Page 207 of These Tears

I know I’m not the meal.

I’m worse – the thing standing between them and it.

My heart stopped a breath ago. The shovel gives a tremble in my hands. My boots might as well be frozen into the damn ground.

The boldest of the four lowers its head, shoulders bunching. Its yellow eyes cut from the smokehouse to my shovel and back again, measuring the distance between hunger and risk.

A vicious crack snaps—

A whistle cuts the air—

And a bolt slams into the pine beside the wolf’s head, splintering bark into the snow.

I jerk my head to the left and see Elias standing by the house, the crossbow from above the fireplace braced against his shoulder. His face is stripped of everything but calculation.

The wolf jerks back with a snarl, and for a frantic second, I almost believe it’s enough.

But the pack scatters only a few paces before hunger makes them still again. Low bodies. Lifted lips. Steam threading from their muzzles.

‘Smokehouse,’ he says – doesn’t shout. I hear it loud and clear despite the gap between us. ‘Now.’

I can’t put my feet to work.

The largest wolf steps forward again.

Elias lowers the crossbow, draws another bolt and works the cocking lever one-handed until the string locks with a hard click.

It takes long enough for the nearest wolf to test another step. Long enough for me to realise exactly how little time we have.

‘Leah,’ Elias says, and this time there is a crack beneath the calm. ‘Get. Inside.’

That finally reaches my legs.

A snarl cracks through the clearing. The wolf lunges at him, teeth flashing.

He fires.

The bolt takes the wolf high in the side and drops it hard into the snow. The sound it makes rips straight through me, and I nearly flinch towards it instead of away.

Whatever brittle order held the moment together snaps.

The pack scatters in a frenzied burst of fur, snow and frightened snarls as the wounded wolf begins to thrash.

Elias’ boots crush through the snow as he breaks into a run across the open ground between them and me.

‘The smokehouse!’ he shouts, and this time the command cracks through the chaos.

I stumble back. One step. Two.

My heel strikes the wall beside the door. I fumble for the latch with one hand, the other hauling the shovel up in front of me. My glove slips against the metal – twice.

A wolf pivots towards the movement. Its snarl cracks through the clearing.

Every muscle in me locks.

Elias barely gets the crossbow across his body when the animal explodes from the treeline. Past Elias. Straight for the smokehouse – straight for me, eating the distance in several long bounds.

And just as a scream gets stuck at the back of my mouth, Elias cuts in front of me out of nowhere and swings the stock across its path.