Child of Man: Chapter 5, Part 1

Shadowdance stumbled along the water’s edge, the cloying reek of acrid smoke clinging to his fur. The river, once crystal blue, now ran greyish-black with soot, coating the rocks along the bank. Twisted, blackened trees loomed overhead, their leafless branches clattering against each other in the wind. The ground felt hot beneath him, and each step left lighter prints behind him as the ash stuck to the pads of his paws.

The wolf’s tongue felt thick in his muzzle, pressing against the backs of his teeth. He licked nervously at his nosepad, but it felt warm and dry, robbed of moisture. He whined, tail curling between his legs as he wandered, lost in his own territory. The trails he had run for years seemed alien to him now, the landscape twisted from true by the fire that had run rampant through his sacred lands.

He tried to catch a whiff of game in the uncomfortably warm wind, some sign of life suggesting that part of his Protectorate had remained untouched by the flames, but when he inhaled dusty soot clung to the back of his throat, sending him into a coughing fit. The ash in the air robbed it of what little moisture might have remained, and every breath burned his lungs. He gazed down at the river, licking his chapped muzzle. The water looked gritty from the amount of black floating on its surface, but beneath all that should be the same river he had always known. He cringed as he neared it, whining as he waded into the polluted river. Holding his breath, he plunged his muzzle beneath the floating scum, lapping frantically at the cool water below.

The water tasted greasy, coating his throat like a layer of oil and leaving a sour, sickly-sweet aftertaste in its wake. From the first swallow, Shadowdance knew something was wrong, but his body craved the liquid and he drank as if driven to it, gulping greedily even as it turned his stomach. Every drop only fueled his thirst, making him dryer than the one before, but he forced himself to drink until his belly hung in the water, swollen and distended. He lifted his muzzle, his gorge rising, and he turned towards the bank, but before his hinds had left the river he vomited, his body purging itself, rancid fluid spilling over the fur of his chest.

He flopped onto his side, the stink of what had been the contents of his stomach mixing with the heavy soot already clogging his nostrils, making him weak and lightheaded. The once-grey wolf tried to call out, to raise his voice begging for help, but only a high-pitched whimper escaped him, cut off sharply by another round of gagging, more of the poisonous fluid coating the rocks in front of him, washing away the black of the soot with a faint greenish stain.

His flesh crawled, his stomach turning itself inside-out in rebellion against whatever noxious chemical he had just swallowed. He tried again to howl, this time managing little better than the cry of a cub, the coppery sweetness of blood lining his lips as the lining of his abused throat cracked and split. When an answering call, crisp and pure, rang in the distance, at first the wolf feared that the poisons from the river had already seeped into his brain. When the howl repeated, though, Shadowdance sagged briefly in relief, then struggled back to all fours, staggering towards the answering call.

His nose caught only ashes and the reek of his own matted and soiled fur in the hot wind, but his ears told him where to go, the howl repeating at intervals above the mindless chattering of the empty blackened branches overhead. The irregular rhythm of his paws belaboring against the ground as he staggered towards the invitation became his only mantra against exhaustion.

As if from empty air, he felt cool paws against his scorched hide, gently brushing the charred patches of fur from his ruined coat. A wet tongue dragged against his cracked and chapped nosepad, and then again at his ear. Then, sweet and pure water covered his tongue and lips, and he lapped eagerly at it, the cramping in his stomach finally starting to relax. He opened his own eyes and stared into his savior’s amber ones, tail thumping the ground in the only means he had of giving thanks.
He wasn’t alone. Past the tan-furred wolf’s shoulder lingered an unfamiliar scent. Heavier, earthy, and yet young, like a cub’s. He turned his head stiffly and saw the blunt muzzle of a bear, deep brown fur tinged with grey. He stumbled past the wolf, and then two pairs of massive paws began gently grooming him, wiping away the charred remnants of his tattered coat, the stubble of fresh growth already evident beneath their touch.

Watcher’s muzzle caressed his own. “Grant us passage, Shadowdance?”

He nodded, trying to rub back, the movements exhausting to him.

The tan wolf shook his head, resting one paw against Shadowdance’s chest. “Rest for now. You’re still very sick.” Watcher licked the grey wolf’s muzzle again for comfort. “Remember when you awaken, and tell Briar. We will be there, before nightfall, with medicine.”

“Medicine?” The grey wolf brightened, his blue eyes shimmered with cub-like hope. Then he yawned, curling up into a ball, his singed tail over his muzzle. He hurt, but the thought of not hurting carried sleep with it, and soon he was dozing, his breathing easy, thoughts of fire and fear gone from his mind.

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The world spun around them, Watcher’s chant a distant rumble in Alex’s ears, and then he opened his eyes, reaching out in front of him as if to reassure himself of the ground beneath him. It was cool to the touch, though the air around him felt heavy and thick with ash.

“The spiritscape is a powerful place, Mr. Demont,” Watcher said as he rose from his own kneeling position. “A healthy soul can purge many of its body’s ills there. A sick one will make its bearer worse. The toxins introduced into Shadowdance’s Protectorate did exactly as our adversaries hoped they would, turning his mind into their greatest weapon. Even if we could treat the land, a Child of Nature in such a disturbed state would corrupt it again in a matter of months; we would be treating the symptoms, not the cause.”

Alex said nothing as he rose, the bear-claw talisman oddly heavy against his chest. Three weeks ago, the wolf had come to his apartment and, in the span of less than half an hour, turned the world he thought he had known on its head. Last night, Watcher had come again, and just as Alex had knitted together the edges of his tattered reality they had been blown forcibly apart, what passed for his home gone with them. The frenetic inquisition through which he’d put the wolf during the night had yielded only more questions, fueling his fear and frustration.

They had stopped, briefly, somewhere near the Colorado border, at an all-night convenience store just off the freeway. While the wolf had secreted himself in the back seat, Alex had scrounged for breakfast, doughnuts and coffee, wandering along the aisles staring at the brightly colored packages of sweet cakes and pastries in wonder. Somewhere, in another world, this was normal, he thought. The clerk named a number when he approached the register, and he pulled a wad of bills mechanically from his wallet. He was in shock, and the still-rational part of his mind knew it, but the rest kept trying to go about business as if nothing had changed.

Sitting on the hood of his car, he sipped from a disposable paper cup, the hot liquid searing his tongue, and watched the sun rise over the tree-covered mountainside, a thin plume of smoke visible in the distance: their destination. Memories of the blast, of the frantic escape from his apartment, of playing Twenty Questions with the wolf, sent his thoughts into an endless loop of unanswerable questions. Where would he go now? When could he go back? Was that even an option? What was really going on? Could he trust the wolf?

What would he do if he couldn’t?

Pushed to his limits, his world gone behind him, that part of his psyche he had come to call the bear-mind came to the fore. Had the explosion taken anything from him that he hadn’t wanted to lose? His contact with the hare—Briar, the wolf had called her—in what Watcher had called the spiritscape had shown him a world in which he had desperately wished to live, without even knowing what it was that he wanted. Meeting the wolf in the flesh had only made that longing more real. In his meditations, he had been seeking another life, and now it had found him. Now was the time not for panic, not for fear, but for acceptance and discovery.

With these quiet self-discoveries, a strange peace settled about his mind, the eye of his emotional maelstrom. The words came to him without effort, as if someone were whispering them into his ear. Great Mother, he thought, breathing deeply, letting himself relax for the first time since getting into his car all those hours ago, I am but Your cub, and if this is the path of my life, then I ask Your help in following it. He inhaled, the scents of pine and cedar, the crisp bite of cool mountain air filling his nostrils, and as he exhaled again a tension he hadn’t known he carried fell from him. It hadn’t been in a tightness of his chest or back, or a throbbing in his temples. It had felt more like a weariness that no longer saturated his bones. Though tired from his night of driving, he felt ready to reach Deer Run National Park, to meet the one who had called for help, and offer what he could.

Watcher lifted his gaze as Alex slid back behind the driver’s seat. “Prayer is important to a Child of Nature,” he said softly, his ears perked in a smile. “It keeps us connected, with those who give us our gifts, and with each other.”

Alex’s response was a single motion, cupping the bearclaw medallion against his chest.