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As the Whakamanu glinted in the moonlight like jewels falling to earth, Trina Huxford held her breath. Soon enough, they’d notice Margot’s absence; the pearl swan did not swim among the prism found in the Thunderbird’s lightning, in the shades and shadows of nature’s glory. From what the saqamaw had told the Kaqtukaq that morning, Margot may never swim with them again.
Swans of jasper, jade, cobalt, and a variety of other hues alighted on the water with barely a splash. The Māori swans’ leader, a large, coal-dark, thick-chested creature, paddled to Trina’s father, the saqamaw of the Kaqtukaq. The two swans circled each other in a traditional greeting on the most important night of their year, which was supposed to lead to a year of celebration with the courtship rituals between Margot and one of the Whakamanu warriors already set, but last night ...
Last night, the wolves took Margot.
A bolt of terror had lanced Trina’s heart. It’d been decades, well before her birth, since the Abenaki wolves dared to step a single paw on Kaqtukaq land. Of course, she and the other children had grown up on stories of big bad wolves and the conflict between the bevy and the Pack: two wolf brothers had fallen in love with a swan woman, stolen her ...
Killed her.
In truth, the Kaqtukaq were running out of time to save Margot. On the night each swan anticipated more than a first kiss, Trina hated being in her true form. Her citrine feathers, like jagged crystal, brought too much attention; otherwise, she might have flown north to the wolves’ encampment and freed her sister.
Margot would not become a story, a memory, a cautionary tale meant to frighten arrogant swan children who wanted to fight wolves when they grew up.
That morning, Maman had stood there next to Père, stoic and resolute. Rosa Huxford, like the rest of her family, claimed to be the descendant of the swan warriors who’d served the goddess Freya. Maman had appeared calm, but the hard set of her square jaw, the squareness of her broad shoulders, and the murder in her rose-colored eyes created an image of a woman who would have been comfortable next to a goddess, sword and shield in hand. What kept her from taking on the Pack by herself?
“We are helpless as the change takes over,” Père continued. They’ve chosen to strike when we are most vulnerable.”
“What are we going to do?” Carney asked. The youngest Huxford had the gentlest heart, loving and kind, except when it came to the wolves. “We’re going to rescue her after the Solstice, right?”
Père swallowed. Something about his posture and his tone struck Trina as odd. Almost ... dismissive, as though he intended to wipe his hands off the entire ordeal. “To go onto the wolves’ land will lead to war,” he replied. “A war we are not yet prepared to fight.”
The muscle twitched in Maman's jaw. If no one else, she was ready to fight.
"Our war council will convene after the Solstice." With that, he'd begun the ritual prayers.
Carney made a small noise that drew Trina back to the beautiful Solstice night when the warmth of evening made the gentle water feel refreshing against her belly and legs, but the Whakamanu’s presence iced any enjoyment she took from the Avon. Apart from the Tane, the others, all warriors from what little Père had told them, kept to themselves in a small cluster. Trina forced herself to look away from the other bevy, instead focusing on her little sister, who pressed against her, laid her long neck over Trina’s, and let out a soft, sorrowful sound. If they’d been human, Carney would have been crying on her shoulder for the second time that day. I know, Trina said. Believe me, I know.
While they comforted each other, Margot was trapped with the enemy. The old stories replayed in Trina’s mind over and over again—the wolves’ brutality, their cruelty, the way they toyed with their prey. Margot wasn’t strong enough to withstand that. Neither was Carney.
It should have been me.
Trina offered a prayer to the Thunderbird. In some stories, he’d created the Kaqtukaq to showcase the colors of the lightning that followed his thunder; in others, swans carried messages from the spirits to the human world. Regardless, Margot needed his protection. Keep Margot safe as she spends this Solstice alone for the first time, and not only alone but among those who intend to do her harm.
The night passed with agonizing slowness. For hours, Trina kept her attention skyward while the stars shifted in increments across a clear blue-black canvas, the Pleiades the brightest among them. Margot loved the stars and the stories about them. She loved stories in general—which she’d passed to Trina—but she loved flowers more. Père allowed her the flower shop on the condition she keep her pearl-like hair and eyes covered. She didn’t. Like Maman, she was a puzzle piece that didn’t quite fit with the picture the saqamaw strove to create, and her beauty, rivaled only by the blooms she surrounded herself with, couldn’t be hidden. No matter what, she stood out. Easy prey.
Maman, the last bride from a foreign land, paddled resolutely next to Père, her speckled rose feathers a bright contrast to his dark blue. This time, the tribe stood to gain a husband, one of the Whakamanu’s strongest warriors. Who approached whom or why Margot had been chosen to secure whatever alliance Père hoped for, or what that alliance even was, remained a secret. Trina hated secrets. The Tane spoke in hushed swan tones with her parents, and she struggled to interpret. Not like it mattered. Without Margot, there couldn’t be an alliance.
Do you think they’ll help bring her back? Carney asked.
Trina bit her tongue. Maybe. It’ll depend on how well Père sells the Whakamanu on the idea.
Another sad sound. Trina understood. They both adored their oldest sister. Margot was sure of herself in a way Trina never had been, a dreamer who loved love and beauty and sought them in words, in nature, in other people. She wanted to bring down the walls of secrecy between the tribe and the rest of Windsor, then the rest of the world. Père rebuked her every time. “We need to stay hidden,” he’d say. “People will see our feathers as a prize, kill us for a chance to hold one of those jewels in their hands.”
“People are surprising,” Margot would reply, and it infuriated their father. He intended for the flower shop to prove her wrong. Six years later, she was so successful she’d added a small nursery and hired an assistant.
Père hated being wrong more than Trina hated secrets.
Finally, the sun crested the horizon. An uncomfortable heat flared through Trina's body, starting as it always did at the tips of her sparkling yellow wings, spreading with agonizing slowness through her chest to her neck and belly and then to her legs. Before her downy feathers retracted back into her skin, she and Carney paddled toward shore with the rest of the clan, and just as she reached it, pain seared her from the inside out, reshaping her limbs and joints, rearranging her organs. She gasped and collapsed on the dewy grass with her glassy feathers surrounding her like a halo.
For a few minutes, she lay on the riverbank and fought the tears she’d kept dammed from the day before. As her kin returned to human, soft chatter filled the air—flurries of French and Mi'kmawi'simk intermingled with the occasional word or phrase from the Whakamanu. Tension, like a gathering thunderstorm, settled over Trina. She swallowed against the tide of fear that threatened to pull her under, but the tremors came anyway. Taking shaky breaths, she searched for her sister. Carney sat a few feet away, eyes vacant, knees against her chest.
In silence, she and Carney gathered their feathers into leather pouches, which would be given to the craftspeople, who would then break them down for a variety of crafts. Last year, Mera made beautiful blown glass ornaments from some of them. Other years, the artisans had made glass beads for weaving and created stunning tapestries. Heirlooms. Sometimes presents given to brides so they'd remember their homeland when they were promised to faraway swan clans.
Maman had such an heirloom—a cape woven by artisans of her clan who had learned how to create thread from the glass-like feathers. It was sturdy but not heavy, comprised of the feathers of her large family into a kaleidoscope of pinks, purples, reds, and golds. Six sisters, two brothers, both parents, both sets of grandparents, and a bevy of cousins had all contributed to the cloak Maman had worn on her wedding day so she'd remember she wasn't alone among the strangers of her new clan. If one watched carefully, they'd realize Rosa Huxford had never belonged to the Kaqtukaq. Her heart remained in Norway with her family and the love she'd left behind, a single thread of turquoise hidden in the cape.
Did the Whakamanu have such traditions? Such artisans? Trina chanced a glance at the warriors—who were gathering their own feathers—and noticed one, a stocky young man—barely old enough to be called a man, she thought—staring at her with large jade eyes and wavy hair to match. Blatant. Trina's body heated under his gaze. She swallowed hard and gathered the last of her feathers, then slipped into her dress.
Then the storm broke. What began as harsh voices turned to yells. The saqamaw and the Tane spoke in the language shared by all swans, one accessed by a simple press to the throat, that allowed them to send their daughters to other tribes. It wasn’t as graceful a language as one would think, but normal swans used honks and guttural snorts to communicate. This ... this wasn't much different, and it was even worse when voices rose.
The gist of the conversation revolved around Margot, of course. The Whakamanu's leader accused her father of hiding Margot away, reneging on their agreement, trapping them for a year for no reason. Père stood tall against the onslaught, Maman beside him as always, though she made no attempt to support him verbally. When the Tane stopped, Père explained the situation like it was only an inconvenience instead of an act of war against them. "We will retrieve her," he said. "And Hapa will have his bride."
Trina and Carney shared a withering look. Whatever happened, the Whakamanu would be living among them until the next Solstice.
***
After a long shower, Trina retreated to Margot's room. Watered her plants. Paced. Searched for any sign of Margot's abduction but came up empty. They had guards who watched the perimeter for threats, and not one of them had mentioned seeing the wolves. Nothing out of the ordinary. It made no sense.
Trina sat on Margot’s perfectly made bed and clutched a pillow to her chest that still smelled of her sister’s jasmine shampoo. The room, small and cozy, was adorned with artwork Trina and Carney had made for Margot as children: drawings of flowers and the Thunderbird and the three of them done in shaky kid hand with crayons tacked up next to traditional tapestries, one of which Margot had woven herself using beads made from her feathers and the feathers of her sisters. Margot's pearlescent beads rippled in the afternoon sun streaming through the window while Trina's citrine and Carney's blood orange offered a warm glow to complement. They were supposed to be together forever. No one expected the wolves to come.
There had been skirmishes, yes. The Pack needed more room to roam. At one point, their territory stretched across the bulk of Nova Scotia, dipping down toward the Avon that separated the Pack lands from the Kaqtukaq. It had been part of a treaty from generations ago, after the blatant murder of a swan daughter by the Pack's Alpha. A swan that had been stolen away like Margot. Like the girl in the stories.
Nausea crept into Trina's stomach, twisting and wrenching and infuriating. She refused to feel weak when she needed to be strong for both of her sisters. Surely her father had a plan to save Margot.
If she's still alive.
"Merde," she spat into the pillow. Tears followed, and the sickness tightening her belly worsened. The tremors that had followed her from the river and through her shower turned to violent quakes that ravaged her while she sobbed into the pillow, drowning Margot’s calming scent with saltwater fear that Père did nothing to assuage. Her imperfect, kind, whimsical sister only had to sit outside for butterflies to land on her fingertips. Carney thought Margot a princess or a kind sorceress, able to attract beautiful things by simply being a beautiful thing herself. She wasn’t made for captivity—the wolves’ or Hapa’s.
Like the other Māori warriors, Hapa boasted a large frame that spoke volumes of his strength. Different tattoos lined the dark skin of his barrel chest, broad shoulders, muscular back, and cruel face, giving him a ferocious look the other girls seemed to like, but Trina doubted he stayed still long enough to see butterflies; even if he did, they’d avoid him. He had eyes of cold jasper, a blueish-green tinted with flecks of rust like dried blood and hair to match. He’d joined the Tane to rail against Trina’s father and pushed her out of the way like an insignificant tree limb. Carney had led her away before the confrontation ended and before Trina said something her father might regret.
Was this what the next year held for them? Flashpoints of anger and frustration marking their days? Fear and terror over Margot?
The wolves’ return for another victim?
Pére had the authority to stop the madness and bring Margot home, if he’d only act. And so far, he didn’t seem to have much interest in it.
Still, he’d lured the Whakamanu to Windsor for a purpose. If it wasn’t for Hapa to marry Margot, then what was it?
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