Page 20 of The Wolf and the Woodsman

“It’s so wonderful when heathens find a way to atone for their sins,” she says. “Godfather Life is merciful, and he may accept her as a servant after all.”

I stare at Gáspár with near-murderous intent. We both leap from our horses and make our way through the crowd of villagers. They part easily for us, either out of respect for the Woodsman or terror at their imaginings of my pagan magic. Of course they have nothing to fear except the small dagger and my clumsy wielding of it, but I smile at the villagers, showing all of my teeth.

The head of the village is Kajetán, a young man with a fox-red beard and a ruddy face to match. I’m taken aback by his age, by his unlined brow. I expected every village head to be as wizened as Virág. But if Kajetán is not near Virág’s age, he is at least half as ornery.

His tent is the largest in the village, swooping and sun-blanched on its eastern-facing side, but he doesn’t even offer us a cowhide rug to sit on. Instead, he sulks on his own cowhide, hackles raised beneath his white suba.

“Tell them, Kajetán,” the woman, Dorottya, urges. “Tell them about the evil that has been stalking our village.”

“There is nothing more to tell,” Kajetán says, dipping into a bucket of well water with a rusted tin cup. He lifts the cup to his lips, drains it, and goes on. “There have been disappearances. An old woman, a young man, and a little girl. But I doubt the Woodsmen will be of any help—there are no tracks to follow, no bodies to bury. Besides, we can scarcely afford to spare any food for two such visitors. Winter is coming. I don’t need more hungry, wanting mouths.”

I glance sideways at Gáspár, waiting for him to respond. Waiting for him to introduce himself as Bárány Gáspár, and to enjoy the look of humiliation on Kajetán’s face when he learns that he has refused lodging to none other than Régország’s true-born prince. Gáspár lifts his chin.

“I understand your apprehension,” he says. “But I will not leave good, pious people to suffer. Give us lodging for one night. We will hunt for our own food, and tomorrow, I will find and kill your monster.”

Kajetán makes a noise in the back of his throat. “What makes you so sure you will be able to find it?”

“Godfather Life sent me to this village for a reason,” Gáspár says. “It is His will that I am fulfilling, and therefore I cannot fail.”

“Are you saying that you are holier than us?” Kajetán’s eyes are burning, but for all his brazenness, there’s dirt clotted in the wool of his suba. “That you will succeed where we have failed because Godfather Life has given you a greater blessing? We are not Woodsmen, sir, but I’ll not have you question our devotion to the Prinkepatrios.”

“Kajetán,” Dorottya murmurs. A warning.

Gáspár takes a step toward the headman, who has risen to his feet. He lays a hand on Kajetán’s shoulder and says, “I have sacrificed much, to be as blessed as I am.”

And then I swear that he turns the scarred half of his face into the firelight. Kajetán meets Gáspár’s eye with defiance, but the bluster drains out of him quickly. His gaze drops to the floor.

“One night,” he mumbles. “But I want the wolf-girl bound.”

I won’t make the same mistake twice. When Kajetán comes toward me with a rope, I thrash and scream so loudly that they all freeze like frightened chickens. I’m glad to be spoiling Gáspár’s story, his assertion that I’m a particularly pliant wolf-girl, mute and malleable, a rare jewel among my kind. I don’t want to think of myself as apart from them, even if it’s all a calculated tale. I won’t let the Woodsmen take that from me too.

By the time they finally get the rope around my wrists, my cheek is bruised and I am still screaming curses. Gáspár is pale-faced with misery. Kajetán is seething. As Dorottya leads us to an empty tent, she is careful to give me a wide berth.

“This tent was Hanna’s,” she says. “Of course, it’s empty now.”

I try not to let the grief in her voice temper my rage.

“Thank you,” Gáspár says. “Your hospitality is deeply appreciated.”

“It’s quite small,” she says.

“It’s fine.” He gives her a tiny nod. “May Godfather Life keep you.”

“May Godfather Death spare you,” she replies, in the instinctive, visceral way of an adage oft-repeated. Then she ducks out of the tent, leaving Gáspár and me alone.

As soon as she’s gone, I turn my livid gaze on him.

“Get this off me,” I growl.

Gáspár regards me with pursed lips. The ghost of his smirk is still maddening me. He stands across the tent, arms folded, and says, “You’ll have to show a bit more repentance than that.”

“Repentance?” I lurch toward him; if my hands were unbound, I might have put them around his throat. “Don’t needle me with your Patritian nonsense, especially not after you’ve volunteered me to fight a monster.”

“You don’t have to fight it,” Gáspár says. “I doubt the villagers would welcome your help anyway.”

“As if you could do a lick of damage without my help.” I twist my wrists futilely, furiously. “You beseeched me to aid you in finding the turul by Saint István’s Day, and now you’ve happily agreed to linger for who knows how long in some nameless village, to fight some monster you can’t be sure even exists. What are you trying to prove?”

Gáspár’s brow draws down over his eye. “And what have you proven, wolf-girl, except that you’re precisely like the heathens that these villagers fear? Vicious, wild, ungoverned by morality or good sense? There’s nothing to gain by confirming everyone’s worst assumptions about you.”