The Wolves of Midwinter (The Wolf Gift Chronicles 2)

A deep angry sound of protest came from Sergei. He took a small step closer to Hockan. Margon gestured for patience. Hockan ignored them.

“Oh, what a withering shadow you threw over the life of your last descendants, Felix,” he said, his voice fast attaining an eerie beauty. “And how they shriveled from the poison of your legacy. The ghost of your murdered niece walks this forest even now, in agony, paying for your sins! Yet you hold a revel in the very house where she was cut down by her own brothers!”

Margon sighed but said nothing. Felix was staring at Hockan, and it was impossible to read into his wolfen face or posture any response. It was the same with all of them. Only a voice or a gesture could reveal a response. And now only Hockan was speaking. Even the mourning females had gone silent. For Reuben to hear these harsh and frightening words spoken with such a beautiful voice was crushing.

“What arrogance, what pride,” said Hockan, “what greed for undeserved admiration. And do you think you’ve seen the last of greedy doctors and government men who would put a price on our heads and hunt us for their laboratories like vermin?”

“Stop,” said Margon. “You misjudge everything.”

“Do I?” asked Hockan. “I misjudge nothing. You put us all at risk with your revels and your games. Fiona was right, you learned nothing from your own blunders.”

“Oh, go away from here, you pompous fool,” said Sergei.

Hockan turned and looked at Reuben and Stuart.

“Young ones, I caution you,” he said. “Move away from the living; move away from those of flesh and blood who were your kin, for your sake, and for theirs. Mothers, brothers, sisters, friends, unborn child—forswear them. You have no right to them or their affections. The lie you live can only contaminate and destroy them. See what Felix’s evil has done already to this one’s father.”

Margon made a low disgusted and derisive sound. Felix remained still and quiet.

“Oh, yes,” said Hockan. His voice now had become tremulous. “Fiona and Helena were unwise, and meddlesome and reckless. I don’t deny it. Young Morphenkinder, untried and unchastened and now gone forever. Forever, when they might have lived till the end of time. Into the need fire, the bone fire of Modranicht! What is it now, this fire? What have your Forest Gentry made of it? An unclean funeral pyre. But who provoked those two, our sisters? Who gave them scandal? Where did it all start, that is what you must ask yourselves.”

No one answered him.

“It was Felix who drew this innocent man into his web,” said Hockan. “Nideck Point is his snare. Nideck Point is his public shame. Nideck Point is his abomination.” His voice rose. “And it was Felix who roused the spirits of the forest to an unholy and bloody violence never witnessed before! It is Felix who has strengthened them, emboldened them, enlisted them like dark angels in his unholy designs.”

He was visibly trembling, but he drew himself up, and caught his breath and then went on in the same exquisitely modulated voice as before.

“And so now you have these murderous spirits on your side,” he said. “Ah, such a wonder. Are you proud, Felix? Are you proud, Margon?”

From Elthram there came a low hiss, and suddenly the same rose from all the Forest Gentry everywhere in the clearing, a storm of hissing in derision.

Hockan stood still regarding them all.

“Young ones,” he said. “Burn Nideck Point.” He pointed to Reuben, then to Stuart. “Burn it to the very foundations!” His voice rose again until it was just below a roar. “Burn the village of Nideck. Erase it from the earth. That should be your penance at the very least for this, all of you! What right have you to human love, or human adulation! What right have you to darken innocent lives with your duplicity and evil power!”

“Enough from you!” cried Elthram. He was plainly in a rage. All around him, the Forest Gentry collected in vivid color in the glare of the fire.

“I have no stomach for war with you,” said Hockan, “any of you. But you all know the truth. Of all the misbegotten immortals roaming this earth, we pride ourselves on rectitude and conscience!” He beat his chest silently with his paws. “We, the protectors of the innocent, are known for the singular gift of knowing good from evil. Well, you have made a mockery of this, all of you. You have made a mockery of us. And what are we now but another horror?”

He walked right up to Elthram and stood before him, peering into his eyes. It was a frightful image, Elthram surrounded by his kindred, glaring at the powerfully built white Man Wolf, and the Man Wolf poised as if to spring, but doing nothing.

Slowly, Hockan turned and drew closer to Reuben. His posture shifted from one of confrontation to weariness, his body shuddering.

“What will you say to the mournful and broken soul of Marchent Nideck who seeks your comfort, Reuben?” he asked. His words came on, smooth, seductive. “It’s to you that she reveals her sorrow, not to Felix, her guardian and her kin who destroyed her. How will you explain to the murdered Marchent that you share her great-uncle’s cursed and pestilential power, feasting now so happily and greedily in this beautiful realm which she gave to you?”

Reuben didn’t answer. He couldn’t answer. He wanted to protest, with all his soul he wanted to protest, but Hockan’s words overwhelmed him. Hockan’s passion and conviction had overwhelmed him. Hockan’s voice had woven some crippling spell around him. Yet he knew, positively knew, that Hockan was wrong.

Helplessly, he looked down at Phil, who lay half conscious on the ground, his head turned to the side, his body tightly covered by the green velvet cloaks, yet plainly shuddering beneath them.

“Oh, yes, your father,” said Hockan, his voice lower, words coming more slowly. “Your poor father. The man who gave you life. And he’s ripped out of life now as you were ripped. Are you happy for him?”

No one stirred. No one spoke.

Hockan turned away, and with a series of small eloquent grunts and noises beckoned his remaining female cohorts to go with him, and off they ran except for one, vanishing into the darkness.

That one was Berenice. She remained kneeling close to Phil, and now Frank went to her, and helped her to her feet in the most tender and human manner.

Elthram backed away from the center, out of the direct glare of the bonfire. All around the great arena, against the pale boulders, stood the Forest Gentry watching, waiting.

“Come on, let’s take him back home,” said Sergei. “Let me carry him.”