Half-Breed

by Anna L. Walls

  Canis stopped at were he would have turned off the Grand Street and waited to see what they wanted.

  “A couple guys were picked up this morning and they were pretty beat up. When we asked them who had done it, they said it was a kid with red hair and white eyes. There aren’t too many people who match that description. Did you beat up those guys?” The question was asked with some amusement in their tone, but an answer was expected just the same.

  Canis merely stood there and studied the three men for a moment, then with a slight nod, he turned to continue toward his destination.

  The guards watched him pace down the lamplit street. “No way that kid beat anyone up,” said one of the constables to his partners.

  “Considering who they were, all I want to do is thank the guy, whoever he was,” said another.

  The summer’s heat was at its peak when Canis started to run a low fever. He had only had one fever before, but that was from ill health, physical abuse, and a long dunking in a very cold river. Thinking it was just a product of the hot days, he refused to let it slow him down. As the fever climbed, Canis sought the cool night streets for relief. He took to roaming the dark city streets all night long, then driving himself during both the morning and afternoon classes.

  One such night, Canis came across the same three constables he had met before. Five thugs had them badly cornered. When Canis came upon the fight, one of the constables was already on the ground and another had just been disarmed. When Canis came up behind the thugs, he caught their scent and knew them as the same men he had fought before.

  Canis flowed into motion; he hamstrung the closest man, dropping him wailing in an ungainly heap to curl up on a leg that would no longer function. Then he raked his fingernails across the face of the next man he reached, causing him to reel backward screaming and clutching at his face. He reached for a new grip and hooked the man’s throat, pulling him over backward and down with enough force to lay him out, senseless or dead, he didn’t care. Without missing a beat, he stepped and spun; his blade reached out, slicing the tendons on the side of the next man’s elbow before he could deal out a killing blow to the disarmed constable. Then, still spinning, he took two steps to the side and sliced upward, relieving the next man of his entire hand. The fifth man would have run from the swirling black ghost with glowing white eyes, but he tripped over one of his compatriots and fell head long, stunning himself in the process.

  With all of the thugs down, screaming or silent, but out of the fight, Canis allowed himself a moment of weakness and sank to one knee for a breath or two, then he stood to face the constables.

  One was bending over their injured friend. He looked up at the other one and said, “Go back to the station and bring a wagon. I’ll tie these…things up so they can be hauled away when you get back.” Then he turned to their benefactor. “Hey kid. Glad to see you. You don’t look too good. Are you okay? Did you get hurt?”

  Canis wiped his blade off on the shirt of the man lying closest, then started to shred that shirt to tie up its owner. Then he suddenly had to get away from the whole scene.

  Several dark turns away, Canis was depositing his supper in the gutter. He knew it wasn’t the fight or the blood, though he had heard of such reactions to killing. It was the fever, he was sure of it, it had happened before – once.

  Shortly before dawn, when hunting produced nothing he was looking for, when frustration at not knowing what he was looking for grew too great to contain, he let out a howl, and then cringed as he heard the sound echo across the city. But as if now started, it filled a cavernous need, he howled again. It wasn’t long before his throat, totally unaccustomed to making sounds, was painfully raw from the effort so he choked down more and headed back to the school.

  The next day, Canis collapsed in a dead faint during his afternoon class. He was carried to his room where they discovered that he had never touched his bed. He had the blankets piled in a corner in what looked like a nest.

  Dagon had him laid out on the bed then he had a clean blanket brought in to cover him. The house healer was called, but there was little he could do; he could find no reason for the fever, so more mundane methods were necessary.

  Kendall volunteered to sit with him the first night and he did his best to dab at Canis’s fevered skin with a cool rag, but he eventually dozed off. When he woke up, he discovered that Canis had wandered off. When he didn’t find him within a few minutes, he woke first Dagon, then Leonard to help with the search. After more than an hour, they found him on the roof where he was crouched in a dark corner. His heart-wrenching sobs were punctuated by howls that echoed across the city.

  When they tried to take him back inside, he turned on them, snarling hoarsely, but the effort was too much for his weakened state and he fainted again. They carried him back to his room. This time, Leonard sat with him. He was determined to keep the kid from slipping out of bed again, but even after all he’d heard and even seen, Canis took him by surprise anyway. He woke with a start and bowled him over, almost making it through the door, but the struggle was too much. Clinging to the open door, he sank to the floor, too weak to go any farther. He let out another heart-wrenching, blood-chilling, throat-tearing howl. It echoed oddly through the halls.

  As Leonard pulled Canis back toward his bed, a huge wolf followed them into the room. Leonard almost panicked, but he had his hands full and the wolf wasn’t showing any threat. It simply ambled into the room after them as if it did this every day.

  When Leonard got Canis back in bed, the wolf stepped up beside him, draped a leg over his stomach, rested its head on his chest, and gazed at Leonard with passive eyes. So pinned, Canis wasn’t going anywhere soon.

  Though Leonard found this all very odd, the wolf merely watched him, so he let it be. He wasn’t about to argue with a creature whose shoulders reached nearly as high as his waist and surely those teeth were as long as his arm.

  Canis’s delirium lasted for another two days, but there was a marked decrease in his restlessness. With an overgrown wolf keeping him pinned down in his bed, there was no longer any wandering.

  Those who watched over him kept a cool rag over his forehead and another one over his throat. No one was willing to venture any closer to the wolf, though it showed no resentment to the attention.

  Joined

  The furry black Wulfen face was the first thing Canis saw when he opened his eyes, but he had been aware of her presence long before that. His fever-fed dreams evolved into a canine presence of his new companion. Visions of puppy play merged into hunting trips shared by both Wulfen and man. Then one day, a long absent man returned to the clan.

  This Wulfen, Rrusharr, was too young to recognize the man, but she understood his belonging to the clan. His words had prompted her journey, a journey across grassy miles and wet rivers avoiding the sight of men.

  Canis recognized the man in those thoughts. He was the man named Orion, the man who said he was his father and his words told of the existence of a son, and the fact that he had grown up…alone.

  Canis didn’t realize how alone he had been until now. He felt filled to bursting from it. He was afraid to open his eyes for fear that the glorious fullness would use the opening to drain away, leaving him empty again, emptier than before, so much emptier having felt this fullness.

  Rrusharr felt Canis’s fear and her soft humor rumbled through his mind.

  Canis opened his eyes then and met the steady gaze of the dark gray eyes in the black face resting on his chest. He let out a sigh of relief when the fullness did not drain away.

  Kendall heard the sigh and leaned closer. He wasn’t willing to lean too close to the great black beast. “You’re awake. Are you feeling better?”

  “Yes,” said Canis. Both he and Kendall were surprised by that single word. It was almost the first word Canis had ever uttered and it came so easily. Surprised too because it came out in a deep thrum, though it was lighter and younger-sounding than his father’s, but only Canis knew
that.

  Rrusharr rose and stepped down from the bed allowing Canis to sit up. He couldn’t remember the last time he had eaten. “I…am…hungry,” he said, speaking deliberately as if testing the sound of each word. “And my throat is…raw.”

  “That’s not surprising,” said Kendall. “You shoulda heard yourself, and no one can remember the last time you were in the cafeteria for more than two or three glasses of water.” He brushed a hand across the sheets. “It looks like you sweated it all out. I’ll tell Master Dagon. I’m sure he’ll want to have this replaced.” He helped Canis dress under the critical gaze of the wolf, much to her amusement. “Come on; let’s go get you something to eat,” he said when they were finished. “The cooks are going to have a fit over your…pet, though.”

  Dressing was exhausting, but he was too hungry to go back to bed. “She is not my pet. Her name is Rrusharr.” The name came out of the back of his throat as more of a growl, but it was almost a word. “She is my…my other half,” said Canis.

  “You really don’t think the cooks are going to care about that, do you? That voice, coming out of you, is going to take some getting used to,” said Kendall.

  “The alternative would be for her to roam the halls hungry,” said Canis, though Rrusharr had generated the comment; she enjoyed the reaction. She found these lowland humans rather amusing, sometimes.

  When they reached the top of the stairs, Canis leaned against the wall. Just the short walk from his room to the head of the stairs drained him of what little energy he had.

  Kendall took most of Canis’s weight as they headed down the stairs.

  Leonard met them at the door. “What are you doing? We could have brought something up. I see it’s still here.”

  “I think it…she…is here to stay,” said Kendall.

  “Really, the cooks are going to love this,” said Leonard. “I gotta see this.” He accompanied them back into the cafeteria.

  The four of them created quite a scene. Fortunately, there were few students left in the cafeteria to see it.

  When the cooks were informed of the hungry wolf, they didn’t react quite like Leonard and Kendall expected. As it turned out, there were always leftovers or bones to dispose of and they were tired of the number of rats the discarded food attracted out back along with the rest of the trash generated by the school. Their biggest concern was that Master Dagon wouldn’t allow the wolf to stay.

  Mention of that concerned Canis too. He wanted to stay. He wanted to learn what Dagon had to teach, but if Rrusharr wasn’t to be allowed to remain, then he would leave too. There was no question of that – not any more.

  As he worked his way through his breakfast, Canis thought about drumming up the energy to make his way to Dagon’s apartment and bring the issue directly to him first, but he was saved the trip when the man came looking for him. Obviously, someone had already informed him that Canis had come down to eat and he’d come to see for himself.

  “I can’t allow pets in here,” said Dagon as soon as he entered the room and saw the wolf gnawing on a meaty ham bone next to Canis’s chair.

  Both Canis and Rrusharr looked up at him when he said that, then Canis stood to face him. “I will pack my things right away,” he said.

  “What? Where are you going?” he said, then… “What did you say?”

  “Master Dagon,” said Canis in the soft rumble that was his new voice, “please allow me to introduce Rrusharr, she is my other half. Where she goes, I go. If she is not welcome here, we will leave.”

  “You can talk. I thought you couldn’t talk,” said Dagon.

  “Until Rrusharr came to me, I could not,” said Canis. He reached up, almost touching his temple and closed his eyes for a moment as if the memory was still painful – it was. “There was an…emptiness in my head that made it impossible.”

  “Really,” said Dagon. He looked down at the black wolf still lying on the floor with a bone propped up between her front legs, staring at him with unblinking eyes. He looked back at Canis, then around at Kendall and Leonard, then back at the wolf. “That’s a wolf.”

  “Yes,” said Canis. Rrusharr’s amusement was tickling at the back of his mind again, though she was less than happy with the reference to being called a wolf.

  “Wolves are dangerous.”

  “Yes,” repeated Canis. “Rrusharr has no intention of hunting in your territory.”

  That wasn’t exactly how Dagon would have worded his concern, but it was close enough. “Well…” He looked around again. “We’ll try it and see how it works out. I don’t want you to leave.” He glanced down at the wolf before looking at Canis again. “Sit down before you fall, better yet, go back to bed. I expect to see you in class again as soon as you’re able.” Frowning, he turned and left the room.

  Canis sank back into his chair gratefully and Rrusharr returned her attention to the bone she had been working on. People were strange.

  “Oh, Master Dagon…” called Kendall and he sprinted after him.

  “Do you want me to help you back to your room?” asked Leonard.

  “No, go to your class. I will be fine,” said Canis.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes. Go,” replied Canis.

  After he had gone, Canis sat at the table until Rrusharr was satisfied that nothing more could be worked off of her bone, then he made his way back to his room. Before he was half way up the stairs, he wished he had taken Leonard up on his offer, but he made it.

  When he entered his room, he found two of the house slaves inside. He leaned against the wall until they were finished making his bed. As he watched them work, he was reminded of Gem. He wondered how she was doing. Perhaps he would try to find her someday.

  When they left, carrying his old mattress with them, he threw himself onto the new mattress without bothering with the covers. It was too warm and he was too tired to drag the blankets over to his corner.

  He slept most of the next two days, during which time he and Rrusharr seemed to meld even tighter into a single entity. It felt as though their bones and muscles were meshing into a single body. Canis quickly discovered that he would not only know Rrusharr’s thoughts, but he would also feel what she felt, even something as simple as her movements. He found that out when he felt her step down from the bed then he woke again when he felt her gleefully hunting fat rats among the trash in the back alley.

  He made his way to class four days later and Rrusharr of course came with him. It was an interesting development, but it worked out well enough, and it didn’t take long for every one to get used to the dark shadow that waited patiently, watching from an equally dark corner.

  After a few more days to catch up more on spent energy, Canis and Rrusharr took to leaving shortly after the afternoon class. First, they went for an exciting hunt among the piles of rubble. Then they spent the rest of the evening roaming the streets. He still wanted to make enough money to pay Patro back for all he had done.

  One thing he did was look up the three constables. With Rrusharr’s help, he found them quickly on his fourth evening.

  “Hey, kid, we haven’t seen you for a while,” said one of them. “Is that a wolf? I don’t think I’ve ever seen a black one.”

  “I am glad to see you are well,” said Canis, trying to make his low voice less of a rumble, ignoring the reference to Rrusharr.

  “If it weren’t for you, none of us would be well,” said another one of the constables. He too eyed the black shadow at Canis’s side.

  “I wish to earn some money. Could you tell me how I might be able to do this?” asked Canis.

  “Make some money?” said one of the men. “You’re just a kid. That could be difficult. I know first hand how good you are, but you’re just not very big. All the jobs I can think of involve heavy lifting or a long term commitment.”

  “I am accustomed to hard work, but I wish to finish taking lessons at Master Dagon’s school and I have a debt to repay,” said Canis.

  “You go to
that school,” said another one of them. “I should have known. How else could you be so good? You must have been born with a sword in your hand. I didn’t think he let kids into his class without passing some tests.”

  “I did not have a sword in my hand until I came here,” said Canis. “And I have passed his tests.”

  “I have an idea,” offered one of the men. “It’s risky, though. There’s the fight club on the north end of the city almost every night.”

  “The fight club? The kid could get killed there,” said another man.

  “I can see that. I was meaning for him to do some betting is all,” said the first man.

  “What is this place?” asked Canis.

  “It’s like a cock fight only it’s men who fight, and they fight dirty. Stay away from that place, kid,” said another of the men. “Dead bodies are always being found around there and they’re not always fighters. The king doesn’t sanction it anyway.”

  “What is this betting you speak of?” asked Canis.

  “You pick the man you think will win the fight and you bet some money on him. If he wins, you get the money bet on the other guy,” said the constable who came up with the idea.

  “I do not think you should try that,” said Rrusharr. “We are still too young to match against elders even in this.”

  “What about the arena?” asked Canis.

  “Yeah,” said one of the men. “You could probably do better there. The fights are more fair, the slaves who fight in the arena are more carefully matched, and it’s harder to bet.”

  “Slaves fight in the arena?”

  “Yeah, only slaves. It’s for the king’s entertainment. He doesn’t like free men to kill each other for sport.”

  That was not pleasing news to Canis. Patro had plans for me to fight in the arena, but if only slaves fight there, then Patro still thinks of me as his slave. Was all of this a trick? “I need to make four hundred gold pieces by next summer.”