Jachum woke up in the morning and stretched. He stared up at the ceiling, thinking slowly to himself, still half asleep. He didn't feel any different. At least he didn't think so. He remembered most of the naming ceremony from yesterday, but it felt like a lifetime ago. As if it really wasn't he who had lived it.

Jachum, having remembered that he was supposed to have received a gift from the fox, decided to get up and move his body around to see if he could figure out what he got. Sadly everything seemed normal. Nothing was different from yesterday. He decided to speak out loud. "Lima beans are the coolest of beans."

His voice sounded just the same as before. Jachum had to accept that his voice, just like his movement, hadn't changed. He looked down at his toes, "One, two, three… All ten are there." He murmured before moving onto his fingers.

Throwing on a shirt and pants, Jachum climbed down from the second-story half loft to the main part of the cabin. Walking over to the large basin of water by the kitchen counter, Jachum looked at his reflection through the bright morning light. "Uhhhh." He said

Nothing had changed again. Sighing in frustration, Jachum decided to go out and do his morning chores and then try to figure out what was different with himself later. First, Jachum took a scoop of salt out of the barrel in the back, then, walking outside, did his daily ritual of sprinkling the salt around the entirety of the cabin just as his father taught him. A long time ago, when he was still helping his father do it instead of having to do it himself, why the salt was sprinkled in the morning and the evening, "Well, Little Wolf, it helps make sure we sleep peacefully. If you don't sprinkle the salt right, you won't sleep at all or could get lost in the dreams you find yourself in."

Little Wolf, or Jachum as he is called now, had nodded his head though he didn't completely understand what his Dad was talking about. To be honest, Jachum didn't know what his father was talking about most of the time. He had a hard time focusing on all the long words his father used, making him drift from one word to another, forgetting to understand the meaning behind the sentence.

After spreading the salt, Jachum went back into the cabin. He was surprised that his father had already had breakfast on the table. "How are you feeling, Jachum?" he asked.

Jachum shook his head. It was weird to be called something different than Little Wolf. He scratched his head subconsciously, "I'm alright, Dad, but I thought you said that I would change because of last night. I've checked everything and nothing's different. My hair isn't even longer."

His father laughed though there didn't seem to be any joy in his eyes, only concern and worry. "Don't worry too much about it, Little.. Uhh, Jachum. We will figure out what has changed about you slowly."

"Ok." Said Jachum, relieved to hear his father not be too concerned about it. Now that he thought about it, maybe something on the inside had changed. Figuring he needed to test. Jachum decided he was going to eat as much as he could for breakfast. Sadly, he was wrong once again. He was only able to eat three strips of dried meat and two big slices of bread before he was fuller than a pregnant pig. He didn't even break the record he set two months earlier for the most food, which was rather embarrassing.

"Off you go, boy." Said his father while finishing up eating his bread, "Just because you are aatma now does not mean you don't have to do your morning stretches and run."

Jachum groaned aloud. He had completely forgotten about his run in the excitement of finding out what had happened to him. His stomach was already starting to hurt from the perceived future pain. He really had eaten too much.

Jachum was out of breath after half a lap, but when he finished the first, he felt like the food was starting to digest. Four days a week, his father would make him run a 1-mile long path. It would go through the outskirts of the woods and back into the large clearing where the cabin was located in. Jachum didn't hate it, but the boredom of it all was terrible. He got so bored one time he wanted to see how long he could hold his breath while running. He made it ten seconds before his head started to get dizzy. It did not feel good at all.

Jachum finished his running with a sigh and began making his way back to the cabin when something shiny caught the corner of his eye. He turned quickly to see what it was, but the thing disappeared. Jachum couldn't help himself and chased after it as fast as he could. Whatever the shiny thing was, it was moving. Jachum sprinted through the undergrowth after it. He was able to catch glances of the thing through the leaves. It was sparkly and silver. Seeing a chance, Jachum leaped into the air. Diving, he managed to push the creature, who hissed at him. "DO you mind?" Said the creature in an annoyed proper sounding tone.

"Who are you." Asked the child with large curious eyes as he stared at the creature.

"I am Gerald Cutherdol at your service." Said the creature.

Gerald was a small, entirely silver creature that was catlike in appearance and was as tall as Jachum. It was wearing a shiny black suit with a tophat.

"Do you mind telling me why you decided to try and tackle me while I was minding my own business strolling through the forest on my morning walk?" Asked Gerald in a pompous tone.

"Oh, sorry. I had never seen you before. Your fur is so shiny I thought you were a spirit of some sort." Said Jachum, still staring in fascination. "It's really nice to meet you, even if you look like a glowing silver cat."

The creature glared at Jachum, "Of course, I'm a spirit. Honestly, the more human's I meet, the more I cannot help but sigh. They are truly an ignorant species. Boy, are you telling me you've never heard of the great Gerald the Stole spirit?"

Jachum could only shake his head silently. The spirit creature was starting to annoy him, so he decided to end the conversation. "Well, it was nice to meet you, Gerald. I gotta go back to my Dad, or he'll be worried about me. Have a nice day."

"Wait," cried Gerald with surprise in his voice. "It's customary when meeting a new human to offer them a drink. I have a lovely bottle of wine back at my abode if you'd care to join."

"Nah, I'm good." Said Jachum, already walking away.

"Do not turn your back on me, you sniveling child." The creature's imperious tone dropped into that of a growling bear's voice.

This scared Jachum, and he started to run away. A sharp pain like nothing he had ever felt burst from his calf. And in a second, he was on the ground screaming and crying. It hurt so bad. The creature stood over Jachum and looked down on him with disgust. "Pathetic humans don't know how to show respect at all, then whine when they offend someone."

Jachum heard Gerald through the pain, and while he was in agony, a burst of anger began to bubble up inside him. Grabbing the knife he kept in a sheath on his waist, Jachum drew it and tried to stab the creature. The cat easily dogged him, while the lung made Jachum's calf scream in agony. "Disgusting." Sniffed Gerald the Stoll. "I had better put it out of its misery."

Pain shot into the back of Jachum's head, and then everything went dark.

After knocking out his own son and making sure he was alright, Elden glared at the Stoll. "You dare lay a finger on my son in my own territory."

"I'm not scared of you." Spat Gerald. "And maybe if you had taught your son better manners, we wouldn't be in this mess."

"He only turned seven yesterday." Growled Elden.

"That's not really my problem, is it." Sniffed the cat spirit.

Pure darkness began to spill out of Elden's shadow as his anger grew. His shadow, which originally seemed normal, had grown out of the ground and stood ten feet tall directly begin the already large human. "I've given you three seconds to get out of my sight. I'm only giving you those three seconds out of respect towards your elders. If you are still here when the time has passed. I will tear your body into a hundred little pieces and feed them to your wife one bit at a time."

Gerald looked like he wanted to argue but then thought better of it. Mayhaps he shouldn't anger the real monster here. Gulping a little at the stories he had just remembered, Gerald bowed and, after saying, "Good day, sir." Left behind a streak of silver, he disappeared into the distance.

"My poor little cub." Said Gerald as he gently picked up the little boy. He looked again at the claw marks that were still dripping blood. He had to tamp down his anger as much as he could. If he didn't have to take care of his son, he would have already gone out to kill everyone with even the smallest relation to that Stoll.

Upon reaching the cabin, Elden set his son on the table and checked him over. Taking a closer look at the wounds, Elden was shocked to discover how deep wounds were. He had originally thought that, based on the blood, it was a shallow scratch.

"If he had been given the gift of self-healing, these wounds should have disappeared." He mused to himself. "I really do wonder what sort of gift the fox gave him."

Sighing, he summoned his gift and began to stitch up the wounds on Jachum's calf using threads of darkness.

When Jachum awoke, he was lying in his own bed. He lay there for a second before he remembered what had happened. He felt annoyed, "What a mean cat." He said aloud.

Jachum looked down at his leg, only to see it had been wrapped up nicely with bandages. He tested his leg and found it really only gave him a little pain while walking on it. This put him in a much happier mood and feeling hungry climbed down to go eat something. He was in a good mood, that is until he saw his father sitting stone-faced at the kitchen table, glaring at him. Jachum gulped and took a seat opposite his father. "Do you have anything to say for yourself, young man?"

Tears began to well up in Jachum's eyes. "I saw something shiny after I finished running, and I wanted to see what it was. Instead of being something cool, it was a mean cat thing. I tried to run away, but it attacked me, and I couldn't do anything about it. And then my leg started to hurt really bad. I tried to fight it with my knife, but it dogged and made fun of me." Sniffling, Jachum finished his story with a, "My leg really hurt."

His father gave a deep sigh, "Jachum, because you are now an aatma, you will be able to interact with the spirits around us. You have to be better than that. You know not to approach strangers when I'm not there."

"I'm sorry." Said Jachum bursting into tears.

"Hey now," said his father coming over to crouch down beside him. "It's going to be alright. Do you want to go learn how to beat the mean cat up?"

Jachum nodded his head without a word and followed his father outside.

What followed was one of their normal training session where his father showed him how to fight someone that was faster than him. It was really hard training, but Jachum couldn't help me stay focused today. He was going to beat up Gerald really bad and make him apologize for hurting him.