Old Friend

	The chill of the early winter air nipped at my nose and ear tips, exposed as they are without the hood of my heavy northern coat.  Damn Klaus for talking me out of bringing it with me inland.  He’d insisted after so long in the Kadrush, my fur would have grown in enough that Amurescan nights would not warrant covering my extremities.  
	And it had, to a certain extent.  But what he always failed to remember is that my fur is shorter and courser than his immaculately-bred coat.  My bloodline hails from the highlands, where the winters aren’t nearly as cold.  Here in the Capital, the oceans graze the city with the icy tendrils of the storms boiling down from further north.  It’s nothing like it is in the Kadrush, of course.  But it’s hardly pleasant when you’ve got ears like mine, and no one likes a cold nose.
	Of course none of this would be an issue if I’d been invited in to the gala he was currently enjoying.  Too much to hope for, I suppose.  But as the last hour had crept past, I’d begun to wonder why he’d brought me out tonight at all.  No, scratch that.  I’d wondered that two hours ago, when we’d been at our . . . well his . . . hotel, and he’d told me we were going out tonight.  And I’d asked him.  I was no fool.  Despite how close my Admiral and I had grown over the last few years, I knew from life experience and basic common fucking sense how taboo our connection was, and that the only point at which he’d ever acknowledge it publicly was on his damned deathbed.  
	So, naturally, I’d been curious why he was asking me to accompany him to another of the stuffy parties he himself had admitted he loathed so much, when it was plainly clear I wouldn’t even be allowed inside.  I was a Midshipman, a rank I was extremely grateful to have, considering my lack of any proper breeding.  I’d proven myself amongst the crew over the years, Klaus was not one for favoritism without merit.  It had been hard-won, but I was well accepted and respected at sea.
	On land was another matter.  On land, the fact that I wasn’t a Pedigree suddenly mattered again.  No matter my accomplishments on his crew, a mongrel like me was not welcome at the sorts of functions Klaus Richter so reluctantly attended.  He’d been mumbling and unclear what this one was even for . . . some kind of benefit, I think.  
	He’d been even less clear about why he was so insistent I come.  But I’d put on my one good outfit, and obediently followed, expecting at least that I’d get an explanation along the carriage ride to so-and-so’s Estate.  None was forthcoming.
	When we arrived at the immaculate city residence, I’d waited patiently to know why I was here.  And then we’d departed the carriage, and I thought surely, then.
	But all the aloof shepherd – my ever-frustrating, often selfish and egomaniacal lover – had given me was a mysterious ‘Wait here’ before turning on his heel and heading towards the Estate with a flourish of gold-trimmed coattails. 
	And since then it had been nearly an hour.  The carriage driver was as befuddled as I.  But the boxer mix was amicable and friendly, thankfully, and had let me share some bad vodka with him while we waited.  It was taking the edge off the cold, at least.
	We were partway into a conversation about the war – he’d apparently been part of the army until about a decade ago when he’d been injured by a horse – when I noticed a tall, vaguely canine figure approaching us.  He stood out not only because he seemed to be headed in our direction, but because the gala had been in full swing for over an hour now and most of those attending had shown up in carriages, not on foot.  Perhaps someone from the stables here, or another servant from the manor?
	He was holding a letter, or some kind of slip of paper, in one paw, and seemed uncertain.  I kept my ears turned in his direction, giving him a sidelong long until it was clear he was in fact headed for us.  But by his posture alone, I could tell he was wary about something and that made me nervous.
	I fingered the hilt of my knife just for security’s sake, my claws tapping at it just to assure my nerves that it was in fact there.  I saw the carriage driver eyeing me, apparently wise to what I was doing, but he didn’t try to stop me.  He’d been a soldier too, after all.
	“Looking for someone?”  I decided to speak up first.  
	His ears perked and he turned his sharp muzzle in our direction, the light from the nearby lanterns catching in his gaze.  I knew from the moment his eyes flashed that he was a wolf.  They had a particularly bright hue.  His was green, although that didn’t necessarily mean his eyes were too.
	He was wearing a long, fur-lined coat, but beyond that I couldn’t make out much in the misty city air until he came closer.  He did so with measured, quiet steps, a stark reminder that many of the wolves left in the world were part of tribes that still held close to their hunter/gatherer roots.  It was eerie how quiet they could be sometimes.
	He was a striking creature, but then most wolves were.  His eyes were in fact green, and he wore mostly dark brown leather.  There was nothing particularly unusual about his coloration, his fur was a blend of greys and some brown, especially along the tops of his ears and a ridge that started near the crown of his head.  I suspected it went further down his spine, but he wore a hood, and more tellingly, seemed to sport the beginnings of a thick mane that wasn’t entirely contained beneath said hood.  Definitely a tribesman, then.
	Also, most certainly a northern wolf.  His fur was thick, his build robust, and he was very tall.  I’d met wolves from the colonies, they’d spent generations intermarrying with the Carvecian breeds and tended towards a sleeker physique.  This wolf was from Northern Amuresca, possibly as far up as the Kadrush.
	When he spoke, his accent confirmed it.  “I am come for a contact of Klaus Richter,” he said in a deep, but mellow tone.  All at once for some reason, I felt at ease.  Perhaps it was the fact that in the light, his towering build was belied by the lost, confused expression on his muzzle.  I had no doubt that under different circumstances, this beast might have been quite menacing.  But at the moment he seemed more like a lost tourist.
	“You know the Admiral?”  I asked, stepping forward.
	“Knew.  Yes,” he nodded, glancing between me and the slip of paper in his hand.  “Long years ago.  I am survey corps, part of expedition to chart passage through the ice fields.”
	“Oh, yeah,” I perked up, “he told me about that.  That was, what . . . five, six years ago?  He took a bunch of you lot up there to find a new route north somewhere, right?  Didn’t go well, from what I heard.”
	“We do best,” the wolf shrugged, flashing his teeth in what was probably supposed to be a smile, but his muzzle was enormous and his teeth equally so.  Everything about him was enormous, honestly.  “I am born from Kharavosk, my tribe knows area well.  I tell them from beginning is no good route where they are looking, but, egch,” he made a noise that sounded something like a dismissive growl that I knew from dealing with some of the northerners basically translated to ‘no one cares’.  It made me smile, for some reason.  I liked the northern people in general, when they weren’t trying to kill us.  It was a harsh, but simpler way of life up there.  And the Church couldn’t quite get a firm grip on the area.  Tribal beliefs still survived in the cold reaches.  Likely the real reason behind all the border skirmishes, but don’t say that aloud in Amuresca.
	“So you’re looking for someone. . . for Klaus?”  I asked, eyeing the letter he was holding.  As if I could read it particularly well.  I’d only recently become somewhat literate, and it looked to be written in badly-scrawled tribal-	
	Before he could reply, I reached forward and grabbed for the letter.  The big wolf stiffened, but didn’t let go of it, and that was fine by me because by then I’d seen all I needed to.
	“Klaus wrote this,” I declared after a long look at the hand-writing, then looked up at him.  “This is a letter from him.”
	“Yes,” he replied, confused.  “I was about to tell you as much.”  He released the letter at that, letting me have it, and stepped back.  As he did, I swore I heard the clink of something beneath his coat.  I knew the sound well.  He’d released a partially unsheathed blade.
	“I’m sorry,” I said, glancing back at him after eyeing the letter another few moments.  “I didn’t mean to grab at you like that.”
	“Is fine,” he said with a sigh.  “I am perhaps too much worried-“
	“I’m fresh from the Kadrush myself,” I assured him quietly.  “I get it.”  I handed the letter back to him.  “And I can’t read this.  I can barely read his writing normally.  The ink smells fresh, though.”
	“I receive it today,” he said, the letter dwarfed in his big paw.  “It says to come here, to meet.  Contact.  Not him, but contact.  It does not say why, except that I take, and make soup for you.”
	“Excuse me?”  I asked, not bothering to conceal how amused I was at that statement.  Could be a translation issue, but if it was it was a weird one.
	He shrugged as if he was just as confused as I was.  “That is what say.”
	“And you came out here, on foot, from all the way-“ I glanced at his clothing.  It was high quality leather, but worn-in and probably rather old.  “You’ll forgive me, but I doubt you live in the Pedigree Estates.”
	“No,” he barked out a laugh.  “I stay in rooming house.  Eighteen blocks, near harbor.”
	“You came eighteen blocks on his say-so?”  I guffawed.  “For that?  To meet someone you don’t know, and . . . what was it?”
	He waved a hand, as if explaining, “I make leek and kielbasa soup.  Very special tribal recipe.  I know that is the one he must mean.”
	By now, I was laughing.  “Lord, this is so. . .” I paused, shaking my head.  “This is so something he’d do, actually.”
	“You must be contact he speaks of,” he deduced.  “You know him.”
	“Yeah, unfortunately,” I rolled my eyes.  “You seem pretty acceptant of this inane situation too, so I’m guessing you know him pretty well.  Or knew, whatever.”
	“Yes,” he agreed, nodding sagely.  “Klaus is odd man, sometimes.  But, has been long years since we have met, and I think, it would be good to see him again.  He must think of me too, to know I am in Capital City and go through trouble of finding me.  Sending me this letter.”
	“Well, if you still work for the Survey Corps, I’m sure it wasn’t that hard for him to hunt you down,” I muttered.  “He has a lot of resources and despite his insistence on being a ‘rebel’, he’s actually an enormous gossip and still likes to keep his fingers in a lot of social pies.”
	The wolf gave me a blank look at that, apparently not understanding the context.
	“He lies,” I summarized.  “A lot.  He enjoys society more than he lets on because it’s a place he can fluff his enormous ego every now and then.”
	“Ah, yes,” the wolf nodded again, flicking his tail.  “Klaus is much with the lies.  Yes.”
	“And yet you came all this way on his say-so,” I muttered, gesturing to him.  “To. . . babysit me, I’m afraid.  That’s why he sent you, you know.  He’s strange like that.  He’s probably meeting,” I paused, remembering this was a stranger to me at least, and I couldn’t know how well he knew Klaus, “someone,” I supplied vaguely, “at this party, and didn’t want to leave me alone all night.  And now I am really wishing he had.  I’m so sorry.”
	“Why?”  The wolf asked amiably.  
	“Because you came out all this way and he’s in there,” I pointed to the gala, which may as well have been the bottom of the ocean for all it was reachable to people like us, “and likely not coming out all night.  He doesn’t go to these things unless there’s something in it for him, you know?  Probably something young and well-groomed, if you get me.”
	“I am getting you, yes,” he glanced towards the building, then back to me.  “But it seems neither will we be alone tonight.”
	My eyes widened marginally.  “Wait, you’re gonna do what he told you to?”
	“Asked,” he said, holding up the letter.  “I am not serving in his crew any longer.  This is favor.”
	I shook my head, putting up a hand, “Listen, I appreciate it, but I really don’t need-“
	I paused because his ears had drooped.  And for one gut-wrenching moment, I felt terrible.  But not nearly as terrible as I felt in the very next moment.
	“But I made soup,” he murmured.
	I wasn’t sure if I’d offended some kind of tribal custom of hospitality, or if he held Klaus in such high regard from their time together that he was earnestly this willing to do whatever the man asked him to, or if he was just a big, sensitive guy.  But whatever the case, I wasn’t a monster.  It was clear there was only one thing I could possibly do.
	I held out a hand to him.  “Luther,” I said.  “Just Luther, no surname.”  It would have been Shepherd if I’d respected my father enough to take on our family’s herd and continued his humble legacy, but that time had long since passed.
	His ears perked back up and he took my paw in his far larger, meatier one, and gave me a shake I would not soon forget.
	“Nikita Ilfarimov,” he said.
	I tried not to state the obvious – that the seven-foot-tall wolf’s name sounded pretty effeminate to me.  I was pretty sure he could break me in half if he deigned to.  Instead, I shook back as well as I could manage, and said, “Well met, Nikita.  And I would like nothing more than to head to your rooming house tonight and try your soup.”
	“You will not be disappointed,” he said confidently.

	And I wasn’t.  Honestly, it’s probably some of the best soup I’d ever had to that point in my life, and since.  The northern tribes really know how to make stick-to-your-ribs meals.  It was a thick broth, rich with an odd flavor I suppose must have been the leeks (can’t say I’ve had many of those before) with potatoes and kielbasa.  The fat from the sausage cooked into the broth and flavored everything with its smoky, rich flavor.  
	I’d been at sea eating fish and pickled. . . everything. . . for months now, so maybe that accounted for how much I enjoyed it.  But it wasn’t just that.
	Nikita was proving to be really good company.  His room was private, I’d been picturing a public room when he’d mentioned a rooming house, so that was a welcome surprise.  It was small and cramped, and I could still smell the docks even with the door closed, but the scent of fish and brine was almost comforting in a way.  He had a single cot we were both sharing as a dining area, with a worn crate for a table and a small wood stove in the corner he’d used to re-warm the pot of soup on.
	“If it’s this good re-heated, it must be amazing fresh,” I said, licking the last of the broth from my bowl.
	“Oh no, that is thing,” the wolf insisted, holding up a paw.  “Good northern cooking is for long times eating.  The longer it sits in broth, the better.”
	“Like cheese,” I chuckled.  “Although I’ll bet it gets even denser with time.”
	“Mmmm,” he agreed, smiling a big wolfish grin.  “Is when is best.”
	He stood, and when he did so, he put one of his big paws on my lower back.  I froze, uncertain if he’d been aiming for a shoulder pat and simply missed, or if it was a northern gesture I was unfamiliar with.  Either way, the moment passed and his hand slipped away, and he went back over to the pot to get himself a second helping.
	“More for you?”  He called back to me.
	“No, I’m good,” I insisted, patting my stomach.  “It’s filling.”
	“You are too skinny,” he said as he ladled out soup into his bowl.  “Is why you are cold.”
	I chuckled.  “I’m cold because Klaus told me to leave my winter coat back on the ship, and like the fool I am, I listened to him.”
	“You call him by name,” the wolf said as he turned and headed back towards me.  “You are close.”
	It wasn’t a question, so I decided I wouldn’t treat it as one.  Nikita had been referring to Klaus by name, so I’d felt comfortable enough to do so myself, was the truth of it.  Normally I was more careful.  But if Klaus had sent this man to meet with me, that meant he trusted him.  And that might mean. . . .
	“So do you,” I replied, eyeing him as he sat down.  “You were a Scout.  How’d you get on a first-name basis with him?  The man can be friendly, but he usually insists on decorum to keep the ranks in line.”
	“I think is clear,” he said as he settled his weight beside me, the cot dipping somewhat, “that we were both of us more than just subordinate.  Ya?”
	I gave him a long, wary look.  “I. . . don’t know how clear it is,” I replied guardedly.  It wasn’t just my own secrets I was worried about keeping these days.  For a man like me, the penalty for heresy was a labor camp at best, a lashing or other form of punitive torture in the most likely case, and death, at worst.  For Klaus Richter, the stakes were higher.  He had station and an entire fleet at his disposal that they could rip from his grasp, and I knew the man well enough to know that would be worse for him than any form of punishment.  Even death.
	“Klaus and I share many things,” he said, using the ladle itself to eat his soup.  With his size muzzle, anything smaller would have been unsuitable.
	Oh no.  Bad line of thinking.  Correct course.
	“Including, I am supposing he intends. . . you,” he looked at me at that, with his forest green eyes boring into mine.
	Suddenly, it all fell into place.
	“Oh, son of a bitch!” I growled.  “He set me up with you?!  That fucking bastard-“
	“This is problem?”  The wolf followed me with his gaze as I stood, pacing towards the window.  I wasn’t even sure where I was going, I just suddenly felt the fierce need to stand and express how offended I was.
	“I’m sure he thought this was a brilliant idea,” I fumed, glaring through the yellowed old glass.  “He goes off and has his fun with some society hound and I’m supposed to accept it because he tosses an old friend my way.  And we get to spend our time in a rotting old room on the port while he prances about with our betters at some posh party.”
	“You don’t like room?”  Nikita asked, glancing around.  “I did not think was so bad.”
	“It’s not that!”  I insisted, literally stomping a foot for a moment before I realized how childish I was beginning to sound.  And how. . . offensive.
	I turned towards him, my posture slumping.  “I-I’m sorry,” I began.  “I didn’t mean to. . . .”
	He waited for me to continue, but after a time when it became clear I didn’t know what to fucking say any more, he simply stood and put his bowl aside on the crate, and began unshouldering his coat.
	“I understand,” he said at length, the thick winter clothing being set aside layer by layer, revealing to me the big wolf beneath.  And he was in fact big, the coat only added a little.  But with his back turned to me and nothing but an old cotton shirt stretched over the contours of his shoulders, the strength in his figure became all the more apparent.  If I’d angered him, I was in for it.
	“You care for him,” he said, surprising me.  He finally turned to regard me again at that, and he didn’t look angry.  Honestly if there was any emotion I could name there, it was probably pity.  Which didn’t make me feel any better, but at least I wasn’t about to get my face beat in.
	I leaned against the cold panes of the small window.  “Didn’t you?”  I asked, my voice coming out more hoarse than I intended.  “Doesn’t it bother you?  To be. . . discarded at his whim like this, only called on when he needs you for something?”
	He only shook his head.  “I never let myself care for that man,” he said in a stony voice, like someone who knew far better than me.  It was clear he was older than me by probably a decade or so, but the wisdom with which he spoke was surprising.  “For any man,” he said, his voice quieter now.  “It is not even as cruel a life in our lands as it is in yours, but it is still cruel.  That is why I travel.”
	“. . . yeah,” I murmured, dropping my muzzle.  “Me, too.”
	“Crueler still to be having feelings,” he said, “for a life of which there is no having.  Klaus knows this.  Whatever is happening on his ship, whether with me, with you, he knows it can only exist in shadow.  Even if you feel is real – to the rest of the world, you lie.  Ya?  Always lying.”
	I felt something prickle at the corners of my eyes.  Awakening to the knowledge of what I was, what had seemed so insignificant a detail of my being until it became clear that the rest of the world took issue with it.  A lifetime of fear, and pain.
	Nikita was right.  Klaus was right.  I was the one holding on to the hope for something impossible.  Maybe this was just Klaus’s way of putting some distance between us.
	Or maybe he was just a self-entitled Pedigree used to getting his own way and discarding people temporarily when it suited him to do so.  The fact was, with Klaus, I would never really know.
	But still.
	“It doesn’t bother you at all?”  I pressed, unwilling to let go of this.  “That he just set us up. . . to fuck, basically, as simple as shit.  Like giving a damn order?”  It made sense, of course.  Klaus was used to directing everything else in his life.
	Nikita only shrugged.  “I do not complain when game is scarce, and another hunter tells me where to find food.  Men like us, we are scarce game.  Especially in your country.”
	I let out a huff of breath, unable to keep a wry smile from my muzzle.  “Alright, I don’t like the hunting metaphor,” I muttered.  “But I see what you’re saying.”
	“I think point is,” he rumbled, reaching down and tugging his worn cotton shirt up over his head, revealing more wolf than I think I’d ever seen offered up to me, specifically for my viewing, in my life.  He followed by unclasping his heavy leather belt, the clang of the metal buckle drawing my gaze down.  “We are both our own man.  Ya?”
	I had to think about that more than was likely necessary.  The last few years of my life had been so committed to Klaus, to the way he’d changed my life and educated me, taught me a whole new world of knowledge and awakened me to the capabilities of my own mind, that I’d almost forgotten about the young cattle dog who’d struck out on his own and told his father to fuck off with his fists, set off into the world to find his destiny, whatever that might be.  I hadn’t even considered going to sea back then, but enlisting had been the quickest way to get as far from my birthplace as possible.
	“Yeah,” I agreed.  “I’m my own man.”
	“Then he does not tell you what to do this night,” he said.  “You do.”
	By then, his britches were coming off, and my mind had gone blank because his big, heavy sheath was hanging free and I was honestly trying to figure out if I’d even be capable of fitting all of him in my muzzle.  It was one of the most pleasant uncertainties I’d grappled with in a long time.
	“Alright,” I said, blowing out a breath, and with it, all of my reservations.  “Fuck Klaus.  I’d like to get to know you better, Nikita.”
	The wolf grinned.  “And I you.”