(Thomas POV)
Feeling restless and not yet ready to turn in for the night, I started looking over the books in the house. It was a random collection that didn't seem to have a rhyme or reason. That was until I came across one that seemed to be handwritten and not printed.
As I stood there and began reading the first page, I realized it was written by my grandmother, Elaraim Raizel. Not as a day-to-day diary, but more as a summary of her life. She spoke of her early life with her younger twin brother Ephraim. They were a simple people and not one of the larger tribes that were heavily impacted by the Euro-American westward expansion.
After reading this far, I found myself engrossed, so I went to the table and began reading further.
Her people called them 'White Drifting-House people' and tried to keep the peace with them. This included allowing priests of their 'God' to teach them to read and write. Elaraiam herself loved learning and excelled at it, according to the priest. He had even asked her to become a sister of the faith, giving her mind and body to their God.
While she did like learning from them, she'd refused. She would not abandon her people's stories, her people's spirits, for the white man's heaven. For that, she was cast out of the mission school, branded ungrateful, a heretic.
She found more comfort in her people's history, that her ancestors had been found by Q'waeti the Wanderer, and he showed them how to move their soul from their bodies to scare away rival tribes and keep an eye on their lands.
Years passed, and life was somewhat peaceful until she and her brother began feeling great rage and occasionally coming across a sweet smell in the woods. She wrote of being out in the forest with Ephraim when they first stumbled on it—the cloying, sweet smell that stirred something fierce in their blood. They found a deer drained dry, its body empty of life. Rage overwhelmed them, sudden and primal, and before they understood what was happening, their bodies broke and reshaped. Wolves stood where siblings had knelt.
Once they changed back, they returned to the village and told their story to their father. That was when they were told the rest of their history. That during a troubled time in the past, there had been a betrayal in their own Tribe. One had used his soul-wandering ability to steal the body of the Chief.
But later, the soul of the Chief returned to find his people in misery because of what the traitor had done. Instead of wasting away like the traitor had hoped, the soul of Taha Aki took refuge in the body of a wolf. And when the tribe uncovered the betrayal, the traitor sought to deny it by spilling innocent blood. Seeing this, Taha Aki's rage burned too hot for the wolf's skin to contain. The beast broke, reshaped, and where it had stood rose a man touched by the wolf's spirit. Thus, the first Wolf Warrior was born.
In the years after, more men found themselves able to change when the tribe faced danger. They became protectors, especially against something the elders called the Cold Ones—pale predators who fed on blood and brought ruin wherever they walked.
But their father was troubled. Never in all their stories had a woman been spoken of as a soul-traveler, much less a Wolf Warrior. When the truth of Elaraim's change was brought before the elders, a great argument split the council.
The elders said that a woman bearing the gift was a threat to the order of the tribe. They whispered that men without the gift would feel dishonored, lessened. They claimed that to allow her to walk as a wolf would fracture the people. A woman's place is in the camp, they said, tending the hearth and the children, not in the hunt or in battle.
Ephraim raged at them. Younger though he was, he called them fools, blind with jealousy. But the council would not be swayed. Because he was male, they named him Chief, the first Wolf Warrior of their time. He nearly turned the honor down in protest, but it was Elaraim who convinced him to take it—for the good of the people, for their survival, even if it costs us both.
The elders forbade Elaraim from changing again, demanded she bury her fire. But she defied them. For her defiance, they cast her out.
Her words grew steadier on the page as she wrote of what came after. Banished from her people, she wandered the coast and the forests, alone but not broken. That was when she met the man who would alter her path forever.
He was not like the pale people who had come from the east and settled near the Tribe. His skin was sun-browned, his eyes dark as wet stone, his manner foreign yet strangely familiar. Without knowing why, she imprinted on him—her whole being anchoring itself to his. His name was Parth Raizel, from a land beyond the seas, half a world away.
And he, in turn, fell in love with her.
Parth brought Elaraim across the seas and back to his home in Nepal. There, she learned his people also carried old fire in their blood, though it took different shapes. When his clan heard of her wolf, of her defiance, of the power the elders had sought to cage, they claimed her as kin and convinced the couple to move to Jiva's Home village, where her fire would not be stifled but studied, sharpened.
Here she was surprised to learn that the 'Jiva' believed that in the beginning of memory (70,000 Years ago) a race came from the stars and began modifying those they found. Combining many together with animals and giving them gifts such as strength and durability unknown before. Some could change between shapes and even fly like birds. Some gained the ability to cast what we now call magic to fight and manipulate their surroundings.
And then there were the stone-skinned ones. Faster than sight, strong as the greatest beasts, but cursed. The transformation hollowed them, stole their lifeblood. To endure, they turned upon humankind, feeding on the blood of normal people.
The Jiva claim those creatures are not of us. They are the flaw in the design, the hunger that was never meant to be. They were cast adrift when the star-race abandoned their experiments, but their kind multiplied like shadows. She realized that these are the Cold Ones of her people's stories, and worse.
She went on to describe her life and reveal that she had given birth to two children. Her firstborn, Vyaghra Ephraim Raizel, was strong in the gift of both his mother and father. He showed early signs of shifting into the shape of a tiger rather than a wolf, and everything indicated that he would be more than strong enough to lead the Tribe one day.
But her second son did not want his gift to awaken, so he requested that it be caged, and he be allowed to go out into the world and live freely. His name was Devansh Parth Raizel, and his leaving Jiva's home nearly broke her. "I gave him my blessing to go with my lips, but not with my heart." She wrote.
I paused here as the enormity of the words hit me. This was no longer just me reading about a figure in a story, but my own blood history. I went back and reread a few passages to let everything settle more.
She received word from Devansh from time to time, but he never returned to visit her. Not even when tragedy struck and her anchor to the world loosened, Parth died in an accident. With the loss of her husband, she then started to speak of old Quileute stories of becoming the wolf and leaving the pain of people behind, but she wanted to stay and watch over Vyaghra. At least until he became leader of the tiger clan.
The last few pages spoke of her watching as Vyaghra eventually claimed his place as chief, and shortly after that, she again heard of her son Devansh. When it was revealed that he had died due to the violent ways of the American cities, she described it as her anchor to the world fully let loose. Knowing her firstborn would prosper, she decided to take her wolf form and leave the village.
I closed the book after reading the last word and leaned back, my mind whirling with all I had learned. Then it dawned on me that the Tribal leader who looked at me with such hatred was actually my uncle. My closest living blood relative on my father's side. With that thought lingering, I went to bed and made plans to learn more of what this Jiva's home had to offer.