Healing Ties (Ties, Book 2) | ✓

Chapter 26

Fanner hovered in the doorway for a moment after Yore had left and then took a tentative step outside. If he didn't leave the cabin now, he would probably just hide himself away and drown in his worries until Yore returned.

Yore's cabin was on the outer edge of the settlement, set away from everything else, so there was nobody around immediately outside. Besides, it was still quite early in the morning. Were werewolves typically early risers? Wolves were usually most active at night, weren't they? When Fanner had come by, Slone had been awake but Yore had been sleeping.

Fanner could hear the sound of a running river, so he headed down a slope, through some trees towards it. He eyed the water suspiciously when he reached it and made sure to keep a couple of steps back from the bank. He didn't think he would ever trust a body of water again after that thing had tried to drown him.

Were there a finite number of known threats, or did the people who lived out here just have to hold a certain level of suspicion towards their surroundings at all times? Yore had said he'd never seen anything like Cookie before. He'd taken it in stride, too, like seeing a new type of creature wasn't a rare occurrence for him.

Maybe if you were as big and powerful as a werewolf you didn't have to worry about it too much, or perhaps this area was just much safer than some of the other ones they'd passed through. From what Yore had said, it sounded like the latter was the case.

Fanner was pulled out of his thoughts when he rounded a corner and saw a man sitting on a wooden dock, hefting a netful of still flopping fish out of the water.

Fanner hurried towards him. "Um, hi. My name is Fanner. Can I help you with anything?"

The man was large enough that he was clearly a werewolf and edging towards middle age. He levelled Fanner with a dispassionate gaze. "Do you know how to clean out a fish?"

Fanner shook his head.

"How to cut it up for drying? How to hang it?"

Fanner shook his head again.

"Then I guess you can't help me."

Fanner stood there awkwardly, his hand twisting in the hem of his shirt. Should he just walk away now?

"You're a fuckin' bully, Morren," a voice said from behind them, and Fanner jumped. He turned around to find Slone, Yore's brother, heading down the path to the dock towards them.

The man, Morren, shook his head. "How's it bullying to tell him I don't need his help?"

"You coulda found something he could help with or, fuck, I dunno, coulda taught him a new skill."

"We have plenty of kids of our own around here to teach."

"Yeah, 'cause you're so busy with that. Where's your kid? Want me to go find her so you can teach her howta dry a fish?"

"Why don't you teach him, then?"

Slone waved a dismissive hand. "Oh, I dunno how. Hardly know how to cook one, honestly."

"How do you manage to spend so much of your time on your own and not die?"

"Well, I'm pretty fuckin' decent at catchin' fish. Don't see any need to cook 'em."

Morren made a face.

"Do werewolves—" Fanner startled to say, then faltered when both men turned to look at him. Somehow, he hadn't expected to actually draw their attention. "Sorry, um. Do werewolves eat prepared foods, like humans? Is eating raw fish unusual?"