FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

Warning: This story contains sexual content between homosexuals and includes gay acts. If you don't like any of the previously stated themes I urge you to leave. There will also be spelling mistakes and grammar errors, I do not have a proofer, but i do try to proof these stories as much as I can. I hope you enjoy.

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The night went on as normal, or at least as normal as normal gets around me. Zap and Jewel were spooning on the couch the entire movie, Valen couldn't stay still for the entire movie and started playing cards with Sig. Doc fell asleep half way through the movie, Sinew went to the bathroom multiple times, probably to let off some steam from before, and Max started texting some Vale Seers. Vale Seers are regular furs that can naturally see through the Vale and understand the complications of the world.

Max has been banging one of them for a while, a lizard girl that was full heartedly impressed with his powers. When you're able to shape shift like him into any form, you can do quite a lot of things in bed.

Me, I watched the movie despite what else was going on. I needed something to distract me. I retired early and went to bed, and sunk into dreamless sleep.

Early the next morning I couldn't get out of bed. Given I woke up at like five thirty, but I had no ambition to get the team together just yet. Instead I grabbed the locket still strung around my neck and opened it. Its melody had changed from its dreary melody to a simple arpeggio constantly repeating itself. I didn't feel like listening so I just closed it and fell back asleep.

At around six, Sinew knocked on my door and helped me out of bed and helped me pack my things for the trip to Concord.

"What's it like master?" Sinew asked while putting away my underwear, which he was enjoying just a little too much.

"What's what like?"

"Concord. Valen and I are the only ones that haven't been there and we are both curious."

I actually had to think about that one, I never really cared much for Concord, but it was beautiful, but held a strange power to it that had your fur stand on end.

"It's kind of hard to explain Sinew. It's best if you just see it for yourself." I said as I was folding my shirts from the wardrobe. We all had a suit case that acted as a pocket detention and could put a lot of things in a small space.

"How long is the trip master?"

"Not that long, about three days by foot, one by car, about six hours by shadow shift." That's when I realized this would be the first time going without Charles. I suddenly felt like the little school pup going to the bus stop for the first time without my parents, but I couldn't remember if I even went to school.

"I would be lying if I said I wasn't existed, but I'm also kind of...nervous."

"Don't be, no one ever lengthened the span of their life by worrying."

"Yes master." The rest of our packing was done in silence. It was a quarter to seven by the time all my stuff was packed. I should have packed last night, but I didn't feel up to it, at least not without help.

I got into the dining room were Sinew had prepared some eggs and bacon for the team. Thank the gods he didn't make sausage, I wasn't in the mood for more sausage jokes. Zap was downing plate after plate and Max made some comment about if he actually tasted the food. Doc had his eucalyptuses paste that he made from the tree out back. Jewel just had some fruit and vitamin water. Valen ate half a plate and gave the rest to Zap. Sig was slurping on a straw from a plastic cup that hid what he was actually drinking, and trust me you probably don't want to know. I finished off three plates heaping with scrambled eggs and bacon.

"So when do we plan on leaving?" Jewel asked.

"You all done packing?" Everyone held up their charmed case. Jewel's was a crimson carryon bag, Zap's was a black back pack, Valen's was a fanny pack, Sinew's was a regular suit case, the same as mine, Sig had a satchel that he could wear while flying, and Doc's was a small pouch that hung around his wrist.

"Then we leave now." I said getting up leaving the dishes as I went for the front door. Everyone followed without question and just went through the threshold with me. We went into the woods just outside and continued until we were deep in the thicket, while the sky was in full dawn.

"Everyone take hands." I looked too Sinew. It was his first time shadow shifting with me. You see, I have two powers, shadow sift and light bending. First in shadow shifting if I am in an area with any form of shadow or darkness, I can meld with it and travel along its lines as long as the shadows are connected. The second involves turning light into its partial form and condensing it into a solid which I can explode on command. If I use these powers inertly I can force light away from certain areas and extend shadows to continue moving farther. I can also take people shadow shifting, but it needs to be done gradually. If you stay in shadow form long enough your body will deteriorate until you are nothing but a shadow and are stuck in the shadow dimension.

Everyone took hands forming a circle. I took one last breath before forcing my energy to move in a clockwise motion. I could feel everyone my energy went through. Sinew's apprehension, Zap's energy, Jewel's impatience, Max's lust, Doc's calm demeanor, Valen's animated spirit, and finely Sig's silence until I felt my energy go full circle and back to me.

I closed my eyes and called my powers to help me and then I felt the earth fall out from underneath me and was a blob of darkness with seven other blobs holding on to me as I raced through the network of shadows, extending them by bending the light and opening new paths. The shadow world looked just like the normal world, but the sky looked like someone took black and white paint and started mixing them, but only got half way through. And the only other scenery was the shadows of other people walking around. I call the shadows Blanks because they are the inhabitance of the shadow world without names or bodies on the physical plane. Other than that it's just a series of tubes and shoots going from one end of the world to the other.

"Is everyone still with me?" I sent the thought down the chain of blobs and everyone sent their name up the chain one at a time. After that I just kept moving. Usually in the shadow world I have time to think, but right now all I wanted was distractions from thought, because all I could think of was Charles.

I was about to start up a conversation with Zap, but I would have to talk through Sinew in order to so I just focused on where I was going. Concord is a very tricky place to find in the shadow realm, because the Vale shrouds it. Concord is the very source of the Vale, and its creators.

The Vale is more powerful in realms were physical creatures aren't because the Vale doesn't have to spread its power so thin to keep the mundane in the dark. And now that we are some of the only physical beings the Vale will naturally try to throw us off the trail even if we are its children. I guess that was a blessing in disguise, the Vale is giving me something to take my concentration away from my thoughts.

"Master?" Sinew was starting to feel sick. That usually happened for first timers in the shadow realm. He has actually been holding up pretty well. It has been an hour at least, so he has a strong stomach, most people only last half this time before they double over in dizzying nausea.

I gathered my thoughts and focus on the light above me searching for a place with a thick Vale overhang. I found a good spot and our chain slowly started to make its assent. When we emerged we were in a field in the Great Plains.

"Ok everybody take ten," I shouted, "Go to the bathroom or eat something, and Sinew." Sinew looked at me with a half disgusted face. I opened my case and pulled out some car sickness pills, "Take two of these, they will help with the nausea." I tossed him the bottle and he didn't complain. He looked awful, I should have been paying more attention to the time. Knowing Sinew he would have blown chunks if he knew I wouldn't have minded, but in the shadow realm your physical sickness just builds until it becomes unbearable. I warned him about shadowing sickness. It's caused from letting your nausea build to a bursting point and when you leave the shadow realm you get what I call shadow poisoning. It's like getting mono and food poisoning at the same time, dry heaving lasting for weeks like mono.

I use to be gray, but my powers drained my fur and skin of color and stained me black, the color of shadow and night. The same thing happened to Charles, and that's how his skin and fur was bleached white. That's one of the strange things about me and Charles, our powers were almost exactly the same. I have the power to control light and shift into the shadow world wile Charles had the power to control shadows and shift into the realm of light. Our invert powers allowed us to build our powers off of each other and reach insane heights of strength. He would take the shadow away from the light and I would take the light away from the shadow creating an imbalance that would clash together to create a new type of energy that could be directed and condensed to change into objects of power, like the locket around my neck and the piano in my sanctuary at Concord.

It was a technique that we came up with together in the short time we had and only managed to create the mirror for the locket. Charles had the locket before, but he added the mirror to it once we constructed it. You see Concord isn't all bad, before they through you into the Vale and wipe your memories, you are given some time to choose one item from your old life and then Concord puts it in a room specially tailored to your personality which becomes your sanctuary. Evidently in my old life I could play the piano, it was odd seeing it for the first time. Concord told me that it was an item that I paw picked out of my material possessions that I couldn't live without.

When I played my piano for the first time it was like my paws were moving of their own accord, almost as if my muscles knew what to do without my brain telling them. I couldn't read music, but I could write my own through memorization and that was Charles favorite thing about me. He would lay on the couch in the grand foyer of my sanctuary and just listen to me play for hours and I would get my inspiration by looking at him and letting my heart leap into my fingers and sing its happiness. But now...I haven't even turned on the radio since Charles died.

I decided to get a little something to eat before we went under and opened my case and took out an energy bar. I unwrapped it and put the wrapper in my case again and took a big bite of the raisin peanut butter oat filled bar. I sat down to look at my team, Sinew was belching to relieve the nausea and Doc was using his healing powers to ease the pain, but Sinew was trying to refuse the treatment. Max was looking at his phone again and Sig was flying above me using echo location to scope out the aria. And Valen was getting Jewel and Zap to help her catch butterflies in the fields.

I waited for Sinew to look semi presentable before I pulled myself up and called everyone back together and went back under. This time I let my mind wander a little and kept my eye on Sinew so he wouldn't get so sick. What I really want to know is what Sinew's object will be, Valen's too. Their personalities are so different I couldn't even begin to guess what they would choose as something to keep from their old lives. Sinew and Valen don't know about what's waiting for them in Concord, we aren't allowed to tell them because Concord likes to tell the Vallings themselves.

The rest of the journey lasted the same way. Submerge, surface thirty minutes later, submerge, surface and so on and so forth until things started getting tricky. The Vale started to thicken and it was becoming harder to find shadows to shift through which signaled that we were close to Concord. This would have to be the most tedious part of your journey. The Vale clouds your judgment and sense of time so you could think you're in Concord, surface, and find yourself two hours away from your destination, but Charles and I came up with something that tricks the Vale. By shifting the light or shadow in the way of all the channels, the ones that stay there are the fake ones that will lead you off track. Right now there were a considerable amount of fake tunnels and very few real tunnels.

I was starting to feel claustrophobic and frustrated and everyone could feel it, I had already done three U-terns and gone down two false tunnels because I was thinking of Charles, but now we were close, very close. I did a loop and then I was in a tunnel that was a strait shot. I felt my frustration ease and my claustrophobia evaporate. This is the tunnel that leads to Concord!

"Get ready guys, we will be surfacing in five. Look alive!" I sent the message down the chain and I felt everyone's spirits lift. I picked up the speed and I saw the end of the tunnel and started to curve up until I started to smell the honeysuckle, chary blossoms, freshly cut grass, and the smell of summer. Yah, this is definitely Concord. We all surfaced in a courtyard filled with chary blossom trees in full bloom with honeysuckle winding its way up the trees and up the walls of the snow white stone.

The thing about the flowers in concord is that the special energy given off by the Three constantly changes the colors of the flowers. They always seem to be shifting color and giving off a rainbow mist that smells different for everyone. And the gothic style castle, it's gigantic! It is about three square miles, it's like its own city, towers and corridors as far as the eye can see. Now we could only see the main entrance, but it is a fore story stain glass window, showing the story of how Concord and the Three came to be was still pretty breath taking.

I looked over to Sinew and Valen who were staring in complete aw. Their mouths agape, I have seen many first timers, and I think their reaction is infinitely better than the view of the castle. Sinew took two steps forward and said, "How did they get it so big?"

I heard Max say a "that's what she said" joke, but I don't think Sinew heard.

I turned towards the team, "Ok everyone meet up in the grand hall at the sixth bell, Doc and I have some stuff we need to do with Sinew and Valen." Zap, Sig, Jewel, and Max understood. Sig spread his wings and flew off and joined a flight formation of other airborne furs and disappeared among the towers of Concord. Zap and Jewel started for the forest wrapped in each other's arms, and Max went to the fountain were some hot lioness was combing her fur in the reflection of the fountain.

Sinew took a step after Max, but I grabbed him by the scruff of the shirt and he instantly looked down in embarrassment. I slung one right arm over his shoulders and started for the grand entrance while Doc was trying to get Valen's attention.

"Come on," Sinew looked at me, "Concord and the Three are waiting for you."

"I'm kind of nervous," knowing how prideful Sinew is this was a statement. He wouldn't have confided that in anyone else so I took it seriously and squeezed his shoulder to comfort him. His muscles became a little less tense, but not much. We reached the glass of the front door. The thing about Concord is that it is never normal, hear we improved upon the sliding door. The glass in front of us started to shimmer and liquefy. The glass became a liquid being, shifting and forming into a beautiful ionic styled Greek archway, covered in glass vines and flowers of various colors and shapes, all shimmering in the mid-afternoon light of Concord.

I could barely hold in my giddiness when Sinew's eyes widened in awe. He moved in a half delirious stupor as he entered the grand entrance. The main entrance was just one floor, the sealing high above our heads, painted like the Sistine Chapel, but showed the history of the Vales founders, the Three. It showed the Three, who were like some hairless apes or something, all holding up the crystal Vale that was the circular skylight with various other sections shooting off into the other portraits all filtering the light into a rainbow of colors. Glass columns shot from the floor to the ceiling like the molten glass was poured from the roof into the room. The walls were carved into statues and mosaics of furs on horseback fighting demons and evil forces spread as far as the eye could see. The floor was covered with wild life and plants growing up making canopies of various greens.

No mater were you looked you could see movement. Birds of thousands of shapes and colors flying in formation and hiding in the trees, bears, wolves, elk, deer, foxes, and other birds playing with each other in the various courtyards between tree formations, and various furs were playing with them too. But of all of these things, the constant fireflies that hover around were my favorite thing about Concord. There were thousands of them all different colors dipping and whizzing by in lazy movements. That's when a butterfly with wings that changed color landed on Sinew's nose and he smiled in the amazement of the impossible sight.

"Master!" he said in complete rapture, "How could this place even exist! It would have taken hundreds of years to make just this one room!" I chuckled and remembered my first trip to Concord. Charles was showing me the main entrance and he had spun around, he looked so amazing that I couldn't take my eyes off him and neither could the fireflies. They danced around him in a way that mesmerized not just me, but everyone. That was the moment I decided I would do anything for him, it was the moment I fell in love with him, and I would never forget it. I lifted my paw to finger the locket proudly displayed on my breast.

The thoughts of Charles were starting to get to me so I started to move Sinew forward and focus on getting to the Chamber of Three. I moved him along until we were in the middle of one of the various courtyards and stood in the center of one of the railed off circular sections.

"Hold on." I said

"What?" he said still looking around only half listening. Then the sectioned off section started to rise into the air and Sinew was instantly shocked back into reality. He instantly gripped onto the railing with both hands, paws straining with growing fear. That's one of Sinew's greatest fears, highs. We were only five feet off the ground and he looked like he was debating whether to jump or not, and he probably would, if I wasn't there to see him show weakness.

I wrapped my arms around him as the platform slowly and gently pulled us up and I instantly felt him ease up and he turned his head to look at me, his cool nose brushing my chin.

"It's all right" I said, "I got you." I could feel the murr building in his chest, but he held it with difficulty, but when he tore his gaze away from me he looked out onto the room now at bird's eye view and his murr quickly turned into a breathless gasp.

His breath was taken away as we weaved through the crystal columns and headed to the back of the gigantic room. We reached a large statue of an angel, such awkward creatures, furless and muzzless creatures with eagle wings spread in triumph. Her gown flowed down and parted into an archway that leads into a series of tunnels. Sinews apprehension had completely vanished and was replaced with glittering eyes and a serious case of swivel head.

"That was amazing!" Sinew said in the darkness of the tunnel with a soft light coming from a clear round disk in the center of the platform we were on shadowing our features. This was a little out of character for Sinew, but have you ever seen the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. Even grown men, tuff as nails men, cry at the sight of the heavenly lord bringing life to Adam. If you felt nothing by looking at that art, I don't want to meet you because you must be some seriously messed up person or sociopath.

"Just wait, there's more." Sinew instantly started looking around, our speed started to pick up, wind rushing through our fur as the platform moved through the horizontal tunnel. Then I saw a light flash by, Sinew didn't see it, but he saw the next one, a blue light lazily went by the moving platform. Then another, this time yellow, then purple, then green, until hundreds of glowing crystals moved past our platform an increasing speed. There were hundreds of glowing crystals lining the walls of marbled silver and gold.

Basically the tunnel was a tube that looked like someone half mixed a gold and silver paint then took a shotgun full of diamonds, rubies, sapphires, emeralds, and every other clear crystal you could think of and went all trigger-happy, and Sinew loved it. His head was snapping back and forth trying to see all the walls of the tunnel at the same time. Then all of the sudden we were out in the open overlooking a library of mahogany trees still growing and green with bookshelves cut into them.

Rows upon rows of literature as far as the eye could see, a main librarian circular desk covered in papers and trimmed in gold in the center with a leopard fur poring over the papers and writing something in a book, then as quickly as it came, we were in the tunnel again, this time moving in a more upward slant than before.

Seeing the library brought back more memories of Charles, he loved to read, always had his muzzle in a book and would find almost anything to use as a book marker. The thing about him reading was that he would start reading more than one book at a time and still manage to keep all the stories strait. Me I can't read more than one book at a time otherwise I start getting confused. There I was thinking about Charles again! I needed a distraction and fast.

And as if on cue, we shot through a window and were flying over the shimmering artwork of the roof of Concord. Sinew couldn't help himself and grabbed onto the railing pushing further into my embrace, but his face never changed from its constant awe. The roof of Concord had thousands of plants and vines growing all over it with gardens and small homes built into the inner rafters of the building. Some pools were also built into the roof and flyable furs were constantly zipping by in formation doing dive bombs into the pools and just doing air sports like air tag. Have you ever played air tag, its great fun. How was I able to play you ask? I'll show you later, now we were making our dissent into another tunnel marked by another angel. We were instantly assaulted by flying crystal and we were close to the Chamber of Three. The tunnel started to become more and more crystal until we were flying through a tunnel of pure diamond.

The crystal became more and more clear and showed that we were moving through time and space. The outside was a galaxy of stars and constellations moving in beautiful patterns. You see the Three aren't actually in Concord; actually they aren't on Earth at all, but in a place between the afterlife and Earth. A pocket dimension if you will. Sinew was so caught up in the walls that he didn't even notice that the platform we were on had completely disappeared, and we were gently put on a salt white staircase descending to an ornate stone door, completely white.

Sinew almost looked confused that we had stopped and then saw the door and I felt his muscles tense up.

"I've seen this door before," he said, "in a dream." That's another thing about Sinew, he has star sight. That's how he knew to jump into my arms the moment he saw me with his memory wiped. He can see snippets of his future in his dreams and he had foreseen McAlester, and that was the last one he had before Charles died. We all sort of had a secret special power, mine was my ability to see the omens, Doc's was his Vale sight, and Sinew's was his star sight.

I could feel Sinew's heart beat speed up, "I will know what my purpose in life will be as soon as I leave those doors." He said in a slightly winded breath.

I just patted his ass and with a yelp from him I said, "Then you better get going." What he said didn't surprise me, I knew exactly what I needed to do once I left that room, and it was to marry Charles.

He took a few steps forward from the circular platform towards the stairs and he looked back, "Can't you come with me master?"

"I'm right behind you Sinew." I saw the slightest bit of relief cross his face then his face became nonchalant again. We walked down the staircase together. I could feel the energy of the Three radiating from the door. It had carvings of the Three on it, all glowing with strange power.

"You may enter!" the voice of the Three in unison said and the door swung open to reveal a circular tower like room, a giant pentagram was etched into the white stone floor. We stepped on the pentacle and the sun in the center glowed and we started to hover in midair.

"Master? What's happening?" I stayed silent as we started to rise. Floating clear crystal hovered all around us as we made our assent, each one refracting light in different colors. Once we reached the top we were in a circular room with three thrones placed evenly around the circle, the dome like sealing gave way to a crystal chandelier that looked like it had grown there in a sunburst pattern. The crystals that were floating beneath us came up and locked together, covering the hole we had rose through.

In each thrown was a figure cloaked in white and each had an animal on it. One had a raven on it, another had an ebony snake, and the last had a black and purple butterfly.

"Sinew, my child." It was the one with the butterfly, her voice was like the sound of paper on paper, "you have found your way back to us at last."

"Skyla?" Sinew said and the head of the figure shifted as if surprised.

"Yes Sinew, it is I, the great healer and holder of the elements earth and wind and keeper of the dimension's life and death."

"I am Thorn." The one with the raven said in a shallow voice, "I am the great assassin, keeper of the elements water and fire and keeper of the dimensions space and time."

"Also known as the Baron of Shadow." Sinew said with aw.

"And I am Zenith," the one with the snake said in a deep rumbling voice, "I am the great destroyer, keeper of the elements of lightning and plasma, keeper of the dimensions of light and darkness."

"So Master Jared is under your jurisdiction is he?" the hooded figure gave a slight nod and a low growl signaling yes.

"And since I am a wind user," he turned to Skyla, "I must be under your jurisdiction."

"That is correct my child, please tell us how you knew about us before you came here. Your memory should have been wiped."

"I have the ability to see small snippets of my future through my dreams."

"I see," Zenith said, his voice shaking the room with its low pitch, "star sight is a very unique gift, and also a curse. Simply because you know the future doesn't mean you can change it. Remember this through your life." Star sight is the gift created from the plasma element infusing with the retina, that's why Zenith knows more about it than anyone.

"Now my child," Skyla said "We shall give you your item of remnant past." With that she lifted one of her hands, the sleeves so long it still dragged on the floor. The butterfly on her hood fluttered to her hand and she brought it up to her shadowed face. Then came a sound of whistling wind and the sound of ocean waves. Then the faintest sound of a pan flute. The butterfly fluttered up high into the dome of the ceiling and it looked like it was growing wings. Then each wing started to flow in one direction, all of them flying by and bunching up on one side. When it was about a half an inch thick it dropped like a rock.

Sinew caught it. He was looking at it with intense eyes.

"Sinew what is it?" I said.

"It's a...journal." It was a black journal with a purple velvet design of a pentacle on the front with a crescent silver moon making up the other half of a golden sun in its center. In-between them was a key hole.

"We give this book to you with the intention to give you your focus." Came Fangs voice, "It will be your symbol of loyalty and one of power. Your power for going through the Vale, and one of loyalty for having gotten back to us."

"We have sealed it shut," Zenith said, "You are never allowed to open this book under any conditions."

Sinew looked at Zenith with confusion and anger, "Doesn't that sort of defeat the purpose of the writing in it?"

"It's not what you want to put in it," said Skyla, "it's what you could take from it."

"This book is a remnant of your past," Fang continued, "it has memories in it that could be dangerous to the way of Concord."

"How could my memories possibly..."

"It's not your memories we are concerned with!" boomed Zenith, "It is the ideas your memories would bring back. Some memories are harmless like Jared's muscle memory on the piano. But there are others like McAlester that have turned rogue because of the toxic ideas of returning to their former life, though they all came to us in the first place!" Lightning flashed outside the crystal windows off into the starry sky, "These types of cruxes we give could jeopardize our entire society. It is these cruxes that show our devotion to the many and our trust in your integrity. You have been bestowed one of the greatest honors, you should be grateful."

"Don't mind him my child," Skyla said, "you will do fine. I have the upmost faith in you."

"As do I." I put my paw on his shoulder and Sinews eyes seemed content with what he had.

"Thank you." Sinew bowed before each thrown, "I won't let you down."

"Such strange choice of words," Fang said, "they were the same ones McAlester said before he betrayed our warnings and dove deeper into his crux for memories. What would make you any different?"

I wanted to go over to Fang and knock his ancient head off, but Sinew did one better, "Because I have something McAlester never had."

"Now I'm interested," Fang retorted, "and what is that?"

"Someone that would kick my ass if I ever got out of line." If I hadn't been trying to keep a straight face my maw would be hanging open. The silence was unbearable, it dragged on and each hood was locked onto Sinew with interest, then they looked at me. That's when I knew what Sinew was trying to do. I lifted my paw and punched him square in the jaw.

"You fucking idiot," I started, "you don't ever swear in the presence of the Three." Skyla's sleeve moved to stifle a giggle, Fang let out a hardy laugh, and Zenith let out a low chuckle.

"I don't think that could have played out any better." Fang said, "Anyone that can make Zenith laugh can fight by my side any day. You have my trust."

"It's not in my jurisdiction to say whether you get to go or not," Zenith started, "so Skyla, dose he pass."

"I had no intention of failing him."

"Good," Zenith said, "then we don't have to take him away from my star pupil."

"You may go, to serve the Vale and your brothers and sisters!" they all said at once, "Concord is adjourned!" the crystal under our feet started to fall away and Sinew started to fall first.

"One more thing Jared," Zenith said, "before you go."

"Yes Master?"

"Don't give up looking. He needs to be found."

"Yes Master," I said as the crystal around my foot paws fell away, "I will find McAlester." The last thing I saw was Zenith shaking his head in disparagement and I wondered what I had done wrong.