Half-Breed

by Anna L. Walls

The only other furnishing in his room was a small table under his one glass window and two chairs. He found the window fascinating. He’d never seen a window with glass in it before. His mother’s window had been covered with a sheet of oiled parchment. It let some light in, but there was no view unless the window was open, and she almost never opened it.

  The view through the glass was slightly distorted and sounds from the street were uncomfortably muffled, but the weather would be held out. He never really liked sleeping in the wind, and he’d rather hear the comings and goings of people so close to where he slept, but perhaps, if the glass held out the wind and rain, it also held out people. At least he wasn’t on the ground floor. He looked down on the alley, if he craned his neck, he could see people walking by on the street, but no one walked by below his window. That suited him just fine.

  It was difficult for him to be around so many strangers and he missed Mia greatly. From her he could gauge how he should react to new people. Sleep refused to come at more than a doze, even though those strangers remained on the other side of his closed door. Every creak and sigh of the big building brought him fully awake, though he heard no nighttime people sounds.

  Early the next morning, those strangers began to troop past his door in chattering numbers, so Canis opened it a crack to watch them pass. Most of them were young like the students he’d seen in Leonard’s class, but there were a few older people, and unless they walked alone, they were all laughing and boisterous.

  Canis waited until he figured the bulk of them were passed before he crept down the hall to see where they all went. About half way down the stairs, he saw Leonard heading up.

  “There you are. I was just coming to find you. Master Dagon wanted to make sure you were familiar with the ropes. Come on, let’s go get some breakfast.”

  He led Canis into a crowded, noisy room smelling of all sorts of food. Canis froze at the door, but Leonard turned back to retrieve him. “Come on. There’s nothing to be afraid of here. You’re hungry, aren’t you?” He pulled Canis forward to a counter where he handed him a plate, then led him to another counter where he loaded his own plate with eggs, bacon and toast, then he poured himself a large glass of juice.

  Canis couldn’t remember having ever eaten food like this, so he selected a healthy helping of bacon and ham. That much he recognized for sure. He’d try other things another day. He didn’t pour himself anything to drink because he didn’t see any water. Drinks of white, yellow, and purple were too strange and too sweet.

  Tentatively, he sat down in a chair next to Leonard who proceeded to introduce him to the others sitting at the table. Canis didn’t try to remember the names or who they belonged to, he couldn’t say any of them anyway; instead their faces fell into a group of ‘maybe not an enemy’. As Canis looked over the other occupants of their table and then at those in the rest of the room, he saw that he was by far the youngest there.

  After breakfast, Leonard led him to his class. Leonard wasn’t going to be the one teaching him after all. Before he left him to his class, he said, “Listen, Canis; regardless of what we did yesterday, you’re not here to fight, not yet anyway. You’re here to learn how to use a sword, so listen to Kendall; he’s a good teacher. He’ll get you started right.”

  Kendall may have been a good teacher, but the three other boys who were his classmates didn’t seem to be here to learn how to use the sword. They were more interested in laughing and playing. At first, he liked the sound of laughter, but he was rapidly finding it irritating.

  After two hours of disjointed instruction, even Kendall was starting to lose his temper. Canis had long since drawn away from the others in an effort to be able to differentiate between the instruction and discipline needed with the other students. Finally, as another round of laughter started, Canis reached out and smacked the ringleader in the face with the cane they had been given to use instead of a real blade.

  The boy started to howl in pain, holding his bleeding nose, and the other two started to holler in protest at the action, so Canis rounded on each of them in turn with a vicious snarl, brandishing his cane in an unmistakable promise of more. As soon as he saw in their eyes that they understood his message, he returned to his place and took up the last pose Kendall had been trying to teach them.

  The other three looked from him to Kendall who took up the lesson again as if nothing untoward had happened. Not brave enough to return the challenge in front of an instructor, the bloody-nosed ringleader, and one other stormed out of the room, but the third one elected to remain.

  After lunch, the younger students went out into the city. Their lessons were over. Canis didn’t know or care where they went or what they did. Almost all of them left the building and didn’t start trickling back until suppertime or later. He didn’t bother to follow their example. Hunting would be very poor this far into the city.

  It didn’t take the students long to find out that Canis wasn’t much fun. He never spoke to anyone, and when they tried to make fun of him or pick on him for not talking, or for being too young or too small, he showed no reaction. At least he showed no reaction if they refrained from touching him. They all found out quickly that Canis wasn’t at all afraid of a fight. Within a couple weeks, most of the students took to ignoring him. It was easier than trying to talk to him and a lot easier than trying to fight with him. That didn’t mean there were no confrontations. Every so often, some new or otherwise clueless student could be enticed to have a go at Canis for one reason or another, and the student who had received a bloody nose at Canis’s hand on his first day could almost always be counted on for a scene, all he needed was a new idea whispered in his ear.

  The first such incident happened outside the cafeteria right after breakfast on his second day. In an effort to give Canis a bloody nose payback, he swung the cane at Canis’s face as soon as he stepped into the hall. Canis ducked and the blow hit another student who had the misfortune of being directly behind Canis. He caught the cane in his throat and was rushed to the infirmary.

  These fights were a bother for Canis so he ended them as quickly as he could, trying not to cause too much damage, but he learned from them too. They served to keep him alert and they taught him how fighters thought.

  Canis used the quiet afternoons at the school to explore the building and some of the surrounding neighborhood. It didn’t take him long to discover why the younger students only had classes for morning hours. Those young teachers who taught the beginning classes in the morning had their own class in the afternoon. This was the class that Dagon taught. Other classes were held in the building, but it was the classes Master Dagon taught that Canis was interested in.

  Canis slipped into the room without being noticed and curled up in a dim corner to watch. This was a class. Twenty students were paired off with each other. Unlike in the beginner’s classes, the moves taught here were complicated multiple attacks and blocks; each set might take up to a minute to complete if they were going slow. Dagon was moving among them correcting a move here or a stance there. Every so often, a new set would be introduced then another stretch of time would pass where it was practiced and corrected until Dagon felt they understood it well enough.

  The next step was to have them try it at speed. It was obvious to Canis why, though they were using real steel swords, they were quite dull. Their sharp blades remained at their hip.

  He liked watching these classes. He came every afternoon and he was quiet enough that it was over a week before Dagon noticed the extra shadow in the corner.

  One day, just after leaving the room, Canis overheard Dagon calling Leonard and Kendall to hang back, and he stopped to listen. “Does that kid have a change of clothes?”

  “I don’t know, sir,” said Kendall. “I haven’t been in his room.”

  “He looks like he’s been sleeping in that outfit. You two are excused from class tomorrow. Take him shopping. Get him something to wear. Whatever he doesn’t have.”

  “Yes sir,” said L
eonard.

  Since the summer was well under way, the city was warm and dry. The citizens were out in droves crowding the streets with their bodies and their sound. Going into the city with Leonard and Kendall was nothing like going with Mia. They stopped at several venders and bought an assortment of confections, which they munched on while pointing out the sights to Canis.

  Canis quietly shadowed them and listened to their banter while he allowed himself to be fascinated by the variety of people passing by.

  Eventually they wound their way through the throngs to a shop where Canis could buy new clothes. When they were finished, they were carrying several new packages and Canis was wearing all new clothes, this time the black he’d wanted last time, and he was wearing a new pair of boots. All his old clothes, aside from his cloak, had been left behind for the shopkeeper to dispose of.

  They were wending their way back to the school by way of the other side of the market street when Canis came face to face with a most magnificent beauty. Her hair was piled high and glittered with jewels and her face was skillfully painted. She was dressed in fine silk that hid and yet hinted at every graceful curve, and fine satin slippers protected her delicate feet. At her shoulder stood a mountain of a man who was obviously there for the beauty’s protection, and because of him, there was a gap in the press of human bodies. Canis would never have done more than stare at her if she hadn’t called his name. “Canis, I didn’t know you were here. How are you?”

  “Wo, Canis; do you know her?” asked Kendall.

  He did know her. Gem stood elegantly before him holding her hands out toward him.

  Canis touched her slender manicured fingers then went on to explore the silky gown with a tentative finger, then her hair. He was careful to touch without disturbing anything and yet needed the touch to confirm the reality of the apparition before him. She, in her turn, ran her manicured fingers through his copper-red hair.

  “What do you think?” she said. “I spend two hours in front of a mirror every morning. My master wants me to be perfect before he will allow any of his clients to see me.”

  Canis looked at her. She had a new master now. She was no longer a part of Patro’s line. He knew that, but seeing her here like this, his view of Patro and his line seemed diminished. He gently reached out and touched her painted face, then looked away. He had treated her badly there at the last, and he didn’t know how to make up for that.

  She reached out a manicured hand and caressed his cheek. “I’ll miss you, Canis. Take care of yourself.”

  Kendall and Leonard walked backward until Gem and her bodyguard was no longer in sight. “I don’t think I have ever seen someone like that,” said Kendall.

  “I think I’m going to have to save up my gold. I think I know which house she might belong to. There’s certainly not many who could afford to buy a girl like that,” said Leonard.

  “What gold?” said Kendall. “You’re as broke as I am. You’ll never have enough money to knock on the door let alone get another peek at that.”

  Canis didn’t want to consider what his two new friends were talking about. He figured he knew, but knowing that Gem belonged to someone else bothered him more than he could readily understand. He felt a protective flair, but he knew he had no right to it, not anymore.

  The Carnival

  Three months later, talk of the arrival of a new type of caravan called a carnival, spread through the school like a wildfire spreading across the prairie. Apparently, this carnival also made the rounds every year, but since their home was here in Chicago, they spent the winter here.

  Everyone at the school talked about the things they had seen displayed last time it had been in town, and they speculated about what might be new this year.

  It was difficult for Canis to understand what they were talking about. What kind of caravan had wares for display and not for sale? How could such a caravan afford to continue every year? He had come to understand the exchange of gold or silver for flesh or supplies and now the exchange for services such as his sword lessons, but he couldn’t understand the exchange of coins for merely looking at something.

  He found out when Kendall and Leonard took him to see the attractions at the carnival. For one or two coppers there was a variety of games in throwing rings for small prizes or shooting arrows for larger prizes. Kendall and Leonard participated in many of these games, but they walked away with relatively few prizes. Canis watched avidly, but since no one offered for him to try, he tried none of them. They looked far too simple to hold his interest for long and he could see no practical purpose to the prizes.

  They then paid to walk through a complex lined with many mirrors designed to confuse the eye and get the person lost or turned around. Leonard and Kendall laughed uproariously at the different warped reflections, but Canis found them quite unsettling. He couldn’t get out of there soon enough.

  Many booths had as many different kinds of foods for sale, and other booths sold sweets of all kinds and colors. Leonard and Kendall bought samples of most everything offered, but Canis bought only one thick sandwich. The sweets smelled far too sweet, though he tasted some of what his companions bought.

  In another area, there was a man who was supposed to be the strongest man in the world and people could pay their copper and go into the tent to see for themselves. In another tent was a woman who supposedly sported a full man’s beard, and like before, people could pay to enter her tent and see for sure. Canis was beginning to understand how this strange caravan could afford to continue its operation; he was also learning about curiosity.

  In the center of the camp was a very large tent, and for a silver coin people could go in and see the show. The picture posted outside showed men doing acrobatics high in the air while on the ground there was something involving a huge creature with its tail hanging from its face. A pretty girl, who wore little more than ruffles, rode on its neck. In other places in the picture, the girl was guiding the strange creature to do things like sit up and stand on its head. Then there were fancy ponies that trotted around while a young man stood on his head on the back of one, or did the splits between two others. It looked fascinating, but only Canis had any silver and neither Leonard nor Kendall thought to ask for it so they moved on to cheaper attractions.

  In another section of the grounds was an assortment of cages holding such things as a striped pony, a great maned cat, and a creature that could have been human if it weren’t about twice the proper size, covered with course black hair and sporting teeth large enough to rip off a man’s arm.

  In a nearby tent, was a collection of smaller cages and boxes that held smaller animals such as large snakes, strange looking rodent-like creatures and smaller varieties of the big, black-haired, human-like thing.

  Then Kendall and Leonard led him into the one tent they were most anxious to see. This tent had a two-headed calf and a two-headed snake. These were stuffed, but the glass case was small enough to allow a close look. Over in one corner was a man who had an extra arm growing out of his shoulder and a third eye on the side of his head; he wasn’t stuffed. He stood up and reached for anyone who came close.

  Other small ugly creatures were displayed here, some of them were alive, but Canis lost interest in the deformed displays when he saw a man in a cage at the back of the tent. The cage was too small for him. It was scarcely big enough for him to sit down with his knees drawn up tight, but this wasn’t what attracted Canis’s attention. The man had eyes like his, though his hair was short and white, tipped with gray, with a black swath three fingers wide at his temples.

  Canis walked up to the cage for a closer look. As he approached, the man bared his teeth in a snarl. His teeth in front were small, sharp pebbles; larger, longer, teeth framed them.

  “The wolf-man,” said Leonard and he tried to growl back at him, but ended up laughing at his own pitiful attempt. “He was new a couple years ago,” he told Canis.

  “Look at his teeth,” said Kendall. “They’re just like a
wolf’s teeth.”

  “Why do you think they call him the wolf-man?” said Leonard as he jabbed Kendall in the ribs.

  Canis scarcely heard them. He ran his tongue over his own teeth behind his closed lips. He had the sharp side teeth, but not the small front teeth, though his were smaller than average. No one ever glanced at his teeth. Even when he attacked the guard, no one questioned why it had been so easy for him to draw blood and tear flesh.

  Ignoring his friend’s antics, Canis stood there and looked at the man, studying everything about him. As the wolf-man watched his friends warily, Canis noticed his profile was rather long. Straight on, his face didn’t look any different from anyone else, but from the side, the lower half of his face was pushed out about an inch farther than his forehead.

  He wore what looked like the tattered remnants of some hide with gray and black hair. It looked as though someone had skinned out the wolf for which the man had been named, then they tied two of the paws together and draped it around him with the knot at one shoulder. They had offered him no other clothing.

  The man stopped snarling as soon as Leonard and Kendall moved away to scrutinize something in a small glass case. Then he reached a hand out through the bars toward Canis and spoke. With words that were uttered around too many teeth and sounds that seemed too deep to be coming from a human chest, he spoke softly. “You have your mother’s hair.”

  He did have his mother’s hair. But how would this man know what his mother’s hair had looked like?

  “Come on, Canis,” said Leonard. “It’s getting dark. We should be getting back to the school.”

  Canis drew away reluctantly, but before he left the tent, he thought he saw a tear trail down the man’s face. Why would he know what my mother’s hair looked like? That question bothered him; it bothered him a lot.