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Someone was climbing the lattice.
I laid on my side, closing my eyes and pulling the blanket tightly around me. The smell of smoky wood and pine was carried to me on the wind, along with something more appetizing.
I heard a lupine grunt, a purring growl that was phrased as a question, then silence.
I didn’t open my eyes.
After what felt like an eternity, the lattice groaned again. The smoky smell faded, but not the appetizing one.
When I opened my eyes, the Beast was gone, but there was a tied-up bundle at the edge of the blanket nest.
I grabbed it and pulled it into my dubious haven of safety.
Somehow the Beasts had acquired dishes. I opened a jar full of steaming soup, and found a chunk of dense bread and a square of actual honeycomb.
I dipped my finger in that first, bringing it to my mouth. I could’ve cried at the taste. Sweetness was the work of the Devil, the Father always said. The last time I’d tasted honey had been when Freya managed to harvest a small amount from the Wood several solstices ago, and she’d only shared it with her grandmother and me.
I smeared the honey on the bread, chewing it with my eyes closed and savoring every bite.
I was so intent on it that I didn’t hear the lattice creak again. It was the deep voice almost directly in front of me that drew a scream. Well, less of a scream, and more of a rusty whisper. Sharp pain shot through my throat when I tried.
The black werewolf who had protected me from Ash crouched in the knothole door on all fours. He watched me, his head tilted and scarlet eyes glowing.
“You like it?” he asked, his voice gruff.
I clutched my bread, unwilling to give it up even if he wanted to throw me to the Beasts below. I would die with this honeycomb in my stomach, by God.
He shifted in place, his head slowly tiling the other way. One ear flicked backwards for a moment, then forward again. “You must eat the soup. The meat will give you your strength back.”
At first I wondered if he was going to leave me alone after that pronouncement, but he remained firmly planted right where he was.
I lowered the bread and clumsily popped the ceramic lid off the jar of soup. My fingers were still aching, but the heat of the jar was soothing as I raised it and began to drink.
The Beast’s heavy, mane-like hackles, which had been raised, flattened down.
So that must mean he was pleased. I studied him over the rim of the jar as I drank my soup, chewing up bits of meat I identified as beef and plenty of root vegetables.
His ear would occasionally flick back, as though he were listening to what went on in the clearing below, but he never shifted an inch. Those deep red eyes followed my movements when I lowered the soup jar and found another lidded ceramic bowl containing hot tea.
I made sure to ration the honeycomb. It was the last thing I ate before I washed it down with tea, the sweetness coating my sore throat and making it feel marginally better.
When my dishes had been practically licked clean, the Beast reached into my nest and moved the bundle aside. That was when I saw that he held a rough wooden bowl next to him, full to the brim with grayish-green slop.
“On your stomach,” he ordered, and my own hackles immediately went up.
“Why are you doing this?” I demanded, clutching my quilt again. “You made it clear I wasn’t wanted in the Wood.”
The Beast was inexorably sidling in. The knothole was extremely large, but the Beast himself was big enough that it suddenly felt very small. He was much larger than a human man, sheer bulk and ferocity.
“Your back must be healed,” he said slowly, as though explaining it to a child. “You were unconscious with a fever for three days.”
I stared at him. I’d been asleep for three days?
No wonder I stank and was so hungry.
“I mean, why are you caring for me? What possible reason do you have to want me alive?” I gave a bitter laugh. “After all, I’m the weapon Vostok turns against you. I keep you out. You’re better off with me dead.”
“I wouldn’t say that at all.” The Beast was now fully in my nest. His claws gently wrapped around the edge of my quilt and tugged. “Now let go of the blanket, woman, unless you want the wounds to fester.”
