The Wiccan Diaries: Neophyte Adept Part 42

It took me a second, but I nodded my head. He was a taciturn, unpleasant sort of werewolf, Lockeone of the old Team Leaders from when we had the Gathering; Locke gave me the creeps, which I knew I shouldn't have said, so I kept my mouth shut. It was almost like Locke, though an impressive specimen, physically, was aloof, outside of the Pack, while being paradoxically esteemed within its group. (It wasn't a fraternity because there were female members in I Gatti. All except for Lia, who had lost her Gift, while acquiring Wicca. Something else she shared with her soon-to-be hubby, was the absence of their animals. Gaven was no longer a transformer, being that he was over thirty and old.) "Anyway," Ballard said, "Yeah. Locke's been making trouble."

By troublemaking, Ballard said, "Locke's been angling to be in charge, you know, politicking."

"You mean he wants to be Head Wolf?" I said.

I asked Ballard why this was so bad, but he just scowled.

"So Locke's been campaigning, so what?" I said. In fact, I was glad Locke did anything so normal as speak. He had certainly never opened his mouth in front of me before, except once.

But Ballard insisted it was not how it was done.

"How what's done?" I asked.

He looked at me. And again, I saw that menacing, prowling something, behind his eyes. The shade of the werewolf.

"Il Gatto is a distinction earned through daring," said Ballard. "It's like riding the biggest wave, or k-killing the most dangerous bear. You don't just talk your way into the Headship and are elected Il Gatto. Everyone knows it's a motorcycle compet.i.tion. In I Gatti, we race for it!" His fist was in the air. It was important I understand how macho and bada.s.s werewolves were.

"So when is the race?" I asked.

This was the wrong question.

"Never, if Locke gets his way. He keeps saying the next Il Gatto will be the most important in our history, and whoever is elected, it should be because they'll be the best fit for 'the particular problems we will face.' Or some such. I'm not good at all that talking. I prefer the actual doing. You know? Something Locke fails at completely. He's all talk. No. Don't start. I know what I'm talking about. If he gets elected," said Ballard, "you'll see what I mean. Rome will fall to pieces. Again. Gaven picked the wrong time to get old."

I thought about that. In fact, I had a theory: that the Head didn't matter so much. It was the body politic and all its processes which gave the Head its power. Without the worker bees there could be no queen bees.

It was impossible that Wicca not intrude on my dream scenario. In Wicca, females ruled. The werewolves seemed to be patriarchal; now Locke wanted to change all that. Maybe Lia could be Head. I asked Ballard.

But he cut me off. "Please. The Head should be a dude. Pure and simple."

"Why can't women partic.i.p.ate?" I asked, indignantly.

"Lia only mattered when she was Gaven's thang," said Ballard, not without smiling. "When he was the Head. Now that he's not... the crown, or whathaveyou, is being held in interreges, waiting for the new one to beyuckfigured out. Gaven's a puppet Head only. A figurehead. A lame duck. That's it. Gaven is a lame duck. Those are the words." Ballard smiled.

"I've always considered Gaven to be a cool cat," I said, "despite his being a werewolf.... Meanwhile, Lia is an Alpha cyanthrope..."

"Alpha, beta, beta, alpha," said Ballard. "And she's not a cyanthrope, she's a witchanthrope."

"Don't be such a misanthrope. You know what I mean, she's got a good head on her shoulders," I said.

"There's just the fact that she can't transform any longer," said Ballard.

"Has it not come back?" I asked, wondering about Lia's transformation, and if possible, if she could somehow become the first Shifter Witch in a centurysince the great Rhea Silva, who I didn't know anything about, but kept thinking of. I didn't know why, but it felt like Rhea Silva was our mother. Like she was Lia's and my mother. Our Wiccan mother. Our precursor, maybe. That we had been brought into a great tradition. Which was like my Mark. I had my mother's Mark. The hoodie was keeping it under wraps. Good thing about winterit hides your Marks.

Ballard just sighed.

"It's hard being the one who's never chosen," he said. And then: "Gaven he's like one of those dogs running around with its hindquarters strapped in a two-wheeler; you know, gimped?"

"Ballard..." I said.

"They treat him like a dead man walking, or worse, like a leper. He's wandering aimlessly. He doesn't know what to do with himself. He's sticking around for her. Lia. Before I met you, when Lia was first shifting, she used to be in and out," said Ballard. "My parents were really worried. They didn't know what was going onwhich I've just learned was a complete and utter lie. They did know what was going on. They just wouldn't tell me. Anywaythey wondered why she kept running around with that dratted boy. Now, apparently, they're going to rewrite the past and say they knew Gaven was the Pack Leader, and an alright dude. Apparently the old Leader whom Gaven replaced, Lorenzo, had run off. I forget what happened. Actually, I think he was banished. I've been thinking about the cats. They say a new cat will have to get thrown out of his home range and wander to find a mate. That's sort of the same with wolves. You realize that there's only one, quote-unquote, mating pair within a pack of wolves, right? In the wild, they form packs of between six and eight. But we're werewolves, so it's a little different. And the pack sizes are larger. Our pack's never been this large before. And there have been squabbles," said Ballard, his mind all over the place. "They say the sin of large families is backbiting. Whatevs."

I didn't know if I was a bad influence on him or what. But I waited for Ballard to talk again.

"Anyway. What I was saying is Lia and Gaven are like this," he said. He entwined his fingertips. "They don't want him coming back. Gaven," said Ballard, making sure I understood.

"Wait... What?" I said.

He sighed.

"It's a hard life being a wolf. Moreso when your own pack turns on you."

"I Gatti has turned its packI mean its backon Gaven?"

"Not to his face," said Ballard, unhelpfully, "but you get the gist."

"No. I really don't," I said. "Explain."

"Gaven is old," said Ballard. It seemed obvious to him. Then why did I feel like I was missing something?

"You don't mean to say" I said, "they don't want him around anymore?"

"Bingo," said Ballard, and winked at me.

Now I was completely confused. And I was starting to get angry. Gaven was Gaven. He didn't deserve this kind of treatment. I focused on Ballard with my eyes to get him to elaborate. Maybe he could see the fiercea.s.sness behind my eyes. Maybe he thought I would put a jinx on him. Whatever it was, he started talking more explicitly, in a way I could understand.

"Gaven can't shift. He is no longer one of us. Before you get upset," said Ballard, "it was my advice that the Council, the Werewolf Council, you remember, make him a lifetime member of the Pack, a consiglieri, you know, a respected advisor, someone on the board of trustees, that sort of thingthat's why I haven't been around, I've been busy Happy birthday, by the way," he said to me.

"Thanks."

"but apparently it's against the rules, and now he's a dummy figurehead waiting for his successor. I didn't make the rules," said Ballard, who could see me getting visibly upset. "In fact, the Council, of which I'm not a membertoo young, remember?suggested that I was colluding with him, that Gaven was trying to exert his waning influence to choose his successor, but then that's how Locke is, he makes everyone so paranoid, to the point where they turned away from Gaven. It's almost like he's outcast, or worse: like Gaven's a non-person. A non-wolf. NWG. Non-wolf Gaven.

"But it's only during Wolf Councils. Of course, everyone's going to be at the wedding. They think it's a good thing. They want Gaven gone and maybe his honeymoon will help expedite the transition. Out of sight, out of mind. Or something.

"Gaven is like that old wolf," said Ballard, which was a kind of echo from the man himself. "With him here, no one else can establish dominance, become an Alpha."

But I had had enough.

"You cannot become an Alpha," I said angrily. "Either you're born with it, or you're not. And I know Locke. And he's not. Despite what others may say!"

Locke was not an alpha dog. Nor was he a beta. He was a tertiary character who was a whining cur and I wouldn't let him treat Gaven this way. I wouldn't.

"But you forget there's also Paolo, and some others," said Ballard. "They all want their shot. In the absence of Alphas someone will rise to seize the Alpha Headship in their stead."

"I don't care," I said. "Gaven should be Head. He's oldest and he's the wisest. And he's the hottest. So there."

Ballard just sighed though.

Apparently I wasn't a werewolf so I didn't understand.

"Do you know what happens when someone new and younger comes in? Either the old make way or there's civil war. Gaven knows this. He doesn't want to be the cause of discord. Especially during these troubling times," said Ballard.

I snorted.

Ballard did his so-be-it look.

Ballard had a point, but I had the rest. Hadn't I seen Ballard, in one of my dreams, as Head of the Pack? Not Paolo. Not Locke. Not even Lia. But Ballard. I decided to keep it to myself. But my Diary had to know. And I made a vow to myself that I would get it all down.

This new sometimes-wise Ballard was really annoying. I missed the old hothead. But now he contained distinctions. I would keep my eye on that.

Locke was a bozothere could be no denying that; and if he was leading the Council, perhaps it wasn't such a leap that he would become Head Wolf. I rubbed my Wiccan fingertips together, itching to pick a fight.

As far as mating pairs went, all the werewolves hooked up with each other. Ballard said they had extraordinary s.e.xual appet.i.tes. Maybe they just needed to go with their instincts on this one, whatever that meant. But it did explain one thing. Why there were no old werewolves in the Pack. They had all been ostracized.

Chapter 3 Luminarium.

Ballard had reinvented himself: he was more self-confident, less of a kid, more inclined to talk impromptu and pa.s.sionately on various subjects, and his mind raced, like a million out-of-control Gambalungas.

He was working on a crutch or a clutch or a brake lining or something, which was all technical mumbo-jumbo to me, while I wrote in my diary. He took the opportunity to look at it again, and comment that, Didn't I know better? "What would happen," he said, "if your Diary fell into the wrong hands?"

I shrugged. "They would be entertained? Besides," I said, "imagine if there were the Risky Diaries, if he had kept a journal? What might we know then?"

He nodded, thinking about it.

"You haven't, you know, found out anything, have you?" he said. "I mean, when I was... I mean... did you?" He looked at me bug-eyed.

"You mean when you were ignoring me, Ballard? No," I said. "I don't know anything new. Why?"

He looked relieved.

"Good," he said. "That way we can figure things out together."

It was like that whole episode in October-November-December was forgotten about.

I looked at him curiously. For whatever reason, he and I were linked. It was like we were lineaged to each other. Descendants of the same problem. What had Risky and the Rookmaakers been up to, that it got the Rookmaakers killed?

And Risky. Whatever had happened, he had never spoken about it to anyone. Not even Gaven or Lia. If Risky wasn't a Rosen, who was he? What had happened to him? What happened to the Rookmaakers, and what was Risky's role in it? Risky had left Ballard a cryptic note, along the lines of find Halsey Rookmaaker. But now what?

The absence of any answer was my biggest problem in life. Risky was dead and my parents too. But then, the secret must lay in House Rookmaaker. I abused my diary gnatting at the problem.

Ballard was rocking out to his beat-up boom box, music I had never heard before. I must've looked all weird, sitting cross-legged with my hair in my lap. I needed a haircut. I couldn't be left standing around not knowing what to do, if I was going to have my own House. I was a Mistress now. The Rookmaaker of Rookmaaker House. Me. It felt like something which had been unearned. And I wondered why my parents had left it to me? If I was ever going to be worthy of House Rookmaaker, I would have to start earning it now. Unbidden came the image of the two gravediggers, and the words: stormr hamrinum. I looked at my Mark, wondering if I should try it. Reckless, said a small voice in my ear.

The words had been spoken, like a magic spell, or an incantation.

I needed someone who could teach me the ropesinstruct me in the ways of Wiccabecause only then could I exercise my powerand keep House Rookmaaker from becoming the kind of place I imagined the Ravenseals had becomedecadent, hierarchical, and compet.i.tive in a way which was disadvantageous to everyone except those few at the very top.

My parents would've wanted Rookmaaker to be a place of inclusion, I felt; and since I had no one else to discuss the matter with...

I bent my head over the paper.

"How's the vampire situation in Rome going?" I asked, wondering if Ballard's family was still hunting them.

Ballard looked up. His forehead slick with sweat.

"It's like they've vanished," he said. He went back to his work. So apparently the vampires were all gone.

With Rome now definitively the werewolves', I would be free to develop House Rookmaaker unenc.u.mbered by outside influences.

And if the Lenoir, or House Ravenseal, or the Master House tried to interfere with me, woe betide the individuals who got on the wrong side of us.

It will flourish like a roisin dubh in the hot Roman sun, my Wiccan Housewherever it was.

Things to do by Magic (a list). I wrote: fly, turn invisible; I made a list, ticking them all off, fully intending to learn each one.

Next, I made a chart of all the known werewolves in Ballard's familyand their proclivities....

There was Locke... And Paolo, of course; Liesel, Lia, Gaven, Ballard. There was also Raina, Lorentz, Blunt, Giorgio, Berenice, Mich.e.l.lePendderwenn. It was funny. There was actually a werewolf named Pendderwenn. I had thought that was a Wiccan House, yet here it was, being used by a daughter (not son) of Romulus. Oh, I remembered, writing it down. There was also Leander, another one of the Werewolf Team Leaders. I listed who was alpha and who was beta. I thought a bit, for if I had missed one. Volt and Pouch, I wrote. I didn't know the Pack dynamics well at all.

Who were all of these lycanthropes?

Plus there were lots more of themthe ones I had never directly 'met'the other shape shifters.

I stood with my back to Ballard and looked at the motorcycle shop, my eyes wandering to the open garage door. Rome was like a wonderful shining metropolis which held the glitter of my future happiness. The past was receding. Ballard's past. Mine. The seven hills were like a fortification, defending us. Somewhere a horn sounded, a statue was crumbling.... And all the while I thought of him, and how we had come so close to our dreams, only to feel them abandon us, like the fog which rushes in and rolls out, each morning. A blanket of filth overhung Rome. I would miss it, when I left. I would miss the romantic notion that I would miss Rome, but I would miss Rome, nonetheless.

So there were four big ones: Paolo, Locke, Leander, and Liesel (who was a chick); and also the big three, Gaven, Lia (another chick; I don't know why that interested me so much), and Ballard.

Something else occurred to me. With House Pendderwenn now extinct (and by that, I meant, all of its members now dead), mine was the only Wiccan House in Rome. In a way I had already fortuitously met the neighbors. What is more, we got along. Which was really big news. I saw Rome as a small community of like-minded pre-, post-, and current shape changers. And me.

(Post would be what happened when you got too old, and pre, like Volt and Pouch, and those types: adolescents not yet into their powers; which is what Ballard should have been; but he wasn't, he was alpha dog; in point of fact, my alpha dog.) Ballard continued to work on the strange and sparkly motorcycle, while I thought about this, and who should be the new Il Gatto.

He could not refrain, however, from asking the question I had hoped Ballard would avoid. Namely, what had happened between me andwhat's-his-face? Lennox?

It's over.

We've moved on.

I'm flying solo now.

I'm going to become a lesbian.