Birds of a Feather (soundtrack: a cat’s purr)
Olive stood at the door of the church, straining to smile at every face. They were slowly becoming familiar, too slowly, but she was trying. She struggled with every bland hello she could muster to remember this one and that one, when really she could care less. Down the line she saw the face of the only person in town, besides Mambo Cree, that she easily recognized. The Dogman, Rastus Ward.
The skin of his face clung to his head tightly, the bones of his skull prominent. Like a barely disguised death’s head, a skeleton masquerading among the living. The watery eyes and pockmarked flesh did little to encourage any other comparison. His long limbs swung wide as he strode toward the entrance of the church.
Olive had watched the way the other townsfolk edged away from him, like always. She met his eyes, and nodded, kin in isolation. He moved past her with the barest of glances, and moved into a pew near the front. A position of power. He wouldn’t have it any other way, and the town couldn’t afford to offend him. The dogs gave them something to hunt with, something to trade, and something in which to take pride.
Rastus had brought most of the breeding stock with him, or so went the story she’d been told. He walked out of the Big Death one day, his pack preceding him, and into the church. He and Mambo Cree spent a day and a night discussing the terms of his acceptance into the Flock. It was one of the reasons he got to keep a house so far out of town. Olive envied him that house, the quiet it afforded.
