Her Wolf King

Everett growled as he skirted the forest floor. He shouldn’t be here, with autumn leaves crunching beneath the pads of his paws. He should be there. In the village. With her.

But night had fallen, and were he to show up now, as a wolf, he would likely be shot on sight. The townsfolk would fear he had come to eat their children or attack their cows.

You should have gone with her, he chastised himself. You need to keep her safe.

He had the pressing sensation that something was horribly wrong. That he’d done her a disservice by letting his wife go into town alone. That he had let her wander into a trap knowingly.

After all, why else would Marya attack a tiny, nameless village if not to bait a trap? She must have known that Lenore would fear for the safety of her family, and that she would go into town.

He ought to have given her something to communicate with. An enchanted raven that would carry messages, perhaps. A magic mirror they could talk through.

But this was no fairytale, at least not one with a happy ending.

And he was not the prince he would ride in to save her. He was the wolf to be feared.

Yet the nagging urge went on pounding at his skull, battering down the door instead of knocking. You need to go to her. You have to ensure she is safe. Something terrible is happening to her.

Sighing, he finished his bloody meal, and made for the town. With any luck, he would be there by sunrise. He’d track Lenore’s scent to her house. Her brother would let him in. All would be well.

All had to be well. After spending the past few months with her, he could not picture himself as a solitary, cursed creature in that castle anymore.

He did not merely need any woman.

He needed his wife. And he refused to let another moment go by without telling her how much he loved her and how deeply she had lit up even the darkest caverns of his heart.

***

Timothy had been right about one thing.

As Lenore lay in the tiny twin bed and listened to her brother snore, she knew Kirk was coming after her.

Because what else could have caused that looming shadow in her window, that crunch of twigs breaking, or that heavy intake of breath, but him?

Watching them?

Watching her?

She rolled over in bed. It’s not him. Go back to sleep.

But she couldn’t.

She removed the knife she had left under her pillow, one she’d taken from the castle to slice the loaves of bread (which had magically multiplied into more than enough to feed the whole village when she’d removed them from her trunk). Gripping its bone handle, feeling the polished ivory and its swirling engravings, she lay in wait. Not even a yawn escaped her despite it being the wee, small hours of the morning, the barely-blue shade of the sky giving credence to her suspicions that dawn had yet to come.

“Lenore?”

She whipped her head around. It was Timothy. “Why are you awake?”

“I was thinking about what Papa said,” she whispered. That was far from a lie. Thoughts of his mysterious statement—that the treasure she sought was her heart of all things–had kept her awake long after she usually slipped into slumber.

“Do you know what he meant? What treasure have you been looking for?”

Her twin bed creaked as she moved over, still gripping the knife with white knuckles. “He must have been talking about…”

She sighed, and explained the curse to him as best as she could, and that she had found Marya’s letter saying there was a treasure in the castle that Everett guarded.

“And you don’t know what the treasure could be?”

“I’ve suspected it could be my horse,” she said. “Some books I’ve read–”

“Ignore the books,” Timothy suggested in a hushed tone. “Who cares about those? Do you think Marya acquired her magic by reading books?”

Come to think of it, she didn’t even know how the woman had acquired her magic.

“A faerie told me that magic is passed through the maternal line…” But Marya’s father was a faerie, not her mother. “Yet it wouldn’t make sense for her.”

“Think as if you were this witch. Put yourself in her shoes.”

She shuddered and tried to jest. “But her shoes seemed so uncomfortable. The pointed toes and high heels–”

Timothy rolled his eyes, the flash of whites in the dark disconcerting. “You bloody well know what I mean, Lenore.”

She let her arm flop over her face. That, she did know all too well. “I wish Everett was here.”

Her voice muffled by her sleeve, Timothy didn’t hear her. “What did you say?”

“Nothing.” Only a thousand words burned on her tongue, but he was the wrong man to tell any of them to.

“Why didn’t your husband come with you?”

“Other than the fact that he has no interest in being run out of town with a shotgun when he turns into a wolf?”

“Yes, other than that.” She felt thesmile in his voice, heard the glimmer of mirth despite the dark hours they were in. The steady breathing of her father from the other room soothed her.

“I think that might be the only reason.” The thought that he wanted to let her go entirely had crossed her mind, and it made her sick to her stomach. What if he had no plans of having her back? Thought her too much of a nuisance, a bothersome intrusion into his life? She had never thought of him so–had begun to consider him her complement, even in his gruff way–and the thought that he might consider her otherwise sent a sliver of icy doubt into her heart.

“You don’t sound so certain, sister.”

“I wish to go to sleep.” What she wanted was to pull the pillow over her head and the covers up to her nose and pretend that she was back in her fairytale bedroom at the castle. Or, perhaps, even that the curse was broken and she might dream to fall asleep in her husband’s arms.

But she doubted it was a dream that would be realized any time soon.

***

The next morning dawned bright and early with a gun-wielding man in the house.

Or more specifically, in the small section of the bedroom she shared with her brother that had been separated with a curtain to form a washstand of sorts with a basin and cracked mirror.

“Must a girl be attacked simply for wanting to wash herself?” Lenore arched an eyebrow at Kirk Stone, who had pressed the barrel of a gun to her head. Her fingers itched for the hilt of the ivory-handled knife she had brought with her, and she found it in the pocket of her robe, thankfully. Taking a deep breath, she tried not to let her fear show too much.

Kirk is nothing compared to Marya. He is a mere human man, prone to all the same weaknesses as the rest of them.

Yet she remembered Timothy’s words, telling her that Kirk thought she was to blame for his mother’s death. A kind and loving woman, Lenore wondered how she had produced a son like Kirk.

The barrel of the gun was cold against her temple, the metal warped in the reflection as she stared back at herself. Kirk seemed smaller now, in her time away, certainly a few inches shorter than Everett, with less muscle.

His grey eyes, as cold and barren as they were, gazed at her as if she had ended not merely his mother’s life but his own.

She wished he truly were dead as his heart. That way, he wouldn’t be threatening her.

“Shut up and do as I say.” He gritted his teeth.

She sucked in a shallow pant, trying to look scared of him. It would make him less suspicious if she appeared to fear him and the gun he had against her, allowing him not to suspect that she had a weapon on her.

“Wh-what do you want from me?” It was all too easy to let her voice tremble, but she would not be the same terrified girl she had once been.

“I want my mother back,” he said in a low, flat voice. “I want you, you bloody witch, to get the hell out of this village and never come back. You already burned the place to ashes. Now you’re back to finish it off?”

“I am not a witch.” At least, she was fairly certain she wasn’t. “And I cannot bring your mother back, even if I was one.”

She protested but made no move to resist as he seized her by the shoulder and steered her out of the house through a side door, into the yard where they had once kept chickens. Now, the only signs of those animals left were the chicken coop her father had built to fence them in, along with a scattering of dusty gray feathers.

“Not a witch?” He scoffed, the gun moving from her temple to her nape. It hit the bones of her spine with such force that she shuddered, pain lancing through her neck. “Then why did you escape our wedding with a wolf, and why did that blasted creature not eat you alive?”

She seized a breath as he shoved her forward with the gun, pushing her through the splintery wooden gate and onto the road.

“I-I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Do not play the fool with me, Lenore. You are smarter than I ever gave you credit for. Craftier, too, it seems.”

“Thank you?”

“Watch your mouth, witch.” The gun rammed against her shoulder and she winced.

“Why did you do it? Why did you leave a perfectly good engagement? Or was I not good enough for you? Huh? Not rich enough, not strong enough–” He broke off.

Was that a strand of insecurity she heard in his voice?

“I thought you would have replaced me by now,” she whispered. “I… never thought you would care for me at all, to be honest.”

“Care for you?” he repeated. “No, I assure you. There was no such thing in my heart as affection for you. But you were mine, and I don’t appreciate it when people take my possessions away from me. Or in this case… when a wolf takes things from me.”

He pushed her again, causing her to stumble onto the dirt in her slippers, the rocks crunching against the thin fabric of the shoes. She landed on her back, and seized the knife in her pocket, her heart pounding as he leered down at her.

“Perhasp I’ll have some fun with you before I get rid of you for once and for all.” He kicked dust over her face, and out of instinct, she raised her hand to cover her eyes. The knife arced through the air, and sank into his calf.

Blood sprayed over her face as Kirk hollered in pain. “You witch!”

She kept ahold of the dagger, now slippery with blood, and stabbed blidnly again. Kirk was hopping around, uncaring of where he went, gripping his foot. She stabbed him again, but the blade glanced off his ribs.

The gun went off.

She screamed.