Chapter 1

"I love you," I said softly.

I kissed him and he was cold, his lips like wax beneath mine. In the other part of the house, in our room, my brothers paced the wooden floor. They were afraid and agitated and they fought with each other when one would get too close. They needed me, I knew, as I needed them. I had to say goodbye though and I was crying.

"Dare..." Joe was there with a blanket in his hands, " ... you should put this on."

He was draping it over my shoulders and I didn't protest. It wasn't for me in any case, but for the men who had come for my Master. An ambulance and a State Police cruiser with their lights flashing, but no sirens. No need to rush. Death had come to our home and taken our Master away. I couldn't know the why of it; there was no reason. He was old and it was time. I understood that much of life at least, but I didn't like it. I'd never known someone who'd died and my Master wasn't like other people anyway.

He was my Master and so it seemed very wrong.

I'd found him after missing breakfast and then dinner, and finally breakfast again, but in truth we could sense his absence from the first. Not his death, nothing dreadful as you may imagine, but only his absence from our home and lives. It had taken me three tries to open the door and enter the house proper. My courage failed the first time, and the second time my hand was confused by the latch and knob of the handle, which seems silly. I hadn't opened a door in two years and it seemed a foolish thing to forget, but in my worry I had.

I tried to explain that to my Master when I found him in his bed. I barked softly and licked at his cold fingers. I sat on the floor near him for a long time, until the weary summer sun had faded to a cold glow in the western sky, and I howled then. Not as a dog, but as a wolf, for they have a song for that. For the death of someone you love. Dogs have their sounds, but they've too long been tamed, I think, and so when my brothers heard me they joined with the clumsy baying of domesticated hounds.

The men went about their business efficiently. The two who had come in the ambulance were dressed in blue, the trooper in grey. The blue men looked at me curiously, but did not speak. The blanket was over my shoulders and I sat on the floor watching them while the grey man spoke with me. He was young, but his eyes were blue and very old and he was gentle, pulling the blanket closed to hide my breasts and sex, but I paid it little mind. Joe was on the telephone and I didn't know or care who he was speaking to.

My brothers were in our room. I'd told them to stay there and they had no reason to listen to me, but they did. They were very agitated and barking though, unhappy with so many strangers in our home. They needed to be comforted and fed, although none of us were hungry. There were thoughts, like words on the tip of my tongue, but I couldn't find them. I didn't know what I was supposed to do, nor did I care. I hadn't had to make a decision or accept a responsibility in over two years. I was unprepared for this.

"Miss, I need to know your name." The grey man had a clipboard with papers on it and he held a pen ready.

I blinked at him and licked my lips, concentrating on his voice for he'd spoken quickly and it was difficult to understand him.

"Your name?" he asked slower. "Can you speak?"

I nodded and cleared my throat softly. "Dare."

"Uh..." He rubbed his nose. "Dare ... Is that short for something?"

I didn't know what that meant.

"Dare," I said a little louder and I leaned over, looking at his clipboard as if I expected him to write that down someplace. When he didn't, I remembered my tag and lifted my chin, feeling the metal under my fingers as I held it out for him to read.

"Dare, right ... I got that," he nodded and finally did write it down. "What, um ... are you related to..." he looked at his clipboard, " ... Mr. Brocken?"

I didn't understand and I didn't know who Mr. Brocken was, so I just sat there, watching the blue men put my Master on a wheeled cart. He was in his pajamas and they covered him with a white sheet before strapping him down. I frowned at that.

"How long have you lived here?" the grey man tried and again I had no answer for him.

The man looked at me for a few minutes and I watched them take my Master out of the room. I rose to my feet and followed them slowly until we were outside and they were lifting the cart to put it in the ambulance. The grey man had followed me and Joe came out as well, having finished his phone call, and the grey man fell on him with his questions while I watched the ambulance leave. I went back to my room then, to be with my brothers.

We were crowded together, the three dogs and I, laying atop one another on our bed, but not sleeping even though it was very late. More people had come and gone, but I'd kept my brothers with me and we ignored the noises from outside. The door opened slowly and Joe looked inside, which brought my brothers quickly to their feet for they'd expected him to be our Master. So had I, even though I knew better, but I'd forgotten at the heavy creaking sound. It was only the Indian though and the dogs regarded him suspiciously, Barley growling with his ears flat, and I grabbed handfuls of his neck and pulled him back down to me.

"Dare, come here," Joe said and I'd never imagined his big round face could look so sad.

I growled at my brothers to stay where they were and it was difficult, especially for Barley and he was tense. Bush was the most calm and he kept his head down on his paws, only his constantly shifting eyes betrayed his impatience, but like the rest of us he didn't know what he was waiting for. I left them and walked to the door, the blanket I'd worn long forgotten. Joe looked as if he might say something, but he didn't. He just stepped aside and led me towards a sitting room, an old parlor near the front of the house. White Cloud was there and I'd sensed his arrival some hours previously, but now that I could see him his presence descended upon me like a great calm and it allowed my body to relax.

Other men were there also, the old tribal leaders who made up the council. I didn't know them. I'd seen them once, at my Awakening during the ceremony at Table Rock. They looked weary and serious and some of them looked away from my nakedness, but most of them didn't. The grey man was still there, sitting on one of the chairs and still writing.

"Mrs. Brocken," he said, looking up and then focusing deliberately on my face. "My condolences on the loss of your husband. I need just two signatures and I, uh ... I'll be done."

He seemed embarrassed and apologetic and I didn't understand much of what he was saying.

"Sit down, Dare. Sit here." Joe was guiding me to an empty chair, but I frowned at him, growling softly before I could stop myself. I wasn't going to sit on my Master's furniture. I sat on the floor, on my heels with my legs folded beneath me.

"Are you sure she's okay?" The grey man looked to the council and they looked to White Cloud. The old medicine man nodded and spoke in the language of his tribe for a moment while the others listened carefully.

"The girl will be fine," one of the other men finally said, looking at the grey man. "This is her home."

"Ma'am, Mrs. Brocken, do you have relatives? Parents maybe? A sister or brother you'd like to call?" The grey man was obviously concerned and I had to think of the words I wanted to say, rehearsing them for a moment in my head.

"My brothers," I nodded and looked back towards our room. "There."

"Uh..." The grey man smiled weakly and tried to understand.

"She means the dogs," Joe offered helpfully.

"She is Onijwa," White Cloud said, sticking out his gaunt chin as if the grey man would dispute it. The other Indians glanced at him, but said nothing.

"Right," the grey man nodded and coughed lightly. "Okay, uh. It's up to you anyway. Um, Mrs. Brocken, I need you to sign here and ... here, please."

He approached me slowly, crouching and pointing with his finger as he held the clipboard. The pen was awkward in my hand and I had to remember how to hold one, and I almost smiled as I carefully wrote my name in the places I was supposed to.

"I need your last name signed too," he told me and I blinked at him with some confusion. "Brocken, right? Like this? That's your name, right?"

The grey man was pointing towards the top of the papers where he'd filled in my Master's name, James Brocken, and I nodded, just to be done with this, but I didn't understand at all. I wrote the name he wanted behind my own in the two places I'd signed, making the letters slowly while he watched.

"Okay, that's fine." He took his pen back and stood up. "Again, I'm sorry, Mrs. Brocken. Thank you for your time."

He left with brief looks and nods at the council and I scratched my head, sitting there and watching him go.

The Indians started talking then, but I paid them little mind. White Cloud was touching my head and said something to Joe and then the old man left, going deeper into the house, towards the kitchen, I thought, but I'd never been there.

"Dare." Joe sat his bulk in the chair closest to me and on the floor next to it there was a briefcase which he was pulling towards me, opening it between us.

"This might be kinda hard to explain." He pulled out a paper, actually three papers clipped together. "Jim, uh, your ... Owner?" he sighed. "The man who lived here, he was your husband. Did you know that?"

"Master," I said, smiling then because husband was the wrong word.

"Right. Your Master was your husband, see?" He was holding the papers out. "He married you. Did he ever say anything about that?"

I looked at the papers and they were marriage contracts, signed and notarized by the Tribal Registry. There was his name and mine, my old human name, and our signatures. I had some memory of signing papers like these, the day he'd given me my tags and I was suddenly excited as I noticed the numbers on the pages. It was at the top, the license number, wa06-11031, and I nodded my head eagerly, showing my tags to Joe. One of them had that number on it and the Indian gave me a small smile as he looked at it.

"Right, that's like your wedding ring, I guess." He scratched his cheek.

"Married," I said softly. The way my tongue moved to make the sound tickled.

At the time I hadn't thought much about it, what I'd signed or what the tag meant. I guess I'd assumed it was a dog license, especially since the tag did say 'Licensed Canine' on it. My Master had married me though, two years before and I'd never known. It wouldn't have changed anything and clearly my Master hadn't done it for any personal reason. I mean, not like people get married to demonstrate love or something, like it was an obligation. He had more than that without marriage. He'd had everything already, and so why would he do that? Not to impress anyone; he hadn't even told me. My Master had been protecting me, I realized.