by Terra Wolf
“Any clue what time Gramps is coming by?” John asked from beneath the quilt.
Deacon nudged the pile of blankets with his knee, and John grumbled, only changing his tune when he saw the steaming cup of coffee in Deacon’s hand.
“Naw. Though knowing him, he’s probably already here. Early bastard.”
John chuckled into his coffee and the two of them settled in with their hangovers.
“And Gracie? What time is she was coming by?”
Deacon grumbled. “Oh god, that’s right. Probably the same time, knowing me.”
Deacon was admittedly terrible with remembering plans. John hadn’t been the only one excited to see Deacon. Gracie, John, and Deacon were all right around the same age, and spent their entire school lives together. She felt more like a sister to them than a cousin.
“Well then I’m going back to sleep,” John said, curling his face into the cushions of the couch.
When 8:30 rolled around, Deacon’s phone chimed; he’d received a text message.
You left the laundry in the washing machine.
Deacon stared at the phone, his stomach tightening. Shit, how could he be in trouble already, and he wasn’t even there?
Shit! Sorry! Was a bit distracted –
Before he could finish the text message, the phone began to ring. Gramps was calling.
“You up?”
“Yeah, I’m up,” Deacon said, still trying to quiet the uncomfortable tightness in his gut.
“Good. I’m on my way over.”
Deacon shot John a sideways glance. “Alright, do you need me to -?”
Gramps had already hung up the phone. Deacon took a deep breath. “Jesus, he’s in rare form.”
John groaned. “Yeah, he has been the past couple months.”
“What’s been going on?”
“No clue.”
There’d been plenty of drama to speak of over the years, from the murder of two members of the Fenn family a decade earlier, to Deacon and his brother being kidnapped, drugged, and locked in the tool shed of Bodie Calhoun, Catherine’s own uncle, just a year earlier. Unlike their relatives, Deacon and John could happily claim surviving the ordeal, though Catherine and her cousin, Bennett, had paid a price to assure it. Then, just seven months earlier, their cousin Kirk lost his house to a fire set by his girlfriend’s psychopath ex-boyfriend. If Patrick Fenn wanted to be in a foul mood, one might expect it – then. Yet, the Fenn family hadn’t seen any trouble since Bodie Calhoun died, and Kirk’s house was now fully rebuilt, putting its former glory to shame. With Kirk’s girlfriend expecting their first child in just a couple months, Deacon found it strange that Gramps was so - he searched for the right word to describe a man whose default setting was dower.
Prickly?
That didn’t seem to do the man justice.
“How long did he say?”
The sound of boots on the porch betrayed Patrick Fenn’s arrival. He wasn’t alone.
John was up from the couch in a flash. “Well, that’s my cue!”
The front door opened without a knock, and John snatched his jacket from over a kitchen chair.
“Are you seriously leaving me?”
John shot Deacon a shit eating grin. “You bet your ass I am. Shoot me a text when he’s gone,” John said, dodging Deacon’s fist as he passed. John disappeared into the front hall. Deacon could hear his voice from the door. “Hey Gramps! Whoa, hey Mr. Talbot. Good morning!”
Mr. Talbot? What the fuck, Gramps?
Deacon hopped up from his seat, coming around the corner to stand in the front hall just as John swept out the door and into the autumn air.
Patrick Fenn stood in the middle of the space, clomping his boots on the welcome mat as Richard White Eagle scanned the room.
Richard White Eagle Talbot was the chief of the Talbot clan, the patriarch of the Passamaquoddy bear shifters. The man stood just an inch shorter than Patrick Fenn, somewhere around 6’6,” and to compare the man’s usual temperament to Patrick, Richard White Eagle made Patrick Fenn look like a fucking ballerina.
Deacon fought not to let his face betray his surprise. As Patrick and Richard White Eagle stepped into the kitchen, a third man appeared in the doorway behind them. This man was a couple inches shorter, and clearly a bit older than Richard, but their features betrayed a close resemblance, guaranteeing another Talbot.
Jesus Gramps, we havin a summit in my living room this morning?
“Go ahead and have a seat, Richard. Maynard,” Patrick said.
The older man nodded in response to hearing his name, offering a quick handshake to Deacon as he entered the home, the only one of the three men to acknowledge the home didn’t belong to him.
“Come have a seat, Deacon. Would either of you like something to drink? Deacon will get you anything you like.”
Both the Talbot elders shook their heads. Maynard looked to be closer to Patrick’s age, perhaps early seventies, but Richard White Eagle was only in his late fifties, his hair still black from crown to end. Deacon knew only so much of the Talbot clan, his last interaction with Richard White Eagle being at the funeral of the two Talbot girls that Bodie Calhoun murdered a few years earlier. Deacon knew Richard White Eagle was the youngest among his brothers, but had managed to claim the status of Chief by challenging his older siblings to a fight – a Kalmud, as they called it on the reservation. The Kalmud was called when disagreements needed to be settled, and the outcome would be decided by fight. Both parties of the Kalmud would shift, and they would go after one another as bears. The one left standing would be the winner. Patrick thought the tradition archaic and needless, the Fenns having settled their differences with colorful language for generations.
Richard White Eagle restored the tradition amongst the Talbots when his father, Markus Talbot, died. Of all his siblings, only two accepted the challenge, and of the two, only one walked away.
Richard White Eagle was a beast, and he was sitting in Deacon’s favorite chair, his long hair braided down his back. Deacon hovered by the kitchen door, watching the three men settle into his living room. Maynard took a place by the window, refusing the seat when one was offered. Maynard held himself with a strange trepidation, keeping his eyes to the floor.
“Come sit, son,” Gramps said, gesturing to the open space on the couch.
“This is not the biggest of your grandsons,” Richard said, his cadence slow.
Patrick shook his head. “No, he isn’t.”
“What of the rest?”
“Well, John is married, and Kirk has a girlfriend.”
“But Kirk is not married?”
“No. Not yet anyway, but they are expecting their first child together,” Patrick said.
Richard White Eagle nodded, as though he was discussing options with a car salesman. “What of your son? Is Terence not a widow?”
Patrick sucked something out from between his teeth and shook his head. “He is, but Deedee was his fated mate. He won’t marry again.”
Deacon’s stomach turned slightly at hearing Aunt Deirdre’s nickname – Deedee. Carissa called him that, and though he hated it, hearing Patrick say it reminded him of her text that morning. Deacon found himself growing impatient. If he didn’t respond to her text soon, he’d be in even more trouble.
“What is this all about?” He asked, finally.
Richard White Eagle turned to his brother, muttering something in what sounded like another language. Maynard glanced at Deacon, then nodded.
“He’ll do,” Richard said, rising from his seat and heading for the door. “We’ll hold the engagement celebration tomorrow evening at the Council Hall.”
Patrick hopped up from the couch and shook Richard White Eagle’s hand, then turned to shake Maynard’s as Richard disappeared around the corner and out the front door of the house.
“Engagement ceremony? What the hell is going -”
Maynard stopped in front of Deacon, offering a handshake, and for the first time, the older m
an met Deacon’s gaze.
“I hope you are a good man, Deacon Fenn.”
Then Maynard turned and followed his brother out the front door.
Deacon turned back to his grandfather, staring up at him in waiting silence. When Patrick finally turned from the kitchen door, he was smiling from ear to ear. Patrick blew out through pursed lips and slumped down onto the couch as though some great weight had been lifted from his shoulders. Deacon was almost unnerved to see his ‘prickly’ grandfather smiling with such abandon.
“Gramps. What the hell was that?”
Patrick Fenn smiled up at him, rubbing his hands together in his lap. “Congratulations, my boy. You’re engaged.”
Two
June 22nd, 1999
“Papa?”
Maggie Light Foot followed her parents with blind trust. The woods were growing cool in the late evening, and the darkness made for eerie sounds in every direction. Yet, Papa was there, and that was enough to draw her onward.
“You’re alright, my girl.”
Maggie glanced back at her mother, her dark eyes creased at their corners in a warm, expectant smile. This night was planned, as it was for all children of her kind – the first hunt. Maynard and Karen Talbot would lead their middle child into the woods, and when they caught the scent of something, her parents would shift, in essence showing her how simply by being present. Maggie felt nervous, the hair on her arms prickling with each passing moment. What if she wasn’t good at hunting? What if she couldn’t keep up and disappointed her parents, or worse, brought shame to the family? She was already an outcast by birth, if she couldn’t be a proper bear, the Talbot family would only look down on her more.
She wasn’t really a Talbot, after all.
“Don’t be nervous, darling. You will be fine.”
Papa continued to slip through the brush ahead, his footsteps making hardly a sound as he moved. He’d taught her to walk as silently as wind when she explored the woods, the quiet ways of their ancestors, stalking through brush like ghosts. This would be a very different thing, indeed.
“What if someone sees us? Someone might shoot at us.”
Papa ignored her comments, keeping his focus on choosing their path ahead.
“It will be fine. You’ll be just like any other bear. Once you’ve made the shift, the bear will take over, I promise.”
“Has anyone ever shot at you? What if there’s a hunter out, or another bear?” Maggie asked, her heart racing.
Her mother spoke in a soothing tone. “It’s illegal to hunt in these woods, and hunting season isn’t for another two months -”
Papa shushed her from up ahead. “Do you smell it?”
Karen stopped dead, closing her eyes as though she could smell better somehow when blind. Maggie smelled something as well, and whatever it was, it was by no means subtle.
“Are you two ready, then?” Papa asked.
Maggie’s stomach turned, instantly. Could she say no? Would her father be disappointed if she just refused to even try?
Yet, it was too late. Maynard Talbot pulled his shirt from over his head and moved closer to his teenage daughter, dropping his hands into the dirt. A moment later, his back hunched upward, and black fur sprung from every inch of skin. Maggie watched her father change, everything human about him disappearing in the matter of an instant. She’d seen this more than once, but it never ceased to send a strange shudder down her spine.
The black bear shook his head wildly as though shaking off a fly. He settled then, turning away from them and heading into the woods.
“Alright, girly. Your turn,” her mother said.
Karen Talbot turned after Maynard, and in one graceful motion, untied her ceremonial dress, letting it fall to the forest floor as her body changed shape. A moment later, she was gone into the darkness, following Papa out of sight. Maggie took a deep breath.
It was now or never. It was up to her to keep up, but – how was it supposed to feel to shift? Was there a button to push, a thought to focus on?
Be a bear, Maggie. Come on, you moron. Be a bear. Grr. Rarr.
Maggie bent over, fighting to feel that familiar shudder that being near her dad’s bear caused her.
Find it, damn it.
Maggie planted her hands into the ground, forcefully arching her back, feeling absolutely idiotic. What else was she supposed to do? Is it working? Will I know if it works?
She heard rhythmic grunts and growls up ahead, her parents calling for her to follow. They were drawing further away with each passing moment. Catch up, Maggie.
Despite the absence of light, Maggie knew those woods well. She’d traveled them a thousand times as a girl. She took off between the trees, letting her feet dance over the ground, leaping over fallen trees and briars. Her body moved with barely a sound, just as it always had, but now with adrenaline pulsing through her system, she felt twice as fast, gaining on her parents as they lumbered through the trees in search of their prey.
“Maggie!”
She stopped dead, her mother’s tone startling her back to reality. Maggie turned back toward the sound of the voice – she’d run straight past her parents.
Maggie moved like her father taught her, lithe and quick, making no sound as she bounded back toward her mother’s voice.
She smelled her father before she spotted him, his massive, black shape almost invisible in the darkness. Maggie stood there, watching him approach.
“Oh god, Maggie. No,” her mother said, frowning.
Maggie turned to find her mother standing there, her brown skin bared to the cool air, the expression on her face that of pain and something else – was that disgust?
Maggie felt her father approaching behind her as she looked down at herself.
She startled at the sight. She’d tried so hard, fought to feel what they told her to feel, but as her father shifted back into his familiar shape, Maggie felt their disappointment as though someone draped it over her like a shroud.
Maggie hadn’t shifted as they’d hoped. Maggie wasn’t like her parents, or her siblings, or much of the rest of the Talbot family.
Maggie was just Maggie – and by the look on her mother’s face, Maggie was a massive disappointment.
August 14th, 2011
“Oh my god, don’t be such a buzzkill. Come on! You said yourself you wanted to check out those weird stick figure things.” Maggie’s older sister, Candyce, stood in the doorway with their cousin, Beth, glaring into Maggie’s bedroom with such fierce disapproval that Maggie couldn’t help but see the resemblance between Candyce and their estranged mother.
“Yeah, in the daytime, not in the middle of the night,” Maggie said.
Candyce rolled her eyes. “Those woods are completely safe.”
“It’s hunting season. I’m not interested.”
Beth scoffed openly, but Candyce just continued to glare. “Seriously? You never come out with us! When was the last time you shifted? Seriously.”
Maggie shook her head. She’d seen the strange effigies hanging from the trees while out walking with her father, as had many of the tribe. None took responsibility for the spooky trinkets, but they all felt unnerved by them – almost enough to believe there might truly be a mad hermit living in the woods. Given that almost every member of her family was a bear, they had trouble believing this. Certainly a hermit would leave a scent they could catch. These stick trinkets didn’t smell like anything but white man, her father said.
Alright, Maggie. Come up with an excuse, she thought. Hunting season? I’m not feeling well? I’m on my period? Something! Anything!
“I’m just not in the mood tonight,” she finally said, only drawing further glares from her older sister.
“I’m beginning to take offense to this, Mag.”
Shit, she thought. “I know. I’m sorry. I just – I don’t know. I’ll tell you later.”
Beth was distracted a moment, glancing out into the hallway as Candyce glared. Maggie gave Candyce a surreptitiou
s look, shooting a focused glare toward Beth, as though to say ‘It’s Beth’s fault. I can’t tell you why, she’s right there. Ask later.’
Candyce gave an exasperated sigh, storming out of the room toward the kitchen. “Oh my god, Papa. It’s days like this that I remember she’s adopted.”
“Shut up, bitch!” Maggie hollered, throwing her copy of The Shining in protest.
Maggie took a deep breath and slumped into the pillows of her twin bed. There was merit to her sister’s protests. Maggie was twenty seven now, and in the decade since that night – the night her parents discovered their daughter wasn’t like them, the night they promised to keep her secret from the rest of the clan – she’d never accepted her sister’s invitations to hunt together, and never told her why. Even as her mother packed up her things, disavowing her husband and her adopted child without explanation, Maynard and Karen Talbot kept her secret from everyone, including her siblings. They knew she was adopted, but they didn’t know she wasn’t a bear. Candyce rarely even asked Maggie if she wanted to go out anymore. It hurt Maggie’s heart every time to say no.
“Alright, hurry up and tell me.”
Candyce slipped into the room, plopping down on the edge of the bed to whisper in quiet conspiracy with her sister.
“I know she can be fucking intolerable sometimes, but when she’s a bear she’s fine.”
“It’s not that,” Maggie said, sighing in frustration. Damn it, how long did she have to keep this secret? They’d have to learn someday, wouldn’t they? When she gave birth to children who weren’t bears someone was bound to notice, weren’t they? Maggie stared into her older sister’s face and frowned.
“Come on. You always say no. Is it something I did?”