Darkwood (22 page)

Beatrice had prepared the beds and hung lanterns on every side of the wagon. It was a strange sight, the lanterns blazing in broad daylight, but even before Annie had completed the thought the sky changed to black. Serena gasped. Beatrice made a small, choked sound. She made the sign of protection three times, once in Annie's direction, once in Serena's, and once over her own heart.

“I'll take first watch.” As she spoke, Bea reached beneath the wagon seat and pulled out a rifle. Then she reached under the seat again and took out a pistol, a second pistol, a cudgel, an ax, and finally, a burlap sack containing an assortment of knives. Some were short and beveled for jabbing, others long and thin for slicing.

Annie selected a short knife with a heavy handle that fit well in her palm. The blade was rounded, like a spear, and ended in a sharp point. She touched her finger to the tip and a drop of blood welled to the surface. Hastily Annie wiped her finger on her cloak and climbed back into the wagon.

Lying beside Serena in the darkness, Annie felt a strange kind of peace come over her. Despite the danger of their position,
despite her worry over Page, there was something about the intense cold, the deep stillness of the night air that felt good to her. The hours crept by, and when Beatrice moved to nudge Serena awake to take her shift, Annie laid a hand gently on her arm.

“Let me, I'm awake already.”

Beatrice looked at her questioningly. “Do you know how to fire a rifle?”

Annie shook her head. “I'll wake you if there's need. Don't worry.”

Beatrice hesitated, but her fatigue won out. She took Annie's place beneath the warm covers and was asleep in seconds. Annie placed her weapons on the seat beside her and wrapped a blanket around her shoulders. She sat for a few minutes with the rifle across her lap as Beatrice had done, but she couldn't stand the feel of it so she laid it at her feet. All this time, the cats had not stopped moving, weaving in and out of the shadows as they prowled the perimeter of the boulder field.

First her nose and then her cheeks stiffened with cold. Her back ached from sitting straight for so long on the hard seat. The sharp scent of skunk musk hung over everything. She closed her eyes, just for a moment, and the sounds of the land at night filled her ears, the wind clicking through the bare branches of a bracka bush, the scuffle of an animal leaving its burrow, the shriek of a bird hunting, and somewhere to the west, the
blub-blub
of water issuing from the earth. A spring. In the morning she should remember to tell them.

Annie's head drooped toward her breast. Then, with a
gasp, she was wide-awake. There she was on the same hard seat, in the circle of lantern light. Serena and Beatrice still slept in the back of the wagon. A light snow had begun to fall, dusting the blankets that covered them. But it wasn't the snow that had wakened her. Annie sat very still, straining her ears. There was nothing to hear: all the animals had fallen silent. Even the wind had died down.

Annie slipped the knife into her boot. After a moment's hesitation, she picked up a pistol. She laid the rifle next to Beatrice and jumped down from the wagon.

The cats were beside her in an instant. Prudence kept bumping against her ankles, and Isadore would sit, stand, walk a few paces, and sit again. With a last, worried glance at Beatrice and Serena, Annie turned and began to walk north. The closer she came to the forest, the deeper the silence grew.

When the cry finally came, Annie realized two things at once: this was what she had been listening for, all along, and it was much, much worse than she could have imagined.

The cry went on and on, part howl, part scream, part sob, part snarl. Not wolf, not human, but both together. Page and Sharta. The pistol banged against her thigh as she ran. Light flickered ahead of her through the trees. The cries came intermittently now, but there were new sounds, grunting and scraping. Shapes emerged from the darkness, gigantic shapes, thrashing wildly in a violent dance. Annie stumbled, stopped. Those weren't wolves. They were monsters. It took her a moment to realize that she was seeing not the animals themselves, but their shadows, cast in huge relief on a boulder
behind them. A large torch, planted in the ground, bathed the writhing bodies in light.

As she drew nearer, Annie recognized Sharta, his white eyes rolling in his dark head. He had the other wolf by the throat and was shaking him as hard as he could. The other wolf scrabbled at Sharta's neck with his claws, trying to reach the vulnerable veins of the throat through the thick ruff of fur that protected them. Both animals were bleeding freely from wounds on their torsos and flanks.

A few yards from where the wolves fought lay Page's cane. Like an arrow, it pointed toward the deep shadows on the other side of the boulder.

The wolves had gathered in a semicircle, at least twenty of them. Page stood with her back pressed against the rock, her hands spread in front of her in a supplicating gesture. She was speaking rapidly in the sharp, broken tones of Hippa. The wolves seemed neither to hear nor understand her. A wolf with a reddish brown coat lunged forward, snapping and barking. Page screamed and cowered against the rock. Another wolf leapt forward, snarling, then backed away.

“Stop!” Annie cried.

Page looked around wildly. “Annie? Is that you?” Fear chased hope across her face. “Get away from here! Go!”

At the sound of Annie's voice several of the wolves turned their heads. The red wolf looked her straight in the face. Slanted amber eyes ringed with black, the muzzle and shoulders
narrower than Sharta's. A female, Annie realized. A beautiful animal.

She raised the pistol.

Something that had been alive in the wolf's face, some question, went dull. She barked twice and the pack broke apart, wheeling in different directions like a flock of startled birds. Annie stood frozen for a moment, struggling with a queer sense of loss.

“Annie, are you there? What's happening?”

“They're gone.” She walked over to Page and touched her arm. Page jerked away, then jerked toward her, grabbing clumsily at her cloak, her hair.

“He protected me! He couldn't see, but he protected me. He saved me again.”

It reminded her of leaving the orphanage with Gregor, her sister's body a trembling weight, clutching Annie like a buoy in the darkness.

As soon as they reached the torchlight, Page broke away.

“Sharta!
Sharta!
Oh, stop it! Oh please, make him stop!”

The other wolf stood over Sharta as he writhed against the earth, his torso twisting in agony. His front claws scraped uselessly against the ground.

“Annie, please! Do something! Please, please help him!” Page was sobbing now.

A rush of different feelings struck Annie all at once. Pride at being asked for help. Fear and its tinny, resentful echo: why
me? But mostly a sense of something being off, a kind of dread for what she was about to do. This was nothing like when she attacked Smirch or the king. This was deliberate.

She handed Page the pistol and took the knife from her boot. Up close, the wolves seemed impossibly huge. She edged up behind the standing wolf and raised her arm.
Don't do it. Not this way
. She plunged the blade into the meaty part of the wolf's hind leg. Instantly, he let go of Sharta. But she had expected him to cry, to fall. He whirled around and threw himself at Annie, knocking her to the ground. She smelled the stench of old wounds, the fresh blood. The wolf lowered his head. She gasped, and he stilled. Their eyes met. His eyes widened, then narrowed. He growled.

Their bodies were so close together that she felt the impact when he was struck once, then again. Izzy and Prue. The wolf snarled and lifted his head, trying to shake free the two small forms that clung to him, hissing and spitting. Relieved for a moment of his weight, Annie flailed around with her hands and feet, hoping some blow would land. Her foot knocked the handle of the knife still lodged in his leg, and the wolf yelped and leapt back. He twisted his head from side to side, a frantic gesture, and Annie realized he was looking for his pack. Again, she felt that queer pang of loss that they were gone. Felt it for him. She rolled sideways, away from the wolf, away from the feeling.

A change came over the wolf. He seemed to age before her eyes, to shrink and grow frail. His eyes gleamed dully and he stood for a moment, swaying, then fell, slow and heavy as a
tree. He hit the ground with the whole weight of his life and lay still.

I killed him
, Annie thought.
I killed a wolf
. She scrambled backward.

“Annie! Are you hurt? I couldn't … I don't know … and Sharta … I'm sorry! I'm sorry I'm so …
useless!
Let me look at you, let me help you!”

Annie grabbed her sister's wrists and gave her a little shake.

“Page, I'm fine. I'm safe.”

Sharta lay crumpled in the snow, not far from the other wolf. His eyes leaked blood tears. Page knelt and took his head gently into her lap, stroking his ears and murmuring to him in Hippa. He growled weakly in response. Page raised her face to Annie.

“He's dying.”

“No, Page, surely—I have a wagon; I'm traveling with two good women, strong women. We can help him.” Page shook her head.

“It's too late; he wants to go. The wolf he fought was his son, Rinka.” She said something else in Hippa and Sharta responded, weaker than before.

“He says we must try to save Rinka.”

Annie looked at the wolf lying a few feet away. Snow was settling on his dark fur. She felt the tickle of blood on her neck where his teeth had grazed her.

Sharta's breath came in rattling pants. Page bent close to hear him.

“We must protect the pack, protect their future. Neither the king nor Gibbet will do it.”

Annie studied the two faces, one stained with blood, the other with tears. She spoke in a clear, loud voice. “I will do whatever I can, Sharta.”

Page whispered in his ear. Sharta tried to respond, but no sound came out. Page laid her hand over his wounded eyes and bent until her cheek rested on his breast. Then she buried her face in his fur and wept.