Glory Reborn

by Sherry L. Brown

  It doesn’t answer. It’s a solid immovable force against my back and I sigh at my silent and unanswered invocations to it.

  Nickolaj is a wolf. A motherfucking lone wolf. I laugh at how ironic the idea is. If I had bitten him before we had sex - would my baby had lived?

  The stars are out in full force. It’s only two days past the new moon. I find it in the sky. A sliver of blue. Hardly the comforting full I love.

  Are any of the others as obsessed with it as I am? Do they feel it’s phases in their bones? Feel it’s pull in their bloodstream? It’s my personal gravity. Earth holds my feet to the ground, but the moon, the moon pulls my blood through my body.

  The blood with a high alcohol level now. There’s the slightest spin from those pinpricks of light. Finally. I close my eyes and wait. Wait for the numbness.

  Why is there pain in my chest? Why can I still feel the cool night air? The hot tears behind my eyelids?

  “Glory?”

  I don’t answer the call. Maybe he’ll just go away. My husband.

  Shame fills me on the heels of that ungrateful thought. He’s protected me. Given me a home and luxuries I’d only imagined as a child. Even a few luxuries I never knew existed.

  “I’m here.” I lift my arm straight up into the air.

  His scent precedes his presence. Warm, clean, fur. Would things be easier if I just swallowed my pride and had this man’s baby? I don’t feel for him as a woman should. I recognize his handsomeness. His abilities. But there’s just nothing within me that wants to. With him.

  He seems cloaked in darkness here in the garden, and my inner wolf recognizes him for the threat he presents. Masculine. Stronger than us. More powerful though?

  He doesn’t say anything when his feet bring him to my side. But I can read the censure in his gaze. He toes the wine bottle over, reading the label. He shakes his head.

  “C’mon.”

  He bends, his hand encircling my wrist to tug me up.

  “Gray, just leave me here.” I tell him petulantly.

  “I can’t just leave you here.” He succeeds in getting me to my feet. He puts my arm around his shoulder and supports most of my weight. We start walking together back to the house.

  He plots. He handles. He is the commander of us all.

  Struck with sudden curiousness (and tongue loose from the wine) I ask him, “What was your wife like?”

  “Emmaline?” He pauses our forward trek.

  “Who else? Unless you’ve been married before?”

  He shakes his head and starts walking again.

  “No, not married before her.”

  We are at the back door, but I don’t want to go in without his answer. I want to know who she was to him. If they loved each other deeply. How they met. How he got over her. What’d he’d do if she popped back into his life. Impossible because she’s dead, but all the same.

  Gray’s an immovable force. He directs and influences life to his will it seems. The grand orchestrator. I admire him, respect him. And wonder if there is any chink in his unflappable cool.

  With his hand on the door knob, he pushes it open and directs me inside with a subtle push at my low back. I stop with my hand on the door jamb and look back at him.

  “Just tell me a little bit.” I sway there in the threshold and he cups my elbow to steady me. A hiccup pops up my chest interrupting my stand and stop, and he tugs me through the door.

  In the house, he tows me up the same back stairs I’d gone up a few hours before, happily ignorant to the storm about to sweep through our front parlor and my heart.

  “She was from Italy. One of the last great wolf families. Old world money. She hated Colorado, most especially the winters. She was spoiled. Vacations in the Mediterranean or Caribbean were her standard.”

  His voice comes out without inflection. There's not pain there. Or really anything. She was the same to him as I am. A possibility of a dynasty, but nothing else.

  I’m suddenly sad for him.

  “Have you ever loved someone, Gray? Like really loved?” I ask when we reach the top of the stairs.

  He doesn’t answer and when we get to my bedroom door, I open it not expecting him to.

  “There’s always hope, Glory.”

  Impulsively, I give him a quick hug and then shut the door quickly, embarrassed by my actions.

  “For you and me both.” His words are quiet, spoken as he walks away. Maybe he didn’t mean for me to hear. But I’ve got great ears.

  Love between Gray and I would be impossible. I hope he knows that - it’s what he agreed to.

  Chapter 12

  Phone calls after ten p.m. are never a good sign.

  “Glory?” Justice’s voice carries an edge I’ve never heard before.

  “What is it?”

  “Independence. Emily. It was a direct challenge. I’ve done all I can. She’s stable. The knife went through her ribs to her lung. It’s not healing. At all. She’s been near unconscious. The blade wasn't even silver! I don’t know what to do.”

  My brain is processing. My feet moving. Out of the bedroom, to the hall where Grayson and Marc are swiftly coming my way. They must have heard the phone ring. Knew it meant trouble.

  I meet Grayson’s eyes. He nods. “We’re coming to you,” I tell Justice, “Just stay calm, we’re on our way.”

  I hit the button on the handheld, and drop it to my side.

  “It’s Independence. She’s been hurt, badly. In a direct challenge from the alpha’s daughter.”

  “Get dressed. I’ll get the car.”

  Grayson comes through. Always.

  His foot on the gas, his sure hands delivering us to my sisters’ doorstep.

  The house, from the outside, appears as it always has. A normal looking white clapboard farmhouse. Wraparound porch, one light on in front of the door. Yellow glow from the front windows, but the blinds are drawn.

  The summer night is silent with the exception of crickets. Creepily deceiving.

  I don’t knock, but enter with a my sister’s name on my lips. “Justice?”

  The smell of blood and antiseptic near bowls me over.

  “Back here!”

  The kitchen’s been turned into a trauma room. Independence is on the dinning table, chest down, and her chest is wrapped in gauze.

  Justice goes into the diagnosis.

  “Silver knife inserted here.” She points to Indy’s back. “Punctured lung. I thought for sure she’d be dead. But somehow…” She pauses, wipes her forehead. “She kept breathing with one lung. Her heartbeat was strong. I carried her home. I fixed the puncture in her lung. Stitched her up. And called you.”

  “Everyone else?” Gray asks.

  “They all believe she’s dead already.” Justice confirms somberly.

  He nods. Wraps her up in his arms, and heads to the truck.

  “We’ll fix her, Justice. I promise we won’t lose Indy.” I hug her, and follow Gray and Marc to the truck.

  We are a special mix of riders in the night. Three wolves and a baby.

  Chapter 13

  “It’s war. Imminent.” Our usual patterns of communication are back. We don’t beat around the bush. Quick and efficient.

  “Can’t you just challenge Rick? Set someone up in his place?”

  “It’s not that easy. Their pack is less than thirty. A blip. And that’s not what I mean.” He pours a healthy measure of Scotch into his glass.

  I’m not used to this Grayson. I notice his shaking hands has he pours. I’d never have thought it. He’s superhero level in my mind. Maybe a child hurt is his kryptonite. The broken body of my sister is damn near my own. I won’t give up, though. He’ll be thinking of answers. Maybe that’s what good Scottish whiskey is for - brainstorming.

  We’d stabilized her. Stopped the bleeding. Cleaned her up and bandaged her. Put her to bed, and held vigil. But it’s not enough. Her heartbeat is sluggish and I can hear it’s strain when I hold her hand.

  He sits behind
his desk and runs a hand through his hair before dropping his elbows to his knees, hands cupping the glass between his legs and his head bent in submission. Deeply troubled is our alpha, and I can’t help but feel I’ve brought him to this. And I don’t like it.

  “Well, we’ve got to do something. Indy is dying. And Justice is at his mercy. Unacceptable.”

  “Don’t worry, Rick’s signed his death warrant.”

  I’m relieved to hear this. Gray has spoken. Rick won’t last through the day. Indy is another matter.

  “And Indy?”

  He doesn’t answer, just stares resolutely at his drink.

  “Please, Grayson.” I swallow the begging tone. “She’s the best of us. The light. You’ve got to save her.”

  It’s true. I’ve felt a lightness in her that doesn’t exist inside Just and me. Something of pure love. Something neither the wolf nor the moon touch. I suspect this is what delayed her growth. Made her a late-bloomer. Justice had given me updates. We plied her with teas and modern day medicines. And finally, finally she transitioned. Just once before being savagely ripped open in a mockery of pack laws. How could they? She’s just a child!

  She’s untethered to our mother, our past hurts, our family history. Pure. Innocent.

  His glass explodes against the wall in violent cacophony. “Don’t you think I’m trying?” He yells.

  I never even saw him throw it. Just the burst of shattered glass and wetness against the wall. The unshakeable alpha is showing a side I’d never seen of him before.

  ‘What would you have me do? That blade was something...She should have died within minutes of it piercing her lung.” He speaks the facts in a quieter, resolute tone.

  I feel hopeless. No teas, no soaps, no candles will fix her. No earth, no moon. Nothing I know of. I feel a hot tear squeeze out the corner of my eye. If Gray is this shook up, there really must not be anything we can do.

  The depressing futility is swiftly extinguished. Life didn’t do this. Gray did. When he didn’t bring them into our pack after Mother’s death. And there is another fault. Why would she abandon her daughters’ when they were still young pups? The taste of blame is bitter on my tongue. Too many people responsible, yet abdicating for what? What was Gray’s reasoning for not bringing my sister’s here? What was my mother’s reason for dying? Rage like I’ve never felt before burns in my gut. The ache in my hands at holding back.

  “There’s one way.” His words are barely spoken.

  “What?” I bite the word out quickly. His revelation has pushed back against my anger.

  “Forced turn.”

  “Forced turn.” I test the words out. I believe it means exactly what it sounds like.

  “Does it hurt?”

  “Most certainly in her state.”

  “But she’ll be healed, completely?” I need to know. My mind is turning possibilities over. Would Indy be able to live a full life? Be able to run with the pack? What would Life demand in exchange for this?

  “More or less.”

  Contemplative silence. Seven a.m. and neither of us want to go to bed after a night of survival. Her survival.

  “Glory, I need to know - now - more than ever. Tell me who her father is.”

  I lift my eyes from where they’d been in my lap. It’s an order he’s giving me. A secret he thinks I’ve been keeping.

  “I don’t know.” I answer him honestly. I don’t. My father passed away when I was ten. Three years later, I noticed a swelling of my mother’s stomach. A rounding that could only mean one thing. By that time, I was so used to her non-answers, psychotic episodes, lengthy disappearances, and other abuses that I’d never even questioned who the father might be. She wouldn’t have given me an answer. And, perhaps too, with my mind occupied by real-world responsibilities: bills, school (for both Justice and me), and food, I simply couldn’t find the capacity to care about it.

  What did it matter? She was another mouth to feed, another to care for. And when I was there beside my mother, under the light of a new moon, and she came into this world, I was in awe. I’d witnessed a miracle. And I loved my sister immediately and unconditionally then.

  “Nothing.” It’s his question and confirmation all-in-one.

  “Nothing.” I agree.

  He stands. “It’ll be better to do it now, when she still has some strength.”

  Chapter 14

  She lives.

  Quietly.

  On the outside, only a light scar remains where the blade entered her flesh. On the inside? It could be anyone’s guess. More emotional scars then I probably have the capacity to deal with.

  “Indy, do you want to come join me in the garden?” I ask her as I open the curtains to her room. The sun comes in and she rolls her face to it for a split second and then away.

  Outside, where the only therapy I know is. In the garden. Tonic for the soul. The great healer, Mother Earth.

  She hasn’t spoken since Grayson took her into the woods. And came back out a wolf in his arms. A beautiful black wolf. I’d never seen my sister’s other form, but I had to admit I was envious of the jet-black and reddish hues of her fur. I could imagine if she opened her eyes in that form, the spring-yellow green contrast would slay any man.

  But today, her diminutive form is tucked beneath the duvet and hardly noticeable. Her sunny blonde hair a stark contrast to the dark gray blanket.

  I hate gray. This guest room was one I never ventured to, one used only by Erik or Locke when they come to visit.

  “C’mon. It’s a beautiful day.” I squeeze the lump of blanket finding her foot beneath.

  “Gretchen is making sliders for lunch!” I tell her on my way out the door. Looking back at her, she hasn’t moved. I leave anyways, knowing she’ll follow at her own pace.

  I’ve let her sleep to mid-day for the past two weeks, knowing she’s healing and needs it. But in the afternoon, I’ve been coaxing her to the garden, the front porch, the kitchen. Anything to get her up and moving.

  Marc’s been a help. Back from school for the summer, he seems to have a well of infinite patience with her, keeping up one-sided conversations and bringing her things he think might spark her interest.

  And his interest. I’ve noticed it. He looks upon her with a man’s gaze. It would be tidy for my sister and my step-son to fall in love, get married and have babies. I let the hope of a giant happy family swell in my breast for a moment. Summer backyard birthday parties with piñatas. Winter nights around a fire, watching movies and eating popcorn. The pack already somewhat does these things, but it’d be so much more fulfilling with nieces or nephews!

  At the back door, I sigh and bury that fantasy deep inside a box. Tuck it underneath my heart, lock the door and throw away the key. Life has never given me such neat happiness. It’s given me glimmers, sure. The shiniest of which might be the night I met Nick.

  But, that’s another box, another locked door with a missing key.

  In the garden, I sit on my knees and pull weeds from around my lavender test plot. It looks like the Thumbelina Leigh variety is doing just ok, while the Edelweiss - a medium-sized variety with white flowers - is really taking off.

  I pull my little notebook from my pocket and flip back to the page where I made notes about the date I planted this bed. I mark a star next to Edelweiss. Had I checked the PH of the soil for this spot? It’s not marked in my notebook. I make a mental note to do it a bit later.

  My peripheral vision catches Indy’s form gliding out from the back patio towards me. She’s wearing a white throw blanket around her shoulders, and in her pajamas, barefoot. I’m going to mark it a win for today. She came out without assistance.

  The blanket adds an ethereal quality to her. A shroud of innocence. Sixteen. I remind myself.

  “Oh good. Indy, I need your help.” With what, I’m not sure. But, I feel like if I put her to work, maybe purpose will pull her out from wherever she is within.

  She sits down in the grass, in a patch of sunlight.


  I pluck a lavender bud and bring it to my nose contemplating. His face suddenly pops into my mind. Not from a memory long ago. No, this is his face as it was just two weeks ago. At dinner. Slightly bemused. What happiness can he know?

  Could I ask Gray about him? How would I even get information without betraying Grayson? No, I have to forget about him. Will he show back up? Make another trip to our house? What is his business with the council?

  I stand and take the few steps over to where Indy sits in the grass. I sit down next to her, hand her the lavender, which she takes with robot-like movements.

  Next to Independence’s arm, my skin is laughably light. She’s so tan, and she’s been inside for weeks. I’ve got that alabaster complexion. English rose some might call it. Is that where my mother was from, England?

  And my father. He was born in New Jersey. A first born of original Irish immigrants. I picture him now. Black hair, blue eyes. Black Irish. He joked that he was born a brawler. Bitten by the wolf on a hunting expedition. I try to imagine what he must have looked like in the seventeen hundreds. How wild American must have been then. So much uncut forest to run through. So much nature!

  And who was Indy’s father? Was he bitten or born? Old or new? What country did he call home?

  A vice clenches around my heart. Poor child. Our mother died before Indy got to know her. I scoff internally. She wasn’t really a mother to me much anyways. She’s known no parents in the traditional sense. Me and Justice. That’s all she’s had.

  I grip her hand in my own, give it a squeeze. We are together now and that’s what matters, right? I’ll bring her back to herself. Give her something to live for. A life filled with love.

  And what about you?

  How long do we sit side by side without saying a word. I’m not sure, but the sun moves in the sky and I feel the skin on my nose and cheeks burning from it.

  I pull her up alongside me, and we walk hand in hand back to the house. I leave her sitting in the kitchen under Gretchen’s eye.