Mind Over Magic by Lindsay Buroker

8

Morgen woketo a loud buzzing noise and lurched upright in bed. She forgot where she was and clunked her head against the frame of the bunk above her.

Swearing, she rubbed the sore spot. It hadn’t seemed right to sleep in her grandmother’s room, so she’d claimed the room she and her sister had stayed in as kids. As the older sister, Sian had taken the double bed on the bottom while Morgen had been stuck in the twin above. With no competition this time, Morgen had opted for the larger bunk, believing it would be spacious enough for an adult, but that had been before Lucky burrowed under the covers and expanded throughout the night. Now, his legs were straight, paws sticking out from under the sheets, as he took up most of the bed. Morgen’s own legs had been mashed against the wall.

“Remember when I was married, and we had a no-dogs-in-the-bed rule?” She couldn’t remember when she’d decided to relax that rule, but Lucky was softer and cuddlier than Jun had been, so it wasn’t that awful. Most of the time.

He was snoring too loudly to hear her. Whatever that obnoxious buzz was hadn’t disturbed his sleep.

Morgen maneuvered around him, clambered out of bed, and padded to the window to peer toward the barn. Fog blanketed the hilltop, making it hard to tell how late—or early—it was. Amar stood in front of the barn, facing a log perched atop a stump and wielding a chainsaw like a sculptor using a chisel and hammer. The beginnings of what might have been a bear were forming under the noisy blade.

Morgen closed the window and glanced at her phone. It was only a few minutes after six. “If Grandma didn’t have a no-chainsaws-before-nine rule, she should have.”

While Lucky snored on, Morgen went downstairs and made coffee, relieved she’d found an unopened can of ground beans in the pantry—alongside another five jars of the pepper and sausage medley.

With the warm beverage in hand, she returned to the window and debated how to tell Amar about her plan to have dinner with Christian. Her natural inclination to avoid starting conversations with strangers—and near-strangers—made her muse that maybe she didn’t have to tell him.

But it would be better to let him know her plan rather than risking him jumping to assumptions. She just worried he would think it was idiotic. He thought the answer was with that bone clip and seemed to believe her blood would make it easy for her to discover it.

Morgen checked the time in Borneo and called her sister. It was after nine at night there, but Sian ought to still be up. Assuming she answered. Sian was as apt to let calls drop to voice mail as Morgen, maybe even more so.

“Is everything all right?” Sian answered.

“Yes. Hi.”

“Hi.”

A long pause followed.

“Normal social conventions suggest I ask you about your work and how things are going in Borneo,” Morgen said, “and I would be happy to hear about such things, but you usually show such disdain for small talk that I’m guessing I should just ask my question.”

“Yes. If you wish an update on my work, you can read my upcoming paper in Nature on homosexual behavior between orangutans in the context of both affiliative and aggressive interactions.”

“I’ll do so. The copulating habits of primates never fail to be of interest.”

“This is true. What is your question?”

“I’m up in Bellrock dealing with Grandma’s estate, and there’s this… Well, I wouldn’t believe it if I hadn’t seen him transform in front of my eyes—on the hood of my car, precisely—but there’s a werewolf here.”

An even longer pause followed.

“I don’t expect you to believe me,” Morgen said, “but since you’re an expert on animals, I thought you might give me some insight. I don’t want to, uh, irk him. Grandma’s letter specifically suggested avoiding that. But he’s kind of a renter or a squatter here or something. They had an agreement, I guess. And I’m going to have to work with him.”

“I’m a primatologist who specializes in great apes.”

“Yes, I know. I was at your graduation and suffered through countless watchings of People of the Forest with you when we were kids. But you studied other types of animals in school, right? I distinctly remember you doing a paper on wolves and talking Mom and Dad into taking us to Wolf Haven in Tenino one weekend.”

“That was when I was in fourth grade.”

“You practically have an eidetic memory. I’m sure you remember a lot.” Morgen was starting to regret calling.

“I remember a great deal, such as errors in pack behavior that were propagated at the time and falsely linger into this century. They were based on studying wolves in captivity rather than wild wolves. To this day, I cringe every time I hear the term alpha male or alpha female. Most wolf packs are simply the pair-bonded parents and their four or five offspring that have not yet reached maturity and headed out on their own. In the wild, dominance fights between other wolves are rare. Captivity forces unrelated wolves into close quarters, so it’s a strange and unnatural relationship.”

“That’s interesting,” Morgen said, though it wasn’t what she wanted to know about. Thus far, she wasn’t dealing with a pack.

She was about to ask about lone wolves, assuming that was what Amar was, but Sian went on. “There are some exceptions where larger packs form and hunt together, such as with the wolves in Yellowstone National Park, which were reintroduced to the area approximately twenty-five years ago. There, the higher prey densities created different conditions, and they ended up with a lot of packs in very small territories. The packs get larger as more wolves are forced to work together. It is less common then for pups to forge off on their own at a young age, and they may stay with their parents and other wolves for up to four years.”

“I knew you knew a few things about wolves. Though I note you’re not commenting on werewolves.”

“I’m pretending you’re an intelligent, educated human being and wouldn’t bring up something so farcical unless you were teasing me because you know I struggle with sarcasm and practical jokes. If you truly believe in werewolves, I am concerned. It’s possible that the unexpected termination from your satisfying and mentally stimulating employment has resulted in the development of a psychological condition that you should be assessed for.”

“You think I should blame any issues I’ve developed on losing my job rather than my divorce?”

“Certainly. Your work has been a crucial part of your identity for nearly twenty years. Your husband was… obnoxious.”

“You find all men obnoxious.”

“Yes. Most women as well. Non-human primates are more intriguing to me.”

“It’s good that you do work that calls to you. What about lone wolves? I’m dealing with one at the property. Are they outcasts or dangerous?”

“Is it a wolf or a werewolf?” Sian asked.

“He can be whatever you need him to be in order to answer my question. Though right now, he’s making chainsaw art on a stump in front of the barn.”

Maybe she shouldn’t have said that. The third pause was the longest yet.

“Lone wolves are typically those who have yet to find an unclaimed territory and a mate, or they have lost their mate. Their goal is presumed to be to find a new mate, settle down, produce pups, and start their own pack. Occasionally, lone wolves will linger on the outskirts of an existing pack until such a time as they can join to replace an existing breeder. There are some false beliefs that packs are required for wolves to kill large animals and survive, but a study of wolves in Minnesota showed that lone wolves killed more prey per wolf than a pack of five. Lone wolves and pairs are very capable hunters on their own.”

“If one is choosing to live alone, is it because he can’t find a mate? Are all wolves driven to mate?”

“It is a biological imperative for most, though exceptions do arise.” Sian’s tone had turned dry.

Was she thinking of herself?

Morgen was fairly certain her sister hadn’t ever gone on a date, but since she had never enjoyed courtship herself, and had married Jun less out of passion-fueled love and more because they’d seemed like a logical match with common interests, she couldn’t fault anyone for that.

“My dessert is waiting for me,” Sian said. “Do you have further questions?”

“Just one.” The only one Morgen had truly wanted to know. “Do you have any suggestions on how not to irk a lone wolf?”

“Lone wolves are typically circumspect and wish to avoid straying into another pack’s territory, lest there be repercussions. I’d worry more about irking any packs that might be in the area, though as a human, you shouldn’t have to worry about any of this. Avoid scent-marking the trees around Grandma’s house, and you’ll be fine.”

“Thanks so much for the tip. Can I send you anything? Fudge from Bellrock?”

“Would it be vegan fudge?” Sian was about as disdainful of Morgen’s diet as a werewolf might be.

“Probably not. And I’m vegetarian, not vegan. I will eat butter and milk, though my doctor suggested olive oil or rice bran oil as an alternative.”

“Do not send me fudge with rice bran oil in it.”

“I don’t think that’s a thing.”

“Good. You know my preferences for gifts. Practical with touches of whimsy.”

“Yes. I remember the bamboo underwear request.”

“Bamboo underwear is practical. It’s soft, dries quickly, resists odors, and is hypoallergenic.”

“I thought you just liked the last set because it was purple with pink flowers.”

“That satisfied my need for whimsy. Goodnight.”

As Morgen hung up, Lucky stirred, oozed out from under the covers, and stretched.

“I’m not sure if I’m any more enlightened about my chainsaw-wielding tenant than I was twenty minutes ago,” Morgen said, heading downstairs to let him out. “But if Amar is the circumspect wolf in the neighborhood, I really don’t want to run into the local pack.”