Wolf's Eyes

Imladris, TA 3020

Gildor's POV

The midwinter feast lasted well into the early hours. I woke late afternoon the next day, but remained lying in bed lazily, waiting for Raven to wake as well. It was getting dusky when he finally came alive and stirred. We exchanged a look, and he stretched, going from fast asleep to wide awake and energetic with the wolf's remarkable ability. The room looked glum and uninviting without any light and only the grey dimness filtering in through the window.

Raven pushed himself up on one elbow and looked at me speculatively. Then he leaned forward to kiss my brow lightly.

"I need to hunt. I won't be able to hold anything back then"

"I…see" I spoke into his hair falling before my face, tickling. His shoulders felt thin and bony "Won't it take much more strength this way?"

"No" Then I could feel him gathering himself for the change, but this time I did not ignore the jarring feeling and deliberately concentrated on it. And I kept my mind open instead of turning away from the disturbing sensation of the change, kept my full connection to him. Somehow I had always thought it must terrible, or at least frightening to observe what he did so closely. I had touched him before when he changed, channelling energy for him sometimes. The most unsettling thing remained feeling his very body form into that of a wolf, bones and muscles adjusting to the built of the animal. It took only a brief moment, but seemed longer now that I felt it so immediately. Then I could feel soft fur under my hands, lying on the wolf's narrow shoulders. His silky muzzle was beside my face. I looked into his eyes, unable to say where Raven ended or the wolf began. His eyes never truly changed, but I could not say if the wolf had Raven's eyes, or Raven had a wolf's eyes. He braced himself with one foreleg on the bed, but the other paw rested on my chest. I set it on my palm, and it was only slightly smaller than my hand. Four padded toes, a large pad in the middle. Further up from his paw, on the inside of his leg was the small claw that corresponded to the thumb. The wolf walked on what were our fingertips. Impossible to imagine how that allowed him the strength, speed and balance he had. I had to touch him before completing this contact. I could feel the wolf's eagerness to be off, Raven's calm patience holding him back, waiting for me.

I had felt the wolf before, had mind-spoken only the wolf-part sometimes, but there had been a line between what had been solely wolf and what I knew was Raven-who-was-also-wolf. Now it took me a moment to drop all my shielding and complete the link Raven held out to me. The way I had learned mind-speech was meant to pass words, worded thoughts, on a deeper level to maybe share emotions. I had adapted that to the Ashi'kha image-emotion mind-speech that was yet more intense than the closest bonds even lovers among my people could share. There were few shields, and less barriers of will. With the wolf, there was no distance at all, except the last barrier that was still between 'me' and 'you'. As Raven had said, it was just short of soul-bonding. I think for a moment we hovered at that edge hand in hand, wanting to leap. I don't know why we did not, then. We both stopped. Maybe if we had, we would have reached our final path easier and sooner. Maybe we needed not have gone to the Havens at all to see I could not go, as little as he could stay alone. But we halted, and I felt the wolf for the first time unshielded, unfiltered and completely. It was not like the time he had tried to show me how he defended himself against werewolves. Nothing slipped me now, both wolf and unfurred extended a link to me I could take and hold. With a jolt, I realized that right now I would be able to take control of him, force him to my will. And it was not even a question of my ruthlessness, because he felt no fear even though he knew I could. I shivered and balked, but Raven nudged me forward, forcing me to acknowledge and use the senses I knew the wolf had. I had to take some measure of control to stay in his mind. And then I looked through the wolf's eyes.

Had I been alone, I would have panicked. As it was, I was sharing his awareness, his sight, hearing, scent and I felt as the wolf did, but all the while I sensed Raven in this. I was able to draw on his presence as an interpreter for concepts that were completely alien to me. Only his presence was there to say 'you are sharing in this'. Otherwise I would I have been lost in a mind which again only by his presence was defined for me as 'the wolf'.

Our connection was so deep that I could not mind-speak Raven, which showed me startlingly how much mind-speech depended on distance. Raven had always denied he mind-spoke the wolf-part, though he sometimes described him also as separate of the unfurred one – now I knew he truly never mind-spoke the wolf-part. He felt him even more immediate as I did now, it was part of him.

So I held myself in place and simply gave my awareness over to watching. I still remember that first time of sharing the wolf's being with a clarity that few memories still retain. If I wish to call it on, the whole night I was with him is there, but if I think of it consciously, I only remember crystal-clear glimpses.

Out two small rooms were large and high to the wolf, full of scents which yet belonged to things I too could identify. Beeswax, different furs, paper, wood and dust, mixed with the invariable scents of our personal belongings, and uncounted fainter smells and sounds.

I remember very clearly the wolf's trip through the halls and corridors of Imladris, because I saw with foreign eyes what I had seen for centuries with my own and had thought myself unendingly familiar with. The buildings were a maze of scents, ordered mainly by the feel and smell of their floors. The wolf drifted silent but for a faint click of claws on tiles and panels through the walkways, navigating the empty areas by scent and hearing. Sight was so unimportant in the dimness and with all the rich flavours to draw on that the wolf almost discarded it. When he smelled or heard others, he froze, melted into shadows until his path was deserted again.

There were torches in the corridors, and I saw the fire through his eyes, the one thing that flared brightly in his vision, painfully bright and flickering. For the first time I knew the undeniable and compelling terror the wolf had of fire. And resolved I would never tease him again with fire. To him, the difference if he decided to light a fire, to enjoy a blaze, to carry a candle, or if he was suddenly and at unawares confronted with fire was indeed vital.

Once in the gardens and the forest, there were only utterly alien concepts. Without Raven's presence I would not even have been able to remember them without understanding. As the wolf's picture of Imladris had been that of the forest was one of scents and sounds as well. I knew a blind wolf would not survive without luck and an extremely social pack, but Raven as wolf used sight only for rough navigation. The wind became more than the beautiful motion of air as which I mainly knew it. On the breeze wafted all scents that allowed the black to survive, that told him in which direction to turn, from which direction to approach either prey or enemy or friend. Other than Imladris, the forest was a maze he was at home in. Every scent, every sound had an image, every image a meaning. Rustles were so different in their sounds that he knew almost always which animal had caused which sound, or if it were only trees rubbing against each other.

Raven had warned me of the intensity of the hunt repeatedly. When we hunted together, I always waited until he either mind-spoke me first or dropped our shared prey before me before touching him. I would not risk the wolf thinking I was taking his meat. So I was prepared for a much more unsettling experience actually being with him and not just beside him hunting. The wolf alone scented, followed and chased the hare he ate that night. I was carried along on the ferocious flood of emotions and sharp reactions, and though I remember sequences, I cannot recall the minute images and cues that allowed the black to run at breakneck speed through forest, rocks and brambles and estimate just when the hare swerved where and just when to snap. There was elation and wild desire in the hunt, pleasure in the success, but no pleasure in the actual kill. The wolf killed quickly, neatly, and without triumph. The way the wolf hunted, I could vouch afterwards, was free of any feeling of either triumph, hate or pity. It was the Way, because he was hungry, and he ran and chased for the kill he made, a kill, his satisfaction after hunting told me, he could just as well have lost in the chase.

The one time I lost complete track of him was, to my surprise, not in the hunt but when the wolf caught the faint voices of a pack howling far away. The flood of deep emotions that came with hearing and answering those voices, and more with hearing them answer him, passed me by in its meaning completely. Raven understood, and I knew then that I had spoken complete truth to Elrond. Nothing in the wolf as he referred to the beast could I not find in myself as well - except the deep understanding of other wolves. That was where I would always fail to follow Raven completely. He might teach me certain sounds and howls as he was trying to, but as I was I would never be enough wolf myself to understand all their language. That notion had two ends and quickly turned around. Total understanding was based on that – as I failed to grasp the whole extent of wolf-tongue, Raven failed to grasp the whole extent of mine. Nothing separated so wonderfully as language. With the difference that the wolf was content to not use language if it was insufficient. In that, relying on his nose and instinct, he understood me better than I would ever understand him.

When the wolf- no, when we returned that night to our room, and our connection faded to a point where I came back to myself still lying in bed, I felt both happier and more sad than ever. I was as exhausted as if I had physically run with him. The wolf lay down beside me as he had done so many times in the wild, and I rolled over and held him in my arms. Even as I was aware of his presence and warmth beside me, I shared his awareness of the room, the houses and the people, even the forests beyond the building. It was a curious double-vision, but better than to give up our connection wholly. We did not break that link we had, and fell asleep together. Rationally I knew I dreamed, and I dreamed as the wolf did, but I remember none of my – our – dreams that night. Wolf-dreams are warm and fuzzy, and there are no nightmares. For a wolf, sleep is rest and oblivion. I know Raven remembers some of what the wolf dreams, but he agreed that he does not dream evil.

I woke late, very late, and mostly because there was a wonderful smell. One that was wonderful without the immediate access to the wolf's nose, which, I realized then, had faded overnight. I sat up and found Raven sitting at the foot of the bed with his back to the frame, holding a mug from which the smell came.

"I was told you like this" he said quietly "The cook said it was only the specialty of midwinter-feast that Imladris traded for this stuff"

I took the mug coffee gratefully "I love this" I said "Yes. Thank you"

The silence stretched between us. I had no words for anything I had experienced, that we had shared. But I was still Elda, and I needed words.

So I asked "What do your people call that…what we did?"

Raven glanced at me "We have no word for it"

I gave a wry laugh, and he smiled cautiously "So now you can tell them what it is like to be wolf"

"I can tell them what it is like to be with the mind of an Ashi'kha" I corrected after a while "The final understanding of…the wolves will always only be yours"

"Not completely either" Raven said softly "Wild wolves have no concept of being wolves. Remember? To be wholly wolf I would have to be unaware that I am one. What they know is not 'I am wolf' or 'I am Ashi'kha', but 'I am I' and 'I am one of my pack-mates'"

I watched him for a while, sitting there cross-legged on the bed, his arms resting lightly on his knees. He seldom sprawled anywhere, except when he slept as wolf, and then only when he did not roll into his customary small ball and covered his nose with his tail-tip. Furred or unfurred he always kept the ends of his body close to himself, reducing the space he took up.

"How old are you?" I asked abruptly.

Raven blinked, then dropped his head, embarrassed "Younger than you"

"I did not mean it that way. You never told me"

"I know the history of your people now" he said after a while "When we were driven north, the earth shook, and when we returned, the lands we knew were changed very much. It must have been the year of the War of Wrath, as you call it"

I gave a small nod. That corresponded roughly to what I had assumed. Give or take forty years. Well, it didn't matter.

"Maybe if I can't have words I need numbers" I said wryly, and he laughed.

"I can make very little use of either" Raven shook off the loose gown he had worn to visit the Great Hall, moving across the bed. Wolf or not, he could move like a cat.

"I know you can do very well without either" I said.