The Wind That Haunts Me

A "hero's conflict" story for English Literature class. I know that is terrible!! I'm really much better at prose as opposed to fiction. However, I would like to make this good eventually.

The Wind That Haunts Me

        Wind whispered fragrantly, tenderly tickling the tips of the pine forest. In winter it would shriek and claw as if it were emulating a sinister, fairy tale dragon. For Fie it was the physical evidence of her pulsating restlessness. She was a wolf-child, bred and birthed to hunt the forests, flying on four legs or striding with two. There was nothing in the world so free, nor any circle more safe than that of her pack. No member, no matter how broken or injured, would ever be left to fend for himself. 

        "To serve is the greatest love." She nearly rolled her eyes. The truth had been scrubbed, wrung out and displayed proudly for so long that cliche was too weak of a word to describe it. Obviously she couldn't help loving those who had nurtured her for an entire lifetime. Sometimes she just wished that she could experience something different---like the humans who lived beyond the forest. 

        The humans fascinated Fie with their square little houses and tree trunk fences....the penned up animals offended the wolf in her though. She shook her head distainfully.  Hunting was one thing, but prey should have a fair chance to escape. Of course humans couldn't be expected to know that....what was it like not to be able to morph from person to wolf at will? There should have been no attraction for her from such beings. She could think of no reason except perhaps their total foreigness.....coupled with the often overprotective elders of the pack. 

        Fie scruntched her nose rebelliously. It seemed like there was a well worn rule for everything. 'Don't hunt alone.' 'Don't race a head of a hunting party.' 'Don't leave the forest!" The last one irked Fie the most. More than the early morning guard duty or having to care for other people's pups while the males her age went on special hunting and scouting trips. What death stench had  reached their nostrils from the world beyond the Forest? Humans might not understand the wolf-people, but it's not like they weren't capable of blending in. In fact the thought sent shivers of excitement down her spine. Grinning toothily she loped off towards the river to explain her plan to the small group of young miscreants that often lazed about there. They called themselves WindRunners...the rebellious youth who drank the night adrenaline with glee and had many cladenstine escapades that only the sympathetic shadows had witnessed. Tonight there would be a new adventure...more daring than any before. They would leave the Forest.....

        "We've tried to make allowances for your youth, but you've reached the point where other lives are becoming endangered by your recklessness." Fie hunched before the 7 elders in front of her. Outwardly she was calm and submissive. Mentally she turned her tail on them. Every time a WindRunner got caught there was the same Gathering....the elders confronted and threatened. Nothing ever changed. This morning would be the same.....

                The forest streaked behind her and the wind that carried its scent was lost upon her aching brain. Banished. The elder's verdict echoed around in her head with the persistent pitch of a scalding squirrel screetch. Her paws quickened. Determined to outrun the tears that chased her, she glared ahead blindly.  She had wanted to know of the humans and now she cradled her wish with trembling finger tips. It was all she could do decide whether to befriend excitement or regret. For three years she was to be barred from the forest--- to live in the world of man---then free to return. The elders parting words still clung to her like wisps of salty campfire smoke. 

        "There will be a price to pay if you do not return at the end of the allotted time. If you are desirous to live amidst them still, content to ignore half of what you are, slowly your senses will dull. You will become like them, shut off from the world beyond the obvious. What once heard quickly will deafen; the clear eye will dim, and the pull to change from form to form will fade away. You will be what you choose to live as and live with the knowledge of that choice." 

        Fie ducked from the merciless memory for hours, charging forward until a sqirrel hole encased one weakening paw. Like a fallen warrior she met the earth and was still---a lanky black wolf. 

 

.....She awoke to find herself staring into the small pool of glittering liquid. Murky grey figures moved about its surface silently...her pack in the close knit evening circle, humans that she had never seen before and suddenly with acute clarity, the face of grinning young man. A large, worn hand swept over the water just then, causing Fie to yelp and tumble back childishly. Rarely was anyone able to walk undetected by her wolf ears...yet something in the figure attached to the hand made her involuntarily lower her hackles of embarrassed anger. There was something familiar about the pliable man before her. Pale and ageless, only his eyes were of note. They danced blue with a stripping capacity that made Fie believe he knew every motive in her heart. That same heart pulsed with sudden recognition. 

        "Beathan (son of the right hand)...." She hadn't taken the time to imagine what he looked like since she was a tiny child. Curled up as a link in the pack's chain around the fire, she soaked up those stories of the Being who had wrought a scattered people together again. Once they had wandered as outcasts amidst the human towns and villages, some hiding their identities to avoid the fear that inevitably lead to hatred and persecution. He had called them out of the human's world and led them into the Forest. There they had found a place to thrive, with excess game and secret little hollows for pups to tumble from. Some said that he spoke to the elders...or appeared when there was some great need. She couldn't imagine what he was doing here. He smiled sadly.

        "Birth has named your calling, but choice can make it void.

          Your often polished pedestal will become a pit without reprieve. 

          A wise man chooses his affliction with my eyes."

        ........She opened her eyes to find herself level with the ground, paw still caught in the squirrel hole. Painfully she clawed her way into a standing position and stayed there a while swaying willowishly. He hadn't told her directly not to keep going. Something in the back of her mind pricked her. She could turn back and stand before the elders in truthful apology. That action alone might have the power to absolve her from banishment. Yet she couldn't. Not for all the safety that there would be in returning. She had to know.The nearer that she limped to the first human village, the more Beathan's warnings faded. Her fears were squelched by anticipation. At last she would experience what it felt like to be human!

        When she was nearly in sight of the first thatched box she willed the change. Large black paws shimmered into pale white toes that stepped confidently down the turf towards the new life ahead...................

 

        At first it was difficult for her to assimilate. Her old prejudices had to be overcome. She need to fit in. It wasn't long however, until she befriended a lively girl named Celeste, who offered her a place to stay. Soon the girl's family and farm were almost considered a substitute home. She was a source of great amusement to them.....ignorant of everything and eager to learn. Hayrides, dances, even milking the cows was a delight. Her bubbling enthusiasm and readiness to try anything soon made her very popular with the youth her age. 

        Eventually life settled into a more steady pace. A year went by and the novelty began to wear off. More and more, she dreamt of the pack. Once while racing Celeste across the potato field, she forgot herself. The pure joy of running flowed over her, and she responded as she always had...by beginning to change into the form that ran best. Celeste's shriek of laughter caught her before she had begun to shimmer very much, and she took it as a warning to watch herself more carefully. 

        Yet no matter how determinedly human she stayed, no amount of will could keep the wind away. Sometimes while she wandered the shadow cloaked apple orchard it found her. Like a messenger it carried those familiar scents of spicy heather, chocolaty moss, icy water and most brutally, sweaty fur faces. Fie stopped walking outside at night. So the wind sighed and turned back to the Forest to bide its time there. 

        Another strange thing was happening. Even as Fie marked the passing of the second year, a glow that had been carefully hidden in her heart began to beam through her eyes--- exposed. Zane was Celeste's grinning older brother. Somehow his easygoing observance and laughing blue eyes had stumbled up and caught her in their unintentional web. Her witty countenance and disinterested smile masked a heart that insisted upon gymnastics every time they glanced at him. Finally, she stuck her tongue out at fear and told him. She wilted at his hidden smile and firmly stamped back the flames from her eyes. Just when the glow was nearly forgotten, his eyes found the same story. 

        The third year was not the innocent faux pas of the first or the loneliness of the second. Laughter was less raucous and butterflied more joy. Looks, once illicit glances, matured into deep gazes that recognized things like a wizened gossip. Fie held her happiness like a talisman against the end of the year. Being human had become a jar of melted honey, to salivate over, then sensuously savor---one could not think of the empty jar. Now no longer skittish of the wind, she floated with Zane in the orchards. He was also a talisman---the whispering wind was jealous. 

        The last week approached....Fie kicked and scratched at the impending choice. Zane caught hints of her well concealed torment and finally grabbed her by the shoulders and refused to release her until she told him what was wrong. It was just past sunrise. Such a brave thing it seemed to her...for the sun to rise despite the inevitable night impending upon this last day. Like a dam, straining for centuries until it cannot bear the weight of the water, her story gushed out in saltwater torrents. Zane's countenance became pale, his thoughts scrawled in his eyes like a foreign language. Mistrust....that was the only familiar integer. Fie could feel her old frustration towards humans clawing up her throat even as her heart sank down it. She wrenched away from his lifeless grasp and bolted. This time the change was begged for---the familiar shimmering that would erase the thumbprints on her shoulders and the footprints over her heart. The wind raced beside her the entire length of her emotions, until the feathered fields and burnished sky began to fade grey. 

        Fie shimmered human at the forking road. One grassy strip lead back to the pack---acceptance, safety, peace---certain as the wolf senses she yet retained. The other, more rutted and wrinkled was.....she squinted against the twilight. A lone, dark figure bobbed towards her. Zane. He reached her, shrinking in desperation to regain his breath. The wind stirred suddenly. It was more insistent than ever before and began to swirl with the familiar howling voices of her family. 

        Fie stared strait ahead. The wind had turned its back on her. No matter which side of the fork her choice sealed her on, it would never grant her the gift to forget. "It is the wind that haunts me." The voice inside of her spoke. It was whiter than the uncertain warble of before. Certainty steeled its nerves and without looking back fixed Fie upon her path. 

        

        

 

Author's Note

Please help me make this better....I'm not good at fiction so I need ideas and specific parts to change!!! Thank you.