Aela Darkwood's Arc

Chapter 4 of 13

Aela stayed behind the pine until her legs shook. The moon still held its circle on the moss. The book pressed cold against her ribs. Then a cry came out of the dark, high and broken, the sound of a dog with a bad wound. It came from the direction Lyra had run. She knew the voice under the animal noise. Lyra. The woman who had knelt in the moonlight an hour ago and read the knot tied into her body. The one person left who could finish the reading before the moon locked the curse for good. Four nights now. Maybe less. Aela stepped out of the ring of pines. Her half-shape slowed her, part woman, part wolf, neither one fast. She pulled her sleeves down over the scars without thinking, then pushed them back up. No one out here to stare. She followed the cry. It came again, weaker. She passed a low bush with pale light in its leaves, small flames sitting in the branches like held candles. She broke off two glowing sprigs and carried them low. The light was soft enough not to wash the moon out of the sky. She found Lyra in a hollow between roots. The wolf lay on its side, blond fur black along the ribs. Three long cuts opened the shoulder. The dark paw, the tattooed one, twitched against the dirt. Blood ran into the moss. "Lyra." The wolf's eye rolled to her. The scarred one. Bone shifted under the skin, wet and slow. The shape fought itself and gave up halfway. Lyra came back as a woman on her knees, tank top torn, one hand clamped to her shoulder. "It ran," Lyra said. "Bigger than me. Not the man." "Can you close it?" "Need something living." Her teeth were tight. "Plant. Fire. Not you." Aela pressed the glowing sprigs into Lyra's tattooed palm. The dark lines drank. The small flames in the leaves went out one by one. Lyra's other hand slapped down on the shoulder wound. Steam lifted. She made a short sound and bit it off. The cuts closed to pink seams. The leaves in Aela's hand were black husks. Lyra sat back against a root. Sweat ran down her jaw. "Bad trade. That took more than it should." "You're alive." "I'm slower now. For days." Lyra looked up. The moon showed clean through the branches above them. "I can't finish the reading tonight. My palm's spent. It has to rest or it burns me out." Aela knelt in the dirt. The book was still against her ribs. "How long to rest?" "Three days. Maybe four." They looked at each other. Four nights until the curse set. Three, maybe four, before Lyra's hand could read again. The math sat between them in the moss. "Then we move," Aela said. "Whatever cut you is still out there. And so is the man." Lyra nodded once. She reached for Aela's arm to stand, and did not look at the scars.