My Lille-Ulv

It happened a fortnight ago, and I still hadn't told Askel, or Jane. The scars still stained my torso, and I swallowed hard as I stared at them incredulously once again through the mirror on the vanity. Just as I had been these past couple weeks. I still couldn't really, process what happened. It was all so fast, and the bites, the scratches, they healed so fast. I didn't even know what to fathom. But I gasped when I heard a knock on my bedroom door, and then a man clear their voice.

"Lille-Ulv? May I come in?".

I dropped my night gown, and spun around to find my dearest friend Gris standing in the doorway. I'd only known him since we were about 14, going on 4 years now, and he was a sweet, very tall and bulky built man. Not far behind him I saw peeking over his shoulders were, Askel, my eldest brother, and Jane, my lovely baby-blued eyed sister.

I raised a brow,

"What is this? An intervention?"

Jane squeezed her way through the towering men and stumbled in front of me, sighing and dusting off her own navy night wear.

"You've been acting funny, and we all know it. Besides!", she then turned her head, and with her hands she gestured back to Gris and Askel who both glanced between one another. Before they passed over a dark, crusty blood stained dress. My eyes widened... The same one I wore that night...

"What the hell is going on Lille?", she spat as she shook the dress in her grasp, and then shoved it into my own.

I stared at it, my mouth just, gaping like a fish out of water. I, I didn't know what to say, where to start, and they all were staring at me. I wanted to cry, scream, and just, explain to them what happened all at the same time, and yet I stood. Silent, and stiff as a deer caught in the crosshairs.

The silence drug on for what felt like hours, but could only possibly been merely minutes, before Gris sighed, shaking his head. Askel reached out to gently take Jane by the shoulders, drawing her back but she resisted. Barking,

"No way! Not until I get an answer!".

We may all have been young adults now, but something about the way she demanded my own business struck a nerve, or was it that I hadn't felt like myself ever since that night, and finally. Just as Gris and Jane were switching places I swallowed... I relented, and I caved,

"I was attacked... A couple weeks ago... Coming home, this... I think it was a wolf, what ever it was it was big, and it rushed me... It all happened so fast, I mean. I still don't even know what to think of it now, it, thrashed me about a bit, and then it was gone...", I felt a ton of weight leave my shoulders, but just as well, the weight steadily was brought back on as I continued,

"It was.. Huge... Like nothing I have ever seen.."

They all stared at me, and again. I hated it, resented it. Like an itch, something inside felt close to igniting but I gulped it down. In hopes of extinguishing it.

"Are you sure... it was a wolf?", Askel wondered, though Gris was dead-eyeing me strangely.

"Yes, I'm sure. You want to see? I don't think a grizzly would be so kind", I then finally, without completely exposing myself, I revealed the marks where fangs sank into tender flesh and tore, and dug and ripped, but yet,

" I... I didn't think anything of it because, I swear by the time I got home it stopped bleeding. Hell, it nearly looked like it does now, when I had reached the front porch.. But."

I dropped the hem back down as I sighed,

"I remember, being so tired, and. Crashing into bed."

"You were in and out of slumber for three days, I remember", Jane said softly.

There it was again, silence like a blanket draping over us. Then while Askel cleared his throat,

he and Gris at the same time spoke,

"So there's a wolf."

"So there's a wolf?"

Though Gris's tone was more confirming while Askel's was a question. They glanced at one another, with the same puzzled-though slightly amused expressions before Gris shook his head.

"I'll go now into town, rally up my brothers and we'll go take care of this. Big bad wolf you speak of", already waving his hands and turning to leave. His arms reaching out for his hunter's cap hung by the front door, but I scurried passed Askel and Jane, swift enough to snatch the sleeve at his elbow.

"No! no, wait. Look, its.. I'm not playing with you, it wasn't just any wolf!", I pleaded with him. Eyes I knew he could read were imploring.

"It was huge, and I mean it. Like, those one's we read about in class, the prehistoric ones. Dires wolves, right? They were huge!".

I was half expecting Gris to say something along the lines of disbelief, as even Askel spat from behind me,

" Maybe you just need to lay off the whiskey, sunshine."

All I heard Gris say as his blue-green eyes stared down at me with nothing short of kindness, and something, unexplainably darker swimming underneath,

"I know."

With that my breath was caught in my throat and I just stood, feeling the fabric of his soft sleeve slip from my fingers, and watched as he turned to walk right out the front door. Leaving us all, speechless, as it shut gently.

"Okay, what the fuck", Jane finally broke the awkward silence.

I cringed, reluctantly turning to face my siblings.

"Yeah, cause either, I'm crazy, or you're crazy, because nothing in the last days, let alone weeks! Has made any god damn sense!", Askel burst, his arms flailing with every gesticulation of his words.

Jane just waved off his tantrum as she stared into me deeply, deeper than I think we ever gazed at one another in our entire lives.

"You aren't lying", she abruptly stated.

And in that moment I embraced her, and Askel could only watch us with only a fond, dubious visage a male sibling could have. Clearing his throat and scratching his neck.

"Still don't explain nothin'. You weirdos".

When Jane and I finally separated, my arms slowly slipped from her own but her hands I grasped, as I glanced between my beloved siblings.

"All I need, is you guys to believe me. But I don't know what to make of anything either."

"Well", Jane gave my hands a squeeze before letting them go to smooth out the lap of her gown,

"I'm sure Gris and his leaden brothers can handle this beast of an animal themselves, and to that we can drink and see the big bad bastard for ourselves when they do!", she beamed.

But Askel and I both held the same, weary look, and I pushed,

"But Jane, that doesn't explain-"

"The healing", Askel chimed.

"Yes, that, it should've... Granted I'm glad it didn't, but It should have killed me, I should have died, I swear it tore me to pieces. My wounds, they were fatal, there was... No way I could have survived, and yet...", I rubbed a hand over my face, growing tired, and frustrated.

"Maybe you're some kind of x-men", Askel mused.

Jane and I both chuckled despite the tensity in the situation. It was kind of funny. But, in the end, no answers, no solutions. We all eventually went back to our separate chambers with the same, troubling thoughts... information... A riddle with no clue...

Nothing...

**********

It must have been some point, a little after midnight, but not too deep into the early morning when I heard it. The moon was still high, half full, and the medley of it and the sky cast down a silvery navy hue. The sound of branches snapping, and movement just outside the window vibrated the very cot I slept in. I rubbed my eyes, trying to rid the sleep from my mind as I drug myself to peek, and what I saw like a shadow hovering just beyond the glass of the window pane nearly had me pissing myself and screaming, yet no sound left my dry lips. Eyes so large yet so human, stared back at me, perched on a large, long, dark matted snout .

It was a wolf. Another, giant wolf... It was much bigger, and darker than the one I saw every time I closed my eyes, replaying that night over and over in my head. Another big, fucking wolf, with eyes so familiar. So blue, and so green. Like pools of lake water, nothing sort of evil, or malicious or yellow like the one that night... But serene, and warm, and in that moment I realized who they reminded me of.

"Gris..."

The beast blinked, and after the initial shock soothed over, I noticed the deep, crimson liquid running down the lupine's muzzle, and out of a fang bearing, panting maw.

I realized what he had done... He could never tell me, but that's how he knew... How I knew our secrets were kept and in the same breathe, I was also set free...

Then the hulking, fresh oozing scar littered, blue-green eyed wolf hesitantly turned, and disappeared into the shroud of shadow and night, deep into thickets and the loving embrace of the forest just beyond our old fence. And to be candid... I never saw Gris, or his brothers again after that... And I remember being heart-broken, but... Also, okay with how he left everything, and I thank him for how he showed me the real him, before he decided, to be free.