Elara's POV
The Elder's aura got heavier, and it seemed to multiply gravity. My shoulders felt heavier and this was doing absolutely nothing to help my heart thumping against my chest. Any moment now, I might have an autorhythmic organ in my hands.
For now, I raised my hands ever so slowly from my sides, all the while wrestling against the layers of gravity emitting from the elder. Swallowing several lumps later, I managed to hold out my wrist, but my gaze never left the Blavktrist. Still, I could tell, behind that heavy, thick veil, she had a scowl on her face. I could feel it.
I heard the sickening slush of flesh before I registered the pain. Fingers wrapped around my wrists and squeezed, twisting the wound to an odd angle, forcing pronation.
The pain that followed was sharp and bolted through my body to my brain. While my blood trickled into a bowl, I was wincing and wondering why this step was necessary, why pain was even a thing.
The Elder let go and my hands dropped to my sides, as if lifeless. Drops of blood trickled down my sides to my toes as I finally found the strength to raise my head. The Elder glided, -not walked- back to Colanvor, and took her stance, holding the bowl containing my blood to her chest.
Then the chants began.
It started more like muttering, the voices overlapping and then grew into a full fledged harmony, louder than anything I have ever heard before. Their voices became one, echoing the same words over and over.
The Elders raised the bowls up towards the moon, and my eyes followed. I realise only now that this was the best view of the moon in all the land, if the moon were to drop, it would drop right there.
Their Elders raised their voices impossibly higher, echoing the same words over and over.
Then something strange began to happen.
Blavktrist started first. It was always cold, throughout the year, but right now it was warm, wait - no, it's back to being cold.
And back to being warm.
Blavktrist was not the only one acting weird. Colanvor right before my eyes is starting to glow. All year round, it had a brown colour, the shade of rust, like iron weathered with age.
But right now it glowing, bit by bit till it's earlier brown looked like blocthes that it was peeling off. It was now particular colour, at least none that I know, it was more like shiny new iron. When the last of the brown blotches glowed new again, the chanting finally stopped.
Each Elder brought the bowl of blood back to their chests.
One elder suddenly turned around, as if on command and poured the blood in her bowl into the Colanvor. She muttered something, another string of words I do not understand not want to understand, and stepped back.
The entire square waited with bated breath, and anticipation made the air thicken, every eye, every parent, every family fixed on the Colanvor, waiting for something, anything to happen.
Then it did.
The entirety of the huge bell suddenly glowed red at once. Not gradual like the first, but at once, as if it was on a switch.
In a split second, the girl next to me dropped to the ground, with an ear splitting scream. I whipped my head towards her, concern weighing heavy in my heart.
She was a redhead, her hair falling gracefully around her as she curled into herself, she peeked out her face for a bit and it was twisted in agony. I felt a sharp stab in my chest, as worry and concern congealed into a dagger.
I had heard tales, eavesdropped on my brother's conversations, and everyone said one of things: the rite of wolfing was painful. But no one said it will be this painful.
I got only a glimpse of her face, but for the first time tonight, I was scared.
Scared beyond my wits.
I bent to her level, and brought her head to my chest. She was shaking so violently under my arms, it could pass as vibrating. Her screams were coming faster than ever, and I was trying and failing to hold her still. To remind her, to help her, and honestly I wasn't sure what I was doing, I just knew I couldn't leave her alone.
Her palm pushed my chest so hard, I released my grip on her, and my hands barely caught my fall. Panting heavily, I tried to get my bearings and turned towards her, but it was wasn't "her" anymore.
Her body was bent at odd angles, joints appearing whetr there should be none. She was still screaming, but it was no longer human, it was... animal.
Her body was visibly breaking and rejoining all at once, agony was all over her face, at least what is left of her face.
Speaking about her face, it was widening, elongating and shrinking all at once. I sat still on the floor, my hands behind my back, holding me up, frozen in trepidation.
I would have probably swallowed, but there was nothing to swallow in the first place, my throat was suddenly patched and scratchy, my saliva gone to a faraway land.
Red fur covered her body, tuft after tuft, till every inch of skin is covered in fur. It looked silky, almost inviting, the kind that makes you want to run your hands through. But the bearer was far from calm, much less inviting.
And me? I sat still, and will probably be frozen if Blavktrist was not warm right now.
Red fur girl started to pounce around, much more agitated than before. The look of agony has been replaced with something else, like there was an itch where she couldn't reach. Then the steely eyes of the wolf landed somewhere. I followed her gaze to the elder who had emptied the bowl into the Colanvor.
She looked the same as everyone else, calm and unruffled, hands tucked on her belly. Except her veil. It was moving slightly, barely noticeable.
She was whispering.
It was barely a whisper, until her incomprehensible words resounded through the square, and when it could not get any louder,
There was a howl
And everything went dead silent.