Ondrog stared at me. His fists bunched together and relaxed. “It’s too late,” he repeated after a long pause. “Even without the men’s threats my moving on was only a matter of time. You cannot understand what it has been to live here, how overdue this exodus is for me.” He turned away, reaching once more to the den, muttering, “Moon bless your future endeavors.”
“Then tell me,” I almost whispered. “Tell me what it’s been like. Tell me what you’ve been through.”
He stood with his back to me, hand on the hide wall of the den. “It is no matter…”
“It matters to you. So it matters to me. Please…”
Silence, waiting for him to vanish, to turn, to snap, something. He only remained still for a long time before letting out a breath. “I grew up in a close family, never knowing what it was to be alone, never knowing a song unanswered. I did not know the sensation of loneliness.” Very slowly, as if in pain, he turned until he faced me.
“I had just chosen a mate, looking forward to the opportunity of raising my own pups, when the human miners started through our territory with their outside dogs and their sickness and my pack died. One after another … after another. They grew weak, feverish, delirious, until their lungs filled with fluid and they drowned. My parents, my sisters, my mate, every pup and elder…” Speaking softer and softer.
“These foxes, the Aaqann River Clan, found survivors after the worst was over. They nursed us. I was the only one who recovered. I set my own den, away from them, where they scarce minded my lingering. It was seasons before I was strong enough to hunt far or travel. Then it was winter and again I had to wait here in their territory.
“I sang, calling for others. I traveled a Moon, two, three Moons out. Still I found no scent, heard no song. So I faced a clan of foxes who hardly tolerated me—and had to be grateful even for that. I felt ill once more. Now … all the time. The pressure, force in my chest—like drowning. Like dying.” He touched his open palm to his chest.
“Every night a nightmare, every day a torment. Pain that you cannot heal, cannot define, that eats your spirit is a hurt beyond broken bones or torn flesh. It is not the pain of death, but of longing for the gift of death that will not come. It is a pain that cannot be fought or conquered on one’s own. It is a suffering that will not change.
“You—who cannot remember family, know nothing but waking to companionship and instant infatuation—will never understand. Moon brought wolf into the world as a pack, so every song might find a harmony. The pain of aloneness is not the pain of death to a wolf. Death is to be preferred.
“I am pleased for you. That you found family after all. There is no need for you to bound off again on hunts after unknown shifters in your fur. Demik knows there are none. Stay where you are appreciated and looked after. They are eager to have you. A loving welcome is a greater gift than nearly anyone seems able to comprehend or value.
“No quest will find my people. No song will bring them back. Now that humans threaten the clan will be unsettled. I should have gone seasons before. So I go now. You, unlike me, have a future here. Stay: make a life with them. Moon willing, our paths will cross again one of these seasons. Now, I must make ready to depart. You must stay with your kind. You have nothing to gain by abusing your own time in my company.”
He looked at me for a long moment, at the tears dropping silently off my chin, and turned away, back into his den, with a final, “Moon bless.” Then he was gone, rolling the bedding inside in preparation for dismantling the tepee.
Chapter 23
Night 10
I couldn’t eat, could hardly catch my breath.
For many hours, I curled on Demik’s bed and buried my face—not crying but at a loss—while Demik, then Mej and Komu, came to see me. Mej mentioned dancing and music here at home. I couldn’t think of such things. He let me be, the three of them stepping outside to talk over Ondrog leaving, and human pressures.
Late in the evening Tweal wanted in for bed. I’d still never met him. Demik wouldn’t allow him inside the den. Mej and Komu, who hadn’t gone to town, also dashed out front. I felt even worse—not wanting lives disrupted because of me. But not so bad that I could move myself to stop them.
There wasn’t much light left, Demik sitting up at the foot of the bed while he cleaned his rifle, before I slunk out. I went to sit by the river.
Demik followed. He tried to explain that Ondrog needed his own people—that it had always been a matter of time before the wolf set out. “The wolf.” They all called him that.
I finally looked at him in the evening sun, low on the horizon, pleading with my eyes. “You really think he has a chance? On his own? You think this is all right? To travel in skin and survive and find other wolves who will welcome him? That he can survive alone without even a dog?”
Demik gazed across the river. He rubbed the back of his neck. He said nothing.
“Then how can you all just let him leave?” I asked, voice almost breaking.
“He’s not a prisoner here.” Demik sighed. “He’s just living on the verge of the clan. He doesn’t like trouble with humans, doesn’t want them anywhere near him. We knew he’d go. And the days are long. Now is the best chance he has.”
“What about us? What about hunting silver foxes? Any shifters? Ondrog would help. If we’re still on a quest? I thought we might keep trailing in fur. Leave everything here. Go with fur only. North or south or west this time.”
Demik nodded slowly. “An interesting idea. We could try in fur…”
“If we were setting out, Ondrog would come, wouldn’t he? He wanted to help.”
“You can’t change the course of the river, Summit. You can only guide your own canoe.”
I blinked fast. Demik tried to put his arms around me, saying my name, but I slipped from him to hurry away.
“Summit? He could have a dog, you know. A couple of strong pack dogs? He’s welcome.”
I nodded but didn’t look around. The kindness made it worse, made that pain in my throat sharper.
I walked aimlessly through the settlement and riverbank, watching sleeping puppies or elders softly beating drums—feeling no urge to dance.
Skeen was out stocking smoke boxes with more wood for the drying salmon—a task that continued at all hours, all summer.
She caught my eye and smiled. I stopped to help. We worked in silence, only gentle drumbeats and the river smoothing air around us, until Skeen shut the last smoker and turned to me.
“Something wrong, Summit? Why are you up?”
I shook my head, then told about Ondrog anyway. Skeen only listened while my words tumbled like spawning salmon.
When I stopped, slightly breathless, she said, “Are you sure you’re giving him enough respect?”
I had to think about that.
“Ondrog is a strong hunter and survivor, born to this life. Of course it’s hard, and dangerous, being a lone wolf. But it’s not a certain death sentence. We don’t know what’s out there. Our people gradually gave up a nomadic life. He has the rest of the summer to travel, to find what’s beyond our horizons. Who’s to say he won’t do just that?”
I swallowed, watching trails of escaping smoke.
“Summit? Are you sure worrying for his safety is why you’re upset?”
“I want him to have a pack,” I said quietly.
“Isn’t that what he’s seeking?”
I met her eyes, dark as her brother’s. “He wants to hunt one. I want him to see he has one right here.”
“Did you show him that?” she asked.
“I tried.”
“Then that’s all you can do. We all must do as we see fit.”
I saw the moon above trees now, even as the sun was just setting. I looked back to Skeen. “Unless you’re in a pack. Then you do as the pack sees fit…”
Skeen cocked her head. She was just starting to answer when I was already dashing away, bidding her blessings as I went.
It was twilight when I
reached the secluded den site. The night’s glow hung over the forest while owls called and the river flowed to the north. Ondrog had a last fire burning, using up his stash of wood. The den was gone, replaced by a neat cluster of poles on the ground, bundled in the hide walls and ground cloth.
His traveling pack was ready, while everything he would not be taking was piled on the mound of his former home. Ready to start in the morning. His sleeping furs were now spread between the little fire and poles, Ondrog sitting upon them, working on something in his hands. Head bowed over a prayer to Moon, perhaps.
He looked up when I approached, but kept working, averting his gaze.
“Demik says you can take strong dogs,” I started without preamble and gulped. “A dog would alert on the trail for bears or men, or if it caught wolf scent when you’re in skin and can’t.”
But Ondrog was shaking his head. “I cannot feed a dog. It is merely an added burden on the trail to look after. I’ll carry all I need on my back. It’s summertime. Not much to take. I’ll cross the river with my canoe and go from there. First thing in the morning.”
“Or,” I spoke carefully, “come with us?”
He only sighed.
I walked to his fire, sinking to my knees. “I talked to Demik. We’ll go searching in fur. We would like you to come. All of us.”
He never glanced at me.
“Is that a new headband?” I watched his fingers move deftly with the needle and a few beads onto the hemp. This one was very small and plain, only one black feather and a few beads offering decoration.
“For you. I’ll leave it here in the morning once it’s finished.”
“Ondrog? We’d be proud for your company, and value your nose and strength on the trail. We seek more than my past now—any shifters, including wolves. We’re hunting for the same thing. We all want this. It’s not safe… Alone…”
He went on stitching in silence while that last word hammered in my head louder than any drumbeat.
“Please…” I whispered, but my voice broke.
Alone. Running, searching, alone… Alone with pain and grief. Alone, into the river with no one to pull you out. No one to run to. Until there was Demik and this clan.
Ondrog claimed to be running from being alone when, really, he was running into being alone.
Alone in a cage. No family.
“Ondrog…” I choked and hugged myself, panic bubbling like the fire, blazing through my insides. They would get him, alone like that, put him in a cage. Or they would shoot him. Alone, out there in the wild beset by human beings … he would die. I was as certain that Ondrog’s going off on his own meant his death as I was of the feel of ground below my knees.
Terror and grief for him filled my whole being. I could not even pretend to say goodbye, to be strong, to wish him well. Instead, tears flowed. Ondrog finally set down his work to watch me. He opened one arm from his side. I crept around the fire to him.
I pressed my face to his chest, bundling into his warmth. Ondrog wrapped both arms around me and I shivered and begged.
“Please, please… You’ll die alone. We need to work together. Please.”
Ondrog only held on and stroked my hair while the night grew gloomier, fire burning down to ash.
Chapter 24
Ondrog’s heart beat in my ear, my head on his chest, as I drowsed with his sleeping furs tucked around me. Never really asleep. He stroked my hair, silent for half an hour, an hour, long enough for the fire to die and dark to settle.
Ondrog watched the moon and stars through the deep blue sky. His only chance at this time of year to gaze upon his Moon.
I thought I heard a wolf’s song. Only total wolves, and many miles distant.
When Ondrog spoke, it was soft, and not at all what I had expected. “What do you remember when you look at me?”
I had to blink, shift against him, enjoying so much listening to his deep breaths and feeling his warmth I did not wish to move at all.
“What do you mean?”
“You were separated from your family against your will? Or lost? What is it you see in my eyes that breaks you? You are not overwrought at a separation with someone you have known a matter of days simply because he is justifiably departing the territory. You are hurt from within and that pain apparently reflects in my eyes.”
“I … can’t remember.”
“You can. You don’t want to. What do you think memories are? A string of pictures forming exact moments from birth to death? Memories are all aspects of living. They may be a scent, a sight, a laugh, a song, a conversation, a place we love, a person we love or respect or fear. Mostly they are emotions. How some event or other made us feel: joyful, content, embarrassed, furious. You say you do not remember because you do not know where you grew up or the names of your family. But you remember more. You remember the terror of a trap, for example. And you remember being alone, don’t you? Almost dying because you were alone? Losing hope because you had no one? Your family is not near. They never were. You wandered for how long? Spent how many seasons questing before you ever discovered this territory?”
“I don’t know, Ondrog. I don’t … I…” I pulled away, pressing into the caribou fur and looking at his chest while Ondrog turned on his side to face me, propped on and elbow and trying to meet my eyes.
He only waited.
“I was … looking for them. I didn’t mean to be alone…”
“Then you were lost.”
I nodded.
“For how long?”
“I don’t know.”
“What about your mate? Did some harm befall him?”
“I don’t know.”
“Were you taken from them? Was there fear, confinement? You were caught in a trap?”
I nodded again, didn’t have to think about it—the feel of it cutting off my breath.
“Then over the winter, perhaps, trapping season, you were caught, brought in alive, separated from your family? You escaped, though took a blow to the head, perhaps? Disoriented, you went the wrong way, couldn’t get back to them, and became lost? Now we don’t know how far you might have come through a full spring. Your family may be a hundred miles away.”
It sounded real as he told it, so real I could almost feel the ice between my pads, smell my own terror as I crouched in the trap. But … if trapped … why hadn’t I changed? Many a leg-hold trap broke the bone. We couldn’t change at all with a broken bone—terrible things could happen. Then had enough time passed that I’d healed a break? How? Running on my own in fur through two seasons?
I didn’t ask. Some of it felt so right, while more only raised new questions.
Instead, I said, “My people know wolves.”
Ondrog met my eyes and breaths passed between us in silence, our noses ten inches apart.
“I remember,” I went on at last. “Ravens guide wolves to good hunting, then share the kill. Wolves share watching the pups and honor that position more than leading a hunt. A wolf leader is called silver. Wolves sing to build family ties and honor their goddess, and the sign you show to Moon or your silvers is called the vow.”
He stared at me. More silence.
I wanted to touch him, feel his face, return to clinging to him, kiss him, show him how I felt. I only lay gazing back into his eyes.
“Our territory ran beside wolves. It must have. They will still run together now, wherever they are. Come with us.”
“This is your search, for your past.”
“Let us make it about your future also. Come with us.” Speaking slowly, staring into his eyes, closer, willing him, deciding for him with my mind.
He looked away.
“Ondrog—”
“Naturally, I wish to be of assistance if possible. It’s only time that I—”
“Me?” I pushed up on an elbow also, close in his face. “Are you running because of me? Men invading are an excuse and you wanted to go anyway? Now you can’t be around me because I remind you of what you’ve lost?”
“Summit—”
“Do I scare you? Because you would stand before a charging bull moose unflinching but one look at me and you remember pain? Why did you kiss me and immediately say you had to leave?”
“It doesn’t—”
“What did I do?”
“You didn’t do anything—”
“Then what didn’t I do? I’m not a wolf? None of us are good enough to be your pack, even for a few moon phases? Much less a mate? Even until you find your own kin again?”
He worked his jaw with false starts, chest rising and falling on quick breaths. “I regret hurting you—”
“Stop talking about me. Talk about you. Ondrog…” I finally held his face, palm on his cheek, noses almost touching. “I love you…”
He jerked away, sitting up. “Don’t. Can’t you sniff that’s the trouble?”
“I can, but I don’t understand why and you won’t tell me!” Again my voice cracked and I swallowed.
Ondrog stared down at me in the gloom—silver moon over his shoulder and beyond the tops of the birches.
He also swallowed, taking a careful breath. “I had scarcely selected my mate when she died. I should have pups of my own. I should have a family and a secure place in my pack. The only way I might have those things is to find a new pack, and … love a new mate. Instead … I met you. You…” Shaking his head violently. “You … screaming, hair-chewing, insane fox who doesn’t even know who she is. You’re not who I’m supposed to meet. Yet Moon sent you and I had to wonder because … because … I feel something for you as well. But this … it’s no future. This is not a reason for me to stay. It’s a reason to go. I’ve grown desperate, with this great alone out here. I was wrong to touch you—weak. Wrong now to lie here with you, no matter how I feel. I must find my people and you must stay with yours.”
We stared into one another’s eyes, him breathing very fast, yet me calmer for this honesty.
Fox's Quest: A Foxy Reverse Harem Shifter Romance (Foxes of the Midnight Sun Book 2) Page 12
