Chương 4: Chapter 3 - Perfect Enough

A sledge, it turned out, was a really big sled. Meant for hauling loads over snow. Conrad explained it to me when I arrived. Since the only coat he needed was permanently attached to his body, he was out there long before anyone else. He had already pulled the sledge out of the garage, and he lectured me as he checked to make sure everything was in order. It wasn't a sleigh because it didn't have comfy seats for people to sit on.

And since it was meant to be pulled by something, it wasn't one of those toy sleds that children were so fond of.

"But don't most people use those words interchangeably?" I asked. I was standing on the foot boards, leaning over the frame.

"Yes," he said, "most people do." He finished inspecting the sledge, straightened up, and reached for the tangle of padded webbing that had been sitting on the bed slats.

"But now you know better." I motioned to the webbing.

"Is that for tying up the trees?"

"No. I have rope for that." I looked down at the coils of rope lying beside the small gas-powered chainsaw. Something occurred to me.

"Conrad, you said that sledges were meant to be pulled."

"Yeah."

"What's going to be pulling us? Does Jacky have a horse?" I heard his quiet dog-laugh.

"Mera, if death has a horse, you will never catch me trying to harness it."

"But—" My question was interrupted by the arrival of the count.

"I'm sorry I took so long," Darius said.

"I had to get a few measurements." He tossed a bag onto the boards. Tucked under his arm was a pair of modern-looking snowshoes. After scooping my jaw off the ground, I managed to say, "Count Vasil, is that a track suit?" He put a hand to his polyester covered chest. If I didn't already know it was impossible, I might have thought that, for a nanosecond, he felt discomposed.

"Is there something wrong with it?" It was one of those classy matching tracksuits that probably cost a hundred and fifty bucks.

"Well, no, but—""You didn't think I was going to go running in one of my suits, did you?"

"I thought you slept in your suits!" He eyed me.

"Don't be ridiculous, Emerra. That would ruin them."

"Aren't you going to be cold?"

"I don't get cold." He put the snowshoes down on a nearby bench, then turned to us.

"Are you ready, Conrad?" Conrad gathered the webbing into one hand.

"Would you mind looking away, Emerra?" My body jerked with indecision. Should I be polite, or should I be a complete Nosy Parker? I never saw much point in fighting my nature.

"What's going on?" I asked.

"I'm pulling us," Conrad said. He made it sound completely normal, but I thought it sounded kind of wrong.

"Are you okay with that?" I asked.

"Why wouldn't I be?"

"Friends don't use friends as sled dogs. I'm sure I read that somewhere."

"Don't worry about it. I don't mind."

"But—" Darius took something out of his pocket. He walked up to Conrad, but he spoke to me.

"The days are getting shorter, Emerra. Can you save your questions for when we're sitting in front of a nice warm fire? Now, turn around." I turned my back to them, but you had better believe my ears ached from straining to hear what was happening. Darius muttered, "Do you want it on your wrist or your neck?"

"Neck," Conrad said.

"I don't want it falling off as I run."

"All right. Here we go." The hushed conversation was followed by a series of strange noises. They were dull sounds, like the creak of a body in motion, only louder. Then Darius called to me.

"You can look now, Emerra." Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions. I walked around the sledge so I could see better. Next to Conrad's empty clothes was a heart-stoppingly colossal wolf. Wolves are already bigger than you might think, and Conrad was a few inches bigger than biggest of them. But on the other hand… He raised his wary eyes to me as I stood in front of him and crossed my arms.

"I'm finally taller than you." Conrad snorted and turned his head. Darius went over to the bench and sat down.

"He can still understand you, you know. He can't talk right now, but he's pretty good at getting his point across." He put down the webbing he'd taken from Conrad.

"Don't blame me if he decides to growl—or bite you, depending on how lippy you are." I squatted down so I could pat Conrad's neck and run my hands through his disgustingly thick coat.

"No, he would never bite me. Would you, buddy? He's a good boy— man." Not that my hurried correction sounded much better. Darius said in a very casual voice, "And his memory's as good as ever. Even if he doesn't bite you, he might have a few things to say to you when we get home." In case his warning had been too subtle, he added, "He's not a dog, Emerra." I was still pushing my hands through Conrad's mass of fur. There had to be a body in there somewhere.

"Sure. I know. Absolutely. But…geez!" I took a handful of fur on both sides of his face.

"He's so handsome." There was a brief growl. Conrad put his forehead against my chest and, without any apparent effort, raised his muzzle, effectively launching me into the snow. When Darius was done laughing, he tossed me the webbing.

"If you're done embarrassing yourself, would you mind putting on his harness?" I had never put a pulling harness on a dog before, but Conrad was kind enough to coach me through the process with a few growls and woofs. When I was finished, I thought I saw something around his neck that didn't belong there. Ignoring his noise of irritation, I pushed his fur out of the way. There was a thick leather lace with several metal and stone charms tied to it.

"Is this what turned him into a wolf?" I asked. Darius finished securing his snowshoes and stood up.

"Yes. That's his rune wrap." He made his way toward the back of the sledge. I twisted around to see him.

"Would it work for me?"

"I advise you not to try it." The count bent down to secure what little equipment we had.

"That wrap was custom made for him. It leaves his intelligence intact while changing him into his wolf form. But he's a lycanthrope. You're not. Since you probably don't have a wolf form, there's no telling what it would change you into." I looked back at the wrap.

"It's beautiful."

"It is. It's also a tricky bit of magic."

"Who made it?"

"Olivia did." My head jerked around.

"Olivia?"

"She's a very talented witch. We're lucky to have her." I didn't want to find myself on Santa's naughty list, so I decided to keep my mouth shut.

"Get his clothes for me, would you?" Darius said. I patted Conrad's fur back into place. Before standing up, I put my mouth close to his ear and whispered, "You're still a handsome wolf." He chuffed at me. I was the sole passenger on that sled ride. Darius ran beside us. Mile after mile, he managed to keep up. Apparently, a vampire's jog was my best sprint. The boards under my feet trembled as we sped over the snow.

The relentless wind pressed against my icy cheeks, and the world flowed by in a smear of white, green, and brown. Whenever the exhilaration grew too intense, I would laugh or let out a whoop of joy. Once, while Darius was shaking his head at my idiocy, I caught a glimpse of his fangs peeking out from his smile. When we were deep in the forest, Conrad slowed and came to a halt. I stumbled from the sledge and unceremoniously dropped to my butt. I couldn't stop giggling. Or shaking. Darius stopped beside me.

"Are you all right?"

"Are you kidding me? That was fantastic!"

"Then let's get you on your feet." He pulled me up.

"You start looking for trees. I'll help Conrad." Before I could wander off too far, Darius added, "And don't turn around for a few minutes." After waving to show I understood, I walked toward a nearby grove. I was debating the merits of a rather tall fir tree when I felt a presence behind me. I looked up. Then up again.

"You're a lot taller than I remember," I said. Conrad was back in his wolfman form. He was glaring at me. I returned my attention to the tree.

"If this is about that handsome comment, I stand by what I said. You're going to have to deal with it."

"I could eat you alive, you know." I sighed.

"Yeah. Probably."

"That's not what normal people would call 'a good boy.'" My cheeks ached from blushing so hard. I'd forgotten about that line.

"I'm sorry, okay! I like dogs…and…dog-shaped things."

"Emerra, other people like dogs. You are stupid about them."

"Do you think this is big enough for the front hall?" I asked, pointing to the distraction. Darius came up behind us.

"If it was any bigger, we'd need rigging." He pulled a tape measure from his pocket.

"Conrad, would you mind? We need to find out how wide it is." When it got the approval of the count, Conrad cut it down and trussed it while Darius and I went off to find the next one.

"What about this one?" I asked. Darius gazed upward.

"For the landing or the long gallery?"

"The long gallery." He pulled out a green plastic rectangle that looked like someone had cut off an edge and installed a handle.

"We'll have to check its height."

"You're not going to use the tape measure?"

"It's easier to use this."

"What is that thing?"

"A tangent height gauge." He held it up to his eye.

"And you can measure a tree with that?"" I can, but that's the thing about being old—I've had plenty of time to learn a few skills." He took a large step backward, sighted the tree, then bent his head around to glance at the bubble level. That done, he tossed me the tape measure.

"From my feet to the trunk of the tree, please." It turned out it would fit. Barely. The third tree—the one for the second-floor landing—gave us a bit more trouble. As we marched through the calf-deep snow, Darius felt compelled to say, "Emerra, we've passed five perfectly good trees." I held up a finger inside my mitten.

"We've passed five good trees. They weren't perfect."

"Were the other two perfect?" Conrad asked. I'd taken so long on my quest that he'd had plenty of time to truss the second tree and join us.

"Perfect enough." Darius grunted. He'd once told me that inherent contradictions were an abuse of both language and logic; it pained him every time I used them.

"You know these are only going to be up for a month," Conrad said.

"At most."

"Yeah, but this is the tree we're going to see every morning when we go down to breakfast. And it'll be the last thing we see as we go to bed at night." Darius glanced at his watch.

"I can give you another half hour."

"What happens after that?" I asked.

"I get hungry," Conrad said. Was it my imagination, or did his voice sound a little menacing? I thought I saw something out of the corner of my eye—a flicker that might have been movement or the flutter of some white thing trying to blend into the snow. I stopped and leaned back. I didn't see the animal, or whatever it was, that had stalled my eyes, but there, behind a nearby fir and almost hidden by its massive neighbors, was a glorious little Christmas tree. I walked closer.

"That one." My unwavering red mitten pointed right to it. Darius gazed at it.

"That thing isn't even as tall as Conrad." The wolfman tilted his head.

"And it's kind of scraggly on one side."

"Making it asymmetrical." The way Darius said "asymmetrical" made it sound like a moral problem.

"It's chubby and cute," I said.

"And you think that makes it perfect?"

"Perfect enough," Conrad said. He put the chainsaw down on a nearby fallen trunk, pressed a few buttons, then jerked the start cord until the saw roared to life.