Maren bloodheart's Arc

Chapter 1 of 1

Three sheep lay dead in the pasture, and Molly knelt beside them before dawn, reading the thornhound's tracks in the mud. She had spent a month trying to tame the beast that killed the last three groundskeepers. Now the estate's owner wanted it put down. If the thornhound kept killing livestock, she would lose her one chance to make it guard the grounds at her side. The paw prints led toward the ironwood thicket. She stood, pouch of seeds in her hand, and followed. The thornhound crouched over a fresh kill beneath a twisting vine of dark ironwood. Its quills lifted when she stepped close. Venom beaded on the tips. Molly knew one scratch could stop her heart. She stopped and set down a slab of salted meat from her bag. "Leave the sheep," she said, low. "Eat this instead." The thornhound snarled and did not move from its kill. Molly understood then. Meat alone would not pull it off a fresh carcass. It needed a reason older than hunger. She drew out the fang-shaped pendant she had found in the thicket weeks ago. It was carved from the tooth of the thornhound's wild ancestors. The old shepherds said such a relic bound a beast to guard what its bloodline once protected. She had never dared test it. She lifted the pendant and held it in the thornhound's sightline. The beast froze. Its quills lowered. It stepped off the dead sheep and came toward her, slow, eyes fixed on the fang. Molly's hands shook. She stood her ground as the thornhound pressed its nose to the pendant and let out a long, low sound. Then a shape dropped from the ironwood branches. An ember-winged fox landed between them, wings glowing like coals. It snatched the salted meat and darted off. The thornhound wheeled, quills snapping up, and bolted after the fox into the thicket, away from the kills. Molly ran after them. By the time she reached the clearing, the fox was gone. The thornhound stood panting, the chase spent, the dead sheep far behind. She knelt and laid the pendant on the ground between them. The thornhound looked at the fang, then at her. It lay down. It did not run. Molly had pulled it off the kills. The owner would spare the beast for now. But she had seen it leave only because something faster had baited it. The pendant held its attention, not its loyalty. And the ember-winged fox had learned where the estate kept easy meat. She looked at the torn salt-bag, then at the thicket where the fox had vanished. Her problem had not ended. It had multiplied.