A Werewolf Comes to Prague: Metsatöll

A Werewolf Comes to Prague:

Metsatöll

By

Stephen Morris

I.

My grandfather gave me the wolf skin when he died. It was old and worn. In spots, it was even worn almost down to the smooth leather. Tufts of fur would drift off it on occasion. If it had been a fur hat, it would have been discarded years ago. Some of the teeth were loose in its jaws and a few had fallen out over the years. It was no longer a beautiful thing, as I imagined it must have been when it was new. As it was when my grandfather had first trapped the huge beast, killed and then skinned it in one of the winters of his youth. He had been hardly more than a boy himself when he had set the traps with his father and grandfather and then – his grandfather having become too old and sick to finish the wolf hunting that season – his father allowed him to achieve his manhood by killing the great wolf when they discovered it in the trap. The skin still bears the bare slash across the left foreleg where the sharp teeth of the iron trap had snapped shut and held the great creature in the forest, waiting in the snow to be rescued by death at the hands of my grandfather.

My grandfather told me that the wolf, its thick silver-grey fur (with tawny streaks running down from under its chin across it stomach) bristling and standing up along its neck, had stood its ground, snarling as the humans approached. He and his father had drawn their hunting knives and the wolf fought bravely, even as it must have known that it was doomed.

My grandfather and his father stood before the trapped animal a moment. My grandfather heard a quiet whisper, “You’ve seen this done before, Alexei. You’ve helped skin the wolves last year and have been practicing the kill all summer.” His father paused, my grandfather’s eyes locked with the wolf’s squinting eyes. “Why don’t you kill this first one of this season?” The boy glanced at the older man out of the corner of his eyes and slowly nodded.

I heard the story many times as I grew up: how my grandfather was able to slip up through the quietly crunching snow to the wolf from behind, as it continued to glower at his father – yellow eyes glinting, upper lip curled back, and snarl rumbling in the back of its throat, free legs poised and ready to leap at whatever or whomever would attack first. When my grandfather leapt onto its back and held on with his left hand, the wolf twisted through the air, jaws snapping at the teen. My grandfather wedged his knife into the wolf’s throat and pulled the knife back towards him, ripping the muscles, tendons, and arteries in ragged jerky motions.

Blood sprayed out in great bursts as the animal’s heart pumped vigorously in its breast. My grandfather held on, terrified of the still snapping jaws and knowing that the only safe place was on the giant’s furry back. It seemed to be forever before the monster began to gradually slow its writhing and attempts to bite my grandfather’s young head off, before the shower of blood was reduced to a trickle, before the beast slumped down onto its haunches and then finally collapsed in the now bright red snow. The clanking iron trap lay still and silent now as well.

My grandfather pushed himself up from the carcass, panting. His breath hovered in frosty clouds before his face. He looked up, across the corpse before him. His father grinned broadly before coming up around him from behind and clapping him on the back. They surveyed the carnage before them.

Dead, the wolf seemed even larger than it had when it was alive and standing before them, crouching and ready to attack. It seemed the largest wolf Alexei had ever seen. As big as, or even bigger than, the wolf Fenrir must have been (which the old stories said would devour the sun at the end of days). Together, they hoisted the wolf onto their sled which they had left not far away, and brought the creature back to their house on the edge of the vast forests of Estonia. Alexei was given the honor of skinning this, his first kill. He was careful to keep the pelt intact, rather than cutting it into smaller strips or pieces, easier to handle. Then the whole family undertook the job of butchering the meat to be smoked, dried, or eaten immediately. There was enough to feed them for at least a month.