I took an indecent helping, delighting my momentary hostess, then grabbed two brownies and went looking for Zar.
I paused to ask a young mother with a toddler on her hip about the mages. She was from Edinburgh and also had no idea, but told me to ask Ronny, an old man she pointed out in one of the many folding chairs around the fire. He was deep in conversation with several others.
That made me nervous too. Asking one by one gave some sense of control, keeping things quiet while also trying to ask around. Going into a whole crowd and making an announcement made me cringe.
I thanked her and returned to the barn where I’d seen Zar and Jed. Only Jason and Andrew now leaning on the rail fence, comparing notes and watching guests.
“Anything?” I asked.
Both looked at my plate and handful in the gloom. The whole area was lit with scattered citronella torches and a few electric lights, but it was mostly the bonfire far behind me.
“Peckish, darling?” Andrew asked, deadpan.
“This is for Zar.”
“Trying to put him out of his misery?”
“The chocolate is for me. Here—” I pushed the plate at Jason so I could eat the brownies before continuing my search. With walnuts even. The best ones. And was that a hint of coffee?
Taking the plate, Jason said, “He’s walking around with Jed. We wondered if they were going back to the Jeep. Can’t see them now.”
We’d parked on the street and walked up the driveway—hundreds of yards. Having to tow the caravan with us everywhere just to accommodate us all, we took up too much space to park in the farmyard.
“They know they can’t do that. We have to stay together. I wish I could talk to him, though. Tell me if you see him.”
“Not craving anything, are we?” Andrew asked, watching my nibbling.
“That comes later.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Cassia…”
“I know, Jay. I’m sorry. I’m going to tell him. All of them. Neither of you have any news of your own? No leads?”
Andrew shrugged. “Too early to tell.”
“Because people keep showing up late?”
“Because people keep drinking. Give them another hour and ask again.”
I started on the second brownie. “I don’t want to be here for another hour… Although … still plenty of food… We didn’t bring enough to fairly represent the size of our group.”
“Darling, we’d have needed a whole cow to represent the size of our group in a dinner gathering.”
“What about you?” Jason asked. “Hear anything?”
“An old man named Ronny—” I pointed to the distant fire. “He’s supposed to know everyone. I could find Shona again. She might be able to point us toward someone.”
Looking that way I spotted Gabriel and Isaac in separate conversations, both holding paper cups. Kage was at the food tables again, helping children get desserts that had been carefully placed out of their reaches at the center. No sign of Jed and Zar.
I sighed. “What time is it? Let’s give it another hour if we must. Try the older people, hopefully locals. I’ll find Shona and Zar. I want to talk to him so don’t come hunting after us. We’ll just be around the barn if I can get him to walk with me. In shouting range.”
“Nervous?” Jason asked.
“What?”
“How do you feel about the place?” Andrew clarified. “Speaking of shouting range?”
“Oh … fine. Parties aren’t my thing at a time like this. But, no, I’m not nervous. You guys? Instincts?”
“Fine,” Andrew said. “Tough to mingle when they all know each other.”
“But it makes it easy to wait,” Jason said. “No one is paying any attention to us, which is reassuring. If someone were, I’d worry.”
I finished off the second brownie and turned to Andrew, who leaned back against the fence with his elbows on it. It was a blissfully pleasant evening, cool but not frigid, and dry. Perfect bonfire night with constellations clearly visible, which Andrew now gazed toward.
“Andrew? I told you we’d come back to it later. What did you think of me when we first met?”
He pursed his lips, still looking upward. “That you were beautiful … and awfully dim.”
I gave him a look.
“What? Taking this mission on? Come on, Jay thought so also. Anyone would.”
Jason regarded the cream and berry mound on the plate. “Not after a day or two. Then I thought … you were kind.”
“To you,” Andrew said pointedly, then back to me. “Not as if he’d have noticed if you stopped to rescue a puppy from the side of the road. Being kind to him grabbed his attention.”
“I don’t suppose there’s anything wrong with that…” I said.
“If you’re fine with self-absorption in your relationships. Oh, wait…” Andrew looked around as if taking in the rest of the pack. “Jason … Kage … Jed … yep, you are okay with that. The schemer, the egotist, and the poor me, martyr, kicked around wolf without a friend in the world because he’s a total arsehole to everyone—while he thinks it’s because we’re all just tossers. Makes one wonder what you first thought of us, darling.”
“I thought you were beautiful … and awfully crazy.”
They laughed.
“Unlike us, you turned out to be a brilliant judge of character,” Andrew said.
“I could have done better on that score.”
“You’d say that with an A-plus. ‘Dammit, where’s my double-plus? If I don’t get a gold star it means I can do better.’”
“Don’t do that.”
“What? Mock you?”
“No, that ship has sailed.” Shaking my head. “The American accent.”
“Oh. Not my fault you all sound flat as Dutch pancakes.”
“I could go for a pancake,” Jason murmured, again looking at the plate.
“Do you two want that? I’ll get another helping. Or maybe I’ll talk to Ronny first. No … there’s another crowd around him. Looks like a story-teller. Now my teeth are full of brownie bits…”
Andrew grabbed a peach sparkling water from his feet to give me. “If you want lady-hair he’ll be just around the parameter keeping an eye on you. Can’t be far.”
“He’s been trying to keep less of an eye on me.”
“Never.” Andrew pulled a face. “He’d carry you everywhere in his arms if he could get away with it.”
“Not anymore.”
“Sure he would.” Jason offered me a sad smile. “He’s been edged out all his life. Taking that as his lot, you know? He’d come out of his shell in these last couple of years. It showed with you right off. He obviously tried really hard.”
“He finally threw himself out there, led his own hunt, did his best, and look at him,” Andrew said. “Edged out again. If he’s been spinning you some tale about how he’s through with you, Cassiopeia, it’s because he’s giving up in light of recent … upsetting events for him.”
“Not because he doesn’t feel the same way he has all along about you,” Jason said.
“What is this?” I glanced between them. “Have you two been gossiping about him?”
“We’ve never been that hard up for a topic of conversation, darling.”
“It’s pretty obvious,” Jason said. “He’s been trying to disconnect from you. Why else would he stay in fur all day? It’s what all his family always did when they wanted to shut down and get away from the pack. The same reason being a stranger is considered unhealthy in modern wolf society.”
“While we’re on the subject, what about Gabriel not changing?” I asked. “His limp is getting worse. He’s got to see a doctor. Even then … he’d be so much better off just changing and getting it over with.”
“Not going to happen,” Andrew said. “You’re asking a vegan to eat a steak. That’s not who he is anymore.”
“But he could change, right? If he really wanted to?”
“Could?” Andrew shrugged.
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“I don’t see why not,” Jason said. “Remember, though, he came out here to help us. He’s scared about his brothers and all of us getting killed after what’s been happening. He didn’t come to change his life or become part of the pack again. To him, this is just a very stressful holiday. Any minute he’ll get to go back to work and pretend it never happened.”
“But he is still connected. This morning, with his brothers… There’s a part of him that still wants that life.”
“A small part,” Andrew said.
“Is there anything you could do for the wound?” Jason asked. “How you helped Kage?”
“I have no idea. I could try if he’ll let me.”
“There.” Andrew jerked his head and I looked around.
Zar had crept to the food tables, sniffing while Kage was still handing out cream puffs, brownies, shortbread, and pumpkin bars.
“Thanks.” I hugged them. I’m not sure why. Just a quick embrace each, gave back Andrew’s drink, then wandered casually across the grass.
I went to Kage first, just able to watch Zar from the corner of my eye and make sure he didn’t flee.
After a few words telling Kage off for his irresponsible actions, I took a paper bowl and piled it with another serving of cranachan, then found myself across the table from Zar.
“Hey…” I spoke quietly, keeping eye contact brief. “I never said I was sorry for last night. You were just trying to take care of me.”
Zar ate a carrot stick and started back down the length of the table.
“Can we talk?”
He glanced up.
“Please, Zar. Let’s go out to the farmyard. We need to wait longer anyway. People are still showing up late.”
Shoulders hunched, he came around the table to follow me.
Chapter 31
We leaned against the side of a tractor in front of the stone byre, farmyard smells drifting around us with the wood smoke and cool night, sweet cream and berries.
I’d meant to say something. Instead only leaned back beside Zar, watching the moon with him. I ate some cream and oat crumble before passing the paper bowl to him.
Zar hesitated to take it. Must have been the smell of strawberries that won him over.
While he ate, still looking upward, I tried to remember the list Zar had once told me of his favorite things. Strawberries … or had it been strawberry ice cream? Music, reflections, what else? I’d been on the list. Or things about me. My hands? His family and pack. More…
“I wish we had a clear pond to reflect Moon here,” I said softly after a while.
Zar watched it: more than half, bright and silver, ready for a full moon, Lunaenott, at the end of the month.
“You haven’t … turned up anything?” he asked after a while, hesitating as if he’d been unable to think of a question, or almost asked something else.
“Not yet. New people just came in. It seems the party goes on late.”
He nodded, ate, and watched the moon.
“Zar? You don’t owe me anything. It would only be a favor if you…” Watching his face in profile, his eyes reflecting silver, nose and hair and high cheekbones highlighted, it was a struggle to find words—not because there were not enough, but because there were too many. “If you would tell me how you’re doing. How you’re feeling. What’s going on?”
“What I said yesterday hasn’t changed.” He glanced at me. “It’s not your fault. You don’t have to apologize for everything and act like you’ve been cruel to me, all right? Moonlight does reach all. You touched me, and all of us. I’m grateful. Now, though, you have other mates, and I have things to work out for myself.”
I opened my mouth to say no, to ask him to elaborate on “things,” to say I was here for him no matter what and he could talk to me about anything and I loved him. Instead, tears in my eyes, I said, “Okay.”
He looked at me again, this time meeting my eyes. “You’ll…? You’re all right, then? You’re not going to keep arguing about it?”
“No. I respect you, Zar. Maybe I haven’t always acted like it. It’s true that I’m sorry about so many things with you… Here’s another coming up: letting you go. But I can’t tell you what I want and you obey—and the fact that I’ve kept trying to only invalidates your feelings. What do you want? What do you need right now for your own mental and emotional health? Just friends for us? Will that help you?”
He stared at me, unblinking, the mostly empty bowl set aside on the tractor tire.
“Zar…?”
“I can’t be casual friends with you.” He looked into my eyes with the expression of someone forcing himself to watch an excruciating horror movie without ever looking away.
“Then what do you want?” I asked.
“That’s not what this is about.”
I hesitated. “Then could you tell me what you want? Or what this is about?”
He paced away. The barnyard was sloppy with the previous day’s rain and he squelched around for a minute, shaking his head, trying with a few false starts and walking away again.
“Cassia—you have—” He faced me, holding his hands out as if to receive a platter. Turned away again.
It was driving me crazy that I couldn’t see his face. The mud wasn’t that great either.
A light glowed around seams in the double sliding barn doors so I took the few steps to crack it open and peer in.
“Hello?”
A single bulb in a vintage green metal shade hung in the alley beside goat pens. The goats were settled, chewing cud, while three swaybacked horses, coats flecked in gray, ate hay from racks on the wall of their box stalls. No one else about. Only some other pens, a tack or feed room, and old-fashioned hayloft taking up half the vaulted ceiling space above. This was open to exposed beams and swallows’ nests.
Gentle orange light and animal warmth were inviting, along with the hay and horse smells that took me back more to favorite childhood books than my actual childhood.
“Come on. We can talk.”
The horses looked around. One or two goats got to their feet or bleated, then all went back to hushed chewing and distant sounds of talk and playing children out at the bonfire.
Zar stepped in and took a minute to look cautiously around, sniffing and listening. There was nothing to sit on so I climbed the ladder to the open loft—with even more care than Zar’s slow entry. Checking every step of the way for spiders, I settled on the board platform with my feet dangling over the side. Zar climbed up to sit an arm’s length away.
The peace of the place—heightened, not diminished, by sounds of people nearby, safety of our pack, comfort of the relaxed animals chewing below—was so meditative I could almost see myself in my grove. A quiet place with gentle light. Seeing it, though, I spotted another scene I could not place. Some imagery, a piece of art from my past, a trace of music, a song from … a movie?
I watched Zar twist a bit of hay around his finger. Not stiff straw bedding but green feed hay which apparently demanded a great deal of his attention. I followed the motion of his fingers, then studied his eyes, and placed the image that had come to mind with the words of a song. I’d seen Watership Down a dozen years ago, but for some reason never forgot that song, “Bright Eyes,” which made me think of connections to spirit worlds and non-human creatures. Until now, when it made me think of Zar. Or he made me think of it.
Zar seemed to be stringing his thoughts together, breathing in a deliberate manner, perhaps planning a speech.
I offered my left hand above boards between us, palm up. After a moment, when I was about to withdraw so as not to pressure him, Zar took it with his right.
Another breath, this one ragged through his mouth, eyes shut.
Swim with him, and his Moon will guide you as well.
I waited, holding on tight and watching, more and more worried for him.
“Right, so…” He swallowed and opened his eyes. “You have other people, other mates. You don’t need me. While I have
a lot I need to deal with and … handle. So…” Gripping my hand. “I’m stepping back. We keep working as a pack. But not as … not anything between you and I personally. You’ll be helping me by letting me alone to have time for … just for myself. It’s not always easy being part of a pack.”
“You’re right. I get that. Out of all eight of us, I think Kage and Andrew might be the only real extroverts. I’m on the fence about Jason… Anyway, that’s okay. It’s perfectly healthy to have boundaries and say when you need something. That’s strength, Zar. Whether asking for help or asking for space, you’re honoring yourself by saying what you need.” I rubbed the back of his hand with my thumb and looked up from our fingers to his face. “Please tell me something, though. Look me in the eye and tell me, honestly, from the bottom of your heart, that being left totally alone and putting space between us is what you need for your mental health right now.”
Zar stared at our hands. He looked into my eyes. “Cass…”
“Tell me,” I whispered, “what you’re really feeling.”
He dropped his gaze.
I squeezed his hand tighter. “When I found out you were a double water sign it scared me. Astrology isn’t everything. Still, it seemed like a bad start. Air and fire meets twin water? It took me a while to see how blessed I was to meet you in the first place—what a gift you have. I’ve never seen your chart, but I don’t think it would be a stretch to say you represent pure emotion. Feelings stacked on feelings stacked on dreams. So the fact that you’ve been so careful not to share a single thing you’re feeling with me lately is scaring me. Not your plan, not what you’re wanting to happen now to wrap a bandage around your emotions and protect yourself, but just how you’re feeling.”
He didn’t say anything, watching our hands, breathing slowly through parted lips.
“Maybe you’re fed up? You’re the little brother, yet you always got lost in the middle. Gabriel was admired and Jed was trouble. You were the good, quiet pup who no one really noticed. And now, grown up, I can never give you undivided attention—always fitting you in as I must fit in everyone else while we find some sort of rhythm in these relationships.
“Or maybe you’re giving up on me? You offered me everything—over and over again. I turned away or told you to wait, or even literally ran from you. Remember that? I think I still have a bump on my head. Because Goddess was telling me to stay. So you bent over backwards for me but I’ve finally worn you down. You’re done. Ready to move on. Ready to find a mate who can give you undivided attention, and admiration you’ve always deserved.”
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