About The Volk Advent
An orphaned Siberian teen loses her job and home on Christmas
Eve. Left on the streets to freeze, Faina flees to an abandoned castle for
shelter. At the castle, she discovers the animal-torn body of a local recluse.
No wonder Eurasian wolves are not recommended for the first-time pet owner. Can
a girl with no past, preserve her future from accusations of murderer and a
pack of escaped wolves?
Excerpt:
The Wolves and Ms. Melora are Restless
Cheery Christmas songs blared through the orphanage, clashing
with the background noise of hurried cleaning and howling wolves. The Christmas
music I was used to. The orphanage had a total of five American Christmas CD’s
that Ms. Melora, our orphanage director, had played constantly since they
arrived free with a magazine subscription eight years ago. Those CD’s had been
here as long as I had, and they sounded just as twitchy and nervous.
The cleaning, I was also familiar with. When I, Faina Smith,
turned eighteen last month, I should have left the orphanage and struck out
into the fierce Siberian countryside on my own. I know, Smith? But one takes
whatever name they give you, when one shows up as a ten-year-old amnesiac.
Anyway, despite my age, Ms. Melora was loath to hire another girl to do my work
when she could get my toil for free.
The incessant howling of wolves…I’m afraid I was not as accustomed
to that.
Oh, sure, we had wolves. Deep in the misty forest, along remote
stretches of the dark Lena river, behind the stone pinnacles that slashed the
thick forested ridges. Siberia was deep within wolf territory. Most of the time
the creatures stayed where they belonged. But these wolves were different. They
lived in a vast, crumbling castle that crouched like a shadow on the edge of
town. A bit of intermittent howling was normal, but something was different
tonight.
What? A castle in Siberia seems unlikely? Of course it is. Who
in their right mind would build a castle in the far north? But that is the
question, isn’t it? Was Kirill Volkov in his right mind? It’s hard to say. The
man did own wolves, after all. Perhaps he felt he must live up to his name.
Volk meant wolf in Russian. Whatever had caused his extreme fascination with
the
origins of their family name, Kirill Volkov hadn’t built the castle. It
wasn’t built here at all, only moved, and it was his father who’d moved it.
I took a cloth and wiped down the face of every child in the
room. They were none too happy with me, but cleanliness was vital today, and so
I persisted. After struggling to wipe the breakfast off eight squirmy babies, I
paused in my work, drawn by the deep throaty song of the wolves.
I peeked out the frost-streaked window. It was late afternoon on
January sixth, Christmas Eve. The village was lit with a fading, dusky light. A
bitter wind kicked up a few small tornados in the snow, blowing them through
the market. Wood smoke curled out of every chimney as each village family
prepared the meatless feast that would break their Christmas Eve fast. When the
first star appeared on the horizon, the birth of Christ would be celebrated
with sweet smelling hay scattered on the floor, glowing white candles on the
table, and twelve traditional dishes, representing the twelve apostles.
The Volkovs’ castle seemed separate from all of this. It rose
out of the gloom of the forest, not quite in town but not far enough away to be
forgotten. It clashed with the quiet ambiance of the small village of Zamok
Drakona.
The name meant Dragon’s Castle or more precisely “The Lock of
the Dragon.” I’m sure the village had a different name once. But when Kirill
Volkov’s father was inexplicably gifted a gargantuan castle from the Ukraine
and had the whole thing shipped to Siberia block by block, what else could they
call the place? He had a wall of river rock built around his new home, but
apparently ran out of resources at that point. No further improvements were
made after that.
The castle sat, long and gray and dark, at the edge of town.
Three stories of rain-streaked stone topped by a black slate roof. Row after
row of leaded glass windows glared out into the Siberian gloom. Only one or two
of them ever showed a glimmer of light. It had remained exactly the same for
the past eighty years.
Eventually, the first old eccentric had died, leaving the
monstrosity to his equally eccentric son. Our new hermit did little to improve
the place, but he did bring in some pets. Kirill Volkov hired some men from the
village to build an immense cage that stretched across the castle grounds. Then
he acquired his very own pack of Eurasian wolves. These critters were well
cared for and large. In the wild, Eurasian wolves top the scales at about 100
pounds, although there were always exceptions. I’d heard whispers that some of
Volkov’s pets weighed in at the upper limit for their species, 160 to 170lbs.
Eurasian wolves are definitely not recommended for the first time pet owner.
But Volkov had gotten away with it so far.
Why I used phrases like “first-time pet owner” and thought in
pounds and inches rather than kilos and centimeters, I had no idea. My
vocabulary was a personal peculiarity. Words and phrases I’d never heard spoken
aloud in Russian filled up my mind. Perhaps the smack to the head that had
taken my memory was at fault. But regardless of my mental glitches, the wolves
were usually much less vocal. Had old Kirill Volkov left his nephew to feed
them again?
That had not gone well. Vladim Volkov hadn’t fed them at all.
He’d tried the first night, but wolves demand strength and according to rumor,
fear had wafted off that young man like stink off a week-old fish. After the
first bite, he left them to starve. Their low angry howls had surely kept him
awake every night until his uncle returned.
Kirill Volkov hadn’t left the castle since, as far as I knew. He
would never forget to feed them. I mean how could he? They were incredibly
loud. And wasn’t his niece at the castle right now, decorating for her big
Christmas gala? Surely even a city girl would notice that something was up with
her uncle’s menagerie.
The wolves continued to howl. The American Christmas music
continued to blare. I yanked my attention away from the window and jogged to
the older babies’ room. Ms. Melora had a guest coming, and she would be around
to inspect soon.
The children in the next room were toddlers. None of the little
ones wore diapers. Instead they cruised back and forth in a large communal pen,
wide-eyed in their threadbare nightshirts and silent. But something
extraordinary happened when I bustled into the room. Those serious little faces
broke into grins and a few brave souls even clapped and reached for me. This
never would have happened my first year here, but I held a dark secret close to
my heart. I had defied Ms. Melora and my risk was bearing fruit.
I rocked the babies.
About the Author:
Kristen Joy Wilks lives in the beautiful Cascade Mountains with her camp director husband, three fierce sons, and a large and slobbery Newfoundland dog. She has blow-dried a chicken, fought epic Nerf battles instead of washing dishes, and discovered a stealthily smuggled gardener snake in the bubble bath with her sons. Her stories and articles have appeared in Nature Friend, Clubhouse, Thriving Family, Splickety, and Havok Magazines. She writes funny romances for Pelican Book Group, including Copenhagen Cozenage, The Volk Advent, and Athens Ambuscade. Kristen writes about the humor and Grace that can be found amidst the detritus of life and can be found at www.kristenjoywilks.com.
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Love the excerpt, Kristen!
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