AU pre-ZA.

*Hialeah means beautiful meadow in Cherokee.

The idea came to me from many conversations I've had with Halohunter89. This is for you- Happy Birthday Wolfgirl...

Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings , etc., are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way affiliated with the owners, creators or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.

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In the beginning, the people say, the Dog was put on the mountain and the Wolf beside the fire. When the winter came, the Dog could not stand the cold, so he came down to the settlement and drove the Wolf from the fire. The Wolf ran to the mountains, where it suited him so well that he prospered and increased, until after a while he ventured down again and killed some animals in the settlements. The people got together and followed and killed him, but his brothers came from the mountains and took such revenge that ever since the people have been afraid to hurt a Wolf. -Cherokee Legend

She anxiously ran her hand through her hair and looked at the clock. Almost one am and Daryl still wasn't home. Hialeah knew he was out with his brother. She hated when Merle was around. He always dragged Daryl out to Hap's bar after work and that brought trouble. Daryl could be an angry reckless man when he drank. His demons danced more freely with each shot of whiskey he downed. It loosened his tongue and his fists as it did with even the best of men.

Presently Merle was staying with them. He was on parole and needed an address so of course he came to Daryl, who'd never say no to family. Daryl offered Merle the couch in the small clapboard house on the side of the hill outside of town that he and Hialeah rented. It wasn't much, but it was theirs. They'd moved in right after they got married. Hialeah paced looking for some way to relieve her nerves. She passed the TV. They couldn't afford satellite and only got two fuzzy stations. She sat at her Singer sewing machine that Daryl had given her for their first anniversary. He knew how much she wanted it and scraped and saved the $260.00 by working double shifts at the paper plant. She sat at the machine and went back to stitching patches on the knees of his worn work pants.

Daryl was like that. He paid attention to little things and always tried his best to make her happy, give her what she wanted. He was the only one in her life who ever had, who'd ever been kind to her. She supposed she was that way to him. She remembered the first day she'd met Daryl Dixon. Ten years old on the school playground. Some older boys taunted her called out 'half-breed' saying she was easy and to get back on the rez. "You don't belong here!" She was used to it. She never felt like she belonged anywhere. Hialeah was half Cherokee on her mother's side and they had lived on the reservation for most of her life with her grandmother. Hialeah never met her white father; he left her mother before she was born. Even on the reservation she was taunted for being a half-breed. She wasn't Cherokee enough there and in town she wasn't white enough. So when her mother married and they moved to town, Hialeah was again out-of-place.

But Daryl had fought the older boys. He fought for her and took his licks. It was his way of saying hello.

He always defended her and after a while she'd accompany him out to the woods every day after school watching him hunt, talking a little. They seemed to have a connection. He loved listening to her stories; the Cherokee legends her Grandmother had passed on to her resonated with the boy. Eventually, he taught her how to hunt; she taught him how to thank and bless his kills according to custom. Sharing and learning to trust each other lead to love as they got older. "You're one of my kind," she'd whisper softly unaware that he heard her every time and his heart swelled with pride.

Her two wolves howled out back behind the house, deep and forlorn, a sound that may have frightened some people or be mistaken for predatory but she heard the long soulful calls and drew comfort. They were calling for Daryl, missing him as much as she was. The two orphan cubs they had found up on the ridge, asleep on their dead mother wolf a couple of years back were now full-grown. She had insisted they took the cubs home and raised them, letting them keep their wild nature. Daryl taught them to hunt ...as if they were his own children. The wolves considered Daryl and Hialeah part of their pack.

Her thoughts were interrupted by the familiar rumbling of the old gray Chevy pickup that needed a new muffler entering the dirt driveway. Daryl stumbled through the front door drunk and with a painful looking black eye.

Alone of course; Merle was nowhere to be seen. Probably out with some whore from the bar.

She guided him to the bedroom and helped him lay down.

"Baby, what happened?"

He just grunted and rolled over. She figured Merle did something to provoke somebody and Daryl ended up involved. She kissed his cheek and took off his dirty work boots, letting them drop with two thuds.

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The next morning Daryl woke with one hell of a hangover. He headed to the bathroom. "Shit" he mumbled seeing his face. Swollen, busted up and bruised. He washed up and dressed. Hialeah was in the kitchen cooking his breakfast. She never let him head to work without eating.

She was beautiful even just standing at the stove frying up his eggs in her black lace slip and fuzzy pink bunny slippers. Her long, dark honey hair cascaded over her shoulders and when she turned to him he fell right into her deep green gaze.

"Sorry 'bout last night. Hope I wasn't a dick to you…" He could be a mean drunk and he knew it.

She shook her head.

"You must feel like shit though." She observed.

He shrugged.

"What happened?"

He shrugged again and looked away mumbling. "Mmm hmmm…."

"Oh." She tightened her lips.

He looked up and nodded.

He knew she worried and she knew the black eye was about her. The other small minded, racist asshole guys in town still gave him shit for marrying a half-breed. But he didn't care. He loved her and he'd been taking punches for her since the first day they met

"Now hurry and eat or you'll be late for work." She said putting a plate of eggs and a mug coffee in front of him.

"Yes, ma'am."

"Do me a favor and come right home after work, tonight please. No matter about Merle, okay?"

"Yeah 'bout that. I can tell him to go. I know you don't like it...him staying on with us here."

"No. It's fine. He's your brother. Where the fuck else is he gonna go? He is your family. He stays."

She turned back to the stove.

"Hay, I love you." He said.

"I know, love you too."

They only gave smiles to each other. No one else. Their trust ran deep.

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After Daryl left, Hialeah took her stepdad's old shotgun from the shed out back and sat on the porch not even trying to control her anger.

She remembered the story her grandmother told her about the two wolves warring inside her. She heard the wise old woman's voice clearly, comforting her after one of her many angry childhood outbursts.

"Let me tell you a story little one. I too, at times, have felt a great hate for those that have taken so much with no sorrow for what they do. But hate wears you down and hate does not hurt your enemy. Hate is like taking the poison and wishing your enemy would die. I have struggled with these feelings many times. I know you do as well. It is as if there are two wolves inside me; one wolf is good and does no harm. He lives in harmony with all around him and does not take offense when no offense was intended. He will only fight when it is right to do so, and in the right way. But the other wolf, is full of anger. The littlest thing will set him into a fit of temper."He fights everyone, all the time, for no reason. He cannot think because his anger and hate are so great. It is helpless anger because his anger will change nothing. Sometimes it is hard to live with these two wolves inside me because both of the wolves try to dominate my spirit."

Hialeah looked intently into her Grandmother's eyes and asked, "Which wolf will win?"

Her grandmother smiled and said, "The one I feed."

She knew she and Daryl both had that war inside. Usually, they kept the other from feeding the angrier side. They were each other's balance but when he was hurt her hackles went up and sometimes they wouldn't be tamed down so easily. She looked around the front yard steeling herself, feeling every muscle in her body hot and tense.

Shadows, windows. Sorrow like an undertow. Clotheslines, telephone lines. It's a matter of time before they find me. I'm waiting for a sign from one of my kind. I'm waiting for the time to fall behind me I'm waiting for a sign from one of my kind.

"I am sorry grandmother. I know which wolf is winning."

She didn't see Merle watching her from the side of the house. He pulled out a wrinkled package of Red Man dug out two fingers of chew and shoved them into his mouth. What you up to girl? He wondered watching her load the shotgun, then lovingly aim at an unseen target and lay it back down across her lap. Again and again. He could see the tension on her face clearly. Vengeance. He took a long look around. The leaves were turning fast bright patches of red and orange stood out against the green Georgia pines, but the heat of late summer continued to shackle the holler.

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The work day had been long, made more tedious by his pounding headache and the disparaging stares of his co-workers at the plant. They'd wait until Daryl walked into the lunchroom and start blowing off about him mixing with the bush niggers, coming up with new insults for his wife like an outcast, Cur, Mongrel. Almost every day feeding his fire of hatred for these people and this town.

Daryl was wound up as tight as a clock when he stomped through the kitchen glad to be home where he could shrug off the rest of the world and be with his kind. He splashed cold water from the kitchen faucet on his sweat and sawdust smeared face. He stood by the window over the sink and took a few deep breaths feeling himself come down seeing Hialeah out back at the den with the wolves. Daryl leaned on the sill gazing down the hill at Hialeah sitting cross-legged, a wolf sitting at either side of her. Behind her was the natural habitat of her spirit animals covered in blooming honeysuckle vines.

She was beautiful with an old world presence. He needed to feel that presence now.

"Hey, Wolfgirl!" He called out using his teasing affectionate nickname sauntering down the short incline. As he approached, the wolves stood at attention then advanced to lick his hand. Daryl was the only other human besides Hialeah that they accepted.

"Are you staying home tonight?" She asked.

"Yeah. I'm beat." He lay back on the grass beside her and let her push the damp hair back off his forehead.

"You coming in?" He asked running his fingers up her forearm.

"No, I have to see Miss Maudie tonight…just for a little while... she's got a prayer circle going for her sister." Hialeah immediately felt a pang in her chest at the white lie. Necessary means to an end, she told herself. "I left supper for you."

He nodded. "Take the truck."

He sat up and pulled her in for a deep kiss. The wolves moved away, trotting back to their den with a graceful rolling gait.

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Daryl walked into the living room to find Merle sitting up on the couch, a beer bottle cocked between his legs anxious to examine evidence of Daryl's lost fight from the previous night and ask stupid questions. Sometimes talking to his older brother made him feel like being trapped in an elevator with a cannibal off his feed.

"So who started it last night? " He called as Daryl headed into the kitchen.

Daryl rummaged in the fridge for beer.

"Duane? Roscoe? Ain't gonna answer me?" Merle chuckled. "Del?"

"Four against one, bitch moves…I didn't back down. That what you wanna know? You already know by looking at me so why can't you let it go?"

"Cause you been up against it since you met her. Your Squaw ain't been nothing but trouble for you. I'm sick of seeing it, hearing it."

"You don't gotta stay here. Hi is the one letting you. I said you should just go fuck off, she insisted you stay with us." Daryl leaned back in his chair and kicked his legs out in front of him.

Merle sucked down his beer. That revelation surprised him.

"Well, what do you say we head on down to Hap's and make it a fairer fight. With me there we can do some damage and git some payback. Like old times, the Dixon brothers raising nine kinds a hell…." He stood and pulled a plastic vial out of his pocket and shook out some white tablets. "Here you go."

"What are these?"

"Them's truckers lifesavers…they keep you awake and make your dick hard as blacktop."

Daryl shook his head.

"How bout a little crystal then." He fished for a baggie deeper in his pocket.

"Nah man..."

"Suit yourself."

"I'm staying in tonight. Promised."

"Pussy." Merle grunted, chewing up a couple of tablets and downing the rest of his beer.

"Sides don't you got a piss test tomorrow? Shit, you just got out Merle. Don't you even wanna try this time man?"

Daryl caught Merle by surprise. This time. He looked around at the modest but comfortable home his brother had. He worked a union job at the paper plant, had a paid off truck and a woman to cook for him and fuck him regularly. Merle sighed. What did he have? Nothing. A couch to crash on until the next time he got sent up.

"So where is your little squaw tonight? Saw her getting in the truck earlier."

"Out meeting the conjure women."

Merle raised an eyebrow and was about to add 'with that big 'ol shotgun she was carrying?' But seeing Daryl's battle-scarred face wearing a calm expression, thought better of it. Instead, he just asked, "Don't say? She was pretty worked up about the state of you, huh?"

Daryl nodded. "Yeah, more than usual. It gets to her. She needs a night with her kind."

Merle looked thoughtful. "Well, I'm heading out. Got somewheres to be myself."

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All she saw was his bruised face and a busted lip. It would never stop. Hialeah's anger was flaring up inside like unceasing licking flames; the heated rage she usually kept under control was the same Daryl felt when anyone threatened her. Daryl was hers to protect as much as she was his. Like her wolves. They mated for life and would fight to the death for each other or kill for each other. Even kill.

She walked silently, willing the gravel to cease its crunching under her engineer boots. She'd left the truck back on the road and now drew closer to Del Porter's old place. The warm night breeze felt good on her bare legs and arms. Her simple black tank dress made her one with the shadows. The rifle gleamed in the moonlight against her hip. Luther, Del, Duane. She saw them all through the dirty window on the side of the garage. Inside they were drinking beer, sucking on a bong and playing darts. They messed with her, messed with Daryl for the last time. She continued to peer through the hazy glass steeling herself while the mosquitos buzzed in her ears. It wasn't difficult to keep her rage burning, especially as she caught bits of the men's conversation.

"One of them half-wits from over the hill."

"She nice?" Del asked Luther.

"Well she ain't much to look at but she sure likes to spread 'em."

"That's why they call her peanut butter."

"How old?"

"Eighteen. She says..." Luther chuckled.

"Hope you tore that up brother."

Goddamn, if she wasn't going to enjoy this.

"You don't think this here, what you're doing, is a little insulting to Daryl?"

She gasped and turned, surprised to see Merle in shadow at the corner of the garage. He tossed the end of his cigarette into the dirt.

"A woman don't fight her man's battle. You ought to know that."

"I'm sick of it. All my life since I was ten years old these pricks have been making me miserable, making Daryl pay for being with me. It's not right and it ends now."

Merle felt the heated rage emanating from his sister in laws' body. Her brow was furrowed, eyes flashing vengeance.

"I know how you feel, but you don't really wanna do this. So they call Daryl a Squaw hopper so what? Hell, I do too."

"They beat the shit out of him Merle, not just name calling. Those goddamn…."

"Imma say it again. This is his fight. Don't shame him woman."

"That's not what this is. I want to defend him...I'm doing it for him."

"You know it don't work that way. Not around here. Men do the defending."

Hialeah grimaced. She knew Merle was right, but she was stronger than most women. Was she strong enough to swallow her pride for Daryl's sake?

"Besides, what you so worried about someone like Duane for? He's stuck here in this county like a smile on a dead clown's ass. Hell, his son eats the dead stuff that collects on windowsills."

Hialeah smiled.

"And Del still huffs bactine cans….talk about shit for brains…."

"But…"

"Fighting Daryl's battles is just gonna make him feel like less of a man. And when you end up in prison for triple murder, who the hell is gonna make sure that boy puts his boots on the right feet? Hialeah he needs you with him. He doesn't need to be making the two-hour drive to Walker State prison every Sunday. "

She reeled. He'd never used her given name in all the years she'd known him. It was always squaw, Pocahontas, featherhead or some other derogatory nickname.

"You know I'm right. Hell, my little brother won't know his ass from his elbow without you around. You're his whole fucking world, woman."

Merle noticed that although she'd calmed down some, her body still shook slightly with dissipating rage.

"Lemme." He gently took the shotgun from her. "What you say we go get Daryl and head to the Dairy Queen."

"What?"

"Like when we was kids."

"I remember that..." She looked past him at the moon and a small smile curled at the corner of her lip. "You always had money...somehow..."

"So what you say? Let's go feed that good wolf in you."