by Leigh Evans
Softly. Kind of a distracted pat, pat.
Once I’d brushed off the pine needles, I’d hauled ass, steadfastly heading in the direction that Mad-one had pointed to. Soon enough, I’d come out into a section of the woods less densely populated. I found the sun—oh shit, that low?—and picked up my pace. As long as I kept my back to the yellow ball in the sky, I figured I was trotting loosely east. But I’d been moving in that direction for what felt like a long time and a few minutes ago the sun had slid behind a stand of trees.
Since the forest is old and its growth exceptionally tall, I thought I had an hour before true sunset. But still, I knew, with cold clarity, what I had to do. I definitely had to stop walking. Find a dry hollow. Then cover myself up with pine boughs, or mulch, or some other body-insulating shit, to keep myself warm through the night.
Exposure can make you sleepy. Exposure can kill you.
I knew this because I’d watched Survival Stories.
I also knew how easy it was to get messed up if you had no fixed point of reference. Once darkness fell, I might start walking in circles. That’s a tip I picked up while watching the episode about the elderly couple whose GPS had sent them straight to hell. When they’d tried to turn their Ford Focus around on a logging road’s narrow track, they’d gone into the ditch. Husband had left to get help. Wife had stayed in the vehicle.
Hubby walked in circles until he died. Wife semi-starved but was found clinging to life a few weeks later. Clearly, that last tale is a honking big point in favor of staying put until the sunrise. There was one huge problem with that line of thought. If I stopped walking, I couldn’t maintain the conceit that I was heading toward something—“you get to that rock and I promise I’ll meet you.”
Staying put also meant waiting for things to find me.
Like sleep.
Or wolves. Or Fae with arrows.
And sitting gives you too much time to think. About Mad-one’s admonitions. About “him” being everywhere. About things I couldn’t handle.
But mostly about him.
Trowbridge is fast. Strong and smart.
He’ll outrun Qae this time.
So, I’d kept walking longer than I might. Because if I chose inaction over action I was courting the very real possibility that the fear roiling in my gut might overwhelm me. And then what would happen? Would I panic and resume the mindless-running routine?
Possibly.
I was on the edge of another meltdown. My skin felt tight; my hands kept shaking. The only way I’d kept from toppling over was to keep replaying every conversation I’d ever had with Trowbridge. Yeah, it was all there in my memory, stored away on a surprisingly short tape. From our first hello in that motel that had reeked of hard liquor and old sex to his most recent good-bye. He’d given me some good survival tips—sprinkled treasures in our talks. They were there, if I focused on them.
We really hadn’t spent that much time together. And yet he was part of my soul. Which was why, whenever I came to the end of the tape and found myself back at the waterfall speech again, I hit fast-forward as fast I could.
Tears are useless.
They change nothing.
Besides, I don’t believe brave girls cry. Maybe they do if they’re contemplating the amputation of their arm or something equally dire, but they wouldn’t dissolve into a boo-hoo session because they’re frightened. Or lost and thirsty. No. People with courage get on with it. They chew a maple stick to keep from getting hungry. They keep their eyes open for any source of water that could ease the burn in their throat. They keep moving even if their souls are bleeding and the bottoms of their feet are shredded.
They try to see the forest beyond the trees.
Which is why I was twenty feet off the ground, with both arms wrapped in a death grip around a maple tree. I’d made a sweaty effort to get the big picture.
Goddess. What did I do to piss off Karma?
Why here? Why now?
Isn’t it enough?
I’d been looking for the right tree for a while. It had to be on a rise with a bough low enough for me to catch and swing myself up onto (check), it had to be healthy because Merry and Ralph needed feeding (double-f’ing-check), and it had to have good strong branches so that I could squirm my way high enough to see the lay of the land (triple-fuckety-fuck-fuck-check).
Fortune smiled on me.
Before the gray light turned into no light, I found my maple. I climbed it to the point where my courage said, That’s good enough. And then, my amulets and I had embraced the big picture.
To which I can say, “Shit.”
From our perch, we could see the Two Sisters, and yes, clearly my orienting skills needed fine-tuning. Either the hills had moved or I’d veered off course several degrees south.
No matter. Tomorrow, we could, and would, cover the ground.
But tonight … oh sweet heavens … I wiped my cheek dry on my shoulder and Merry stroked my face again in wordless comfort.
Sometimes during daylight, it’s possible to see both the sun and the moon in the same sky. I used to wonder how that could be—the moon was a nighttime creature, no?—until I found a book in Bob the blind bookseller’s secondhand store that explained it. The author went into more detail than I wanted, but eventually I understood that it’s a trick of reflected light.
So, there you go. Sometimes you can see both.
At least you can on Earth, viewed from a fairy pond in Creemore. I don’t know what or how science explains the phenomenon in this realm. Perhaps the same laws apply; perhaps they don’t. Doesn’t change the fact that I could see both the sun and the moon.
Merenwyn’s moon was low. She seemed more white than silver. But her outline was solid enough.
Damn, damn, damn.
My wolf trembled inside me, anxious for her treat.
Tonight’s moon would be a full one—she was round as an uncut wheel of cheddar cheese. She’d sing to the wolves of Merenwyn this evening.
Well, at least I wouldn’t have to worry about falling asleep.
* * *
If a person’s life is flattened so there are no peaks or dips, it would basically be one thick line on an otherwise blank canvas, bisected here and there by slashes to indicate points of interest.
The early years of my life had three distinct events: Hedi was born; Hedi lost her family; Hedi found Lou. Then we had a long uninterrupted line unmarred by any activity because nothing much happened. Which, by the way, is exactly what happens in a person’s life when they wait for something to happen.
But six and a half months ago, Hedi stole into Trowbridge’s room. She inhaled his scent and her inner-bitch moaned. And from that point, her time line grew jagged. Now, if you were a clinical scientist, you might eye those wins and losses—Hedi claims, Hedi kills, Hedi screws up—without any appreciation for emotional growth. On the other hand, if you were a florist, you’d be rubbing your hands in glee, because the tight little bulb that was me was poised to go into full bloom.
For crap’s sake, I’d been moving toward meeting my wolf ever since my first orgasm with Trowbridge. My inner-bitch’s presence had progressed from a mild salivation issue whenever I passed a deli to an entity I’d struggled with tooth and nail. Every time I’d come close to letting her go, I’d pulled back, frightened that her presence would diminish the Fae in me.
However, my inner-wolf had claws too. And she wanted out.
I was exhausted. My defenses were down. In this flat-earth world, there was no physical interference to mute the moon’s voice. No electrical cables buried underground. No cell-phone towers. No satellites. However well I blocked my Fae pointed ears with my fingers, I’d still hear the moon’s siren song.
I could plug my hearing. Or, for the first time in my life, I could open my ears and listen.
Fae have no scent. But wolves do.
Come find me, Trowbridge.
* * *
The bleeding sun that had briefly rimmed the trees had disap
peared, and the wash of gray that had stolen the color from the shadows had deepened.
I shivered, though I was not cold.
Once I’d made the decision not to fight my transformation, I’d moved fast. From my treetop, I’d scanned the area for a safe place to change into my wolf. The pickings had been slim, and the spot I’d chosen for the event was elected chiefly because it was close and offered some shelter. It wasn’t so much of a cave as an overhang of rock, which was open on three sides. It smelled ripe with musk. That excited me.
All scents did. Every breath I took through my nose was a sensual feast.
I blew on my fingers. Payback pain hadn’t found my hands and I was becoming increasingly convinced it never would. Maybe that’s why Fae in this world use magic so easily and dismiss its effects so readily. There are no consequences for using it.
“On or off?” I asked Merry, my tone clipped and hurried.
With a deliberation to match my own, she tightened her chain until she sat near the base of my throat.
“You planning to choke me? I’m pretty sure”—I paused to shudder—“that my wolf’s neck is thicker than mine.”
Faster than I could blink, she zip-lined down to my mid-chest, where she gave a throb of orange. Then, with equal speed, she ratcheted herself back to her former position.
“Got it,” I said. “You’ll go with the flow.”
Tears burned my eyes.
Stop it. They are useless.
My skin crawled. The base of my spine ached.
There remained the problem of Ralph. At the best of times, he was an unhappy passenger, prone to peevishness. While I was in mortal form I could deal with his nonsense, but all bets were off when I wore fur. I’d been around wolves enough to know they didn’t tamp down on minor irritations. They dealt with them. Immediately and, in most cases, with little thought to the future. Unless Ralph was in the mood to cooperate with my wolf, things could go foul very fast.
“What about you, Ralph?” I tested. “You with me or without me?”
With stilted distaste, he unwound three strands from his Celtic knot. Two of them became thin legs; the third became an arm. He gripped his chain, kind of like a woman grabbing the edge of her dress’s train, and walked up the slope of my breast until he’d reached my shoulder. There he gave his chain an upward jerk—a very clear indication that he wanted “Off” with a capital O.
Typical.
I removed him and placed him in the corner, near the wall. “Stay,” I said, knowing that the ungrateful sod planned to bail on me as soon as I had a tail. That was not going to happen. He was not going to ditch Merry or me. I turned, searching for something heavy, and immediately spied a rock about the size of a bowling ball. Just sitting there. Waiting to be pressed into service. How providential. Grunting, I rolled it to where Ralph glowered. I flitted briefly with the idea of flattening him with it, but in the end I simply rolled its weight onto his chain.
He gave me an indignant flash of light.
“Make yourself comfortable, chum,” I told him, hoping he’d figure out that meant “stay put, asshole.”
Clothing next.
I caught the hem of my shirt and lifted it over my head. Another shiver racked me. I gritted my chattering teeth waiting for it to pass, then took time to fold my shirt and place it by my feet. My jeans followed. Denim is slow to dry; they were still faintly damp from my swan dive off the waterfall and they put up a fight to stay where they were. It took effort to yank them off my hips and more work to shimmy them down my legs.
Given their clamminess, it was absurd to fold them too, but I did it anyhow. My jeans and shirt were talismans to a life I wanted to go back to.
I turned my back from Ralph to remove my bra. My fingers felt thick, and I had the violent urge to rip the thing off, instead of taking time to unhook it. Breathe. Just breathe. Two deep inhales steadied me. Methodically, hook by freakin’ hook, I removed my bra. Again, I folded it neatly, cup inside cup, and placed it on the thin stack of my clothing.
Cold air beaded my nipples.
I was naked; I was anxious. A virgin about to be deflowered.
My Fae was utterly still. I could sense her watching my wolf and me. I could intuit her fascination warring with her jealousy. She did not want me to join my wolf. She did not wish to be minimized. Not here, in her realm.
But she could not squash my growing moon-lust.
Here’s what I’d never understood when I’d stood among the Creemore pack and watched them staring at the moon with the gap-jawed lust of the class nerd poleaxed by the hypnotic bounce of a cheerleader’s breasts—that bitch in the sky is a beautiful singer.
So foolish me for being deaf to her. Every time I’d stood there, vaguely superior with my less than superior thoughts, they’d been listening to this—
No words, no chorus, no melody line.
Just pure beauty. A lyrical call, sweet and high. Full of movement—up a scale, down a scale. Each dip, a feather stroke of solace to unbearable pressure at the base of my spine; each rise, a tug inside me.
I pressed my shaking hands against my skull and paced.
I wanted it to go on forever. I wanted it to stop. I wanted it to get louder until I couldn’t think anymore, until the fear inside me, and the fright and the uncertainties and the—
“Oh Goddess!” I howled as the first stab of agony skewered me.
I fell to my knees.
I thought I knew pain. Thought I knew every word for it, every nuance to it.
I knew nothing.
Don’t scream. They might find you if you do.
Shaking like a woman with a fever, I rolled on my side, stretching for the pile of neatly folded clothing. I hooked my jeans, dragged them to me. Another spasm. Another stab. Moaning, I stuffed the pant leg into my mouth and bit down on it.
Let it be fast.
Escape. That’s all I wanted. Escape from the bite, the gnawing teeth, the chew, the stinking stretch, the blood, the awful, horrible split second when I knew I was poised to go, that I couldn’t hold on any longer, that being here—human, grunting, legs kicking, back breaking—had to be worse than hovering on the brink of the threshold.
I toppled, mentally at least.
And went there. To where my transformation would kill me—Goddess, just let me die—or it all stopped.
* * *
Alive. Free. Hungry.
Who’s that?
Free.
Who’s free?
Hungry. Thirsty.
Geez. That’s my wolf talking. I can understand her. Wow, that’s so—oh, look at that, I can hear me too. That’s so weird. I’m talking to myself, and I can hear—
Hungry.
Both freaking conversations. My internal one and hers. Does Trowbridge think like himself when he’s got a tail?
Food.
Hey … I’m pacing … Son of a bitch!… I’m pacing on four legs. Goddess, I’m furry! Sweet heavens, I did it! I am wolf. Did I pass out? I must have. How long have I been pacing around my pile of clothing?
Alive.
Yes, you are. We both are. Well, slap me on my furry rump and call me stupid. I haven’t lost me. I’ve just merged me and she. And look at the bonuses. I feel so light on my feet. And powerful. Gad, I’m so powerful. I’m not short and round. I’m not the spaz who never got picked for school yard dodgeball … This is amazing. I am balance; I am muscle; I am strength. I am …
A girl with a really long tongue.
Geez Louise, I’m such a fur ball. What color is that? Black? I’m a black wolf? Huh. I always thought I’d be a gray wolf. Black, eh? It’s kind of a rich ebony, though, isn’t it? Oh, what’s this? I have a silver-tipped ruff? That’s an upgrade, isn’t? Damn, I really won the wolf lottery. I’ve got deliciously pretty fur. Take that, League of Extraordinary Bitches. I am—
Hungry.
Okay, I’m a hungry wolf, that’s what I am. With silver-tipped fur.
Prey. Fox. Fox. Fox.
Yes, it does stink of fox in here.
Run.
No. Not safe. We have to stay here. We can’t wander.
Hungry.
Geez. My nose is command central. Inhales are explosions of knowledge, emotion, response, thought—
Prey.
Okay, enough about the fox. I know its lingering stink is hugely annoying to our sensitive nose—an itch we need to take care of—but the fox hasn’t been here in a long time. It had its kits; it ate a rodent or two. Even the scent of its pee is old. Ignore it …
Fox.
Hey! I said, “Ignore it.”
Oh shit, I’m squatting. I’m peeing on the pee.
Hunt.
No, we’ll go back into the den area. We’ll just pace and pee over everything that bugs us, okay? Got plenty of pee.
Hunt.
No. We’ll stay here. Geez, what’s that movement? Squirrel? Oh shit—
* * *
My wolf took off, and this time I got to experience what it feels like to sit as a passenger, hanging on to the seat belt, hoping doofus in the driver seat doesn’t steer us into trouble.
Hell-on-wheels fun, that’s what it is.
Being a ride-along is a whole lot of good times.
The faster she ran, the more her joy flooded into me. And the longer she ran, the less I feared. Because wolves don’t care jack about what’s up ahead. They’re all about the moment. They live in the now, not the back there or up ahead. That mind-set had to suck if you were a sixty-pound Chow Chow stuck in a two-room city condo, but it was beyond wonderful if you a were a wolf in the wild.
The chase. The sheer joy of hunting.
Somehow in the running and hunting, the union between my wolf and Hedi self changed. A new form of soul merge. I didn’t fight, or swim against the current of her needs. For the moment I let her be—let her run, let her think, let her lead us over hill and dale—while I floated on her emotions.
We lost that prey, which as it turned out was not a squirrel but a chipmunk that very sensibly went down a hole. A few moments later, we picked up another trail. It was faded, forty-eight hours or older, possibly that of a female porcupine. Not particularly tasty. Whatever. We set off in pursuit for no other reason than the sheer inexpressible pleasure of running free.
