The Things We Water

Two years before, on a full moon night in an Arizona state park, Nina¹ lay awake when magic more potent than anything she had ever felt pressed against her consciousness. A telepathic voice whispered, "Care for him." She opened her camper door to find a newborn creature covered in birthing fluid, its eyes still sealed shut.

In the distance, two red eyes gleamed from the chaparral. The mother, whatever she was, howled once with a sound no coyote could produce and vanished forever. Nina¹ raised the fragile pup herself, feeding him every two hours, carrying him in a sling. He stayed small, twelve pounds for two years, until the morning she woke to find his tail ablaze and his eyes the color of rubies.

Matti and Sienna,⁶ recovered from food poisoning, fly back to Chicago. At the terminal, Matti⁶ mouths a message to Nina:¹ "Get my cousin to marry you." Driving back through the mountains, the grief of separation and the weight of uncertainty overcome her. She weeps.

Henri,² in the passenger seat, notices her tears smell like cinnamon, a scent he admits makes him want to bite her. He pulls into a diner parking lot, cradles her head against his shoulder, and calls her "poor little Cricket.¹

"Over lunch at the Howling Hill Diner, where Shiloh's¹⁰ mother Phoebe works as a waitress, Henri² reveals fragments of his past: college, police work, then inheriting the ranch when Matti's⁶ mother died. He also returns Nina's¹ obsidian bracelet, telling her she does not need to hide who she is.

Weeks into her stay, Nina¹ asks Randall, the strawberry-blond security guard, to help her find Spencer⁷ the sasquatch. She insulted his dry hair during their first hostile encounter and wants to apologize. Henri² intercepts and drives her himself. Before they approach Spencer's⁷ cabin, complete with solar panels and satellite television, Henri² rubs his cheeks across her face and neck, coating her with his scent.

Spencer⁷ calls her an abomination and a demon, but Nina¹ offers a conditioner bar and a genuine apology. The eight-foot creature, lonely and perpetually angry, grudgingly accepts. As they leave, Henri² tells Spencer⁷ to relay a message to a woman named Maggie, calling her a traitor.

During their nightly game of tag, Henri² spots gnomes marching from the trees, carrying torches with green fire. They bow to Henri,² calling him "Great Wolf" in recognition of his divine ancestry. To Nina,¹ they speak in a language Henri² cannot understand, claiming they rejoice in her presence.

Days later, they return and reveal more: her biological father,⁹ whom they call "the son of the night," is alive and well, though they had believed him dead. Their brethren in the south once lived among her mother's people, which explains why Nina¹ can understand their tongue. When Henri² asks what they said, Nina¹ repeats their words, her hands shaking with the weight of a heritage she has never known.

Dominic⁸ corners Nina¹ in the kitchen after being cruel to Agnes,⁴ his biological daughter whom he abandoned and whose parental rights Henri² forced him to relinquish. When Nina¹ tells him to leave, he gets in her face, snarling. She finally unleashes the magic she inherited from her father:⁹ she shows him the flame of life that burns inside every living being, explaining she can see it, gauge its strength, and pinch it out completely.

She tells him that death sometimes wears a fanny pack. Dominic,⁸ pale and shaken, flees. Moments later, Henri² and Franklin⁵ enter. Agnes⁴ tells them Nina¹ was going to kick his ass. Later, Nina¹ confesses to Henri² that she put Duncan's³ would-be kidnappers into comas by taking portions of their life force.

A deep male voice intrudes on Nina's¹ dreams: "Child? Are you there?" She wakes gasping. Henri,² across the hall, heard it too. He finds her outside, barelegged and shaking, seeking answers from the gnomes, who tell her the voice belongs to her kin. Henri² wraps her in his arms, then sits with her in the moonlit forest, her body on his thigh, and talks about the land.

Nina¹ admits she finds him gorgeous, that her attraction means nothing, that she knows he only sees her as a friend. Henri's² face tightens; he says, "I see." Days later, the voice returns, using her name. But this time Henri² does not come, and Nina¹ cries alone, curled around Duncan.³

Word spreads that Nina¹ stood up to Dominic⁸ without flinching. Suddenly, eight or nine male werewolves arrive for breakfast, including Dominic⁸ himself, who announces he will mate with her. Henri's² reaction is immediate and volcanic: he orders them all to leave, then backs Nina¹ against the counter and rubs his cheeks across her face, her neck, her hair, saturating her with his scent.

Franklin,⁵ bewildered, sets up a future schedule for courting. Meanwhile, the elder reveals the Alaskan community is sending a representative to evaluate Duncan.³ When Henri² learns they might want to take the pup, he flatly refuses, promising Nina¹ that no one will take her boy.

Exhausted by the relentless demands of the ranch, Henri² is drowning in phone calls and crises. Nina¹ hands him the keys to her RV and tells him to escape for a day while she handles his phone, lying to anyone who calls. When he returns, he presses his lips softly to hers and thanks her for the kindest thing anyone has ever done for him.

But days later, when the dream voice wakes her and she again asks Henri² if he has changed his mind about marrying her, he leans away. His face closes. He says, "I see," and leaves. Nina¹ resolves to stop hoping. She will find someone else, someone who wants her, because Duncan³ needs this place to work.

Ilya,¹¹ the leader of the Alaskan community, arrives and offers Nina¹ sanctuary with a three-year mating deadline. He also reveals that Franklin⁵ knows who her father is. That night, Nina¹ and Henri² confront the elder in his bedroom.

Franklin⁵ unclasps his gold-and-obsidian bracelets, and the room floods with ancient, subtle magic. He confesses: his brother is Thanatos,⁹ the god of death. Nina's¹ biological father. Franklin⁵ himself is Hypnos, god of sleep. Their parents, he explains, were the Night and Darkness.

Her father⁹ and her mother, a fertility goddess named Isha, met on a cruise ship, spent one night together, and later agreed to give the baby away. Franklin⁵ only learned of Nina's¹ existence when she arrived at the ranch. He begs forgiveness.

Shiloh¹⁰ and Pascal¹⁰ have run off again, this time searching for the secret waterfall. Agnes⁴ guides Nina¹ and Duncan³ to the river, where Pascal¹⁰ clings to a rock in the middle of a swift, waist-deep current. Nina¹ wades in, inch by inch, the water so cold it numbs her legs. A submerged log slams into her back and sweeps her under. She swallows water, certain she will die.

She manages to throw Pascal¹⁰ toward a fallen tree trunk, then grabs a branch herself. On the bank, soaked and trembling in her underwear, she clutches the sobbing children. Henri² arrives at a dead sprint, his face white with fear. He carries Pascal¹⁰ while Nina¹ walks, wrapped in emergency blankets, her body convulsing with cold.

That night, Henri² finds Nina¹ outside and admits he was never taking care of her for Matti's⁶ sake. He was trying to wait for the trial period to end, following rules he himself established. He cannot stomach the thought of her with another man. He kisses her, deeply, then says the words she never expected: "I want you to marry me."

When she asks why now, he reveals his ancestry: his mother was descended from Fenrir, the monstrous Norse wolf, and his father was the original Amarok, the Great Wolf. He would leave the ranch he inherited if Duncan³ chose Alaska. He takes her to the sacred waterfall, glowing with pink and purple bioluminescence from the ancient meteor's magic, and asks her to be his mate under the next full moon. She says yes.

Two elderly brothers from Alaska arrive and examine Duncan:³ he is, without doubt, a hellhound, their youngest sibling from the same long-lived mother. As they celebrate, the gate camera shows a man jabbing the intercom. Franklin⁵ recognizes his brother Thanatos.⁹ Dominic,⁸ violating every rule, lets him in.

Henri² intercepts Dominic⁸ first, lifting the six-foot man by the throat with one hand and exiling him permanently. Nina¹ then faces her biological father,⁹ who declares she is his daughter and he wishes to make amends. She tells him she has no interest. Franklin⁵ puts his brother to sleep with a wave of his hand. They leave the death god sprawled on the gravel.

The hellhound brothers invite Duncan³ to live with them in Alaska. The pup presses against Nina¹ and projects clearly: "No. No. Family." He stays. Three years pass. Nina¹ and Henri² have two babies, Shima and Nicolas. Agnes,⁴ now officially their daughter, fills her room with anime posters. Franklin⁵ is a doting uncle.

One ordinary night, Duncan's³ bedroom door opens and a lanky five-year-old boy with black hair and pale skin steps out, wearing a too-big T-shirt. He looks at Nina¹ and says his first spoken word: "Mom?" Then he turns to Henri² and whispers, "Hi, Dad." Henri² drops to his knees, his eyes wet, and presses his forehead to his son's.