His Human Queen

The soft plumes of my breath sent frosted clouds around my head like a halo of hatred. My hands shook around the steel blade clutched in my fist. My chest ached from the frantic beat of my heart carving patterns of chaos against it, and my ribs ached from the hunger gnawing into them. I hated the fear quaking my bones, hated the way the blade shook to a beat of its own no matter how tight my grip on the handle was. I looked deeply into the belly of the Eupine forest and prayed to whatever god or deity that may take the time to listen that some kind of hunt would come along soon. I had been in this tree for hours and the burning ache in my fingers and toes was proof of it. I was so stiff at this point I wasn't even sure I could get down if any game did come along. I looked into the snow-covered foliage; I hated being this close to the mountains… They say deep in the Eupine Forest myths come to life. The stories we are told at bedtime, the things the old folk warn you about, it’s all behind those mountains, all fur and gnashing teeth, all beauty so haunting it pulls you in by the heat. That's why I never go any further than here when I hunt, thankfully, I never have to. Still, I slowed the steady beating of my heart, refocusing my thoughts before I drove the blade into the bark of the birch beneath me, and used it as a foot hold for my boot before standing tall and knocking an arrow into my bow. One deep breath after another finally calmed the racing of my nervous system, and with it came the thing I had waited all morning for. Fifty yards ahead stood a buck, proud and graceful. All I saw was my family’s next meal, and as I released the arrow and watched as it hit my mark an overwhelming sense of relief flooded me. Dinner… not just for tonight, but for weeks if I cut right. I made quick work of climbing from the tree and crossing the fifty yards that felt more like a hundred as the snow pulled my ankles deeper into it. Crimson stained the newly fallen snow, a sight that once turned my stomach, but now… now I was numb to it. So quickly, I thanked the above for the hunt. “O spirits of the wood and sky, I thank you for the swift flight of my arrow. For the strength in my arms and the life that now feeds my people. May its spirit run free in the forever-fields.” Then, I gutted it right there, knowing carrying the beast would be easier if I prepared it here. The moment my blade sank deep into the buck, the hot snarl of something too big blew down my neck, blowing the wisps that had fallen free of my braid around my face. I froze. The chaos that had been flooding my system went silent, as if death had already claimed my every nerve ending. I gripped the hilt of my blade just as a growl slipped the things maw, and I turned with the ferocity of someone at death’s doorstep and plunged the blade deep into the neck of the biggest wolf I had ever seen. I couldn’t move as the being’s blood, hot and thick, spurted all over me. The warmth, the comforting warmth of its death coated my chilled skin as I set silent in the snow with no sound but my ragged breathing to keep me company. Its mouth opened wide as if to avenge itself, instead of taking my life, I watched as the life left its eyes at my feet. I sat there what felt like lifetimes, I sat there until the birdsong fleeted with the dying sun, and then, only then, did I gather the meat of my kills, keeping their pelts, the antlers, and the hooves of the deer, leaving the rest to return to the earth that provided me with such a bountiful hunt and then I set off for home. By the time I broke the tree line to our cabin, I was barely moving, frozen and hungry. I dumped the meat onto the small kitchen table, hung the pelts to dry, and made my way to the shower that creaked and groaned in the same way my bones had begun to at only twenty-four. I scrubbed and soaked and scrubbed some more until my skin was raw, but the evidence of my hunt was long gone down the drain, long gone like the girl who used to cry when my father brought home a hunt like I had today, long gone like the girl who once cared for anything. It’s amazing who you become once you understand what it’s like to be profoundly hungry. When I got out of the shower, I half expected my mother to be cooking, my sister to be bickering with her about what she might buy from the money those pelts would bring, and my brother, as silent as the day of the accident that stole our father’s young life, looking out of the fogged over window at the kitchen table. Instead, the smell of burning meat reached me. I ran for the skillet, turning the stove off and turning just in time to be scared into the same stillness I had sat in while I watched that wolf die just hours ago. A man, larger than any I had ever seen, more handsome than any I had ever seen, held my brother by the throat. My brother did not fight, did not try to break free, only let the man choke him until nothing but the sounds of his final wind squeezed past his lips. I acted without thinking, acted without remorse, and flung the carving knife my mother had laid next to the skillet at the arm holding my brother’s life tight in its grip. The hot blade drove deep into the arm of the man, the god like man. His growl shook me from my trance, my spine straightened and in the best voice I could muster, I demanded, “Let him go.” To my surprise, he had no choice. He had to let him go to get the knife out. “It was her, she killed the wolf, not my son.” My heart pounded at my mother’s words. I didn’t know what was going on, but I was certain of one thing, my mother had just spared my brother’s neck while tying whatever noose was that man’s grip around my own throat. But the man just laughed, a beautiful, hearty sound. “You expect me to believe the tiny human girl killed my Gamma?” He roared a sound so beautiful that chills skittered across my skin, up my arms and down my legs. “It was me, I killed the buck and the wolf.” I admitted, watching as he took three long strides across the room as my brother fell into my mother’s arms. His hand went around my throat, his blood ran down his arm, down my chest, running hot between the valley between my breasts, until my shirt soaked it up at the hem. “Bull s.h.i.t,” he snarled. “I don’t know how to prove it.” I grumbled, taking a split second to think before digging my thumb into his knife wound making him release me just long enough for me to grab the hot skillet and sling its contents in his direction. I nearly growled myself when he dodged it and came forward, unsuspecting, as I swung again, hitting his shoulder with the pan, shivering at the sound of his sizzling skin with the contact of the hot iron skillet. I fought the ogre of a man, kicking, biting, scratching, and swinging my skillet with every ounce of my strength until finally he shifted, the sounds of his breaking bones realigning enough to gag me. I had no time to run, but I tried anyway, if I could, I would lead him from the cabin to the river. It had rained so much last week that the water would pull the being under no problem. But, I wasn’t fast enough, and before I knew it, I was pinned beneath him, forced to feel his skin stretch and realign as he shifted back into the man that was in my living room just moments ago pinning me into the frigid snow and ice that blanketed the earth. “Do not run, do not stab me, do not move.” His breath was warm on my neck, his body heat hot against my exposed skin. “I will not go quietly, wolf.” I growled, trying to knee him in the balls only to find my attempt futile beneath his weight. “You don’t have to go at all, mortal. I will give you a choice. Go back to Arthos with me as my gamma, or my men will slaughter your family while you watch, then you will go in the same bloody manner.” A chorus of wolves howling broke the whistle of the wind, and I shivered beneath him knowing the words he spoke were the truth. If I didn’t agree, he would kill them… kill me. “I’m just a human; how can I be your gamma?” I asked, partially curious, but mostly trying to buy myself time to get out of this mess. I let my heartbeat still, my breath even out to fight off the bitter cold biting at my body still pinned into the winter mess. “You killed him, it is your life for his… or you can admit it was the man in the house who killed him, and I will take him instead.” I only laughed at that. “Something funny?” his grip on my throat tightened. “I am the man in the house. Jacob hasn’t spoken in over six years; he doesn’t even wipe his own a.s.s anymore.” I spat bitterly, watching a twinkle of surprise flicker in his eye, a flicker that died almost instantly. He opened his mouth to speak, but before he could, I spoke quicker. “If you take me, you will be killing them anyway. I am the only provider they have left.” “As my gamma, it will be my duty to ensure they are cared for.” I shook my head violently thinking about them. Jacob, my mother, Lori, they weren’t meant to be any place like whatever lay behind the Eupine’s they wouldn’t survive. “They don’t cross the mountains. If I agree, they stay in the human realm.” I demanded, only to find him running his nose from my collar bone into my now freezing hair. “Deal.” He hummed low. “Deal.” I snarled, biting back some other choice words I had for him.