She-Wolf I

by Gaëlle Bonnassieux

  The shapeshifter was amazed. He seemed dumbfounded by what he was feeling, namely, my presence inside of him. He was touching his whole body in a very comical way: he wasn’t used to having someone else in his head. He’d get used to it. In a couple weeks, he wouldn’t even notice it anymore. I really hoped the bond would last. I drank some coffee to recover from this trial and that pounding headache, which made me wanna hit my head against a wall.

  “That’s crazy! I can feel Milo’s presence. It’s working!”

  “For now,” I winced. I looked at Adélie: she was most likely the one who had some answers.

  “I think that if you’ve managed to create the link, there’s no reason why it should fade away,” she explained. “However, Esthelle and I had thought of a little spell — in case this happened — which might strengthen Milo’s link with you wolves, so that there may be no difference in terms of intensity.”

  “You wanna give it a go?” Esthelle asked with a mouthful of cupcake.

  “Of course!” Milo and I answered in unison.

  Adélie left the room for a couple minutes, and came back with some candles, matches, a needle, and a piece of paper. It sent shivers down my spine. Even if I’d been living with the witches for a while now, I’d never seen them practice magic nor perform weird voodoo rituals. It was a first for us she-wolves. And I realized they had never seen me as a wolf either.

  Adélie used a white chalk to draw a little pentagram on the floor, and she then circled it. She put a lighted candle at the top of each branch of the pentacle. There was a sudden bizarre ambiance in the living-room. The air smelled like magic. Even though I didn’t have any magic powers, I was a part of the supernatural world, and I could feel the febrility flickering in the air and the heavy atmosphere; and the others noticed it too. Esthelle lured Colin in another room with toys and cupcakes. Was this spell PG 13? This didn’t exactly fill me with confidence. Lola and Clemencia’s concern reinforced mine. I may be open-minded; I wasn’t so thrilled at the thought of being the object of a satanic ritual that may send me six feet under.

  I looked at Adélie with a questioning eye. “Everything’s fine,” she smiled. “The pentagram symbolizes the victory of the spirit over nature’s elements, and the circle is about protection and infiniteness. It’s used by all kinds of spells, like those of protection, reinforcement, or summoning rituals, but this is white magic we’re dealing with. On the other hand, the reversed pentagram has no circle and points downwards, and that one is used for black magic.”

  “Oh, well this is fine then,” I sighed even though I didn’t feel fine at all.

  “If you must know, you can’t kill anyone with a pentacle,” said Esthelle. “So don’t worry.”

  Adélie smiled. Her benevolent aura and her peaceful control of the situation were comforting. She seemed to know what she was doing. She placed a hideous little red bowl in the middle of the circle, and she hit us with this blunt explanation. “We are going to link you guys by blood. Each of you will give me a tiny droplet of their blood, which we’ll put in the bowl, and once that is done, Esthelle and I will bind you with the spell. It’s painless and totally safe.”

  “This is sick,” Lola shivered.

  “Shall we start?” Esthelle said, ignoring her.

  “No, wait.” I wasn’t so sure I wanted to take part in something this seedy, and besides, I had to ask everyone’s opinion. We were a pack now; I couldn’t make any decision without asking them whether they agreed to it or not. Lola was terrified, Clemencia was disgusted, and Milo was fascinated. I was all three. Once again, I trusted the witches, but magic was something I’d never rubbed shoulders with, and I could allow myself to put any pack members in danger. Yes, I wanted to strengthen our bond with Milo, but not at any cost. “I’d like to know what you guys think about this,” I said eventually. “If any of you don't want to take part in this ritual, then we won’t. This is not mandatory, and I completely understand if you’re frightened or horrified.”

  “Horrified?” Esthelle mumbled. “You’re taking it too far.”

  “She’s right,” Lola surprised us by saying. “I’m a bit scared, but this is only because I don’t know anything about magic, so it’s kind of irrational. I trust the witches.”

  “Witches are like those really strong sleeping pills: you trust them with your eyes closed,” Milo declared. I rolled my eyes at him while everyone snickered. What a simile. I was glad he didn’t come up with anything spookier, that would have turned me down for good.

  Clemencia was the only one who hadn’t said anything, so I turned to her. “What about Colin?” she trembled. “I won’t let anyone take his blood.

  “That goes without saying,” Adélie said reassuringly. “Your blood runs in his veins, so the bond will reach him through you, don’t worry.

  “Oh. Okay then,” she agreed.

  Everyone then looked at me. They were waiting for me to give my endorsement. Well… This was something we needed to do for us to be a better pack. I winced and grabbed the needle to prick my finger. The blood dripped for a second before the wound healed, and it gave me just enough time to drop the scarlet bead in that ugly bowl. I felt like a ten-year-old girl performing one of those BFFS blood pact. The others pricked their fingers too, and the blood covered the bottom of the bowl. Adélie kneeled before it, and Esthelle faced her. They started chanting what was written on the piece of paper.

  “One and one are one

  One hundred bloods are not only blood, but they shall remain one

  Mind and body and heart all beat together

  Each minute and each second and each hour whisper as one on the edge of time

  While dancing they mix the hundred bloods

  Mind and body and heart shall be united

  So that the one hundred bloods are nothing but one.”

  I was dumbfoundedly staring at the witches. Their little weird song wasn’t the next summer hit: too zany. Moreover, the assonances and alliterations made the song oppressing and frightening. Well, all things considered, it was probably the point. Anyway, if I ever got married, I wouldn’t ask them to help me with the vows or let them write a speech. I suddenly jackrabbited when I saw the blood in the bowl burn. Literally, there was smoke coming out of the bowl. Adélie gestured to chase the fire away, and the blood disappeared. The candles were put out and the weird spluttering of the air stopped. This was nuts.

  “You guys can move, you’re not gonna die,” Esthelle cried standing up. Her sarcastic tone broke the silence that had filled the room. We all started breathing again, and that witchcraft thing was soon nothing more than a bad dream. We’d only just woken up, so it was still pretty vivid, but it was over. This experience was one-of-a-kind, but I wasn’t so eager to reiterate it so soon. Maybe never. “So, did he work or not?” Esthelle asked while her sister was cleaning everything up.

  I focused on our bond, and I was perplexed to notice that Milo’s chocolate-brown link was glowing strongly and steadily, just like everyone else’s. I could feel him closely and I even sensed his bliss. He had just found out about that thread linking him to me and to the other wolves of the pack. Since he wasn’t used to life in the community, it was probably weird for him to discover the presence of three women and a little boy in his head. “This is amazing!” he cried enthusiastically. “I feel like I’m in you and that you guys are in me”

  “That shit is getting weird,” Esthelle violently teased — it did make us all smile though.

  “Esthelle!” Adélie reprimanded her — she was smiling too. “So, Maddie, if you wanna include new members in your pack, you just need to ingest a tiny drop of their blood, and they have to do the same with yours. The spell mostly revolves around you since you’re the alpha, so you just have to do this and then they’ll officially be a part of your pack.”

  “Lovely,” I growled at the disgusting idea of drinking blood. “And if I want to banish someone what should I do? Butcher them, or bleed them to death?”

&nb
sp; Everyone burst into a laughter at this remark which was anything but polite. It felt good to make them laugh, but that was a question worth answering. I wouldn’t probably exclude people from the pack every day, but if I ever needed to do so, I had to know how.

  “It won’t have to go that far!” Adélie exclaimed. “Blood is only used to strengthen your bond with the others’, but your pack will still function like a regular one. If you wanna banish someone, you do it like any other alpha. The blood won’t influence your decisions or your choices.”

  I nodded along to show her that I’d understood. Basically, the spell wouldn’t change anything. The pack bonds were the same, they were just stronger for the non-wolves, thanks to the magic. For now, only Milo was concerned, but it might be great to see witches, vampires, fairies and others join our pack. The first motley pack. Yeah, that’d be really great. I could already picture it, the famous Maddie and her worldwide fame, crossing the borders to allow all solitary creatures to join her little pack — the pack of the rejected ones. I liked that thought. I wondered how Danny might react when he’d get there. And my grandma too… Would she back it up? She may be open-minded too, a pack with non-wolves could be considered an aberration. I still had trouble believing it myself. Milo was actually a part of my pack.

  “Do you guys wanna go hunting to celebrate?” I suggested to my new associates.

  “Totally!” Lola cried.

  In William’s pack, females weren’t allowed to hunt as a group. Only men could, while the good housewives stayed home to take care of the villa and everything else those machos didn’t feel like doing. Therefore, I had never gotten the chance to run as a wolf with Clemencia or Lola, except during the night of my escape, so that would be a first. I had no idea what hunting with your fellow wolves felt like. I had only ran alone, or with Bridget. My heart ached at the thought of that narcissistic blond vampire whom I missed terribly. But for now, I was longing to discover what it’d be like to hunt with Milo and the girls. And it was thrilling to feel that their resentment towards me was gone. We were truly reunited, and I was happy.

  “I would have loved to, but Colin can’t come,” Clemencia pointed out.

  “No worries, we’ll babysit him,” Esthelle offered. “You go running naked in the woods.”

  “This is not what going hunting is like,” I laughed, shaking my head at her prejudices. “This is just about spending time with your fellow wolves. We let our deepest selves take control, and we share this great cohesion spirit. And we catch a squirrel or two.”

  “Wow. You guys sure know how to have fun.”

  I rolled my eyes at her, and Clemencia agreed to the idea: her desire to run was as strong as mine and Lola’s. Milo was more reticent, and I sensed he was a bit worried. I looked at him inquisitively, I didn’t want him to be uncomfortable. “I’m not a wolf. Can I come with you though?” he asked shamefaced.

  “Of course! You’re a shapeshifter! You can change into whatever you want and run with us, it’ll be nice, and we’ll have fun,” I said reassuringly.

  His concern instantly vanished, and he was now more joyous. Being accepted and not feeling like the odd one out soothed him. His doubts seem childish to me: he was with us now, and wolf or not wolf, a pack takes care of its own. That was just the way things went. I realized that he still had a lot to learn. Even though he might have been part of a shapeshifters’ community, it was probably nothing like a pack. We had rules that the wolves innately knew: respect and obey your alpha, look out for the others, stay clear off their thoughts, remember your place in the hierarchy, etc. We were going to have to teach him about all of this. But I was confident it’d go well. He was a good student.

  I still had no clue on how to run the pack. I was the alpha, but obviously, I wasn’t going to dictate everyone's behavior and abuse my powers. I wasn’t William. They could do whatever they wanted to do, or say, or think, and I would only step in if I absolutely needed to. I’d look out for them, and make sure they’re safe. They will not turn into puppets forced to live under a despotic rule without free-will or feelings. No. They’ll be my friends, my confidants, not minions. There, problem solved. That’s how I’d run my pack. And I’ll do my best to keep everyone happy.

  Chapter 16

  We took leave of the witches and set out towards the woods joyfully, as a team. We were lucky to live in a town which had woods nearby. It might seem cliché for wolves to like running in the woods, but that was what we loved most. How could we let our deepest selves take over if there were no trees to protect us from human eyes? There was no way we could run as wolves in the streets, in front of the passersby. It was cliché but it was vital. I never could have settled in a town that didn’t have any greenery. We needed a place to hide and to express ourselves.

  Milo kept asking questions on the way over. “Is it normal for me to feel what you’re feeling? Is it normal for me to be so serene? Is it normal to feel like we’re a family now? Is it normal for me to hear your thoughts? If I concentrate hard enough, could I have access to your memories? Can you see what I’m thinking about?”

  It took me a good deal of patience to answer all his questions and to explain how all of this worked. Yes, everything was normal. Yes, having a pack brings you a sort of inner peace that’s soothing. Yes, maybe if we concentrated hard enough, we might be able to read each other’s minds, maybe even each other’s memories, but we ought not to do it, because feeling someone invading your private space is not so great a feeling. No, we didn’t see what he was thinking about because we wouldn’t pay attention to what was going on in his head, unless we needed to. The girls helped me answer from time to time, going deeper into my explanations or developing some details. I was surprised to realize that everything was going on swell and that in the end, being a sort of teacher did feel good.

  At the edge of the woods, a distressing thought made me stop suddenly. Milo bumped into me, and his hands ended up on my hips to keep me from falling. It wasn’t the worst of sensations, but I longed for Johan’s hands. I immediately stepped away.

  “What’s wrong?” Lola asked.

  Excellent question. A very problematic issue had just entered my mind. I had been so glad to make up with my friends and build my pack that I had forgotten they didn’t know about Johan. However, with our pack bond and all, every one of them could break into my thoughts with the right amount of concentration and find out what I was hiding from them just like that. I trusted them enough to know that they wouldn’t do that on purpose, but one could never be too careful. I was especially worried about Milo, who didn’t know how to control his new abilities just yet. His enthusiasm about the pack and the bond could easily take over, and he might accidently barge into my mind, and steal some information. I could push him away, obviously. I did it constantly in my former pack. But this was different.

  As an alpha, and as a person, I was allowed to have an inner sanctum, but I didn’t want to keep secrets from my protégés, and I didn’t want to lie to them either. This was a tough call. What should I do? Was I supposed to keep quiet and hope that they’d never find out about Johan, or tell them the truth this second? Why was I making such a big deal out of this anyway? I hadn't been plotting behind their back, Johan was neither dangerous nor an enemy, and I had the right to keep him to myself anyway. But it did feel wrong. After all, they were asking questions about this lycanthrope lurking in the whereabouts, and they were starting to worry about it. I had to soothe their concerns. I had to tell them. “There's something you should know,” I mumbled.

  “It’s the end of the road,” Lola said, looking around as if she were indeed looking for a road. It made us all smile, and sort of dimmed the tension that had just taken place amongst us.

  I was definitely not disposed to start this conversation, and I sat cross-legged on the ground. The others instantly sat too. Ooh, right, I was their role-model or something now, wasn’t I? Their concerned looks stared at me impatiently. Hum, how was I supposed to start? My
stomach ached. I didn’t want to share Johan with anyone actually, he was mine. My wolf-self growled, she didn’t want to share him either. We have to, doll. Period. “I fear you might take this the wrong way…” I said.

  “That’s a good start,” Milo teased. I rolled my eyes at him. Where was the poet when you needed him? He'd only be all Shakespearian and lyrical whenever it suited him.

  “You know that wolf,” I said again uncomfortably “the one who brought all you guys over, who’d been lurking around back in the city and who’s been hanging around here too?” No one answered, they were just waiting for me to go on. They were only curious, which was a good sign. “Well, it just so happens that he led me here too. And, hum, we might have made contact, and it just so happened that we found a way to communicate with little notes. That was totally a coincidence, it wasn’t something I planned at all. And one thing led to another, and before I knew it, we were seeing each other. I mean, we’ve met! We’ve met like once. Or twice...”

  A long silence followed my speech. They were a bit perplexed and maybe a little lost but I sensed no anger. This was going well.

  “Remember when I saw you reading that note in your locker at work?” Milo said eventually. “Well, since you didn’t want to talk about it, I mentioned it to Lola, and we had discussed a few possibilities.”