Screams erupted. She dashed after the children toward a hulking shadow holding Oliver aloft by the neck, little feet pounding against the shop counter. The others huddled behind the counter, screaming.
Liesel dropped her candle for her knife, threw herself at the round, heaving belly, and stabbed. The flesh parted easily. He dropped Oliver, bellowing in pain, and something heavy collided with Liesel’s head. She blinked—the room was spinning—she was on the floor, breathing sawdust. The shadow loomed over her, the knife protruding from its stomach. A dark hand reached for her.
Three children launched themselves over the counter and tore into the shadow, hair and clothing, skin and bone. Liesellunged forward and grabbed the handle of the knife, tore it out. The shadow man roared.
“OUT!”Liesel yelled.“ALL OF YOU OUT NOW.”
The children slipped from the shadow man like snakes, disappearing through the shop door slamming in the wind. Oliver picked himself up, but he wouldn’t be fast enough to get out on his own.
The man charged. Liesel dove for the floor; the man crashed into the far wall. Liesel scrambled to Oliver, grabbed him, and hauled him outside.
He regained his feet quickly. Liesel shoved him away, hissing,“Run home!”He didn’t think twice. Not a moment after he’d disappeared in the night did the shop door snap open again.
She ran for the center of town. She didn’t know where else to go at this time of night, when everyone was asleep and the wind was so loud it could steal screams. Her head was still ringing. She stumbled every few steps, but she was faster than the gutted pig—for now.
The well appeared from nothing. Liesel hit it so hard her knees buckled. She caught herself from falling. She spun, dropped to the ground against its rough exterior, and held her arms braced, knife out.
She’d guessed right. He was behind her, and as she dropped,she ducked below his stomach. He speared himself on her knife right at the juncture of his legs. There was a gasp, a sudden impact of weight against the stone well, and a shift of momentum. The knife was ripped from Liesel’s hands. The shadow man tipped—shouted—disappeared.
There was scraping, several thuds, and finally a heavy splash. Then only the wailing of the wind.
Shaking, Liesel got to her feet. The well was deep enough that even the most fit among them would not have been able to climb out, not with the slick, cold stones that lined the inside. Her ears ached from the cold. She touched the side of her head and her fingers came away wet. She didn’t feel well. She needed to vomit, and then sleep for a very, very long time. She turned and looked down into the well. There was only darkness. The wooden bucket banged against its post.
She thought she heard quick footsteps nearby. She looked up. Her vision swam.
“Tomas?” she called out.
Two hands settled on her back, firm and bony, never warm. She knew those hands.
Liesel tipped like an empty bottle over the lip of the well, into darkness.
Six
In Greymist Fair there are many stories about wolves and children. In some the childrenarewolves, little terrors who must be taught how to eat, drink, and speak in civilized ways. Who must learn trades, maintain a home, and, eventually, raise little wolf children of their own to keep their history alive.
In other stories, older stories, the childrenbecomewolves. These are the children who are lost, who are murdered in their innocence. Their tormented souls cannot depart this world, for the claws of the forest hold them fast. In the old stories, they are the Wargs of Greymist, and they guide those who stray back to safety. In these stories, the wargs belonged to no witch. They were not evil.
It has been a long time since then. The wargs serve Death now.
The morning after the violent storm, the children from the butcher’s basement are reunited with their families, and the details of their ordeal revealed. The butcher’s house is searched,his vile cellar uncovered. The murder of the boy Tomas is revisited and attributed to the butcher’s bloody hands. The butcher’s body is pulled from the well, and steps are taken to determine how badly it contaminated the water. The butcher’s son is questioned but knows nothing, and only looks at his father’s pale corpse with vague curiosity. Some wonder if he has the intelligence to mourn. Others know he does and are repulsed by his lack of emotion.
The butcher’s son wonders if his father’s bones will look like bigger versions of the ones he has collected over the years. Bones from little fingers and toes, ribs, teeth. Bones his father tried to hide behind the house.
The freed children insist their savior fell into the well with the butcher. One says she was pushed by a third person of the same size and bearing as the butcher’s son, but no one believes this. There are no other bodies in the well. There was an old dress caught on the butcher’s body, but no one can be sure whose it is or where it came from. If there were shoes, they sank out of sight. A solution is offered: she climbed out. She went home.
But no one could have climbed out of that well, and she is not home. Her cottage is in shambles, the thatched roof torn off, one wall collapsed. Dirt and debris litter the interior. Thereis no sign of life here. No one has seen the young woman who saved the children from the butcher. No one will ever see her again.
Later in the week, over drinks at the inn, someone posits the theory that she died in the struggle with the butcher and then turned into a warg and ran off. That would explain the dress. Someone else disagrees; she was not a child anymore, and only children turn into wargs. Of course, the first person says. Right. You have to be a child. That’s why the butcher wasn’t taken, either.
But they are drunk and mistaken. The forest does not care about age. Children and adults alike have become wargs, but only if they are of Greymist Fair. Only if they claim the village, and the village claims them.
The butcher was left behind because the forest didn’t want him. He had given up the right to call Greymist Fair home. But Liesel: she belonged.
Katrina
One
On a beautiful spring day, with wildflowers blooming in the fields and orioles heralding a rare and strong wash of warm sunlight on the village of Greymist Fair, Lady Greymist gave birth to a daughter who would be called the loveliest child in the world.
