Wolf of War

A Patricia Briggs werewolf fanfiction

Chapter Four:

Soul-Searching

"So what'd you do after I left yesterday?"

Even though he had hoped to hear her voice again, it still came as a bit of a surprise; she wasn't on the trail when he'd finally decided to get breakfast again, but apparently she hadn't been very far away.

"So will you be joining me to walk to breakfast every morning?" Ares slipped back to her, smirking widely.

"Don't you know it's rude to answer a question with a question?" she shot back with a mock glare; the smirk twitching at the corners of her lips belied the tone of her voice.

"So you think I'm being rude?" he grinned more widely now.

"No, not really," she remarked, and he grinned even more widely. "What?" she gave him an amused but wary look.

"I won," he chuckled softly. She gave him a briefly confused look, and then it dawned on her.

"You're messin' with me?" she half asked, half retorted.

"Should I not?" he asked, smirking. "I am trying to be your friend, and as far as I know, friends do occasionally mess with one another like that."

"Oh," she blurted out, as if what he'd said was surprising to her. The bright expression of amusement that had frozen on her face vanished as if that surprise had lead to an unpleasant revelation, and in response his own amusement was wiped from his own lips. She was quiet for long enough that he was just about to offer an apology for his teasing, when she finally responded.

"Thank you for yesterday," she offered quietly; she had her head bowed, and was looking at a spot on the ground just ahead of where she stood, "before I bolted and left you standing there," she added. "I don't have too many…friends, around here. Bran takes care of me, I guess you could say, but I'm not a wolf, and a lot of the wolves don't really….well, they don't not like me; I guess cuz I'm not a wolf, they don't really go out of their way to make me feel like one of the pack." She paused, and again he opened his mouth to speak, when she continued. "I guess that I guess I'm just not used to someone wanting to be friendly towards me."

Her expression darkened and shifted to something he recognized on his patients sometimes, when they suddenly realized how vulnerable they had made themselves to him.

"You're not trying to get into my pants, are you?" she asked, that wariness in her expression evident in her tone.

He snorted derisively.

"Um, no offense, but you're too young for me, little girl," he smirked at the end, attempting to take the potential sting out of his words. "And there's a lot of things that the woman in my life would have to accept from me; I don't think that's a conversation I can have with you, no matter how mature you might be, and at the least I'd have to be able to have that conversation with her, at a minimum." His smirk shifted to a gentle smile now. "I'd also want someone with a bit more meat on her bones and more experiences in her life. And while you might have a lot of experiences for a sixteen year old, I'd need a bit more than that from someone I was looking to get into the pants of."

Mercy gave her own snort and a slight chuckle. "So no reason for trying to get Garrak off my back?"

"Of course there was," he offered with a smile on his face and sincerity in his eyes; Mercy's own expression sobered up some again. "Because it was the right thing to do," he added. "It doesn't matter if it was Bran himself; if you had said the same thing to me, I would have stood up to him the same way." He paused. "Of course, the Marrok might have decided to rip my head off, but that wouldn't have changed what I did in the least. Bullying is wrong, no matter who's doing it."

"Among the wolves, might makes right," Mercy groused just a bit, though his explanation had brought back the ghost of a smile to her face.

"Doesn't mean they have to be assholes about it," Ares returned. "Come on; to breakfast!"

Ares never did get to answer her question about what he'd done the day before that Mercy had asked him; just like the day before, she quickly loaded up a plate with some food that had been put out for everyone to grab from, ate almost as quickly as some of the few wolves who have come to breakfast had done, and then once again disappeared for the day.

And just like the day before, he felt himself to be a bit at odds with the little corner of the world he found himself in; unlike the day before, however, he found that he'd gained a bit of attention from his…fellow potential inductees to the pack.

"So I hear you challenged one of the other wolves yesterday," Darius offered in between the last few bites of his eggs and bacon. Ares looked up from his own finished plate, glancing at the younger male, and idly wondering what he intended with that non-sequitur comment. Out of the corners of his eyes, he noticed a quick glance at Darius by Diana and Tamara, the other people still left finishing up their breakfast, and noticed the not quite hidden interest in hearing the answer from them as well.

"You heard about right," he returned, pulling up a glass of orange juice and draining perhaps a third of the glass in one go. He was pretty sure now, after a few moments' thought, that Darius was fishing, trying to find out what had happened, and what that might mean for him and the rest of the potential wolves.

"So what happened?" Darius asked, his curiosity naked for all to see.

"I challenged one of the wolves," he answered back, before taking another long swallow of juice.

"Okay, smart aleck," Darius snorted, "I get that; what happened that made you challenge him, though?"

"His attitude," Ares supplied, stifling a chuckle at the other, younger male's impatience.

"Oh, for Christ's sake." That came from Tamara, who it seemed was just as interested in knowing what had happened. Ares gave her a brief glance, quietly amused. Maybe that had been behind her glances his way during the latter part of the day, on the one or three occasions before bed that he had crossed her path.

Other than challenging Garrak, he spent the rest of his time mainly wandering outside to look in the wilderness. There were trails aplenty to take, up and down the mountain, and he chose three that day to go and explore. It was cold, though, and after each bit of exploration, he spent some time indoors, reading a little, mentally writing stories, and doing a bit of wondering just he might do, after surviving the Change—and of course putting down an arrogant ass who needed to be taught better than to bully others.

"What was it about his attitude that you didn't like?" Tamara continued, "What about his attitude made you wanna challenge him? What did he say or do, that made you decide to challenge a wolf, when you're not a wolf yourself yet?"

He let a snicker escape. "A little curious, are we?" he grinned, and after another slight pause, he continued, "Garrak is his name; he was being an ass and a bully to someone simply because he's a wolf and they aren't, trying to basically tell them that anyone who isn't a wolf doesn't matter around here. It was suggested to me that we ignore him, that he was basically a harmless blowhard, and I was planning to do just that, before he tried to put his hands on someone. I stepped in and let him know that I wouldn't put up with his behavior, and that if he didn't like it, we could have a bit of a dance after I survive the Change."

"That wasn't so hard to tell, was it?" Diana chimed in this time.

"That wasn't so hard to ask the right questions, was it?" Ares snarked back at her, a slightly smug smirk to his expression.

"You think you're gonna survive the Change?" Darius tossed in.

"I don't think I'm gonna survive," he returned, "I'm planning on it." He offered a dark grin. "And then I plan having a dance with a wolf."

"You've certainly got balls," Tamara grumbled.

"Why thank you," he returned in a light, airy, slightly mocking tone.

"It wasn't a compliment," she shot back. "Only a man would be so idiotic."

"As to defend someone who couldn't defend themselves?" he lobbed right back into her court. "To defend a young teen, regardless of their gender, from someone who is bigger and stronger? To put myself in harms way for another? To fight a fight I could maybe lose, to take the threat away from someone else? Or is it because you see it as a pointless fight, me and the other wolf just posturing and being all uber-masculine because we need to prove who has the bigger, brass-ier set?"

"That one," Tamara growled at him. "Because he's a wolf already, and you're not, and he could gut you like a fish, and then what? Then you can't 'stand in the gap' and fight the good fight anymore, and then you've only made things worse for her."

"'All it takes for evil to win, is for good men to do nothing'," he quoted to her. "And among the wolves, it's a matter of dominance; whoever is the most dominant, can force the others who aren't, to do what they want. You think about that, if you survive the Change; you might come across someone more dominant than you; I hope for your sake that whoever that is, doesn't decide to make you their plaything."

"Fuck you," Tamara snarled back at him from across the table, standing up so suddenly that her chair nearly tipped over.

"Not even if you asked," he returned, his voice even, but his eyes stony and serious and dark. "I did what I thought was best to try and help. If I'm wrong, I'm wrong, and I'll find that out in due time. But if you can't stand the fact that the world of wolves is a bit more savage than you might have thought, if you can't stand the idea that wolves sometimes solve problems by fighting and killing one another because the one who is right is still alive and the one who is dead is seen to be the wrong one, and you can't deal with the thought that you might end up being someone's little subordinate toy, or even worse, that you might have to be responsible for someone's safety, or even more fucked up, that you might have to be responsible for putting down an idiot in your pack simply because he's an idiot and your pack leader tells you to do so, then you need to go pack your shit and leave now, because this ain't sunshine and roses, and you ain't even got to the nitty gritty yet." His voice was harsh thunder by the end of his words, and the expression on his face was far from pleasant.

"And how the fuck do you think you know about all of this?" Tamara almost shouted at him.

"Because I pay attention to the world, that's how," he growled back. "I decided that when I wanted to pursue becoming a wolf, I studied every bit of information I could on wolves, and every piece of fiction and listened to every strange tale and found my way to a few wolves who told me what I was getting myself into." He paused, then continued, "and even then, I've still been paying attention around here, and I can see with my own eyes that being a wolf isn't simply about being stronger or faster, that there's a culture here that isn't as nice and happy-go-lucky as humanity tries to pretend that it is. You bond with a wolf, 'for Christ's sake', as you said. You don't get to pretend that you will be the exact same person after the Change as you were before, and you don't get to pretend that the life you're getting yourself into is bound by all the exact same rules, too."

"So you think you know it all?"

"No, but apparently you haven't been paying attention," he sighed heavily. "As I said, I made a choice, and if I'm wrong I'll have to live with it. And, as you pointed out, so might Mercy. But the point is, I made a choice. I made myself responsible when the moment came and the need appeared. It's not always about knowing everything, but about knowing what you know, and making choices based on your best info and learning to live with those choices, good or bad. If you're going to jump into a society where you live or die by your choices, you can't be indecisive."

"Your words are harsh, but there is truth to what you say," another voice chimed in, and drew everyone's attention, even his own. Coming into the kitchen was another wolf—of that much, Ares was certain; his skin was perhaps a few shades lighter than the darker brown of Ares own African-American heritage, but his hair—what of it remained, that was—was of a fine quality that spoke of a different heritage. He was of about average height and a slightly stocky build, yet his bearing and his gaze held the same sense of power and enormity that he got from looking at Bran.

"I am Asil," he introduced himself, "I'm the dangerous one the Marrok has warned you about." He offered up a slightly disarming smirk, but Ares could see in his eyes that the smirk didn't reach them.

"Hello, and welcome," Ares offered with a respectable bow of his head. "I am Ares."

"'God of War', huh?" The smirk widened some. "It's good to meet you, Ares," he continued. "But what of everyone else? Or have manners fallen to the wayside in this age?"

That soft chiding seemed to nudge the others out of their silent surprise, and the other three potential wolves introduced themselves to the older dominant wolf.

"It is good to meet you all, young ones," Asil continued, then turned his attentions back to Ares. "As I said, your words to the young lady are a bit harsh, but," and he turned towards Tamara then, "if you intend to become a wolf, it's better to find out now the harsh truths than it is after it's too late to change your mind."

"So he was telling the truth? He wasn't exaggerating or anything like that?" Darius chimed in now, looking at Asil with a touch of concern in his expression.

"Perhaps not absolutely the truth," Asil temporized, "but what he might have missed is, perhaps, best found in the details and learned through actual experience." The older wolf approached the table, and everyone, including Ares, gestured politely for him to sit close by, which he did.

"It is true that dominance is one of the guiding forces of the pack," Asil continued, "and one of the ways that dominance is established is through fighting." He paused to smirk a bit again "Not all of the fighting needs to be of the physical type, but usually between males, and usually between those who are close in dominance to one another, that is the most assured way of asserting who is most dominant over another, or to rise in ranking within the pack."

"Typical males," Tamara groused.

Asil turned on her. "Among many of the unmated females as well," he quietly informed her. "Mated females are ranked in part due to the rank of their mates, though sometimes it can work the other way around. Not often, but occasionally. But a more dominant male, if he should be…petty enough, and his Alpha either not dominant enough, or too unconcerned enough, can demand of a less dominant, unmated female that she be his…that she keep him warm at nights, if she is fortunate, and worse if she is not."

Tamara recoiled at the older wolf's words, though before she could open her mouth to speak, Diana decided to speak up.

"Is that true with all packs, or most of them?" she asked.

"It is no longer true with many packs," Asil answered definitively, "though occasionally we hear and find that a pack is lead by a dominant alpha who is less than considerate of the females in his pack, or who is in some way not willing or not able to be as responsible for his pack as he should be. More often but still a bit rare, we find that a lone wolf will find or turn a female wolf, and then use her for his own satisfactions."

"Why is that?" Diana asked another question.

"Female werewolves are rare," Asil returned, "and human females who are willing to stick around once they discover the wolf inside of us are almost as rare. Males are supposed to cherish and protect our females, wolves or humans, but some instead give in to their baser urges and behave in ways that are not as acceptable to us as they once were."

Asil was quiet for a moment, but then continued, "And even now, there are some of the younger wolves…who like to imagine that anyone who is not dominant enough to be dominant over them is not someone worthy of anything but contempt." The older wolf smiled, and then turned his gaze toward Ares. "I'm sure that, someday, some of those younger wolves will learn differently."

And with that, he stood, and left the kitchen.

"Sounds like he all but approves of all this machismo," Tamara all but grunted. "I mean, the part where you fight another wolf," she added, gesturing to Ares.

He shrugged. "You heard him say that this is a part of what it is to be a wolf," he gave back to her, his tone even and conversational. "You don't have to like it. And you can think whatever you want about the challenge. The points are that, I did what I did to try and help out another, I took a stand and made a choice, and it is a part of the way things are done in the pack. And I will stand by all of what I've done, for better or for worse.

"Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go get some fresh air."