Wolf Who Rules

"Yes, all the enclaves of Pittsburgh owe fidelity to Wolf Who Rules. He chose people he thought could function as heads and supported the building of their households. It is a huge undertaking to convince people to leave their old households and shift to a new one. To leave the Easternlands - to come this wilderness - to settle beside the uneasy strangeness of Pittsburgh -" Stormsong shook her head and switched to English. "You have no fucking idea how much trust these people have in Wolf."

"So why did he choose me? And why do these people listen to me?"

"I think that he sees greatness in you and he loves you for it. And they trust him."

"So they don't really trust me?"

"Ah, we're elves. We need half a day to decide if we need to piss."

"So - I'm not married to him?"

Stormsong tilted her head side to side, squinting as she considered the two cultures. "The closest English word is 'married' but it's too - small - and common."

"So, it's grand and exotic-and there's no ceremony for it?"

Stormsong nodded. "Yup, that's about it."

A hoverbike turned into the alley with a sudden roar. Stormsong sprang to her feet, her hand going to her sword. Pony checked the female sekasha with a murmur of " Nagarou " identifying Tinker's cousin Oilcan as the sister's son of Tinker's father.

Oilcan swooped around the extra barrels and dropped down to land in front of the loading dock where Tinker sat.

"Hey!" Oilcan called as he killed his hoverbike's engine. "Wow! Look at you."

"Hey yourself!" Tinker tugged down her skirt, just in case she was flashing panty. Gods, she hated dresses. "Thanks for coming."

"Glad to help." He leaned against the chest high dock. Wood sprites was what Tooloo had called them as kids - small, nut brown from head to bare toes, and fey in the way people used to think elves would look. Beneath his easy smile and summer stain of walnut, though, he seemed drawn.

"You okay?" She nudged him in the ribs with her toe.

"Me?" He scoffed. "I'm not the one being attacked by monsters every other day."

"Bleah." She poked him again to cover the guilty feeling of making him so worried about her. "It's like - what-nearly noon? And there's not a monster in sight."

"I'm glad you called." He pulled out a folded newspaper. "Otherwise I might have been worried. Did you see this?"

"This" was a full front-page story screaming "Princess Mauled." She hadn't seen a photographer yesterday when Windwolf carried her through the coach yard but apparently one had seen her. She flopped back onto the cement. "Oh, son of a turd."

Oilcan nudged against her foot, as if seeking the closeness they had just moments before. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have shown it to you."

"You didn't take the picture." Lying down felt too good, like she could easily drift to sleep. She sat back up and held out her hand for the paper. "Let me see how bad it really is."

She looked small, helpless and battered in Windwolf's arms, covered with an alarming amount of blood. The picture caption was "Viceroy Windwolf carries Vicereine Tinker to safety after she and her bodyguards were attacked by a large wild animal."

"What the hell is a vicereine?" she asked.

"Wife of the viceroy."

"Oh." There, she was married, the newspaper said so. "It still sounds weird."

"Vicereine?"

"All of it. Vicereine. Princess. Wife. Married. It seems unreal for some reason."

She scanned the story. It was odd that while it was she and the five elf warriors in the valley, all the information came from human sources. It listed her age and previous address, but only gave Stormsong's English name, not her full elfin one of Linapavuata-watarou-bo-taeli which meant Singing Storm Wind. And the sekasha were labeled "royal bodyguards." Was it because the reporter didn't speak Elvish, or was it because the elves didn't like to talk about themselves? She learned nothing except the news had a very human slant. It was odd that she hadn't noticed before.

"Even after all this time, you don't feel married?" Oilcan asked.

She made a rude noise and nudged him again in the ribs with her toe. "No. Not really. It doesn't help that Tooloo is spreading rumors that I'm not."

"She is? Why?"

"Who knows why that crazy half-elf does anything?" Tinker wasn't sure which was worse: that Tooloo was considered an expert on elfin culture, or that the people Tinker cared about most all shopped at Tooloo's general store. Her lies would spread out from McKees Rocks like a virus with an authenticity that the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette couldn't touch.

"Hell," she continued. "It was like three days before I even figured out that I was married - I don't even remember what I said when he proposed."

"Does he treat you well?" Oilcan asked. "Doesn't yell at you? Call you names? Try to make you feel stupid?"

She made the kick a little harder. "He's good to me. He treats me like a princess."

"Ow!" He danced away, laughing. "Okay, okay. I just don't want to see you hurt." He sobered, and added quietly. "My dad always waited until we were home alone."