Corvus Nightshade's Arc

Chapter 2 of 11

Dawn leaked gray light through the barn slats. Corvus had not slept. The wolf was still out there. He could feel it the way he felt a knife at his back. He stepped outside the red farmhouse and scanned the tree line. He found it within seconds. The blue wolf sat inside a fallen tree's tangle of broken limbs, pink markings glowing faint in the mist. It did not move. It only watched. Corvus walked the perimeter to learn his enemy. What he found stopped him cold. A strip of soft earth behind the barn held paw prints layered over paw prints, ferns crushed flat from many nights of pacing. The wolf had been here longer than he had. It had been waiting for him. "It won't hurt you." The voice was quiet and even. A young woman stood at the corner of the barn, dark hair loose, a leather satchel at her hip. She did not look surprised to find a stranger on her land. "I'm Elara. This is my farm. You can stop pretending you're not afraid of it." Corvus said nothing. Elara stepped closer and set something on the top rail of the fence. A flat stone, slate-gray, ringed in burnt ash. A deep wolf print was pressed into its center. "It left this at my door the night before you came," she said. "I've lived here my whole life. It has never done that before. So whatever you are running toward, or from — it chose you. And it chose me to help." Corvus picked up the stone. It was heavier than it looked. Twenty years of plans, and none of them had a line for this. He met her eyes and saw no fear there, only a decision already made. His foothold had just become something else. He was no longer alone, and he no longer had a choice about it.