"By the Light of the Moon" by Travis W. Herring

                It was cold and rainy the night Mira Allanserei disappeared.  Cold, because it was late fall, rainy because the first storm of winter had arrived.  It was the time of year when trees turn gold and red, when grass fades to a yellow approximation of its once-green self.  The storm was busily dropping its heavy load of rain upon the lands and manors surrounding Nachtig, City of Night.

                Mira had grown up the daughter of a nobleman, spared nothing she required or requested.  She had run free in the fields surrounding her noble father’s manor, playing with the butterflies and shouting at the occasional brave fox that wandered too far from its protective copse of trees.  She ate meat at every meal, a luxury many who lived in the streets of Nachtig would kill for.  She grew up strong-boned and strong-willed.

                She had a certain charisma about, the servants said.  A look that commanded without saying a word.  The servants would whisper about it when the Lord was not around.  She had the “evil eye” they said.  She was the child of a devil and her mother.  Not the progeny of His Lordship, Allanserei.  No, they said.  No child could give a look like that and be wholly human.  Not unless a creature from the dark abyss had a part in it.  For proof, they pointed to the fact that Mira’s mother, the beautiful, raven-haired Kira, whom she resembled in almost every way, had died the night she was born.  For no woman, they would whisper, can survive the birth of a demonic child.

                No one considered that Mira, bright-eyed, strong-willed Mira Allanserei was special.  No one considered that it might not be a devil consorting with her mother that had brought this unique chilled about.  They would rather believe she was a creature of darkness; that she had a ‘touch of the spirit’ about her.

                For how many children can stagger a man simply by meeting his eyes?  How often does it take a Lord stopping in mid-sentence and being unable to continue after having met her eyes from across a crowded room?  Yes, Mira was special.  But not special enough, Fate seemed to decree.  For she would have to disappear in her lifetime.  Disappear and reappear, changed and no longer fully human.  Almost that which the servants whispered about her when she was but a small child.

                That was seventeen years ago.  When she disappeared she was but seven, and barely higher than a full-grown man’s hip.  Certainly not a child ready to take on the world alone, was she?

                The high grasses that remained from the late summer filled her vision the evening she ran from the serving girl.  The girl, not but an older child herself, was frantically calling her name as she ran after.  The sky was a forboding gray, but what difference does a gray sky make to a child who does not wish to finish her afternoon’s playtime?  She would rather run away, to that thicket she had seen earlier in the day, when the ladies had been chatting by the stream.  Rather run and hide and watch poor hapless Elizabeth search for her in the bushes.

                But the sky opened up on them both while she ran.  With a clap of thunder and a brilliant flash of light, the storm announced its breaking, and they were both soaked to the skin in seconds.  But was this reason enough for a stubborn child to turn back and go home?  Nay.  Never.  Not while there are adventures waiting just beyond the rise.  While creatures of fantasy, both real and imagined, still like in a thicket just beyond the trees. 

See them?  Over there.

Mira was quick in the high grasses, unlike her ungainly, teenaged watcher.  Outpacing the slowing Elizabeth due to the fact that she wore no petticoats beneath her woolen robe, she disappeared into the high, waving grasses and out of human life.  How was she to know that, in his rage, Lord Allanserei would have poor moaning Elizabeth put to death for her failure to protect the child she had helped to raise?

His search through the area for the next few days would activate every household in the region to find her.

But I get ahead of myself.

The thicket Mira searched for was exactly where she remembered it.  Elizabeth’s cries had disappeared into the constant thrum of rain on the trees and grasses.  This was no springtime rain shower, even little Mira knew that.  This was a storm, and a strong one at that.  She rapidly grew cold.  Despite the fact that she could wrap herself in the long drapery of her robe, she was still soaked to her skin, and the wind was picking up.  She could not wait to get into the thicket and bed down in the dry leaves she knew would be there.  A thick luscious pile of golden and peach-colored leaves had lain beneath a roof of alderberry branches.  There would be dry leaves beneath whatever had gotten soggy in the initial downpour, she knew.   Enough leaves to make a bed for herself and lay down for a while and get warm.

And this is exactly what she did upon her arrival.  She had heard the bards sing songs of men who did this when the weather was inclement.  They survived the worst of storms, to emerge in the morning dry and well refreshed, despite sleeping on the hard ground instead of a bed.  The leaves were warm and the soil soft beneath the bush.  Ignoring the muddy mess she made of her robe, she abandoned herself to watching and listening to the rain.

It fell in sheets across the small river that lay near the manor, its impact with the surface making what she imagined must be the sound of hundreds of thousands of coins falling on a bed already lined with them.  The clinking swish filled her eyes, ears, and entire awareness.  So completely did she lose track of time, that she never actually heard the increasingly frantic calls of Elizabeth as the girl staggered through the downfall in the area just beyond the thicket.  When Elizabeth finally gave up, she cursed Mira’s name and swore to all the dead gods that she truly must be a demon child to enjoy being out in this kind of weather.

Once Elizabeth had gone home, Mira was able to relax and concentrate more on her rain watching.  She lay on her stomach, watching as the rain continued, legs splayed out behind her beneath her blanket of leaves.  She propped her head up on her hands, burying her elbows in the black loam and smiling contentedly at the worst of the storm’s fury.  For with her safe little haven, there was no leakage.  She was dry, so long as she stayed where she was.  The moisture soaked into her robe was bothersome, but not terribly so.

Yes, they would be getting worried back at the manor right about now.  Yes, Elizabeth would get a scolding for letting her get loose, let alone getting lost in a rainstorm.  And her stomach did grumble a bit at the thought of missing dinner.  But, she was free!  So long as she remained where she was, she was certain that no one would find her.  She could play and think and watch the rain fall as long as she wished.  No one would come out searching in this hard a downpour, surely!

These thoughts kept her entertained for a few hours as she watched the storm drop its load onto the summer-dried lands.  Water rose from the dry soil and ran in rivulets down the embankment, to join the small river below on its rush to the lake nearby.  The fish stocks would be good this year, she thought.  The stews would be full of water for the winter, giving lots of room for the fish to swim around in.

Room was important for Mira.  Space to run around in and call her own had always been her biggest priority.  She wanted the outdoors, the open skies filled with clouds for running beneath.  She liked the long, high-windowed halls of her father’s throne room the most of all places, for there, on the right kind of day, you could see the beams of sunlight move across the floor from below in the gloom.  The motes would dance in the sunlight and Mira would cavort with the beams of light, dancing to and fro as if they were the high and mighty noblemen her father regularly dealt with there.

But what she craved most was the outside.  Within the manor, the rooms were predominantly small.  When her father was home, the court hall was always filled with visitors and she could not play there.  So her first act upon his arrival, beyond that of hugging and welcoming him home, would be to drag Elizabeth outside for a romp in the grass.

This time, she thought, there will not be an end to the romp, until she was good and ready to end it herself.  Daddy would be upset, but Daddy rarely actually thought of her beyond the smile and gift he would give her upon his arrival.  Then it was ‘go away honey.  Daddy has business.’

A muffle grunt escaped her lips as she thought about the warm manor in the distance, beyond the shelter of her haven.  Yes, Daddy would have business.  Until late this evening, if she had heard the servants correctly.  Elizabeth would have already returned, expecting her to do the ‘sane’ thing and come home sooner or later.  She would not tell Daddy until it was too late.  Until the storm had been unleashing its fury long enough to make traveling unwelcome and at the most, dangerous.

So there was a self-righteous grin on her face when she awoke suddenly, in the middle of the night.

Unaware of her surroundings at first, her first thought was that she was still dreaming, safe in her bed.  But the dampness of the air told her otherwise.  It would not be like this in her room, and the lights there did not play like they did through the branches moving above her in the light breeze.  It was still raining, and she was still in her thicket.  It was the middle of the darkest hour of the night, when creatures roam and goodly people are home in bed.  Terror reached in and constricted her heart, the sound of a branch snapping nearby alerting her to the danger.

Frozen with fear, she listened as something heavy moved through the underbrush toward her leair.  A boar perhaps?  What would she do if it came in here?  Those tusks had ripped great mean in half, she knew.  Tales of hunts had been the popular songs this year in courts across the land.  No wars had been fought for years, so hunts and jousts were the most popular thing to sing about.  Bards told tales of village histories to pass news from one to the next.  Boars had only come into her awareness this past summer, along with blood and the concept of death from their attack.

Cautiously, she crept to the edge of her den, peering out into the falling rain for a sign of whatever it was that might be coming toward her.  Maybe if she was fast enough, she could run away before it could see her.  Maybe it was blinded by the rain and desperate to find shelter.  Any shelter.  Her shelter.

On her belly in the dirt and leaves, she protected her eyes from the falling rain, feeling water droplets collect on her fingers about her face.  Lying as she was half-exposed from her hideaway, her hair was getting damp, but there was nothing she could see past falling rain and flowing mud.

Then, a figure appeared down near the river.  Stepping out of the trees that edged the waterway, it was a low shape in the darkness, a shadow amidst the gray rain.

“Boar!” her mind shouted.  “Run!”

But fear rooted her to the spot.  She could no more run than do a tapdance or even straighten out the cramp that was growing in her leg where she lay.  The shape closed with the hiding place, slowly clearing into the shape of…

A wolf.  A wolf mother and the cub she carried in her teeth.  Searching for shelter, as Mira had been.  Searching for a place to hide from the rain.  And Mira occupied it.

When the wolf finally did see Mira, she froze.  A growl escaped from behind the cub, but the small creature only let out a fearful yip, shaking its head against the rain falling into its eyes.  The mother set it down and crouched on the rain-crushed grass, glaring into the darkness at the frozen human child.  The pup curled into its mother’s chest for warmth, not seeing and not caring about what was happening above and around it beyond the fact that it was wet and miserable.

“Friend,” Mira whispered.  Quietly and ever-so-slowly, she held out a hand to the mother wolf, as she would to an unknown hound.  “Share?”

The mother glared still, growling dangerously.  Ready to leap and tear Mira’s throat out at any sign that her cub was in danger, she was tensed and ready.  Ears back and teeth exposed as she growled, the mother seemed to afraid to turn away, and unwilling to come any further toward the dry, empty lair she’d been expecting to find.

Mira lay quietly, meeting those brilliant blue eyes through the intervening rain.  Fear had drained away, to be replaced with purpose once she saw how unhappy the pup was.  This mother and child needed shelter.  Mira was not using it all.  There was room for both. 

They could share.  They would share.

“Come on,” she whispered, rising slightly from where she lay.  The wolf bared its fangs further, putting a foreleg over the back of its pup and hunkering into position to run if necessary.  Mira continued to hold her hand out, beckoning the wild creature toward her.  Concentrating; wishing; demanding that, for the good of her child if not for herself, that she come into the shelter and get some rest.

And slowly, ever so cautiously, the mother came.  Step by step, as if she were fighting an urge she could not understand, the wolf moved closer to the haven, cub still howling at the rainwater coursing over its rainsoaked skin when she picked it up by the scruff.  Its mewls of distress were ignored by the mother and the human she could not break eye contact with.  Mira’s eyes were a brilliant blue, the color of the sky when there are no clouds.  The same as the wolf’s.  There was something about her that he wolf had to come forward.

Eventually, Mira had the creature standing just a few feet away from the haven.  The wolf was shivering with the cold, she saw, the cub yipping occasionally as a raindrop splattered into his eye.  Mira was up on her knees now, beckoning still with her hand, her eyes still locked on the wolf mother’s.  Puzzled, the mother approached and then stopped, standing her ground just a few feet away from the shelter.  Everything about her upbringing told her that humans were dangerous.  That they were not to be trusted.  But something about this one told her otherwise.

“Come on,” Mira said again, aggravated.  It seemed like it had taken forever just for the mother to approach as far as she had.  Her concentration on the simple cause of mentally pushing the mother to come forward (as if she could actually do that, she thought with a grin) was wearing her out.  Much longer and all she would want to do was sleep and then wake up and go home and eat.

It was the imagery that finally finished the wolf mother’s resolve.  Food and warmth are nothing a warm-blooded creature can deny when offered.  Their mental alliance thus bound, the mother stepped past Mira’s open hand and into the shelter of her warm haven.  Looking back, she watched Mira carefully as she found a spot to set her cub down.  With a meaningful look, the wolf met Mira’s eyes and then shook off the worst of her wetness.  A moment later, she collapsed to the leafy floor.  Mother and cub were sound asleep moments later.

Uncertain what to do, Mira waited a while before attempting to move.  The mother was sleeping with her cub drawn up close against her, a paw over the cub’s back as it slept.  Any attempt to take the sleeping pup would awaken the mother in a fit of gnashing teeth.  And if I move too fast, Mira thought, that will happen anyway.

By the time she returned to the clump of leaves she was using for a blanket, she was exhausted from the night’s exertions.  The chill and damp had combined with a lack of supper and her lack of proper sleep to leave her shivering in her moist gown.  Gritting her teeth at the necessity, she stripped the dirty and torn dress off and laid it out on the ground where she would sleep.  Then, drawing the leaves up in as big a pile as she could find without awakening the wolf mother, she lay down and collapsed into exhausted slumber.

When Mira awoke again, the wolf mother was gone, but her pup was still present.  In fact, it was the pup that awoke her, nibbling on a finger where it protruded from the pile of leaves.  His wet tongue and playful nips at her fingertips drew her from the dark pit she had fallen into when she’d finally slept, drawing a grin and a laugh as she awoke to the playful yips of the young wolf pup.

“Wha?” she asked, grinning at the wet sensations at her fingers.  A bark told her she was still not alone  and the bouncing puppy beside her warm pile of leaves was yipping and hopping around their little enclosure, wiggling his head and waving his tail to and fro so fast that it threatened to knock him over.  “Where’s your mommy?” she asked, smiling at the little fellow.  She began to sit up.

In answer, there was  low growl at the entrance to the shelter, and the sunlight flowing through the opening closed off.  The dark shape of the mother wolf stood in the entrance, her blue eyes clearly visible in the dark den.  Mira froze, uncertainty warring with anger that the animal would show such disrespect for someone who had shared her home for the night. 

And then she stopped, considering.  If the wolf had wanted to, she could have killed Mira while she slept.  But she hadn’t.  No.  There was something more here.  Something she couldn’t understand.

At her concerned look, the pup yipped again, a series of silly, playful barks that drew both its mother and Mira’s attention.  When he was certain he had them, he leapt into the air, prancing about before landing and leaping at Mira with another playful noise.  Mira was bowled over by the heavy weight of the young dog, laughing and giggling as the little fellow began licking her nose and playing about her face with his tongue.

“Stop that!” she giggled, pushing him away.  But it was no use.  The dog was into playing this morning and would have none of her pushing away.  He lowered himself to the ground, growling a lusty noise before throwing himself at her pile of leaves once again.  Mira found herself sliding away from his attack, sitting up and pushing at the pawing, licking fellow and protecting herself against his claws.  When she banged her head against one of the supporting branches, it was time to stop for real.

“Seriously,” she said, growing quiet.  “Please stop?”

Oddly, the pup calmed immediately, drawing a puzzled look from the mother, who had sat down in the doorway to watch the children play.  The pup tilted its head from one side to the other, watching her closely.

“Thank you,” Mira said, mock-seriously.  Then, careful not to bump her head again, she moved away from the wall of their enclosure and inspected her reddened skin where the puppy’s claws had scratched her painfully.

Aware of the chill after the rain’s passing, she finally remembered her gown, buried deep beneath the pile of leaves she had slept in.  With a searching hand, she dug inside for the cloth and pulled it out, tsk’ing the dirty stains that now covered its length.  “Elizabeth will have my head for this,” she mumbled, grinning at the puppy.   “As if it’s your fault.”

Grinning then, she held her hands out to the puppy and, ignoring its mother’s protesting growl, took him into her arms and hugged him tight when he stepped near.  “Friends,” she said to the pup and then to the mother.  “Friends.”

As she played with the puppy, the mother watched, her eyes on Mira the entire time her pup was in the human’s arms.  The little animal seemed content to bark and lick occasionally, but seemed in no danger.  It was with some uncertainty that she turned and left, to find something for them all to eat. 

Mira had been accepted, from one family to another, it seemed.  It was necessary.  For Mira would never see her family again.

When they heard the sounds of the guardsmen searching later that morning, the wolf mother decided it was time to leave.  They had spent too much time in the presence of humans.  More were coming after their own cub.  She had a youngling to raise and this human was not worth losing both of their lives over.  When she gathered her pup into her teeth and made to leave, Mira stopped her.

“Where are you going?  Those are the guards.  They’re my friends!”  She stopped, seeing no sign of understanding in the wolf’s eyes.  Instead, she almost thought she could see the mother’s thoughts.

Humans.  Dangerous.  Kill us.  Must leave or die.

And Mira understood.  Thinking hard, she realized that if she did go home, her father’s anger would be such that she would probably never be allowed outside the manor again.  Poor Elizabeth would be punished for Mira’s stubbornness.  And that could not be allowed to happen.

No.  Mira would not go home.  She would see the wrong side of a belt for her activities last night, she knew.  No.  She would not stand for that.  There was nothing wrong with what she had done, she considered.  She heard tales of heroes spending nights in forests like she had last night.  And they went on to great adventures.  Well, so would she.    She’d show them all that she wasn’t just a little helpless girl.

“I want to go with you,” she said solemnly.  “I don’t want to go home.  Let me come with?”

The wolf mother seemed to stare at her for a moment, tilting her head inquisitively and flicking its ears.  She turned and left the enclosure, walking away slowly.  It would not be easy, the look had said.  There were no promises about anything.

It was the language of the wild.  Death would await the three of them if they were not careful.  Winter was upon them and there was little anyone of them could do for Mira.  It would be a miracle if she survived the winter.  She had no pelt!

They set off through the woods, Mira trailing behind the mother as she carried her burden.  Even the pup fell silent as they snuck away from the lands Mira had always known.  Luckily she had learned much about picking edible roots, she thought, as she turned and looked back one last time on the very furthest edges of the grounds.  She might never get another cooked meal.  Good thing she liked berries!

The day was hard, and many times, Mira would hear men calling out for her in the woods behind them.  Adrenaline kept her moving, just ahead of those who would end her adventure before it ever began.  The wolf mother simply trotted along, keeping a punishing pace until Mira could no longer keep up, so exhausted was she.  Then, she would sit quietly while her pup raced back to guide her along until they had rejoined.

It went this way until Mira was no longer certain which way led back home.  Truly, she thought, my adventures have begun.

They traveled for what seemed like forever to a young girl no older than seven years of age.  Staying away from towns lest someone recognize the missing Mira Allanserei in the filthy young girl she was rapidly becoming.  Mira became one with the natural way of things, shedding any similarity to the child who had run away that evening.  She learned to hunt.  She learned to eat meat raw and enjoy it.  She learned to pick the berries that would not make her sick, and to dig for the roots that kept her from getting ill from lack of nourishment.  She learned to run at a mileage-eating lope that helped them to get wherever it was Mother wanted to go during those days.

Mira grew up while Mother and Pup grew older.  She had no names for them.  They had no names for themselves when she asked, and she did not feel that she could arbitrarily give them out.  Mother grew older, Pup grew larger and stronger, and Mira began to develop into an attractive woman.  Daily, she would play with Pup, rolling in the grass and diving and barking with him while Mother watched.

Years passed that way, the days becoming weeks becoming months, until Mira no longer had any concept of time.  Each day was a day to be enjoyed; a day to hunt, and a day to spend together with those whose lives she really cared for.

Her dress had shredded with abuse with the passing of years, becoming further and further threadbare and torn until it had simply fallen apart one morning when she tried to drape its dirt-encrusted remains around her dirty body.  She had grown out of a need for such things anyway, by the time it did so.  She hadn’t seen a human being except from afar for many years, and the wolves did not seem to care whether she was covered or not.

She traveled naked now, missing none of the trappings of a youth long forgotten.  Her lithe form was packed with energy and power, running burning what extra body fat she developed and did not need for the winters.  She found a bear skin in a trapper’s cottage one night not long after leaving her home.  She slept in it, kept it up for the times when the air was cold and food was scarce.  She had taken it from him in retribution for what one of his traps had done to Mother’s paw.  She walked with a limp for almost a year before the pain went away.

Mira had never forgotten that stretch of woods.  They would never return there.

Once a year, they would travel into the foothills at the base of a set of mountains far to the west of where she had grown up, to assemble with the other wolves of Mother’s pack and pass news.  Mira’s presence had caused a stir only long enough for the arriving wolves to realize she had none of the smells associated with Man.  She smelled of the earth and of the Wolves.  She could speak their language, through gesture and expression and stance.  She could remove the worst of their ticks when they let her pet them, and she quickly became a favorite at the events.  Pack members would wait their turn to have their pelts examined, to let her caress them like they would let no other Human.

She became a pack treasure, beloved of them all.  When Pup was old enough, he claimed her for his own, and while still a favorite for her touch, she could rarely share it once Pup stood his ground in front of them.  The fact that he was a full-grown adult by that time had passed her by at the time.  His head now reached to her hip, his growl was not so playful when he did not intend it to be, and his bite could rip the head off a rabbit while it still ran.

Mira loved her canine friend.  There would never be another.

Until the harsh winter came in her fifteenth year.  That year, a third of the pack died from malnutrition, the woods of the area being hunted almost bare by the Humans looking for sustenance after a bad summer.  Mira lost weight and grew sallow-skinned.  Sick and “bedridden,” she was forced to accept her meals from the offerings of the remnants of the pack when they arrived in the hills where she’d taken refuge.  A small cave provided safety and warmth in numbers as the wolves came to where she lay.  It was a first.  They had met on the hilltop at the base of the mountains for as long as she could remember.  But their favorite could not travel, and they must have their moot.  Mira recovered in the peaceful slumber of a woman at home, surrounded by the warm, sleeping shapes of twenty wolves.

That was the winter that claimed Mother.

She disappeared one night while hunting for food near a Human encampment.  Hoping that they could scare up some game in the region with their heavy, inefficient floundering through the forest, they had all wished for the lighter game that the Humans would not find.  Perhaps, in the pens around the Human places, they could find something to eat?

Mother never came back.  Mira recognized her pelt on a wagon just five days later, still smelling like the Mother she’d always known.

That night, ever man in the encampment died at the jaws of an enraged wolf, Mira’s agony of loss penetrating them all until they simply had to act.  While watching the Humans before the attack, she learned how to make fire by rubbing two rocks together over dried wood.  She claimed some of their cloaks and gear after the attack, sharing in the horse-flesh feast with her brothers and sisters.

Finished gorging herself, she claimed Mother’s pelt from the cart where it lay drying, to take into the woods and leave for the wild to reclaim.  She did not leave the clearing where she set it out for several days, crying herself to sleep until the wolves came to retrieve her from her dizzying, self-destructive despair.

Pup left the pack.  Left Mira.  Left them all, his anger and loss too much to stay with the rest of them.  Humans had killed Mother.  Mira, despite all she had learned, was still a Human.  Hence, in some form, she was responsible for the attack that had claimed his mother’s life.  Mira’s agony at her death could never replace the fact that she was, when it came down to it, a Human.

Mira almost died that night.  Gave up hope and life and all that came with it in the face of such loss.  Mother was dead, her ghost avenged by the pack.  But Pup!  Pup had been her love and her life since that day in the forest when they’d met.  She had watched him grow from just longer than her forearm to the full-grown wolf that he was.  They had been the reason she had left Humanity behind and embraced Wolf-kind.  They had never been apart for a single day since then.  And now, they were gone.

It took Mira almost a year to get over the loss of her beloved Mother and Pup.  They heard stories from the other Wolves that Pup had taken to ravaging farmers of their sheep, driving them away and killing them in such a way that there was no possible connection to the wolves who lived in the areas.  Pack moots revolved around stories that the Humans thought a demon or devil was stalking them at night in the guise of a dark shape with glowing amber eyes.  Pup’s eyes, Mira knew.  Pup.

It was then that she was finally able to forgive Pup his leaving her and his mother’s memory.  For he had not left her out of anger, but of a knowledge that what he was going to until his dying day was ravage Humans for their brutal offense against Wolf-kind.  He would spare Mira that kind of existence by leaving her behind.

She cried herself to sleep the night she realized this.  That night, and for several months thereafter, whenever she heard of his attacks in the lowlands and fields, she would shed tears for her love.  In remembrance of Mother and in envy, that she could not do the same to avenge Mother’s death.

It was a warm night in the Fall of Mira’s seventeenth year that she met the one who would drastically change her life and be drastically changed in turn.  They were outside a large town in the northern reaches of the settled lands, after a series of wars that had left the involved kingdoms weak and open to outside depredation.  The wolves were foraging the land for food, taking their chances with the Humans by taking sheep and cattle when they felt they had the ability to do so.  Chickens were disappearing daily from farmers’ coops and calls were being made in the Human lands to do something about the wolf problem.

They were sleeping in a hollow just a mile away from a Human settlement in the wilds of the northernmost plains.  They had been raiding coops and sheep fields successfully for days, so there was no sense of urgency.  Each wolf had a full belly.  Mira was overloaded with meats that had been stolen from smokehouses and butcher’s blocks.  She too, was full.  The times were good.

And then came the night of fire.  The Human settlement caught flame one night while they rested from their day’s hunt.  A red glow started over the hilltops surrounding the hollow and the bravest and least full were sent to investigate.  Upon their return, the scouts told of flames licking the rooftops of one of the Human dwellings and Humans running about, chasing after another of their kind.

When the more curious made their way up the incline to see, they watched as the Humans chased one of their number out of their burning settlement, which was now entirely in flames.  They threatened him with weapons and shouted curses and imprecations at his fleeing back.  One even leveled a crossbow in his direction and let fly, hitting him in the shoulder and drawing a howl of pain.

It was the howl that made all the wolves’ fur stand on end.  It was remarkably similar to that of a wolf’s!  Many more began crawling their way up the incline on their bellies, low to the ground.  The man who ran had disappeared into the foothills at the base of their hollow, staggering with the bolt still protruding from his shoulder.

Scouts were sent to find him, while the rest watched the Human settlement burn to the ground.  The Humans tried unsuccessfully to save it, and disappeared into the night on the far side, apparently leaving before the damage was fully done, to try and make it to the next town over.

When the scouts found him, he was unconscious, bleeding from a wound which would not heal straight due to the constant motion of his arms as he’d run.  But he breathed.  Being that he was Human, and they had no idea what to do with a living Human that was no threat to them, they sent for Mira.

When she arrived, it was the first time she had seen a Human man in the prime of his life, and during the prime of her own.  He was filthy, blood-streaked, and wounded.  She had him pulled aside, into the bushes, so that if there was a search for him later, they would find nothing.

Once in the bushes, she stripped off the rude shirt he wore, rolling him onto his stomach so as to get at the bolt still sticking out of his back.  It had gone deep, burying itself in his muscles.  The pain must have been terrible, she thought, staring at him.

“We have to get this out,” she gestured at the wolves.  They stood around, staring at the man, fearful while anger went through they like waves.  This was one of those that had killed Mother.  Her memory was still a sore one, due to the constant attacks of Pup.  They would never forget, or forgive.  They did not move to help.  What were they to do.

Not knowing at all either, Mira did the only thing she could think of.  That length of wood with the feathers would have to be an arrow, she recalled from earlier in her life.  Men called archers used them to strike down birds and other Men.  There was only one way out for such a thing.  She pulled on the bolt, drawing a ragged sigh of pain from its victim.

Jumping away in panic, she hid behind the bushes with the rest of the pack, waiting for the man to awaken and attempt to kill them all.  For long moments, she stayed still with the others, watching, crouched in a position she had long ago found very comfortable.  The Man did not move.

She thought several times to leave, letting him rot and die where he lay, punished by his own people for whatever purpose they had determined he should die for.  Still, something about the cry he had given when shot kept her from going.  Here might be someone like herself.  Someone who understood the wolves and might understand her.

Then again, he might just be someone whose cry sounds an awful lot like a wolf howl, she thought.  Well, nothing for it.

Sneaking back to him again, she rolled him back onto his stomach from where he had lurched during her first attempt and grabbed hold of the wooden shaft once again.  Pushing her long black hair out of her eyes, she crouched in that balanced position again and prepared herself.  Then, with a fierce cry that sounded like the bark of a wolf, she yanked on the shaft, drawing it from its entry point and falling back to the ground behind her.  Bare buttocks bounced off hardened dirt beneath her, the impact driving the air from her lungs and leaving her stunned where she fell.  A friendly, concerned lick at her nose reminded her that there were others around, waiting.

She patted the head of the concerned one and sat up, rubbing her backside as she stood and walked back to the lying man.  He was breathing easier now, she noticed, not the labored breath that comes of a wound.  Blood trickled from the entry point, however.  That would have to be fixed.

“He’ll live.  I hope,” she gestured.  “Get him away from here.” 

Their leader growled, dissenting.  His yellow eyes glowed from across the hearing.

“He lives,” she sent.  “You heard his cry.  He knows all of us.  Of our ways.”

The leader growled again, refusing to allow this.  For all they knew, he would awaken and try to kill them all for their pelts when he could!

“Mother did it for me when I needed help,” Mira said softly.  The rough noise that escaped her lips surprised them all.  She spoke only rarely and then only when it was important to her.  The rest of the time, she limited her utterances to barks and yips, like the others.

Leader glared for a moment longer and then stood.  For a long moment, Mira thought he would force a challenge.  She had seen other Leaders do it before, just before a young wolf challenged for the right to be Alpha Male.  But he did not.  A glance over his shoulder before he left was enough.  Wolves began moving toward the body, to drag it back to a safe place.

Mira set to hiding the trail they would make.  It was the least she could do.

The Man slept that entire night without waking, even when Mira tied a shred of cloth tightly around the wound to keep it from getting dirty.  His sleep was undisturbed, which was just as well, seeing how he would have awakened to find himself in a copse of trees, faced with a filthy, nude young woman, and five dangerous-looking wolves.  When he finally did awaken, however, his first view was that of a woman’s face.  A dirty face, but a woman’s face, nonetheless.  She had startling blue eyes and straggling black hair that hung in clumps around her head from years of neglect, but she was attractive in a base sense.  There was something about her eyes, though.  It took him a long moment to realize she was wearing nothing but dirt.  Crouched as she was over him, her adolescent form was both animal and erotic in appearance, even with the filth.

“What did I ever do to deserve this kind of wake up?” he asked, smiling.  An attempt to place a hand on her arm resulted in a sharp pain in his shoulder and her leaping a short distance away.  Her eyes were wide with surprise and fear, while around him, five throats joined in a threatening growl.  At the sound, he glanced around the circle surrounding him and closed his eyes.  “From scapegoat to prisoner,” he mumbled.

He opened his eyes once again a short time later and nodded to her.  “What would you have me do, Lady?” he asked.  Carefully, he leveraged himself up on one elbow and smiled at her where she crouched, staring at him.  “I seem to be at you and your pet’s mercy.”

“Not pets,” she growled back.  Her voice, scratchy with lack of use but serviceable, came to her without too much effort.  She had to swallow to wet a suddenly dry throat.  Now that he was awake, what was she going to do with him?  They had never captured living creatures before!

“No?” he asked.  “They protect you like they are.”  He nodded at the circle around him, making it obvious that he meant the fact that they were between him and her.  “I am, after all, wounded.  I could not hurt you if I tried.”

“And would you?” she asked, remaining in her crouch.  From that position, she could leap to her feet and be off running faster than he would even be able to roll over.  His eyes kept wandering her body, she saw.  They rarely stayed on her eyes.  It was infuriating, as well as confusing.  Why did she not like that?  She felt her face flame beneath the dirt and turned away.  A long length of dirty black hair covered her when she turned sideways to him. 

“Aye, maybe,” he said in answer.  “Not often a beautiful naked woman wakes me up in the forest.  I might hurt you accidentally in my excitement.”  His eyes were now on her muscular thighs and buttocks, where they hid the rest of her from view.

“Excitement,” she said, glaring at him through the veil of hair.  “What is exciting?”

“Why, you are of course!  Here, I run from a group of crazed villagers who’ve lit their own houses on fir, get shot, and awaken at the mercy of a wild woman no one has ever mentioned lived in these parts!  Of course, the bonus that you are dressed, shall I say… minimally, is enough to make any man’s blood excitable, I should think.”

Feeling her flush at his continuing attentions, she turned away and waved a hand back at him.  “Stop staring at me.”

“Put something on, and I’ll consider it.”

“You are wounded.  How can you talk like that?”

“It is minor,” he said softly.  “Gone within another day, most likely.  I get over accidents like that rather quickly, I’m afraid.”

“Aren’t you afraid of my ‘pets’?”  Standing suddenly, she moved into the tree line to get away form his staring eyes.  “They will tear you apart if I tell them to.”

“You won’t,” he said.

Angry now, Mira spun about, temporarily forgetting what he was staring at and giving him a full-body view.  “How do you know that?  What is to keep me from killing you myself?  I’m a fair hunter!”

“Aye,” the stranger said, his eyes wandering the length of her body now that she was standing in full view.  “That you might be.  But you’ll be wanting to talk to me, I think.  I could teach you things.”

Startled and caught off-guard again, Mira leapt into the protection of the nearby trees, hiding herself behind a trunk as she spoke.  “I do not want to learn.  Especially anything you Humans have to teach me.”

He raised an eyebrow, smiling.  “Oh?  Not what I’m thinking of teaching you at this moment, I’m sure, but something else.  Like, what has been going on in the world while you’ve been running around out here, Miss Allanserei.”

Mira felt reality fall out of alignment for a moment.  That was a name she had not heard for a very long time.  A name which she had managed to forget over the years, but which would not forget her, it seemed.  She stepped slightly away from the tree once again, staring at him.

“You know my name?”

Smugly, the man laid back down on the ground, ignoring the wolves encircling him.  “To tell you that, I’ll have to be healed, won’t I?  I can’t just spend all my energy having conversations with naked young girls, can I?”

“You can’t do that!” Mira cried, stepping fully away from the tree and stamping a foot.  She began stomping toward him, making him raise his eyebrows and appraise her once more as she approached.  She really was in incredible shape.  “That’s not fair!”

“Not fair, huh?  You disappear for ten years and this isn’t fair?  What would you know?”

“I could have you killed!” she cried.  “I could have left you!”

“We’ve already been over that.  You won’t do it.”

At a glance from Mira, the five wolves began growling dangerously again, standing from where they’d sat and beginning to move toward the prone figure before her.  Sweat stood out on his forehead suddenly and he grinned at her, trying and failing to ignore their imminent threat.

“I’m a friend!  Honestly!  I’m not here to hurt you or anything!  Thank you for your help!  It’s just that…  I need to get away from that village before the villagers come looking for me!  If they find us, it’ll mean the end of us!”

Mira waved a hand and the fivesome stopped, turning and looking at her for further guidance.  A subtle movement and the wolves stood and began moving toward the place where the rest of the pack waited just over the rise.  Mira moved to his side and offered a hand, pulling him up without straining.  He winced at the pull in his shoulder, but rose nonetheless.

“You’ve definitely grown,” he said.  “Gotten strong.”

“Who are you?”  Mira stepped out of arm’s reach once he was on his feet and stayed a safe distance away as they moved toward the hiding place of the rest of the pack.

“Nathan,” he replied.  “Nathan Amesburn.  Rover, traveler, and bard extraordinaire.”

Mira stared at him.  She’d never heard those word before.

“I’m a thief,” he said, grinning self-consciously.  He rotated his shoulder tentatively and smiled to himself when the pulling sensation faded somewhat.  “I wander the lands and tell stories for a copper pence or two and take things when I don’t get enough.  How’s that?

“I heard your story when I was learning to sing.  Most bards do, nowadays.  The girl with the amazing eyes, who disappeared one stormy night.  Tales that you’d been seen are following you, you know?  Every time I’ve traveled north, there’ve been new stories of a woman who runs with the wolves.  Rangers and loner-types, but they’ve seen you, or so they said.

                “I’ve always wanted to see if they were telling the truth, so I’ve followed the stories this far.  Last time I heard about you, it was in Croftshire.  Based on the direction you’d been going, I figured you’d be up around this area right about now.

                “When I heard there were a large number of sheep disappearing up this way, and that they were blaming it on a wolf pack of unusual size, I figured I must be right.  And here you are.

                “You know, there was a reward out for you, up until a few years ago.  Everyone says your dead now.  No one was ever able to return with the right girl.  Those who tried bringing a stand-in were killed as soon as your father saw them.”

                “My father.”

                “He’s a right angry man, he is.  Lord of Nachtig now.  Member of one of the Eight.  Not a man to upset.”

                “Nachtig?”  Again, a name from memory.  The City of Night.  Somewhere close to where she grew up, she remembered.  A random thought came up.  I wonder if Elizabeth has forgotten me?

                “You know, the city of the eight keeps?  Center of civilization he’s called in some circles.  Although the stuff that lives within the walls shouldn’t be called ‘civilization.’”

                “Why are you searching for me?  What made you want to find me?”

                “Because.  I’ve always wanted to see those eyes they talk about.”

                When Mira turned to glare at him, she found him staring into her eyes with an intensity she’d never seen.  Wolves could only provide so much information in their eyes, but with a Human, she quickly found that eyes can convey a thousand meanings.  Nathan’s were telling a story.

                “Stop that,” she said softly.  “I don’t like it when you stare.”

                “I’m sorry,” he said, pulling his eyes away from hers.  “You know, you really are quite beautiful.  I wasn’t just saying that.  But you really shouldn’t be wandering around without clothes…”

                “I wear what nature gave me,” Mira said, suddenly tired of words.  Wolves never talked this much!  Her ears hurt and her throat was beginning to bother her from all the words.  “Leave me alone.”

                They rose over the crest of the hill then, to stare down into the eyes of some twenty-odd Wolves, intent on securing the safety of their favorite.  For a long time then, Nathan’s fast-talking mouth was silent.

                Over the next few days, it became apparent that Nathan was no normal person.  His injury, so terrible to behold the day after it happened, faded within a few more, as he’d said it would.  After a week with the pack, there was no sign that he’d ever been shot.  A special trick the dead gods had given him, he said by explanation.  He left it at that.

                The Wolves and Mira stayed in place even after the villagers returned to pack up their remaining belongs, and rounded up their animals to leave for a new home.  No attempts were made to find the stranger who had mysteriously shown up the night their homes had burned down.  The Wolves, Mira, and Nathan were safe for the time being.  It was a chance to rest from the long runs which had brought the pack this far north, and Nathan took advantage of it to get to know the beautiful woman who ran with them.

                Mira quickly took to wearing her bearskin around him.  Bare in patches from years of travel, it still provided enough warmth in the winter for her to sleep under.  It was a ragged cover for a ragged woman.  Nathan did not see it at all.  Instead, all he could see were her sky-blue eyes and how similar they were to the wolves she ran with.

                Once he was fit to move, the pack determined it was time to go.  If he stayed with them, they said, the would have added an extra Human to their midst, and feeding one properly was problem enough.  Mira was special in their eyes.  She could talk to them.  This new person could not, and therefore would never be accepted the way she was.

                Somehow, Nathan knew this.  So, on the morning they made to leave their makeshift home, he showed them the true reason he was run out of the villager’s settlement.  He took off his own clothes and transformed before them all.

                Moments before the transformation, he was a speaking, breathing Human being.  When it was over, he was a huge Wolf, with fangs, claws, and a back large enough for Mira to ride if she wished or knew how.  Mira let out a screech of fear and ran for the trees as his skin began to buckle and run with fur.  The pack turned itself into a single, massive entity, growling in fear and distrust while the Werewolf before them simply stared them down.

                It was too big to attack on one-on-one terms.  Leader instantly knew that.  Taken one at a time, it would destroy the pack before any of them had a chance to even injure it.  Even a pack of twenty Wolves would be hard pressed to kill it, and even then, they would be a pack no more.

                After a short moment, the Were transformed back, becoming Nathan again.  Calmly, he began to pull his clothing one once more, staring at smugly at Mira, who still stood behind a nearby tree, her eyes as wide as he’d ever seen before.

                “What was that!?” she cried.  “That was amazing!”

                “I’m a werewolf,” Nathan said quietly, pulling on a boot.  “I’ve been one for almost ten years and I can see no end to it soon.”

                “Is that the real reason you were hunting for me?  Because you thought I was a… a… were… werewolf?”  She stumbled around the unfamiliar word.

                “The thought had occurred to me.  But, no.  Wolves don’t like running with Weres.  The were has it too easy to become Alpha Male.”  He turned and looked at Leader where he sat, speaking calmly.  “I don’t want to be Alpha Male,” he said quietly.  “That is not why I am here.”

                “Then why are you?” Mira asked suddenly.

                “Because the world holds no place for me.  I could only dream of being you when I came to realize I could not stop being a were.  You were someone who wasn’t a were, but who lived with wolves and was happy, according to the tales.”

                “If there are so many tales, why hasn’t my father found me and brought me home?”

                Nathan sighed.  “I guess he just can’t believe that you’re not dead.  Besides, reports of a woman running with the wolves does not necessarily mean that you ARE Mira Allanserei.  There’s an empty coffin out there somewhere with your name carved on a stone marker above it.

                “He doesn’t want to think that you’re alive.  If he did, the heavens only know what he would do to you for putting him through all that.”

                Mira grimaced, realizing the truth in what Nathan was saying.  It had taken her a year to be able to believe in her heart that Mother was truly gone.  She kept thinking that they had found another Wolf’s pelt and that they had all simply been wrong.  That she was going to wake up one night with Mother’s tongue wetting her cheek.

                Nathan stood and walked toward her, the eyes of the Wolves around them following him as he moved.  He placed his hands on her shoulders and stared fearlessly into her eyes.  It was a discomforting stare, Mira thought.  One she wasn’t sure she wanted to see.  She shrugged his hands away, but he stayed right before her, his eyes not moving.

                “I came searching for you because I loved you,” he said.  “Or loved the idea of you.  Living free out here.  With friends who wouldn’t turn into enemies when they found out your true nature.”

                Mira glanced around at the wolves lazing about in the sun.  Most were still staring at the two Humans in their midst, having a conversation in that odd noisy language of theirs.  Several had gone to sleep, or were cleaning their pelts in anticipation of their delayed run.

                “I don’t know about that,” Mira said uncertainly.  “They might not accept you like they did with me.  Mother brought me here, and she had to argue for them to accept me.  I’m not a Wolf.”

                “Mother?”

                “A long story,” Mira said, trying to avoid the subject.  “I was brought into the pack by another Wolf.  I cannot bring you into the pack.  I am not a Wolf, even though they listen to me as if I was.”

                Nathan glanced around at the surrounding Wolves.  “You were just arguing with them when you found me, weren’t you?”

                Mira dropped her jaw in surprise.  “How…  How did you know that!?”

                Nathan smiled again.  Without realizing, he reached out a brushed a bothersome hair out of her face.  “I was not entirely unconscious, Mira.  I could hear things, although I could not answer.”

                “Don’t do that.”  She flinched away again.

                “Do what?”

                “Touch my hair.”

                “What?”

                “You touched my hair.  Don’t.”

                “It was in your face.  You do it all the time.  You really should cut that.”

                Mira laughed.  “With what!?  There is nothing out here that I can cut it with!  Besides, until you came along, I never worried about it!”

                “You should,” he said seriously.  “Especially if you ever want to go home.”

                Mira stared at him for a long minute.  “Home?  Why should I ever want to go there?  You just said everyone thinks I’m dead and would rather continue thinking that way.  Why would I ever want to go there?”

                “Home, cities, villages.  Civilization, Mira.  Don’t you want to know what is going on in those places, where Humans gather?”

                “No!  Those places smell!  Humans come together and chop up the trees and hunt the forests until there’s nothing left for the rest of us!  Why would I ever want to go there!?”

                “Because they’re your own kind, Mira.  You just said it yourself.  You’re not a wolf.  They listen to you, but they don’t accept you as one of them.  Because you’re not one of them.”

                “I am!” she cried, feeling tears welling in her eyes.  This was not fair!  Who was he to come into her life like this and tell her all these things?  Who was he to destroy her belief in this world?  Her world!?  “Go away!” she cried.  “I hate you!  Go back to your smelly Human places!  I hate them!  I hate them!!”

                “Mira, I…”

                But it was too late.  Mira was running away from him, hands covering her eyes as she struggled to keep the tears from falling.  The Wolves had taken notice as their voices rose, and now they were glaring at him for whatever it was he had done to their favorite.  More than a few of them were growling quietly in his direction.  She came to a stop amidst a small cluster of them, falling to her knees and petting them fiercely, resting her head against one of them.  She hugged them all to her, all too aware for once that they were covered in warm fur and that she was not.

                It was a long time before she could or would talk to Nathan again.

                The night she did was a bad night for the pack.  A raid on a sheep farm had gone wrong.  The shepherd had a large dog on patrol, and while he was no match for the twenty or so wolves who raided his lands at once, his barking caused a stir amongst the sheep and then awoke the farmer.  By the time the man had left his hut to see what was happening, three sheep lay dead on the field, the slower of the raiding party beginning to drag the carcasses away for the evening meal.

                But the shepherd would have nothing of that.  He had a bow and several arrows and rapidly put them to work, shooting the larger wolves and driving the others away from the fallen sheep.  The Wolves ran, several with wooden arrows sticking from their thick hides, yelping with every gallop as they ran away.

                A counter attack later that evening saw the shepherd die at the hands of Nathan, having transformed into his Wolfen form to kill the man for what he had done to his adopted family.  But Nathan had not counted on the shepherd’s wife, and she was able to stab him before he could kill her as well.  By the time he returned to the pack with his news, he had lost a lot of blood.

                He would not be able to travel for several days, he said.  He needed time to recover.

                But time was not something the pack would have.  The murder at the shepherd’s house was found the very next day by a local villager.  Within hours, a search had begun to find the murderers and the lost sheep.  Since the fields were covered with wolf prints, it was known who or what had done the killing.  The shepherd’s and his wife’s wounds matched those of an oversized wolf, they knew.

                Within a day of the killing, hunters were called into the area to deal with the wolf threat once and for all.

                Nathan could not leave.  The Wolves wanted to leave him.  Why should any of their number die for the were, they said.  He had only joined them recently and meant nothing to anyone.  Except Mira, they said. 

Untrue, she replied.  He had avenged the attack by the shepherd and had almost died for it.

He had no reason to do so, they replied.  That was the way of things.  So they did not eat tonight.  They had gone longer. 

He had put the entire pack at risk and was continuing to do so by being wounded.  They would leave.

NO! Mira cried.  She tried and warned and cajoled, but nothing was to come of it.  In the end, it was she and Nathan sitting in the darkness, waiting for the hunters.  The Wolves would meet them at a tall rock along the sides of the valley they were in, if they survived the night.  They would wait there for two days and then move on again.

Mira should have no problem catching up.  If she weren’t dead, Leader told her.

“What now?” she asked.  “I’ve never fought Humans before.  I don’t know what to do.”

“You don’t,” Nathan said quietly.  His face was white with loss of blood, but not so bad as it had been earlier that day.  He was already healing.  Death, however, does not get better, and he knew he was dying.

“What do you mean, I don’t?  I can’t let them capture you!  They’ll kill you this time!”

“Yes, but you have no reason to stay, Mira.  You can continue on with the pack.  They were right.  I have put us all in danger.”

“You wouldn’t know that if I hadn’t translated for you.”

“No, but you did, and I do.  They were right.”

“I’m not leaving you.  You are a part of the pack now, whether they realize it or not.  I’m not going to let the Humans take you.”

Nathan smiled and reached for her, taking her hand and pulling her to sit with him while they waited.  “Mira, I know you want to run with the Wolves.  You cannot say you don’t.”

“I never said I didn’t.”

“then what if I told you I could make you run like them.  Be like me, only smaller.  Women turn into smaller wolves.  Almost indistinguishable from those you run with.”

“They wouldn’t accept me!  I’m not a were, like you are!”

“They would, Mira.  You know that.  You would finally be like they are when you become a wolf.  I’m going to die here, tonight, Mira.  I have accepted that, and so should you.  I can’t run, and I can’t fight and neither can you.

“But, I can make you what you’ve always wished you were.”

“You can’t!  I can’t!  I won’t leave you!”  She was almost in tears.  Here was the first Human she’d ever met since becoming a member of the pack and he was dying!

Nathan grinned at her like he had the first time he’d met her, caressing her cheek with the back of his palm.  She had cleaned her face earlier that day, as she had her entire body.  She had taken to dunking herself for long periods of time in the region’s rivers, scrubbing the worst of her dirt from her body in an effort to ease the looks he gave her.  While she was not clean per se, it was better than the dirt-covered beast he had found that first time.  Of course, cleaning herself had only led to more frequent looks, rather than less.  She’d grown increasingly flustered as her skin grew more and more pink from beneath the dirt.

She was even prettier than he’d first thought.  With her hair reasonably clean, and her skin refreshingly pink beneath her dirty tan, she was turning out to be quite a gorgeous specimen.

“I can, and you must,” he said softly.  “I will not see the woman I love killed for a mistake I made on my own.”

Mira was stunned for a long, silent moment, staring at him.  “You what?”

“I love you, Mira.  I cannot bear to see you dead because I made a foolish mistake.  But I can give you what you have always wanted with the pack.  I can make you one with them.”

When she spoke next, it was in a quiet voice, barely audible.  “How?”

“Have you ever seen the Wolves mate, Mira?  Do you know what that means?”

“I am not a fool,” she said indignantly.  “I know what that means.  It is how they have pups!”

“That is how.”

When Mira left an hour later, she carried the knowledge that within the next cycle of the mon, she would begin feeling strange impulses.  Rather than fight them, Nathan told her, she must embrace them.  Run with them like she had always run with the wolves, he said.  She must explain to them that she was going to become like they were, grow closer to them.  They would not understand at first, but when she had learned to control the metamorphosis, they would know.  It occupied her mind while she limped back, helping her to forget the pain and embarrassment that had come from her coupling with Nathan before leaving.

She had never done such a thing before, and while she had seen it happen between members of the pack and knew what it meant, she had never experienced it for herself.  While she had sometimes expressed curiosity about the act, she had never thought that, when her time came, it would be on her back, pinned beneath a man who treated her with more love and respect than she had ever known.  When he had entered her body, she had cried out in pain and embarrassment, curling up when he finally let her go.  Only a small part of her had listened to his instructions at the time, so caught up was she with the feelings she was going through.

What was this she suddenly felt toward Nathan, she wondered?  Why was it that she had to find them on the night when he was requesting she leave him to die?  Why was it that all the people she ever came to care for had to die or leave forever!?  Would she have pups from this?  If so, how would she take care of them?  The female Wolves had mates to take care of their feeding needs.  Mother had left her male and lost him during a hunt shortly after giving birth to Pup.  What would Mira do if her stomach began to distend?  What would the pack think?

The pack was where it said it would be, waiting.  She joined them without a word, and they loped off for greener pastures.  She never saw Nathan again.

Over the next month Mira began craving things normal people would find unusual, but which she had always liked before.  She craved raw meat, but they ate that normally.  She wanted to run naked and howl at the moon, but that was normal for her too.  Her stomach, thankfully, did not grow.  She did, however, cease cleaning herself, wondering why she bothered, now that the one who’d originally told her to do so was gone. 

What surprised her was on the night of the full moon, when she blacked out and woke up the next morning, covered in blood.

Arriving at the lair, a cave in a hillside, she drew a lot of attention, being covered in blood and the remains of whatever it was she had slain the night before.

Where were you, asked Leader.  We worried for you.

I don’t know, she replied.  I can’t remember.

Can’t remember, asked another, one she referred to as Gray.  Or won’t tell?

Can’t remember, she repeated.  She looked around at the assembled Wolves.  Did anyone see me last night?

No response.  Taken to be a negative, Mira nodded.  What happened?

We held our moot, Leader replied.  You did not come.  We missed you.  All missed you.

I am sorry, she answered.  I will clean up so I do not scare the game.  We can move after this.

Leader simply watched her as she left, nothing in his expression to let anyone know anything about what he was thinking.

This happened for three months.  Mira ran with them every day, but on the night of the full moon, when they were meeting with the rest of the pack and exchanging stories of their adventures, she would disappear, only to not remember the next morning where she had gone or what she had done.  Leader and the pack began to get worried.  Without her to pick their ticks, they were growing increasingly uncomfortable.  They had grown spoiled with her to attend them.

Finally, she stayed aware during one of the full moons, and learned why she had passed out before.  Memories pounded back into her head at the change, and she suddenly knew what had happened on those nights she couldn’t remember before.  Rather than explain it to them, she showed them at the next moot.

She changed before them into a small black wolf with sky blue eyes.  A wolf who bounded out of their circle with no regard for wolfen protocol, pushing those who got too close by ramming her head into their bodies until they backed away.  She led them on a mad hunt then.  More of a chase than anything, she did not stop until she had killed, whereupon she tore the game to small shreds, leaving nothing for food.

She did this several times.  A rabbit.  A doe.  A sheep, and finally a Human in his dwelling deep in the forest.  Killing for no reason other than killing.  Definitely NOT the way of the Wolves, and they knew this immediately.  So did Mira, but there was no talking to her to her that night.

Sheer, utter madness.  And she did not remember that the next morning.  Or the morning after that, or the week after that.  The wolves were properly terrified by this change.  Any other day of the month, she was their loving favorite, treating them all as she always had.  They tried to explain to her what had happened, but she could not imagine what they were trying to say.  They smothered her in care and love, trying to talk her out of the next mad chase, but it happened anyway.

After three full months of this, a desperate moot was called during the dark of the moon, rather than during the light of the full.  Mira’s activities as a wolf were not acceptable, the elders said.  She should immediately stop whatever it was she had begun when Nathan had died.

She could not, she told them.  It was permanent.  She was becoming more like them, she said.

No.  Not like us.  Like a crazed, bee-stung wolf who has lost all sight of life and balance.  You are a danger to us all on the night of the full moon.  We do not wish this danger upon our pack.  Do you?

No!  But I don’t remember this!  How can I be held accountable for what I do not remember?

You say we lie then?  Growls filled the air.

No!

                Then we tell the truth.  You are endangering us all by this activity.  You must stop this by next moot time or, despite our love for you, you will have to leave us.

                Leave!?  I have done this to be closer to you!  Everything was going so terribly wrong!

                Reasons do not make what is happening acceptable.  Learn to control what you do as one of us and you may return.  We only offer this because you have chosen to become more like us out of love for us.  Normally, you know we would kill you for your illness.

                Is it illness to want to be more like those I love?

                It is an illness to have more than one shape.  We kill those who are ill.  You know this.  It saves them the slowness of dying.  It is part of the Way of things.  Because you are who you are, we accept this illness and let you live.  But you endanger us all and that is not part of the Way.

                If you cannot learn to control yourself by the next moot, you will no longer be allowed to run with us until you do.

                Mira stared at them, tears forming in her eyes and running down her cheeks.  It was not fair, but there was nothing she could do about it.

                Nor was there anything she could do to control her actions as a wolf the next time the full moon came around.  Despite the concentration she tried to maintain while shifting, she awoke the next day, faced by the circle of elders who had surrounded her, the rest of the pack outside and looking in.

                You may return when you have learned to be a proper wolf, they told her, ignoring the whines of the rest of the pack.    Until then, you have no pack.  You must learn to be like us, as you said, before you can return to us.  Endanger the pack, and you must be expelled.  Love continues for you, Mira, but you are a danger and must go.

                Mira stood and watched them leave through a haze of tears.  Blood caked her body, and grime was beneath her fingernails from whatever it was that she had killed last night.  They were leaving her!  Alone in the world for the very first time!  A hard choice, she knew.  She had seen the pain in the eyes of even her beloved elders as they made their proclamation.  She was packless.

                But that was the language of life, she conceded.  One who endangers all must be set aside for the safety of the pack.  And she had endangered the pack with her madness.

                She swore to herself then.  A mission she would endeavor to her maximum ability to complete successfully.  She had to learn to control herself as a wolf.  To learn to be herself, but within the wolf’s body.  Nathan had told her it would take time.  Maybe he had mastered it quickly and that was why he’d been sure the Wolves would accept her?  She did not know.

                To learn though, she would need practice.  But to live in those times between the full moon, when she became the wolf, she would need shelter and companionship.  In all her years, she had never been as fully alone as she was now.  Naked in more than just clothes, Mira stared out at a suddenly hostile sky and knew what she needed to do.  She would do as Nathan had told her until the nights of the full moon, when she could return to her own ‘natural’ life.

                She would live with the Humans.  How she would do that, and where she would begin was the biggest question in her mind that day.

The wolves had known the possibility of her need to return to her own kind and had arranged to be close.  She staggered out of the woods, a bath in a river seeing to the worst of the mud and dirt and blood that encased her body like tattered clothing, the bear cloak pulled tight around her body to conceal it from anyone who would look her way.  She wandered this way for most of a day before coming to another collection of huts, which in her earlier life she would have avoided like the death that it represented for her kind.  Now, instead, she wandered directly into it, terror in her eyes, but determination in her heart.

                Entering the village brought her the assistance of a local matron, who rushed out to collect her when she saw the beautiful, raven-haired and sky-blue eyed woman walking nearly naked toward the gates of the City of Darkness.

                “My dear,” she said into the confused eyes of the wild child, “If you think you can survive dressed like that, you don’t stand one whit’s chance of making it in that place, if that is where you are going.”

                “It is,” Mira said, turning and looking up at the high walls of the city and it’s eight dark towers.

                “Then you will need clothes,” the matron said, making tsk’ing noises as she followed along up the stairs.  “I don’t know where you’ve been or what’s happened to you, but the bandits are always coming and going through this part of the world, despite the damned city bein’ so close.  You’d think they don’t right care about what’s going on outside their precious walls.

“Come with me, and we’ll get you fixed right up.  I’m not letting another babe wander out of the woods and get eaten by the maw of that monstrous city without at least helping you to get yourself set up proper.”  She turned and looked up at the black walls, making the sign against evil while she did.  “I don’t suppose you’d tell me your name, would you?”

                “Mira,” the wild child said quietly.  “Just Mira.”

                And that, my friends, is where this tale ends.  For, you see, Mira stands at the gates of a grand city.  THE grand city.  Nachtig itself.  Home to her father in his madness, domicile of eight dark Lords and their foul schemes to bring dominion over the realms.

                A child of nature, she stands upon the cusp.  What the future brings is yet another tale.  One she will write as she lives it.