The Wolf & The Witch

Claire woke and squinted an eye open- it was pitch black, and cold was falling, and frost was falling, like sheets over bodies, and the world was quiet and soft, deadened except his breathing.

Heavy, ragged breaths- he carried her in his arms, running at the edge of the red fields, near the tree line.

She had dreamed about his words through the night- I’m sorry for slapping you. In all her life she could not imagine a wolf apologizing. They were too prideful, and arrogant, to ever think they did anything wrong. But he had apologized to her. He had also shielded her from the guards. Maybe she had been wrong about wolves. Maybe it was just the pack wolves that were horrible. Maybe these lone, packless mutts were different? She cleared her throat and looked up at him and doubted it- wolves are wolves. “No horse?”

“I rode it till it-” he huffed, and took a deep breath, and ran on. “Died.”

She studied his face- he was sweaty and tired. How long ago had the horse died? She struggled to get out of his arms, but he held her. “Let me down.”

“No. We only have… one pair of boots, and we… need to move fast. They’ll be on us… tonight.”

She looked at her clothes- a green flannel shirt with half the upper buttons missing, opened and showing her cleavage, a coat wrapped around her legs, and the rags of a torn coat wrapped around her feet and tied with rope. She reached up and felt her head- more rags tied into a toboggan with rope. She turned and looked at his boots- solid and leather, and he had pants, but no shirt- a saddle blanket was wrapped around his shoulders, as were two saddle bags. He had water skins tied to one side, and a sword at his other. She felt something on her leg and reached under the coat- a hunting knife was strapped to her thigh, and for the smallest of seconds she started to fuss- how much of her body had he seen while strapping a knife high up on her thigh? But she didn’t fuss. And she didn’t fight, because, truthfully, once again, she would be dead without him. She reached around him for one of the water skins.

“That one is wine, the ones… on the other side are… water.”

She paused, and reached around his other side, for one of the water skins. “Wine?”

“Yeah. I stole everything the… alpha had on his horse- water, wine… knives, dried meat, nuts…” He stole more than that, but was tired and out of breath. The witch wasn’t that heavy, but the chain, the packs, the skins- he was weighed down and he felt it in his legs and back.

She drank water, then reached the skin up and gave him some, then retied the skin to him, then leaned up and dug through one of the packs hanging off his shoulder. He motioned with his shoulder to the other pack, so she leaned over and stuck her hand down that till she found the nuts, and ate those.

The wolf carried the witch mile after cold mile. He needed a plan, or an idea, more than he needed sleep. He was good with a sword, but not against six soldiers. Not cuffed to a witch. She shifted in his arm, tugging her flannel shirt closed a little, then she readjusted her toboggan. “I got a couple answers from… one of the guards.”

“Yeah?” She looked up- his eyes were hidden in the shadows cast by his heavy, sharp eyebrows and a low-rag toboggin.

He looked down at her- round, hazel eyes and brown hair and pale white skin, then back up. “He said the other couple wore… hoods, and covered up, but that they… joined them. Then he said they stole a horse, food, and the… wolf raped the Alpha’s mate, then-“

“What?! While cuffed to a witch?! How?” And once again, the problem with wolves came full circle. They’re animals. Maybe they can control their animal urges sometimes, but clearly not for long. What kind of depraved human does something like that, while cuffed to a woman? Only a wolf. “See- this is why wolves are the scum of the earth. That wolf should be hung from a tree. Goddamn it. We were treated like shit because-“

“I agree with you. Wolves are scum,” he interrupted. He recognized that trait in nearly every wolf he had ever met, which is why he refused to join a pack. But it wasn’t just wolves who were scum- witches, soldiers, farmers, store owners, preachers, prostitutes- most of the people he had met in his life were scum. “I’m guessing that means he raped the witch that was with him, too.”

“Probably.” She studied him, curious. He didn’t have to tell her all that- she was passed out at the time, and he had to know that information would feed into her already low opinion about wolves, but he told her anyway. “What else?”

“Something is bothering me,” he huffed. He could only run so far and was slowing down. He stopped to catch his breath and looked at the night sky- gray clouds were piling up like old carpet in the corner of a room. Snow would pick up, and by this time tomorrow they would either be dead, or in inches of snow. “The guard called this place the… wasteland, and he said no one escapes it, which is why… they weren’t surprised that we came back.” He looked down at her, and held her eyes, and she held his.

She swallowed. The wasteland? Something about that word bothered her, and reminded her of how most of the stuff in the city turned to dust in their hands. “How many miles do you think we are from the city? The cell we woke up in?”

Lestat considered- they had traveled maybe twenty miles so far on foot, and he rode the horse till it died, probably another fifty. And the only reason their pursuers hadn’t caught up yet is because their horses were tired. Lestat knew how this worked- at best he and the witch could travel twenty miles a day, whereas a horse, once it’s fed and rested, could easily do fifty. They didn’t want to kill their horses by running them to death, and they knew they would catch up, and soon. Their pursuers were slow because they knew there was nowhere to run, and no way to outrun them. They had the rest of the night, and then the day, and they would be on them by nightfall. “Somewhere near seventy, maybe.”

Not much progress, Claire thought, especially given most of that was probably on a horse. That would put their pace, on foot, at a piddling 4 miles a day. Claire did some quick mental math- at that rate winter would overtake them, and soon. At 4 miles a day it would take over a year and a half to walk back. They needed horses. And miracles. “Hey, I have another idea.”

“We need to steal their horses.”

She nodded. “Steal every goddamn thing they have.”

He stopped running and took a few deep breaths and looked down at her. “We’ll use you as bait.”

She glared and crinkled her nose and pushed her lips out, as if trying to burn holes through him with her eyes. “No.”

“Your white-“

“Shut up, and no.” She pulled the coat rags off her feet so they didn’t get wet and climbed out of his arms and stretched, then looked down and pulled her flannel shirt closed- all the top buttons were popped.

“I think-“

She punched his chest. “God damnit no! You’re not using my white anything for bait!” She glared at him.

He scooped her back up in his left arm; she fought him for a minute, then relented, and let him carry her. And the wolf and the witch continued through the wasteland, in the dark early morning, discussing their plan. And then they found the perfect spot to execute their plan- a nook in the rocks that a small stream had carved out long ago. They followed the narrow canyon further into a small cave. Anyone coming here would have to dismount- men could fit through this crack in the rock, but horses could not. Now they had the place for their trap, they just needed to figure out what to do and how to do it.

The wolf and the witch were so busy worrying about their pursuers, and trying to plan a trap, that they didn’t notice they were being watched. A different wolf, and a different witch, cuffed together, huddled in the shadows of the trees on the opposite side of the broad red field, watched as they passed.