by Maria Vale
* * *
I’d barely entered Westdæl when Eyulf skitters out of the dark and jumps up, his front paw across my shoulders, his teeth across my muzzle.
I shake him off, continuing slowly up until I find a spot wide enough to accommodate my change.
Eyulf is larger than I am, so it takes longer for him to change. Still, his fur is almost gone when I am done. I grab at the molting hairs from his undercoat before the breeze sends them dancing away like the seeds of a dandelion.
“Varya?” His voice is throaty and worried as he pulls himself up. “Look at me?”
Instead, I look out over Homelands. A few thin ribbons of melting snow still streaking the upper peaks, the glazed-green slopes, the dark forests, the water dropping or trickling or rushing everywhere. Stone and thorns and flowers and trees and mountains and valleys.
“You have to leave.” My throat is tight, and my mouth is dry. Remnants of the change, I suppose.
“What?”
“You have to leave.” I don’t want this to go on any longer than it has to. “I am going to be mated to Lorcan.”
“Mated?”
“Like being married, but—”
“You don’t love him.” He grabs my arm, forcing me to face him. “Look at me, Varya, and tell me that you do.”
I am more tired than I have ever been. Even when I’d spent months on the run, eating badly, sleeping barely at all, I was never this tired. Too tired to even pull my arm away.
“It’s not about him.”
The trees below the High Pines are just touched with the brightest green. Up above, the remaining veins of snow are melting into the trickle and rush of water. I know birds are padding their nests with the stray tufts of our heavy undercoat. A creak followed by a crack followed by the sound of branches slapping against water signals that the beavers are changing the world one tree at a time.
“Do you see it?”
“See what?”
“The land. Everything. This is the last refuge of the last truly great wolf pack. There is no other place for them. You said I couldn’t always protect, that some things are out of my control. Maybe, but not this. This I can do. I will do.” I squeeze my fist tight, surprised to find that there is something in it. “You and I were playing a game. Pretending. But this was never really yours. I was never really yours. You were never mine.”
“And what about me? What do I do?”
They call me Varya the Indurate when they think I’m not listening, but supposing I really was Varya the Hard? What would Varya the Unfeeling say?
“You will start over,” I say coldly, pulling my arm away from him. “It’s what you do. A new place. Another page in your book.”
There’s a sudden intake of breath and a long pause. Then the sound of things breaking underfoot. Someone walking away who doesn’t care if he makes noise. I regret the last bit. It was beneath me. Beneath him. Nothing but a pointless attempt to end a conversation that I no longer had the courage to continue.
I look at the felted mass of white fur in my hand.
* * *
How did I get here? I had been at the heights of Westdæl, and now I appear to have been standing among the trees behind the Laundry for some hours. The sun is already low against the tamaracks. What happened to the time? A wolf in front of me looks down at his feet, not sure what to do.
“You’re with the 13th, aren’t you?”
He nods, the bare toes of one foot crossing over the other.
“The 13th is helping Tristan clean and restock the med station.”
“Yes, Alpha,” he says and turns on his heel without looking at me once.
With the changing seasons, two of my roommates will be moving out, joining a handful of other misfit wolves in the Boathouse while Lorcan moves his small box of possessions in. With me. I don’t remember agreeing to it, and now Lorcan is pawing through my clothes, none of which I would care about, except that somehow they smell of that other warmer, receptive me that I will never see again.
“You smell different.” Lorcan lifts my underwear to his nose and breathes in deeply. “Warmer somehow.” He smiles. “Mating agrees with you, Varya. Which side do you want?” he asks.
“Doesn’t matter.”
He hammers a nail into the wall and hooks a dingy gooseneck lamp to it. When he turns it on, the light pierces my eyes.
I head back down the ladder and crawl outside, running through the woods until I find the corpse of a black walnut recently torn from its roots.
A half hour later, my ax is moving as if on its own. One branch after another falls off until the crown is gone, and I put on a drag harness and pull the trunk step by struggling step to the woodshed.
I need to work. To make sure that this Pack, at least, will survive. So that all the sacrifices of all the wolves will mean something.
That’s how each day passes. A blur of work. The 12th is one of the echelons building another fence, one to replace the chain link we currently have. Made of slats of galvanized steel, when it is done, it will extend far deeper into the forests on either side of the road.
There are three echelons working on it so it will be done by the Iron Moon. I am setting the pace for the wolves whose job it is to sink steel posts into the still-frozen ground, but it makes me nervous to have one fence partly down before the other is finished.
At the end of each day, other wolves drag themselves off to sleep or the Bathhouse or the Great Hall. I drag more windblown trees from the forest to restock our winter-depleted firewood.
My shoulders are raw, there is a knot the size of a quince below my shoulder blade, and my hands bleed, but I can’t stop. I feel like I will never stop again.
Chapter 39
“Alpha.”
“Alpha.”
“Alpha!”
I arc the maul down against a half log that splits with a crack and falls to the ground before settling another full log on the chopping block. I swing the maul high and wait for Silver to speak.
“The Alpha asked to see you.”
I slam the maul down again. Two halves fall to the ground.
“Should I tell her you’re coming?” Silver asks, threading her way through the undulating piles of wood back to the path that leads to the Great Hall.
I set one of the halves back on the—
“Do you know the story of the wolf who chopped so many—”
“I’m not in the mood for stories.”
Leaving the wood for when I get back, I wipe the edge of the maul before hanging it in the woodshed. Then I lope after Silver. I check my pocket, feeling for the little compressed pellet of white fur, which is getting smaller. Despite all my care, it’s getting smaller.
“Wait, Theta. There is one story… The Bone Wolf. Tell me the story of the Bone Wolf.”
“Which one?”
“What do you mean?”
“There are two. There’s the one everyone knows, the one that says the Bone Wolf watches over heaven and earth, waiting to announce the end. When men will be as wolves to men.”
“And the other?” I ask numbly.
“Gran Sigeburg preferred that one. The entire story is the same, except for one word: the Bone Wolf watches over heaven and earth, waiting to announce the beginning.
“When men will be as wolves to men.”
Something whimpers. Silver looks at me sideways but says nothing.
I run toward the Great Hall.
At the top of the stairs is a huge black wolf covered with nurslings, four of his own, two belonging to the Alpha. For a wolf who had never been a wolf until last fall, Tiberius is very tolerant with the pups, playing Chase the Tail, Chew the Ear, Bop the Nose, and other nursling games. He occasionally opens his mouth, gently nibbling a muzzle, or bats away sharp claws too near his eyes, but mostly he waits patiently.
“As soon as Arthur comes”—Silver strips off her clothes and lies down next to her mate—“we can go hunting.”
Tiberius suddenly jumps up and the pups go tumbling. He paces back and forth, snapping and snarling and batting the pups away from Silver’s changing and very vulnerable body until a cry of “Wulflings!” comes from the direction of Home Pond.
All six of the pups rush to the top of the stairs, orrrooo-orrroooing for Arthur, who looks…different. He walks rather than shuffles. He doesn’t wrap his arms around his waist. His neck isn’t curved down. He is straightened and unbent like a sheet someone found crumpled in the bottom of the closet and shook out.
“Alpha,” he says with a nod and the momentary lowering of his eyes. As is right.
“Arthur.” I lower my head briefly but not my eyes. A sign of respect but not deference. He says nothing else until I am almost at Evie’s office. Then the pups orrrooo-orrrooo again, and Arthur orrrooo-orrrooos with them.
Evie’s head is bent over her desk when I wrap my fingers around the lintel of her office. She waves me closer and turns to a blueprint with a number of small suites arranged in an L around a play area and a grooming station.
Along the bottom, Sten, the monosyllabic head of carpentry, has written The Great North’s Fucking Kennel.
“This isn’t—?”
“Yes, it is,” Evie chokes out. She stops for a moment, her hand smoothing the paper. She takes a deep breath. “For when the Department of Agriculture and Markets comes to inspect.”
“We are going to cage our own?”
“Pups and juveniles,” she says, her voice dry with fury. “It’s the only way we can keep the helicopters away from Homelands. I don’t know when they’ll come, but Josi says we should be ready as soon as possible, so I’m putting the 12th on this. Get help from the 14th if you need it.”
Evie rolls up the blueprint and considers me carefully. “But before you do anything else, Shielder, eat something.”
“I’m not hungry.”
Evie slips a rubber band from her wrist. “I didn’t ask if you were. Get something from the kitchen, or hunt if you’d rather.” The rubber band slides down the paper tube with a hollow scratching. “Your Alpha,” she says, leaning against me. Can she smell that I’ve marked myself over and over with the dingy ball of fur that carries the sharp, ionized scent of clean stone and the earth before a storm?
“Your Alpha would have you eat, Shielder.”
I head to the kitchen from the back. It’s busy as it is all the time now. The scents of garlic and turmeric mix with yeast and cinnamon. The sounds of knives chopping against wood, whisks clattering against glass, water splashing in the big trough sink. All the wolves talking at one time, until the 8th’s Gamma sees me and they fall silent. I cast my eyes around, but I don’t feel like walnut rolls or lentils with cauliflower. If I have to eat, I’m going to eat something that bleeds.
I’ve only just finished changing when Victor sounds the call to law from the front porch of the Great Hall.
“Nu is seo mæl for us leornian þine laga and sida.”
The Deemer has the door open, shooing the pups and juveniles inside, even though it is warm enough outside.
“Nils. Nyala. You too,” he says and picks up Evie’s nurslings. “Time to come to the law.”
I cock my head at him. That’s odd. Why would he want Evie’s pups?
We don’t come to law until after the First Kill. Nils and Nyala won’t understand enough for another couple of years. Victor doesn’t look at me, just brings the pups inside with the rest.
Silver has just finished feeding her pups and jumps down the stairs to her waiting mate. She writhes on the ground in front of him and flicks his muzzle with her legs, then Tiberius jumps up and sets his jaw on his mate’s shoulders.
Sigeburg scrambles on top of me, getting a better view as the two of them run away. I shake her off, but the pup is tenacious, digging her claws into my hide.
She starts to slide down, just as a wave of short warning barks come from the direction of the access road. Heavy footsteps run across the hall before the barks are even finished. Tara jumps down the stairs, followed by Evie, her phone to her ear. I get up to follow, but the Alpha yells for me to stay.
“Guard them,” she says, heading down the path past the woodshed toward the gate. It’s probably a hunter or a teenager, but there is too much going on to leave anything to chance. Whoever is on gate duty will hold them until Evie and Tara arrive to take care of it.
Elijah runs past, pulling on a sweatshirt. For whatever reason, they need the lawyers. Standing at the edge of the porch, my ears circle, listening. Because I’m listening, I hear the rapid thump and thunk of a car on uneven ground. A car that is coming fast and not up the access road. I growl for Arthur and the pups to stay behind me.
My nidling looks at me worriedly. I snarl along my flanks for the wriggling foursome to be still. As young as they are, they stop immediately, making themselves small and silent.
I roll my shoulders forward and feel the power of my jaws.
Chapter 40
An enormous Sportsmobile van cuts across the grass and drives right up to the front of the Great Hall.
A door opens, bearing a shield that proclaims it belongs to the New York State Department of Agriculture and Markets, Division of Animal Industry.
At first, all I can see is a foot encased in supportive black shoes and sagging gray socks.
The man rounds the front of the car, eyeing first me, then the pups. He puts his hand on his hip.
“I’m from Agriculture and Markets. Division of Animal Industry,” he says to Arthur, who folds back up, his arms around his waist. My nidling looks to me for guidance.
I do not trust this man. His hair is thinning, his body thickening, and he smells like anger and disappointed expectations. Like one of those high school bullies we read about in human books. Only this one got older without ever growing up.
“We have to wait for the Alpha?” Arthur says worriedly, still looking at me.
I chuff at him, irritated. He knows better than to talk to a westend like that.
The man with the gray socks snorts. “Your boss is busy explaining to my colleagues why none of the Great North Kennel’s dogs have had their rabies shots. By law, we have to take them in.”
He opens the back door of his van, and when he turns around, he has a large crate and a long, thin gun that is green and makes a whupp sound. Something pinches my flank. Another whupp sound, and Arthur growls and falls.
When I leap at him, my leg responds awkwardly and sends me flying down the steps, my head in the dirt, my ribs cracked against the stair. As I try to raise myself, the man shoots me again, then runs up the stairs and puts the pups into the cage. Theo cries out, and I drag myself toward him. I can’t jump, and everything swims loosely in front of my eyes. I dream that I flounder toward the man and grab his calf above his stinking sock. My jaws feel like cotton.
I dream that the man screeches and kicks at me with his other foot. The little hairs of his leg itch the roof of my mouth. The crate crashes against my ribs, and the pups mewl and bark, their claws scraping for a hold on the slick plastic. Then everything is made of water. Something goes tight around my neck and pulls me unrelentingly into the back of the van. I’m swimming at night through the cold water. Even for an Arctic wolf, it’s impossibly cold and my sinuses occlude. I can’t breathe. I don’t know which way to swim. Where is the surface? My body bumps across ground and metal, and a car door slams. I’m paddling as fast as I can. Trying to save them.
Trying to save them all.
But then the dark, cool water covers me and I fail.
* * *
It’s airless in the back of the van. It smells like many frightened animals, but most of all, it smells like the fear of baby wolves. The pups mewl softly. It takes
a lot of effort to roll over to face the crate and Sigeburg’s little muzzle pressed against the grating as she reaches toward me with her paw. A bright-blue tarp scrunches to the side, and the corrugated metal floor is hard and cold against my belly. I push myself against it. Road, legs, mind—nothing is stable, and I careen from one side to the next, until I hit the door and let myself fall.
There’s no handle here, just a gap in the door panel. I start scraping at it, tearing at it until my claws bleed. Snarling, I lash out with my jaws, and something around my neck pulls at me. Only when I tumble back and a metal cable slaps against the floor do I realize I have been collared and tethered to a winch attached to the front cab.
It’s long enough to reach to the door but no farther. I pull and scratch and lash and bang and bleed and fail. Every time becoming more furious, with snarling and snapping that has no effect on the door.
“Guard them,” Evie said.
I had only one job, and now they are caged in the back of a van.
You can’t always protect, Varya. Things happen in the world that are beyond even your control.
I stare at the tangle of fur and blinking eyes, retreating as far as possible into the back of the crate. Away from me.
Sometimes all you can do is love.
Dragging myself over to the cage, I press my face to the grating and wait.
It doesn’t take long for Sigeburg to come forward again. Maybe she remembers that I once rubbed her tummy. I strain my muzzle toward her, awkwardly marking her cheek through the metal wires. John comes next, then Theo, and finally Solveig. Each looking for comfort from the only bit of home they can find.
Pulling against the collar, I curl my body around the metal and plastic that cages them, trying to make a fortress against the world. Whatever comfort they are taking from me, I am taking more from them, from the smell of their fur and the feel of their warm breath and sharp claws as they knead against the scars on my belly that they haven’t yet learned to fear.
The dark water sucks me under once more, only to spit me out again when the van slows and turns sharply before coming to a stop. The door in the front opens. Two other doors from another vehicle slam shut. There are voices. I clamber to my feet, grateful that my back legs have some feeling again. The pups whimper, but when I snap, they obey immediately, moving quietly to the back of the crate.