We Might Not Come Back

~Natakha~

It was too loud in the house that early in the morning. Too loud for Natakha Rybakova to concentrate.

"Talya?! Have you packed both the trunks?!"

"Yes, Mama! They're ready to go!"

There was the scrape-and-grate of blade on stone in the tiny lobby of Mrs. Rybakova's small wood-and-stone house, and its cacophony was a loud, undying hum under the house-owner's yells of order and instruction. Her frenetic walk from one corner of the house to another, into the kitchen and back in the lobby, by the staircase and to the chipped block of wood that she called her dining table was enough to keep her eldest on her toes, but alas, her youngest was not perturbed by those antics in the least.

"... both of them down here, don't you forget one of them up there!"

For although Talya Rybakova zoomed across the small house at each of her mother's beck and calls, her younger sister, Natakha could not have been disturbed by anything at that moment; nothing could have taken precedence over the sharpening of her dagger's blade as she sat squatted on the floor by the sooty, grimy fireplace, her skilled fingers gliding the iron of her blade on the smooth surface of the stone, for its edge had gone dull over the past week, and she did not like it in the least.

"...get the door, Talya!"

Although Natakha would usually sharpen the blade of her dagger when it would so much as border on blunt, she hadn't had the time to do it this particular week, for it was also the week when it had been brought to her attention by the inexplicably happy Mrs. Rybakova that this year, she too, was to attend the Annual Ball, for she had, finally, turned eighteen.

"...have the trunks gone out?!"

Natakha had been unfazed by that piece of information, for it was not unheard of by her, because her elder sister, Talya, had attended the Ball (a yearly congregation of werewolves arranged in the effort of finding their other halves, also known commonly as 'mates') at Abakan the previous year. And truly, nothing could have doused Mrs. Rybakova's spirits more, for she had been appalled at her youngest's reaction at the joyous news, or apparently, at the lack thereof.

"...on the table, Talya, hurry up!"

Natakha's tongue was set on the dark pink of her bow lips, brows slightly drawn in in concentration as her hands moved the blade dexterously across the stone. But then something dark obstructed her vision from the left, and she huffed. Unfortunately enough, though, the strand of her dark hair was just as stubborn as her, for it did not budge.

Somewhere in the background, over her mother and sister's loud yells, she heard the front door open and close.

It's almost there... Natakha thought, continuing patiently with the blade's edge to be as sharp as she wanted it, where it could catch even the feeblest beams of light and glint beautifully. But the stray strand of dark brown was still obstructing her view.

So, she huffed again.

Nothing happened.

But then a finger curled and tucked the strand behind her ear, and Natakha stopped, tilting her head up to find a golden-haired, brown-eyed girl grinning down at her.

"Still on with the blade?" said the newcomer.

Natakha laughed, going back to her dagger.

"I'm almost done, Zhanna. You're done with yours because you had the whole day to yourself."

Zhanna shrugged. "Well, that's probably the only advantage of having brothers for siblings."

At that, however, Natakha rose from the floor, blade level with her eye to inspect it. After a short second, she replaced it in its sheath that she wore under her many layers of clothing, content with its newly sharpened edge.

But then Talya appeared in front of her, flustered.

"Finally," she sighed, slightly out of breath, and dragged Natakha by the arm and to the dining table, sliding out a chair and pushing her in.

A snicker sounded behind her, and Natakha twisted her neck to give a grinning Zhanna a roll of her eyes.

The clatter of wood on wood followed, and she turned back ahead to see a creamy bowl of salad in front of her, followed by a fork. Zhanna slid into the chair next to her.

"Now finish it," said Talya, narrowing her eyes, "we're getting late. You're the only one we're waiting for, Nat."

Natakha picked up her fork and shoved it into the bowl of food, much to her sister's relief, gulping in a forkful when she saw her mother down the table with her three other friends, Maria, Varvara and Ruslana. But at the taste of the salad, a moan rumbled in her throat.

"Mm, radish salad," she sighed, eyes closing at its deliciousness.

But then-

"Yes, radish salad," came the mature, booming voice of Mrs. Rybakova, and Natakha gulped in the mouthful rather forcefully. A stoic old woman with broad shoulders, a nest of wavy brown hair that refused to grow past her shoulders, and a perpetual irritated expression stood before her, and Natakha shoved in another forkful of radish salad into her already full mouth. "Now it will be good of you to finish it fast, Natakha. Your trunks have already gone out; the omegas just came to collect them, and your father's been waiting to take you all to the pack house since about an hour!"

At the end of Mrs. Rybakova's little flustered outcry, Natakha noticed a tinge of pink in her mother's cheeks, and she quickly took to finishing her bowl of breakfast, because her mother could be very intimidating when she wanted to be.

"Yes, Mama," she squeaked.

At that moment, the front door opened, and Mr. Rybakov's head peeped in.

"Ready girls?" asked a short, balding man with beady, brown eyes and a salt-and-pepper handlebar moustache.

"Yes, we are," they all said in unison, Natakha excepted.

"Well then, let's go."

He disappeared behind the door again, and the girls began making their way after him.

Very hurriedly and very uncomfortably, Natakha gulped in another forkful of radish salad just as Zhanna whispered to her before following the others, "Hurry up."

She was the only one left in the lobby when she was through with her breakfast, and she slammed the bowl back on the table, rubbed her mouth clean on her sleeve, pushed her chair back hard and got up.

"I'm done, mama. I'm leaving!" Natakha managed to shout through all the food in her mouth before flying out the front door.

Mrs. Rybakova came scurrying out of the kitchen with a bar of dish soap in one hand and a barely lathered plate in the other.

"Take your overcoat, Natakha!"

No sooner had the door shut behind her than she came back inside, grabbed her overcoat from the stand by the door, and flew back outside, sending the coat-stand tumbling behind her.

*****

It was snowing that cold morning in the city of Murmansk, Russia, and the streets were a mush of mud and half-frozen precipitation which the Rybakovas and the four girls were knee-deep in. But they weren't the only werewolves out and about the small city, making their way to the Pack House for Murmansk, for there were other overcoat clad werewolves trudging through the snow-laden streets.

"How many trunks are you taking, Varvara?" asked Maria from Natakha's right.

"Oh, my clothes weren't really fitting into them," replied Varvara, "so I had to leave some of them behind, and I managed to finally fit them into just three trunks."

A snicker sounded from Natakha's left at that, and she turned to see Zhanna stifling a laugh behind her hand. She rolled her eyes, a chuckle on the verge of slipping out of her, too, but Maria, Varvara and Ruslana were too engrossed in their conversation about clothes to pay much attention to them.

Although it was well into morning, the sky was vapid, a doleful grey of endlessness above them, and because the sun's rays were too bleak to light anything, lanterns were kept burning by almost every door that the party passed by. But their glow was a blur of oranges and yellows because of the snow that clung to their lashes, and Natakha couldn't wait to be under shelter again.

The rusted, looming gates of the pack house weren't a very distant spectacle by then, and as the party drew nearer, Natakha felt an unfamiliar jolt of nerves spread through her chest, for it was at the sight of the Pack House that the reality of leaving for the Annual Ball set in, as did the possibility of never returning home. But she wasn't alone in that, because as she began to notice, the faces of all werewolves around her, whether she knew them or not, reflected that same nervousness, mixed with a bit of excitement, and anxiety.

Mr. Rybakov and Talya were the first to pass through the gates of the old building, but they had only just set foot in when a pair of guards by the gates interrupted them.

"Parents or guardians may leave the werewolves here," they said. "The ladies may proceed to the loading gates. On your left, please, miss."

At that, Mr. Rybakov turned around and hugged his daughters to his chest, cupping their heads adoringly. Natakha, on her part, found her face muffled into her father's muffler, having to breathe in the scent of old clothes that had a rather strange odour from being stacked away for a long time.

"I'll be back, Papa," she squeaked, finding it harder to breathe.

But her father only hugged them tighter.

"Hush, don't say that, businka," he whispered, finally pulling away to cup their faces. "It is my sincerest of wishes that you both find your mates this year; nothing could make you happier, and I mean that, Natakha."

With that, a parting kiss on their foreheads, and a wave of farewell to the other girls, Mr. Rybakov left.

A sigh of relief left Natakha at the sight of his retreating back, making her breathe in a large breath of fresh air.

"So," she spun around to face her friends. "Where to now?"

*****

"All wolves, attention here please!" called one of the guards at the loading gates.

Natakha, along with the others had been ushered to the loading gates, that opened onto a wide muddy path on which stood at least twenty huge horse pulled carriages. There could have been more behind the ones she could see, but the huge crowd of werewolves among which they stood obstructed her line of sight. Sandwiched between restlessly energetic wolves, she found it hard to concentrate on what the guard wolves were trying to tell them, but she was quite certain that many wolves in the crowd were faced with the same trouble as her. Her sister, Talya had wandered off with her own friends.

"Silence, please!" the same guard, a man somewhere in his mid-thirties said at the top of his voice, flailing his arms in the air to gather the attention of the young crowd. "For your journey to the Annual Ball in Ekaterinburg, you will be traveling by horse driven carriages during the day, but at sundown you will be required to transform into wolves to journey for the rest of the night. Carriages will again be available at sunrise."

Although the crowd listened, a constant murmuring hum refused to die down.

The guard took in a breath, then began again loudly. "Carriages will be assigned according to your ranks."

He pointed to the waiting, empty carriages at the front of the queue of carriages, each one pulled by ten horses. "The two carriages in the front are for the pack elite; please stay away from them, they are out of bounds to all who are not pack elites. If anyone is found loitering around them, and he or she is not supposed to be there, he or she will not be allowed to shift at sundown. You will travel in human form at night time, and let me tell you that you won't find it very comfortable.

"The third till the eighth carriages are for the pack Hunters," he explained, gesturing to the carriages behind the first two, "followed by the ninth till the fourteenth carriages for the Salutaries (healers), the fifteenth till the twentieth carriages for the Sentinels (patrol), the twenty first till the twenty sixth carriages for the Omegas, and the last five carriages for the Guards and Scouts."

Natakha felt a finger poke her elbow as she listened to the guard speaking up ahead, and she turned to her left to see Zhanna, a hunter herself, surveying the group of carriages for hunters, smirking. She, too, a hunter, felt a sense of pride blossoming in her chest for having been placed just after the pack elite. The fact made her smile.

The guard who had been speaking paused, sucked in a huge breath, then began again. "Your luggage will not travel in the same carriage as yo-"

He was interrupted suddenly by an outcry from some of the girls, who began shouting at him in refusal. But the man seemed to have been expecting the kind of response he got, for his features impatiently arranged themselves into a scowl.

"Ladies, ladie- LADIES!" he shouted, then schooled his features again.

The girls momentarily stopped, giving him dirty looks.

And he continued. "As you should be able to observe, the carriages are not big enough to house both you and your luggage. Hence, a bogey has been arranged for the purpose of storing and carrying the luggage."

He gestured to a small carriage-like box at the end of every group of assigned carriages.

"I suppose that is all," he finished haughtily, eyeing the girls who had interrupted him, then turned on his heel and disappeared in the overflow of wolves.

People in front of her slowly started to disperse, and Natakha and her friends inched closer to the carriages. As soon as they reached the gates, Zhanna by her side, she turned to her other friends to see them off, Zhanna being the only other hunter in the group besides herself.

"See you when we get there, Nat, Ana" said Maria as she, Varvara and Ruslana turned to their right, waving at the other two as they left.

"Well," said Zhanna calmly when the girls were out of sight, before breaking into a huge grin, "WHO wants to see the hunters' carriage, which, by the way, are right behind the elite's?!"

Natakha laughed. "WE DO!"

And they ran to the first hunters' carriage house.

The wooden carriage house, worn out from the outside, had a door that had become very creaky after years of use. Natakha creaked it open and a musty smell engulfed her. She climbed the two small steps at the door and her eyes landed on the grey, fur covered walls and an identical sofa on the wall to her left. In front of her, velvet curtains of red were drawn across the windows, next to which a lantern, which was the only source of light in the dim carriage, burnt fervently. Zhanna squeezed in next to her.

"Bunk beds," she stated as soon as she stepped in, eyeing them distastefully.

The wall to their right, indeed, housed two bunk beds, one on either of the right corners of the carriage.

"Four beds," said Natakha. "Looks like we're going to have compa-"

"Would you please," came a reedy voice from behind them, "MOVE."

Before the girls had a chance to turn around and face the source of the voice, they were both pushed roughly in the back, making them tumble down hard on the scratchy, worn, wooden floor.

"Ow!" Natakha scowled, immediately getting to her feet. "What did you do that for?!"

A boy, who appeared to be about a year or two older than them, stepped onto the steps where the girls had stood before they had been pushed away rudely. He had a small rucksack in hand which he conveniently placed on a rickety table in front of the sofa, now on their right.

"I don't know how it works with you girls, but if one has a whole night of traveling miles on foot, one usually, sensibly, chooses the time they have at hand before to rest, relax, and not ogle," he laughed, stressing on the last word mockingly, taking to lounge on the sofa.

Zhanna, who still sat on the floor with her legs crossed, glared at the boy menacingly as he tapped one foot with the other, legs crossed on the table.

"You don'-" she started angrily, but was interrupted by the sound of the door creaking, and another boy came in.

"Here you go, Dmitri," said the newcomer, tossing a carton of water to the boy named Dmitri.

Dmitri caught it with his right hand while the other hand lazily graced the sofa's back. "Thanks, brother."

"Wait, who are you boys?" Natakha frowned at the newcomer impatiently. "And why must you stay in this very carriage? Go stay in some oth-"

But the boy interrupted her. "Whoa, hold your horses, woman," he said warily, making his way to where Dmitri sat on the sofa. "All the other hunters' carriages are full."

"Yes," added Dmitri, setting his feet down on the floor and wrapping an arm around his brother, "so the guards sent us here. But if you really have a problem with us staying here, feel free to talk it out with them."

He gestured to the door.

Natakha and Zhanna exchanged angry looks, but before either of them could open their mouths to retort, Dmitri said, "Oh, I forgot to answer your question. How rude of me."

He gave his brother a look of mock incredulity before turning to them. "I am Dmitri Pavlov, and this is my brother, Stanislav Pavlov."

At the mention of his name, Stanislav smiled, and Natakha saw that all his bottom teeth were crooked. She stopped herself from making a face with a lot of difficulty. Zhanna, still on the floor, finally rose to her feet with an angry huff.

"Wait here, and I'll make the guards kick both of your arses out right now," she spat.

Natakha watched her spin on her heel and whip open the door, and followed her out. A loud thump sounded from inside the carriage just as the door closed behind them, and she turned to frown at the carriage confusedly.

"Where are the guards? I don't see anyone out here," Zhanna muttered from a few paces away.

The snow-laden road which was crowded with wolves a few minutes ago was now devoid of people, and the lawn beyond the now closed loading gates was empty.

"Those lying brats!" Natakha exclaimed, understanding dawning on her, and fisting her hands in the air, she stomped back up to the carriage.