Old Wolf, New Tricks
When curiosity leads a hunter to poke her muzzle through the veil between worlds, what she finds is more surprising than she ever expected.
The Hunter is old.
Not as old as the forests she claims or the river she drinks from, but old enough that the memories of thousands of hunts accompany her every time she stalks her prey. Old enough that it has been an age since she’s been surprised by, well, anything.
As a result, when the sound of a human girl shouting carries through the air to her ever-alert ears, the Hunter is not alarmed. She’s only somewhat curious.
The grove where she happened to chase down her dinner is one of the few remaining places where the veil between the mortal world and her own remains thin. Since there haven’t been humans in her forests for centuries, it’s easy enough to conclude that the cry came from the other side of that veil.
“…just let me go, please! Someone! Help!”
The hunter cocks her head first to one side and then the other. Compassion. Mercy. These terms had long ago ceased to be relevant, given her isolation. Curiosity, on the other hand, is much harder to ignore.
Almost casually, she finds where the wisps of the veil metaphorically flutter and steps through to the other side.
The moment the world changes underneath her paws, she is reminded of several concepts which have been long absent from her personal lexicon.
Regret.
Disgust.
Dismay.
The alley she finds herself in warrants every single one of these remembered concepts and more. Filled with trash and flanked by sodden brick buildings, it barely allows a view of a sickly, starless sky.
Her teeth are bared, hackles raised, even before she picks out the back-lit figures of two men forcing a young woman into the shadowed depths of this architectural rut. Since she now occupies those shadows, she’s rather pleased to see that they don’t seem to notice her yet.
She’s irritated enough to give no warning before leaping, and the force of her attack drives all three mortals to the ground.
Evading the frantic kicks and struggles from the closest man is fairly easy, and she has her teeth in his throat before he can rally any true defense. She jerks her head from side to side and blood fountains. The sound of sobs fleeing towards the street are noted, but deemed unimportant. The heavy breathing and cursing that has unwisely backed itself into the dead-end behind her, on the other hand, is very important.
She raises her muzzle from the ruin of one man’s throat and looks over her shoulder at the other.
As the Hunter thinks, several long neglected concepts begin to fit more naturally into words. The man has pulled something small and metal from his jacket pocket and she wonders what it is.
“Back off!” the man shouts, “I’ll kill you… fucking dog.”
Kill her? How, exactly? It’s enough to make her pause, tail warily swaying from side to side. For a moment, they stay like that. Wolf, wondering what new trick this prey might show her and Man, torn between action and inaction.
This won’t do. What is that thing? It’s so small, how could he possibly imagine it would stop her?
She cannot get her answers unless she asks.
With a shake of her head, she pulls on a form she’d deemed impractical ages ago. Her tail melds back into her spine while her back legs lengthen and her front paws elongate to fingers. Silk cloth replaces the fur covering her body while long dark hair unfurls from her head. It takes her only seconds to adopt her more human guise, but it’s plenty of time for the man’s mouth to drop.
“What is that you are holding?” the Hunter demands imperiously. There is movement behind the man, amid the trash, but the Hunter ignores it for the moment.
“What the fuck is this?”
“I asked you a question. What is it that you are pointing at me and how do you expect it to kill me?”
She’s beginning to doubt that the man can answer her coherently. He smells of alcohol, he’s shaking, and by the looks of it, he’s already lost control of his bladder. The Hunter’s patience reaches an end and she steps forward, intent on simply taking the item by force.
In that moment, several things happen nearly simultaneously. The motion behind the man proves itself to be that of another mortal, rising from the trash to jerk the other man’s hand down while also swinging a glass bottle to his head, the metal thing gives a bright flash, and a deafening bang fills the alley.
The brute falls to the ground, as does the metal weapon.
The other mortal, also a man, quickly crouches to pick it up and then looks to the Hunter. “Hurt?”
“Excuse me?” Her eyes stay on the weapon, marking well which way it is pointed.
“Are you hurt?” the man repeats. A groan at his feet prompts him to kick the fallen attacker in the face, hard enough to silence all protests. Then, almost as an after-thought, he tucks the metal thing into his sagging pants.
“No,” she says crisply, “I am not.”
She is lying of course. Point of fact, her pride has been badly stung at the thought that this ragged mortal may have saved her life. She studies him but poverty and misuse have rendered him sadly unremarkable. He is dirty, his hair matted, and the scent coming off of him is a mix of rotting food and unwashed human
“Good,” he grunts, then wipes at his mouth with a filthy sleeve. He stares at her, no doubt in awe.
The Hunter sighs. She reaches into the folds of her skirt and retrieves a simple but well-made leather pouch. She holds it out and watches the man focus on it.
“Apparently you’ve done me a service,” she says somewhat stiffly. The mortal’s eyes widen in surprise. “Here. Take it.” She tosses the pouch across the distance.
The man catches it, but just barely.
She turns away, preparing to leave. She’s satisfied both her curiosity and her debt. It’s time to go home.
“This isn’t what I want,” the man says sharply.
The Hunter looks back at him, startled at the impudence. “It’s a great deal more than you probably deserve.”
“Doesn’t matter. It’s not what I want,” the man squares his shoulders.
She’s curious despite herself. “Then what do you want?”
“Grant me three wishes,” he asks confidently.
“You have mistaken me for something else,” she snorts. “I am Sidhe, but I am not a leprechaun.”
“So, they’re more powerful than you, is that it? I see,” the man nods knowingly.
The Hunter’s pale eyes narrow. “Human, look at me. Do you see the silk of this gown, the gems at my throat? Whose power, if not mine, do you think brought those forth? What’s more, do you see the blood staining my mouth? What do these things tell you about my power?”
“Everything.”
She pauses, mollified.
“So, grant me two wishes,” he presses.
“Two?” she raises a brow, “For a single service done?”
“Saving your life is such a big service, though. I’m sure it more than makes up for two measly wishes.” He smiles at her, a clear attempt at charm.
The Hunter wrinkles her nose and then relents. Such bravery, stubborn though it may be, perhaps did deserve something in return. “If you can catch me within an hour, you can have two wishes.” It’s a test fit for a wolf and even though he hasn’t got a chance of catching her, she feels no shame in giving it.
“Catch you,” the man repeats, “I have to find you and catch you?”
She nods.
“But you can’t just go back to where you came from or go someplace I don’t have a chance of following,” he is quick to add. “That wouldn’t be fair.”
She shrugs. “No place that you could not conceivably follow me, then.”
He is quiet for a long moment and the Hunter wonders if he’s going to see sense and just accept the gold.
“I’m not sure you want me wrestling you to the ground when I catch you,” the man says slowly, cautiously, “How close would I need to be for it to count? Close enough to talk to you?”
How very considerate.
“Fair point,” she drawls, “Let’s say you must be close enough for your voice to reach me in a whisper. I have a strong enough stomach for that, I think.”
He grins and nods, “Okay, let me take a piss first.”
With that, he turns and shuffles towards the trash cans. The Hunter refrains from tapping her foot as he fumbles in the dark for several moments before accomplishing his task.
He turns around and coughs, “Ah, sorry. I suppose I should have handed this back first. Didn’t get anything on it though, I swear.” He hands back the pouch and she wryly tucks it away.
“Ready?” she asks, all at once impatient.
“Rea-“
She’s gone before he finishes the word. Even in human form, she runs faster than any mortal has any right to expect. The decaying thing that the humans call their city is somewhat confusing, but she has no need to understand it. She effortlessly twists her path through streets, under bridges, and across roof-tops, letting her whims guide her.
It occurs to her, as she scales her fifth fire-escape, that she’s forgotten how exhilarating it is to explore someplace new. There’s nothing unfamiliar, nothing unknown in her forests. Time has given her mastery over all of it. As ugly as this world is, being in it feels a little like she’s jumped into ice water. All of her senses are sharpened and thrumming.
It’s…nice.
The hour passes all too quickly. Feeling generous, she finds a park and a tall tree to perch in while she waits for the last fifteen minutes to run out.
Five minutes later, the silence of her contemplation is shattered by a high-pitched trilling sound coming from her skirts.
Perplexed, she identifies the sound as coming from the pouch she offered the mortal. The trilling continues, but by the time she finds and opens the pouch it’s gone. It’s not hard to tell its source, though. The chunky rectangle of plastic and glass she fishes from the bag is certainly not hers. She picks it up with some bemusement and turns it over.
Without warning, it begins trilling again and the glass on its front as well as several raised squares with symbols light up with a rather disconcerting green glow. She runs her fingers over them and finds they have some give. How odd!
Several more minutes pass before her prodding leads her to inadvertently hit the answer button on the phone while it’s still ringing.
A voice replaces the trill mid-ring and the Hunter slowly puts the battered device to her ear to hear it better, “Yes?”
“Good,” the man she left in the alley-way sounds relieved, “Can you hear me alright?”
“I can,” she returns, amused. “Where are you?” She looks around, almost expecting to see him at the foot of the tree.
“Close enough for my voice to reach you, it seems,” he whispers.
The Hunter is rendered speechless. Not only is this a flagrant manipulation of semantics, but the sheer amount of audacity involved in implementing it is staggering. The mortal must have slipped the device into her pouch while he was relieving himself, which meant that he’d only had a few moments to both plan and execute his little cheat.
“Clever mortal,” she murmurs, impressed in spite of herself.
“I’m glad you see it that way,” the man says, “Look, don’t return to the alley. There are police there. I’m two streets...”
“I can find you,” the Hunter interrupts. Then, just on principle, she allows some menace to color her tone.
“There is nowhere that I cannot find you.” She drops the phone back in the pouch and jumps down from the tree.
It only takes her a few minutes to catch the man’s scent and follow it to where he sits on the stoop of an abandoned store. He’s paying attention to his surroundings but she still takes him off guard with her approach. He jumps to his feet.
“Not exactly a fair solution,” the Hunter is blunt, “But then again, the wager wasn’t fair to begin with. You’ve proven your cunning, at least, so I’ll allow it. What is it, exactly, that you want?”
“My first wish is that you don’t hurt me or cause me to be hurt in anyway,” he watches her as he speaks. “And yes, killing is hurting.”
For a moment she debates denying the wish but then chooses against it. If she decides later that she wants to cause him pain, there are at least dozen ways around his wish. Besides, she wants to know where this obvious set-up is going.
“Agreed. And secondly?”
“Marry me.”
It takes a moment for that to truly sink in.
“And why,” she growls, “would you wish for that? Let me guess. You think that by marrying me, you’ll own me? Quite a neat way to get all the wishes you could want.”
He doesn’t flinch in the face of her scorn but he does step back.
“That’s not really the way things are anymore, which is kind of my point. You’ve been gone long enough, I bet nothing seems familiar.” His voice becomes ever so slightly cajoling, “Wouldn’t you like to explore more? Wouldn’t it make sense to do that with a devoted partner who knows about things here?”
She hesitates. There’s no denying that part of her is no longer looking forward to returning home. She has words again and she’s reluctant to lose them. To stay for a time, to test herself against the challenge of this world, and to chase something more than deer or boar once more…
“And,” the man adds with deceptive mildness, “if my lovely wife wants to travel in style? Who am I to say that she can’t make that happen?”
Her eyes snap to meet his. In this light she can see that not only are they blue, they’re also positively glittering with mischief.
She blinks.
Well.
She supposes it certainly isn’t the worst proposal she’s ever gotten.
With those clever, expectant eyes still watching her, the Hunter weighs her choices and slowly begins to laugh.
