“There’s a wolf following us!”
A flash of indignation crossed the man’s face as he shook himself free of her. “Save your hysterics. It’s daylight.”
Which only meant this specter wolf was especially powerful. Or hungry. Or both. Alora would know; she’d finished the entire book ofRare Creatures of the West.
“Quit your arguing, Urchin, andlook!”
Alora wasn’t sure if it was her furious desperation or the fact she’d let slip she knew his true occupation, but the Urchinnarrowed his gaze at her before doing as she bid and glancing into the trees. Only then did she feel him tense beside her.
“What in the blistering hell is that thing doing so close to the lane?”
He called the creature athinglike doing so might make it lesser, but Alora could feel the fear rolling off him in abundance. Despite the man’s attempt at an ample mustache, he was clearly younger than her. And he obviously knew nothing of specter wolves.
“They are drawn to enchantment.”
“But I’ve not got much to speak of. I can sense emotions, that’s all.” When the quiet grew weighted, the Urchin fixed her with a glare. “Unlessyou—no, this makes much more sense to me now.”
The wolf weaved among the ferns, disappearing from view now and then to reappear later. All the while, it watched her.
“What does?”
“I’d been given strict orders to see you safe to the gate.”
“By Merridon?”
He sneered at her as if she were a burden he’d rather toss off. “One of them.”
Alora emitted an incredulous sound at his admission. “Will they attack the horses?”
“They can’t sense the horses.”
Had she read that? Fine, perhaps he knew a little more than she thought.
Her pulse thrummed, and she yearned to stifle it. To squash the enchantment churning in her blood before the creature decided it would no longer wait to make a feast of it. “Should we increase our pace?”
“Would you— I don’t know, all right? Just quit prattling a moment so I can think!”
Alora glared at him, thinking about how much she’d like to add another bump to his nose, when he said, “They were supposed to be exterminated. What is it doing here?”
Exterminated?As far as Enver was aware, the entire forest crawled with them.
A brief flash of memory, of the Urchin captain telling her the threat of the woods was exaggerated, and she realized there likely hadn’t been a specter wolf sighted in a long time.
A break in the foliage revealed the true size of the creature and Alora gasped. “It’s fed on a lot of enchantment.”
A pitiful sound left the Urchin when his eyes found what hers did. The wolf rivaled the height of George. “Increase our pace, it is.” With a snap of the reins, the horses leapt into a run.
Alora’s back met the cushions with a jolt, and she hung onto the side of the wagon with all her strength. The trees blurred past her, the horses’ ears flattened to their skulls, and she wondered, somewhere in the background of her desperate thoughts of survival, if they would lose all the lovely wood trim she’d commissioned from the carpenter. She wouldn’t have time to get more.
“Nearly there,” said the Urchin like a prayer, at the same moment Alora said, “Oh my heavens, there aretwoof them.”
“What!”
“There’s another on my side. Not as big, I don’t think, but I can’t be sure with how fast we’re moving.”
“You better be hanging on, because I won’t come back for you.”
Alora believed him completely as he snapped the reins again, and the horses hurtled faster yet. She could hear, and feel, the trim bouncing all around, and knew for certain that most would be cracked if they made it through at all.
