The big, gray wolf with his long legs and handsome, wooly gray coat, padded up to us as Demik carried me back toward camp, Mej and Komu trotting ahead, ignoring Demik.
I thrashed until he held me low enough to paw and lick Ondrog’s nose. Ondrog stepped back, staring at me with his yellow eyes as if I’d said something shocking, possibly hurtful to him.
I flashed my brush, chirped, and crooned with a soft sound in my throat.
Ondrog cocked his head. Wolves didn’t make the same sounds that we did. Just like Ondrog didn’t speak much Vulpen when he was in skin, but Lucannis and Na-Dene languages. Perhaps English? I wasn’t sure. Mej and Komu spoke perfect English.
I gave a puppyish yap to him and, in response to the noise or wagging or licks, though slow, Ondrog finally offered me a bit of a wag in return once Demik was well past him, and I had to face Ondrog around Demik’s arm.
Demik did not set me down until he’d made the careful walk back to camp.
Now sun rays streaked through the trees like shooting stars, just reaching us here and there in light kisses. It must be nearly 4:00 a.m. A good time for a fox. A time for hunting and listening to the night time world.
Demik thought not. He sat with me among our clothes, bags, and his and Ondrog’s rifles.
“Do not change. You’ve changed too many times lately and it’s bad for you. Don’t you know that? It’s a terrible strain if you change too much too close together. You’ll hurt yourself.”
I snuggled my head up below his chin. He was so warm and solid and smoky. Not the bitter smoke of Mej and Komu’s tobacco they used in fur, but the outdoor, food smoke of the fires in the settlement at home—fish and wood smoke. I licked, tasting his skin while he talked to me.
Mej and Komu were already curled up like brothers on my skirt—Komu a scrap of a fox compared to Mej’s plush coat and stocky body.
“Sleep, look after yourself. When the loggers are up, we’ll go in skin—not you—and ask if they’ve seen anyone.”
I’d wanted to ask if they’d seen silver foxes as soon as we’d spotted the camp. Demik had been horrified. He said they’d put out traps and go out shooting for them if they thought they were around. No, we could ask in the day, when the loggers were up, if they’d seen “Indians”—what the white men called foxes in skin, as well as humans from Hän and other local human clans—but we could not ask about foxes. At least he’d been willing to ask at all.
Now I’d been able to sniff, we knew I’d been there, and Demik would go over and find out soon if they knew of any people in skin in the area.
Then we could go home. A long walk back, so Demik was right. It was time for rest.
Ondrog lay down with us and yawned. His jaws were like the jaws of a glacier. I reached eagerly to paw his face, show him I was glad to see him too. Again, Ondrog stared at me.
Demik lay on his side with a sigh, head on his pack, our clothes under and over him, draping a shirt over his face against the new light.
I stretched out in his arms, muzzle nestled at his throat, kissed his jaw, and also sighed.
Demik was right. Those men were too scary to dwell upon. Before I could remember why, however, I was asleep.
Chapter 4
Day 6
I watched Demik, Mej, and Komu—all big, upright and dressed in their skin—walk across the bridge to the logging camp through long streaks and fountains of sunlight. The river bounced like laughing kits. The smells of slain trees, carved through by human axes and saws, filled the air along with coffee, tobacco smoke, and the reek of sweat. The men were up and working.
I shifted on Ondrog’s shoulders, my forepaws sliding down his chest on the right side, brush dangling beside his left arm. I alone remained in fur.
Ondrog was big and warm and strong, his neck and shoulders like the fork of a mighty fir tree. I clambered my paws up with much effort until I stood rather than draping on him. We watched.
Demik, Mej, and Komu vanished around a timber building. A dog barked, then the other.
I stood stiffly, nostrils quivering. The rest of me shivered involuntarily, yet I felt the warmth of Ondrog, who did not react, only watching from the tree shadows. If Ondrog was not troubled, I would not be troubled.
There was a glossy black feather at my nose, sticking from Ondrog’s handsome headband. I nibbled the feather, putting my incisors to work at the delicate quill, and at once felt better—more at ease. I nibbled down the shaft to the hemp band, then Ondrog’s equally glossy black hair, thick and long and smelling of wolf and wilderness, courage and the hollow, faraway smell of loneliness. I soon forgot to nibble, taking a great mouthful of his hair, chewing eagerly right back to my molars. I was savoring the aromas, the rich, woody taste, and sliding, moving textured in my mouth, when Ondrog reached both hands to pull me away.
His hands were vast, shrinking me down to a woodrat as they seemed to engulf my face and whole body. He pried a fistful of hair from my mouth. I couldn’t have anything pried from my mouth. That didn’t seem right. If it reached my mouth it was mine. I growled. I burbled. Finally, I shrieked.
Ondrog dragged me around until I found myself swinging in the air with his huge, strong hands under my arms, nothing left in my mouth but a few strands. I worked my jaws as those strands corded across my tongue.
His black brows were drawn in over his ever-serious eyes. He appeared displeased…
I looked quickly around. Nothing amiss as far as I could smell. I heard faint male voices, fox and man. Mostly, though, I heard only the river. Even the dogs had stopped barking.
Unable to think what there was to be upset about on this glorious summer’s day when Demik and Mej and Komu would soon be returning to us, I faced Ondrog and smiled. Ears relaxed, eyes soft and hooded, jaws parted, I flashed my brush and chortled sweetly at him.
Ondrog still frowned at me.
I tried a whining noise that sounded more wolfish.
“You should put your skin on,” he told me calmly in Tanana.
Should I? I thought quickly, trying to come up with a reason for such a thing…
No … after a moment, I smiled at him again. I couldn’t think of one. Ondrog must be mistaken. Perhaps when Demik got back I would need to talk with him. But Demik hadn’t wanted me changing too much.
I strained both forepaws for Ondrog’s shoulder. At last, he bent his elbows in, allowing me to heave myself back onto my perch—all four paws now balanced on his right shoulder. There was the headband, smelling of him and birds and other animals with fangs and claws woven into it, yet I seized a mouthful of that delightful hair. It scrunched and rippled between my teeth, moved smoothly over my tongue, and bunched in my mouth as satisfyingly as hot, flailing marmot flesh.
Whoosh, swish—dangling out in the air again, hair twisted from my jaws as I shrieked and snapped at thick fingers. Down, down, down, swinging in strong hands, then open air, fingers gone from around my ribs, drop into summer mulch.
Hmm… I sniffed around. I worked my tongue to extract a few strands of thick hair. I blinked against a sun patch down here. The river seemed farther off, duller, the stumps much taller, the living trees looming.
I couldn’t see properly across the bridge. Even the scents came fainter.
I twisted to look up. Ondrog was a giant gazing down at me, still frowning. The right side of his thick, long hair, below and behind the headband, was mussed. And delicious.
Somehow … I’d ended up on the ground. Ondrog? I climbed at his deerskins, reaching past his knee, pawing in a quick beat as if I would swim up him to my perch.
I met his eyes and lashed my brush, pinning back my ears and opening my mouth: explaining there had been a mistake and I’d fallen off. If he would just lift me up again all would be well.
Ondrog glowered at me. “You should change, Summit.”
The way he said my name gave me a pleasant chill. I shivered and clung to his knee. Perhaps a great leap would put me in his arms like Demik’s.
“You
r clothes are just back there.” The wolf gestured and returned to watching the logging camp.
“Creeey-yee-yee,” I said.
He looked at me.
I smiled and jumped, wagged and pawed.
Ondrog did not seem to understand that a mistake had been made. Nor did he understand how to rectify it. It was too bad but, of course, he did not know Vulpen. What might a wolf do?
A wolf … wouldn’t have stood on another wolf’s shoulders in the first place. Perhaps that was the trouble.
What else? Wolves liked soft, smooth sounds. They liked greeting their silvers or elders with low heads, chin licks, and even lying on their backs. We foxes liked some of those things as well. If I showed Ondrog I understood he might also understand and set me back on his shoulders.
Whimpering like a wolf before a silver, I fell on my back.
Ondrog glanced down. His face seemed as far up as the sun.
I wriggled, waved my paws.
Ondrog watched the camp.
I licked as if I could reach him, thrashed my brush over the ground.
He glanced at me.
I whined, pawed, squirmed, squeaked, and beamed at him.
Ondrog’s muscles tightened as he set his jaw, a strong, straight line, a carved face, big but handsome and commanding. Ondrog must have been a silver—a leader—when he had his own pack. No … perhaps he was too young. Older than Demik and Mej, but not by so much. A few winters. Did he used to have his own mate? I bet he remembered her. Was that why he was so lonely? But his whole pack was gone somehow. Enough for any wolf to be hollow.
He would not be so sad if he had a fox to hold and keep close.
At last, he seemed to understand this and bent to pick me up.
I scrambled into his arms, snapping as his hair fell forward past his shoulder. I grabbed at a mouthful of delight.
Ondrog’s hand was in my face, dropping me back at the same time. “No!”
I recoiled, stared, ears leaping to the sharp sound, shocked. Again, I sniffed around, yet the wolf seemed to be addressing me, a growl in his voice with the word.
“Do not bite my hair,” he said, low and hard as the deepest river rocks, a finger in my face.
I stared more. His hair? He didn’t want me biting his hair? But his hair was so beautiful, so savory, so intoxicating in my teeth. There was nothing about biting his hair that was not pure bliss. How could he not want that? Did Ondrog want to be sad? Was that why he stayed lonely instead of moving to the heart of the settlement with the Aaqann River foxes? Not because they were the ones who didn’t want him mingling so closely, as I’d feared?
Whatever it was, I’d upset him. His brown eyes were sharp, his words harsh. I fell over on my back again, this time crouched and appeasing, telling him I was sorry he was upset.
I hardly heard the steps on the bridge, all the foxes moving stealthily, even in skin, and I was so distracted Demik’s voice startled me.
“Wolf—” A bark. “Leave her alone!”
Ondrog was bent over me, a finger in my face, talking about his hair, while I lay flat. But I sprang up at the call from Demik. I dashed to him. He smelled like the logging humans and coffee and even dogs, but I didn’t mind. I leapt and Demik again caught me.
I squirmed up to his chest and he held me tight. My whole skull fit into the hollow of his throat. I tucked it there, ears back, sniffing him in. Demik’s hair was pulled back—well out of reach. Mej and Komu had short hair—Komu’s just falling into his eyes and Mej’s shorter even than that, a tousled, scruffy nest on his head. Only Ondrog had chewing hair.
“What are you doing to her?” Demik snapped, his own voice growling, so angry I nuzzled in closer, trying to reassure him and me.
“You ask her.” Ondrog made a derisive sound in his throat. “If you can get her to change. What did the humans say?”
“Nothing intelligent,” Mej said, “so … typical.”
“They haven’t seen anyone,” Demik said, still angry. Shifting me in his arms, he stroked my ears. “Summit? Mej and Komu say they picked up your scent here last night. You should change and tell us what you think before we decide what to do next.”
Next? Weren’t we going home? He’d said we could go home today.
I did want to talk to him, to be with him in skin, and to tell Ondrog I was sorry for … something. Whatever he was upset about.
He had such nice hair. Perhaps he would let me touch it in skin. He’d held my hand some on the days we’d spent walking up the river. I always had to take it in the first place, but he would hold mine in return.
Demik, scowling, carried me back to my things. Ondrog stood stiffly, not following. Mej and Komu also gave him sharp glances.
Something had gone wrong. It was my doing, yet I couldn’t see how.
Once more, it took me a minute to change, to remember the sensations, with Demik shaking out my skirt and speaking gently to me.
“Think of yourself already in skin, the sensations, then will that form into being.”
The rush, the pain, exploding into more … and less. Losing my brush and my nose, growing fingers and hair, finding a voice and a new height and way of seeing that again changed the forest and the others.
Demik helped me dress while I was shaky and breathless, taking a moment to lean on him and let the pain subside through my bones and muscles.
He kissed my forehead, sending warm, full feelings through me from the touch on bare skin—intimate and sensitive without fur between. I wrapped my arms around him and sighed, enjoying so many of these new sensations I could have laughed. He didn’t smell as good now. But he felt so much better. I wished I hadn’t rushed with clothing. Skin with skin, nothing between, was a special sort of contact. Better than chewing hair. Maybe even better than having a real nose.
These thoughts reminded me I had to speak with the others.
“Demik?” I pulled back, holding his arms and looking up into his black eyes. “Don’t be cross with Ondrog.” My words felt like pine sap, blunt and sticky on my tongue, speaking in Vulpen but remembering as I did that I had to switch to Tanana for Ondrog to understand.
“You were frightened.” Demik’s glare returned, his face hardening at the mention of Ondrog’s name. “What was he doing to you? Did he hurt you?”
My heart sank with that glare and tone. “We’re his pack.” I found the use of my hands in stroking Demik’s face, watching it begin to relax at my touch as he leaned his cheek to my palm. “He wouldn’t hurt me.”
“You keep calling us that,” Demik’s voice remained harsh, but quieter. “We’re not wolves. We may move about in a skulk from time to time. But we’re no one’s pack.”
“We’re family. That’s the same thing.” I stood on my toes, kissing his lips, then hugged him again.
Demik started to speak but paused. I knew what. He’d been going to say we weren’t his family either. But I was a silver fox, just arrived to the Aaqann River Clan. Demik wanted to think of me as family. He could not say I was while Ondrog was not—after Ondrog had lived as his close neighbor for many seasons. I hoped that was what stopped him. Or he was only busy embracing me in return.
At last, I stepped back. “We’ll go home now?”
“That’s what we wanted to talk to you about,” Demik said. “You confirmed you’ve been here before, right?”
Mej was pulling his almost empty pack onto his back. With no one now in fur there wasn’t much to carry. Komu picked up Demik’s rifle and looked around for anything we’d missed. Only Demik’s bag remained. I had to check and make sure he had my river stone.
Ondrog stood back in the trees and stumps, watching from a distance.
“But not my family,” I said in Tanana. “That’s who we’re looking for.”
Demik glanced around, grudgingly also changing his speech so all could follow. “We’re looking for you also, Summit. And we found your trail? That could lead to your clan.” He gently pushed back my hair that tumbled down my back like a wa
terfall. I wished Mej would braid it again. Or … perhaps it was good to chew…
“No trail… I just … faded. We didn’t smell others.” I looked around to Mej and Komu, who nodded.
“The only fox we picked up was her,” Mej told Demik.
“We tracked out also,” Komu said. “It was stale to start, then gone.”
“Gone close in,” Mej said. “We could circle the whole camp, a quarter mile out in all directions, try for a hit, but…” Shaking his head.
“It’s the reason we’re up here,” Demik said—irritable. “Now you’re all behaving as if this is a nuisance. Like we could track, but why bother when there’s a den to get back to?”
“It’s not a good place,” I told Demik while Mej and Komu shifted and mumbled about daylight and humans and fur.
“Not good? You remembered something?” He asked me. “When you went through the camp?”
“No … except … scary. I don’t want to sniff around here anymore, Demik.” I looked from the direction of the river and camp back to his eyes. “I just want to go home.”
“We want to find your home, Summit.”
“Home with you,” I clarified.
Demik sighed. “We could be so close to your family…”
“I can track out,” Ondrog said.
Everyone looked at him.
“I can cover the distance efficiently, with a better nose than you all, and catch up by evening. So you can start your return now.”
Mej made a noise in his throat. Demik frowned.
Did he really have a better nose? I detached from Demik to walk over to him while everyone was considering that.
“And what if you do pick up a trail?” Mej asked. “If we start for home, what use would that be?”
Fox's Quest: A Foxy Reverse Harem Shifter Romance (Foxes of the Midnight Sun Book 2) Page 2
