Wolf Valley: Chapter One

This is the first chapter of an untitled novella of mine (current placeholder title is Wolf Valley) that I am writing. The other three chapters will come out over the course of the month of April 2024. I began outlining this story in January 2023, and started to write the text itself in January 2024. This is still an early draft and is subject to change, but I wanted to release it today, April 7th 2024, to mark the ten year anniversary of the first video posted on the channel Preston Jacobs, April 7th 2014. Preston Jacobs is a huge inspiration for me and my writing since I was a child, and I want to commemorate this anniversary by releasing a chapter this conspiracy-laden fantasy novella.

For Preston

Maddest of them All

Chapter One

Descent

He watched his kin scheme against one another.

Distant howls and the clanging of swords could be heard through the thick stone walls of their keep. The wolves inside paid no mind to the sounds, it was as common as the strong wind that blew against their home here in the high hills of Wolf Valley. His kin continued to play their game.

Jacob shifted in his seat, his roughspun tunic itched at his sensitive skin. His father had made him wear it, for it bore the heraldry of their lowborn house, a bunch of red grapes upon a field of green. House Preston was known for their strongwine, a third of their village, also named Preston, worked in their brewery, so it made sense his father would make it their symbol. They had some servants, but they could not afford one that could make them fine clothes, so his mother had woven tall their outfits. She was not good at it. Most kinds of clothes made Jacob uncomfortable, it was a problem no one else seemed to have, so he just had to deal with it himself. He would have taken it off, preferring to be shirtless despite the early morning cold, but he had to wear it, he had to help represent their branch of the family at the council.

His father and brother sat in the middle of their little hall. Their small game table was set up, and the two large men sat on their little wooden chairs, which wobbled under their weight, and played. Jacob sat in the corner of the hall and watched silently, as he often did, and was ignored by his family, as he often was. He had been watching them since they started, studying their expressions. His brother, Robin, stared at the board in drunken confusion. His father, Robert, seemed far more at ease, sitting back on his chair, looking carefully at his heir, a hint of a smile on his face. Jacob knew who was going to win this game.

They were built much the same, his brother and father, with big bellies and broad shoulders. To any other man, Robin would have seemed like a large brute, and he was, but next to his father we looked like a child. Robin smirked and moved one of his pieces. He looked up at his father with his bright eyes, through his messy golden hair, and his father looked back with his dark eyes, his black as night hair tied under his cloak. Robert leaned forward, the snout of his bearskin cloak now looking down at Robin, who wore a wolfskin cloak of his own, and he moved his own piece. Robert’s face betrayed nothing, but his faint smile unsettled both his sons. He has a trick up his sleeve, Jacob thought to himself, what is it? So far, he hadn’t been able to figure out either of their plans. He knew how to play, but rarely played it himself. The last time he played, he ended up physically aching from trying to figure out his father’s plans, trying to come up with a winning plan, and trying to keep his father from figuring out that winning plan. He lost. Jacob was better as an observer than as a player.

Robin looked to the board and his face lit up. Without hesitation, he danced his wolf-shaped piece over the board and took his father’s steward piece. His smug smile dropped when he looked up and saw his father mirroring the look back at him.

Robert, the Thane of Preston, stood up from his chair which creaked with relief. He looked down at the board, picked his sheep piece and danced it around the board, taking all three of Robin’s castles. He then took one of Robin’s pieces, the only piece Robin could soundly move without falling into some trap, and slid it where it had to go, and then Robert moved his own tankard piece and took his son’s wolf piece, winning the game. Robin, in his own way of accepting defeat, tossed the board and all the pieces to the side where they clattered onto the stone floor. Robert then shoved the gaming table to the other side, where it broke in two as it landed. For a moment, it looked as if they were to fight, but then Robert held out his three-fingered hand towards his son. Robin battled it away, threw a half-hearted punch into his father’s big chest, and then fell forward into an embrace. The family of the wolf seemed to treat love and hate, as well as violence and tenderness, as one and the same, Jacob had come to understand.

The doors kicked open and a gust of wind howled through the hall. The candles fluttered and Jacob’s skin prickled at the crisp night air. In from the cold walked his very red-faced mother. Jane Preston was stouter than Robin, fairer than Isa, and fatter than Jacob, and meaner than her husband, but not by a lot.

“Robert Preston, you fat whoreson, I called on you an hour ago!”

“I told you that in confidence, woman,” Robert jested back at her as he released his son from the bone-crushing bearhug by tossing the young man to the floor, “can you not handle the luggage yourself? I was playing a game with the boy.”

“Always the same with you, isn’t it. I pushed out three of your whelps and you can’t even push around your own weight.”

“To be fair, lass,” said Rober as he sauntered over to her, stepping on a castle piece on his way, crushing the stone pawn as if it were glass, “there is quite a lot of weight.”

Her thin lips broke into a reluctant smile, “Don’t I know it.”

Robert grabbed the woman, who was half his size, and began to eat her face. Jacob and Robin turned their heads in disgust. Robin began pouring himself another tankard of strongwine. He was in his early twenties now, but they say he had been drinking morning, noon, and night since he was babe.

Jacob was quite the opposite; the taste of such drinks did strange things to his stomach. He wasn’t like most of the family, he had come to realise. He was born the wild and weird blood of the wolf fifteen years ago, but he always seemed to be the runt of the litter, even his little cousin Owan seemed more like the wolves than him. Jacob was as quiet as a mouse while they were as loud as cows, he was as thin as a branch while they were built like bears, and he was pale, freckly, and fair, while they were mostly swarthy and dark-haired. Even Robin’s golden locks were growing dark and dirty, while Jacob’s was brighter than anyone on his mother’s side.

“Save it for the ride, perverts,” called Isa as she passed their parents in the doorway. Each footstep rang with the clink of metal, “You two can fondle each other in the carriage, once you’re far from me.”

Robin was a brute, but Isa was a warrior. She was just as big as her brother, but she was more muscle than fat, though there was still a lot of fat. At only seventeen, she was two-thirds the size of her father, but Jacob was sure his sister would grow to rival him soon enough. While Robert led, Jane worked, and Robin drank, Isa fought and trained, and that was why she was chosen to stay behind while the rest of them went down south to join the council.

“All the new knights are exhausted. They did quite well,” she told their father, whose hands were still on his wife in ways Jacob couldn’t bring himself to describe, “they lasted longer than I thought they would.”

Jacob had gone to bed before dusk to the sounds of swords clashing in the courtyard, and he had woken up to the same sounds only an hour or so ago.

“Good,” said Robert with a smile, “they’ve earned a rest. Is the carriage ready?”

Jane nodded, her smile wider and her face redder than before.

“Then it’s time. To the carriage with you, and you boys.”

When his father’s eyes glanced at him, Jacob’s heart skipped a beat. He seldom liked attention, especially from his own family, for it rarely came before anything good. Robert’s eyes only rested on his for a moment, long enough to see if he was listening, before moving onto Robin. Jacob didn’t need telling twice. He slid from his chair and silently made his way to the door. He hoped to slip by and make his way to the carriage without his family catching his scent and paying him any more mind.

Robert then clasped his daughter’s face. “When I return, I will be the Earl of Denholm, Petty Overlord of Wolf Valley, highborn at last, and you, my itty Isa, will be the new Thane of Preston.”

“Hang on,” said the drunken Robin, “I’m your heir!”

“Idiot,” muttered Isa.

“You are my heir, sweet Robin,” his father told him with a sigh Jacob was far too familiar with, “but when we take the earldom, you will become the Earl of Denholm after me, and everything you see in this valley will be yours, and Isa will be your vassal. Drink what’s left in that tankard, I’m cutting you off for the rest of the trip. I’m going to need you to stay focused tonight and tomorrow, you hear. Sunrise is nearly upon us, we should reach Denholm by sundown, I want you as sober as a sheep by the time we get there. If you drink a drop more on this trip, I’ll kill you. Understand?”

Whatever Robin said next, Jacob didn’t hear. He was already out the door and hopping down the keep’s stairway, skipping every second step, before landing in the courtyard where the old wooden carriage was waiting for them. Jacob hopped inside and placed himself into the corner by the window. The sky was turning blue, and the eastern hills of Wolf Valley were starting to flow, the sun was soon upon them. He looked back out the other side of the carriage. Robin was helping Jane down the steps as Robert was giving a violent hug to Isa, telling her how he’ll see her tomorrow.

Their keep was a simple stone tower house, built a century ago by his great-grandfather to defend a now-ruined church that once sat alone up on this hill. The keep was soon followed by a village, named Preston, and then a brewery, built by his grandfather. Preston was a big village, not big enough to be a town, like the other settlements of Wolf Valley like Dawn Castle, Shawside, or Denholm, but it was big enough to have a landed gentry, a thane, the highest of lowborn, and that was his family. Tomorrow, Jacob thought, we might become nobles, the lowest of highborn, or we may all be dead.

The carriage leaned a little to the side as Jane clambered in and found her seat opposite Jacob. It then creaked even further to the side as Robin stepped inside, before it settled back into place once he sat himself down next to Jacob. And then the carriage nearly toppled over onto its side as Robert pulled himself into it. Jacob’s hands grabbed onto the walls in panic, but his mother and brother made no such move, their heads just bobbling and their bodies just jiggling as the carriage rocked back and forth. Perhaps it won’t be out cousins who kill us tonight, Jacob wondered, one hard turn and we may tumble down the valley.

Isa waved them off as the carriage started moving. With them came only a few peasants; some servants, carriage drivers, a merchant or two, and, notably, only four guards. Jacob struggled to understand a lot of things, another one of his differences that set him apart from the rest of the family, but this made the least sense to him. They were going straight into the Wolf’s Den, facing their violent cousins who would benefit from a little kinslaying, they’ve done worse for less, and all his father is bringing is four guards. Preston defended the northernmost thanage of Wolf Valley from mountain clans, peasant rebels, and eastern invaders, and so it had a decent number of soldiers for a village, but most were kept behind with Isa. Jacob had even overheard his father saying in private that he had hired two small sellsword companies, but they were nowhere to be seen. Not only that, but a month ago Robert had dismissed the village’s eight knights of the constabulus and held a small tourney to select his new knights. He then promoted his former knights to the role of his knight wolves, so they would be his official guards when he becomes earl, with the new knights remaining under Isa’s thanage, but winning the election is not certain, and if he doesn’t win, then he’d have two sets of knights working for him that he cannot afford and cannot reassign without causing someone offence. And he hasn’t even brought his knight wolves with him! Jacob fell into a tizzy whenever he thought about it for too long. The new knights of the constabulus were also untrustworthy. They were all from lesser lowborn houses, but not ones from the thanage of Preston. They were Sir Sun Jun, Sir Jane Denson, and Sir Ken Kennel from Denholm; Sir Abby Howl, Sir Ennis the Elder, and Sir Shay Shawson from Shawside; and then Sir David Dawn and Sir Adam Anderson from Dawn Castle. None of their new knights of the constabulus were loyal to them, but they were raised under the thanages of their competitors, some even being related to them. Jacob was sure that there was some conspiracy against them, that these eight knights had cheated to win the tourney, and that there was a betrayal waiting to happen, but his family had dismissed his worries as another one of his meltdowns, and so his warnings fell on deaf ears.

Jacob felt sick to his stomach as the carriage made its slow way down the Hill of Preston. Even if they survive this council, even if they win, his father’s misrule may doom them yet. But there was nothing he could do, except wait. Jacob hated waiting.

“What about that bear piece?” Robin asked his father, bringing Jacob back to the present, “you kept moving it around the side of the board.”

Robert smiled. “Aye, that I did, and you followed that bait well. The bear was irrelevant. You focused on that while you wandered into my trap. My sheep and tankard too you unawares.”

“I thought…”

“Aye, you thought,” said Robert as he waggled his finger, “but you didn’t think. I moved that bear, and my wolf, as if I had a plan for them. I didn’t, but you thought I did, and when you think you know what’s going on, you stop paying attention. No one keeps looking after they’ve already found what they’re looking for, and you don’t think about what you don’t notice. When you think you’re safe, that’s when you’re most in danger.”

Robin’s eyes stared at the wooden floor of the carriage for a moment, trying to untangle the knot of words his father had just thrown at him. Robin missed more than he caught, a little like Jacob. Actually, he was worse than Jacob, but because Robin was the eldest child, the heir, and was born the big brawny brute of a man, their father seemed to have more tolerance for him.

Whatever drunken process was going through his brother’s mind ended when a howl of wolves was heard, closer than they liked. The family looked out the window into the Wild Woods that lay deeper into the valley. His father’s hand slipped under his bearskin, no doubt gripping whatever was making that faint axe-like shape in his tunic. As the howls died down, Robert’s hand came back out. His father could seem to tell which howls were wolf-made or man-made, but Jacob couldn’t. He had heard stories of the mountain clan that had somehow survived in Wolf Valley for over a century, how they would attack travellers, raid villages, kidnap children, and feast upon the dead like wolves. Jacob wondered if his uncle and cousin, who had left Preston the night before to help the Steward of Denholm prepare for their arrival, may have met an unfortunate fate on the road. He was still concerned that they only had four guards, but at least they had some, unlike the lone merchants that made this trip. The guards were also trained to fight off the clan, armed with poison-tipped swords and aconite arrows. Clan Garwalf were distant kin to the Prestons, the bandit beasts descended from the Black Wolf’s eldest son, while the Prestons descended from the Black Wolf’s youngest son. Jacob was sure his civilised third cousins would try to kill them at the council but hadn’t considered until now that his wild third cousins may kill them on their way.

The sun could be seen over the eastern mountains of Wolf Valley by the time they passed the Wild Woods. The danger had passed, for now. The carriage creaked further down the hill before the road began to widen and become more even. They were now travelling alongside the River Den, all they had to do was follow the river through the Monkshood Meadow, past the town of Dawn Castle, around the Howling Forest, past the town of Shawside, and then they would be in Denholm.

“Jacob,” his father said calmly, startling him.

Jacob looked at him like a cow in a thunderstorm. “Yes, father?”

“Do you know?”

“Know what?”

“Where we’re going, what we’re doing? What do you think is happening?”

His father, mother, and brother were all staring at him. Jacob felt his face flush red. He was the runt of the litter, the sickly pup of the pack, and to the family, he was the simpleton. He wasn’t, his mind worked, it just worked differently to theirs. He watched and listened but didn’t always follow or understand. Sometimes it was like they were speaking another language to him, one of grunts and growls and howls and stares. They said things but meant other things, and everyone else understood them but him.

His mind didn’t work like theirs, but it still worked, in some ways it worked better than theirs. He could see patterns where they could not, he could see answers before they even knew the question. He knew from their former head brewer’s boots that he had been swindling incomes from them. He knew how Robin had been sneaking strongwine about just from the way that he walked. He knew who their vassals had bet on for the tourney just by the details of their outfits. And he knew when his mother had miscarried before his father did. But not everything he knew was correct, and he was wrong more often that he was right, and that was all anyone in the family seemed to remember. There were times he could function, and times he did not, and his family had no patience for that, so to them he was nothing more than a simpleton. They only brought him along because he was eligible to vote, and they needed all the votes they could muster.

His father was still staring at him. They had never told him explicitly what was happening, they had no reason to, but he had picked up on things over dinners and luncheons, conversations he half understood. He had a picture in his head, and now was the time to prove how aware he could truly be.

“We’re heading south,” Jacob began, “to Denholm. The Old Wolf died without a chosen heir. He has no surviving immediate kin, so they have to go back up the family tree to find the next of kin. You gave me an illustration of it. There are issues in the succession; abdications, disinheritances, other issues that make it unclear. To avoid conflict, the Steward of Denholm has called all the branches of our family, the bloodline of the wolf, to come together, form a council, stake our claims, and vote for the next earl. You put your name forth, as did Borys Shaw, Shiv Shaw, Donna Wolf, Malcom Wolf, and Bill Bloodwolf.”

His vision slowly returned to him as his mind began to focus on his surroundings instead of on his speech. Jacob cringed at the sound of his own voice. He spoke like someone reading from a book after only just learning their letters. His body also ached. He didn’t know why he tensed when he talked but he did. His eyes glanced around the carriage. Robin had grown bored and was looking out the window again. Jane had an expression Jacob couldn’t quite place, concern, pity, disappointment? Robert was staring at him, almost trying to figure him out. For a moment, Jacob wondered if he had even said what he thought he was saying, or if he had just babbled like an idiot.

“Yes,” his father said to him, “that is an accurate summary of events.”

Jacob felt his stomach tighten. He couldn’t tell if his father was mocking him or was genuinely trying to communicate with him.

“Do you think we have a chance at winning?”

Jacob tensed again. We have a greater chance at dying, he thought to himself.

His mother scoffed while his father chuckled, “We won’t die, son. We may be wolves, but we aren’t savages.”

He felt his face turn red. Did I say that out loud? Jacob wondered. It’s happened before.

“There will be some barking and howling,” Robert continued, “some biting and clawing, but once we win, we’ll have the power that the overlordship grants us, and with that we can tame any dissenters quite easily. Some will try to dispute the election, but none can dispute our lineage. We have the strongest claim.”

We have the weakest claim.

“And” Robert added, “we have a secret weapon. Jacob, take a look at this.”

His father unhooked a strap from his belt and brought forth a scroll. The parchment was fine and fresh. The ribbon that tied it closed had intricate weavings over the rich fabric. Even the seal was made of golden wax, with his father’s heraldry carefully pressed upon it. This was a scroll that was fit to be sent to a king.

“What’s in it?” Jacob asked.

“Ah, the key to understanding everything. But it’s a secret. We can’t let the information inside this scroll fall into the wrong hands. If any of the other competitors find out about this before the time is right, then we may have a problem on our hands. So, both of you, keep your yappers shut. Especially you, Jacob.”

Jacob nodded, and then again harder in case the first time looked more like a shiver. His father slid the scroll back into his belt. Jacob’s eyes remained transfixed onto it. The scroll was pure white, it almost shone in his father’s dark brown belt, amidst his dark green tunic and dark green trousers, surrounded by the great belt of the black bear. It was like a magic beacon, attracting all eyes towards it. Did it contain the speech Robert will give? Did it contain secrets? Did it contain important legalese or some kind of contract or agreement? Did it contain a threat, or a warning? The key to understanding. Jacob was as enamoured as he was concerned. His father was a smart man, but not the smartest. There were things he often missed, details he overlooked, bets he did not win, and ideas that were not well thought through. I have to see what’s in that scroll, Jacob thought to himself. If he could read it, he could spot what they could not, he could help them. I have to understand.

The sun was settling down upon the peak of Ben Dusk, the tallest mountain to the west of Wolf Valley. They continued to follow the River Den, which was thrice as wide as it was when they first met it, towards its mouth. The roads had been cobbled since they passed by Shawside, but now the cobble was smoother, more worn, but better kept. Beside them, the fields of wheat gave way to farmsteads, then fields of sheep gave way to hamlets, then an inn, then an old chapel, then they saw a cluster of buildings in the distance. Denholm.

Jacob had never seen a city before, but he struggled to imagine a place much bigger than Denholm, despite it only being a town. There were no walls or watchtowers to mark where the town really began, but he judged it to be perhaps a league wide, from the coast of Loch Den and the River Den in the south and west to the fields of sheep and the stretch of the Howling Forest to its north and east.

The further into the town they went, the more intense it got. Not even the biggest tourneys or festivals of Preston or Dawn Castle were as crowded and alive as an ordinary evening in Denholm. The roads were broad and busy, with children playing in their path. On the outskirts, the houses seemed rather ramshackle, but the deeper in, they grew into affluent manses before they entered the busier and more commercial centre of the town. Robert pointed at the manor that had a statue of the dragon out front and noted that it was the Sun Estate, a merchant family that were going to be important in the council. The buildings grew taller and more tightly packed, with various alleys and crookback streets. They passed whitewashed houses, some timber, and some stone, some with thatched rooves, others with slates, some with windows, others with shutters. Shops began to appear and became more frequent as they got closer to the centre. They passed traders, merchants, and guildhalls, a blacksmith, a barracks, a butcher, a bathhouse, some storehouses and a granary, some stables and cobblers, an alchemist, and a bank. As they passed by the harbour, with a dozen or so ships docked, they saw a market full of fishmongers, traders, and insurers. Every third building, Jacob noticed, was either an inn, a tavern, an alehouse, a public house, or a brothel. Robin looked at each of them as if he hadn’t drunk in days.

They turned down another road and passed by a grand church, white and beautiful and golden in the sunset, with the stained-glass windows shining all sorts of colours inside. Behind the church lay a wide graveyard, one that had been filled for decades. Near the back of the cemetery stood a great statue of the Black Wolf, a large man with a wolfskin on his back, and his family around him. Jacob noted that it was interesting that the Black Wolf’s statue was made of white marble. This first Earl of Wolf Valley had his youngest son and Jacob’s great-grandfather, the Little Wolf, on his left shoulder. His next youngest son, the Big Wolf, and his only daughter, the She-Wolf, knelt before him, his hand on his daughter’s shoulder. And to his right, leaning on him but looking away, stood his other son, the White Wolf. The Bad Wolf is not present, noted Jacob.

The plaza was still quite busy, despite the slow setting of the sun. Instead of buildings, there were rows and rows of different coloured tents, each selling various exotic or homemade goods. People were shouting about their goods and arguing over prices. Jacob could hear two lutists playing different songs from either side of the market, and a troupe of performers were finishing up their final show of the day. They didn’t hear the trickle of the water fountain until they were right next to it. Jacob knew his family’s symbols well enough to know the statues spouting up the dark water were wolves before they were close enough to tell.

The carriage groaned as they ascended the hill in the middle of the town where the Wolf’s Den sat. They passed under a thick and tall stone wall that surrounded the hill; Robin said it looked like a large tankard. Within the passage of the wall, on either side of the road, stood two stone statues, as big as the carriage, of wolves standing on their hind legs and dressed as soldiers. Jacob spotted red jewels in their eyes as they passed. They pulled into the courtyard, which was far less busy than the streets beyond the wall, and the carriage came to a halt. Jacob looked up at the castle that had housed the earls of Wolf Valley for over a century; where I will either live or die, he thought, depending on how this night goes.

The Wolf’s Den was a castle made of black stone, ten times the size of the keep in Preston. It was an old building, older than its name, older than the house of the wolf, built by and taken from Sun Lang the Third when the Sage Kings conquered the land centuries ago, with many of its secrets being lost to time. The ground flood was the largest, in length, in breadth, and in height. It housed the great hall, as well as the kitchens, offices, the disused library, and servants’ quarters. The second floor was half the size, though still huge, as it held most of the bedchambers, and beyond the walls was a wide balcony that surrounded the floor, with stone crenelations and steps leading down the side of the castle. The third and fourth floors were even smaller, a tower of more bedchambers that made the castle look as if it had been impaled. Jacob could see a flock of crows, or perhaps ravens, circling above the tower of the Wolf’s Den. The banners baring the heraldry of the Old Wolf still hung from the walls; a sinister black wolf with bright white eyes pursuing rightward on a field of stone grey.

“That’s where we’re staying tonight,” Robert pointed to the family as they pulled themselves from the carriage, “the top floor, even the Steward knows how important we are.”

Or how unimportant we are, Jacob thought as he stretched his legs, we’re staying in the rooms furthest from the hall.

“Speak of the golden devil,” called Robert as the large doors of the great hall creaked open and a mouse-like man scurried out, “Colin!”

The Steward of Denholm, Colin Kennel, wore an amiable smile. His hands remained inside his orange robes, clasped together as if he were a monk. His hair, or what was left of it, was a golden fringe surrounding a shining hairless patch, like a low crown upon a bald head. He was in his late sixties but had spent most of his life serving the Old Wolf. Colin’s father was the Steward of Denholm before him, and his aunt before him, and her father before her, who had helped the Black Wolf take Wolf Valley from the Sage Kings during the Liberation, and then served as the first Steward of Denholm. Colin’s eldest daughter was currently the Steward of Shawside, and his son was undergoing a scholarship at the University of Auldarran, in hopes of becoming a steward as well. It was an open secret that the Kennels were the true administrators of Wolf Valley, while the earls just sat the throne and led the ceremonies and did whatever they liked whenever they liked, though that seemed to make the position of earl all the more appealing. Colin’s other son had broken the family tradition and become a knight, though a poor one, now one of the new knights at Preston, while his other daughter had married the Old Wolf and died birthing the heir to Denholm, but who was outlived by the Old Wolf.

Jacob eyed the Steward as his father embraced him like an old friend. It was Colin who had called for a council to be assembled, hoping the family and vassals of the wolf may choose their next earl with minimal bloodshed, though Jacob doubted his intentions were so pure. His grandson would have been earl next if he hadn’t died a year prior, but he had other grandchildren. His eldest daughter was not only the Steward of Shawside, but had married Rufus Shaw, the Thane of Shawside, and both her children put their claims forward to become the next Earl of Wolf Valley. The Shaws were the descendants of the Black Wolf but through the disinherited line of his third child, the She-Wolf. They were up against the Wolfs, descendants of the Black Wolf’s second child, the White Wolf, who had abdicated in favour of the She-Wolf before he had children of his own. The Wolfs were also descended from a more senior branch of the Shaw line as well, giving them more legitimacy in the eyes of many. Few would have considered either of the Shaws to be the clear heirs to Denholm, and none would have considered the younger Shaw, and yet both were chosen as legitimate candidates for the election. Chosen by the Steward of Denholm, their grandfather. Jacob figured this whole ordeal was just a way for the Steward to get Kennel blood to sit the throne, rather than just being the power behind it. After all, once the matter of succession became an election, it was no longer about who had the best claim, but who could win votes.

“Jake!” shouted a familiar voice as some giddy force slammed into Jacob’s side, almost knocking him off his feet.

Jacob fought back by grabbing the kid’s scruffy ginger hair and pulling it until his cousin let go of him and started to claw at his hands. Owan, his uncle’s ten-year-old bastard son, growled as Jacob stook a step back, recollected himself, and then knelt to properly hug his little cousin.

“Friends!” said Robin in a mocking tone. He wasn’t wrong, Owan was the closest thing Jacob had to a friend, despite the boy being the wildest of all the wolves. Owan never judged him, never made him feel bad, and always seemed to look up to him. He was also the only person who was able to get Owan to sit and listen, the way Jacob explained things seemed to resonate with the boy. Perhaps we aren’t too different, Jacob often found himself thinking, before Owan began climbing the walls and eating candle wax, and then Jacob thought better of it.

“I thought they’d cage you the second you arrived,” said Robert, which made Owan bare his crooked teeth at him and hiss, before he ran on all fours and leapt into his uncle’s arms, “where’s your father, boy?”

“He’s making your rooms!” shouted the boy right into Robert’s ear, “I made Jake’s room!”

Robin scoffed, “I bet you a copper he shat under your bed,” he whispered. Jacob didn’t respond, Owan was strange, but he wasn’t that kind of strange. He was wild and reckless, but in no way a simpleton. His family’s lack of understanding of Jacob was only outdone by their lack of understanding of Owan.

The Steward of Denholm told the servants to store the barrels of strongwine that Rober had brought into the great hall. Jane affectionately grabbed Owan by the scruff of the neck and pulled him off her husband. The great doors creaked wider open as the family entered the Wolf’s Den.

The great hall was dark and candlelit. The golden rays of sunlight lit up the room for a moment, bringing everyone’s attention to the Prestons as they entered. Fewer than a dozen figures were scattered about the room. There was a smoke hole in the roof that opened up to the balcony, but it was closed as the hearth that sat in the middle of the hall had been removed and replaced with more tables. The walls and floors were made of timber and stone, and doors to hallways lined the sides of the room. Five large stone busts looked down at them from high up on the walls, two on either side and one on the wall at the back. Each depicted a former Earl of Wolf Valley; the Black Wolf who had conquered the land, the She-Wolf who inherited after her elder brother abdicated, the Big Wolf who won through usurpation though he didn’t live long enough to be anointed, his son the Young Wolf, and then the Old Wolf.

On the main floor sat six long tables with benches on either side. Up on the dais sat a seventh, the high table, with fine chairs in a row on either side of the throne of Denholm. On the furthest stone wall, where the great banner of the reigning house would usually be, were the six banners of each of the competitors for the title of Earl of the town of Denholm and the domain of Wolf Valley. Jacob noticed each banner lined up with a table.

The first banner, on the leftmost side of the hall, was the personal heraldry of Bill Bloodwolf, the bastard beast, and the illegitimate eldest son of the eldest son of the eldest son of the White Wolf, as well as the illegitimate eldest son of the eldest son of the only son of the She-Wolf. His banner displayed a full faced couped head of a white wolf with bright red eyes upon a sable field. Next to that was his brother, the trueborn Malcom Wolf, Thane of Dawn Castle, whose heraldry was similar to his bastard brother’s, with his being a full faced couped head of a black wolf with blood red eyes upon a field of dark azure. After that, in the middle-left of the wall, was the banner of Malcom’s little sister, Donna Wolf, whose claim was bolstered by the claim of her husband, Sun Lang the Seventeenth, whose family once ruled this land before it was called Wolf Valley. Her banner was of a full faced couped fox, with fiery red fur and black eyes upon a sable field. Next to hers was the banner of Shiv Shaw, the Thane of Shawside, granddaughter of the Colin Kennel, and great-granddaughter of the disinherited She-Wolf. Her banner showed a sinister ginger wolf with white eyes upon an argent field. Shiv’s brother came next, Borys Shaw, whose claim boiled down to the fact that he was a man. His claim was the weakest, as absolute primogeniture had been law in the kingdom for over a century, and that for his male-only claim to hold water, he had to disregard his uncle, who was a father of Bill and Malcom, and ignore the fact that his claim derives from the She-Wolf. Nevertheless, he was a contender, and his banner of a dexter ginger wolf with black eyes on a sable field stood tall on the wall. Last, on the rightmost side, was the personal heraldry of Robert Preston, a bunch of red grapes on a field of green. The rest at least had animals, most had wolves of some kind, but the Prestons had grapes. Jacob felt that was a poor sign of legitimacy.

“Robert Preston,” called a voice from the end of the hall. Jacob’s eyes adjusted to the room, and he saw cousin Borys sitting on the throne of Denholm, his feet up on the table and a chicken bone in his hand, “you’ve come down from your high hill to mingle with us real wolves, eh?”

Robert stared at Borys Shaw for a long time, before saying just “bald.”

Borys dropped his bone, hopped over the high table, and walked the length of the hall towards them. The last time Jacob had seen his cousin, he had lush ginger locks of hair, but now his locks were gone, his hair shorter, and his forehead had grown a little larger. He was only in his early twenties, but the Kennel curse was already upon him. Borys came right up to the Thane of Preston, who was twice his age and looked almost twice his size. They eyed each other up, and then Borys glanced to Jane, who was trying to get Owan to stop biting her arms, and then to Robin.

“Your lot have five or six votes between you, right?” asked Borys, “Name your price. Another thanage, more land, gold, titles. Make me earl and I’ll make you a happy man.”

Robert just stared at him, saying nothing. Borys took the hint.

“Your son looks very much like your wife,” Borys said, louder than a whisper, but not quite a shout, “yet not so much like you. Interesting.”

Robert didn’t react, until one of the doors at the other end of the hall swung open. Out sauntered a large man wearing a white wolfskin and gnawing at a goat’s leg. It took Jacob an instant to recognise him, the eldest of the competitors and the scariest yet most jolly of his distant cousins.

Bill Bloodwolf, the bastard beast of Dawn Castle, had bright red eyes and milk white skin, and all manner of scratches and scars on his face. His hair was brush cut and a black. Jacob remembered rumours that he had dyed it black to make himself seem more like a Wolf like his trueborn brothers. Ever since the bastard daughters of the Bad Wolf formed Clan Garwalf, their family had a sore spot when it came to illegitimate children, but Bill Bloodwolf had changed that decades ago defending Wolf Valley from an eastern invasion when the rest of the able-bodied family were away in some other war. Robin had told him that Owan would have been abandoned in the woods if it wasn’t for Bill’s efforts to change the family’s attitudes towards bastards.

Robert swung his arm out and shoved Borys away, a wide smile broke out on his face. “There’s the bastard that ate my fucking fingers!”

Bill chucked his half-eaten goat’s leg to the side and bared his teeth at his cousin, “and I’ll do it again you fat dog!”

The two men met in the middle of the hall in a wide embrace. Bill was less of a second cousin and more of a big brother to Jacob’s father. Both had grown up together in Dawn Castle, along with Bill’s brother Malcom, and Jacob’s aunt Arianna and uncle Remus. Robert’s mother had passed birthing Remus, and his father couldn’t handle children, so it fell to the Thane of Dawn Guard, Alexander Wolf, and his husband, Rowan Shaw, to raise the pups, and for that, the Prestons and the Wolfs of Dawn Castle were as close as the Shaws and the Wolfs of Denholm. Robert pulled back, one arm still over Bill’s shoulders, and loudly asked “if I gut you, would I find my fingers still in there?”

“Naw,” Bill replied, as if Robert was a fool, “I shat them into my chamber pot, where they belong.”

A devilish smile formed on Jacob’s father’s face. He threw his other hand out and beckoned the whole room, which had doubled in size since they had entered, to hear. “He admits it,” Robert shouted, “my fingers have passed through his rectum. Jane, you owe me ten silvers. I’ve fingered the bastard!”

A dozen hearty laughs rang out through the hall, though with the lungs of this family it felt like a hundred. Bill had an angry smile on him and replied to that comment with a swift punch into Robert’s stomach. Robert retorted by digging his claws into Bill’s neck and pushing him downward, which only allowed for Bill’s rebuttal with an uppercut into Robert’s crotch. Robert argued back by placing both hands on Bill’s head and slamming his cousin’s head into his knees. Bill cursed as he stumbled backwards, before laughing, charging, and tackling him into the floor, where they both began to wrestle and laugh manically. They look like stupid little boys, Jacob thought, not the forty-three and forty-seven-year-old men that they are.

Reunions were a queer affair when it came to the house of wolves. They loved each other almost as much as they hated each other. In the span of seconds, cousins could go from laughing at a light-hearted joke to attempted bloody murder, once they tired, they’d fall into tender familial hugs, followed by an intense argument about petty politics, and then declarations of eternal friendship. Whenever there was a lull in the conversation, unexpected violence often erupted, the easiest solution. They could switch between love and hate, tenderness and toughness, as if they were one and the same. At times they could be twins, at other times they could be strangers. Their apathy and empathy towards one another changed with the winds. Allies at dawn and enemies at dusk. It was a family of contradictions. Jacob could rarely keep up with such odd customs, he could never understand their relationships or what they thought about one another. They spoke and lived a language he had never learned.

Jacob looked around the room. Two dozen people lurked about; some servants, officials, guards, a few peasant attendants to the gentry. People were talking, some eating, all waiting for the night to properly begin. Jacob’s mother had disappeared somewhere, likely to check out their chambers. His brother had already started some violent slap game with Borys, both men the same age, their early twenties, but still acted like boys, much like the elders in the family. Owan had vanished, but then Jacob noticed the growling boy-shaped curve behind one of the banners up on the wall. Sitting up at the high table upon the dais were the three weird women of the family; the ancient Aoife One-Eye, who was grandmother to the Old Wolf, mad grandaunt Blyster Greyskin, who had the mind of a child, and the Black Bride, Ana of Ellago, who had married the Old Wolf’s son before he died. Between Jacob and the dais, on one of the middle tables, sat another cousin who had kept silent so far. Donna Wolf, once known as the Fox, sat and watched her older brother and her cousin battle on the floor. Next to her sat her husband, Sun Lang the Seventeenth, who had one arm over her shoulder and another on her swollen belly. Robin had told him that they were on their seventh or eighth pregnancy, but no child had survived birth. He told Jacob that it was because they were mongrels, though Jacob knew that was just the hate talking. Many in their family did not look too kindly on easterners, for centuries Wolf Valley had been the battleground between the east and west, both citing ancestral claims to the land, neither willing to compromise. Jacob noticed Sun Lang was glaring across the room, at some soldiers and an old man wearing the armour of a Sworn Sword, Jacob remembered him leading the household guard some years ago. Jacob had heard his father saying something about the former Sworn Sword being a guest of honour. The man was staring at Donna and Sun Lang as he spoke to the soldiers, clearly talking about them, and clearly not affectionately. House Sun had earned its place under the Old Wolf, even fighting off eastern invaders to show their loyalty, but it was clear they’d never be seen as truly native. Besides the two of them, their table was empty. Sun Lang’s dark eyes locked onto Jacob, Donna’s soon followed, and Jacob suddenly felt real again.

He had been standing by the door for some time now, just staring at people. His cheeks turned red as he directed his gaze to the ground and walked away. Their table was on the right side of the room, so Jacob brought himself there and sat down at its end. The bench bounced as his father sat himself at the other end, exhausted but victorious, with Bill groaning and chuckling on the floor. Jacob stared at his father’s belt, for a moment he thought the scroll was gone, that Bill had pilfered it, but then Robert readjusted himself in his seat and Jacob saw it was still there, his belt had only moved.

“Jake!” shouted Owan right into Jacob’s face. He hadn’t seen the boy climb down from under the banner, but he had snuck his way onto the table and was sitting in front of Jacob like pup would. “Who’s gonna win? Who’s gonna win?”

Jacob looked at his cousin for a moment, and then asked, “who do you think is going to win?”

Owan cocked his head to the side, his smile fading as he began to think. Jacob figured no one had asked the boy his opinion since he arrived. He wondered how much Owan even knew.

It wasn’t much, apparently, as evidenced by Owan’s reply. “Dad?”

“Your father isn’t a competitor, Owan,” Jacob told him, trying to make sure his tone was clear enough that Owan would understand without feeling belittled. “Do you know who is?”

Owan shook his head and pulled himself off the table to sit next to Jacob. He was the only one who knew how to teach Owan things, and Owan was always a good student. Jacob had tried to tell his family how to talk to him, how to get through to him, how to make him listen, but they never took him seriously. They would rather just say the same things over and over at him until they gave up.

Jacob pulled out a folded piece of parchment from his breast pocket and began to flatten it out on the table. He then pointed to the six banners high up on the wall. “You see those banners, Owan? Each one of them represents the six family members who are trying to win this election. You see those grapes? That is my father’s banner, your uncle.”

“Uncle Robert is in the game?” said Owan. Jacob smiled and nodded at his cousin, it was a small thing, putting two and two together, but it was still worthy of praise. Owan’s face lit up, praise was hard to come by in their family even for the normal ones, for Jacob and Owan it was near impossible.

“Look here, Owan,” Jacob told him, pointing at the parchment, “this is out family tree. These names are the people in our family, the lines show how we’re related to each other.”

“Like arrows! Those names come from those names. Like I came from dad, and you came from your mum and dad!”

“Exactly! My father wrote down this family tree for me a month ago when he tried to explain it to me. Not everyone in our family is included. This mostly shows the descendants of the Black Wolf himself, not his sisters or cousins. If it did, it would include the likes of the Earl of Sheeside, Lord of Brighthill, Lady of Greywater, High Lord of Outer Laushire, Duke of Arte, and Earl of Lauhead, even the royal family would be distant cousins of ours. This family tree also doesn’t count those whose lines died out or those who didn’t or can’t have heirs, like aunt Arianna, our cousin Edd, or grandaunt Blyster. And it doesn’t count the children who didn’t make it to adulthood, so you’re on it… for now. Can you see your name?”

Owan stood up on the bench to get a better look. He almost pressed his face onto the paper as he scanned up and down it. Jacob had been teaching him his words and letters back home. He knew most of the letters off by heart, and he knew how to read and write his own name.

“Oh, oh, oh. There, no, that’s got a line in it. And that one’s got a ruh, ruh, ruh, in it. Oh, oh, oh. Wan. Wan. Owan!” He slammed his finger down onto where his name was, in the corner of the tree, as he began to jiggle in excitement.

“Well done! So, you are the son of your father, Remus Preston, right there. Your father is the younger brother to my father, Robert Preston. When it comes to succession, the election, winning the game, eldest comes first. Siblings only win if the elder has no children.”

“Eldest on the…” Owan began, he then looked at his hands and shook his right one, “… I write with my right, so this is my… Eldest on the left, like when writing or reading, the left comes first.”

“Yes! You’re getting it. So, my father comes before your father. Your father isn’t trying to win, he can’t, my father is older, which means he has a better chance at winning, we call that his claim, so your father is here to help my father win instead.”

“Like teams!”

“Exactly, just like teams. If we go up this line, all the way to our great-great-grandfather, we see the Black Wolf. You can see he has other children, not just our great-grandfather.”

“They’re older than him. Does that mean they come first?”

“Yes. But things get complicated here. His eldest son had no trueborn children, so it would go to the next eldest, the White Wolf, but he did a thing called an abdication.”

“He touched himself?”

“No, not that. The White Wolf did not want to become the Earl of Wolf Valley after his father died, he didn’t want to win the game, so it went to his sister.”

“But there’s a line under him? The White Wolf has a kid. You said the sisters could only win if the elder has no kids.”

“That’s true. Well spotted,” said Jacob, and Owan smiled, “but these numbers under their names say when they were born. When the White Wolf chose not to win, he didn’t have any children, so his sister, the She-Wolf, won. Then, he did have children, but the She-Wolf was already the Earl of Wolf Valley. You can’t lose after you’ve already won.”

“I get it! I get it!” Owan said excitedly, “So, her line goes down, eldest to eldest, to eldest, and it’s this name. Buh, buh, buh…”

Jacob knew it was going to get harder to explain the further they got. He wasn’t sure if Owan would be able to follow the rest, but it was worth a try. “That’s Bill Bloodwolf, the first banner on the wall, one of the competitors now trying to win. We’ll get back to him in a second. Let’s stay with the She-Wolf for now. You see that black symbol her name?”

“Her dad has it too. The Black Wolf.”

“Yes, that shows us who won each game, who become the Earl of Wolf Valley. The Bad Wolf and the White Wolf don’t have those symbols because they didn’t win. What do you notice about the She-Wolf’s son?”

“Um, his name is different. His numbers are different. He has a red symbol?”

“Red. Not black. The black ones mean that they won the big game; they became the Earl. The other symbols are for the smaller games, becoming Thane. Let’s stay with the She-Wolf,” Jacob wasn’t sure if he could keep Owan’s attention for long, “the She-Wolf was slain in a bloody war with her younger brother, the Big Wolf. He won the war and so he won the game. If you have enough strength, you can force yourself to win, regardless of the rules. So, the Big Wolf did something called disinheritance, it’s like abdication, you remember that word, but it is when someone else does it to you. He disinherited the son of the She-Wolf, so he could not win the game, and so it went to the next eldest, the Big Wolf, but he also died, so it went to his son.”

“That one!” Owan shouted, pointing at the son of the Big Wolf.

“Exactly, great work! And after him, his eldest won the game. And he was the Old Wolf.”

“Old dead guy!” shouted Owan. Jacob failed to hold back a chuckle at that.

“Yes, I don’t suppose you remember him that much. And because he has now passed on, who wins next?”

Owan pointed at the Old Wolf’s son, Connor Wolf.

“You would be right but look at the numbers. He is already dead, and he had no children of his own.”

Owan traced his finger back up the tree and to the Old Wolf’s brother, Chad Wolf.

“Numbers again. If they have two numbers, that means they’re dead. If they have one, then they’re still alive.”

Owan’s finger went down again, to Chad’s bastard son, Walton Wulfe.

“Ah, and now another problem,” Jacob said to Owan’s visible annoyance. Jacob was starting to lose him again. “That person, Walton Wulfe, is a bastard. Bastards are shown on this tree with those dotted lines, rather than the straight ones Do you know what a bastard is?”

“I’m a bastard! Billy’s a bastard. It means… it means we’re animals?”

Jacob wasn’t sure how to feel about that answer. “No. It means your parents were married when you were born. That is important for some reason. It means that you can’t win the game.”

“Oh. Wait, but you said that Billy was a com… comp… player trying to win.”

“I did, good spot,” Jacob said, and Owan’s face eased to that, “so, skip over that person, he’s far away and lord elsewhere, so we’re all skipping him for some reason. Follow where the line goes next.”

Owan’s finger went back up the family tree, through the Old Wolf’s father, onto the Big Wolf, then to his younger brother, the Little Wolf, and back down, through Jacob’s grandfather, and then onto his father. “That one has one number. That’s your dad! He’s won!”

“That’s what our team is going with,” Jacob said, sighing, “but remember those issues I said before, this election means that they may be passed over, depending on how people feel about them. The line of the White Wolf believes that, since they are the eldest line, they should win, and that the abdication doesn’t follow down the line. The line of the She-Wolf thinks that the abdication does follow down the line, and that the disinheritance should be ignored, since the line that did that to them is no longer in charge, and since they are the descendants of a former winner, that means they should win.”

“Wait, wait, I got this, Jakey,” said Owan as he furrowed his brow in concentration. “So, if we follow the White Wolf down, we get to… buh, buh, Billy! Wait, but he’s a bastard too?”

“Yes. So, he should probably be passed over, but he is the most senior known descendant of the Black Wolf, so the Steward has considered him a competitor,” Jacob said. No doubt the Steward chose three Wolfs to try and split their votes, giving his grandchildren a better chance at winning.

“But if Billy the bastard can still play, why can’t that one, what did you call him; Walton?”

“Yes, Walton. It doesn’t make a lot of sense to skip over Walton but include Bill, which is why we think Bill’s claim is weak.”

“Weak,” repeated Owan, with a hint of understanding in his voice, “dad said it was a game of talking, convincing. It’s like when we play stacking games and someone tries to lean the things on other things, we then argue about who is right. Right?”

“Exactly. It’s just like that. Bill thinks he should be included because he is the eldest known descendant of the Black Wolf, and he has to argue that claim and convince the voters that he’s right. If he talks really well and changes enough minds, he will get the most votes, and so he will win the game.”

“Okay,” clapped Owan, “who is next?”

“Well, if bastards don’t count, you tell me.”

Owan put his finger on the nametag for Bill Bloodwolf and traced his finger to Bill’s trueborn brother and asked, “what does that say?”

“That is Malcom Wolf, he calls himself the True Wolf, because he’s the eldest trueborn descendent of the Black Wolf, and says he looks just like him. His claim is simple, if you ignore his great-grandfather’s abdication, he will win.”

“I get this!” said Owan with a proud smirk on his face. “Who else is playing?”

“Well, you see Malcom’s sister, Donna Wolf, she’s playing.”

“But she has an older brother. Is that another weak claim?”

“That’s what every other team believes, but she is married to this man right here, Sun Lang, and his family are said to have ruled this land long before our family, and so she is staking a claim through that.”

“Boring,” said Owan, who took one look at Sun Lang’s face and frowned, “next!”

“Okay then. If we keep it simple and believe what my father says we should believe, the abdication means that the White Wolf’s line doesn’t count, where does that take us next?”

Owan traced his finger back up and landed on the She-Wolf and then traced his down, through her son, and then his eldest son, and then landed back on Bill Bloodwolf. Owan hesitated and began looking at the tree again.

“Don’t worry, you’ve got it right,” Jacob told his little cousin in a reassuring voice, “look, Bill, Malcom, and Donna have two fathers. Their first father was the grandson of the White Wolf, but their other father, the one who birthed them, was the grandson of the She-Wolf.”

“So,” said Owan, eyeing up Jacob, “does that make their claims… stronger?”

“To them it does, but to the other players, no. Our team says that both lines cannot win, because of the abdication and disinheritance, but the other two players say something else. You see, the father that birthed them, the grandson of the She-Wolf, was disowned by his own father. You remember the small games, the ones for becoming Thane. They work by the same rules. The red symbol is for the Thane of Shawside.”

“There?” asked Owan as he placed a finger on the She-Wolf’s son.

“Yes, that is Brandon Shaw, the first Thane of Shawside. But he hated his eldest son, Rowan Shaw. I don’t entirely know why; I think it was because he was queer. It doesn’t matter why, all I know is that Brandon disinherited his son, and so when Brandon died, the small game of who becomes the next Thane of Shawside began, and because Rowan was disinherited, he was passed over and his little brother, Rufus Shaw, became Thane.”

As Jacob explained, Owan’s finger traced down from Brandon Shaw to Rowan Shaw, then to Rufus Shaw, and finally down to the eldest child of Rufus, Shiv Shaw. He looked to Jacob to see if he had done that right, and Jacob nodded.

“That is Shiv Shaw, another player in the game. She believes that the White Wolf’s abdication and Rowan’s disinheritance means that the Wolfs can’t win.”

“But her granddad was dis… dissing… had that thing done to him. They ignore one but accept another?”

Jacob nodded, “that’s what we and the Wolfs like to point out. We believe that makes their claim weak.”

“Weak,” echoed Owan.

“But Shiv believes that the disinheritance of the She-Wolf’s line doesn’t count now that the line that did that, the Big Wolf’s line, is no longer in charge, while the line that disinherited Rowan Shaw is still very much alive in her. And my father also says that she’s a disgusting bigot who barely thinks of Rowan as a person, let alone a man.”

“That’s five players. Your dad, Billy, Malcom, Donna, and Shiv Shaw. Who is the last?”

“That would be big Borys Shaw, Shiv’s little brother.”

“Not the eldest. Weak claim.”

Jacob smirked; the kid catches on quick. “Exactly, his claim is almost as poor as Donna’s. Except, he is advocating for the old ways. Long ago, this kingdom didn’t let women win these games, they were passed over for boys. Borys wants to return to that way of things. He thinks his sister should be passed over for him.”

“That’s not a rule! If you can just make up new rules like that, then I want to play, and the only rule is that only those called Owan can win.”

Jacob laughed at that, “you’d have my vote. You’re right, and that’s why many of us don’t take his claim seriously.”

He wondered if the Steward had only included him in the list of competitors because he was his grandson, or perhaps he agreed with Borys’s politics.

“Weak claim,” said Owan as he began to look over the family tree again. “How can Borys think boys come before girls when his dad was the younger son.”

“He also believes in Rowan’s disinheritance,” Jacob told him, “and like his sister, he’s also a disgusting bigot who doesn’t think Rowan was a man.”

Owan traced his finger back up the line and started tapping the She-Wolf, “his line comes from a woman!”

“True,” said Jacob with a smile, even he was shocked at how well Owan was able to understand what was going on, he may be a scholar yet, “his excuse for that is that it doesn’t matter, she sat the throne of Wolf Valley, she won the game, ergo her descendants have legitimate claims, so long as those descendants are male only. What a coincidence that his political beliefs about inheritance just so happen to culminate in him being next in line to become the Earl of Wolf Valley.”

Owan had hopped up onto the table and started attempting a handstand. He had learned what he could from the parchment and was starting to move on, and the words Jacob had just said were too complex for him. After a few false starts, he managed to balance on two hands. “It’s all very messy,” Owan told him as he wobbled, “but tomorrow it will be sorted out, right?”

Jacob nodded, but he wasn’t so sure. I doubt it, he thought to himself. Calling this election has given every candidate hope, their eyes are now set upon the earldom, and to tear that away would embitter them towards the victor, towards the whole process. The fact they have been selected as viable competitors has given their claims credence and legitimacy, the fact that they have a chance at winning will disillusion them if they don’t. Another conflict may come. If not tonight or tomorrow night, then years from now, maybe in the next succession, maybe the next war, maybe decades or centuries down the line when the family has expanded even more and over a dozen claimants are vying for the earldom. Succession is a war that never ends, Jacob found himself thinking as his stomach twisted. Does my father have what it takes to fight in this war… do I?

“So, how do we win?” Owan asked as he slowly raised one hand, balancing on just his right hand, “Who do you think is gonna win?”

Jacob sighed, “It looks like Malcom has the strongest claim, but Bill is a local legend, Shiv is a well-known and well-respected Thane, and Borys is said to have been throwing quite a few silvers behind his cause. My father says that we have the simplest claim, so we have the best claim. We are the next eldest trueborn kin to the Old Wolf. We lack the complexities of abdication or disinheritance. But we are still the most junior branch of the family, we are barely known beyond our strongwine brewery, and I don’t think we have the finances to buy any votes. Though my father did say he has a secret plan.”

That caught Owan’s attention. He bounced off his one hand and landed next to Jacob on the bench. He looked up at his older cousin with eager eyes, “secret plan?”

Jacob smiled; they were more alike than he often cared to admit. He put an arm around Owan and pointed across the table towards his father, who was now sitting on the steps up to the dais talking to the old Sworn Sword.

“You see that scroll on his belt,” Jacob told his cousin, “apparently my father has some secret plan written in there, a plan that will ensure his victory tomorrow night.”

“What’s the plan?” Owan asked him, his voice a whisper.

“I don’t know,” Jacob replied, “I haven’t been told, but I’ll find out.”

The great doors of the hall swung open with a quick but heavy groan. There was much less light that streamed in now than when the Prestons arrived. In from the night sauntered Shiv Shaw, the Thane of Shawside.

She was a wide woman with chiselled features, bigger than her brother in every way. Her hair was fairer, almost strawberry blonde, and her tunic was the red of Shawside. She walked into the hall as if it she already owned it.

“Where’s my shithead brother?” she called out to the hall. Jacob felt a gust of wind from beside him, when he looked, Owan was already gone.

“Cousin,” said Robert as he walked down the hall with open arms, “how the hell are you?”

“Robert,” she replied with a warm smile, the sharpness from a moment ago briefly lifted, “I’m well. The journey was fun, I saw Malcom’s horses coming down the way, so I rushed my own group to beat him. He almost overtook me, but I threw rocks at him from my carriage until he had to pull back. He was fuming.”

Jacob’s father let out a hearty laugh at that. Shiv’s face dropped as she Borys hiding amongst a group of attendees lurking around the dais. Without a second thought, she shoved past Robert and marched towards her brother.

“There you are you coward. Still hiding out here with all the other sexist sheep?”

Borys threw the first punch, shoving his attendees away and swinging his fist straight for his big sister’s forehead. Jacob could swear he heard a crack when the strike landed. Shiv’s head flew backwards as she took a step back to recover, grabbing her brother’s offending hand as she did, before pulling him towards her, stepping forward, and headbutting him in the skull. Borys fell back onto the stone floor with a heavy thud.

“I missed you too, brother,” she told him as she wiped spit from her mouth, “but you hit like a woman.” Jacob heard the room chuckle at that, but it erupted into laughter when Shiv tried taking a few steps away and then collapsed onto a bench, the strike finally taking effect. A few of her allies stepped forward to help her back up, but she raised her hand to stop them.

Robert looked down and smirked, he then called to Bill, who Jacob could see wrestling little Owan up on the dais, “Bill, if we’re lucky, the competition might kill themselves.”

Borys was quick to pull himself back up onto his feet. He glared at Robert, and for a moment Jacob thought he was going to charge him, but then he extended a hand to his sister. Shiv did not appreciate the solidarity and swung her fist up into his crotch. Borys squealed like a pig as Shiv stood and put him into a headlock, before giving him a noogie.

“Do you think if I kept doing this, I’d burn off the rest of his hair?” Shiv asked the room as Borys clawed at her hands, “I see none of your potions or elixirs have helped regrow your hair, brother!” She then pushed him away and bounced back towards her. Both siblings squared up against each other, chins up, teeth bared, before they fell into a brief hug, parted, and stormed away from one another. The great doors began to groan open again and Shiv uttered a quiet “oh shit” as she scurried to the side of the hall.

Malcom Wolf strolled into the great hall and pulled back the head of his black wolfskin, the eyes of the dead wolf were red. He was a little larger than his bastard brother and a little shorter than Robert. His eyes were dark, and his hair was darker, and he had a thin beard that lined his sharp jaw. He wore a dark blue tunic, the colour of Dawn Castle He growled as his eyes scanned the room, a hard look at Borys, a conflicted glare at Donna, a brief smile at Bill, a piercing stare at Shiv, and then a warm grin at Robert. Jacob felt the room darken with the presence of the True Wolf.

All six competitors were together now, each hoping to win the election, each with their own plans. Jacob’s eyes darted to his father’s belt, the scroll was still there, almost shining.

“Three-Finger Rob,” Malcom growled.

“Malcom. Aren’t you a bit too wild to be vying for an earldom?”

“Aren’t you a bit too far from the family tree to be the old dog’s heir, little wolf?”

Jacob’s father chuckled at that and walked up to him. Robert was a head taller than him, though they were almost the same age. They both wore rough smiles, but Jacob knew they were hiding wider ones. Robert put his hands on Malcom’s shoulders, “Little? For the love I bare for your dearly departed dad, I will not strike you for that.”

Malcom’s roughness faded into tenderness in that moment, “it’ll be ten years next month since he passed. It’ll be a tough month.”

“He was a tough man, and a better father than any other man in our family.”

“Better than my other pa.”

“Better than my real dad.”

Malcom leaned to look around Robert towards Borys, “and certainly better than your pa and grandpa, prick.”

Borys raised his hands in the air, “I didn’t even say anything?”

“Hey Robert,” shouted Bill, who had Owan over his shoulder, “Rowan was my pa too, but you still broke my bloody thumb!”

Robert turned and faced him, “that’s because you’re an illborn mongrel, you!”

Malcom scoffed then put on a forced frown and shoved Robert back, “No one calls my brother a mongrel but me!”

“Oh, yeah?” Robert said as he smiled, then supressed the smile and looked up at the sky, “Old Rowan, forgive me for what I’m about to do, but you get it, he has it coming.”

Robert then brought his head back down onto his shorter cousin, just as Malcom was already throwing a punch towards him, and as seemed to be tradition in the family, they began to fight. Jacob looked around. The room had slowly been filling up, and now there was enough people to begin a chant of “fight, fight, fight” along with fists banging on tables and feet stomping on the stone floor. He noticed Shiv and Robin greeting each other with a hug on one end of the hall, they looked quite alike with their fair hair and heavy builds, but as the crowd began chanting, they both turned and joined the rally. Even Donna and Sun Lang were chanting along. He noticed Shaunie Shaw, Steward of Shawside and mother to Shiv and Borys, standing by one of the doors, looking on disapprovingly.

“Brother!” called Malcom, who was being pinned by his larger cousin, “a little aid?”

Bill was in the middle of tossing Owan up and down, both trying to see if they could get the little bastard up onto the chandelier above the dais. “Naw, mate, I’ve had my fill of that prick for one night. This is your fight.”

Jacob couldn’t see his father and third cousin through the crowd that was forming around them, but he heard Robert yell out in pain and start cursing.

“…he bit me…” broke through the crowd, followed by the brief sight of them standing again, Malcom howling and shouting “I am the True Wolf!” before charging Robert. Jacob spotted his mother at the edge of the crowed pushing her way through, not to stop it but to watch, of course. Donna and Sun Lang had moved themselves to the side of the hall. Borys and Robin were standing on benches and shouting their support. Jacob thought about standing atop the table to get a better view but thought better of it. He heard some more shouting and arguing, Shiv’s voice was briefly heard, but he couldn’t see her. She must have been right in the middle of the crowd. Jacob felt himself straining to look and so gave up, sitting back down and closing his eyes to focus, trying to hear them. Robert kept swearing and Malcom kept growling, but both were still laughing. Advice was flying from all sides, he heard someone placing a bet, some slurs being thrown about, various howls. Jacob had been to Denholm a few times in his life, but the great hall had never been as chaotic before, not when they had an overlord to keep the peace. The Old Wolf was as mad as the rest of them, but at least with them there was a sense of order in their violence. The family still fought, but the vassals, the guards and soldiers, the lesser houses, the peasants, and the servants, none of them would have been shouting or betting or howling like this. Jacob felt a shiver run up his back, blades could be drawn, and no one would be sane enough to put a stop to it, he thought.

He heard Shiv’s voice break through “…you mean my aunt and uncle…” and it was followed by a quieter ruckus. People were still talking, shouting, betting, and howling, but those in the middle of the crowd were silent, the fight had stopped, and within a few seconds the silence spread outwards. Jacob opened his eyes and saw some people turning away, walking off, taking their seats. He had a better view now, and saw Robert helping Malcom up off the floor, both dusting themselves off, then turning to Shiv who still stood defiantly beside them, and then they charged her, and the fight continued. Some people began shouting again, chanting and hollering, but it wasn’t as loud as before, and the fight wasn’t as pretty, now with it being two against one.

That was when Shaunie Shaw stepped in. She was a tall and thin woman, in her late forties, with tied up golden hair and a fine orange dress. She looked lanky and frail but was still able to shove the attendees to the side like they were nothing. Her voice echoed through the hall, “enough of this, children!” and the hall fell silent again. Shaunie Shaw pushed her way into the social ring and Jacob could see the fight. Robert was on his ass and in Shiv’s chokehold, turning purple, while Shiv had a bloody face and a clump of hair torn out, and Malcom was behind her, hanging off her back with his arms over her, clawing at her neck and chest. Shiv let go of Robert and threw herself backwards, crushing her older cousin under her, before she pulled herself up, turned, and starting punching down on Malcom, just as Robert got to his feet and was about to swing at her face.

Shaunie put herself between them. Robert uncurled his fist and let it land on her shoulder, “Shaunie,” he said in an exhausted and polite voice, “how the hell are you?”

She batted his hand away and turned to her daughter and nephew. Her fingers dug into their faces like the claws of a falcon and tore them away from one another.

“Both of you, get off it. It’s no way to behave. Boys, you’re forty fecking years old, you can’t keep at this. Shiv, you’re here to become a lady not a piece of tenderised meat, go and clean yourself up. Borys, fuck you.”

Borys gasped, “eh, I didn’t do anything?!”

“Exactly,” his mother replied, “don’t just stand there when your poor sister is getting whaled on. Same for you, Jane, how would you feel if that was your little girl getting roughed up by two men twice her age. And you, Bill, stop swinging the little bastard around!”

Jacob looked over. As the rest of the hall had grown silent and was staring at Shaunie Shaw, Bill was up on the dais swinging Owan around by his foot like the poor child was a mace. When Bill heard her, he released his grip and Owan flew towards the stone wall. Several voices shrieked and Jacob saw the crowd flinch at Owan hit the side of the hall, but instead of bouncing off it or breaking upon it, Owan just grabbed onto it, somehow cushioning his own force, and then he began to climb up it like a spider. A sigh of confused relief filled the room.

Shaunie got the attention of the room again. “Right,” she said, “all of you, outside. The Steward of Denholm has a lovely welcoming ceremony he’s cooked up for us. After that, we’ll be back in here for the feast!”

That was met by a hearty cheer, followed by the heard slowly moving towards the great doors. Jacob slid off the bench and moved to find his family in the crowd. He passed Shiv heading away from the great doors and towards one of the halls. He bumped into Borys who called him a peasant, not recognising him.

“You’ve messed up my hair,” said Malcom to Robert as Jacob found them.

Robert held out a hand and helped Malcom up, “since when has your looked ever mattered to you?”

“My hair is as black as the Black Wolf’s hair. Old Aoife One-Eye once said I looked the spitting image of him, I’ll have you know. If I look like the Black Wolf reborn, I could win her vote tomorrow.”

“Aye, because you’re the only one of us who descends from him,” said Robert with a smirk.

“Well,” Malcom chuckled, “depending on which rumours you listen to, we may all be bastard’s bastards.”

And according to other rumours, Jacob thought to himself, the Bad Wolf’s daughters weren’t even bastards. The true heirs of Denholm may be out in the woods.

“Don’t tell Bill I said that, though,” Malcom finished.

“Don’t tell Bill what?” said Bill, pushing through his brother and cousin, “who’s this?”

All three of these old men looked down at Jacob. He felt his heart stop. He forgot he was a person, not just a bodiless observer. Six eyes, four dark and two red, stared down at him. He felt like a child again.

“That’s my son,” Robert said, putting his massive hand on Jacob’s shoulder, “you remember little Jacob.”

“Ah,” said Bill, crouching down to get a better look, “the runt! Didn’t think you’d make it when you were born. Malcom bet ten silvers you wouldn’t make it through childhood.”

“Still might win that,” Malcom scoffed, “he’s far from a man yet. He’s a green boy, literally.”

Robert chuckled, “they said that about the Little Wolf too, but my granddad survived well enough, until the plague got him but that’s different.”

“Hello, lads,” said a mousy voice from behind them.

The three large men turned around to face their own runt of the litter. Remus Preston, the Steward of Preston, had his brother’s face, albeit longer and a little gaunter. He had a clean-shaven face and slicked back dark hair, unlike his redheaded son, Owan, who hung from his father’s arm as if it were a swing. His uncle’s body was thin under his grey robes. Jacob wondered if you had to be thin and frail to become a steward. It was clear that being raised at Dawn Castle didn’t always lead to one becoming a hulking boisterous beast like Bill, Malcom, or Robert. Remus had a tired but amiable smile on him, but the glare of his family broke that smile a little and made him look smaller than he was.

Malcom was the first to smile, his arms reaching out for his thin little foster brother and grabbing him tightly, “Remus, you grey hound, welcome to my future home!”

“You mean my future home,” Bill corrected as he grabbed Owan from Remus’s arm and rested the kid on his own shoulders, “or I might make my little keep into the new seat of Wolf Valley, I haven’t yet decided.”

“I think that would be…” started Remus, clearly about to critique that silly idea, but then Bill looked down at him and Remus changed his tune, “…an interesting idea, William. It’s certainly worth discussing.”

Bill laughed and slapped Remus on the back, “it absolutely is! What’s grunkle Colin’s plan outside then, eh?”

“He’s not our grand-uncle, Bill,” Malcom sighed, “he’s out aunt’s dad. Granduncle would be our dad’s uncle.”

“So, who is Colin to us? Our dad’s brother’s wife’s dad?”

“He’s just a steward,” Robert said, “his kids married into the family, but not our branches of the family, so he’s nothing to us. When I’m the Earl, I’m getting rid of him and putting Remus here in his place.”

Remus looked down at the floor. Malcom scoffed, “I don’t see why you and Shiv brought your stewards with you. I left mine at Dawn Castle to, you know, be the steward in my stead.”

“It makes sense to me,” Bill said, “Remus is a descendant of the Black Wolf and Shaunie is the wife of a late descendant of the Black Wolf. They get votes in the election. Your steward, whatever his name is, gets no vote. Shaunie is a sure vote for Shiv, and Remus is a sure vote for Robert. Right?”

Their eyes glared down at Remus again. His eyes widened and he gave a polite nod.

“Boys!” shouted Shaunie at the great doors. They all turned to face her. Jacob noticed the hall was almost empty now. The three weird women were still up on the high table, braiding each other’s hair, and Donna and Sun Lang remained seated, focusing on Donna’s baby bump, and a few more servants and attendees lingered about, but besides that, everyone had already made their way outside. The six of them were the last ones standing in the middle of the great hall. Shaunie beckoned them, “you’re going to miss it if you don’t hurry up!”

“Miss what?” called Malcom as the group started to move, with Jacob close behind them.

“The kind of stupid show that might just burn this whole den to the ground.”