Wolves (English)

Chapter 12

The red numbers on my clock radio turn to 3 AM. It's the middle of the night, and I still haven't been able to sleep. My head is completely full of all the strange stories from earlier.

After we made an appointment to continue talking tomorrow morning, or, well, actually today, the five of us sat around the table for a while, accompanied by the biscuits and the sounds of the house. It seemed as if no one else dared to open his mouth. All this time, it remained very quiet.

At one point, Finn got up to announce that it had been a long day for him and that he really wanted to go to bed now. My parents nodded in understanding and let him go.

Shortly afterwards, they also got up, and Dyre and I were the only ones left. To be honest, I didn't feel like starting a conversation with her. Someone you got to know earlier that day as a wild animal isn't exactly an attractive interlocutor, if you ask me. I needed time to get used to the idea, and to realize that I was part of some secret pact between my parents, Finn, Dyre, and Erik, whoever that might be.

After sitting across from each other in silence for about 15 minutes, Dyre decided to break that silence, 'Hey, Ester. I haven't been able to tell you before today, but I want you to know that I'm grateful for what you've done. If it wasn't for you, I was probably still there in the woods dying.'

'Yes,' I replied, looking straight into her beautiful brown eyes. 'Maybe you would have been dead. There were hunters around, you know.'

'I know,' she replied softly. 'They shot poor Alvin.'

I saw a tear coming from the corner of her eye which she desperately tried to hide. At that moment, I felt a little sorry for her. After all, she cannot help the fact that we are now in this situation.

I decided to stop being curt, and moved up a few chairs until I sat next to her.

She looked at me with a tearful face. 'Sorry, Ester. But it was just so bad. Alvin has never harmed anyone in his life. Even the flies were always safe from him. Once, when he was not transformed, he freed a fat blowfly from a spider web. That beast was really disgusting, and the buzz was super annoying, but Alvin was always and everywhere looking for the right thing.'

I saw her smile at that memory. From her story, I immediately concluded that Alvin must also be a Shadow. Still, I couldn't help but ask, 'Is Alvin the wolf they shot yesterday? Near Mr. Vineyard's shop? Do you know what I mean?'

'That little shop in the woods?'

I nodded.

'Yes, I do,' replied Dyre. 'My mother always does her shopping there. But that wolf was indeed Alvin. I hadn't known him very long, but we always got on well. I had warned him not to get too close to civilization, and now...'

New tears appeared in her eyes.

'Do you want to talk about it?' I asked softly.

Dyre wrinkled her nose. 'Of course, if you give me a tissue first. In a little while, the snot will be running over the table here. Your parents will like it.'

'They certainly think so,' I laughed. 'It's a wonder you can still sleep here.'

Fortunately, she could laugh about it too.

It didn't take much time for me to find a packet of tissues. After blowing her nose, Dyre told her story, 'Alvin and I met about a year and a half ago, when Erik decided to graduate him. He and Finn will of course tell you more about that tomorrow, how it works, but the bottom line is that he became a Healer, just like me. In the group of Healers are mainly Shadows who have the gift to heal others, be they humans or animals. We all know a lot about nature, and that is why we can already work wonders with a simple plant or bark of a special tree. Even the worst wounds are a breeze for us. At least, we always thought that.' She let out a deep sigh. 'Well, back to where we were. Alvin joined the Healer group while he had always been a Messenger before. That in itself was special because you don't just get graduated to a Healer. You really need to have a number of important qualities for that. Anyway, Erik always makes all the decisions about things like that so we all had no problem with it. In the end, I was the one who had to train him. That went very well. Alvin was eager to learn, smart, and very social. We became good buddies. Some wolves even claimed it was more than that, but we thought that ... at least, I thought it was nonsense.' She stood to refill her empty glass. 'Would you like some more?'