Huldra groups do not have leaders. We all lead and we all follow. So Renee’s parental attitude this evening was not appreciated or accepted.
Shawna sat on the couch and patted the cushion beside her.
“No, I’m sorry, but you cannot sit on the furniture in a blood-soaked dress,” Renee chirped, shaking her head. She wore a long, white robe tied around her waist. It almost glowed against her dark hair and skin.
The scent of male blood wouldn’t be the best addition to a huldra home. I pulled the dress up over my head, but my unexpected strength tore the thing in two. I peered up at my coterie as I gripped two handfuls of black fabric.
My sister Olivia laughed and quickly put a hand over her mouth. “Sorry, it’s not funny. It shouldn’t be funny,” she mumbled through her fingers.
I padded to the kitchen, tossed the two pieces of the dress into the trash, tied the bag, and placed it beside the side door leading to the patio. I thought better, and opened the glass double doors to place it outside the house, onto the patio. I returned to the living room and stood beside the couch, beside my partner sister.
Celeste lifted her nose. “You smell delicious,” she said before licking her lips. She took a hesitant step toward me.
“It’s in my hair,” I said with a groan. “His blood.”
“I’m well aware,” Aunt Patricia answered. She stepped between Celeste and me.
Aunt Renee threw her hands into the air. “This is just… I can’t…”
“Tell us what happened, Faline,” Shawna spoke up, diffusing the tension in the room. “From the beginning.”
“Okay.” I thought about sitting on the couch, but still didn’t want my bloody, matted hair to touch the fabric. I opted to stand.
When I finished sharing what little I remembered of the night, Aunt Patricia rubbed Celeste’s arm and walked toward me. “Do you think he was working for someone else?”
“What? Brian. Definitely. He’s never not working for someone.”
Shawna chewed her lip. “He said he was working for someone on the human trafficking case. Could that person have hired him to kidnap you?”
“Maybe, but I don’t see why.” A cloud of fuzziness moved and recollection hit me. “The papers I have mention a whole ring of people involved, but nothing of any evidence found and the skip is the only name given. They only brought up charges against one woman, which is weird that one woman would take the fall for a whole operation. Still, I don’t see how that has anything to do with me.”
“He didn’t drug you,” Aunt Patricia said solemnly.
Aunt Renee nodded. “Drugs don’t affect us that way.”
“Then how did he get me back to the room?” I asked.
“It’s got to be the succubi.” Aunt Renee glared out the sliding glass door. She shot a glance to her sisters. “They’re getting revenge.”
Aunt Abigale sucked in a breath.
“Wait,” I said with hands in the air. “They’ve already gotten their revenge. I have a missing mother to prove it.”
“Marcus isn’t from Oregon, is he?” Shawna asked, worry etched in her brow.
“No, I made sure to ask before anything happened between us.” I thought to comfort my sister with a touch, but didn’t want to soil her sleeping shirt. “But Brian travels.” I corrected myself. “Traveled, all over the west coast. He could have met the succubi and agreed to work a job for them.”
The succubi were a territorial group. Even in the old country they’d war with the huldra over who had claim to which village. Both groups preyed on men and neither wanted to share.
Patricia shook her head. “He wouldn’t need to agree to anything. They make men do their bidding and leave the men with not even a memory of what they’d done. Just like you haven’t any memories of what you’ve done.”
“But they can’t cross state lines,” Celeste said.
“Haven’t they before?” Renee reminded us of my mother’s abduction.
Except, they hadn’t abducted me. They’d gotten a man to do it for them. I still wasn’t sure how he was able to cause me to black out, to let my huldra free.
My huldra.
They hadn’t anticipated that she’d be so close to the surface, excited from hunting skips, scratching to be released. When I blacked out, my huldra broke free.
I swallowed the lump forming in my throat. I had not made the same mistake my mother had. I did not choose to mate with a succubus’s man. “They have no reason to target me.”
“You are the daughter of their enemy. The offspring of their human male whom they believed betrayed them for a huldra. You are the third point in their triangle of revenge.” Patricia brought her hand to her mouth and tapped her teeth. “But why now?”
“At least one succubus has to be up here, pulling the puppet strings,” Aunt Renee argued. “Every hotel has cameras. A security guard monitoring the camera system would have spotted you leaving looking the way you do and called the cops. Do you hear any sirens? Because I don’t. Only a succubus would be able to wipe the memories of any witnesses and cause security tapes to disappear.”
My scalp itched. I reached up and sticky flakes of dried blood greeted my fingers. I quickly dropped my hand to my side.
“Is it weird that I want to lick her?” Celeste said, still eyeing me. The dampness of the ground had moistened my feet on my way in, but now it dried and blood cracked around my toes. My arms didn’t look much better.
“Keep your head about you,” Patricia, Celeste’s mother, scolded. “You and your sisters will be on your own, leading this coterie someday; these are the types of things you’ll have to deal with.”
“I think it’s time we taught the succubi a lesson,” Aunt Renee interrupted. She stopped pacing and stared at me with what looked like complete control and confidence. “We should plan an attack.”
“Attack on what?” I asked, exasperated. “Their home? Do you realize how insane that sounds?”
“They won’t stop until you’ve suffered your mother’s fate.” Aunt Renee sat on the couch as though she were about to serve tea and cookies. Her sudden extreme calm unnerved me.
“It’ll be a bloodbath. No. I won’t agree to it. And you’ve forgotten the Hunters. They have rules against this. We can’t cross state lines.” I scratched a patch of dried blood from my right arm. Tiny bits of red fell onto the wood floor. “I’ll clean that up later.”
Patricia nodded. “Let’s focus on the here and now,” she said. “Since we think we know how this happened, we need to figure out how it will affect Faline. I see from your movements, that you’ve gained speed? And strength too?”
I nodded. I opened my mouth to add that I could also now feel my huldra right under my skin, vibrating, yearning for more strength. But I bit my lip instead. Their heavy minds didn’t need more troubles added to the heap.
“Then I suppose the next step is to watch you closely,” Aunt Patricia said.
Renee scoffed. “And just wait for them to try again? What if Faline’s strength wears off? She’s stronger, faster; it’s time to strike now.”
“Sister,” Patricia said. “There’s no telling what Faline’s body is going through. Huldra haven’t killed for centuries.”
I cringed.
“Faline, we can reconvene to discuss every symptom you’re experiencing.” Patricia nodded to Renee. “And we’ll conduct a full physical, once you’re cleaned and the scent you’re wearing isn’t so…so…tempting.”
“Yeah,” I said as I made my way through the living room toward the back door that led to the four tree homes, antsy to leave the confines of walls.
Shawna gasped. I froze in place and closed my eyes. I’d completely forgotten.
“Your bark,” Shawna whispered.
I inhaled and tears filled my eyes. Frustration and anger washed away, leaving me raw and vulnerable—the two feelings I hated most.
“The Hunters will be screening us in less than a month,” said my partner sister.
; “I know.”
“What are we going to do?” Celeste asked.
No one answered.
I reached my hand in front of my face and spread my fingers apart. In one second, with just the thought of creating bark across my skin, russet colored ridges sprang up where knuckles belonged.
“It’s growing!” Olivia shrieked. “Across your back!”
I didn’t turn around. I didn’t want to see their faces. I thought of bark covering my whole body and instantly pinpricks tingled from my back and stretched to my legs and arms. I bolted from the common house, ran past our tree homes, and sped deep into the forest. My huldra wanted out.
Seven
My foremothers used to live in woods much like those I crouched within. Dark, emerald, fuzzy moss clung to the russet tree trunks, and sage green, porous moss hung from the branches. Ferns sprouted up like mini bushes, blotting shades of green along the dark brown dirt. To keep my inner huldra at bay, I ran across my property so quickly my feet barely touched the ground.
My foremothers. This was normal to them, natural. Bark façade covering their skin. Naked among the evergreens and the alders. Wildness was their nature. So why did it feel so wrong for me? I flung myself at an evergreen and dug my fingers into its soft outer layer, pulling myself up the trunk until I jumped, feet first, onto a branch. Higher. I needed to go higher.
Moonlight filtered through clouds and pine needles. Rain sprinkled down my scalp in a much needed shower. My tangle of matted red hair calmed until it hung straight. Water mixed with blood as it dripped from the strands and wound down my butt and legs.
I fought the embarrassment crashing inside, the ache to run away from my coterie and never return. I’d be protecting those that I loved if I just left tonight. I could live deep in the forests like my foremothers had. My foremothers. Wild Women. Had they struggled with the shame of their existence? Huldra history lessons taught by the Hunters said yes. But my mother’s whispered bedtime stories had once led me to believe otherwise.
“Long ago, men and women lived equally in peaceful farming lands and cities built on the belief of cooperation,” she’d tell me monthly, each night she returned from her Hunter check-in, as she tucked me into bed. “These areas thrived. But people from another land with different beliefs, who sought to take the success of others for their own, took over. They had no interest in cooperation or equality, and soon they established a hierarchy in these once peaceful cities based on gender and wealth. In time they condemned the original goddesses and gods of the land, and claimed their own gods to be the true rulers of heaven and earth. They even ruined the goddess temples.
“The goddesses knew their worship would soon fade into forgotten history. In one last act of protection for those who lived by their teachings, the goddesses bestowed upon their highest priestesses their own supernatural abilities. Each goddess had a different skillset of abilities.”
“That’s when Freyja made us,” I’d say each time she told the story.
“Yes,” she’d answer, “and when Lilith created the succubi, and when Atargatis created the mermaids… That’s how all the Wild Women were created.”
It’d been easy for my mother to speak of huldra and succubi as one, as Wilds, before they’d killed her. Now, because of that thinking, she couldn’t speak at all.
“And where were the Hunters with all their promised protection when the life-suckers took my mother?” I muttered into the night. Mist formed around my warm breath in the cold air.
“They joined forces with the Oregon Hunters to get her back.” Shawna answered.
Shocked, I scanned the ground and then the other trees, but didn’t see Shawna. Out of all of us, she threw her voice the best. Within a few breaths, Shawna stood at the base of the tree whose branches I sought refuge within.
I lay my stomach onto the branch and peered down at my partner sister. “But they didn’t return with her.”
“At least they tried,” Shawna said.
But it was too late for me. I’d traveled past the point for Hunter protection—if there ever was such a thing—and crossed the line from their charge to their enemy. They just hadn’t realized it yet.
I stood and walked toward the trunk of the tree. I jumped to the lower branch, and the next lower, until the balls of my feet hit the moist dirt with a thud.
Shawna inhaled deeply. “You smell like…squirrel?”
I nodded. Thankfully, the ingestion of animal DNA had no effect on my bark patch or huldra abilities, because while I’ve been told other Wilds practice veganism, I’ve never heard of even a vegetarian huldra. “I needed to hunt. It crossed my path.” I ran my fingers through my wet hair. “Were you sent to come get me?”
“Yes.” Shawna cocked her head. “I also wanted to make sure you didn’t try to fall on your proverbial sword and leave us.” She turned, without waiting for my response, toward the front of our property where our tree homes stood. I followed.
“So what’d they say?” I asked when Shawna walked in silence for a few minutes too long. She was much better than me at keeping her thoughts to herself. And it drove me up the wall.
“Aunt Renee wants to discuss it with you,” Shawna answered. “But I can’t stick around for what I’m sure will be a…lively discussion…because I need to try to get another couple hours of sleep. Tonight’s the benefit for the animal sanctuary.”
My hand dropped to my side and I turned to look at Shawna. “That’s right. Do you need help with setup or anything? The least I can do is buy you a pint of coffee.” My poor sister would have to run a whole event after the night’s drama. I suddenly felt guilty for an entirely different reason.
“I may take you up on that. But seriously, it’s hard to think about that when we have your check-in to worry about,” she said.
I grabbed her hand. “Well don’t. Worry about me, I mean. Check-in isn’t for another month. That gives us a lot of time to figure things out.”
A slow smile worked its way onto my partner sister’s face. I hated that it took so long to get there, that I had caused her this anxiety. “Okay. But you’re still coming, right?”
I wove my fingers through hers like I had when we were little girls running through the forest together. “I wouldn’t miss it.”
I carpooled to the benefit with my two other sisters and three aunts. Celeste and Olivia sat in the last row in my aunt’s crossover. The two partner sisters chatted quietly. Whereas Olivia’s dark features looked more Hispanic, Celeste’s most resembled those of Vietnamese women. Huldra don’t track their human lineage, so I couldn’t say for sure.
I stared out at the night sky from a middle-row seat and shuffled through the evening’s early events. When I’d woken from my post-shower nap, I saw that I’d missed two calls from Marcus and he’d left a message. I still hadn’t listened to the voicemail.
Marcus and I hadn’t finished our last conversation, let alone agreed to separate on any sort of terms—good or bad. But to be alone with him again, with succubi after me, had the potential to end tragically. I refused to put him at risk. When I returned to work I’d try to pick the skips from different cities so I wouldn’t have to drop them off at Everett Municipal—wouldn’t have to see Marcus.
“You sure it’s safe for you to be around humans?” a voice asked from the front seat.
“I am fine,” I said for the one-hundredth time.
“Because if you’re not, that’s okay too.” It was my Aunt Renee talking, though she didn’t turn to look at me. She got carsick easily.
I almost repeated my new phrase for the one hundred and first time, but Patricia reminded her sister of the coterie’s agreed plan—which was basically to do nothing but wait. Considering our next check-in, we had a little more than three weeks to decide on our next move. Since I’d agreed to wait, Renee had been goading me to change my mind.
We reached the great double doors of the event center—a sprawling building in the country. Bright lights and the scent of fresh-baked bre
ad flooded out from the entry. We walked across the stone tiled foyer where a modest bar stood, covered mostly with wine bottles. A tall, handsome bartender quickly served his customers full glasses of reds, whites, and some cocktails, keeping the long line moving.
“Hello, welcome, thanks so much for coming.” A woman in black dress slacks and a royal blue, silk top greeted us as we entered the dining hall. She eyed our invitations with a quick glance and escorted us to a large round table with seating for ten.
The benefit for rescued animals was being held at a ranch-style community center in Arlington on a five-acre plot of land. The many floor-to-ceiling windows gave way to views of mountains in the distance and horse pastures lining the square lot.
“Shawna puts on the best galas,” Aunt Abigale said with motherly pride as she sat and folded a white fabric napkin across her lap.
Aunt Patricia nodded. “I look forward to this every year.”
Posters propped on easels lined the dining hall, and an ongoing video of dogs playing with ropes and chew toys projected onto a white curtain at the front of the room.
Servers in black slacks and white button-up tops breezed through the room leaving warm bread on each table. I reached for the sweating glass pitcher of ice water with lemon wedges, and poured myself a drink, then offered to fill the empty glasses belonging to my coterie.
The large potted plants in each corner had to have been Shawna’s decision. Greenery and trees are to huldra what name brand clothes are to high schoolers.
My three aunts served themselves bread smeared with butter, and then passed the food to Olivia, Celeste, and me.
I was slathering soft butter onto my chunk of pre-cut bread, when Renee spoke past the bread in her mouth. “You sure you’re not feeling your huldra, being around so many human males?”
“Aunt Renee,” I scolded. I peered around the room. My warning gaze came to rest on her. “Not here. People can hear you.”
She lowered her voice to hide her words from those outside the huldra persuasion. “I think we should attack, that’s all I’m saying.”
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