Skywing's Arc

Chapter 1 of 3

Skywing had six weeks before the passes closed, and a wolf who still tried to bite anyone who came near her. She sat on a bench at the edge of a town park because the town was on her route home, and her mother was waiting, and she could not fly the whole way with a half-wild animal clamped to her leg. The wolf pressed against her boot now, ears flat, watching a boy chase a ball across the grass. She had cut him out of a trap a year ago. He had saved her life twice since, once from a bear, once from a rockslide he heard before she did. He would not let a stranger within ten paces without lunging. Skywing folded her wings tight so they would not draw stares. Her horns already drew enough. She had picked this park because it was open ground, no low branches, easy sightlines, and full of the exact thing the wolf needed to learn: people who meant him no harm. A small bird landed on the bench arm between them, red-headed, blue-winged, white at the breast. The wolf's ears came up. He did not lunge. He watched the bird tilt its head, hop once, and pick at a crumb. Skywing held still. A child ran past chasing the ball, close enough that the wolf's shoulders bunched, but the bird stayed, and the wolf's eyes kept flicking back to it. The child passed. The wolf did not move. Skywing let out the breath she had been holding for a minute. She reached slowly into her satchel, tore a strip of dried meat, and set it on the bench. The wolf took it without looking away from the bird. When the bird finally flew, the wolf's gaze followed it up and did not drop to the running children again. Skywing stood. The wolf stood with her, close at her leg, but his head was up now, not lowered to strike. She walked him once around the path. A woman with a stroller passed at four paces. The wolf's lip did not curl. It was not tame. It was a start, and a start was all she had time for. She turned toward the road that led out of town and counted the days again in her head. Five weeks and six days. She would have to teach him on the move.