Shield Skin

by F. E. Arliss

  “I couldn’t really see what it was that grabbed them away from me at first, as I just ran blindly to get away. Then I hid behind a woodpile and when I looked back one of the men was already hanging by his belt from one of the curly decorations on a lantern post. The other guy was being dragged towards the post. The thing dragging him looked like a small cow with horns, regular cow hooves on the back, but big raccoon-like hands on the front with claws. It had a long tail that had little spikes on the end. It used the guys boot-laces to tie his feet together and hung him from the other side of the lantern post. Then I ran,” Emery whispered, slumping in her chair.

  “It was a bahkauv, they are a type of creature that dislikes drunks. It most likely saved you from being even more grievously assaulted. Whether it knew it was saving you or whether it simply wanted to punish the drunks, we will never know. Thank goodness it came when it did,” Albertina said, gently rubbing Emery’s hands in hers.

  “I ran to Max at the pub and then we came home. Everything was fine for a while on the drive home, but then some butt-ugly werewolf thingy howled and a few seconds later leapt onto the hood of the Rover. Max tried to get away, but the Rover slipped in the mud and crashed into a tree.”

  “It put its claws into a tiny little gap in the window and shoved it down. I can still see the old manual window handle turning as if by magic as the window went down. It was so creepy,” Emery shivered as she murmured the last part.

  “We jumped out the other side of the jeep and Max was going for something in the back. I wanted to get the thing away from him and suddenly I was just so mad. So angry. It had been a terrible evening and I just got done being afraid. If that thing bit me, it wasn’t going to puncture me anyway. I am a shield skin, afterall. All at once, I was just laughing. Laughing so hard,” Emery whispered. “I think I might have been in shock a little or something.” Albertina nodded.

  “Me laughing seemed to confuse the ugly thing. I started talking to it, between laughing. That made it even more agitated. I don’t think it’s used to people laughing. Probably they run and scream. Wolves like that. Laughing and not running, though, seems to confuse them,” she added thoughtfully.

  “When I pulled on the energy of the woodlands, Perchta showed up with some Wolpathuga’s and Mash. That was pretty much the end of it. Perchta told the thing to hightail it or Mash would mash him. It ran. I petted one of the rabbits while Perchta told me she was guardian of the beasts and that Mash was an ogre. Then two red deer bucks came and we rode them back. Perchta sent Max on ahead. Though I’m sure we got here sooner as the bucks are very fast,” Emery ended, then slumped forward onto the table top. “It was just a lot to take in. I’m tired,” she whispered. “Can I go back to bed?”

  “Of course,” Albertina said gently. “Can you make it up the ladder? Or shall I call Max to help you?”

  “No!” Emery practically shouted, she’d had enough of the horrid little man for a lifetime.

  Emery’s reaction to Max’s name gave Albertina all the information she needed. As the girl disappeared into the space beneath the eaves, the older woman slumped over the table. What was she to do about Max? He’d endangered an apprentice. He’d always had a weakness for drink, but living out here had kept that demon at bay. She’d felt she could trust him to take Emery to town, never imagining that he’d leave the girl alone, or go off drinking. She’d thought having responsibility for the girl would keep him from that. She had been wrong.

  Here in Oberwolfach, the locals called werewolves “beerwolves” and that, for Emery’s case, was exactly right. If Max hadn’t been hanging out way too late on a full moon, drinking, the entire incident would never have happened. Beerwolf, indeed, thought Albertina. Heaving an enormous sigh, she went to find Max. As an erdhenne, or house spirit, Max was bound to the slanted house Albertina lived in. She would have to unbind him and, hopefully, find him a new location where beer was nowhere to be found.

  When Emery woke eight hours later, it was dark again. The fireplace was roaring, lighting the room below. She crept quietly down the stairs and was surprised to see Albertina sitting quietly in a rocking chair by the fire, conversing with the three wood wose, Lory, Cory, and Tory. She lifted a hand in greeting and the three tiny women rushed to her and dragged her into the chair opposite Albertina in front of the fire. “Let’s see your throat,” they chorused, little faces grim with worry.

  “It’s much better now,” Emery said, experimentally trying her vocal chords and finding that the statement was true. “Yes, much better,” she repeated, fingers worrying at the knotted end of the gauze Albertina had dressed her abrasions with. Finally, finding it and prying it loose, she unwound the slightly soiled gauze.

  “Ooooh,” chorused the wood wose in unison. “It looks bad. Very black and blue,” said Tory.

  “No blood,” muttered Cory. “Though I suppose as Shield Skin you wouldn’t bleed, just bruise underneath.”

  “Not so swollen as I had imagined,” chirped Lory. “It will get better fast now.”

  During this examination, Albertina had brewed Emery another cup of the foul-tasting tea and handed it to her with a slight smile. “It does look less swollen, but the damage is still quite extensive and you will need to have the bruise dressing reapplied,” the older woman said, turning Emery’s head this way and that as she inspected the damage.

  Returning to her seat she gazed at Emery and said sadly, “I’ve sent Max away after consulting with Perchta. He endangered an apprentice with his love for beer. He has been assigned a new post in a location where there is no pub. I am very sorry this happened to you here. It was our responsibility to ensure your safety and we failed you. I am deeply sorry.”

  “It is also partially my fault,” Emery said. “I am Shield Skin. I had let my guard slip and so my skin was not as toughened as it should have been. I did not bleed, but I had allowed myself to become soft with the nice bed of moss I have here. Comfort lured me into not keeping my guard up. In the Rover coming back, I meditated on hardening my skin, so I felt ready to face the werewolf. Unfortunately, this,” Emery waved her hand at her neck, “had already happened. It was a good lesson,” she added, smiling sadly at Albertina. “If nothing else, I’ve learned that no matter how safe a place seems, danger lurks at every turn.”

  The older woman nodded her head sadly, and said, “That, unfortunately, is true.”

  Emery finished her tea, described the bahkauv and the beerwolf to the wood wose in detail, then trudged out to the outhouse, used it, and then fell once more into her soft, moss-covered bed.

  The last day with Albertina, the large red buck appeared at the edge of the clearing and when Emery climbed onto one of the upright, cut-log seats, it sidled alongside, allowing Emery to throw her leg over his broad back. Checking with a glance of one large brown eye, that Emery had a good grip on the thick scruff of fur between his powerful shoulders, the deer leapt away into the woods. Leaving the wood wose chorusing in awe and Albertina smiling happily.

  That evening Albertina dropped Emery off at the airport in Stuttgart, all evidence of the extensions that had allowed Max’s short legs and arms to control the steering wheel and foot pedals of the Land Rover had disappeared. Albertina hugged her, saying, “You are a powerful young woman. I am proud to have hosted you and sorry that we let you down.” Emery simply shook her head and hugged the woman in return. Albertina stepped back into the battered jeep, and with a wave, was gone in the crowd of far shinier autos.

  Emery slept the whole way home. When Circling Wind picked her up at the large airport, she saw him through the crowd and rushed to him, threw her arms around him and once more burst into tears. The gnarly old man simply rocked her back and forth for a while and then said gruffly, “Let’s get to flying, girl. That will cure what ails you.”

  He was right, as soon as they were in the air and bound for the ratty little airstrip near the King mansion, Emery felt better. As the small, rickety plane bumped along the grass landing strip towards the ba
ttered brown Chevy parked at the end of the landing area, three moth-eaten, mink-clad old ladies crawled stiffly from the rusted behemoth.

  Emery had never been so glad to see anyone in her life...well maybe Circling Wind a few hours ago. She ran to the ladies, hugged each one firmly, hugged Circling Wind once more, then waited and waved as the plane bumped back along the landing strip and into the air.

  Dorothea shoved Emery into the back seat of the huge boat of a car and said tartly, “No need to explain it all to us now if you don’t want to. Albertina called and gave us the rundown. All I can think is, “What the heck?” “That said, we can wait a day or two to hear it all from you.”

  Emery, relieved, sighed heavily. Dorothea, seated next to her, hugged her. Then, tired and relieved, she simply slumped against the flea-bitten mink bosom and napped. She heard Bertha mutter to Letty in the front seat, “These damn training runs are gonna kill the girl if we’re not careful. We’re gonna have to do better than this in the future. It’s not safe anymore to send her alone.” Letty, eyes on the road, simply nodded.

  Chapter Twenty

  Rest and Contemplation

  It took Emery several days of completely avoiding the King cousins before she was ready to talk about her time in Germany. It wasn’t that it had been terrible. She’d really liked Albertina and had enjoyed meeting all the wonderful creatures and interesting beings that she’d always believed were just tales or myths.

  She had not enjoyed the grumpy, house-erdhenne, Max, and his drinking sojourn that nearly got her killed. Nor had she been keen on the slinky, stinky werewolf. She’d been so shocked by that episode that she’d completely forgotten to ask all the questions of how a werewolf happened, that she now wanted to know. Well, maybe she’d be able to find that out from the King cousins.

  Finally, she’d screwed up her courage and walked to the mansion house after school. Bertha saw her coming and threw open the front door, gesturing warmly with her hands for Emery to come in. The front entrance was as dark and musty as ever. Not that Emery usually came in that way. She usually went around back and entered under the portico into the back hall. Emery suspected that Bertha had been keeping watch for her from the round window at the top of the third-floor landing.

  Emery closed the door behind her and was instantly swept into Bertha’s embrace. “We’ve been so worried,” she said, blue eyes watering behind her finger-smudged, cat-eye glasses. “We were afraid you’d be angry with us.”

  Emery hugged the old woman, letting Bertha’s short, spiky grey hair stab her in the temple. “I’m not angry. Just tired and a little confounded,” Emery whispered.

  “What are you confounded about?” came the sharp question from Dorothea, who was now looming in the door to the enormous front parlor.

  Emery detached herself from Bertha and saying nothing, stepped over and hugged the bony frame of Dorothea King, rocking her side to side. When she drew back she was shocked to see tears gleaming behind the worn frames of Dorothea’s glasses. The old woman reared back and said sharply, “Let’s have tea!” Then she stumped away, wiping surreptitiously at her eyes.

  After they were settled in the conservatory room with steaming cups of herbal tea, and the tiny, blue poisonous dart frog had settled himself behind Emery’s ear, a silence descended. “I’m just still processing everything I saw. There was a lot to take in,” Emery stated quietly.

  “I mean, seriously, werewolves - I want to know where they come from, by the way. And, wood wose - or wood spirits - they were very sweet; a house spirit - more like an evil house elf than a house spirit,” she added. “He was so grumpy! Then, of course, there was the drinking night from hell.”

  “I loved the wolpathugas, so cute! Wonderful Perchta, the guardian of creatures, sent the werewolf away. Werewolf!” Emery stated loudly. “Enough said.”

  “Mash, fantastic, sweet ogre. Moss faeries, so dainty and sweet. Bahkauv, drunk slayer, not sweet, not dainty. I still don’t know if he was helping me or just being ornery,” Emery mused. “There was the feldgeister that Albertina could talk to, but I couldn’t see - it made whirlwinds and threw bolts of lightning - who needs Thor? Last, but not least, was the wonderful red deer buck who took me home after that whole “beerwolf” thing and that I then rode another day. It was awesome! We galloped through the forest and leapt over streams and scrambled up mountains. He was so brave and so magnificent!” she enthused.

  “So, as you can see...a couple of death threats, among some other very nice creatures. It just put me off balance. I let my guard down and got pretty damaged by the men in the alley. The bed was so soft and Albertina wasn’t doing anything rough with me, so I’d stopped hardening my inner skin. That laziness almost got me killed,” Emery said flatly.

  The two old ladies nodded, grim looks on their wrinkled faces. “Yes. We are giving some thought to how to proceed with your training if you even want to proceed. Perhaps we should all take some time to think about the future and what it is that might come of this training, and what you want out of it,” Dorothea said grimly. “We need to know what you want to do with your life, girl. You’re going to have to give it some thought. If you continue with this training, it can go on for years.”

  “Do you want to go to college?” Bertha asked, curiosity in her voice. “And, if so, where and for what? We’ve never really discussed your interests at school except for art. Is there anything else you’re intrigued by?”

  Emery shook her head. “I like to read. I like to paint. I like being outside and I love animals. I don’t like science much, and I hate math. I’m a whiz at logic,” she added. “I never miss a single logic question. I can’t understand how anyone misses a logic problem! They’re so common sense,” she added, shrugging her shoulders. “My math teacher says that logic and geometry are linked, but I just don’t see how that can be. I’m a whiz at logic and I detest geometry and am no good at it at all.”

  Bertha and Dorothea snickered. “Yeah, they also say geometry and music are linked and I can play the piano like a whiz but I also hate geometry,” Bertha laughed through her words. “I think those are just things teachers tell you to try to get you to exert yourself more.”

  “Like that ever worked,” Dorothea snorted.

  “Well, it didn’t work with me, either,” Emery agreed. “Now, no more dallying! I want to know how a werewolf is made!”

  Dorothea nodded at Bertha and relaxed back into her rickety white-wicker chair. Bertha took a deep breath and began, “Werewolves were not made by witches! Don’t let anyone try to tell you that old wive’s tale! Real witches “harm none”! She added emphatically.

  “No one is truly sure how they came to be, but the oldest references are from well before the era of Christianity. The story of Gigamesh, a royal prince of the Mesopotamian dynasties, tells that Ishtar, the goddess of fertility, love, war and sex, set her sights on him. She flirted and cajoled him trying to entice him into falling in love with her. Since she had a bad reputation for rejecting her lovers after a short time, Gilgamesh restrained himself.”

  “He remembered a young shepherd from the area that had been smitten with Ishtar and offered her gift after gift. Instead of winning favor with her, she began to see him as pitiful and pathetic and turned him into a wolf in order to send him away from her. The young shepherd's own dogs turned on him and tore him apart. So,” Bertha added, “you can see why Gilgamesh thought Ishtar best avoided. She was a shallow and vain goddess who punished a young man for simply boring her.”

  “That is the first story of a man being turned into a werewolf. Or, at least, into a wolf. Some say now that werewolves run in families and become a wolf only when they don a belt made of the enchanted wolf-skin of their ancestor,” Bertha finished, sighing deeply.

  “No one really knows for sure except the werewolves themselves. They exist. But the rest is a bit of a mystery. The only thing that runs through the thread of history after the story of Gilgamesh is that the other gods and goddesses of the time thou
ght this was an unjust punishment for a young man who had done no harm but find a woman desirable. From that point on, only men that had shown themselves to prey on others could be turned into a werewolf. So, in these times, supposedly all werewolves are from families that earned their fortunes on the backs of others,” she said, leaning back in her chair and taking a sip of tea.

  “So werewolves are bad,” Emery said slowly. “They’re only werewolves if they use people for their own gain?”

  “Yes, precisely,” Dorothea said sharply. “Don’t go feeling sorry for them. They aren’t the pretty wolves from Twilight, girl!”

  “No, I get that,” Emery murmured, thinking hard. “The one I saw had a weird thing around it’s waist. It looked sort of like a fanny-pack or a belt with pouches.”

  Bertha and Dorothea looked at each other, eyebrows raised. “That’s good information to know. We’ll pass that on to the council of Crones on the Isle.”

  “Now we need to discuss your future and what you want out of it,” Dorothea changed the subject authoritatively.

  The next few weeks the three discussed many things. Emery could more easily tell them what she didn’t want to do, than tell them what she did want to do. Although when she did tell them things she did want to do, they were almost always something adventurous. She did want to fly a plane. She did want to see Mount Everest. Hang-gliding sounded fun. So did parachuting. Ballroom dancing was a no, though she supposed it might come in useful sometime, but there was no way in hell she was wearing a tutu for ballet.