When Dealing with Wolves

by A. R. Thompson

  “Could you come think in bed, with us?” Isha pulled back the covers. With a weary sigh, Rostfar crawled into the space beside him on their makeshift bed of cloaks. She hadn’t realised how cold she had gotten until she kissed his shoulder; his skin warm and smooth beneath her cool, dry lips.

  “What’re you thinking about?” He asked, his breath brushing across the top of her head.

  “We could run away,” Rostfar said. Her throat was hot and tight. “Go through the tunnels Aethren was talking about to Hrafnholm, find Arketh, and flee to the north coast. Maybe build a boat and go to A’avenshka. To the K’anakh.”

  Isha let out a shuddering sigh. “I thought you were tired of running and hiding?”

  “I am.” Rostfar shut her eyes and buried her face in the crook of Isha’s neck. “I really am. But I’m also just – tired. Of all this. Faren has an army, and we . . . don’t.”

  “You still think they’ll come, even after what happened to Ethy?”

  “I think Ethy’s death gives all of them more reason to attack Deothwicc, not less. The need for vengeance does terrible things to a person.”

  “We’ll fight, Rost,” Isha said gently, “if you ask us to. And the wolves will, too, I’m sure.”

  Rostfar sat up and turned to look at him, studying the earnest set of his face. “That’s the opposite of what I want.” She shook her head sadly. “If the fighting starts, where will it end? When we’re all dead and there’s only the trees and animals left alive?”

  Isha didn’t answer straight away. The quiet stretched on, so loud that it smothered the distant forest sounds and Mati’s gentle snores.

  “Rost . . .” Isha spoke slowly, gradually turning to gaze up at her through the green dimness of the den, “we have time, don’t we?”

  “I think so.”

  “Then we’ll work it out.” Isha rested his hands at her hips, urging her to lie down again. “But you need to talk with us – all of us. Otherwise we can’t help you. I know I haven’t been there for you, but . . . that’s over now. I’m going to listen, and I’m going to act.”

  Rostfar couldn’t breathe for the warmth that swelled in her chest. She leant in and kissed Isha full on the lips. He stiffened in surprise for a moment before his hands moved up her body, finally coming to rest on either side of her face as he pulled her in.

  Mati mumbled and shifted beside them, and Rostfar reluctantly broke the kiss so she could look at him. His face was clouded with sleep, but his eyes shone with humour as he took in the sight.

  “Leaving me out?” he asked.

  “Of course not,” Rostfar said, and bent over to kiss him. Isha took advantage of the distraction to run his lips up the side of her neck, making her shiver. He stroked her hair back and kissed into the hollow behind her ear, right where he knew would leave her breathless.

  Mati’s low laugh rumbled through the small space as he hooked a finger under her chin and coaxed her to look at him. His other hand caressed her hip in firm circles as he asked, “Is this what you want? We don’t have to.”

  “He’s right. I’m sorry—” Isha started to pull away. Rostfar tangled her fingers in her hair and drew him back. Perhaps she should have been reluctant, given their situation. But it had been so long since she’d felt so safe and content and in love, and the ache she felt for them went far deeper than the yearning in her soul.

  “Yes,” she said, “I really do.”

  ⁂

  Grae was woken by voices. He flicked his ear in irritation and lifted his head, but everything was still. Kristan, Marken, Aethren, and Natta slept soundly, undisturbed. There was no sign of the raven-human, but that wasn’t unusual. She rarely slept, and often wandered the borders of Deothwicc at night instead.

  It took Grae another moment of watching and listening to realise that the voices were coming from Rostfar’s den. He couldn’t quite make out what they were saying, but their tones were low and heavy with intimacy. Not something he should listen to.

  With a short huff, Grae got to his feet and carefully picked his way around the sleeping humans. If he couldn’t sleep in peace, then he would take advantage of the night-time stillness to hunt.

  He didn’t notice Yrsa until he was almost on top of her.

  She was crouched at the edge of the clearing, half in the act of turning away with one paw in the air. Their eyes met. And then she turned and ran.

  Grae hardly knew what he was doing as he took off after her. She was as swift and quick as ever, but the forest floor was littered with sun-dry leaves and it wasn’t hard to follow her pawsteps. Further into Deothwicc she ran, past the dens and clearings and scrapes, past even the Speaking Tree’s clearing. Grae kept as close behind as he could and never lost her trail.

  At last, Yrsa skidded to a halt at the base of the large rock mound where Rostfar cooked her food. Her breath came hot and heavy in the air and her hackles bristled, but she didn’t seem afraid. If anything, Grae might have said that she was . . . angry. Guilt ran through him. He couldn’t shake the feeling he had tainted her, somehow, as if his anger was an infection.

  “Yrsa—”

  “No.”

  Grae tensed, expecting her to flee again. But Yrsa stood her ground. She had always been small by wolven standards, but now she looked shrunken, worn down like a rock by a constant wind. That, too, was probably his fault.

  “Why didn’t you come back?” Yrsa burst out. Her body quivered from head to tail. “Why did you run away?” From me hung in the air between them, unspoken but no less cutting.

  “I couldn’t. I didn’t.” Grae felt like his very soul was trembling. He sucked in a breath that burned all the way down. “This isn’t my home anymore, Yrsa. After what I did . . . you know I couldn’t come back.”

  “Well,” Yrsa said stubbornly, “you can come back now.”

  “You know I can’t.”

  Yrsa’s whole body drooped. She looked at him with mournful eyes. Pleading. “I don’t see any reason why you can’t come home.”

  “Yrsa . . . I betrayed Estene’s wishes and acted against the pack. I am—” he choked off, wondering why the words were still so difficult for him to say. He took a pained breath and started again. “I am unwolf.”

  “But you’re not blood-crazed and mindless like Unwolf, or an abomination like Other. You’re still you.”

  “Am I?” Grae looked away from her. Maybe Yrsa was right – or did he just want her to be? He had been waiting and waiting to lose his mind, to wake up and not know who he was. That hadn’t happened. Yet.

  Yrsa crept up to his side. Grae could feel her scrutinising him through the wyrdness. Her gaze cut beneath his skin and peeled back his flesh, leaving him raw and vulnerable. He felt sick with the realisation that this was how Unwolf must have felt when they first met. The faded scar on his shoulder throbbed with a ghostly pain.

  “It doesn’t matter,” she said at last.

  “But—”

  “It doesn’t matter,” Yrsa said again, louder.

  Something in her voice irritated Grae like a fly bite, and he snapped, “It matters to me.”

  Yrsa recoiled with a stunned stare. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean – I’ve changed, and I want . . . I want to grow. And I can’t do that if I pretend that what I’ve done doesn’t matter.” He hesitated, expecting her to argue, but she continued to stare at him with blank non-understanding. “You want to me to come home. I don’t want to. I don’t—”

  (belong here)

  “—think I can do better if I stay here. There’s too much old pain.”

  Yrsa didn’t say anything at first. She circled Grae, eyeing him with unreadable coldness. When at last she came to stand in front of him again, her body was tense.

  “Then why are you here now?” The question was sharp-edged and accusatory.

  “I needed to know if you were all right.”

  “And now you know,” Yrsa responded, but although her voice was hard, it wasn’t cold. She didn’t seem
to want to say anything more, and Grae couldn’t bring himself to break the silence.

  Realising that the conversation was over, Grae turned to leave – but Yrsa’s head suddenly snapped up, her ears pricked, hackles up. Her eyes had a look that told him she was seeing something through the wyrdsight, but he had no idea what.

  “What is it?”

  Yrsa didn’t look at him. Her eyes were wide with terror.

  “Humans,” she said. “They’ve come.”

  Chapter 51

  When the howling began, Rostfar’s heart stopped in her chest and the waterskin she had been filling fell from her numbed fingers. The howls rose and fell in waves, a swift current of alarm that washed over the entire forest. More and more wolves joined in until the ground itself felt alive with their cry.

  “What is that?” Isha, still half-undressed, stumbled out of Rostfar’s den. “What’s happening?”

  “I don’t . . .” But before the words had even left her mouth, she saw it: threads of anger and vengeance-hunger and determination rippling through the wyrdness like tendrils of mould.

  Rostfar didn’t wait to explain. She discarded her breakfast preparations and ran. Low branches smacked her face and the wind bit into the flesh of her uncovered arms, but she didn’t stop until she arrived at Deothwicc’s boundary slope.

  Her feet and the wyrdness had taken her exactly where she needed to be. Myr stood there already, staring at the trail of human figures that were climbing out of a steep-sided ravine. His hackles were up and his teeth were bared, but he made no sound. There were other wolves, too, pacing along the boundary on either side. Waiting. Watching. Dreading.

  The pounding of human hearts, quick with anger and fear, made the wyrdness thrum like a strung bow. Rostfar’s own heartbeat hastened in answer. Her blood was boiling, and it was hard to think straight. Her brain kicked into a gallop, trying to piece everything together. They must have cut through the Wyccmarshes, as she had done, and followed the dried-up riverbed, staying downwind and out of sight. The realisation that Faren had probably forced a march through dangerous territory in pursuit of his own goals made Rostfar sick with anger.

  And yet . . . they still looked so small, down there in the swathe of flat plain before Deothwicc’s edge. Better than ever, she could understand the derision with which the wolves had first regarded her. What were humans to them? Dull, stick-limbed creatures who had to make metal claws and steal other animal’s furs because they had none of their own.

  But no. Even as the thoughts took shape, they fell apart. Such a mistake had been lethal for Other when it underestimated her.

  “What is it? What’s happening?” Kristan came crashing out of the undergrowth and stumbled to a stop, grabbing Rostfar’s arm for balance.

  Rostfar opened her mouth to answer, but she didn’t get a chance. Kristan’s arrival had broken the dam, and now the rest of the Erdansten refugees were stumbling out of the forest in varying stages of wakefulness.

  “What do you want to do?” Myr asked Rostfar. Her surprise at being asked was brief: she had run with the pack, hunted for them, died among them. She had as much right to defend Deothwicc as the rest.

  Before Rostfar could answer, Myr uttered a short yelp and flinched as if struck. Pain, white and metallic, whistled through the wyrdness like an arrow. It filled her thoughts with a wild, heartbroken scream that made the wyrdness quake.

  There was something familiar about that cry, like the broken edges of a shattered vase. But the pieces were wrong. Rostfar couldn’t put them together.

  She turned to Myr. “What was that?” The sensation was still there – fainter now, but insidiously persistent. Impossible to ignore.

  Myr shook himself off, his confusion and distress plain on his face. Looking back to the advancing army for answers instead, she saw that they had disappeared behind a line of rocky hillocks. All but one.

  A solitary figure emerged over the crest of the hillock bearing a rolled-up banner. Rostfar couldn’t see the details of his face, but she knew it was Faren. Her flesh crawled as two more figures came behind him, pulling what looked like a lump of furs on a large board. They tipped the lump off its board and let it tumble down the slope, finally coming to a limp halt on the dark ground.

  Faren unfurled the banner. It was dyed a deep rust-red and painted with the motif of two hands breaking a piece of bread.

  “What does that mean?” Myr asked warily.

  “That’s the tradesmoot banner,” Rostfar said slowly. “He – he’s asking for trade? He must think he has something we want, but I . . . I just don’t know what he wants.”

  Isha cleared his throat, startling her. She had almost forgotten he was there.

  “Me,” he said. “He wants me.”

  ⁂

  The silence grew and grew until Aethren thought its weight would crush them. Rostfar was staring at Isha as if he had wounded her, fear and pain written all over her face. He stared back at her with damp eyes, trembling slightly.

  “No,” Rostfar said at last. “No, I – I’ll go. Alone.”

  “Rost, you can’t,” Nat said, a warning in her voice, “they’ll not hesitate before ramming a spear in you.”

  “Rost doesn’t need your permission, Mam,” Kristan snapped. He and Natta had been talking a lot – low, earnest conversations held in secluded corners and quiet clearings. Aethren had a feeling that the topic of those talks was on Natta and Kristan’s minds as they shared a hard, meaningful look.

  “No,” Natta agreed at length. She gave Rostfar a tremulous smile. “You don’t need my permission, of course. I just – don’t want to see you hurt.” Or worse remained unspoken, but Natta didn’t need to say what everyone else was thinking.

  Rostfar made a small, frustrated noise. “Look, I know these people,” she said. “They’re still the people I was raised with and by. Surely, they’ll listen before doing me harm.”

  Aethren flinched. Rostfar’s words cut too close for comfort.

  “That’s what I thought, too.” Their voice was bitter and bleak. “If you’re going, I’m going with you.”

  “And me.” Yrsa was quick to add.

  “Me too,” Kristan said.

  “No.” Rostfar looked close to tears. “I can’t ask anyone else to come. It’s too dangerous.”

  “You didn’t ask,” Aethren cut in, “and neither did I.”

  “I don’t want anyone else to—”

  “Stop!” Everyone turned to look at Isha. The dusky skin of his cheeks had a darker, reddish tint, and his fists were clenched and trembling at his sides. As all eyes turned on him, he drew himself up to his – rather small – full height and lifted his chin. “He’s my brother, and I’m responsible for him.”

  “You’re not responsible for him being an arsehole,” Aethren couldn’t resist pointing out.

  “I know that.” Isha cast them a look that could almost have been a glare, but he couldn’t hold it. He cleared his throat and turned back to Rostfar. “I know that this isn’t all my fault, but I was an arsehole, too. I need to do this.”

  Rostfar still looked like she was going to cry, but she took a deep breath and nodded. Reluctantly, Aethren thought.

  “Yes. Good.” Rostfar nodded unhappily. “Alright, so just me ‘n Isha. Nobody else needs to go.”

  Aethren scowled and pointedly cleared their throat.

  “And Aethren,” Rostfar added. Aethren flashed their teeth in a vicious smile, satisfied with that. They quite liked the idea of getting to hit Faren if he tried for violence.

  But their satisfaction evaporated when they turned and saw Marken’s face. He was looking at them in the same way Rostfar had looked at Isha – except he was trying to hide it, which was somehow even worse. The two of them had barely spoken since arriving in Deothwicc, and then Aethren hadn’t let any conversations go on for more than a few words. Now though, everything seemed to come rushing to the surface like blood to a bruise.

  “Pa, I’m—”

  “It
’s alright,” Marken said softly, putting a hand on Aethren’s uninjured shoulder. “I know you’ve got to do this, and I’m proud of you.”

  “But?” Aethren pressed.

  “But that doesn’t mean I’m not scared.” His voice was soft. Everyone else seemed to fade into the background.

  “Scared,” Aethren repeated. “Was that why you never spoke up for Rostfar, or for Natta? Why you let the council fall apart?”

  Marken frowned. “Someone had to stay on it who wasn’t utterly blinded, Ren. What do you think would’ve happened if I’d spoken up in Natta or Rostfar’s defence?”

  Aethren clenched their teeth. They’d guessed already that was why he’d remained silent, but they still wanted to be angry at him. There was so much unspoken – so many secrets – and the answers they’d found in Hrafnholm had only made things worse.

  “I’m angry at you,” Aethren said in a thick voice. “But I love you.”

  “I know.” Marken sighed and pulled them into a hug. “We can talk it all over soon, I promise.”

  When Aethren drew back, they became sharply aware that everyone else was waiting. Their cheeks heated.

  “Are you ready?” Rostfar asked – gently, without reproach. Aethren nodded. “Then let’s go.”

  Chapter 52

  The air was alive with tension as Rostfar, Aethren, and Isha crossed the open plain. Faren and his army had retreated behind the crest of a large hillock, leaving the trade-flag planted at its summit. All Rostfar could see was that dark lump on the ground at the hillock’s base.

  “Is that . . .” Aethren shielded their eyes from the sun, their shoulders going tense. “Rost, are any of the pack missing?”

  Just behind them, Rostfar heard Isha stop walking. Horror and recognition sluiced through her veins like ice as she realised what – who –she was looking at. She wanted to stop, too, but her legs refused to listen.

  Unwolf.

  Gone were the malice and cunning that had so marked Unwolf’s scarred body. It lay bound in thick netting, blood seeping into the cold earth, quivering from head to tail tip.