Fur

iv | Subject

Leila's father always cried when he beat her. Cried because it didn't work, because there was something wrong with his child, because there was question over the love of his life's loyalty and she might be the walking manifestation of betrayal, because everything was so wrong that he was beating his child to fix it.

But it didn't fix it.

It didn't make her love him. Didn't make him love her. Didn't make her shift.

Of course he tried other things besides beating her. He tried tests. Many, many tests, all of which singled out one aspect or another. One of them involved Leila sitting in a chair, her hands and feet chained in place, her eyes blindfolded, her ears stuffed with cotton and candle wax. To prepare for this test, she had been starved for two days.

It began on a human level. Her father carried food into the room, a platter of roasted and seasoned venison whose aroma reached Leila's nose. Her stomach growled audibly to all but herself; her mouth salivated.

Thus it was concluded that she had, at minimum, a human's sense of smell. The test proceeded.

The room's door was left open so as to prevent any telling swoosh of air if it swung. Pack members came and went through the room, one by one. Leila could not hear or see their arrivals or their exits. But she could smell them, could identify their scents like a bloodhound.

Every time her father came into the room, without fail, he hit her. When her grandfather came in, he shook her chair violently. When either of her brothers or any other pack member entered the room, they did nothing.

And so it was observed that when her father entered—when she smelled his scent—her whole body tensed, her every muscle solidified itself in a brace for impact. At the presence of her grandfather, her fingers tightened on the armrests, clinging to the chair so as not to be shook out of it. At the presence of everyone else, she would become tense in anticipation, but only if they neared closer—if their scents neared closer.

Thus it was concluded that she had a sense of smell so flawless, so impeccable and sensitive, that it could belong to none other than a werewolf.

Further tests must be conducted.

~~~

Another test consisted of Leila being blindfolded—as so many of them did—as she stood with her back to the edge of a cliff. She was to hold her hands level with her shoulders, palms facing outward.

Her father's hands met hers. They pushed. She toppled backward, her feet leaving the ground, her body slicing through midair until she slammed into the ground below with all the force of her deadweight.

And so this process repeated: hands up, hands touch, push, fall, hit, pain, be hauled back up the cliff slung over her father's shoulder.

By the third time she hit the ground, she was desperate not to again—not so much to avoid the crippling pain, but because she was unsure if she would survive a sixth, a fifth, a fourth.

The fourth time her father's hands touched hers, she shoved him back, shoved with every fiber of her being, every muscle fascicle she possessed.

She did not fall.

Thus it was proved that she possessed strength no human child could... Strength characteristic of a werewolf.

Again, more tests were necessary.

~~~

The tests were always conducted in series, always repeated consecutively. For one week or more these tests would last. For that week, or weeks, Leila would experience the presence of none other than her test administrators: her father mainly, sometimes her grandfather, sometimes a random pack member they ordered to assist them. She would sense them in one capacity or another only during an active test. The rest of the time, she would remain in a single, windowless room, left alone with her own body and her own thoughts.