The Wolf Gift (The Wolf Gift Chronicles 1)

He walked after that, dreamily through the dense forest, crossing the broad stream on a thick moss-covered log, his clawed feet easily clinging to it, and he ventured even further into the canyon, beyond the places he,d known, and further up the flank of Mount Tamalpais.

At last he fell down and lay against the bark of a tree, peering through the dark, and seeing for the first time many more creatures than he,d ever dreamed were harbored in the brush. Scent of fox, squirrel, chipmunk - how did he know what each was?

An hour passed; he,d been snuffling, crawling on all fours, wandering.

The hunger was on him again. He knelt beside a creek, his eyes easily tracking the swift progress of the winter salmon, and when his paw came down, he had a large fish, helpless, squirming and flapping, which he tore open at once with his teeth.

He savored the raw flesh, and how distinctly different it was from the meat of the juicy sinewy bobcat.

This wasn,t hunger he was satisfying, was it? This was something else - a great flexing and exercising of what he was.

He climbed again, high, fumbling for birds, nests in the shivering branches, and devoured the eggs shell and all as the screeching mother bird circled him, pecking at him vainly.

Back down beside the creek, he bathed his face and his paws in the icy water. He walked out in it and bathed all over, splashing the water over his head and shoulders. All the blood must be washed away. The water felt refreshing. He knelt and drank as if he,d never satisfied thirst in his whole life before, lapping, guzzling, gulping the water.

The rain sparkled on the rippling, tossing surface of the stream. And beneath it, the indifferent fish swam speedily past him.

He climbed up again and traveled in the trees, high above the valley floor. Never mind, little birds. I don,t want to torment you.

Thou shalt not seethe a kid in its mother,s milk, - indeed.

As had happened before he could see the stars through the thick mist. What a glorious thing it was, the open heavens rising above the thick layer of fog and damp that shrouded this earth. It seemed the tumbling rain carried with it a silvery light in its busy descent. It sparkled and sang on the leaves around him. Then down from the upper branches it became rain again to the lower branches, and from then on down to the world below, rain and rain and rain, until it fell soft on the tiny quaking ferns and on the deep mulch of dead leaf, so rich, so fragrant.

He couldn,t really feel the rain on his body, except for his eyelids. But he could smell it, smell it as it changed with every surface it cleansed and nourished.

Slowly, he dropped down once more and walked, his back very straight, the strong desire to feast having left him, and he felt a wondrous safety in the dark forest, musing with a smile that he had encountered nothing that was not afraid of him.

The annihilation of the three evil men revolted him. He felt lightheaded and liable to weep. Could he weep? Did savage animals actually weep? A low laughter came out of him. It seemed the trees were listening to him, but that was most certainly the most preposterous of illusions that these thousand-year-old guardians knew or cared that anything else whatever was actually alive. How monstrous were the redwoods, how out of scale with all the rest of the natural earth, how divinely primitive and magnificent.

The night had never seemed sweeter to him in all his existence; it was conceivable that he could live this way forever, self-sufficient, strong, monstrous, and utterly unafraid. If that was what the Wolf Gift had in store for him, perhaps he could bear it.

Yet it terrified him that he might surrender his conscious soul to the heart of the beast pumping within. For now, poetry was still with him - and the deepest moral considerations.

A song came to him, an old song. Where he,d heard it he couldn,t recall. He sang it in his head, putting its half-forgotten words in proper order, only humming under his breath.

He came out into a grassy clearing, the light from the low gray heavens increasing, and after the closeness of the woods, it seemed beautiful to see the shimmering grass in the thin rain.

He began to dance in large slow circles singing the song. His voice sounded deep and clear to him, not the voice of the old Reuben, the poor innocent and fearful Reuben, but the voice of the Reuben he was now.

,Tis the gift to be simple

,tis the gift to be free

,Tis the gift to come down

where we ought to be

And when we find ourselves

in the place just right

,Twill be in the valley of love and delight

Again, he sang it, dancing a little faster and in greater circles, his eyes closed. A light shone against his eyelids, a dim, distant light, but he took no note of it. He was dancing and singing - .

He stopped.

He,d caught a strong scent - an unexpected scent. Something sweet and mingled with an artificial perfume.

Someone was very near to him. And as he opened his eyes, he saw the light shining on the grass, and the rain sparkling gold in it.

He caught not the slightest hint of danger. This human scent was clean, innocent - fearless.

He turned and looked to his right. Be gentle as you are careful, he reminded himself. You will frighten, perhaps terrify, this blundering witness.

Yards away, on the rear porch of a small darkened house, there stood a woman looking at him. She held a lantern in her hand.

In the total darkness that had been the night, the light of the lantern expanded widely, thinly; and surely in this light she could see him.

She stood very still, apparently gazing at him across the expanse of wild soft grass, a woman with long hair parted in the middle, and large shadowy eyes. Her hair appeared to be gray but this might have been a mistake. For as well as he could see, he couldn,t quite make out the details of what he saw. She wore a long-sleeved white nightgown and she was utterly alone. No one in the dark house behind her.

Don,t be frightened!

It remained his first and only thought. How small and fragile she looked standing on the porch, a tender animal, holding the lantern up as she stared at him.

Oh, please, don,t be afraid.

He began to sing again, the same stanza, only more slowly, in the same clear deep voice as before.

He moved slowly towards her, and watched in secret astonishment as she moved along the porch and to the head of the back steps.

She wasn,t afraid. That was plain. She wasn,t afraid at all.

He moved closer and closer, and again he sang the words. He was now full in the strong light of the lantern. And yet she stood still as before.

She looked utterly curious, fascinated.

He came closer until he stood at the foot of the small steps.

Her hair was gray, actually, prematurely gray surely as her face was as smooth as a china mask. Her eyes were a large glacial blue. She was fascinated, all right, and unshakable, as if she,d lost herself utterly in gazing at him.