The Trials con’t

I’d seen them come before.
Once every five years, more than 500 motorcycles ride into this park.
You felt the ground shake at their approach.
Then you heard them.
Then you saw them.
Yesterday, when we’d arrived on the property, the radio played Dr. John’s “Season of the Witch.” I love the song, but I thought it was a likely a bad sign.
Yes I believe in signs sometimes, don’t judge me.

This is the event where the three lupin nations meet to hammer out conflicts and talk treaties. It concludes with The Trial- where three candidates vie for the hand of the chosen bride. The bride, herself chosen five years earlier, waits at the end of a unique race through the local woodland. The course is seeded with traps. Some they aren’t designed to get past. It’s our way of trying to assure the continuation of the species. Unfortunately, the bride wasn’t given a choice in her fate.
That last bit didn’t bother me so much, until it was my turn to be the Bride.
I went from excited onlooker of the bike procession, to a queen reviewing troops. I didn’t want to be there, but at least my man was one of the candidates for my hand.
Now it’s my daughter standing in the position…but she saw it as being a prized pig in a butcher shop and the wolves were eyeing her for dinner as they rode by.
She wanted none of it.

Standing just behind her, to the right and one step, Uncle Tony was 5’8, grey goateed and wore half moon spectacles – runs this wildlife preserve, I swear to God, grew 5 inches as those bikes roared by. Until they arrived on the land he was just Dr. Anthony Ramos, famed wildlife researcher who specialized in wolves. Now he was the Eastern National Representative. He was one of the holders of power.