A/N – So I was watching the SatAM episode Cry of the Wolf – not as Writer!Scrib, but as Viewer!Scrib. And even though I wasn't actively looking for writing material, several things came to me while watching that ep that, while I do indeed love it dearly, made me think 'Hey, that can't be right'. So this is me trying to slot a few things into continuity re: how wolf packs are governed in the wild. Plus some other stuff. Contextualising! Yeah. That's the student part of me talking. Moving on...
Influences – Dark of the Moon by Yvonne Navarro. The Deptford Mice Almanac by Robin Jarvis. The Wolves of Time: Journeys to the Heartland by William Horwood.
Feedback– Mandatory. I need to know if I arsed up something crucial.
'Lacrimae Lupae'
© Scribbler, November 2004
Her name was Lupe, and she had cried all her tears.
Far above the kiva, the Lady Moon drenched the desert like a pale, nighttime sun. She was fat tonight, signalling the onset of a change of phase. Customarily at this time, preparation would be made for passage into the new month. At this time of year, that translated to removing all Rowan garlands as they switched to the Month of the Ash. To keep the old garlands indoors once the month was over was to invite misfortune.
The Ash wasn't particularly well-liked, since its roots suffered no competition from others. Wolf lore dubbed it 'the strangling tree', but there were other cultures where it was doted on. Wolverines passed newborn kits through clefts in Ash branches, thinking it would make them good fighters. Otters, the greatest mariners known to beastdom, valued its wood because they believed it would protect them from drowning, and gopher custom said that to carry an Ash twig in your pocket would safeguard you from snakes.
Lupe thought of these things, amongst others, as she sat in the lee of a huge rock and stared at the small bundles of dried herbs before her. Three of them, wild sage, piñata and creosote, kept separate from each other and tied up with string made from the Medicine Father's own fur. She didn't fully understand their significance, but she assumed there must be some. Medicine Father was old, and had little energy for anything without a deeper importance.
There should have been a painted pottery bowl next to the bundles, but none had been saved. She made do with an ordinary cup of water, washing herself down and shaking off the excess. Her fur puffed up a little, and she grumbled and patted at it. At fifteen winters Lupe was still prey to the trivialities of youth, and didn't want to spend the evening resembling a giant dandelion head.
When she had done what she could – her tail refused to cooperate – she took the three bundles and rubbed herself with them. The heady scent of the sage and the acrid creosote filled her nostrils, making them twitch. She snorted a little, sneezed, and blinked into the gloom.
I wonder if any others before me sneezed at their inauguration. It was a secret thought, unceremonious and special to her. Lupe was practical, and though the ancient rituals still held a thrill, she didn't accredit them with the same weight as some of the elders did.
Used to. As some of the elders used to.
She scrutinised the clothes she'd been given. This was less admiration of the craftsmanship, more checking for scorpions. This far into the wilderness they were common, and liked to crawl between the folds of fabric and hide. The bigger ones looked fearsome, but their sting was only painful, not deadly. The tiny bark scorpions, however, had only to prick a beast to kill it. Regeane had made sure everyone knew how to recognise the pale tan bark scorpions when they first approached the desert. Back home in the grasslands there was no need, but out here it was easy to miss them – less than the length of a finger joint and prone to conceal themselves in tunics and leotards.
Back in the grasslands there had been snakes. Lupe knew how to deal with snakes. Her father used to sit her down and teach her such things, matching the rise and fall of his baritone to the flicker of the fire. He would weave her lessons in with stories from their history: stories of Grandmother Spider, Lady Moon, Wulfin, and the great spirits. Lupe had spent her puppyhood waiting for nightfall, so she could light the fire and wait for him to come home with his stories. She'd feasted on the old legends, cutting her teeth on Wulfin's defeat of Smilodon, the great cat warlord, and learning how to howl along with the first wolves born from Lady Moon's own glow.
But those were just stories. She knew that now. The spirits didn't exist. Neither did the gods. If they did, where had they been when their people needed them?
This was a time of the self-made creature.
The age of Men was encroaching.
No, not of men. Of one man.
The clothes she'd been given were strange. Once she was sure they were free of scorpions, Lupe held them up and sniffed them. They smelled of wood-smoke and... something else. Something strange. It reminded her a little of Medicine Father's pueblo.
She used to watch his doorway as a youngling, along with all the other pups her age. It was a game – stay there as long as you could without him seeing you. Childish tittle-tattle said he caught disobedient pups and put them in his pot. The odd scent that came through his door was their cured pelts, which he sewed together and wore as a shawl. They were rumours that circulated every generation, and quite untrue. Medicine Father ignored them in his quiet, deliberate way. Still, Lupe recalled them now. Had she not known the cloth in her hands was made from plants, she might have felt for fur.
In design the garments were... somewhat bizarre. They looked like nothing so much as a hybrid of male and female clothes – a shirt with decorative strands running vertically down the front, and loose, baggy pants with matching strands each side from waist to ankle. Each strand had been carefully strung with four different coloured beads – one blue, one green, one brown and one red. She knew intuitively that these represented the four elements, water, air, earth and fire, but it was not the beads that held her. Instead, she stared at the threads themselves, picking one up with her thumb and forefinger to study it. Unlike the shirt and pants, the fabric of these was coarse and a little uneven. With a start she realised that it was not fabric at all, but hair. Yet even through the careful plaiting she could see that it could not be the hair of a single creature. There were many different colours there – russet and grey and auburn and flaxen, and several indefinable.
Hair from each surviving packmember, donated and sewn so tight into her ceremonial garb that they were almost indistinguishable from the actual cloth.
Lupe felt the urge to cry, but she couldn't. She had no more tears.
She'd had wet cheeks all the way from the grasslands to the wilderness. She knew she'd started to annoy Regeane and Urgan by then, but she couldn't stop. Her mother had never been more than a vague memory, insubstantial as a candle flame, so her father had been both father and mother to her. He raised her in the ways of the pack and furnished her with everything she needed to know as she grew up. Always he was there in her memories, with his stories and familiar scent and authoritative air. Now he was gone, and the sun had appeared dark in her eyes ever since. Leaving the grasslands, crossing the desert, all the while knowing he was not dead, but captured – stored somewhere until Robotnik was ready to roboticise him.
Robotnik.
The name made a growl rise in Lupe's throat. It was completely unbidden, and surprised her a little. She had been taught to hate no beast. Judgment was reserved as the spirits' honour, but... well, Robotnik was a special case. No other enemy had ever sliced through her people like him. The lore hadn't been written with SWATbots in mind. Thanks to Robotnik, her pack was a pitiful fragment of what it used to be. He had ambushed them, using their respect for the House of Acorn to smuggle machines across their borders. Those who hadn't been captured had fled, and of those refugees not everyone had survived the trek deep into the heart of the wilderness, to the territory her ancestors had given up in favour of the grasslands.
This place was caracal territory now. The pack would have to move soon, but they had been hounded less since they journeyed into what Medicine Father called the Gorge of Moon-Petals. The caracals preferred higher ground, where floods were less likely when the rains came. If they followed this path, he said, they would come to the homes of their ancestors, buried deep in the rock face and under the ground. It was strange for Lupe to imagine wolves living underground; but, she reminded herself, if the tunnels existed then they were over a thousand years old. A lot could change in a thousand years.
Hell, a lot could change in four months.
The elders had shaken their heads when her father taught her to fight. Fighting was a male's prerogative. Females tended the fields and whelped pups. Unlike other cultures, wolf lore was prominently patriarchal and resistant to change. Males fought for the right to become Alpha, while females held subtler contests to become his mate and Ledrene over the rest of the pack. It was the highest accolade she could gain – to stand beside him and be second to howl after he started.
In some ways it was biological – females were built wirier than males, more tendon than muscle. Males were physically stronger. It wasn't a fair fight to pitch one against the other. There was only one female Alpha in their histories, and that was Wulfin, the warrioress, who lived and died when the grasslands were an idle dream and wolfkind was at war with Smilodon and his savage cat army. Wulfin had taken control of a disorganized wolfkind when Smilodon killed her mate, stitching the different clans together to fight a common foe, which their petty differences had allowed to divide and butcher them. She had risen to power because of that war and segregation, and not had to battle to prove her suitability as Alpha once it was over. A millennia later, nothing had happened to prompt such an unprecedented event again.
But now, all that was changing.
Lupe's father had not been a fool. He knew his daughter would never exceed a male's strength, so he taught her a different fighting style – one that relied on speed and finding the weaknesses in your opponent's defence. Since combat only occurred when a leader died or stepped down, fights had become exotic things. Nobody trained day-in, day-out when an Alpha was at his peak, and even when he began to wane there was little preparation from his prospective successors until talk started of him yielding within the week. As a result, fights – known as Trials – had become ceremonious, almost pompous mass brawls, relying principally on brute force and intimidation. It had been known for smaller males to back out before the fight began, just because their opponent was bigger than them, or had been a puppyhood bully.
When Robotnik decimated the pack, nobody had thought much about electing a new leader. They'd been too concerned with escape, and then with getting as many survivors across the desert as fast as they could. Nobody knew if Robotnik would follow their flight.
Then the caracals started harrying them, tormenting them while they slept and watching their progress. The small, tuft-eared cats were weaker than wolves, and always stayed at a safe distance, but they were vicious and sneaky. They could slip past guards and avoid the fire's glow until they were among the sleeping packmembers. Elhana had lost her two remaining pups to them in the night. Regeane and Urgan had seniority, so everyone had looked to them for guidance. They in turn deferred to Medicine Father on important matters, and through their three-way leadership they had done the best they could with what they had. Only when they reached Gorge of the Moon-Petals had talk of a Trial begun.
At first everyone thought it would be a battle between Urgan, Klimt and Tervicz for Alpha. Hrim was too young, Medicine Father too old, and Elhana, Regeane and Lupe all female. When Lupe put herself forward to compete, she'd been laughed at. A female in the Trial? It was absurd. She was near enough adulthood that, had things been different, somebody might have courted her and given her pups, but age meant little to this exclusion. Only Medicine Father's support of her request had allowed her a chance. He commanded enough respect that the pack would bend tradition for him, if not openly break it.
Of course, all the others had immediately set on Lupe in the Trial. They made no agreement, but she was the target of all first assaults. She was the weakest, and it made sense to put her out of the competition first and use this as a warm-up to get their blood boiling. Yet she had used this to her advantage, turning their attacks back on them and using the skills her father had taught her. She skimmed over their headlong rushes, doubling back and nipping at their heels. In, strike, and out. Duck, hit, and leave. She was a ghost, an apparition that cut but could not be caught – a whirling dervish of fists and kicks and acrobatics that nobody could match. She always hit first. If one of them went to counter-strike, she wasn't there anymore. She was a wraith, slipping between moments. When she emerged victorious Medicine Father was the only one not shocked.
And so it came to this – her inauguration. She'd been in isolation all day while preparations were made, but now it was time to begin. Lupe slid the shirt over her head and pulled on the pants. They felt bulky and inhibiting, though she supposed those used to tighter designs might feel freed by them. Still, she looked forward to when she could put her leotard back on, and thought almost wistfully of those cultures where to wear only shoes or a vest wasn't unusual.
In addition to the top and bottoms, she found a set of wristbands and loose-fitting anklets. She wondered who and what the pack had traded with to get so many beads, and who had thought to save fabric when they fled their home. A thin circlet of metal completed the outfit, which she slipped over her head and balanced on her ears. She'd tied her hair into a thick braid that hung between her shoulder blades. It made its own whish-whish noise as a counterpoint to her clothes.
There were no new sandals, for which she was thankful. Her much-repaired pair was comfortable and fit well to her feet. When she was finished dressing she rose and, on impulse, picked up the cup of water to look at her reflection. She was the first female to compete in and win the Trial in millennia, but she was still fifteen. A secret thought again stole into her mind, and she wondered whether maybe the problem was not that she sometimes forgot how young she was, but that the world expected her to be young at all. She'd always been a little different, a little too mature for her own good. It was disconcerting when adolescence reared itself within her.
It was a short while before anyone came for her. A caracal yowled far away, tracing a shiver down her spine. A cold breeze ruffled her hair and stung the scar on her cheek. She touched it, remembering how it was made and how close she had come to being captured by a SWATbot in the pueblo she shared with her father. Pure luck dictated the SWATbot found her preparing their evening meal. Luck also put the peeling knife in her hand when it burst through their door, and guided her aim to the power line in its 'neck' when she had only one strike between freedom and capture.
Her father had not been so lucky.
You will pay for what you have done, Robotnik, Lupe vowed for the hundredth time that day. She'd had a lot of time to think of these things with nobody around and nothing to do but meditate. For my people, for my father, and for me. You will pay.
She didn't know quite how she would keep this vow, but becoming Alpha brought her one step closer to achieving it.
She hoped.
"Lupe." Regeane stepped into view around the rock.
When Lupe turned the beads clinked together in a way that wasn't entirely tuneless.
Regeane was a forceful sort of female, not good-looking, but impressive. Her eyes were hard most of the time, but when they softened they softened you. Now they fixed Lupe with something akin to deference, and Lupe felt a twinge of embarrassment in her belly. Like most females, Regeane wore a leotard. The maroon fabric highlighted her taupe fur and picked out the gold flecks in her eyes. Next to her, Lupe felt hopelessly overdressed.
"It's time," Regeane said.
Lupe swallowed, nodded, and followed.
Everyone had gathered in the kiva tonight – even Hrim. At six winters old, he was alight with excitement and as far from sleep as was possible for a pup to be. He hadn't yet learned all the lore, and his mother had been a pup when the last leader went through his inauguration, but some of the others' feelings had transferred to him. He knew that something special was happening tonight – something extraordinary.
The packmembers had formed a sort of path across the centre of the kiva, a line of them on either side. Regeane went to stand by her mate, Urgan, thus completing the left side. Lupe gathered herself and walked up the middle between them.
Lupe was an elegant, fair-furred wolf, and despite her recent grief and battle she was a female to whom eyes turned. Her own eyes were large and clear, and though they carried a natural confidence they were also kind and compassionate. She was the first to be cut out of scuffles with her puppyhood friends – the first they noticed was different. Some of them wanted to protect her, to play games other than track-and-hunt. Her father had chased them away from their pueblo with his hackles raised. She was too young then – and besides, she didn't want to make her own puppies yet. None of the other females could understand it, but Lupe just didn't have the same maternal instincts they did.
Her feet were perhaps a little large, the paw-pads a little too wide, and her legs a little long, so that there was a awkward youthfulness about her movements she couldn't quite shake off. It disappeared when she fought, though. Then she became lithe and sure-footed as any seasoned warrior. Yet in everyday life she felt ungainly, like she had yet to grow into her skin.
Never more had she felt like that than while walking up that alley of wolves, their gazes boring holes in her back and sides.
And at the end of the path... sat Medicine Father.
For as long as Lupe had known him, Medicine Father had been an old wolf, with rheumy eyes and a beard like a frostbitten bush. He had escaped Robotnik's attack with the same luck that had guided her hand, and spent much of the journey propped on Klimt, or Tervicz, or anyone else with a good pair of legs and a strong back. Lupe knew that Elhana had cried herself to sleep more than once, wondering how this doddery old beast had survived where her mate and pups had not.
Yet now there was something different about him. The kiva had been made by the pack's ancestors. Reaching it signalled their proximity to the territory of those ancient wolves. It was huge hollow, but despite its great size Medicine Father made it feel small. It wasn't so much his physical presence as an invisible... power that he radiated: the idea that here was a vessel for so much of their history and, just maybe, also their future.
Lupe resisted the urge to shake herself. Her fur felt tingly, as if charged with static electricity. She was convinced it had fluffed out in the heat of the four sacred fires that had been lit – more than she could remember seeing in one place before. Everything about tonight seemed geared towards excess. She'd learned that, had they been back in their village, an inauguration would have also called for drums and Tsué sticks to beat, bells to ring, and Berrybrew to drink. Garlands of flowers would have been strung about, and females would have spent the previous day making and hanging them, shooing out well-meaning but clumsy males and gossiping amongst themselves.
This version seemed a poor relative, but it was the best they could do.
Medicine Father tapped his staff on the ground. "It begins," he said, and though his voice was watery as ever it seemed to saturate the kiva and soak into the baked earth.
Lupe wasn't sure what to do, but when he offered her his hand she took it, helping him to his feet. He nodded at her and raised his arms, addressing the rest of the pack over her head.
"Lupe, daughter of Rudi, son of Kubrat, descendant of the first wolves. You have succeeded in combat and gained victory at the Trial of Ancients. By our sacred lore, you have earned the right to be known as Alpha."
The fur at the nape of Lupe's neck prickled and lifted. She blinked, eyes drying out from the heat of the four fires. Awkwardness gave way to trepidation in her belly. She had a sense that something was about to happen, something important, and it both excited and chilled her at the same time.
Medicine Father turned to face her. His eyes, which she had always remembered as cloudy, were the colour of a twilight sky. His gaze was steady and hard, but not at all cold. She didn't know why that made her feel relieved, but it did. He rested his free hand on her shoulder, lightly enough that she could have moved away from the touch with a particularly heavy breath.
As if this were a cue, the rest of the pack crouched down and began slapping their hands on the ground. Tervicz used only one hand, the other bandaged where she had laid it open to the bone. It took a minute or two of dissonance, but eventually they picked up a rhythm; not excessively fast, but not slow enough that she could tap her foot to it without cramping her ankle. The walls of the kiva echoed the noise, reflecting it back again and again, until it sounded like sixty wolves, not just six. If she closed her eyes, it was almost possible to believe the complete pack was here – including her father and all the other lost wolves.
Medicine Father's low and scratchy voice cut into her thoughts, and she realised she had closed her eyes. Yet somehow... somehow it didn't feel wrong. There was no sense of incorrectness, like when she was caught with her hand in the cacao bin. She listened, spellbound, as Medicine Father's words tumbled over themselves and from his lips. And suddenly it was the most beautiful sound in the world, the slapping and chanting and keening wail of... what was that? Not a caracal. No, it was too redolent for that. But there were no other wolves for hundreds of miles. It sounded sad and tender and far away
"It falls to you," Medicine Father intoned, "to rise and save this pack from ruin. For though we are few we still are, and while we are we must be. For that is our birthright: the right to be. That is the due no beast, no creature, no man may take from us. In the long years when our elders were finding wisdom, our pack was at peace with Nature and with the world. Lady Moon smiled upon us and we grew stout on her bounty, turning our minds to more intellectual pursuits than survival. Though we did not forget the old ways we lost sight of the lessons our ancestors learned. We made homes that could not be moved, raised families that sowed and reaped, and told legends as stories. We found a different kind of wisdom. We taught ourselves to loathe the hunt, to eat as the squirrel and deer and hedgepig. We lay down next to what once was prey, blunted our teeth and filed our claws. Now we find ourselves persecuted, lost and bewildered by the change in our lives. And it is only now that we realise what our easy living has rewarded us with; what our refinement has wrought. We are not the wolves who once roamed these harsh lands. We are not durable as they. We are a thinking tribe, a docile tribe. And now we are a small tribe. A small tribe with small thoughts. It falls to you, our new Alpha, to lead us from these small thoughts and back to the greatness that our ancestors once wielded and fought for. Though millennia have passed, and some things cannot be changed, we must accept the need to amend ourselves, or accept the fate we have been presented with."
Lupe nodded, but frowned a little. There was a terrible urge in her to just float away, to let the words carry her. They flowed, glittering and smooth, pouring like finely ground cornmeal in the warm sun. They enticed her... but there was something in them that tensed her shoulders and arched her back. The palm of her right hand itched.
"You are our redeemer," said Medicine Father, but he sounded further away than before. "You are the one to lead us from the dark. You are guide to this pack, descended from the Anasazi that roamed these canyons and scoured this land to nourish themselves."
Anasazi? The word was strange to Lupe. She tried to remember what it meant, thinking she'd been taught it before by her father, or maybe by Regeane, or one of the others. Maybe even Medicine Father himself. Yet she had no memory of that word, that important, oh-so-important word...
Ancient people who are not us.
The voice that wasn't a voice was clear inside her head. It was sad and tender and far away, but near enough that she could feel breath on her shoulder and warmth at her back and strength in her limbs. She wanted to gasp, but she didn't. Couldn't. Wouldn't.
"In the shadow of the kiva dug by the paws of the Moqui - "
Moqui?
The dead.
"I show my belly and call you Alpha."
Faint sounds came to Lupe on the breeze. A tiny portion of her brain told her there was too much noise to hear such whispers, but the rest said it was undeniable. She could hear pups nuzzling against their mothers. She could hear horns blowing, calling warriors to battle. She could hear the growling of soldiers and yipping of lovers and the anguished squeals of the dying. And from it all, a voice called her name – a husky alto she'd never heard before, but which stirred something in the back of her head, where the synapses were dustiest.
Not every generation is faced with such changes as yours. Not every generation needs a warrior for its leader. But sometimes one must be called who is not afraid to change things – to rail against tradition and find a new path. One who is certain as stone, brave as the lone storm cloud in the clear sky, and will not refuse to reach out and seek help from other cultures, other peoples. Not all generations need this in their Alpha. But yours does.
Suddenly, Lupe could clearly see an image in her minds eye – an image of a wolf. Auburn-furred and long-legged, the wolf she saw had a short snout and deep-set eyes. Its face was painted purple, green and blue, fur streaked with what she could only assume was berry juice. In its hand it carried an atlatl – a polished wooden throwing stick favoured by her ancestors – decorated at the top with macaw feathers and pieces of jade. Just over four feet long, the wood was glossy red with black stripes, obviously heavy and resilient. And she knew, just as well as she knew her own name, that this atlatl was made from snakewood, one of the hardest woods in the world. She knew it even though she'd never heard of snakewood before. She knew what it felt like in her grasp – its heft and balance, and the sensation of a grip fashioned for her hand alone. Her right palm itched unbearably with the need to hold it, to sight along it, to throw it.
You will need weapons, the voice that was not a voice told her. The wolf with the atlatl didn't move, but Lupe could think of no other voice coming from its mouth – nothing else would sound right. You must have faith. You must keep your spirit strong. You must never falter. These are the things a leader of your breed must do.
And of yours, she thought, for who else could the painted wolf be? It was an amazing leap to make, an outlandish conclusion to draw, but in that heady moment it seemed entirely logical. The information seemed placed in her mind, like the knowledge of the atlatl and the properties of snakewood.
The wolf looked at her and smiled. It felt like sunbeams on her face and good food in her belly.
So you know me, little wolfling.
I know of you. I've heard the legends.
From your father.
I... Yes. From my father.
The wolf's smile turned sad. Lupe heard a whimper in her ear and a hand clutch her chest. Someone was coughing and retching and telling her to take his place, to never let their enemy swamp them while there was still breath in her lungs. She could smell blood and taste tears running into her mouth as she swore on her own life to carry on in his place.
You're grieving. A good leader must know the sting of grief, so as to avoid it.
Your mate...
Died. A long time ago.
So did you. Lupe recoiled. This can't be happening. You can't be here. You're not real.
Can't I? In my lifetime I would have thought robots absurd. Machines that turn flesh and blood to steel and oil were inconceivable. Men were fairytales. But to you they are truth. Real is relative.
I... that means... you're a ghost?
I am a guide. Yours is a time of conflict and struggle. No other spirit-guide seemed appropriate to your situation.
Then all Alphas have this happen to them?
New Alphas know what they need to know.
You can't...
The world has changed since my time. When I was alive, wolflings respected their elders. It might have been a reprimand, but for the fierce little smile that went with it.
Lupe felt an impulsive liking for this wolf, this ancient creature that was only so much smoke and rumour. It was an odd feeling, since she usually took time before deciding she liked or disliked someone. Yet there was something kindred about this female. They were a thousand years apart, but as close as grains of sand. Maybe it was the headiness of the sacred fires' smoke, but she couldn't help but think that way.
The painted wolf's smile fell away. She immediately looked very sad. I would not wish this kind of life on anyone. Yet there are greater powers at work here than me. Or you, little wolfling. The spirits are a cantankerous group, but even they agree with me on that. You must be ready to do the unthinkable, just as I did. Some will not thank you for it, but it must be done. You are the Alpha. You must learn that your word is law. It sounds an easy task, but it is very difficult. You will hurt sometimes, forcing others to your will. That is the mark of a good leader – to be able to understand why your pack does not agree with you. To only see your own way is blindness, and a blind warrior will trip over the first rock on the battlefield. A conflict is coming that will entrap all of Mobius if it is not stopped. Wolfkind cannot win this battle alone. Nor should it. It will affect every beast, and so every beast must work against it. You must be ready to lead your people into a pact with more than one Extranjero if you hope to overcome this 'Robotnik'.
Lupe's hackles raised at the name, but the odd word gave her pause. Extranjero?
Not wolf. Those who do not know the lore. Tradition says they must be scorned and frowned upon, but it is this kind of thinking that has driven wolfkind apart from the rest of the world, and thus made it an easy target for enemies. In my time, wolfkind was divided within itself. In your time, it is divided from everyone else. I had to unite those of common blood. You must unite with those not.
Pardon me if your task sounds the lesser of two evils.
Another fierce little smile. You have fire in your belly and a good heart. You will make a good leader, Lupe. That is why I told your father to train you. Your potential was visible even in puppyhood.
Lupe got the feeling she should feel surprised at that; maybe even a little resentful, but she couldn't summon enough energy for it. The spirits she had only half-believed in had been influencing her life since she was a pup. It was a strange thing to think, the response not easy to think of. Was there an appropriate response?
The painted wolf was speaking again, but her voice was now joined by others – too many for Lupe to identify. They seemed to surround her, flowing like the wind, too fast and elusive to pinpoint. The warhorn sounded in the distance. A pack in full regalia rushed into battle. Those left behind wept when their loved-ones didn't return and called out to her.
Never let yourselves be trapped in a box canyon.
Protect your backs at all times.
Strike with surety.
Take the hand of friendship when it is offered.
Trust, but do not be too trusting. Not everyone is your ally.
Never sacrifice your people needlessly. Life is paramount. If a battle cannot be won without loss of life, then it is not a battle, it is murder.
The old ways are not necessarily the best ways. Learn from them, but do not repeat past mistakes.
Make your shoulders strong. They will need to support many burdens.
Be true.
Be honest.
Be bold, but not fearless. Know fear, so that you do not become arrogant. Know grief, so that you do not become heartless. Know uncertainty, so that you may see all possible paths.
All possible paths.
All possible paths...
All possible...
All...
Lupe opened her eyes and blinked. She was stretched out on the floor of the kiva, on a mat of woven yucca leaves. She couldn't remember lying down, and she didn't think she'd been sleeping, though the Lady Moon had shifted in the sky. She had a slight headache and a bitter taste in the back of her throat, and she realised that Medicine Father had likely put something in the sacred fires that she'd inhaled in the smoke. It was a well-known fact that he kept dried plants in a pouch at his waist, and sometimes used them to obtain a state of meditation, but she wished he'd allowed her to make her own choice about that. Loss of control over herself wasn't something she wanted or enjoyed.
She sat up, feeling lethargic and heavy, as though her arms and legs were weighted down with large bags of creek stones. The twinge at the back of her skull turned to a dull ache, and even as she was considering the bitterness in her mouth someone held a cup of water under her nose.
"Drink," said Medicine Father.
Lupe drank. When the small amount of liquid was gone she looked up at him, head clearing slightly. He seemed as old as ever. His eyes were clouded over with milky film, and he leaned heavily on his staff. As if for the first time, Lupe noticed the single red feather hanging from the top of it.
"Is that from a macaw?"
He seemed surprised at the question. "Why yes. Though the bird it came from was dead before you were born."
She nodded. Then she got to her feet. Medicine Father stepped back, and beyond him Lupe could see the rest of the pack. They were sat cross-legged in their rows, watching her. Hrim bounced a little, and Klimt's tail was bent where she had broken it during the Trial, but their eyes were all unswervingly fixed on her. An air of expectancy hung over them.
She took a breath. "We'll move on in the morning. For now, everyone is to get some sleep and prepare for the journey ahead. It's not too far now to our destination."
"You Saw this?" asked Medicine Father, and she could hear the capital letter.
"I Saw many things," she replied. "We will not return to all the old ways, Medicine Father. We can't. We're not the same pack that lived here a thousand years ago. We're not killers." His expression fell, ever so slightly, but she ploughed on. "But we will not roll over and die. Robotnik has taken our lands and our loved-ones from us, and we shall work to rectify that. In our own way." There was meaning beneath her words, and it didn't go unnoticed.
A fragile soap bubble pulsed over them. Then Medicine Father bowed his head and Urgan got to his feet. "As you say, Alpha," he said, doing likewise.
Lupe acknowledged their acceptance of her status with a nod, and watched as the rest of the pack rose and went about what they needed to do. The sacred fires would be allowed to burn themselves out. the smell of roast sage would cling to the area long after they had departed.
She looked up at the sky and watched the stars. They shone at her, bright and a little reproving. And she could not be sure, but she fancied another Alpha had once stood in this kiva, staring at these same stars and mourning her old life.
Her head was already back, but Lupe opened her mouth and took up her privilege as Alpha. She began to howl, voice low and sombre, but clear enough to carry up and out of the canyon. Only an Alpha could start the howl. Only an Alpha had the right.
Far away, caracals heard her voice and shivered, knowing that something had changed this night. It was sad and tender thing to hear, a lone song of beautiful, achingly exquisite sorrow.
A reedy voice went up with hers. Medicine Father had little energy for howling, but he did it anyway, and there was a satisfaction to his rasping that she had done this thing. Next came Urgan and Regeane, matching each other in pitch and volume, then Tervicz, Klimt, Elhana and Hrim. They climbed into the starry night sky, paying homage to Lady Moon and howling down their own story. They howled their loss, their desert trek, and their hope for the future. They howled of personal triumphs and shared misery. They howled of destiny and of ancient gods and spirits, a howl made compelling by the fact that their flight and desire to remain unnoticed had made it impossible to howl before. And they howled of nothing at all, save to hear the sounds of their own voices.
Gradually, their howling grew weaker. Their voices fell away until only one remained. And that voice howled the longest and loudest, howling of a place where they could be safe, a fight to be won, and a wolf who carried an atlatl topped with jade and macaw feathers.
Her name was Lupe. She was Alpha of her pack. And she cried hopeful tears.
FINIS.
END NOTE:
To clarify, the names of Lupe's pack have their roots in several different places.
Medicine Father is the shaman from Yvonne Navarro's short story Dark of the Moon.
Urgan was the name of the wolf slain by the fox Urgan-Nagru, who then stole and reversed it as his title in Brian Jacques's novel The Bellmaker.
Regeane is a lycanthrope from the book The Silver Wolf by Alice Borchardt.
Rudi, Lupe's father, is a Teutonic name meaning 'famous wolf'.
Klimt, Tervicz, Elhana, Kubrat (Lupe's grandfather) and Wulfin are all derived from the novel The Wolves of Time: Journeys to the Heartland by William Horwood.
Hrim is a truncated version of Hrim-Hari, wolf prince of Norse legend.
Though not a member of Lupe's pack, Smilodon was a prehistoric sabre-toothed cat.
And as we all know, Lupe is bastardised Latin for 'she-wolf' (although as a minor factoid, my Latin-English dictionary also lists the nominative singular as meaning 'prostitute').
The title Lacrimae Lupae is also Latin (I like to keep a theme), and translates as Wolf's Tears.
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