The Wolves of Midwinter (18 page)

Actually he had no idea how far the oak forest continued to the east. He and Laura had many times walked in it but never to the farthest eastern boundary. And the scope of this undertaking, this lighting of the forest in honor of the darkest days of the year, left him kind of breathless.

He felt a sharp pain when he thought of the gulf that now separated him from those he loved, but then he thought, They’ll come to the Christmas gala, and they’ll be here with us for the banquet and the singing. Even Jim will come. He promised. And Mort and Celeste would come, he’d make sure of it. So why feel this pain, why allow it? Why not think of what they would share while they could? He thought of the baby again, and he doubled back to the front and hurried along till he reached the stable. It was dark there and the marble Christ Child was barely visible. But he made out the plump cheeks and the smile on its face, and the tiny fingers of its extended hands.

The wind from the ocean chilled him. A thick mist suddenly stung him, rushing so fiercely against his eyes that they teared up. He thought of all the things he had to do for his son, all the things he’d have to assure, and one thing seemed absolutely certain, that he would never let the secret of the Chrism enter the life of his son, that he would shield his son from it even if it meant taking him away from Nideck Point when the time came. But the future was a little too vast and crowded for him to envision it suddenly.

He was cold and sleepy, and he didn’t know whether Marchent was waiting for him.

Could Marchent feel cold? Was it conceivable that cold was all she felt, a bleak and terrible emotional cold that was far worse than the cold he was now feeling?

A fierce exhilaration came over him.

He went back to the Porsche, and took his Burberry out of the trunk. It was a fully lined Burberry and he’d never bothered to have it hemmed. He hated the cold and liked that it was long. He buttoned it up and down, pulled up the collar, and went walking.

He walked into the vast airy shadows of the oak woods gazing up at the miracle of the lights overhead and around him. On and on he walked, aware but unconcerned that the mist was thickening and that his face and hands were now damp. He shoved his hands into his pockets.

On and on the lighted boughs seemed to go, and everywhere the mulch was thick and safe for walking. When he glanced back the house was distant. The lighted windows were scarcely visible, an unshapen flickering beyond the trees.

He turned back and continued east. He had not come to the end of it, this exquisitely illuminated forest. But the thick mist was now shrouding the branches ahead of him and behind him.

Best to go back.

Very suddenly the lights went out.

He stood stock-still. He was in complete darkness. Of course he realized what had happened. The Christmas lights had been connected with all the outside lights of the property, the floods in front and at the
back. And at eleven thirty the outside lights always went off, and so had the Christmas lights of this wonderland.

He turned abruptly and started back, immediately running smack into the trunk of a tree as his foot caught on a root. He could see nothing around him.

Far away the burnished light of the library and dining room windows did still reveal his destination, but this was faint, and at any moment someone might snap off those lights, never dreaming that he was out here.

He tried to pick up the pace, but he suddenly pitched forward and fell hard on the palms of his hands on the mulch.

This was a ridiculous predicament. Even with his improved sight he could see nothing.

He climbed to his feet and made his way carefully, feet inching along the ground. There was plenty of space for walking, he only had to keep to it. But once again he fell, and when he tried to get his bearings, he realized that he could no longer see any light in any direction.

What was he to do?

Of course he could bring on the change, he was certain of it, strip off these clothes and change, and then he’d see his way clearly to the house, of course he would. As a Morphenkind he’d have no problem even in this awful darkness.

But what if Lisa or Heddy were up? What if one of them were going around turning off the lights? Why, Jean Pierre would be in the kitchen as he always was.

It would be ridiculous for him to risk being seen, and the thought of enduring the change for reasons so mundane, and then quickly hiding again in his human skin and dressing hastily in the freezing cold outside the back door, seemed absurd.

No, he would walk carefully.

He started off again, his hands out before him, and immediately his toe caught again on a root and he went forward. But this time, something stopped him from falling. Something had touched him, touched his right arm and even caught hold of his right arm and he was able to steady himself and step over the roots and clear of them.

Had it been a bramble bush or some wild sapling sprung from the roots? He didn’t know. He stood very still. Something was moving near him. Perhaps a deer had come into these woods, but he could catch no scent of a deer. And gradually he realized there was movement all around him. Without the slightest crackling sound of leaf or branch, there was movement virtually surrounding him.

Once again, he felt a touch on his arm, and then what felt like a hand, a firm hand, against his back. This thing, whatever it was, was urging him forward.

“Marchent!” he whispered. He stood still, refusing to move. “Marchent, is it you?” There came no answer from the stillness. The rural dark was so impenetrable that he couldn’t see his own hands when he lifted them, but whatever this was, this thing, this person, whatever, it held fast to him and again urged him forward.

The change came over him with such swiftness he didn’t have time to make a decision. He was bursting out of his clothes before he could even unbutton them or open them. He pushed off his raincoat and let it drop. He heard the leather of his shoes ripping and popping, and as he rose to his full Morphenkind height, he saw through the darkness, saw the distinct shapes of the trees, their clustered leaves, even the tiny glass lights threaded all through them.

The thing that had been holding him had backed away from him, but turning, he saw the figure now, the pale figure of a man, barely discernible in the moving mist, and as he slowly looked about he saw other figures. Men, women, even smaller figures that must have been children; but whatever they were, they were receding, moving without a sound, and finally he couldn’t see them anymore.

He made for the house, easily sprinting through the trees, with the torn remnants of his clothes over his shoulder.

Beneath the dark and empty kitchen windows, he tried to will the change away, struggling violently with it, but it wasn’t listening to him. He closed his eyes, willing himself with all his soul to change, but the wolf coat wouldn’t leave him. He leaned back against the stones and he stared into the oak woods. He could see those figures again. Very
slowly he made out the nearest figure, a man, it seemed, who was looking at him. The man was slender, with large eyes and very long dark hair, and a faint smile on his lips. His clothes looked simple, light, some sort of very old-fashioned shirt with balloon sleeves; but the figure was already paling.

“All right, you don’t mean me any harm, do you?” he said.

A soft rustling sound came from the forest but not from the undergrowth or the overhead boughs. It was these creatures laughing. He caught the very pale outline of a profile, of long hair. And once again they were moving away from him.

He heaved a deep breath.

There was a loud snapping noise. Someone somewhere had struck a match. Pray it wasn’t Lisa or the other servants!

Light leapt out from behind the north end of the house, and seemed to penetrate the mist as though it were made of tiny golden particles. And there they were again, the men, the women, and those small figures, and then they vanished altogether.

He struggled with the change, gritting his teeth. The light grew brighter and then flared to his left. It was Lisa. Dear God, no. She held the kerosene lantern high.

“Come inside, Master Reuben,” she said, not in the least fazed that she was staring at him in his wolf shape, but merely reaching out for him. “Come!” she said.

He felt the most curious emotion as he looked at her. It was like shame, or the nearest thing to shame he’d ever known, that she was seeing him naked and monstrous and that she knew him by name, knew who he was, knew all about him and could see him this way, without his consent, without his desire for her to see him. He was painfully aware of his size, and the way his face must have appeared, covered in hair, his mouth a lipless snout.

“Go away, please,” he said. “I’ll come when I’m ready.”

“Very well,” she said. “But you needn’t fear them. They are gone now anyway.” She set the lantern on the ground, and left him. Infuriating.

It must have been some fifteen minutes before he made the change,
cold and shivering as the thick wolf coat left him. Hastily, he put on his torn shirt and what was left of his pants. His shoes and raincoat were somewhere back in the forest.

He hurried inside, and was intent on running up the stairs to his room, when he saw Margon sitting in the dark kitchen, at the table, alone, with his head resting on his hands. His hair was tied back to the nape of his neck, and his shoulders were hunched.

Reuben stood there wanting to speak to Margon, desperate to speak to him, to tell him about what he’d seen in the oaks, but Margon quite deliberately turned away. It wasn’t a hostile gesture, merely a subtle turning, his head bowed, as if he were saying,
Please do not see me, please do not talk to me now
.

Reuben sighed and shook his head.

Upstairs, he found the fire lighted in his room, and his bed turned down. His pajamas had been laid out for him. There was a small china pitcher of hot chocolate on the table with a china cup.

Lisa emerged from the bathroom with the air of one who was busy with a multitude of errands. She laid his white terrycloth robe out on the bed.

“Would you like for me to run you a bath, young master?”

“I take showers,” Reuben said, “but thank you.”

“Very well, master,” she responded. “Would you care for some late supper?”

“No, ma’am,” he replied. He was livid that she was there. Dressed in torn and filthy garments, he waited, biting his tongue.

She walked past him and around him and towards the door.

“Who were those creatures in the forest?” he asked. “Were they the Forest Gentry? Is that who they were?”

She stopped. She looked unusually elegant in her dress of black wool, her hands appearing very white against the cuffs of the black sleeves. She appeared to reflect for a moment and then,

“But surely you should put these questions, young sir, to the master, but not to the master tonight.” She held up one emphatic finger like a nun. “The master is out of sorts tonight, and it is no time to ask him about the Forest Gentry.”

“So that’s who I saw,” said Reuben. “And who the hell are they, exactly, this Forest Gentry?”

She looked down, visibly reflecting before she spoke, and then raised her eyebrows as she looked at him. “And who do you think they are, young master?” she asked.

“Not the forest spirits!” he said.

She gave a grave nod, and lowered her eyes again. She sighed. For the first time, he noticed the large cameo at her neck and that the ivory of the raised figures on the cameo matched her thin hands, which she clasped in front of her as though standing at attention. Something about her chilled his blood. It always had.

“That is a lovely way to describe them,” she conceded, “as the spirits of the forest, for it’s in the forest that they are most happy and always have been.”

“And why is Margon so angry that they’ve come? What do they do that he’s so angry?”

She sighed again and, dropping her voice to a whisper, she said, “He does not like them, that is why he is cross. But … they always come at Midwinter. I am not surprised they are here so early. They love the mists and the rain. They love the water. So they are here. They come at Midwinter when the Morphenkinder are here.”

“You’ve been in this house before?” he asked her.

She waited before answering and then said with a faint icy smile, “A long time ago.”

He swallowed. She was freezing his blood, all right. But he wasn’t afraid of her, and he sensed she didn’t mean for him to be afraid. But there was something proud and obdurate in her manner.

“Ah,” he said. “I see.”

“Do you?” she asked, but her voice and face were faintly sad. “I don’t think that you do,” she said. “Surely, young master, you do not think the Morphenkinder are the only Ageless Ones under heaven? Surely you know there are many other species of Ageless Ones bound to this earth who have a secret destiny.”

A silence fell between them, but she didn’t move to go. She looked at him as if from the depth of her own thoughts, patient, waiting.

“I don’t know what you are,” he said. He was struggling to sound confident and polite. “I really don’t know what
they
are. But you needn’t wait on me hand and foot. I don’t require it, and I’m not used to it.”

“But it is my purpose, master,” she responded. “It has always been my place. My people care for your people and for other Ageless Ones like you. That is the way it has been for centuries. You are our protectors and we are your servants and that is how we make our way in this world and always have. But come, you are tired. Your clothes are in tatters.”

She turned to the hot chocolate, and filled his cup from the pitcher. “You must drink this. You must come and be close to the fire.”

He took the cup from her, and he did drink the thick chocolate in one gulp.

“That’s good,” he said. Strangely, he was less rattled now by her than he’d been in the past, and more curious. And he was infinitely relieved that she knew what he was and what they all were. The burden of keeping the secret from her and the others was gone, but he couldn’t help but wonder why Margon hadn’t relieved him of this burden before now.