The Wolves of Midwinter

10

HE WAS AWAKENED in the middle of the night by the howling—the same lone Morphenkind voice he’d heard the night before.

It was about two a.m. He didn’t know how long it had been going on, only that it had finally penetrated his thin chaotic dreams and nudged him towards consciousness. He sat up in the darkened bedroom and listened.

It went on for a long time, but gradually became fainter as if the Morphenkind was moving slowly and steadily away from Nideck Point. It had a tragic, plaintive quality as before. It was positively baleful. And then he couldn’t hear it anymore.

An hour later when he couldn’t get back to sleep, Reuben put on his robe and took a walk through the corridors of the second floor. He felt uneasy. He knew what he was doing. He was looking for Marchent. He found it an agony to wait for her to find him.

In fact, waiting for her was like waiting for the wolf transformation in those early days after he’d first changed, and it filled him with dread. But it soothed his nerves to make a circuit of the upstairs hallways. They were illuminated only by the occasional sconce, little better than night-lights, but he could see the beautiful polish on the boards.

The smell of floor wax was almost sweet.

He liked the spaciousness, the firm wood that barely creaked under his slippers, and the glimpse of the open rooms where he could just make out the pale squares of the undraped windows revealing the faint sheen of a wet gray nighttime sky.

He moved along the back hallway, and then turned into one of the smaller rooms, never occupied by anyone since he’d come, and tried to see out of the window into the forest behind the house.

He listened for that howling again, but he didn’t hear it. He could make out a very dim light in the second floor of the service building to his left. He thought that was Heddy’s room, but he wasn’t sure.

But he could see precious little else of the dark forest itself.

A chill came over him, a pringling on the surface of his skin. He stiffened, keenly aware of the wolf hair bristling inside him, nudging him, but he didn’t know why it had come.

Then very slowly, as he felt the prickling all over his face and scalp, he heard noises out there in the darkness, the dull crash of branches, and the sounds of grunts and snarls. He narrowed his eyes, feeling the wolf blood pulse in his arteries, feeling his fingers elongating, and he could just barely make out two figures beyond the end of the shed, in the clearing before the trees closed in, two wolfish figures who seemed to be pushing and shoving at each other, fending one another off, then gesticulating like human beings. Morphenkinder certainly, but which Morphenkinder?

Before this moment, he was certain he knew all the others by sight when they were in wolf coat. But now he was not certain at all who these two were. He was witnessing a violent quarrel, that much was clear. Suddenly the taller of the two threw the shorter Morphenkind against the doors of the shed. A dull reverberation went up from the wood as if it were the surface of a drum.

A high angry riff of syllables broke from the shorter figure, and then the taller figure, turning his back on the other, threw up his arms and let loose with a long, mournful, yet carefully modulated howl.

The shorter figure flew at the taller one; but the tall Morphenkind shoved him off and again appeared to lift his head as he howled.

The scene paralyzed Reuben. The transformation was coming over him fiercely now, and he fought desperately to stop it.

A sound interrupted him, the heavy tread of feet just behind him, and he started violently, turning to see the familiar figure of Sergei against the pale light of the hall.

“Leave them alone, little wolf,” he said in his deep gravelly voice. “Let them fight it out.”

Reuben shuddered all over. One violent chill after another passed through him as he fought the transformation and won. His skin felt naked and cold, and he was trembling.

Sergei had come up beside him and was looking down into the yard.

“They will fight it out and it will be over,” he said. “And I know there is no way with those two but to leave them alone.”

“It’s Margon and Felix, isn’t it?”

Sergei looked at Reuben with undisguised surprise.

“I can’t tell,” Reuben confessed.

“Yes, it’s Margon and Felix,” said Sergei. “And it doesn’t matter. The Forest Gentry would eventually come whether Felix called them or not.”

“The Forest Gentry?” asked Reuben. “But who are the Forest Gentry?”

“Never mind, little wolf,” he said. “Come away and let them alone. The Forest Gentry always come at Midwinter. When we dance on Christmas Eve, the Forest Gentry will surround us. They will play their pipes and drums for us. They can do no harm.”

“But I don’t understand,” said Reuben. He glanced back down at the clearing beyond the shed.

Felix stood alone now facing the forest, and raising his head he gave another of those plaintive howls.

Sergei was leaving. “But wait, please tell me,” Reuben insisted. “Why are they fighting over this?”

“Is it so disturbing to you that they fight?” said Sergei. “Get accustomed to it, Reuben. They do it. They have always done it. It was Margon who brought the human family of Felix into our world. Nothing will ever divide Margon and Felix.”

Sergei left him. He heard the door of his room close.

The sound of the howling came from far off.

Four a.m.

Reuben had fallen asleep in the library. He was sitting in Felix’s leather wing chair by the fire, his feet on the fender. He’d done some computer work, trying to trace down the words “Forest Gentry,” but could find nothing of any significance. And then he had sat by the fire, eyes closed, begging Marchent to come to him, begging her to tell him why she was suffering. Sleep had come but no Marchent.

Now he woke and at once sensed that some particular change in things around him had indeed awakened him.

The fire had burned low but was still bright in the shadows because a new log had been added to it; a big thick chunk of oak had been nestled in the embers of the fire he’d built two hours ago. Only shadows surrounded him in his chair before the brightness of the fire.

But someone was moving in the room.

Slowly he turned his head to the left, looking past the wing of the leather chair. He saw the slim figure of Lisa moving about. Deftly, she straightened the velvet draperies to the left side of the huge window. Bending easily, she stacked the books that lay on the floor there.

And in the window seat gazing at her with a look of fierce and tearful resentment sat Marchent.

Reuben couldn’t move. He couldn’t breathe. The scene struck perfect horror in him more surely than any other visitation—the spectacle of the living Lisa and the ghost in hideous proximity to each other. He opened his mouth but no sound came out.

Marchent’s quivering eyes followed Lisa’s smallest gestures. Agony. Now Lisa moved forward towards the ghostly figure, smoothing the velvet cushion of the window seat. As she drew nearer the seated figure, the two women looked at each other.

Reuben gasped; he felt he was smothering.

Marchent looked up furiously and bitterly at the figure who reached quite literally through her, and it seemed the obdurate Lisa stared right at Marchent.

Reuben cried out. “Don’t disturb her!” he said before he could think or stop himself. “Don’t torture her!” He was on his feet shaking violently.

Marchent’s head turned as did Lisa’s, and Marchent raised her arms, reaching towards him, and then vanished.

Reuben felt a pressure against him, he felt the pressure of hands on his upper arms, and then the soft tingling feeling of hair and lips touching him, and then it was gone, completely gone. The fire burst and crackled as if a wind had touched it. Papers on the desk rustled and then settled.

“Oh God,” he said in a half sob. “You couldn’t see her!” he stammered. “She was there, there on the window seat. Oh God!” He felt his eyes watering, and his breaths came uneasily.

Silence.

He looked up.

Lisa stood there behind the Chesterfield sofa with that same cold smile he’d seen on her narrow delicate features once before, looking both ancient and young somehow with her hair swept back so tight, and her black silk dress so prim to her ankles.

“Of course I saw her,” she said.

The inevitable sweat broke out all over Reuben. He felt it crawling on his chest.

Her voice came again, unobtrusive and solicitous as she approached him.

“I have been seeing her since I came,” she said. Her expression was faintly contemptuous, or at the very least patronizing.

“But you reached right through her as if she weren’t there,” Reuben said, the tears sliding down his face. “You shouldn’t have treated her like that.”

“And what was I to do?” said the woman, deliberately softening her manner. She sighed. “She doesn’t know she’s dead! I’ve told her, but she won’t accept it! Should I treat her as if she is a living creature here? Will that help her!”

Reuben was stunned. “Stop it,” he said. “Slow down. What do you mean she doesn’t know she’s dead?”

“She doesn’t know,” repeated the woman with a light shrug.

“That’s … that’s too awful,” Reuben whispered. “I can’t believe such a thing, that a person wouldn’t know she was dead. I can’t—.”

She reached out and firmly urged him back towards the chair. “You sit down,” she said. “And let me bring you some coffee now, as you’re awake and it’s useless for you to go back to bed.”

“Please, leave me alone,” said Reuben. He felt a massive headache coming on.

He looked into her eyes. There was something wrong with her, so wrong, but he couldn’t figure what.

In what he’d seen of her deliberate movements, her strange demeanor had been as horrifying as the vision of Marchent crying there, Marchent angry, Marchent lost.

“How can she not know she’s dead?” he demanded.

“I told you,” said the woman in a low iron voice. “She will not accept it. It’s common enough, I can tell you.”

Reuben sank down into the chair. “Don’t bring me anything. Let me alone now,” he said.

“What you mean is you don’t want anything from my hands,” she said, “because you’re angry with me.”

A male voice spoke from behind Reuben. It was Margon.

It spoke sharply in German, and Lisa, bowing her head, immediately left the room.

Margon moved to the Chesterfield sofa opposite the fire and sat down. His long brown hair was loose down to his shoulders. He was dressed only in a denim shirt and jeans and slippers. His hair was tousled and his face had an immediate warm and empathetic expression.

“Pay no attention to Lisa,” he said. “She is here to do her job, no more, no less.”

“I don’t like her,” Reuben confessed. “I’m ashamed to say it, but it’s true. However that’s the smallest part of what concerns me right now.”

“I know what concerns you,” said Margon. “But Reuben, if ghosts are ignored, they often move on. It doesn’t help them to look at them, acknowledge them, keep them lingering here. The natural thing is for them to move on.”

“Then you know all about this?”

“I know you’ve seen Marchent,” said Margon. “Felix told me. And Felix is suffering over this.”

“I had to tell him, didn’t I?”

“Of course you did. I’m not faulting you for telling him or anyone else. But please listen to me. The best response is to ignore her appearances.”

“That seems so cold, so cruel,” said Reuben. “If you could see her, if you could see her face.”

“I did see her, just now,” Margon said. “I hadn’t seen her before, but I saw her in the window seat. I saw her rise and come towards you. But Reuben, don’t you see, she can’t really hear you or understand you and she can’t speak to you. She’s not a strong enough spirit, and please believe me, the very last thing you want is for her to become strong, because if she becomes strong she may stay forever.”

Reuben gasped. He felt the maddest impulse to make the Sign of the Cross, but he didn’t do it. His hands were shaking.

Lisa had returned with a tray, which she set down on the leather ottoman in front of Margon. The fragrance of coffee filled the room. There were two pots on the tray, two cups and saucers and the usual silver and old linen napkins.

Margon let loose a long stream of German words, obviously some sort of reproof, as he looked at Lisa. His words never became hurried or harsh, but there was a cold chastising tone to what he said nevertheless and the woman bowed her head again, as she had before, and nodded.

“I am so sorry, Reuben,” said Lisa with soft sincerity. “Truly I am sorry. I am so rough, so perfunctory sometimes. My world is a world of efficiency. I am so sorry. You will, please, give me another chance, that you might think better of me.”

“Oh, yes, of course,” said Reuben. “I didn’t know what I was saying.” He felt immediately sorry for her.

“It was I who spoke badly,” she said, her voice now an imploring whisper. “I will bring you something to eat. Your nerves are shattered and you must eat.” She went out.

They sat there in silence, and then Margon said, “You’ll get used to her and used to the others. There are one or two more coming. Believe me, they are expert at serving us or I wouldn’t have them here.”

“There’s something unusual about her,” Reuben confessed. “I can’t put my finger on it. I don’t know how to describe it. But really, she’s been so helpful. I don’t know what’s the matter with me.”

He took a folded Kleenex out of the pocket of his robe and wiped his eyes and nose.

“There are a lot of unusual things about all of them,” said Margon, “but I’ve worked with them for years. They are very good with us.”

Reuben nodded. “It’s Marchent that worries me, you know that, because she’s suffering. And Lisa said the most horrible thing! I mean—is it really possible that Marchent doesn’t know she’s dead? Is that conceivable, that the soul of a human being could be bound to this place, not knowing that it’s dead, not knowing that we’re alive and struggling to talk to us and not being able to do it? That’s almost more than I can believe. I can’t believe that life could be that cruel to us. I mean I know terrible things happen in this world, always, everywhere, but I thought that after death, after the cord had snapped, as they say, I thought there would be—.”

“Answers?” offered Margon.

“Yes, answers, clarity, revelation,” said Reuben. “Either that or, mercifully, nothing.”

Margon nodded. “Well, maybe it’s not so neat. We can’t know, can we? We’re bound to these powerful bodies of ours, aren’t we? And we don’t know what the dead know or don’t know. But I can tell you this. They do eventually move on. They can. They have their choice, I’m convinced of it.”

Margon’s face showed only kindness.

When Reuben didn’t answer or speak, he poured out a cup of fresh coffee for Reuben and, without asking, put two packets of artificial sweetener in it, which was what Reuben always took with his coffee, and after stirring the coffee, he offered it to Reuben.

There was the soft rustle of silk announcing Lisa, and the pungent smell of fresh-baked cookies. She held the steaming plate in her hand and then set it down on the tray.

“You eat now a little,” she said. “Sugar wakes one in the early hours. It rouses the sleepy blood.”

Reuben took a deep drink of the coffee. It did taste delicious. But the ugly and terrible thought struck him that Marchent could perhaps taste nothing. Perhaps she could smell nothing, savor nothing. Perhaps she could only see and hear, and this seemed penitential and awful.

When he looked up at Margon again, the compassion in Margon’s face almost made Reuben cry. Margon and Felix had so much in common beyond the darker Asian skin, the dark eyes. They seemed so alike as to be from a common tribe but Reuben knew that wasn’t possible, not if Margon was telling the truth with his ancient stories, and everything about Margon suggested that he always told the truth, even if others didn’t like it or want to accept it. Right now, he looked like an earnest and a concerned friend, youngish, empathetic, genuine.

“Tell me something,” said Reuben.

“If I can,” said Margon with a little smile.

“Are all the elder Morphenkinder like you and Felix, and Sergei and the others? Are they all kind and gentle like you? Isn’t there some scoundrel of a Morphenkind somewhere who’s rude and hateful by nature?”

Margon laughed a low rueful laugh.

“You flatter us,” he said. “I must confess there are some quite unpleasant Morphenkinder sharing this world with us. I wish I could say there were not.”

“But who are they?”

“Ah, I knew you would immediately ask that. Will you accept that we’re all better off if they leave us alone here, and keep to their own territory and their own ways? It’s possible to go on for a very long time without coming in contact with them.”

“Yes, I accept it. You’re saying there’s nothing to fear from them.”

“Fear, no, there’s nothing to fear. But I can tell you there are Morphenkinder in this world whom I personally despise. But you’re not likely to encounter them, not as long as I’m here.”

“Do they define evil in a different way that we define it?”

“Every single soul on earth defines evil in his or her own way,” said Margon. “You know that. I don’t have to tell you. But all Morphenkinder are offended by evil and seek to destroy it in humans.”

“But what about in other Morphenkinder?”

“It’s infinitely more complex, as you found out with poor Marrok. He wanted to kill you, felt he should, felt he’d no right to pass the Chrism to you, felt he had to annihilate his mistake, but you know how difficult it was for him, you and Laura being utterly innocent. And you, you had no difficulty in killing him simply because he was trying to kill you. Well, there you have the entire moral story of the human race and all the immortal races in a nutshell, don’t you?”

“All the immortal races?”

“You and Stuart. If we answered every single question, we’d overwhelm you. Let it come gradually, please. And that way we can postpone the inevitable revelation that we don’t know all the answers.”

Reuben smiled. But he wasn’t going to let this opportunity slip through his fingers, not feeling the pain he was feeling now.

“Is there a science of spirits?” asked Reuben. He felt the tears welling again. He picked up one of the cookies, which was still warm, and ate it easily in one mouthful. Delicious oatmeal cookie, his favorite kind, very thick and chewy. He drank the rest of the coffee, and Margon poured another cup.

“No, not really,” said Margon. “Though people will tell you there is. I’ve told you what I know—that spirits can and do move on. Unless, of course, they don’t want to move on. Unless, of course, they’ve made a career of remaining here.”

“But what you mean is they disappear from your sight, don’t you?” Reuben sighed. “I mean, what you’re saying is they leave you, yes, but you can’t know that they’ve gone on.”

“There’s evidence they go on. They change, they disappear. Some people can see them more clearly than others. You can see them. You get the power from your father’s side of the family. You get it from the Celtic blood.” It seemed he had more to say, and then he added, “Please listen to me. Don’t seek to communicate with her. Let her go, for her sake.”

Reuben couldn’t answer.

Margon rose to go.

“Wait, Margon, please,” Reuben said.

Margon stood there, eyes lowered, bracing himself for something unpleasant.

“Margon, who are the Forest Gentry?” Reuben asked. Margon’s face changed. He was suddenly exasperated.

“You mean Felix hasn’t told you?” he asked. “I should think he would have.”

“No, he hasn’t told me. I know you’re fighting over them, Margon. I saw you. I heard you.”

“Well, you let Felix explain to you who they are, and while he’s at it, he might explain to you his entire philosophy of life, his insistence that all sentient beings can live in harmony.”

“You don’t believe they can?” Reuben asked. He was struggling to keep Margon there, keep Margon talking.

Margon sighed. “Well, let’s put it this way. I’d rather live in harmony in this world without the Forest Gentry, without spirits in general. I’d rather people my world with those creatures who are flesh and blood, no matter how mutant, unpredictable, or misbegotten they may be. I have a deep abiding respect for matter.” He repeated the word, “Matter!”

“Like Teilhard de Chardin,” said Reuben. He thought of the little book he’d found before he’d met either Margon or Felix, the little book of Teilhard’s theological reflections inscribed to Felix by Margon. Teilhard had said he was in love with matter.

“Well, yes,” Margon said with faint smile. “Rather like Teilhard. But Teilhard was a priest, like your brother. Teilhard believed things I have never believed. I don’t have an orthodoxy, remember.”

“I think you do,” said Reuben. “But it’s your own godless orthodoxy.”

“Oh, you’re right, of course,” said Margon. “And perhaps I’m wrong to argue for the superiority of it. Let’s just say I believe in the superiority of the biological over the spiritual. I look for the spiritual in the biological and no place else.”

And he left without another word.

Reuben sat back in the chair, gazing dully at the distant window. The panes were wet and clear and made up the many lead-framed squares of a perfect mirror.

After a long time and gazing at the distant reflection of the fire in a glass—a tiny blaze that seemed to float in nothingness—he whispered: “Are you here, Marchent?”

Slowly against the mirror, her shape took form, and as he stared fixedly at it, the shape was colored in, became solid, plastic and three-dimensional. She sat in the window seat again, but she did not look the same. She wore the brown dress she’d worn that day he’d met her. Her face was vividly moist and flushed as if with life, but sad, so sad. Her soft bobbed hair appeared combed. Her tears were glistening on her cheeks.

“Tell me what you want,” he said, trying desperately to stifle his fear. He started to get up, to go to her.

But the image was already dissolving. There seemed a flurry of movement, the fleeting shape of her reaching out, but it thinned, vanished—as if made of pixels and color and light. She was gone. And he was standing there, shaken as badly as before, his heart in his throat, staring at his own reflection in the window.