"Why don't we start with who, exactly, you are?" suggested Quil, obviously still fuming.
"Fair enough," said Jaz with a shrug. "My name is Jazmine Running Wolf, of the Oklahoma River Village. Mojave," she supplied wryly when the boys looked confused.
"But…" Jacob frowned.
I knew what he was thinking. With that carrot top hair, snow-white skin and freckles, Jaz didn't look like anyone's idea of a Native American from any tribe, much less one from Southern California. I'd been more than a little surprised when she'd told me her last name too. (Her school papers said Briscoe, exactly, she said, so she could avoid this situation.) She laughed.
"I know, I know, couldn't get any whiter of a white girl if you tried, could you?" she said wryly. "I'm adopted. My real parents dropped me off in a basket at the edge of the reservation when I was only a few days old. The tribal medicine man found me, cared for me and gave me to a couple that hadn't been able to have children. I grew up as part of the tribe."
"And this tribe has wolves," said Jake.
"Oh, we've got wolves, coyotes, pumas, even a mountain lion or two," Jaz said cheerfully. "The shapeshifting gene is extremely strong among my people. Over 75% of the children shift at some point during their adolescence, but it's anyone's guess what they're going to be until they actually do. Parents learn from the time their children are very young what signs to watch for. When one of the teenagers starts showing signs of the change, an alpha takes them out into the desert and stays with them until it's safe for them to come home."
"So wait," said Quil skeptically. "You just tell all of the parents their kids are going to grow up to be animals…and they're okay with that? I thought it had to be this huge secret."
Obviously he was thinking about Embry, whose mother still had no idea that her son had a tendency to go furry.
"Oh God, no," said Jaz, her eyes widening with horror. "Can you imagine what a mess that would be? Trying to hide the signs of the change, and never knowing if someone would be around to help control the change when it happened, and then trying to live a normal life after? A normal family life is next to impossible after the shift, and school? Yeah, until you've got complete control, forget about it. And even then the hunters would have to go days without sleep when the vamps were in town."
Jake's lips tightened, turned down into a frown.
"Oh," she said softly. "I see you know that a little too well. They didn't…prepare you for what was going to happen?"
"No," Jake said grimly. "Nobody told us anything until after we'd phased, and by then it was too late. I almost bit my dad's head off before I heard Sam trying to talk to me."
She reached over, laying her hand over his.
"That's why the alphas take the young ones out into the desert, where they learn to shift and to hunt without any danger to those around them," she said gently. "I imagine it must have been terrifying for you, not knowing what was going to happen."
"That still doesn't explain how you knew about Claire, or how you managed to stop Jakey-boy here in his tracks," said Quil. "Don't get me wrong, I have nothing but respect for anyone that can lay out a bloodsucker and two wolves, but…" he leered at her, "…you really don't look the type."
Jazmine sighed, her face serious now.
"The spirits spoke to me at a very young age, and I started showing certain...talents," she said carefully.
"You're a witch?" Edward said, surprised. I jumped a little. I'd gotten so caught up in Jaz's story that I had forgotten he was back there.
"Shaman, actually. Shamanism is notably different from traditional witchcraft, although no less despised by those that don't know anything about it."
"Wait," I said, frowning at her. "You mean you actually believe you can do…magic?"
Everyone cracked up.
"Bella," said Jazmine, affectionate scorn in her eyes, "I'd think anyone that spends as much time with the vampires and the wolves as you do would manage to say 'magic' with just a little less doubt in their voice."
"Sorry," I muttered in a small voice. It was incredible, but hadn't I seen her yank both Quil and Jake out of their wolf form while they were still unconscious? And she was right. It was hard to believe in werewolves…sorry, shapeshifters…and vampires and not believe in magic, at least a little.
"That's how you heard Claire," Quil murmured.
Jaz nodded.
"She's still tightly bonded to you, and when I touched you she told me what had happened," she said, her eyes gentle. "She's a very sweet little girl."
"Yes, she was," he agreed, his eyes hollow with grief. Jaz hesitated, looking uncertain for the first time that night.
"Quil, how much do you know about imprinting?"
Quil shrugged, but it was Jake who answered. "We know that somehow some wolf magic steps in and makes you go bonkers for the person who's supposed to be best suited for helping you breed the next generation of wolves."
"That's…partially true," Jaz agreed. "Imprinting is actually pretty complicated. The pertinent part is that once a wolf imprints, and the object of his imprint acknowledges his or her affections in return-even a child, such as Claire-your souls are forged together in an unbreakable bond known as the mate bond. So Claire has half your soul, and you have half of hers. That's why what's left of her soul can't go on to be with the ancestors, and why you literally can't go on living without her. Half of your soul is in the earth with her."
"It's always like that when an imprint dies?" I asked, remembering that the wolves would live forever as long as they continued to phase. What happened when their human imprint grew old and died?
"No, not exactly," said Jaz. "Wolves mate for life, so unless there is great need most will choose to stop shifting and grow old with their imprint. Over time the presence of the wolf fades and the bond becomes less intense, more human than supernatural. When time and old age finally break that bond the one left behind will grieve, but they'll grieve as a human grieves.
"But when an imprint is ripped away early, and a strong mate bond severed, the wolf pines. They won't eat. They won't sleep. Most of them die within the year, either from starvation or from going out and picking a fight with the wrong vampire. It's a testament to your strength that you've managed to make it this long," she said, looking at Quil.
Quil looked haunted, staring out at her through hollow eyes. I guess in a lot of ways he was. Claire was dead, and now there was someone in front of him who was telling him that half his soul was literally in the grave and destined to stay there forever. He wasn't going to get better. He wasn't going to get over it. He was just going to slowly and surely go insane until he couldn't take anymore and just decided to kill himself. Unless…
"What is an unbinding ceremony?" I asked.
"Ah, yes. The unbinding ceremony is a ceremony held to disentangle the living from the dead when a mate bond is unnaturally broken," said Jaz.
"Wait, you can just break an imprint?" said Jake, sitting up and looking hopeful. I knew that once upon a time he'd hated the idea of imprinting, hated the fact that it would take away his free will. I guess he never really got over that.
"No, you can't."
Jake's face fell.
"When you imprint your wolf takes your imprint as its mate, and it doesn't let go easily," Jaz said kindly. "The bond cannot be broken while both are alive. After death, however, it is possible, even necessary, for the freedom of the one who died and the continued survival of the one left behind. You separate the mate bond, giving all but a small piece of the soul back to the dead and returning all but a small piece of the soul to the living. That way, you still remember each other, but it's as you do with your first love. You'll always remember them fondly, but you're able to go on living your life."
Silence fell across the room, all of us looking at Quil. His painfully thin shoulders were slumped, shaking with his sobs as he rested his head on his legs. Jaz stood up and walked over to him, crouching down to rest her hands on his arms.
"This should have been done within days after her death, at the same time you returned her body to the earth, so her soul could be free," she murmured. "Continuing to be joined is hurting both of you."
"How do we perform this…unbinding ceremony?" Jake asked.
"It must be done at the place of the binding-in this case, your village," said Jazmine. "The council of Elders must be present, along with your shaman, to permanently break the mate bond. And you, alpha," she looked at Jake, "along with the rest of the pack."
Jake scowled.
"I don't know where you keep getting this idea from, but I'm NOT the alpha. Sam is."
Brows scrunched together, Jazmine reached out to touch his hand, her other hand still lightly resting on Quil's shoulder. She glanced over at me, her eyes widening in surprise, before quickly turning back to the two wolves.
"No," she said slowly, shaking her head. "No, his wolf definitely acknowledges you as alpha. Perhaps because you're so far away from your own pack?"
"Jacob was always meant to be alpha of his own pack," I said, ignoring the glare he gave me. I remembered teasing him about it years ago, calling him "Chief Jacob." It seemed only fitting that fate would hand the position to him sooner or later.
Jaz shrugged. "I don't know. We have many alphas in our tribe, and the sharing of power is a strange thing. Perhaps this Sam gave you his, either intentionally or unintentionally, when he sent Quil away. Or perhaps your wolf bonded with his as alpha out of necessity to keep him alive. Either way Jacob, you've officially got your own little pack."
Jake started to argue, then looked at Quil. His shoulders had stopped shaking, but he still wouldn't look up. Without his clothes on it was easy to see how thin he really was, how desperate his situation had become. Jacob sighed as he surrendered to the inevitable.
"We'll have to go back to La Push to do the ceremony," he said. "The only problem is, we don't have a shaman. Or someone who knows how to do the ceremony, for that matter." He glanced over at Jaz. "I don't suppose you'd be willing?"
"Of course," she said immediately. "We have time off in just a couple of weeks, and we can spend the entire week in Washington. Will that give everybody time to arrange their schedules?"
Jake and Quil nodded.
"Bella?" she asked.
My eyes opened wide.
"I don't…I mean, I can't…" I took a deep breath. "I don't know why you need me there. I mean, isn't this some kind of mystical wolf mumbo jumbo?"
Jacob frowned at me, a touch of hurt in his eyes. Oh crap. Fortunately, Jaz saved the day before I could open my mouth and make things any worse.
"You're right that we don't necessarily need you for the ceremony, but you're a friend and Quil's going to need all the support he can get," she said, glancing from me to Edward and back again like she wanted to say something but was holding her tongue. "It would be good if you could come along."
I nodded slowly. Quil was a friend, a good one. He'd saved me from a sticky situation tonight, and had welcomed me back with open arms even after everything I'd done to them in the past. How could I do anything else?
"All right," I said, forcing some cheer in my voice. "Looks like we're going back to Forks."