A.N.D. - Wolf Woods

“Did you?” Griswold asked.

“Well, there were a few problems when I ended up in the Ninth Kingdom, yeah, but I was cursed! It was an accident!”

“Thirty-one mirrors isn’t just an accident!”

Wendell frowned. There was something... he remembered something about angry dwarves and darkness and sounds of something breaking, but mostly he remembered wanting biscuits. And there was something about Snow White too, but he thought that was probably just wishful thinking.

Rupert was sliding his chair slowly away from Anthony’s. “But there’s seven years bad luck when you break a mirror, isn’t there?”

“Seven years for every magic mirror broken,” Sebastian chipped in. “And Lord Anthony isn’t suffering bad luck, at all, much less two-hundred and ten years of it!”

“Snow White fixed it,” Anthony muttered.

“And I’m the Naked Emperor,” Griswold snapped. Wendell shuddered at the image, and caught Rupert turning green out of the corner of his eye. He had to stifle an ill-timed smile behind his white glove.

“She did!” Anthony launched to his feet, an unsubtle reminder to them all that he was the tallest man in the room. He towered at least seven inches over Chancellor Griswold. “She’s buried under the falls, isn’t she?”

“Is she?” Wendell asked eagerly. He missed his granny so much, and it hurt not to know where he could at least plant flowers.

“I don’t know for sure,” Anthony admitted. “Virginia said she saw her tomb, and then Snow White came out of the ice and talked to her. She offered Virginia a wish, and my daughter wished for my back to be healed-it had been broken in a fall-and my bad luck to go away.” He turned desperately to Wendell. “You were there, Virginia said so! Don’t you remember?”

He remembered warm, loving hands ruffling his fur and lying happily at someone’s feet, but that was hardly anything he wanted to admit to. Wendell cleared his throat. “I saw Snow White, yes. She wasn’t upset about the mirrors, or she would have refused to lift the bad luck. Surely the dwarves can accept her judgement and forgive Anthony at her request?”

“And if they don’t, your majesty? What then?”

Wendell looked at his former manservant, who returned the look pleadingly. Anthony had been clumsy, yes. But how often had he saved Wendell’s life?

“No matter what they do or do not do, I am not turning over Lord Anthony. He is our hero and we will protect him.”

“Sire, the time-honored link between the dwarves and the House of White...”

“Lord. Anthony. Stays. Safe.”

Lord Anthony offered to go back through the mirror and stay in his home dimension, but Wendell wouldn’t hear of it. He was positive that Warwick would come around.

He didn’t. As weeks passed, Warwick continued to insist on Anthony’s death, and Wendell continued to refuse to turn his former manservant over. Whenever Anthony was out of earshot, Griswold pressed harder and harder for a resolution, pointing out that the Fourth Kingdom was hardly ready for another war, even with his new soldiers. But the dwarves did not attack.

Instead, they retreated. As the weeks passed, the dwarves who lived and traded in the Fourth Kingdom slowly disappeared, taking with them their businesses. The Fourth Kingdom had been the only one where the reclusive dwarves would come out from underground. Had been. Now that trade advantage was lost.

Wendell didn’t kid himself. The only reason the dwarves hadn’t gone to active warfare was the power of Snow White’s memory and the threat of his wolves. Rumor had it a full-grown wolf could eat a dwarf in two bites. But that respect and that fear wouldn’t hold them forever. He would have to find a solution, quickly. A solution that didn’t involve executing the man who was rapidly becoming a father to him.

While he tried to find an answer to that unsolvable problem, there were more pleasant duties to perform. Today was his audience with the leaders of his new army. Outside of Wolf and Sebastian, he hadn’t really spoken with any wolves, and he was looking forward to the experience. Judging from the two he’d met, he had no idea how such twitchy, nervous animals had gotten such a fearsome reputation.

The footman at the door banged his staff three times. “Wendell’s Wolves!” Wendell, who had been pacing as he thought, sprinted to his throne and tried to look both regal and welcoming.

Then he got a good look at what was coming through his door, and he just hoped he didn’t look as terrified as he felt.

The leader was in human form, looking much as Wolf or Sebastian had. Only unlike them, he moved with a confident, menacing grace. Behind the burly man were four gigantic wolves. Not people with tails stuck on-full, furry, four-legged wolves. They were bigger than the pony he had first learned to ride. Two of them curled their lips in a silent snarl at the portrait of Queen Red Riding Hood the First. My, what big teeth they had.

“Wel...” Wendell squeaked. He cleared his throat and tried again, bluffing for all he was worth. “I welcome you, my victorious soldiers.”

One of the wolves sniffed the air and chuckled slightly, but silenced at a glare from the leader, who bowed low, then dropped to one knee. The animals stuck one foreleg out and gracefully touched their noses to the floor, then lay down full length, their muzzles on the ground between their huge paws.

“Er, please rise,” Being stared at was unnerving, but it just wasn’t right to make the wolves... men... soldiers... who had rescued his people just lie there like dogs.

All five wolves got back to their feet, and every story about wolves eating people ran through Wendell’s mind, knocking out the speech he had planned. Gripping the arms of his throne, Wendell tried to think of something-anything!-to say.

“We frighten you, your majesty.” The leader wasn’t asking a question.

Well, they would hardly dare rip his throat out in his own throne room. “How I feel is beside the point. You have done good work in service of the Fourth Kingdom, and I wish to recognize that.” Honesty, and nerves, compelled him to add, “Although you aren’t at all like Wolf is.”

“What’s he like?” one of the wolves asked. It was the same one that had snickered at him before, and just as before, it silenced at a yellow-eyed glare from the leader. Wendell was just thankful that the leader’s eyes returned to brown when he turned back.

“Forgive my cousin, he is impetuous.”

This wasn’t so bad after all. Somehow it cheered Wendell immensely to know that even the leader of his feared wolf army had discipline problems.

“It was an impetuous wolf who scaled the walls of the Troll palace, was that you?” Wendell asked. The wolf nodded, wagging his tail slightly. “Then it is your pack that rescued all the people from the dungeons. I hear that more would have died that night in the Troll torture chambers if not for your bravery. Thank you.” The wolf bowed and Wendell bowed his head in return. “What are your names?”

The leader frowned. “We’re all Wolf.”

“I know you’re wolves, but...”

“Sire, that is our name. When you lead, your name becomes Wolf. You are The Wolf of whatever your pack is. So I am Wolf of Wendell’s Wolfpack. This,” he gestured to the last animal on his left, “is Wolf of the First Squadron of Wendell’s Wolfpack.”

He went up the line in that manner, up to his obstreperous cousin, the Wolf of the Fourth Squadron. “Just like your kingdom!” the irrepressible wolf said, wagging in a most unmilitary manner. Wendell smiled at him.

“What pack did Wolf lead, your Wolf?” the Lead Wolf asked him.

“I don’t really know,” Wendell admitted.

“What color was he in his fur form?” Fourth Wolf asked eagerly.

Wendell blinked. “He never changed. I’m not sure he could.” It would have certainly helped to have fangs on their side during their journey!

First Wolf wuffed in surprise, and Lead Wolf frowned. “He couldn’t change? But... that means he’s not really a wolf!” The other wolves looked at each other in consternation.

“Oh, he was a wolf, he had a tail,” Wendell said confidently.

“He might have wolf blood, but if he couldn’t change, he isn’t a wolf wolf.” Wendell’s expression must have told him to elaborate on his explanation, because he added, “His blood isn’t pure. He’s not full wolf.”

“You’re kidding.” Wolves were wolves were wolves, everyone knew that! For a brief moment Wendell felt a deep and unexpected sympathy for his travelling companion. Hated by humans, apparently hated by other wolves-no wonder Wolf was so neurotic!

The Lead Wolf was still working through this unexpected revelation. “The Wolf of Wolves isn’t even a wolf?”

Enough of this! Wendell had had a bellyful of prejudice from his own kind; he wasn’t going to deal with it from the animals as well. “Well, if that’s going to be a problem, I can adjust the pardon so that it only covers part-wolves, and deal with you separately, for your military valor.”

“Oh! No, your majesty, no, not a problem, not at all...” The Lead Wolf all but started groveling, while the furry ones nodded madly. Of course they wouldn’t dare lose any part of that pardon-what could be amended could also be erased.

Oh, if only the dwarves would be as easy to handle!