Lady of the Veiled Vale

Jessica

"They aren't going to let this go, you know. They might even walk into the woods when I'm not looking. Do you know how hard it's been, keeping them to the clearing?!"
   "Yes, as a matter of fact, I do. I also know that you haven't succeeded as well as you think. The only reason they haven't actually made it to the wayes is because of Smoke."
   "We've never seen Smoke in the--" Jessica snapped her mouth shut before she could incriminate them any further.
   Much to her surprise, they just laughed.
   "You wouldn't, would you? That's sort of the point."
   Jessie glared at the adults who weren't making any sense, arms crossed.
   "Come now, child. Do you want to see what's out there, or not?"
   She thought for what she considered a long time, but it was all of five seconds.
   "Yes."
   Her something or other great grandmother held out one hand, with a wink and a smile. She took it, and they vanished.
   Sam had to suppress a yelp. Gran said she knew the paths, and she said this was one of her several times great grandfather's houses. Maybe they were connected?
   They were, indeed. Jessie found herself in a forest, where things rustled in the trees. She clung to her grand whatever's side in fear.
   Until Nyxi peeked out at her and waved.
   "Is it faerie that are making those noises?"
   "Mostly," the pixie chirped. "Dinnae worry, though. Long's you're with Lady Varla, you're safe as a babe in arms."
   It took several steps for her to ask what would happen if she were here alone.
   "You're never alone here--"
   "But if one of us didn't find you," her great gran interrupted, "you could be lost forever."
   "Or hunted, but that's... never mind, just lost."
   Nyxi vanished into the trees when great gran glared at her.
   "H...hunted?" she squeaked.
   Varla pulled her closer. "You needn't worry, child. As long as you have a guide you know, you'll not go awry. It must be one you know, do you hear?" She shook the hand she held for emphasis.
    Still wondering what would hunt pixies, she nodded vigorously.
   "Hear what? Oh, who's this?"
   A deep, booming voice sent her skittering into her grandmother's side.
   "'Tis your niece, here to see what the dragons are up to."
   "I get to see dragons?!" She forgot the scary voice and peeked around the tall elf, but she only saw an even taller man with wings, scales, a tail, and lots of scars.
   "Oh, it's just you."
   Varla slapped the back of her head.
   She yelped and glared.
   "So it's a lesson she's come to learn, eh? Who should we get for the tour, do you think?"
   "Why, am I not good enough for you?"
   Raiden's pupils disappeared, but only for a moment. He snatched her hand and dragged the child past all manner of wonders that she would've loved to look at more closely. He snatched a bag of food from a table and kept on marching, past creatures she'd only heard tales of.
   "I know not what drew Varla to you, nor why I must fetch my lady wife's food, but I'll not waste another moment coddling a spoilt child. If you cannot be civil, you'll go where I go, until your grandmother comes for you."
   Jessie hadn't walked this much, this fast, in her entire life. Her legs began to wobble. When her knees buckled, he just threw her over his shoulder and kept on walking.
   The up side was, she could see the wonders more clearly. The downside was being carried like the sack in his fist.
   The up side became the down side when they reached the field where her aunt worked. The beautiful creatures were now marred, scarred, and/or bloody. She couldn't bear the sight, so she buried her face in a broad shoulderblade.
   "And who's this you bring me?"
   The hope that tore at the gentle voice tore a smaller piece out of Jessie. If this was her aunt, she would be hoping to see one of the twins. Her eyes began to water, but she tried not to cry in front of the maybe dragons.
   He dropped her to the ground none too gently, but also not so hard that she couldn't stand.
   The pretty dragon lady's face fell, closed up a bit, though she tried to pretend she wasn't disappointed.
   "So, little Jessica has come to visit. How is everyone?"
   Without waiting for an answer, she plunged her hands deep into the side of a weird wolf thing. What she pulled out didn't look like an organ, because it was covered in wet, matted fur. She set it in a towel a short man held out, and he rubbed it until it squeaked.
   She pulled more squeaky creatures out, faster than the man could make them squeak. The other maybe dragon was feeding her food from the sack, so he couldn't help.
   Jessie didn't know what made her pick up a towel, but she did. There was a whole stack of them, but only one person using them.
   Nobody said a word when she held out her towel, though her aunt did pause long enough to smile at her. It made her feel all warm inside, having a complete stranger trust her with what she realized was a puppy. She babbled while she rubbed it dry, unsure what to do or say to the strangers she was related to.
   The puppy was purple, and she didn't know if that was okay. The others were pink and blue. She watched the man with the other puppies, to see how he did what he did. She hadn't gotten a squeak yet, but he angled his down a bit, and stuff oozed from the tiny mouth. She tilted hers down, and gunk oozed out of it. He rubbed harder than she was, too. She tried it, and was rewarded with a wobbly squeak that put the biggest grin on her face. She'd done it! She'd saved the puppy!
   Kevin handed his niece another puppy towel. She was reluctant to let go of the first one, so she settled it carefully in her lap. He shook his head with a chuckle. It was her first birthing. It was natural to get attached, but she'd have to give it up eventually.
   They worked side by side, until all the chromatic wolf pups were out of their mother. That was when Jessie realized that it was a huge gash in her side they'd been using to save the puppies.
   "Food!" her aunt barked.
   Her uncle stuck a chunk of jerky in her mouth, which she savagely chomped while piecing what was left of the mama wolf together. Now that they'd gotten the pups out, they didn't need the opening. She was working from the bones out, patching her wounds as fast as she could.
   Jessie didn't want to know any of it, but she sat with a prime view of it all. She saw how her aunt, when the body was whole, pushed on its chest to get it to breathe. She blew into its nostrils, pushed some more, blew again.
   She saw how her uncle had to pull her from the corpse, so she didn't pour all of her energy into a dead thing. She saw the heaving sobs wrack her body.
   And as he carried her bodily from the scene, she saw the very pregnant stomach.
   Jessie looked down at the neatly arranged puppies in her lap, tears falling on their tiny heads.
   "Heyla, they'll get a bath soon enough."
   Her sort of uncle pulled her into a sideways hug. She let him, caught up in the immense sadness of it all.
   She reached a hand out toward the mother wolf, when the elves and recuperating patients carted it away, but she couldn't get up with a lap full of puppies.
   "She'll serve a purpose, lass. Everyone does, in Sanctuary."
   Jessie wasn't sure she wanted to know, but she asked anyway. She guessed it made sense to feed the ones that didn't make it to the ones who did, but it still made her faintly ill.
   "And what about them?"
   Varla appeared beside them with a basket, lined with soft blankets. Kevin put his in it, but Jessie refused, until she knew what would happen to them.
   Varla looked at Kevin over her head, and she could swear they were talking to each other, but she didn't hear a word.
   "Someone will have to bottle feed them. I'm afraid we haven't got a compatible nursing female. Oh, I suppose we could split them up, squeeze them in here and there." The older elf's eyes sparkled with something she didn't understand. What she did understand was that the puppies needed a home.
   "Do you think mama would let me do it?"
   Varla resisted the hope in her eyes long enough to tell her that it wouldn't be easy, that she would lose much sleep in the coming weeks. Those narrow shoulders squared right up, and Varla could swear her aunt shone from her little face.
   "There are five of us, and twelve of them. And if they won't help, maybe I'll just do it all myself."
   Maybe you just will, her Gran thought. But I hope your cousins rise to the occasion.
   And that's how the girls got their first pets.