swamp, but it’s not technically mine. I’m just here for a while until I can find a place I like better.” He looked her over. Up close, she was quite pretty, like a sunrise on a frigid morning. Very striking. And, he thought, she looked a little similar to that other shifter as well. Something about the black and orange markings, the swirls and the spikes. Maybe they were related? It seemed likely enough. “Y’know, I know it’s none of my business, but…you wouldn’t happen to know a shifter who was a Kalona like yerself, would yah? Only, I saw one pass through here a few hours ago, and I wondered if maybe y’knew each other or something.”

Belatedly, it occurred to him what that sounded like. “Not that I think all Kalonas know each other! But we don’t get many Kalonas here, and I thought, well, seems like a big coincidence, two black Kalonas passing through here on the same day…?”  

[Geyser Eelborn]

Well, whoever this shifter was, he was clearly insane. That much was evident from him being a shifter. But his attitude towards her sealed the deal. He was mad, obviously so. Why else would he not be attacking her?! Why else would he be letting her go without hurting her?! He had the advantage, why not take it?!

“My name is Metawa,” she said. “You still haven’t answered my question, why are you following me?!”

But then he kept speaking and she snarled again, her wings flared. “So he is here!” she shouted. “Here, in this swamp! That mangy, flea-ridden, leech-sucked rabid son of a coyote—”

She stomped her hoof, sending water splashing against both of them. “But I can’t find him!! No matter how hard I try, I can’t catch up to him, he keeps getting away!! The slimy, slippery, cheating little—”

Erasmus spoke, cutting off her speech. “I take it he’s no friend of yours then?”

“He’s my father,” Metawa spat. “And I hate him. I hate him so much. That, that…wolf! And he’s getting away again! He probably came to the swamp to get me off his trail!!” Without thinking, she started pacing, her tail lashing back and forth and her wings fluttering in irritation.  

[Geyser Eelborn]

Father. That’s more or less what he expected. Erasmus sighed. Whatever was going on was clearly complicated. The mare was agitated. He wished he could calm her down, but in a state like this, he didn’t think it was likely. When people started acting like this, they usually couldn’t be talked back down again. Metawa clearly had a lot of history with her father.

“Are y’ here to kill him?” Erasmus asked softly.

“No!!” Metawa snapped. “No, never!! I don’t want to kill him, I just—!!” She took a deep breath, looking like it was taking every last strand of sanity to stay calm. “He’s like a wild beast, just some mindless killer. I don’t want a mindless killer, I want a father!!”

Birds took off from nearby trees, more frightened of staying in place near the angry Soquili than of revealing their location to the shifter (who could clearly see them).

“I just want a father!” Metawa said again. When she turned to face him, he could see tears in her icy eyes. “Or something, some kind of family that doesn’t make me feel ashamed to exist!!”

Erasmus winced. It was too late to withdraw from this conversation now. He hated confrontation like this, hated the difficult emotions. He loved people, but he was bad, very bad, at calming people down when they were being controlled by their emotions like this. He was missing a whole story here, but he had to do what he could to help. The look in her eyes, of utter hopelessness, was too much for him to bear. “Everyone deserves to have a father,” he said gently. He saw the flash in her eyes and added quickly, “Having a shifter for a father, ‘specially a cursed one, that’s hard, I can see that.”  

[Geyser Eelborn]

“Yes.” She snorted at the absurd creature before her. “Any shifter at all, really.” He still wasn’t attacking her. He sounded…sympathetic. Like he was trying to draw her in or something.

Or maybe, just maybe, he was genuine. Maybe he was a good person. That’s impossible, that’s now how shifters work. They’re monsters, they have to be, it’s in their nature, they can’t help it. She’d seen too many of her father’s rages to think otherwise. “You’re an odd one,” she said. “Why haven’t you attacked me yet.”

He stared at her. “Why would I?”

“You’re a shifter.”

“So what? You’re a Kalona. Don’t y’all have…shadow magic or somethin’?”

Metawa laughed. “Technically, yes. I’ve never had reason to use it.” To be honest, she didn’t actually know how to use her powers. She hadn’t spent enough time among purebred Kalonas to know how to tap into their abilities. “I don’t particularly see any reason in sickening you.”

Erasmus nodded slowly. “Alright, fair enough. And I don’t see any reason in eating you. I’ve got other things to eat. I don’t eat Soquili. Feels too close to cannibalism for my liking.”

She squinted at him, suspicion rising again in her mind at his words. “Too close to cannibalism? So what? It’s cannibalism. You are a shifter,” she said slowly, as if explaining a simple concept to a foal. “You are a monster. You eat people. You attack them and destroy their lives, you kill and hurt and maim and you don’t care, none of you do, none of you have families or homes or people you care about, you are monsters!” She started out talking at a normal volume, but by the end she was shouting at him. She was aware that her ears were pinned against her neck, and her tail lashing, but she didn’t care. There was a shifter here, one who was trying to trick her into believing that he was nice, and gentle, and not like the other shifters. As if she would fall for that! As if she were that stupid!  

[Geyser Eelborn]

Erasmus was not easy to anger. He prided himself on being calm and level-headed, capable of not taking offense, no matter what other people said. He tried to let the emotions of others slide off of him like water off of scales—never soaking through to the body beneath. But what the mare was screaming at him was enough to make him lose his calm. He found he was starting to hiss, deep in his throat, and he was bearing his teeth once again. The mare had sharp teeth, it was true, sharp enough to make him bleed, but he had more of them, and his were bigger, too. His jaws were more powerful. His claws could scratch even better than her hooves.

He could take her in a fight. He could tear her apart, show her just how awesome a shifter unleashed could be.

But he wouldn’t do that. He was a Lafayette, and they Didn’t Do That. They Didn’t Have To. And he certainly wasn’t going to attack a mare who was clearly mad at someone else.

Besides, it was a cursed shifter, and his family had all kinds of things to say about them, none of them complimentary.

He took a deep breath and forced himself to calm down. “I do care about people,” he said softly but firmly. “Even strangers. It sounds to me like your father is a cursed shifter, and an uncharmed one at that. Am I right?”

She looked confused. “Charmed?”

Ah. That might explain it. Non-shifters knew so little about their breed, it was no wonder, but still… He lifted left foreleg to show her the Angeni charm attached to his skin there, echoing the green of his other skin. “Angeni charm,” he said. “Works a treat. Clears the mind of the Darkness.”

She looked up at his face, her own still lined with suspicion. “Shifters can’t go near Angeni,” she said flatly. “Everyone knows that. What Darkness?”

“You said your father was vicious. Well,” he amended, “didn’t exactly say. But y’ implied. That’s the Darkness. Rules most shifters. Makes it hard for them to care about the feelings of others. Strips away altruism and compassion and empathy. Guess y’could call ‘em feral. But these” he lifted his leg again “free the mind from the darkness. Sure, you’ll still get some shifters who are every bit as vicious as they were before. But mostly, the charmed ones aren’t. It’s a gift from the gods and the stars, being able to think without the darkness.”

She stared at him for a long time, emotions flitting across her face, clearly trying to figure out if she could believe him or not. “You called them…Angeni charms?”

“They’re made by Angeni. Mostly, we have to ask other creatures to bring them to us. Hard to mingle with Angeni. But most of ‘em are happy to make ‘em. They know they’re needed.” Metawa was starting to calm down, and he was starting to relax as well. She didn’t seem quite so angry anymore. He was still upset at her calling him names, but at least it was better. “The blood and light of a willing Angeni will chase the darkness away. I take it your father hasn’t got one.”  

[Geyser Eelborn]

Metawa shook her head. “No, he doesn’t,” she said quietly. Her mind was racing. Every part of Erasmus’s body language suggested he was telling the truth. If so…then the solution to her problem could be here. A charm. She’d just need to find an Angeni. They weren’t exactly common, but surely she could find one? Yes, she could find one, and maybe convince them that her father needed one—

Her father. Without the darkness, she could finally know her father.

The breath was catching in her throat at the idea of it.

“How long do they last?” she asked, forcing her voice to be calm through force of will.

Erasmus laughed. “Forever!” he said. “They fuse to the skin. All y’gotta do is touch the charm to the body of the shifter and their mind will clear. They might not necessarily be good people. Everyone’s different. But it clears away that which makes it impossible to be better. It means they have as much a chance to be good as a unicorn or a wind-dancer.”

Metawa shook her head again, slowly. “That’s…too good to be true. I’m not saying you’re a liar, Erasmus—I’m just saying…” She took a deep breath. “I’ve been hoping for a solution for a long time. Most of my life. And now you’re telling me that there is a solution? And that there’s always been one?”

The shifter’s voice was soft. “What’s the point o’ lookin’ for a cure for somethin’ if you aren’t willin’ to accept the cure when y’ find it? You say you’ve been lookin for a solution. Here it is. It’s not exactly common knowledge,” he added. “Mostly it’s just Angeni and a few families of purebloods—pureblood shifters—who know it, that kind of thing. Not surprised you didn’t know about it, unless you grew up around Angeni.”

“I didn’t.” Metawa grimaced. She looked Erasmus over. He still looked like he was being honest. Or maybe he’s still lying to me? Maybe he’s trying to lull me into a false sense of security. Maybe he’s a better liar than I thought. “I still don’t trust you,” she said at last. “I’m…sorry I called you a monster. You’re helping me, even though I called you that. So whatever your intentions might be, well…that’s a point in your favor.”

Erasmus raised an eyebrow. “Thanks, I guess?” he said at last. “I don’t know if I should trust a Kalona, even one who doesn’t use her powers against me.” He shook his head. “Listen, Miss Metawa, if y’ don’t believe me, there’s an Angeni who lives in the chestnut grove north o’ here, over the hill with the three boulders on the top. Talk to them, and they’ll tell you the same thing I told you, about the charm. It might not be enough to bring your father ‘back,’ but it’s the best chance you’ve got. At the very least, you’ll be able to take out your frustrations on him instead of me.”

Metawa ducked her head, feeling ashamed. “Thank you, Erasmus Lafayette. I will take your advice.” She sighed. “The wolf’s probably escaped by now anyway.”

“He must be cleverer than he looks. He looked pretty…mad to me.”

She laughed. “He’s insane,” she said. “Not the craziest shifter I’ve met. But he’s…up there, certainly.” She looked him over. “It was…well, I don’t know if it was actually nice to meet you. Since I was so…”

“Angry?”

“Yes.” She sighed. “You didn’t deserve that.”

He grinned. “Probably?”

“Well, I don’t know you. Maybe you’re a mass-murdering serial killer and your belly is just too full to want to eat me,” she sighed. “I don’t know. I’m so tired of meeting awful people. I want to trust someone like you, because at the end of the day, I want to live in a world where people like you are trustworthy. I don’t believe I live in that world, but maybe I can pretend, for a little while, that I do.”

“Maybe I come from that world,” he said. He chuckled. “Go find the Angeni, Miss Metawa. Get that charm. Charm your father and maybe get him back. Then come back and tell me how it went. I’ll admit I’m curious. Though I warn you—I’ll want to know the full story.”

“Alright.” Metawa spread her wings. “Thank you for your help, Erasmus. It was…very hopeful. I’ll see you again when this is all over.”

And with that, she set off into the sky, leaving the swamp and its enigmatic shifter, behind.