Gwynn and the Wolves

The Book

Excerpt

Trivia

EXCERPT

Chapter 1
 
I LIE CAREFULLY perched on the branch of an elm tree, looking through its new foliage into the clear blue sky be-yond. It’s a good thing spring is setting in—winter means nothing but hardships for my family. The sky above looks like a promising one, like a small eternity of pleasant breezes and warm nights and gentle rains. It mesmerizes me, filling me with hope and anticipation. Then a goat leaps up next to me and straddles my face, obscuring my small reverie. I hear her chomping away, but all I see is her furry underbelly.

“Do you mind? I was here first.”

I nearly give in to the urge to push her off me, but it’d be cruel. An unexpected fall from this height could hurt her, and she doesn’t really mean to be annoying. At least I don’t think she does. If anything, I reason, her straddling me like this is a show of trust. I carefully worm my way out from under her, the bark scraping away at my back, and fall off the tree myself. Four feet didn’t seem like much before I hit the ground, but I land on my wrist funny and it stings something fierce. Cradling my arm, I look around me.

Fifteen goats, I count. That’s all of them still. Usually they stay together on their own, but the whole reason I’m here is to make sure one doesn’t wander off alone and get lost. The landscape is gently sloping, broken up by bushes, rocky outcroppings, or the occasional tree like the one I’d been daydreaming on. The goats clip away at the tops of clover and the tender limbs of the bushes, and of course there’s the goat that displaced me in the tree above. It must have been a pretty impressive jump that got her up there.

One goat hears the commotion of my falling and strolls up nonchalantly to stare at me with its yellow, horizontally slit eyes. “Oh, Lara,” I sigh. The goats all have names, and sometimes respond to them. “I don’t have any treats for you right now. That’s why we’re out here—you can find your own food. Go on.”

Lara has always been particularly lazy, and here she is, trying to get me to do all the work for her again. But I’m not going to indulge her, not today.

It’s a difficult thing, to love goats, because they don’t re-ally love you back. A goat will graze on the mound of your dead body and think nothing of it. If you stand between them and food, they will resort to violence to get past you. It’s perfectly believable that they all descended from some demon, cloven-hoofed and horned. But I love them anyway. I don’t mind being unrequited.

There’s a noise in the distance like the snapping of a branch, and all the goats lift their heads in unison, then freeze. I follow suit, for a moment just another member of the herd. It’s my brother, Garl, laboring up a hill after me. I walk towards him—if he gets too close, he might scare the goats off, and then I’ll have to chase after them.

“What are you doing out here?” I ask him when I’m close enough to talk quietly.

“Did you forget what day it was?” he says, lightly panting. Garl is a good foot taller than me, and I have to tilt my head up to meet his accusatory gaze. Maybe it’s because he’s two years older than me, this height unfairness, but it’s also possible I’ve stopped growing. I don’t like to think about that.

“What’s it matter what day it is?” I reply.

“You really did forget, didn’t you? When Father said you would, I didn’t believe him, but I came here to remind you anyway. It’s a full moon tonight, Gwynn.”

“Well, I can’t really see the moon now, can I, so how was I supposed to know.”

“Because Father told you before you left, I heard him do it. Now hurry on back to the house, you hear me? We have to get ready.”

“I hear you, I hear you,” I mumble, and turn back to my flock while Garl returns down the hill, towards our farm-stead in the unseen distance.

I pull a single apple out of my little knapsack. That’s all it takes to move the whole herd, when applied correctly. They all follow Nandy, a castrated male nearly nine years old, and Nandy will follow an apple for miles on end, with all the uncomplaining optimism of a true idiot—I’ve used this same apple for a week now, never once letting him actually get to it.

“Nandy, get over here!” I shout, and the goats startle to attention. Nandy, a long-horned fellow with grey streaks in his coat, stumbles forward and begins the endless chase for the treat in my hand as I walk away from him, hand extend-ed behind me so that it’s always in view. The rest of the herd shambles into formation, and we’re on our way.

It’s a slow process, and it takes us all of an hour until we’re in the familiar environs of our farm. Evening is al-ready approaching, the air cooling a bit. Garl is out waiting for me, leaning impatiently against the post of a run-down fence.

“Took you long enough,” he says, falling in behind me as I pass him.

“It’s not really me that sets the pace. You know that, right? I coulda been here in five minutes, myself.”

“Just get them into the barn.”

I lead Nandy through the large double doors of our barn, to a bale of hay that’s waiting to receive them all. Some of the goats saunter off to drink heartily from a trough of water while I pull the doors closed behind them. There’s a large beam of wood that goes across the doors for extra reinforcement, and I struggle to put that into place before Garl comes and helps me. Then everything’s set.

“Be quiet tonight, promise me,” I say to the goats with an admonishing tone. I leave through a small side door, which I make sure is shut securely behind me. It’s made to blend into the wall so you can’t see where it is from the outside unless you know what you’re looking for. Nodding my approval, I hurry off to the nearby entrance of our little house.

I shut and secure that door behind me too, then go round the corner. Mother and Father are already seated at the rickety wooden table in our small dining room. Father drinks slowly from a pewter cup, and Mother sways gently side to side in her chair, a distracted look on her face. I take a seat beside her. Garl is there too, but he stands apart from the rest of us.

“Everyone in a poor mood already?” I ask, smiling to try and cheer things up a bit.

“Evil times,” Mother whispers, still swaying.

Father lowers his cup to the table and shakes his head. “You locked the goats up good?”

“Of course we did.”

“And you locked the door here?”

“Of course I did. Father, I know what day it is.”

Garl snorts from his corner, but it’s best to ignore him and his opinions.

As if reminded of my brother’s existence, Father says, “Sit down, Garl.”

“I’m fine,” he replies, crossing his arms.

“It’s no good to stand by the window like that,” my father persists, and Garl has to concede. He takes one last look through the little portal to the outside world, to the dying light, then joins us solemnly at the table.

The mood is already as dour as it gets, but I’m ready and willing to fight it. “Nandy’s been trying to mount all the girls again. He got kicked twice, but that didn’t discourage him. You’d think he was a young buck again, by the look of him.”

“Inappropriate conversation,” Mother says, looking appalled.

“How’s that?” I reply. “You give me these chores, but I can’t talk about them? I’m not watching Nandy get around for my own personal satisfaction, am I?”

“Gwynn,” Father says. Just my name, but it’s enough to quiet me. He’s not offended by Nandy’s promiscuity like Mother—he’s done his fair share of tending animals and knows what goes on. It’s my tone he doesn’t like. Mother doesn’t deal with the animals, she stays inside all day every day of the year doing household chores. I couldn’t take it, personally. A body needs fresh air.

“Sorry, Mother. Just trying to make conversation is all.”

Eventually we do find conversation we can agree on, though it often lapses into strained silences as night fully sets in. I’m in the midst of conjecturing how much milk we’ll get out of the goats tomorrow morning when we hear the first howl.

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