Chapter 5: A Child of Music
"All music comes from God" —Johnny Cash
Mississippi - 1859
It was late in the afternoon when he saw Jude coming down the stairs and the now drunken slaver in the gray suit was right behind her, he was saying something to which she just nervously giggled in answer. Then the fat oaf grasped her arm and pulled her towards him, trying to force her into his embrace. His hand was down on her hip and he was trying to push the dress up. There was concerned murmuring from those around him, but no one tried to help her and they instead turned away as if trying to ignore what was happening. He felt a hand grab his arm as he gave a low growl and stood up. The old gray-haired man next to him was shaking his head no as he desperately tried to keep him from intervening.
Jude let out an exclamation of protest when she pushed the slaver away even as he tried to shove her against a wooden wall. His hands were pulling at her dress before she gave him a mighty shove and broke free, desperately she staggered clear of his groping. What he yelled at her made those around him gasp and he yanked his whip from where it was tucked into his belt. The black leather strap snaked out across the wooden deck and he swung it as if to strike her even as he yelled at her. She shook her head at what he was saying and tried to turn to run away from him, this angered him more and he menacingly lifted the whip again.
The whip snapped towards her, but before she could freeze time and avoid the blow, Fenrisúlfr had stepped between her and her attacker. With a crack, the leather strap slashed a bloody trail across his ebony-colored chest and the man, who had once been a wolf, looked down at his wound in surprise when he felt the pain and as drops of blood trickled down unto the wooden deck. The slaver said something else in his rude language as he drew back his long whip for another blow. There was a deep angry snarl and Jude fell back in surprise when the wolf's disguise was suddenly banished and Fenrisúlfr was no longer in his human form. The wolf god moved fast as he reached out and seized the shocked human with his paws, his fangs drawing closer to the now whimpering fool's throat. "No!" Jude cried out. "Don't!"
The wolf had lifted the trembling human from the deck and the slaver gasped for breath as he struggled against the large black-furred paw which had him firmly grasped by the throat. The wolf smelled that the fool had soiled himself in fear. "This one attacked you," Fenrisúlfr snarled. "He struck at a goddess and for that, he should die!"
"Please don't!" Jude pleaded. "He did not know that I was a goddess."
There was screaming as the other dark-skinned humans fled or stared in fear at the large black wolf that stood on his footpaws while he grasped the struggling lighter-skinned mortal.
"Still he attacked you because you refused his perverted advances," the wolf growled. "I may not have understood his words, but he wanted to force himself upon you."
"Please don't kill him," the red-haired girl begged.
"Fine!" the wolf god growled and then with, a seemingly simple flick of his paw, he hurdled the fat human high through the air, and with a splash, the slaver hit the water. "I've had enough of these mortals treating me and these others down here so evilly just because they think that their skin color makes them superior. Let me lay waste to them all and send their pathetic souls to my sister Hel."
Jude ignored his words as she turned towards the now cowering woman who clutched a crying child in her arms. "Your daughter must live!" she suddenly said to her while she held out her arms. "Death is coming for you all, but if you give me your daughter she will live." Then realizing that the human did not understand her, she repeated the words in their crude language. When she spoke, the goddess threw off her own human disguise and stood there as a vixen. The white lightning played from her eyes, the mother clutched her child tighter and screamed. But a mortal's strength is puny compared to that of a goddess and the vixen tore the crying child from her wailing mother's arms. "Here!" Jude cried out as she thrust the bundle into the wolf's paws and then she pushed him. "Keep her safe!"
Fenrisúlfr fell backward, surprised at how strong the much smaller fox had become since she had changed back into her true form. He lost his footing and clutched the fragile bundle to his furry chest as he plummeted into the water below. Just when he broke the water's surface, there was a loud hissing noise and then an earth-shaking explosion as a fireball engulfed the ship. In the midst of the flames he saw Jude, but then she was gone. Blinking in surprise, he turned and struck out towards the distant shore.
The large wolf ferried the small human child upon his back, while he dog paddled through the brownish water with all his strength just to keep from being pulled downstream by the mighty river's swift-flowing current until he reached the shore and there he panted before he collapsed upon the muddy bank. In the oncoming darkness he could not see Jude, nor could he catch her scent. The toddler still clung to his fur as she made some annoying babbling noises, but he managed to pull himself up the embankment, and then as he laid upon his side, his human cargo fell free into the soft grass. "If I had my true form, this river would be no more than a stream which would barely muddy my paws," Fenrisúlfr softly whispered to the child. He felt her small hand touch his muzzle while she sweetly cooed as if to answer.
"You are supposed to be a wolf god!" a voice snarled from the dark woods and Fenrisúlfr glanced to see that two other wolves had emerged from the trees and were slowly advancing towards him. "Instead you are pathetic!"
"Geri and Freki!" Fenrisúlfr, snarled back while he stood on his paws, his teeth were bared as he faced the wolves. "Odin has let you off your chains."
"We have come to take you back," the wolf named Geri snapped at him as the dark and light gray furred beast approached. "But seeing how weak you are, maybe we should just kill you instead? Perhaps by doing so, we can bring the threat of Ragnarök to an end?"
"Do you really think me as being so weak?" the black wolf laughed as he prepared to strike. "You two have been domesticated like dogs, begging far too long for scraps of food tossed to you from the dinner table by your master Odin."
"I'll tear your throat out!" Freki snarled as he lunged forward with his jaws open ready to strike. A small reddish-orange blur appeared from out of the darkness and a smaller fox vixen landed upon the larger wolf's back, her teeth bit onto his left ear. With a yip, Freki shook the fox off of him and whined when he felt the pain. "My ear! You bit my ear off!"
In disgust, Jude spit out the bloody torn ear onto the ground. At first, she shook the water from her fur and then sat there on her haunches while she gave the two wolves a very fox-like smirk. "Come on big boy, do you really want to fight with the goddess of time?" she said as her eyes flashed with white lighting and her reddish-orange tail flicked. "Maybe I will just turn you old and decrepit so that you can limp around toothless?"
Freki withdrew, but what remained of his ears were now laid flat upon his forehead and his teeth were still bared in anger.
"Tell your master Odin that I am not amused with his attempt to interfere," the vixen calmly said. "You can remind him that I have my father's powers and I am sorely tempted to turn all the Æsir back into babies as he did. This time, however, I will leave Odin as the only adult so he can play nanny in a city full of squalling brats."
With their tails tucked between their legs, the two wolves slinked back into the darkness as Jude stood again and shook more of the water from her fur. Fenrisúlfr found himself staring at the attractive vixen and when he realized that she had turned to face him, he tried not to blush as he quickly looked away.
"How's our little cargo?" the vixen asked as she stepped closer to the wolf. He tried not to sniff her scent for she smelled of wet fur from the river and so very feminine.
"She seems to be no worse for the wear," Fenrisúlfr replied as he looked down at the cooing child lying in the grass. "Is her mother…?"
"She is dead," came an answer from the riverbank even as there were the sounds of dark fluttering wings, and both the wolf and fox looked to see that Death had arrived.
"Even that nice old man? He was good and showed me kindness," the wolf asked.
"All of the mortals are deceased and I have ferried their souls to the afterlife," Death replied. "Including the slaver, he drowned. He wailed in fear when I took the old man first to his god's paradise and then I left his tainted soul in the not so loving webs of one of the ancient gods of those he abused. Anansi the spider god will enjoy playing with him for a millennium or so before I allow him to move on. Now, what about the little one lying next to you?"
"She has to live," Jude said as she stepped between the child and the angel of death. "It is not her time."
Death nodded before she turned and there was once again the sound of dark wings beating when she disappeared. "What was that about?" Fenrisúlfr asked before he stood upon his own four paws and gave a mighty shake. It was good to be free of the confines of clothing and back to his natural state. From the corner of his eye, he saw that the vixen's ears were indeed blushing before she looked away and he could not help but give a small grin.
"The little one still needs to be taken downriver where there is a kind mortal who will care for her."
"Then we travel by land, but the fastest way is in our current form. We can move quicker through the woods and see better in the darkness like this."
"How are we going to carry her without hands? I am not going to carry her in my teeth, she is too heavy."
"Then stand up and pick her up in your arms, then the two of you can climb up on my back and I will carry you both."
"You're too small for that and we are too heavy."
The wolf looked back at her and shook his head. "All you have to do is let me age some more so I can grow larger," he answered.
Jude nodded as she walked up and touched his shoulder. He about jumped in surprise at her gentle touch and then felt himself begin to grow. Moments later, he gave her a rather annoyed look. "Are you not going to allow me to age any more than this?" he asked as he looked down at her.
"I can't have a wolf towering above the trees," she said as she scooped up the baby. "Someone would see us and there are no legends of giant wolves among the river settlers."
"Very well, climb upon my back and hold on to my fur." He felt her straddle his back and grip a pawful of his fur while she clutched the child to her chest.
"Giddy up!" she giggled as she poked him in his flanks with her footpaws as if he was a horse.
He lunged forward, rushing through the brush and trees at a full trot. Fenrisúlfr sniffed the scents of the woods around him as he ran. The wolf god had been given the chance to once again run liberated of the chains which had once confined him. For once in a very long time, he felt whole and free despite the weight on his back. Finally, after several hours of running, he smelled wood smoke and saw a cabin in the distance. "That's where she lives," Jude said as she pulled on his fur as if it was they were reins. "Stop and let me down."
The large wolf was tempted to just sit on his hunches and send the vixen rolling off into the pine needle covered ground, but then he remembered the baby and instead he laid down so she could crawl off with the child in her paws. Jude had changed back into the red-haired human once again, her naked skin was almost ivory white in the moonlight and her reddish-orange locks fell down past her shoulder. Slowly she approached the door and knocked, there were sounds within the cabin and the door opened to reveal a dark-skinned elderly woman holding a large object with two barrels which she aimed as if threatening Jude. What the wolf took as being a weapon soon dropped when the old woman saw who was at the door. Instead, she set the object down and seized up a colorful blanket which she draped over Jude's naked shoulder.
He just laid there and waited as he listened to what was going on within the cabin, not understanding what was being said. The old woman was arguing with Jude, but suddenly he heard the old woman exclaim a name in fear. A few moments later, Jude was at the door and she was no longer in her human form, but a vixen once more. "What happened?" he asked as she walked toward him.
"She argued a lot, mostly because she claimed that she was too old to raise a child, but in the end she agreed," Jude said as she stood there before him.
"I heard her call you something after you must have changed back into yourself."
"She has much of the old blood in her, of the people who lived along this river long before the others came. She called me Wakoshi-Mitimoye which roughly means Grandmother Fox in her tribe's language."
"You don't look that old to me!" he scoffed and then quickly turned his gaze away from her, hoping she didn't see his embarrassment. "So why did we have this little adventure and just what is so special about that mortal baby, is she a queen or something?"
"Every river has its spirits or nymphs," the fox began.
"Like a nøkker?" he asked and she nodded. "They are known for their music."
"That child holds the soul of such an ancient river spirit within her and she will grow to be the grandmother of jazz music," Jude replied. "It is a type of music that will change the world by inspiring some of humanity. She will pass her gifts onto her children, one of whom will venture downriver to a placed called Congo Square in a city called New Orleans and there she will inspire yet another and so on."
"What is jazz music?" Fenrisúlfr snorted. "Music isn't that important."
"Oh my dear Fenny, you have no idea do you?" the vixen giggled.
He scowled at her, "Don't call me Fenny, my name is Fenrisúlfr and I am a wolf god!"
"Nope you are my Fenny now," Jude chuckled as she reached out with her right paw and stroked his muzzle, making him jump back in surprise. "Come on, I now want to hear some good old-fashioned jazz or even better yet, some Delta Blues!"
She gripped his paw and he went lightheaded as they jumped through both time and reality.