Why We Fight
#6 of Mother Mulda (Dead Story)
06 - Why We Fight
"So, you wanna tell me what this is all about?" Mulda sat comfortably in her easy chair. It had taken two young werewolves an hour to get it through the front door and into position. Every time she sat in it she smiled, appreciated their hard work, and felt truly at home in this place.
"What do you want to know... exactly?" Vincent asked as he brought her a steaming mug of hot cacao.
"Tell me, about this feud?" Mulda said as her eyes watched him through the steam.
"Oh... it's complicated..." The crackle of a roaring fire popped a deafening ember in the hearth.
"My granddaughter's been bitched and knotted, Vince. I deserve to know it all."
"What do you-"
"The good, the bad, the things you're too embarrassed to talk about. Especially those bits."
The old wolf took a drink of his mug and sighed heavily. "It's been going on a long time. So much time... it's become a tradition to hate the Bales."
"Tradition's what people do when they don't have the time or energy to think on their own," Mulda muttered darkly as her eyes continued to burrow into him.
"I don't know what else to do."
"That's why I'm here," Mulda told him seriously.
"Fine... it all started as a territorial dispute between our tribes."
"Territory?"
"Back before your people came."
"You've been fighting for over 250 years?"
"We've been enemies for as long as we've had stories to talk about it. We all wanted the same land and the only time we ever stopped fighting was when white people started wiping us out."
"What got it going again?" Mulda asked when he paused a little too long.
"A woman."
"A... woman?"
"My grand-sire was in love with a white woman and that upset a lot of the different people on the rez. There was a big stink made over it but her being white was not the real reason for the arguing. Turns out she was just one of those women that draws guys like us. She was strong willed, beautiful, and just vulnerable enough to activate the noble protector in us."
"So you were all fighting over a woman and brought your families into it?"
"It wasn't like that," Vincent said with a little more steel in his voice than Mulda expected from him. "My grand-sire caught her being all friendly with his main rival in the Bale's family. As rivals the two families competed over everything, but they had managed to keep it civilized."
"So they fought over this girl and what happened?" Mulda's tone was changing as she became impatient. She didn't care for the drama, she just wanted him to spit it out.
"Well, my grand-sire defeated his rival, and then the woman he had won rejected him. He went mad and killed his rival, drawing first blood and reigniting the feud." For a few moments, the fire was the only voice in the room.
"You all are ridiculous," Mulda said with a scowl. "It's been a century, all the original offenders are dead, why can't you stop?"
"No one wants too," Vincent told her with shame in his eyes. "They want to keep killing... it's all they know how to do, at this point. That's why I brought you here. Maybe they just need an outside voice."
"Vincent," Mulda said in a gentle tone, "do you honestly think an angry tribe of feuding Native Americans is going to listen to a white woman?" Vincent's eyes grew wide with momentary horror. "There's so much bad blood between our people. I'm amazed your family was able to accept us so readily. How do you think the others will react? I think them calling you an apple will be the least of your worries."
"Red on the outside and white on the inside..." Vincent muttered.
"A general hate of my people is the one thing that has managed to unite your people when all else failed. Hate is a powerful force. It can only be defeated by love and acceptance... but they have to want to forgive and accept. Otherwise, the cycle of hate will turn and turn until the end of us all."
Mulda thought of Jennifer sleeping in the next room in the arms of her mate. Happy and content, they would become parents of a new generation. Mulda's great-grandchildren would grow, cry, and be loved, but they would also be surrounded by the feud... and eventually...
"This is why feudal lords always gave their daughters to each other in marriage," Mulda said with a weak smile. "Family creates strong bonds."
"Those bonds are why we are here," Vincent said.
"Hmmm... daughters..." Mulda took another sip on hot cacao and swished the creamy liquid across her tongue a few times before swallowing it down. "There is an old story, from ancient Greece. Sparta and Athens were fighting and fighting and neither every seemed to get the upper hand. The wives of both nations were tired of watching their husbands and sons go off to war and not come back, so they rallied together and went on strike."
"Strike?"
"They withheld their serves from their husbands. No sex, no home cooked meals, no wifely chores, and some of them even locked their husbands out of their houses all together."
"And they did this until the fighting stopped?"
"Yes."
"I don't know, Mulda. It's a funny story but I don't know if that will work here."
"Oh? Why not?"
Vincent opened his mouth, closed it, rubbed his chin, opened it again, closed it again. Then took a deep breath. "Fine," he said with a sigh, "if you can convince the other women to stop the fighting then I'll back your call. But you know, it's easy to convince people to fight, but damn hard to convince them to stop."
"Well then, Friday's going to be an interesting day."
*****
"This meeting has been called to discuss a strategy change," Vincent said as he scanned the faces of a dozen men from his tribe. "As many of you know, I've taken a new concubine, and her advice has given me a lot to think about." Faces darkened at the mention of this but tongues did not wag out of place. "I am tired of war. This feud has gone on without end for too long."
"Going soft?" one of his tribe-mates spoke up. "I stayed quiet when you decided to apple out and thin our blood, but this?" Muttering between the members of the tribe began. "You just want to give up? You just want to forget all those who have died?"
"No," Vincent said sternly, "I am not forgetting the dead. It is because of them that I was to stop our children and grandchildren from having to fight and die in the same fields that we have."
"A coward's words fail to move me," the challenger fired back.
"Then I open this forum up to our wives," Vincent said with a sinister smile. At that moment the patio door slid open. Wives, mates, girlfriends, and daughters all stepped into the room and looked at the heads of their families. Their faces were set in defiance. Each woman giving the men in their lives the looks women always gave when resistance was futile.
"You... coward," the challenger gasped as his wife scowled deeply into his eyes.
"Shut-up, Bill," his wife snapped. "We've already lost three children and a brother to this feud." Bill flinched as if struck. The women had spoken and the men would obey.
"Now that our better halves are here," Vincent said with a grin he could no longer contain, "I would like to turn the floor over to my wonderful adviser."
There was some dark muttering when Mulda stepped out of the kitchen and into the parlor. She did not let them detour her. With her head up and her eyes devoid of fear, she met them with the strength this new body had given her.
"Mothers," she said, ignoring the men, "for the past week I have met with most of you and we have had conversations about this new idea. If we want our children to be free of this nonsense, we're going to have to be the ones to bring it about. I propose we do this by gaining the trust and support of the women in the Bales family."
"How do we accomplish this?" one of the older mothers spoke up.
"Good deeds, subterfuge, and seduction," Mulda answered and there was some chuckling among the listeners. "No, really," Mulda said with a smile of her own, "it sounds silly, but there are a lot of women out there who could help us with this. Part one of our strategy involves getting some of the current mothers over to our side. Not all of them will talk to us, but there are women outside of the families who we could get to help us. All we have to do is get them to seduce some of the Bales family boys and they can work their men from the inside."
"This is stupid," another husband objected. "We've been fighting the Bales for years, Red Claw will never stop fighting."
"He will if the rest of his tribe turns against him," Vincent said.
"I'm not going to listen to this bullshit," Bill scoffed.
"You will if you ever want to feel the twist or the swing ever again," his wife sneered, drawing chuckles from others in the room.
"Or a hot meal," threatened another wife.
"Or a look at my ass," said another wife to her husband.
"Alright," Mulda said with a laugh, "I think they get the idea." Looking strait at Bill she raised her brow. "Do you surrender?"
"Do it for the twist, Bill," one of the other husbands said and all laughed.
"If it's what my Moonbeam wants," Bill said with his eyes on his wife. She smiled and took his hand, causing a look of deep shame to creep into him.
"It's not as easy as it sounds," Mulda continued, "Peace never is, but the reward is worth the struggle." Her eyes searched the crowd and found John with his arms around Jennifer, smiles of support on their faces. "My family is now tied to yours. As of last week, ending this war is my life's work. I cannot do it without you. But I will not stop, I will not surrender, and I will not give up."