by Maria Vale
They are complicated, these wolves. They are frightened and stouthearted, stiff and flexible, infuriating and wondrous, and I would do anything and everything to protect them and this wild place that is their only home.
When I stand on the promontory overlooking this corner of the land that has been carved and painted and protected by the Pack, I understand better the Bredung, the braiding. I have never seen one, as they are silent, private affairs joining two wolves not only to each other, but to the land and the Pack by bonds that end only in death.
My breath comes slowly and mixes with the thawing earth and all the life that clings to it.
And the smell of cold as Eyulf pushes his damp nose against mine and holds me with his green and blue eyes.
I leap on his shoulder and jaw his ear, and he rubs my muzzle with his until I stumble backward over a thick, moss-covered branch and fall on my back, legs stretched toward him, and he bounds up, pretending to pounce down, his paws landing near my belly. Then I twist around, my forelegs stretched in front of me, and snap at his tail when it flashes through the air in front of me. He licks my chin, and we jaw spar a little before falling down and over and biting gently and nipping a little harder, followed by chasing and stopping and posturing and skittering and slipping through the damp and leaf-rot of the undergrowth.
There is no word in the language of men for the courtship games of wolves: run-and-jump doesn’t begin to cover it, because in the Old Tongue, behleapan is to leap upon, but also to settle on. To be devoted to. It is the metaphysical made very physical.
We both stop, ears turning and noses quivering, attuned to the presence of other wolves. Seeing me, they back away, but when I look over my shoulder, Eyulf has disappeared.
I snap irritably at the wolves, whose only crime was to run as wolves together. I’m irritable because Eyulf has slunk away and our game of run-and-jump is over. I’m irritable because it must feel so good to run thinking of nothing else, just cold air and the scent of prey. The soft give of the forest floor, as the wolves mingle their scents into the land. With an almost imperceptible angling of the head and tail, they change directions, and shoulder to shoulder, they run. They even run across the Clearing where anyone could see them.
I follow Eyulf’s scent to the top of the Gin and down the loose stone through the thin strand of trees and over the gash left by the trucks.
Something races past me, bright and fast and silent like a knife through the air, and runs up the unstable rock and then slides down it until he stands in front of me, his forelegs extended in front of him, his hind legs coiled, his tail up, not wagging but shivering at the top.
Play.
Puffing out a breath, I turn my head to the side. Come back.
Come home.
But he backs away, leading me deeper Offland, into this place that isn’t his home and isn’t mine either.
A low, steady howl drifts across the bowl of our mountains, joined by another higher howl that weaves back and forth across his. It’s nothing: no wolf is calling a warning or asking for help or announcing a kill. It’s just mates being playful.
His tail shakes again, and this time, his hind legs do too.
Play?
Stretching beyond him is the ravaged wound down this hollow that once housed a river but now holds intersecting lines of tire tracks, the herringbone patterns filled with water that glimmers in the moonlight.
Yes. Play.
I jounce gracelessly down the rounded rocks and land splat in front of him. He jumps and twirls in midair, then takes off through the ruined ground, his feet a blur leaving a spray of muddy water.
I can see every liquid movement as his powerful back undulates under white fur. He doesn’t have to look behind him to know that I am chasing but not full out. That’s the difference between prey and play.
Then he veers left and churns around, drawing almost parallel to me before running on ahead. Something startles to his left. Instantly, I am alert to my responsibilities; I stop fooling around and swing wide to stop any possible escape into the woods.
In the end, we have a rabbit. Not a big rabbit. Spring is still too new and the rabbits are thin, but I know to be grateful for every mouthful of hot blood and fresh flesh and narrow bone.
It’s inevitable on such a small kill that noses touch and muzzles rub.
Mine.
Yours.
Ours.
* * *
The endless rains gather in the canopy overhead and fall in heavy, irregular drops onto my face. Mud coats the pale fur of my chest as I vault over an ancient trunk. He races past me. I don’t know this land at all and shouldn’t be running flat out. It’s only when it’s too late that I realize there’s a rill or a stream that I can’t see, and I slow. If I’d kept going at top speed, I might have cleared the gully, like Eyulf did, a jagged bolt of lightning sailing across in the moonlight.
But I doubted and slowed and missed the far edge. My claws scrabble on the eroded edge, scraping, trying not to get up, just to slow my tumble to the bottom. The earth falls away in a thick slurry under my churning claws, until my hind leg catches in a thick root and the dirt under my front legs melts away. I fall backward, my head…hurts. It hurts, and pain shoots across the back of my head and around the front of my muzzle and into my sinus. I have to get up. I have…responsibilities. I must stand guard. A soft tongue laps against my scalp.
He pats my shoulder, pushing me back down. He nuzzles my ear and then gently touches his nose to mine and gives out a soft questioning whine deep in his throat. It’s what we do when we are worried and without words.
Are you okay? it means.
Please be okay.
Then he sits next to me, alert, his nose twitching, his ears circling, the lucidum of his eyes glowing as he watches the dark. After a lifetime of shielding, I allow myself to be shielded.
When I wake up again, he is just the same, except one paw is propped on mine so that when I move, he curls down around me, nuzzling into my fur.
Wild, it’s easier to touch him and show how I feel than to say those words that seem so remote from our true selves. When he gives me a big open-jawed kiss, I stretch my head back, looking upside down at the periwinkle blue of the morning sky.
Eyulf nuzzles me some more, making whining sounds, because he doesn’t understand what it means when a wolf exposes her throat. I stretch out longer, even more vulnerable, until by some ancient instinct, he moves that open-jawed kiss down and sets the points of his teeth so gently on either side of my neck. He is so careful that those teeth, powerful enough to break through bone, barely touch the tips of the longest guard hairs.
For wolves, fucking is far from the most intimate thing we do. But this…this is what wolves do when they have no words. It means I give what is most vulnerable about myself and know you will not hurt me.
It means I trust you.
It means I love you.
Chapter 35
The last day, as I straggle back to Home Pond, Tara calls to Kieran, who already looks thinner and weaker and more threadbare, though it has only been three days since I challenged him.
The final day of the Iron Moon is the traditional time for challenges. It gives the restive Pack something to do when they are too full to hunt. It starts with the lower ranks, like the fight between the 10th’s Theta and its Iota for cunnan-riht to the Iota’s bedfellow, which was a whole lot of spit and snarling and not a single injury. Very few wolves even from the 10th bothered to show up.
A few fights involved strength and strategy, and since there was the promise of blood, the audience share was inevitably higher. We’re not so different from humans that way.
Because I am an Alpha and Kieran a Beta, our challenge was always going to be near the end. Since a mæþ holmgang, an honor fight, is rare, it comes at the very end, so I nestle into a hollow beneath the roots of a nea
rby tree. A thing I never imagined happening happened, and I didn’t want to lose a single precious minute of my time with Eyulf to something as meaningless as sleep, but now I fluff my tail over my nose and breathe in deeply, napping until Tara wakes me, announcing that it is my turn.
A lot of wolves have gathered to watch, arrayed around the paddock and near the big log bench. Some even have gathered on the steps to get a higher view. Pups try to clamber up on adults, not quite understanding what all the fuss is about. Lorcan and Arne, the 8th’s Alpha, stand at the sides of the paddock, Evie and Victor on either end to make sure no one is hurt. That Kieran isn’t hurt. Not badly. Or fatally, to be precise. Nobody is much worried about me.
With a yawn, I shake the dirt and dry bark from my fur. Then I give in to a good stretch, letting the muscles ripple from my shoulders all the way to the tip of my tail.
Evie puts her damp nose against mine and snorts, blinking her golden eyes once. Avoid the face. At least try to avoid the face, she tells me. Kieran will be going back to his job at Global Foundries, and it would be better if he did it without fang or claw marks shredding his cheeks.
Unfortunately, wolves in the middle of a fight don’t always remember.
And I don’t remember anything after Tara threw back her head. A short howl that started high, then got lower before rising again. When I jumped over the paddock, my mind was already empty: no pain, no sadness, no honor, no Alpha, no loss, no Pack. All that’s left inside is the ember of old fury stoked to a purifying burn.
Kieran is in unfortunate shape, but there is a reason we don’t have challenges at the beginning of the Iron Moon. Soon Tristan will change, and he will hopefully be able to knit Kieran back together. I forgot that thing about his face.
Lorcan opens his mouth hesitantly. He is my shielder and will do what needs to be done, but I can already tell he’s praying that I don’t need him to debride my wounds. I don’t. I really don’t want his tongue anywhere near me.
The real pain comes after, when the Iron Moon is over. Every tear in my hide rips open again—and further to accommodate the changing flesh underneath. I stand under the gentle drizzle of the ice-cold shower in the Bathhouse, watching the bright-red blood slip down my legs and onto the tiled floor before mixing with other wolves’ soap and briars and pine needles and dirt and swirling down the drain.
They look away as I head down the stairs to the basement to dry storage. Big metal shelves are fitted with large plastic bins labeled with sizes (most XL and above). My power is not in my size, so I rummage through one of the few bins labeled simply Large, quickly pulling out sweatpants and the pale-gray Henley, because Evie is about to announce the beginning of the Iron Moon Table.
The Pack gathers at the Great Hall. Some washed, but many are just shifted. Combing fingers through their hair to get rid of burrs and seed pods, they wait in line to scrub blood and mud from their hands at the big trough sink in the kitchen before taking plates of scones and eggs and bread. Some gnaw on the stone-dry Baltic rye bread that is served after every moon to help scrub our teeth clean.
“In our laws are we protected,” Evie says.
Taking the stairs three at a time, I get to the hall in time to answer with all the other wolves.
“And in lawlessness are we destroyed.”
Evie leans against the head table, looking out over the expectant eyes of her Pack. “By now, I’m sure even those of you who were in the High Pines know that we had visitors.
“Shifters came as soon as we had changed to present a proposal from August Leveraux. I have heard it before, but since it was made to me directly, I ignored it. Now he has made it to the Pack, and I can’t. I will tell you the basics, and we will see if anyone is willing to be the for-speaker.
“The bottom line is that we join with the Shifters. Through us, the Shifters hope to be able to have children. In return, he promises us his protection.”
There is a long silence, while every wolf waits to see if their Alpha will clarify. Finally, Eudemos stands, scratching at his beard. When Evie nods, he says only one word.
“Children?”
And that’s the question. We don’t have children. We have pups. They may change back and forth in utero, but once they have come into the world and felt the connection with it that is their birthright, they stay wild for as long as they can.
“He believes he can train them.” Evie stares at her coffee mug, her long, dark fingers turning it slowly against her palm. “Train all our young to resist the change, make the Iron Moon irrelevant. Make them children.”
“Like he did with Tiberius?” Silver mutters.
Evie does not mention the threat implied in the Shifter’s last words. “He would truly prefer.” She is trying to keep to the facts, keep her voice neutral, because it is the Pack’s decision and only one thing can stop it from going to the Thing.
“Are there any for-speakers?”
Almost as a whole, the wolves of the Great North drop their heads, only daring to sneak a side glance to see who might consider being a fore-spreca, an advocate. If no wolf feels strongly enough to speak for it publicly, then it is not worth the Pack’s time and consideration and will not go to a vote.
Several wolves slide hands under muscled thighs, just to be sure. Evie stops looking at her coffee, and I can see that she is relieved the Pack doesn’t want this any more than she did.
“Alpha, I know it is not customary for the Deemer to be fore-spreca.” Victor fingers the ironed collar of his shirt. “But custom and law are not the same, and the law allows it.”
Evie grimaces and then nods to Marco. I didn’t know that Victor is allowed to be for-speaker; the Alpha is not. She is considered to have too much influence, too much sway. That was why Evie was trying so hard to keep her words, her voice, and even her face cool.
But once Victor has said he will do it, she has no choice but to start the Thing. Marco lifts the massive wooden box bound with metal straps. It is new, a careful duplicate of the ancient one that went up in flames this winter. The fire set by the same Shifters who now offer their protection.
Then Marco opens the lid, retrieving two heavy bags filled with stones collected from Homelands rivers from inside. He hands one, filled with dark stones, to Henry, then follows behind carrying another filled with pale stones. Those who agree with the for-speaker, with Victor, will put the light stone in the Thing. Those who don’t will cast the dark stone. The lid has a hole as round as the moon and big enough for the largest fist, so that a wolf who does not want the color of their stone known can hide it easily enough. This is how the Pack makes decisions.
Next Evie asks for a wiþer-spreca. An against-speaker. There doesn’t have to be one, but I can tell by the Alpha’s expression that she fears that without one, the Deemer will carry—
“Oh, by the Moon!” Victor barks toward the table where the 14th is seated.
Quicksilver Nilsdottir is holding the hilt of her seax with one hand, while trying to extract her leg from the crowded bench.
“I will be the wiþer-spreca, Alpha,” she says, and Victor looks away with disgust.
Tiberius sits upright, his shoulders expanded, so that his mate, who is still recovering from her lying-in, can lean against his big arm without looking weak.
She doesn’t. The Pack cannot coddle weakness, and no one is more aware of this than the runt, the least significant wolf in the Great North.
Still, there’s a saying that is common in one form or another among all Packs: a wolf who discounts the power of the smallest has never had to sleep with blackfly.
Mosquitoes, they said in Vrangelya.
“Alpha, I need Adrian to get something for me.”
Evie signals for Adrian, the oldest and fastest of the juveniles. Not yet an adult, he can’t vote. Silver whispers to him, slipping her hand up and under, indicating some invisible place, then checks to m
ake sure he understands. He whispers something. Tiberius breathes deeply, his lips tightening over teeth that are just as sharp and inhuman as Silver’s.
Victor stretches his neck, looking through the window as he strains to catch a glimpse of where Adrian is going.
“Deemer?” Evie says.
He shakes a crease free from his pant leg.
Chapter 36
I am curious why Victor, of all wolves, wants to speak on behalf of the Shifter proposal. Victor, who has been so dead set against all strangers and now is speaking on behalf of joining with a whole swarm of them.
First, he walks slowly and silently before the arrayed tables. It is theater, but the Great North watches him hungrily.
“Only a few weeks ago, you said that while it was my duty to preserve the Old Ways, it was your duty to preserve the Pack. At least I think that’s what I recall.”
Evie doesn’t say anything. She knows and he knows that was exactly what she said.
Now the Deemer turns to the Pack. “When the Shifter first announced that he had a proposal from August Leveraux, I immediately thought no. Whatever he was thinking, the answer had to be no. There is nothing the Shifter has that can be of any use to our Pack. But during the three days that followed, I could not speak and had time to think. My mind wandered back to something else our Alpha had said.” He stops in front of the 11th. “Do you remember what it was, Sylvie?”
The 11th’s Beta bedfellow shakes her head.
“I do. She said, ‘We do not fear questions.’ So I started to ask myself questions. Starting with the most basic one: Should I listen? If it is for the good of the Pack, the answer must be yes.”
Evie smears some fig spread on a slice of rye, then adds some cheese. Irony is usually avoided by wolves, who count it among the various forms of human misrepresentation. Leonora teaches it using a mnemonic. JAFFEWIP—Jokes. Advertising. Falsehood. Flirtation. Exaggeration. White lies. Irony. Politics.
The Deemer turns to the 10th. “What is the fundamental purpose of our law?”
