Victoria nodded, her lower lip caught anxiously in her teeth. "Try. Don't think about it too long, just reach out for it with everything you've got."
Without even bothering to kneel down, Claire tried to push aside the wood, to find the fire, but it was like swimming with her clothes on: everything felt impossibly heavy and wet. She shook with the effort, searched desperately for the clarity that came with being a wolf. For one second, she pushed back the heavy curtain of her humanness, and she shoved at the dull wood with her thoughts.
A flame danced along a single branch. Not deep or fast or consuming, but enough to catch. And spread.
Enough to burn.
"Yes!" Victoria did an awkward, hopping little dance toward Claire, who burst into laughter at Victoria's ridiculousness, at the giddy lightness bubbling in her own chest.
"I did it! Did you see? A real fire!"
"How could I miss it?" Victoria giggled. "Look how quickly it's taking off!"
The two of them stood, admiring the flames.
"You know you need to keep at this," Victoria warned. "Make sure that you can do it wherever and whenever you need to."
"I know. There's too much at stake to ride on one success. But it's a start, right?"
"Better than," Victoria assured her.
The two of them sat around the fire until it had faded enough to put out.
As she walked home, Claire thought about the naming. Victoria had helped her so much. She desperately wanted to find a way to return the favor. But names weren't exactly falling out of the sky.
She slipped into the house, sifting through her thoughts like sand, searching for a solution. The next week passed in a blur. At night, Claire slipped into the woods, lighting the fires again and again, scouring the forest for anything that would burn. Until she knew she could do it.
Until it was easy.
Halloween—and the full moon—were just a couple of days away. They would have a short gathering—quiet, late, doing only the minimum required. Doing more would be too risky. There was too great a chance that some thrill-seeking human would be wandering through the woods.
Marie's face grew even more severe as the Halloween gathering approached, and Saturday morning, for the first time, Claire noticed threads of silver appearing in her mother's hair.
"Are you okay?" she asked, watching as the sun caught the glimmering strands while her mother stood near the window. Marie had a jeweler's loupe pressed to her eye, checking her lenses for tiny scratches and microscopic blemishes.
"Hmm?" Her mother was distracted.
"You just look sort of stressed is all." Claire wrinkled her nose at the box of cereal on the counter. She missed the days when Lisbeth cooked bacon and eggs on Saturday morning.
"I'm fine, Claire. Did you need something?" Marie snapped. Startled, Claire grabbed her cereal and slunk toward the living room.
"No. I'm going shopping with Emily. She's picking me up in an hour—I just thought I should let you know."
"Shopping?" Her mother looked up. "You hate to shop."
"It's for a dress. For the dance?" Claire prompted. She waited for understanding—recognition—to cross her mother's face. Instead, she just looked confused.
"What dance?" her mother demanded.
"The Autumn Ball. At school? I'm going with Matthew, remember?" Once again, anything that had to do with Claire's human life sailed right over Marie's head, as unnoticed as a distant airplane or a passing cloud. Claire's fingers curled around her spoon in frustration. She wasn't just a wolf. But that was the only part of her that her mother cared about. Obviously. "Oh. Fine." Marie nodded toward the back hall. "Take the blue credit card from my purse. Don't buy anything foolish, please." She turned her attention back to the lenses lined up on the table in front of her.
Claire stomped down the hall and rummaged around in her mother's bag, pulling out the credit card and sliding it into her back pocket before flopping down in the den to eat her cereal.
She wished Lisbeth was around to tell her not to spill milk on the couch or to ask her what stores she and Emily were going to. At least she'd be excited to see Claire's dress.
Assuming she found a dress.
Claire crunched through her breakfast. When she was finished, she stretched out on the sofa, watching TV and listening for the sound of Emily's tires against the gravel. The instant she heard it, she leapt off the couch, abandoning her cereal bowl and grabbing her jacket. She darted out the door without saying good-bye to her mother. Why should she bother? It wasn't like Marie cared where she was going or when she'd be home. Not unless it somehow involved claws and fur in the forest.
Emily looked startled to see Claire barreling out of the house.
Claire opened the passenger door and slid in. "I am so glad you're here."
"Obviously. I haven't even put the car in park yet. What's going on?"