Her Wolf King

THE DEATH

LENORE CLUTCHED HER threadbare wool cloak more tightly around her thin form, using her fingers to tuck the corners of the cloth over the apples in the basket she carried. They were the last ones from her family orchard, and she would have to decide how many to save to make pies for bartering, and how many to sell in the market. But before she could do that, she would have to bypass the forest.

Many a babe had been warned at their mother’s knee never to venture too far into the thickets of black oaks and ash and rowans. The trees that, even in the spring, never once bore the green leaves signifying rebirth and life. They were cursed, or so said the old wives’ tales. And haunted, to boot, which would make sense. Considering the howling that went on every night, and was especially chilling on nights of the full moon. Reverberating through the trees like a stiff wind; weaving like a song into the hearts and minds of children.

Some infants were driven mad by those howls, could not speak or move except to fall to the ground, clutching their heads in their hands, and let out a reedy shriek. A thin echo of the wolf’s howl. Those children could not eat, nor sleep, could not do anything except be driven mad by the wolf’s call. They were left out in the woods, to die. For that would be a better life than to be haunted by the wolf. Sometimes their parents would find the bloody bones of the their children; and more often nothing more than the memory keeping them alive.

Lenore and her brother had been fortunate. They had both their sanity, and their family had been well-off for villagers, owning a small orchard whose apples they sold, as well as a garden that froze over in the winter. But then Mother had died, and Father, throwing himself into his work, bartered the family’s house and what little of a fortune they had, into a shipment of gold and treasure that never returned, either looted or sunk. Either way, it vanished with her father’s hope, and they were forced to move into a ramshackle cottage far too close to the forest for any of their likings.

Lenore tugged as much of her fraying sleeves over her hands as she could, shivering against the biting winds. Her thoughts turned, as they often did these days, to a man who was as harsh as the blowing snow: Kirk Stone, her fiance. He was a handsome man, in an angular sort of way: eyes like chips of stone, pitch-black hair, and skin so pale that to look at him was like looking upon the surface of the moon. But his appearances were of no concern to her—only the fact that he held a sword over her head every time she saw him.

You are mine. I own you. You owe me a debt, his gaze would say as it traced over her body, like he was draping her in chains. And one day soon, you will pay it.

And if those thoughts were real, they were true anyways. Her father was in debt to Kirk’s father, who was the town’s richest merchant. Kirk owned the roof above their heads, and could cast them out at any moment if he wished, could leave them to the mercy of the forest and its wolves. Robert Stone, Kirk’s sire, had offered the Abrahams a place to stay—in exchange for Lenore being wed to his son.

And if she didn’t get home soon, he would be kept waiting for her. Waiting for her, waiting to hurt her in some way, or worse, hurt her family. But the snow was deep, and the boots she wore pinched at the toes, and she had a thousand excuses to make, a thousand reasons not to face the man that made her feel colder than any amount of ice and snow did. Colder than the longest winter, when the walk home lasted lifetimes and she was so frigid she had become ice, a numb block of it, and her toes and fingers were mere dead extensions of her body, her entire body nerveless. The kind of cold that made her almost dread the moment when she walked back into the house, if only for the pinprick of needles all over her body that came with drying out by the fire. That was how cold Kirk was, how much colder he was.

Shivering, Lenore pressed on. She was no foolish girl to assume that dying out here, that falling into the snow and letting it cover her until she fell into an endless sleep, would make life any better for her father or brother. They were her family. She could not leave them, could not abandon them—even if they had abandoned her.

Lenore was almost home. She was so close; she could see the fire burning in the cottage, the smoke wafting out of the chimney, envision the pale gleam of moonlight on the thatch roof. She imagined her father skinning rabbits, her brother’s hands blackened with soot from his day at the smithy as he poked at the coals in the fire, turning the iron kettle and being careful not to let whatever stew was inside it burn.

She could almost smell the food cooking, taste it on her tongue. Hear her brother’s protests as she ruffled his hair on the way into the house, much to his chagrin. She was so close...

A howl pierced the night air. Lenore stumbled, though she should have grown used to it by now. Some apples tumbled out of her basket, down the riverbank, landing on the snow-covered ice with a soft thud. Lenore cursed under her breath, set the basket down on the ground and packed it with enough snow to keep it in place. Then she slid down the hill after it.

There was only darkness and snow, terror and silence making her heartbeat seem loud as a drum. Each beat rang in her ears as she dug through the snow to find the apples. Regret began to flood her as she went deeper into the heart of the forest; they were only two apples, probably bruised or eaten by now. And she herself would be bruised or eaten very soon if she did not find the apples and return home.

Lenore longed to turn around, to give up on the fruit. But she could not, could not give up on what little hope of survival her family had left. So on she went, until the scent of smoke and charcoal; the warmth of her father’s embrace and her brother’s smile; were only distant memories that belonged to another girl.

Until it was all replaced by the endless night and fathomless cold.

Her dark blue cloak blended into the shadows cast by the trees, which in turn seemed to twine around their heavy drooping branches. Like some dark, eerie tinsel looping around an equally macabre pillar. Snow seeped through the fabric of her hood, soaking her hair, and twigs caught in the hem of her dress. She dug through the snowbanks until her fingers were red and aching; until her entire body was shivering and soaked with sweat as well as snow.

It was not hope or desire that sped her on, that urged her to keep moving; only some blind animal instinct. Some blind drive to keep moving, to go onward and not dare look back. That urge to survive. Even when she was hopelessly lost, when her breathing was shallow and ragged, when her heartbeat was the only sign of life in her—keep going, a voice whispered. Do not stop.

When Lenore was certain that her legs would give out, that the breath would be squeezed from her lungs, that she could fall here in the snow and become part of this frozen, deadly world—she saw it. A cave, with a warm fire, and without thinking, without question, she fell into it. Hard stone and chips of gravel ground into her skin where her tattered clothes had ridden up, but she was unbothered, did not care about anything except getting warm. A sob of relief fell from her clenched throat as she sank to the ground, warming herself. She kept her eyes shut, her arms wrapped tightly around her knees. Lenore rocked back and forth, letting the fire warm her.

She began taking into account her surroundings; surely she would have to stay here for the night, unable to risk catching a cold or being eaten by one of the vicious predators that roamed these woods. Or worse, the fairies. She didn’t quite believe all the rumours, but if there were ever a place that smacked of magical tampering, it was these woods.

And her suspicions were proven when the horse-sized wolf appeared out of nowhere and pounced on her.