Noah stayed awake late into the night awaiting Sylvie’s return, but she never appeared. With all the practice he was getting, his cane balancing skills had improved from apprentice to master level. He was excited for a few moments until he realized balancing a cane was not a talent that could earn him trunks of silver.
Sitting on one of the chairs at the cracked table, he traced the gouges in the wood with his fingertip. The pitiful wood bared its scars with pride for the world to see. It had been hurt, but it had survived. Now all who looked upon it would understand the struggles it had persisted through to remain whole. All the trees in the forest would tell their young saplings the legends of its perseverance for eons. Noah jumped back from the table in horror, his chair toppling over at his sudden movements.
“Holy shit! Has my sanity finally forsaken me?” he questioned with wide eyes, staring at the table that had somehow become sentient in his mind. His horror slowly turned to a deep sadness as he stared at the scars on the table. Each crack weakened the integrity of the wood, bringing it ever closer to ruin. How many cracks could it withstand before crumbling?
He pushed the table out of his mind with an unhinged chuckle, before laying on the floor and using his cowboy hat as a pillow. Sleep had eluded him more than usual lately, and he feared ill effects would find him in the waking world. The unwanted thoughts of his past commanded his mind once his eyes closed, no matter how hard he tried to fight them. Tossing and turning on the wood floor, he rubbed his temples, begging and pleading with the traumatizing memories to ease their hauntings for just one night.
“Please, just one night. One night, that’s all I ask for,” he whispered, a tear gently sliding down his cheek.
The dawn light streaming through the windows and open doorway gently woke him. Dark shadows underneath his eyes proved that whatever entity he prayed to last night had refused his request. With a sigh, he grabbed his things and headed to the lodge for breakfast. He didn’t notice the sunlight flickering through the leaves in alluring beauty. He didn’t notice the family of birds chirping a melodious good morning to him. He didn’t notice his privilege of sharing this forest with the majestic trees and breathtaking flowers. Blind to all but the misery of the world, he continued his sullen trek toward the lodge.
The idea of having to face the angry wolves again didn’t thrill him, but he had no other choice if he didn’t want to starve. He struggled to open the swinging door panel and once again encountered dozens of stares that ranged from curiosity to hatred. Addressing no one, he kept his head lowered and served himself some food from the buffet table. The elder wolf, who had never provided her name, assessed him from the kitchen but didn’t comment on his change in mood. After loading his tray with meats and fruits, he walked directly to the sibling’s table, not even bothering to look for Sylvie.
“Hey Luna, do you think you can give me a tour of the territory today?” he asked as he plopped his tray down on the table.
“Sure, Mr. Human. We can show you the trade market and the swimming hole,” Luna said, nodding her head up and down in overdramatic agreement.
“His name is Noah,” Silas snapped at his sister.
Noah honestly wasn’t sure if Luna couldn’t hear Silas’s words or if she was the world’s foremost authority on ignoring them. She never even glanced in his direction, and if Noah hadn’t seen Luna interact with Silas before, he would have feared Silas was a specter conjured from his warped mind.
“Thanks, Luna. And don’t worry, you can call me Mr. Human if you want to. I never liked the name Noah,” he said with a smile.
After a silent breakfast filled with glares and hushed whispers toward them, the trio left the lodge and began the tour of the Baleful Fiend Pack. Unlike Greenwood, which consisted basically of one city, the wolves had the ability to defend a larger area from the other races. Their homes were more spread out, and they had large empty stretches of forest that the humans never would have been able to guard.
The siblings paraded him around and showed him the different cabins that the wolves called home: a few of them were at ground level, some were tree houses, some had multiple rooms, and some had multiple stories. All were built simply out of wood, but the pride the wolves had in their homes permeated throughout.
Because of their limited population sizes, Shifters and Vampires could not have someone specialized in each type of labor. Without metal workers, they had to buy iron goods from the human trade caravans. Without candle makers, they had to trade with the Seelie for fae globes. He hadn’t even seen one restaurant, gambling den, or whorehouse. What the wolves did for fun, he did not know.
Despite the spread-out cabins they passed in the woods, the wolves exhibited a strong sense of community. They ate together, hunted together, and much of the time, slept together in the lodge. With a diet that mainly consisted of meat that the pack hunted together, Noah spied many mushrooms, herbs, and medicines that lay untouched in the woods. Most of the unbothered fauna was considered precious to the humans and would fetch a high price.
He didn’t blame the wolves for their lack of entrepreneurial skills. There just wasn’t a great need for medicine as the wolves’ natural immune system and regenerative abilities were better than any medicine, other than a master vampire’s blood, which was toxic to the wolves anyhow.
The siblings brought Noah to a large clearing, though much smaller than the meadow that held the lodge. There were no stands, carts, or advertisements, but pack members had laid blankets down and placed their wares in front of them, hoping to entice customers. The goods ranged from smoked meat to wooden furniture to leather clothes. Towering trees at the edges of the clearing provided the necessary shade in the summer heat for the sellers.
Noah leaned in to whisper to Luna, who was skipping and humming her way through the makeshift stalls, “Luna, what is the currency that your pack uses?”
“Currency? What’s that?” Luna pursed her lips in thought at the unfamiliar word.
“There is no currency, at least not in the way humans use it. The pack works on an exchange system. I want meat so I trade an equal value of clothing. Every good is bartered for and exchanged on the spot,” Silas chimed in for his younger sister. “The only exception being those who work for the pack, such as guards, cooks, and warriors. They receive a stipend from the Alpha that can be used to exchange for goods.”
“But what is the stipend and how can you tell how many goods it’s worth?” Noah asked, schemes already running rampant through his head.
“It’s a wooden token with a claw gouge on it. The amount of the Alpha’s magic that is injected into it determines its value,” Silas answered, giving him a repulsed glance as if he could sense Noah’s less-than-scrupulous morals.
Noah nodded his head as his dreams of becoming rich were dashed in an instant. With nothing of value to trade with, he could only look upon the wares being offered in the marketplace. One particular stall caught his interest as they passed by, and he walked over to examine the few pieces of hand-carved furniture laid out for sale.
Not knowing that he was in the presence of a legend every day in Sylvie’s cottage, the hand-carved table vainly tried to impress him. He scoffed at the young upstart and shifted his gaze to examine the stools, tables, and ornaments. On a blanket next to the furniture were glass jars of inks and needles.
“Anything catch your eye, human?”
Startled out of his browsing, he looked up to see the two female wolves who shared this little spot in the market. Behind the hand-carved furniture stood a woman taller than even Sylvie. She had short blonde hair that was just long enough to tie back with twine. Next to her, another woman stood behind the tattoo supplies, standing only a few inches taller than Luna. Her silk-like black hair fell down to her waist and her brown eyes carried a hint of mischief that he instantly gravitated toward. Intricate symbols and lines of ink covered her arms, drawing his attention to her hands. The two women held hands, their fingers clasping tightly as if they had been fused together.
Noah raised his brow at the public display of affection, glancing around to see if anyone else had taken notice. Humans certainly had no qualms about taking pleasure in whatever desires of the flesh that called to them. However, because of the population shortages, humans considered same-sex partners as more of a side pleasure. Birthing the next generation was every adult’s duty in the settlements, and an open and permanent coupling like this would be scorned. Even someone with power such as Jericho hid his proclivities behind closed doors. Noah had assumed the Shifters, who faced an even more dire population crisis, would be even harsher against same-sex matings.
“Do they not have all female or all male mates where you come from?” the short, ink-covered woman asked, noticing his questioning gaze on their hands. She did not seem to be angry at his curiosity, but curious herself at human customs.
“We have them,” he said with a nod of his head. “People consider them more a vice of pleasure than a true coupling, but we have them.”
Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.
He glanced up to see the two women furrow their brows at his bluntness. “Forgive my rudeness. I mean no disrespect, but I assumed with the wolves’ focus on birthing pups to grow the pack, your union would have been frowned upon.”
The taller of the women lowered her woolen shirt, exposing a bright red bite mark on her clavicle. “In a wolf pack, we revere the mating mark above all,” she explained, releasing her shirt to cover the mark once more. “Who would dare question a perfect mate handpicked by nature herself?”
“Birthing pups is not the only value that one can bring to the pack,” the smaller wolf said, nodding her head at her mate with adoration in her gaze. “Everyone has value if you open up your eyes and mind to see it.”
Noah nodded thoughtfully at her words. “I will keep my eyes open for the unique value every wolf brings to the pack. You have my word.” He took off his hat and gave a quick bow to the couple.
“My name is Noah of Greenwood. Who might I have the pleasure of speaking with?” he asked while he returned his hat to his head with careful precision.
“My name is Isla,” said the tattoo-covered woman. “And my giant partner here is Keziah,” Isla finished with a slight smirk on her face as Keziah flushed in anger. Oh yes, this Isla and he could become best friends.
“I am not giant. Forgive me if some of us actually grew past childhood,” Keziah said in anger, but their hands never separated.
“Size is nothing to be ashamed of, dear Keziah. I bet your wolf must be quite the asset on the battlefield,” Noah chimed in, trying to diffuse the situation.
“My wolf is no bigger than a normal animal,” Keziah said with a sad shake of her head.
“I don’t understand. If the size of your human form doesn’t equate to your wolf’s size, what does?” Noah asked, cocking his head in confusion. This question had been plaguing him ever since he first saw the wolves shift.
“The size of your wolf correlates to one thing and one thing only: the amount of magic running through your veins,” Isla chimed in when Keziah remained silent, looking off into the distance with sadness in her eyes. “Your magic will grow during adolescence, but once you hit puberty, that’s as big as your wolf will ever get.”
“The pack would never admit this, but there are many wolves who do not have animal forms big enough for combat,” Keziah said, shaking her head in disappointment. “For those of us who dreamed of being warriors as young pups, reality crushed our dreams as soon as we hit puberty.”
Isla patted her mate’s back as old scars surfaced on Keziah’s face. Noah clenched his fists in anger at the pain behind Keziah’s eyes. Even as a blood slave, he still held onto hope, refusing to let it slip through his fingers. But for Keziah, her hopes and dreams were crushed as a young child. No matter how hard she desperately clung to her dreams of being a warrior wolf and no matter how much she trained, she could never reach her goal. Which god decided their fates at birth like this? It seemed happiness would forever elude them if they refused to change their dreams to match their talents.
“I do have one last question, though,” he said as he unclenched his fists, releasing his built-up tension. “Why is it you are ink-free? I would have assumed that you would let your mate advertise her business on your skin.”
Keziah scoffed. “I would never defile my body with ink laced with silver. My skin will remain pure as nature intended.”
His eyes widened in shock at her answer, darting between the mates rapidly. The fused hands unclasped instantly, and Isla whipped around in righteous fury at her mate. “It is not defilement! It is how I express myself.”
Noah backed away as slowly and quietly as he could from the bickering couple. It seemed he had roused an old argument between the mates, and he knew when a quick getaway was required. Speed walking as fast as he could, he found the siblings and pushed them along toward the exit of the clearing. Sweat ran down his forehead as he heard loud shouting coming from the scene of the crime.
They left the open-air market, meandering through the swaying trees until they reached a large lake. Wolves were everywhere, enjoying the sun and water. Some were in human form and others were in animal form as they paddled around the cool water. The mist, splashed into the air by the wolves, reflected the sunlight to create small rainbows dotted across the surface of the lake. Leaving the cover of the forest, they walked a short distance through tall grasses to reach the embankment of the lake.
In unison, the wolves paused their enjoyment of the day to stare at the trio who had just arrived. It wasn’t a very warm welcome, and Noah wondered if they had made a mistake by disturbing a site of leisure for the pack.
“Hey Luna, are you sure you were allowed to bring me here?” Noah turned to the young girl, seeking reassurance. Except the young girl was gone and a blonde wolf was darting past him in a blur. She leapt high into the air before belly-flopping in the water with a yelp.
“I think she just wanted to come swimming, to be honest with you,” Silas said, shaking his head at his sister’s clumsy jump into the water. Noah nodded his head in full agreement. Luna was a little trickster, but that was why he loved her.
A giant black wolf emerged from the lake, shaking violently and flinging a spray of water into the air. Two smaller wolves joined it at the bank, and they sauntered up to Noah and Silas. He took quick note of the two smaller wolves trailing the larger one by a few feet. It seemed whoever this wolf was; it had a position of authority in the pack.
He gripped his cane tightly as the giant wolf stopped a few feet away from them, growling so loudly that he could feel the vibration in his chest. Silas immediately averted his eyes before flashing an apologetic look at Noah. He shifted into his wolf form and ran off to join his sister in the water, leaving Noah to face the wolves alone. He took a steadying breath and felt his charming smile grow on his face. Once fully in place, he tipped his hat and twirled his cane in greeting.
“Good day, fine gentlewolf. It seems you’ve caught me at a disadvantage, as I don’t know who I am addressing.”
The air shimmered and in an instant, three human forms replaced the wolves standing in front of him. The size of the packmates required him to raise his head until he could make eye contact with Alder’s dark brown eyes.
“Ah, Adler, my good man. Thank you for taking the initiative to introduce yourself. I believed it was well overdue for us to get more acquainted, and I’m glad you shared the sentiment.” Noah held out his hand, but it was left untouched in the air. The noises of play and merriment vanished from around the lake as the wolves watched the standoff with great interest.
Alder narrowed his eyes at the hand Noah had extended toward him. “Noah is it? I’m going to tell you what every wolf in this pack thinks. We think the Alpha is making a mistake. We think that bringing another race into the pack will spell our doom. You are neither trusted nor welcomed here. Period!”
Noah didn’t recognize the two young warrior wolves that stood beside Alder, but he watched them as they sneered at him. He didn’t blame the wolves for their prejudices. The humans would treat shifters in the same manner, if not worse. How could anyone overcome hundreds of years of rage and hate?
Returning his gaze to Alder, he asked, “And let me guess. If it wasn’t for the curse, you would have been Sylvie’s mate instead?”
Alder growled, and his body briefly shimmered, but he kept to his human form. “Sylvie was always going to be my mate when we grew up. I felt brief sparks of my magic resonating with her just as we reached puberty. A curse doesn’t change that. She will understand one day that a pupless coupling is better than mating with a human and producing monstrous hybrids.”
Alder appeared to be done with the conversation, spitting at Noah’s feet while walking past him. As Alder passed, he forcefully shouldered Noah, causing him to be thrown to the ground and slide on the muddy embankment of the lake. The trio of young warrior wolves shifted and bounded off into the depths of the forest, not once looking back.
Laying in the mud, he ignored his dirty trench coat and hat, hyper-focusing on the muddy stains on his ruffled shirt. With frantic energy almost reaching the level of manic, he crawled to the water and began scrubbing the stains from his shirt with wild eyes. He had to get it clean. He had to. He had to. As the pure white began to peek its way through the mud, the wildness left his eyes. Panting heavily, he looked up to see the wolves staring at him with concerned looks. He plastered on a charming smile and tipped his hat to them with a shaking hand.
After the highly entertaining scene was over, the wolves returned to their festivities; his panic forgotten. He sat on the bank of the lake, watching the siblings paddle around the water and splash each other. He wasn’t brave enough to leave his cane on the bank while he went for a dip. That and his hat. He’d never risk his hat by leaving it where a thief could run off with it. And if a thief were to grab it, how in the world was he supposed to run down a wolf to retrieve it? He was reckless, but he wasn’t that reckless.
Movement at his side caused him to glance up in alertness, ready to react to any threat. He relaxed as Wren sat down beside him, wearing her tasseled jacket.
“Hello, Wren. A fine day to enjoy the water, don’t you agree?” he said, tipping his hat to her in greeting.
Wren laughed, a beautiful melody carrying across the lake and through the trees. “A fine day, is it? Is that why I had to let an angry she-wolf sleep in my cabin last night?”
“Sylvie and I had a minor disagreement. I’m sure she will see my point soon enough and return to our cabin,” he said with a wince.
Wren blew a strand of hair that had escaped her blue bandana away from her eyes. “You two are too stubborn to be mates. There is no give in either of you. She at least has to contend with the instincts of an alpha. What’s your excuse?”
Noah played with his cane, digging it into the muddy bank. “So, I am stubborn because I refuse to remain a prisoner in an enemy territory?”
Wren shook her head and sighed in disappointment. “Prisoner? Enemy territory? Tell me Noah, what ill-treatment have you suffered from our pack? When I was younger, I lost myself in wanderlust, just like you. I traveled all over the region and visited many territories of each race… minus the Unseelie and Vampires, of course.”
Noah snorted as she eliminated half of the races and wondered what point she was ineffectually trying to make.
She narrowed her eyes at him; her pale skin flushing. “My point is that I survived and returned to my pack, where I belonged. The animosity and hatred between the races are real, that I concede, but it is not as all-encompassing as you believe. We are not automatically enemies to the death with every other living thing we share this continent with. There is room for compromises and peace if we strive for them.”
Noah tipped his head in acknowledgment of her point. He wished he could be so idealistic, but reality cared none for such benevolent thinking.
“Are you not going to swim as well? I promise I won’t tell Sylvie I spied on you shifting by the lake.”
“Nope, no swimming for me. I just came out here to enjoy the sun for a few hours,” she said, her lips curling into a delicate smile. They fell into a comfortable silence, with Wren seeming to be lost in her thoughts as she stared out over the lake. Toying with his damp, ruffled shirt, Noah wondered how much longer he had before madness took him for good.