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Chapter 4
Amanda
I hear the wind again. It’s louder
this morning than I’ve heard in many a week. The wind seems to want something, or somebody. It’s much worse now and I wish
I knew why. Is it the start of another rainy season or is this a new twist on weather that just seems to go from bad to worse?
I
don’t know, but I feel I should. The pack depends on me to know.
But this time, I don’t know. And I didn’t know when
the end began.
I woke to the sound of the wind that day too. The sun was coming up over the pack’s village. Haint
and Mischka were stirring in the bed. Mischka stretched, pushing the green comforter further off the bed. Her muscles relaxed,
tensed and relaxed again. She wanted to get up and relieve herself with her morning’s morning, as my Papa used to say (before
the last round of the Hive got him), but she didn’t want to lose her place on the common bed. She considered and watched
me out of one half-closed gold eye.
I watched both of them, Mischka and Haint, with the same awe at their casual
beauty and sensuality. Even just lying on the bed, wrapped around each other, and me, they give the impression they could
spring into silver-gilded action with no effort at all. Their muscles stretch across sinews and bones that work together
to make even their languid morning movements the poetry of a clear river.
Haint was only half-awake, but he threw his
head across my belly to urge me back to sleep. As he pulled closer to me, he knocked a blue pillow to the floor. He’s always
the last up. Maybe it’s his late nights wandering the woods out back or maybe he needs more sleep because he’s older, I don’t
know. Another thing I don’t know.
I hate not knowing. I am supposed to know. I’m a Listener. It’s my job to know.
If I don’t know, we all suffer. Listeners are the Breeds’ and the villages’ first line of defense and warning. If we don’t
know what is coming at our Breeds and homes, then no one does. That failure can mean the extinction of our Breed.
Like
last summer when the Dane pack just about killed off our breed. I should have known from Haint and Mischka that something
was wrong when Listener Dagmar showed up at my doorway unexpected and unbidden. They knew something was wrong. He smelled
of malice. Haint and Mischka knew and tried to warn me.
But we had a treaty. The Danes and the Weims were allies.
We celebrated each other’s Breed days. We visited each other’s Nationals. We even interbred some during High Seasons. That’s
not something to be taken lightly. We had been allies long before the Sporting and the Working groups went their own ways
and we believed our breeds’ friendship unbreakable.
But water changes everything. Papa used to quote some last century
philosopher who said, “money changes everything.” Maybe it was money in the twentieth century, but here and now, it’s water.
Clean, fresh, unpolluted water. That’s what everybody wants and needs.
We would have worked with the Danes to find
more water. We might even have shared some of our water with them (not much because we have our own pups to consider) as
we helped them. But the Danes have always been overbearing. The other breeds told us that and told us to watch them. We
did, but not close enough.
But that’s last summer. Since then the winds have gotten bolder, almost ripping the wraps
from around the children as they play on the common ground. The only things that blunt the winds are the limestone outcroppings
around the villages. The days are drier, and without our deep cisterns and the artesian well the Breed managed for decades,
we have to search for water in places our elders warned about before many of them recycled.
I like most mornings.
Maybe it’s just because I like to see the sun come back one more time. Maybe I hope today, just today, the winds won’t screech
as loudly. Maybe I’ll wake up in a world before the Warming and the Hive and the Burn and I can curl up with Mischka and
Haint and watch the silent sunrise and know there is enough water to drink and the fams’ offspring will be safe.
I
wish, but that’s not today. And it wasn’t the day the end began. The wind reached in through the D door that swings back
and forth in the front door. The wind batted the small door like a cat with a ball.
Mischka was the first to slide
off onto the floor. I hate cutting her nails so there is always that tapping as she pads to the D door and slides into the
morning.
Haint, too curious to stay behind when there might be something to see or hunt, rolled over away from me
and jumped to the floor, landing on the blue and green plaid rug. Stretching in an extended bow, Haint threw a considered
look at me over his tawny gray back and followed his mate through the swinging D door.
They are right of course. I
can’t lie here all morning. I have too much to do and the Nationals, our Breed celebration of the new year of births and
remembrances of deaths, were less than two weeks away. One of the events of the Nationals, mixed in between the competitions
leading to Best of Breed, will be the annual meeting of the Village Alphas and Listeners. The Breed will want to know what
the New Year promises. I’m the Listener, for the village and the Breed, and they expect me to have answers. But I have none,
for them or for me.
Some might think being the Listener is an honor. But I’ve found it to be much more work than pleasure.
The training starts before the onset of menses. Most young Listeners are at first feared by their families and neighbors.
Then the young Listeners in training must endure grueling hours of training, not just to refine their talents, but to keep
them in check as well. No one wants an untrained or unprincipled Listener wandering around. The potential for harm is just
too great.
But right now I don’t feel like an accomplished Listener. I feel like one of the rest of the village,
with no view forward or into the ways of nature around me.
All I know for sure is the wind is worse. It’s louder,
it’s hungrier and I am more afraid than ever before. Something is not just wrong. In the part of me that Listens, I know
something is far beyond just wrong.
I’ve seen it in the familiars’ eyes too. Haint and Mischka know something is
wrong. I know they know. I just wish I knew what they know. Sounds like one of those old “who’s on first jokes,” doesn’t
it?
Sometimes, I see them sitting together, almost conferring. Last night I saw them do it again. Mischka was sitting
on her haunches in front of the late fire with Haint stretched out on his belly before her. They stared into each other’s
gold eyes for the longest time. I could feel some message passing back and forth between them but I couldn’t hear it. It
was like playing a radio and catching only the odd word with static. You know something is out there but your equipment just
can’t catch it. That’s what it’s like watching my two familiars, or fams. They are communicating with each other, not me.
That
morning, like many others, I heard them outside the door, scuffling at the rat holes. They are Sporting, and a good kill
in the morning is a good omen for us all. Mischka always takes the lead on hunts and Haint backs her up. She cracks her short
barks as she calls Haint to check for other outlets. Maybe it’s the wind or maybe there’s just so little food in the village,
the rat hole run is fruitless. No rats, and no good omens.
Haint burst through the D door, with Mischka close behind.
Both leapt on our bed. Their combined weight of about 140 pounds, landing on my shin and my stomach, brought me straight up
off the crumpled sheets and feather bed.
“What are you doing? Off, off, off!” Of course, I knew what they were doing.
They wanted breakfast and I was supposed to get it. So I rolled off the bed onto the plaid rug, slid my feet into the wool
house boots and pulled a blanket off the pile next to my bed to wrap around me, over my flannel gown, while I made breakfast,
theirs’ and mine. Mischka jumped off to the right and Haint dropped to the left.
Haint and Mischka leaned into me and
rubbed their sides against my legs. I reached down and scratched each of them in that spot right over the tail that fams
love to have scratched. The feel of their silky gray coats and their warm, comforting strength reassured me. All couldn’t
be wrong in the world if my fams were by my side. I smiled into Haint’s eyes.
“Thank you, both of you.” Haint and
Mischka looked up at me in a way that told me they understood my love if not my words. “What would I do without you?” Haint
moved closer and leaned his side against me, turning his head around to look at me. The warm velvet of his coat caressed
my outer thigh. I reached out, stroking him along the length of his torso, feeling the strength underneath. For that one
moment, I was at peace.
Mischka, not to be left out, pressed against Haint on the other side. She lined her body up
to his, letting her body lean into his. The three of us stood there, silently soaking in the shared affection of a pack “hug”.
They may not have arms but Haint and Mischka still give better hugs than most humans. It’s like being cradled in peace and
protection.
Stories go that before the Warming, humans considered fams to be their servants. They kept fams in backyards
and could even kill them with impunity. But that was a long time ago. Nowadays, no one would stand still for that kind of
barbaric or sacrilegious behavior.
I can’t even imagine trying to keep Haint and Mischka in the yard all the time.
They love our bed and our comfort too much to stay outside. Besides, they are as much a part of me as the rest of my family.
Their line has been with my family for well over 100 years. I knew their sires and dams. Her mother, Karma, birthed Mischka
in my bed. They are as much a part of me as are my arms or legs, or my own pup if I had one.
Blast, I have trouble
keeping Ginger, Maybell and Magic, the horses, in the back field. Ginger’s the worst since she knows how to open the door
with the handle. If I’m not careful at night, I can end up with a couple of tons of horses in the great room.
Maybell
and Magic are draft horses. Maybell’s a bay with massive hooves and Magic’s a roan with deep gray mane and tail. And then
there’s Ginger.
Ginger is more like my sister than my horse. She’s a huge sorrel with the most gorgeous red mane and
tail. When I was little, Ginger taught me how to ride by patiently waiting while I climbed up after the inevitable falls
off her broad back. Then we would ride on a little further, until I fell off and climbed back on again. Sometimes this could
go on for hours. Ginger never lost her patience but I did learn to ride.
At night, when I was frustrated with my studies
or upset because the other pups couldn’t understand me or were afraid of me, I would find Ginger in the field or the barn
and cuddle up to her as she lay on the ground. Her smell and her strength comforted me. Mama would find me out there sometimes
in the morning, sleeping next to her belly. I think it worried her that I would trust her so much but I always knew I could
count on Ginger. She would never hurt me, no matter what.
I always felt more comfortable with fams, horses and just
about any other kind of non-humans than I have with humans.
But back to the morning when everything changed.
There
was a knocking at the door. I left the fams’ full bowls on their eating stands and walked to the door. “Who’s there?”
Liddy,
who lives nearby, called my name. “Mandy, open the door before the wind leaves nothing but bones!"
Liddy and I have
been friends since before I can remember. It just always seemed that Liddy was there, with her chocolate brown hair and deep
brown eyes. Our fams had interbred and only last spring her Cloudy had birthed a litter from my Haint. Cloudy had five healthy
puppies, two of them with Haint’s small white star on his chest. I guess Liddy and I both were as proud of them as any grandmother.
I
opened the door just wide enough for her to slide her diminutive frame through and then shoved the door closed against the
force of the wind. She dropped into Aunt Nanny’s rocker sitting next to the fireplace and pulled back her light cape hood.
“How
fare’s the morning? What is the word for the Nationals?” she said.
By now I was at the wide windowsill with two windows,
one inside and one outside, that I used as food storage and pulling out a bunch of green grapes, a hunk of yesterday’s brown
bread and a small keg of peanut butter from the Pugs. The cold nights, combined with the tight window frames, kept things
fresher.
“I’ve only met it a few minutes ago, not nearly enough time to ask. As for the Nationals, that will wait
too.”
Not one to be put off, Liddy pressed on.
“I can see the fams got you up this morning and not you them.”
“What?
Have you become a Listener now, with the power to look around doors?
“No, I know you and I can tell from your overwhelming
hospitality this morning that you have had less than a graceful dismount from your bed. Hence, I suspect that the evidence
suggests a fam-inspired good morning, complete with dirty paws?”
Liddy loved the old 20th century crime novels where
people had to solve mysteries. She took every opportunity to invent “cases” and “deduce” solutions. Unfortunately, this
time she was right, but I didn’t want to hear about it.
I put the food on the table in the middle of the great room
and pulled mugs out of the cabinet. Then I went for the peppermint tea brewed in yesterday’s sharp sunshine.
“Well?
Am I right?”
“I’ll not dignify that question with an answer.”
She grinned, and waited.
“I’ve no word
yet. All I know is what I feel, and that may not be very comforting.”
Liddy got up and walked to the shuttered window.
I placed the plates at two seats, then I called Liddy over to join me for breakfast. She turned, dropped the cape in the
rocker and sat in one of the seats at the table.
“I wouldn’t pass up a chance for the Pugs’ peanut butter! Those women
take the same peanuts we buy from the Collies and turn it into brown manna. It must be the spices they use, cause I know
we all have the same peanuts.”
“Are you sure about that, having all the same peanuts I mean, Liddy? I heard the Pugs
and the Collies had worked out some pretty tight trading treaties. Maybe they’re giving the Collies a shot at the best grades?
It wouldn’t be the first time Working and Toy breeds found mutual benefit.”
Liddy flashed her lop-sided grin and stuck
her tongue out at me. She had considered becoming a Working at one time but luck and jealousy had made it more comfortable
for her to stay Sporting. The Working sire she’d bedded, with hopes of gaining his 6’3” frame for her offspring instead of
her 4’10” one, had conceived nothing more than the ire of his long-term mate, a woman with breeding hips and an under-bite
that would have looked good on a mastiff.
Subtle though it may have been, Liddy knew me long enough to see through
the veiled jab. That’s all right. She’d get me back later. I had enough in my closets to give her a lifetime of equally
sarcastic digs.
The fams were finishing their breakfast and starting to eye ours. They love grapes. Blast, they love
just about anything on a human’s table. They may eat meat, but fams are definitely omnivores when it comes to food sitting
a couple of feet off the ground. Haint and Mischka are no exception to this rule.
Liddy knows I don’t allow them to
eat off the table. It’s not necessarily out of sanitary reasons; it’s for pure control. I may have extra meat on my bones
but two Weims can be hard to control with physical strength alone. I have to keep the mojo on them or risk Haint or Mischka
trying to take the alpha position. As a poster I found in an abandoned bookstore in a town a couple of days ride from here
said, “There can be only one.” The poster was for a movie called “Highlander.” The actor on the poster looked like good
breeding stock but its hard to know without watching them move, and of course, how could I watch that movie now with little
excess energy to spend on such things. But the phrase stuck.
That’s the thing about Weims and Weim fams and why the
packs are so small. Weim fams are too bright and too sharp for most people. They’re always thinking about what comes next.
Is it time to hunt game? Is it time to make a move towards leadership? Is that grape just sitting on the table with no one
to eat it? Have I waited long enough before making my move for the spare meat parts? Always thinking.
You can see
it in their eyes. Weim fams don’t avoid your gaze. They’ll stare you down, unless you are the alpha or have some other station
of power. Look into their eyes and you know they are looking into your soul. Or each other’s souls, like the other night.
The
only thing that keeps them bound to us is the bred-in desire to be a part of our packs and play by our games. But sometimes,
late at night when I’m watching Haint or Mischka, I wonder if there isn’t something more.
“Mandy, Mandy!” Earth to
Mandy! Come in Mandy!”
“Huh?”
“Mandy, were you Listening? Did you pick up anything else?” Liddy thought I
had gone away, as some people termed Listening. “Is there anything you can tell me or want to talk about?”
She was
trying to be helpful, I knew that, but I also knew Liddy likes to know things first. She wants to be the one who is not surprised
when it comes out that some sire beds a new dam or, a fam bitch who brought herself in for an extra season, delivers an unexpected
and unwelcomed litter of mixed puppies. Liddy wants to know first.
I was curious too, but not about the mundane items
of some guy’s sexual habits. I wanted to know about the wind. What is that in the wind? What’s making the wind sound so
malicious? Maybe it’s not just the sound; maybe it is malicious.
I pulled away from that thought to see Liddy picking
up her cape.
“Where are you going?” I asked her.
“Home. It looks to me like you aren’t quite here. You’re
getting the Listening look and we can jabber later. There’s plenty of time for you to make unkind references to my faux pas
later. Besides, I’m worried. There’s something wrong about the weather and the wind. I mean, even more wrong than usual.”
As she said this, Liddy glanced at the door and the windows. “You can hear the wind too. We’re almost to the end of summer
and the winds should be dying down. It should be quieter, not screaming like Irish banshees at 8 in the morning. What’s
wrong, Mandy, what’s wrong?” I wasn’t sure if she was asking me or the universe. Either way, she wasn’t getting an answer
then.
She was right. As the summer heated up, the winds usually got worse but this late in the summer, when apples
were starting to ripen and corn was at it's peak, the summer winds should have died down some. They weren’t. They were getting
fiercer. The Airedale scientists, few that they were, should have had some answers but even they were quiet before the winds.
They dithered about some changes in air patterns but at the base of it they seemed to have no real answers.
Now, the
packs looked to their Listeners for something from the Totems or from the Listeners’ own outer travels. Something that could
give them light or reassure them. Anything that let the packs hang on to their fragile hopes for a future.
Liddy looked
at me hopefully; then turned toward the door. Her voice was almost a whisper. “News or no news, I fear the worst. I just
don’t know what the worst could be, and that frightens me even more.” Gripping her red-orange cape around her shoulders and
mouth, she slipped out the door into the wind’s maw.
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