Hailey
The final image of Joric’s face, tight with fury, is a satisfying one. It is a small, hot coal I carry into the cold of the woods. The whispers and pity of the village fade behind me, swallowed by the rustle of leaves and the creak of ancient branches. The air changes instantly. It is cleaner here, thick with the scent of pine needles and damp soil. It smells of truth.
The thin sacrificial gown catches on a low hanging branch. I pull it free without breaking my stride. It is an absurd garment. A costume for a play where everyone but me believes their role. Beneath it, my own clothes feel like a secret skin of defiance. My boots make almost no sound on the packed earth of the path.
They expect me to follow this track, a straight line to my demise. A path for lambs. But I am not a lamb, and this is not a slaughterhouse. It is a homecoming.
I veer away from the path, stepping into the deeper gloom beneath the canopy. My eyes adjust quickly. This is where I have always been most comfortable, where the light is dappled and the world is a mosaic of greens and browns. My grandmother’s voice is a soft echo in my mind.
‘Never trust the easy path, little bird. It is made for the feet of fools and the mouths of wolves.’
I find a game trail, a faint depression in the moss that only a practiced eye would notice. This is the forest’s own road. I move with a steady pace, my senses open. A raven calls from a high branch, a sharp, interrogating sound. I see the flicker of a squirrel’s tail as it spirals up an oak. The world is alive. It is speaking.
My goal is not to hide. It is not to escape. They want to appease the wolves, to give them an offering. Fine. I will be the offering. But I will not be chased down like a frightened rabbit. I will walk to the heart of their territory and meet them. I will look my fate in the eye.
This is the only way to truly be free of the village. To die here, on my own terms, is a better end than a long, slow life of being tolerated in a place that will never be home.
An hour passes. The last of the sun’s light is gone, leaving the woods in the silver wash of a rising moon. The temperature drops. I pull the ridiculous white gown tighter, grateful for the warmth of my tunic beneath it.
And then it happens.
The birds go silent. The insect hum that has been a constant companion ceases. The silence that falls is not peaceful. It is a heavy, listening silence. The kind of silence that precedes a lightning strike.
My hand moves instinctively, my fingers brushing the worn leather of my grandmother’s pouch. A tool for every occasion. But what tool works against a creature of nightmare?
I stop. I stand perfectly still, letting my breathing slow to a near stop. I listen. Not with my ears, but with my whole body. The way my grandmother taught me. Feel the vibrations in the soil. Taste the change in the air.
There. A twig snaps. It is to my left, and far too heavy to be a deer. The sound is deliberate. A statement. I am here.
I do not turn my head. I do not give it the satisfaction of my fear. I simply acknowledge its presence and begin walking again. My pace does not quicken. My shoulders remain straight. I am not prey. I will not behave like it.
But I can feel it now. A weight on the air behind me. A pressure against my back. It is like walking through deep water. The sheer presence of the thing is immense, a physical force that makes the hairs on my arms stand up. It is stalking me, matching my pace with an unnerving grace. For something so large, it is terrifyingly quiet.
I scan the trees ahead, looking for a place. Not to hide. A place to stand.
The moonlight spills into a small, circular clearing a hundred feet ahead. It is ringed by ancient, moss covered stones, like the teeth of some long dead giant. It feels old. It feels important. That is the place.
My heart is a frantic drum against my ribs, a wild bird trapped in a cage. But my hands are steady. My feet do not falter. I walk out of the oppressive darkness of the trees and into the center of the moonlit clearing.
I stop and slowly turn, my body a pale column of white in the silver light. I face the direction from which I came. I face the hunter.
“I know you are there,” I say. My voice is quiet, but it carries in the profound stillness. It is not a plea. It is not a challenge. It is a statement of fact.
For a long moment, there is nothing. Just the cold moonlight and the silent trees. I begin to wonder if I imagined it, if the fear and the forest have conspired to create a phantom in my mind.
Then, from the absolute blackness between two massive pines, two points of light ignite. They are not a reflection. They glow with their own internal fire, a pale, eerie gold. The light is not animal. It is intelligent.
My breath catches in my throat. I cannot move. I can only watch as the creature detaches itself from the shadows and steps into the clearing.
My mind refuses to comprehend what my eyes are seeing. The stories, the whispers, the fears of the village… they were all children’s tales. Pathetic understatements. They spoke of wolves. They did not speak of this.
It is a wolf, but it is to a normal wolf what a mountain is to a stone. It is colossal. Its shoulders are higher than my head. Its fur is the color of polished jet, so black it seems to drink the moonlight, swallowing the light and leaving only a void in the shape of a monster. Muscle ripples beneath its pelt with every silent step it takes.
But it is the eyes that hold me. Those glowing, intelligent eyes. They are not fixed on my throat. They are fixed on my face. They are not looking at a meal. They are looking at me. They are reading me. A low growl rumbles from its chest, a sound that vibrates through the soles of my boots and up into my bones, a sound that promises to shatter the world.
The colossal black wolf stops at the edge of the clearing, its gaze locking with mine across the moon-drenched grass, and in that terrifying, intelligent stare, I know my fate has finally found me.
