February 10th, 1891 — Wizzhard Books

She was supposed to be working today, but she'd called out for the morning citing an unsettled stomach. This was the first day her book would be available in stores, and she simply couldn't resist going to see it. Her cover, her title, repeated dozens of times over the end-cap display Zach had arranged. Not her name on the book, of course, but close enough; she felt connected enough to the name Forfang now that she still felt a surge of pride in seeing it.

She had an author's copy of the book at home, so she'd already seen how everything was laid out in the pages, but she picked one up all the same. She ran her fingers over the cover and cracked the stiff spine open, being greeted by the familiar smell of new paper. She turned to the first chapter and drank in the way it looked: the title, the drop capital initial, the lines of text neatly following. She let out a contented sigh. She closed the book and went to replace it on the display, but a man (vaguely familiar but unplaceable) had stepped between her and the shelves. She hesitated, not wanting to be seen putting the book down as if she'd decided against buying it, particularly if he was thinking of buying a copy himself. But she wasn't going to buy her own book just to avoid drawing attention to herself.

"Excuse me," she said softly.

  

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Prof. Marlowe Forfang

Jules

Who is Marlowe Forfang?

The question occupied enough minds that Kieran had another assignment, after his review of Mother Wolf. All the complaints in the world that he was not a private investigator or even, particularly, interested in academia could dissuade Pengloss, and so - he was assigned to figure it out. And he was curious, for all that poking around the identity of someone who studied werewolves seemed... bad.

There was a sense that he ought to respect secret identities, too; certainly Kieran kept a multitude of secrets for his own safety. But - well, it wasn't like he wanted to harm Forfang, and if he found nothing he found nothing. And - well, at least Kieran wasn't someone who was trying to cause injury to werewolves, and he had an obvious sympathy for Forfang's work. So. He had justified looking.

So he had come to Wizzhard Books on the release day for Mother Wolf, almost hoping that Forfang would appear for one of the public events that the bookstore hosted sometimes. But - there was a display, no author, and nothing about the author on the display. So the reclusive author was still reclusive.

"Sorry," Kieran said, taking a step back from the display of Mother Wolf. "It's a good book, for what it's worth." Well. It was good except that Kieran had learned some things about childbirth and female anatomy that he really had no interest in learning - one of the advantages of his sexual proclivities was that he didn't have to know anything about pregnancy, and unfortunately Forfang had changed that for him. But other than that, it was a good book.

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   Juliana Ainsworth

She'd meant to just put the book down and skitter back towards the edge of the store, and probably head home. Maybe, if she was really feeling restless about the book, she might go ask Zach whether anyone had said anything about it yet. This stranger's comment piqued her interest, however. The book had only be released today, so either he was speaking from no experience or he had something to do with the publisher's house. She hadn't met anyone from the publishing house, obviously, but she'd written to them fairly extensively during the editing process, so she was certainly curious which one it was standing before her. Or, if he was making this up and he hadn't read the book yet, what was his connection to it that had lead him to make a comment like that out of nowhere? It was hardly going to be a best seller — the subject matter was fairly niche. Not everyone had an interest in werewolves, or research — certainly Juliana did not look like the type of person who would.

"Have you read it?" she asked curiously. "I thought it was only released today."

  

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Prof. Marlowe Forfang

Jules

Kieran nodded. "I got an advanced copy," he said, "So I was able to read it that way." There was something interesting about reading stories of people like him, even if they were all women - it was academic, but it wasn't the horrorshow that Picardy put out there. Lupine Lawlessness had just made Kieran feel faintly nauseated, and he hadn't read past the first chapter.

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So he was someone from the publishing house. Jules wanted to know his name, but she didn't feel as though he'd left any good avenue open for her to ask, so she might have to poke at this conversation a little more in order to get to that point.

"Oh? What do you do that gets you advanced copies of lycanthropy research?" she asked, as though she didn't know. He didn't look particularly like any of the people she typically wrote to at the publishing house — or, rather, he didn't look like the way she had imagined any of them. She had rather a vivid imagination and had detailed facial features for everyone she regularly corresponded with; it made them feel more human. Especially her subjects.

(She'd had to adjust her mental image of A recently when she got a bit of his hair — she'd been picturing him with something slightly lighter).

  

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Prof. Marlowe Forfang

Jules

"Write on creatures for the Prophet," Kieran said with a wry smile; he placed his hands into the pocket of his jacket for want of something to do with them. Kieran hadn't expected the woman to talk to him for this long; she had a middle class look about her, and many middle class women tended to think scrawny-looking men in overworn coats were better not to be conversed with. Not all of them, of course - but many.

Still, they were chatting, and Kieran had nothing better to do here if there wasn't an author event for the book. "So maybe take my recommendation with a grain of salt, I'm not an academic."

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Oh! The reporter! She'd nearly forgotten that she'd asked the publishing house to send him a copy, too, though how she could have forgotten she wasn't quite sure. She'd spent so long puzzling over his letter before she'd eventually written back. His handwriting had seemed familiar, and she didn't want to give hers away if he was someone she'd written to in another capacity. She had eventually reasoned that lots of people had similar handwriting and she was probably just being ridiculous, or paranoid; life wasn't like something out of a thriller novel, and this reporter was probably no one. So she'd written back, but kept the letter brief, just in case. What was his name? Something vaguely gaelic, she thought, or Irish. He certainly didn't look Irish — no red hair. (Dark hair — darker than she'd expected? a small voice inside her thought, but she pushed it down — now she was really being ridiculous).

"I think the recommendation of someone who isn't an academic is worth even more, when it's being marketed as a book," Jules pointed out, hesitant to end the conversation though she couldn't have said exactly why (well, she could have said, but was not at the point of admitting it yet even to herself). "It could have been a series of journal articles just as easily, but I expect Forfang was trying to reach a wider audience."

  

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Prof. Marlowe Forfang

Jules

Kieran grinned at her comment. She understood more about academia than he would have expected, but then again, Kieran didn't really spend a lot of time with academics. Kingsley was the closest, in his head, and that was just because Kingsley was smart.

"See, that's the sort of thing I would have put in my article if I had thought of it," he said, "But I don't know much about book marketing, especially considering that my work is basically - reading and writing, all the time." Reporting was the best job he'd ever had, but it did involve a lot of parsing words, probably obviously.

"Do you read books like this?" he asked, since she had at least been looking at Mother Wolf, and they had now been chatting long enough that this could be counted as a Conversation.

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Juliana should have expected that he would eventually take some passing interest in her, since she had been putting questions to him for so long and typically people liked conversations to be more participatory and less like interrogations. All the same, she felt very put on the spot by the question, and for a moment she didn't know how to answer. She glanced down at the copy of the book in her hand as though considering, though she was really just trying to buy a moment before speaking.

"I'm not sure," she decided. "Has there ever been a book like this? Female werewolves aren't exactly a popular subject, in fiction or nonfiction," she said with a shrug. "Actually, you know, I think some people didn't even think women could be werewolves until the news about the Minister's daughter broke."

  

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Prof. Marlowe Forfang

Jules

It was a not-unpopular topic of conversation, and certainly still an innocuous one, but after years Kieran still felt his heartbeat quicken and his stomach drop at the mention of Topaz Urquart. He was just, he knew, going to feel guilty about it forever. Physically, there wasn't much of an indication of the drop in his mood - he glanced over his shoulder at the Forfang display before looking back at her.

"You make a good point," Kieran said, after the beat. Then, to make up for his weird pause, he added: "There's not much about female werewolves in the news, even - which I realize that I write the news, but it sort of depends on what ends up in the headlines. Which is - usually werewolves who are men, for whatever reason. Maybe there are more men." He had just talked a lot, and he was aware of it - but he couldn't take it back now. And other than the Topaz thing, he was actually enjoying this.

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"Or maybe men are more reckless," Juliana responded, though she didn't really believe that. It was only a bridge to what she actually wanted to say, which was: "The papers only report on werewolves at all when something goes wrong."

What she meant by that line was that the press coverage was really not helping anyone, because it gave the public an unfair view of what those with lycanthropy were actually like. The only time anyone heard about a werewolf at all it was in connection with a murder. There had not, for example, been anything about Topaz Urquart in the news for years, because she had been quietly following the rules and leading an exemplary life. She did understand, however, that another full moon come and gone and dozens of werewolves failed to murder or maul anyone would not make for particularly good headlines.

  

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Prof. Marlowe Forfang

Jules

"Mm," Kieran said, although that was certainly possible. "That's what news is, I suppose." Maulings and murder and mayhem sold; quiet mornings evaluating his injuries from the night before with Jude did not sell papers. Or maybe they would have, if Kieran risked it, and outed himself. He wasn't going to do that, either.

"There's perhaps something to be said for - men having slightly more agency, freedom of movement," Kieran said, "Perhaps it's easier for a male werewolf to keep his identity secret from the Ministry, because he's less dependent on family, and then something eventually goes wrong." He added, thinking: "But there are certainly secret female werewolves, too. At least three, from this book."

Plus Morwenna, who was too old to be one of the subjects, but Kieran wasn't going to point that out.

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   Juliana Ainsworth

The thing he'd said about the female werewolves being dependent on family was genuinely interesting, and Juliana had nearly forgotten that other thing in the back of her mind that she'd been turning over while they spoke.

"I know what you mean when you say that," she began, "But I might argue that men are not less dependent on family — at least not those with lycanthropy. I'm not sure if you read Forfang's earlier work, but so many of the cases involved people — men and women — depending on others for help. For shelter, for guidance, for protection, to keep their secrets. 'No man is an island' and one with such a condition even less," she continued. "The ones who do try to isolate themselves seem to be the ones who run into problems, sooner or later. I don't think it has anything to do with avoiding the Ministry's registry."

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   Kieran Abernathy

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Prof. Marlowe Forfang

Jules

She was right, was the thing, but he couldn't say she was right - Kieran had only gotten in trouble when he was less reliant on Jude's help. He couldn't think of any examples to use that were relatively public knowledge, though, so he made an agreeable noise instead. "That's an interesting thought," he said, "About what the risk of being an outcast does to people."

"But I suppose that it's difficult to get people to be thoughtful about an issue like this," Kieran said, "I've written on vampires, too, and sometimes I wonder if they have an easier time of it."

Ishmael seemed to be having a lot more fun than Kieran, most days.

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   Elias Grimstone, Juliana Ainsworth

"Oh, I don't know that you can compare them," protested Juliana. "On the one hand, vampires don't have the option of keeping secrets about that part of their identity, but it's not — vampires need blood; they're predatory by nature in the way I don't think you could argue a werewolf is. Lycanthropy is more — chaotic than malicious. That's not to say I think vampires out to all be strung up, or anything," she clarified quickly. "It's just — I don't think it's a comparison you can make in good faith. And, besides, vampires live so long," she said with a shrug. "And for so many of them, everyone they knew is already gone. It's — it's not the same."

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   Kieran Abernathy

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Prof. Marlowe Forfang

Jules

She had a point, about vampires. It wasn't as if Kieran knew what Ishmael had been doing for the first few decades (or whatever; Kieran was never sure how old Ishmael actually was) of his post-life. "You make a good argument," he agreed, "I just don't know that everyone sees the nuance in it, because of the destruction that a werewolf can wreak."

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