First Week: Reunion

The long claws of the leopard were each time more close to me. I tried to change into a wolf, but I wasn't able to do it. It was a day of a black moon and the wildness god was resting, along with my animal spirit. I closed my eyes, preparing myself for the worst. I wished I hadn't separated from the group. A roar drew our attention, mine and the leopard's. A black bear in the Congo rainforest had to be him.

The leopard changed his attack posture into a defensive one. The bear approached us and the leopard walked backward slowly until it got close enough to escape through the undergrowth. The leopard was more intelligent than I was.

"Brais," I said almost whispering. He looked at me and his brown eyes transmitted more emotion and intelligence than a normal bear. I didn't doubt more about it. I looked for my emergency beacon in my pocket while he approached me, I pushed it and I focused on him. I got up and for a second he looked back. I thought that he was going to try to leave. "Are you Brais? I'm Noa." I yelled to get his attention. "You know your Noa, c'mon you can't forget me after three years."

He continued his closeness. He was only a meter to me and I fell to the ground again due to fear. I knew he was Brais, but I couldn't be sure if he was the same Brais who I loved and I couldn't defend myself from a bear or the animals he could transform into. He sniffed for a while and suddenly he started to change. His snouts become a human face and his paws into strong and muscular legs and arms.

He was so different; his face was more mature, his curly hair was wilder but not longer, and his body, he was no longer that pale and skinny boy I knew when we were eighteen years old. He was twenty-two at that moment and his muscular body with light-brown hair on his arms, legs, chest, and abs made him look hotter than before. Damn, he was so sexy that I could spend hours looking at him.

He smiled at me and offered his hand to help me up. However, a dart stuck in his neck before I could grab his hand, and he fell over me. I grabbed him so he wouldn't keep falling.

"It wasn't necessary. He was responding to me," I said.

Tim came out of the bushes. "I couldn't wait for him to escape, finding him again in the jungle would be a miracle. Besides, you overstate your seduction skills."

"You're a dickhead Tim," I murmured.

"What do you say?" he growled. All my body became rigid; he was using his dominant bark on me.

"I remind you that becoming my beta was your decision, girl. Respect me and don't call me Tim. Timoteo or alpha are your options."

I hated his arrogance, he was only three years older than me but he treated me as a little girl. He approached and put the silver pendant on Brais's neck and gave me the wood totem.

"Really?" I asked.

"It's the unique that I found in the gift shop, besides, it's perfect for him." Tim combed Brais's hair with his hand so that it would not fall on Brais's face and looked at him with a sweet expression. "Why do you look at me in that way? He is my first beta."

"Yes, of course, this is the only reason you came from Spain to the Congo," I said while looking at the small Pikachu totem.

"It's the only one that matters."

"You are developing an enormous savior complex, aren't you?"

"Not, this is more his problem," he said at the same time that he carried on stoking Brais's hair. "Why are you hesitating now?"

"It's not easy. He could hate us for this."

"Maybe, but I preferred him to hate us at home than him alone in the middle of a jungle thousands of kilometers from his home. However, it's your election. He promised to always be with you, not with me."

"And now we are going to use this promise to capture him." Tim placed his hand on my shoulder, trying to encourage me.

I took a deep breath and started to recite in the forgotten language. "Goddess of trades and promise, I want to enforce the promise of Brais Galgot. Three years ago he promised me eternal love and his company, and gave me this wristband-like symbol of this promise." I took the macrame wristband in my right hand and the Pikachu totem in my other hand. "I want my compensation for his unfulfilled promise." The wristband turned into dust and the totem started to brighten.

"We were lucky that he made the promise and the forgotten language to seem more romantic," Tim said while carrying Tim on his muscular shoulders.

His words bothered me extremely due to the fact that this was true. His promise, the only reason we could get him back was because he tried to be romantic before doing something terribly stupid and brave to save all of us. Never has Brais believed in exclusive love and much less in eternal love.