Prologue: Page 2

Three years later…

Dewinar Melodyhowl scrunched his face as sunlight hit him square on. He rolled away and scratched at his ear, hoping he wasn’t getting fleas. After yawning, he scratched his ear again and smacked his lips together, upon which he discovered a rancid taste in his mouth. His nose wrinkled.

What the hell happened? He tried to recall the night before. Crap, the Frenzy—the time of the month when WairFolk lost their ever-loving minds.

Mistress Moon! What had he gotten into while furry? He sat up and looked around him, hoping to find something to rinse his mouth out with. Instead, all he found was a bunch of overgrown trees.

“Dewi, are we alive?” Oben Quickfang looked over with bloodshot eyes at his best friend and first cousin from between his fingers. He had the worst headache. He always seemed to wake up with a headache after the Frenzy. How he hated when the New Moon came around. Last month he woke up in bed with a WairBunny. The time before that…

He groaned. He didn’t want to think about the time before that.

During the Frenzy, Wolves always went about in twos, using the buddy system in an attempt to stay out of trouble. Usually it was two males, or two females, sometimes, though less often, a male and female. The two could be friends, siblings, or even lovers. If they were mated, well…they usually didn’t go out at all.

Mated WairFolk weren’t affected by the Frenzy like those who were unmated—they mostly stayed home and enjoyed wild semi-furry sex, except in the case of WairBirds who had wild semi-feathery sex, and WairAmphibians… no one wanted to know what they did or how they did it, semi-amphibian or no.

Many a time during the Frenzy, unmated WairFolk found themselves in rather compromising positions, such as Oben in bed with the Bunny—the buddy system didn’t always pay off. Since WairFolk, for the most part, mated for life—depending upon if it was an arranged mating or if it was fated with the Wairs going into their half-state—any mate would be mighty upset to find out their other half had ended up in bed with someone other than them. Which is the reason why mated Wairs didn’t lose control of their senses during the New Moon and stayed home.

That left the unmated to go about in their Frenzy and, in the case of the Wolves, it was always nice to have a buddy about in case one or both ended up in jail.

 “Yeah, we are.” Dewi groaned, though he wondered about that. He shoved hair in shades of silver and black off his face—he was a Gray Wolf or, as the Gray’s referred to themselves, a Lobo. “But, right now, I’m more concerned with where we are. I don’t remember any forests in Upper Fair View.”

“There aren’t. They all moved away centuries ago. Something about the Beavers moving in.”

“Never tell me we traveled into the next county?”

“For all I know, we traveled across two continents.” Oben stretched and then returned his hands to his aching head. “I hate the Frenzy.”

Dewi scratched at his ear again. “At least you didn’t fuck a Bunny this time, old man.”

“I’m never going to live that down, am I?”

Dewi laughed. “Hell no. As Lobos, we don’t fuck Bunnies.”

“No, we eat them.” Oben shared a grin with his cousin—their mothers, both Lobos, were sisters—but then went back to scowling. “Why is it that our Dear Luna chose the day of the new moon to never come into the office?”

“Because, no self-respecting Wair wants to be seen during the Frenzy.”

“But Luna isn’t a Wair, she’s the Moon Goddess.”

“It’s said she wanted a personal day each month. She was just nice enough to take it when the moon was new. Could you imagine it being the Quarter Moon Frenzy? Or worse, the Full Moon Frenzy?”

Oben grunted and shoved himself off the ground to his feet, a hand still held to his head, fingers tangled in hair a mixture of auburn—his father was a Red Wolf—and grey. He looked around, his scowl deepening. “No, we aren’t in Upper Fair View anymore. I wonder if there’s a Tree Nymph nearby who can give us directions out of here.”

“By the look of this place, there hasn’t been one in years.” Dewi stood as well and tried to make sense of his tattered clothing. Where the hell was his wallet? Or had he even put it in his pocket last night? He looked at Oben, wondering if he had given his wallet to him, but Oben wasn’t in any better condition. At least they weren’t naked. That had happened three Frenzies ago and in the middle of a busy intersection. “Nymphs are pretty meticulous about their Groves.”

“They have to be, what with the Divinities preferring park-like settings.”

“Well that settles it. If there were a Tree Nymph around, we wouldn’t be here. They usually protect their Groves from guys like us during the Frenzy.”

“You have a point.” Oben rubbed his temples. “Still, it wouldn’t hurt to have a look. Maybe there’s some other Nymph around or maybe a Forest Fairy we can speak to. Groves are supposed to have Forest Fairies, right?”

“As long as it’s not a pastel Faie. The last one I ran into…” Dewi shuddered.

“Was that the one who tried to claim she carried your pups?”

“Mmmm, that’s the one. Could you imagine what those poor pups would’ve looked like?”

“They’d probably be pink poodles.” Oben sniffed the air, then sniffed his pits. “Damn, what were we rolling in.”

“Probably the same thing we were eating.” Dewi grimaced once more at the taste in his mouth. What had the wolf side of him gotten into? “Wait,” he squinted, thinking he spotted something and pointed. “Does that look like a door to you?”

Oben looked in the direction Dewi pointed, his head tilted to the side. “Behind all that ivy?”

“Yes.”

“It could be.” Oben shrugged. “Maybe it’s the Tree Nymph’s residential tree. That thing is huge.”

“I’m surprised she left her tree.”

“Maybe she didn’t. For all we know, she croaked, but had no relatives to wonder why she hasn’t called.”

“That would explain why we weren’t chased off last night.” Dewi slapped his friend on the shoulder. “Up for a bit more exploring?”

“Oh what the hell. Lets go. So what if we find the skeleton of a Tree Nymph, right?”

“Right.”

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