by Karah Sutton
A twig snap jolted Zima awake. The midday sun peeked through roving clouds overhead. All around was the scuffle of boar and barks of roe deer who, unlike wolves, preferred daylight as their waking hours.
Zima lifted her head, wondering what could have made the noise that woke her. Grom and Potok were each sleeping peacefully, their tongues lolling from their mouths. It took her a moment to realize that Leto was gone.
She rose and slumped to the edge of the clearing where the pack slept. But Leto was nowhere to be seen.
Leaves crunched beneath her carefully placed paws. The forest floor glowed amber in the sun as she trotted along, following Leto’s scent.
She wove her way past poisonous nightshade berries and mushrooms, the scent guiding a safe passage into a part of the forest she’d never entered before. Zima shivered, though the chill air was calm. After tracking the scent over two hills and beyond a stream, she still hadn’t caught up with him.
She picked up speed, stretching her muscles, bounding over roots and rocks. Soon Zima lost track of where in the forest she was, knowing only Leto’s scent and using it to guide her further.
The smell of fire crept through the air, and her heart slammed against her chest. But it wasn’t the stench of sky-high flames scorching trees in the forest, just the small, smoky fires of human wood-burning ovens.
The realization snapped at her with sharp-toothed jaws. Leto was heading toward the village.
No, he couldn’t be. He knew better than to put himself in such danger.
Zima broke into a full run, the messy, flailing run of a wolf with fear nipping at her tail and gnawing on her heart.
She stumbled over a tree stump. There seemed to be stumps everywhere. And just in the distance, riding the wind, came the sound of human chatter. Low voices like the patter of rain mixed with high-pitched laughter.
Zima! What brings you this way? came a call from among the trees, making her jump.
With a glance behind her Zima recognized Veter, the lone wolf. He bounced as he trotted toward her.
Zima tried to keep running but her paw ached from her stumble. She shook it and walked on, shouting over her shoulder, No talking now, Veter—I must find Leto!
But Veter bounded in front of her to block her path, his brown tail wagging.
You can stop to play, he said. I am so happy to see you. His one eye was round and bright.
Zima winced. She couldn’t see him without thinking of the fire; the same fire that killed her parents had also killed his entire pack. Ever since then, Veter had lived near the village, stealing whatever scraps of food he could find and sleeping behind wood piles.
She carried on down the path, but the lone wolf bounded about, inviting her to play.
Zima ducked past him and picked up speed. Veter panted as he galloped to match her pace. Where does Leto’s scent lead? he asked.
The village, she answered. The word caught in her mouth, dry, like she’d swallowed a bunch of dead leaves.
I can help you! He hopped on yet another tree stump. I know the village. I know how to get around there without getting caught. His tongue hung from his mouth as he panted joyfully. We can have fun searching!
Zima stopped in her tracks. She dug her claws into the ground. “Fun” was the last thing she’d call this. Veter didn’t understand the danger, that her heart pounded like a stampede. It was hard to focus on the scent when she had to answer his questions.
It is not fun. It is dangerous. She arched her back, indicating she wanted to be left alone. Leave me.
Veter’s ears flattened. He shrank down like a shriveled berry.
Zima sniffed and raced away from him as fast as she could manage. For a moment there was a surge of guilt from her stomach to her throat. When there was no sound of paws hitting the ground behind her, she was half-glad he had listened to her, and half-angry with herself that finding Leto now fell solely on her.
She lost Leto among all the other smells of the village. Horses, chickens, pigs, all scratching around in their hay-filled pens. Smoky fires and oil from lamps that had been put out when the sun rose. Soap and clean clothes. Even the distinctive smell of freshly splintered wood. All of them recognizable from the only other time that Zima had been close enough to the village to smell them with her father.
Zima had gotten angry at him for taking them so close to so much food, and not allowing them to have any. She didn’t know that in only a few moons he would be gone.
Wolves and humans have a long-held pact: If we stay out of the village, they will stay out of the forest. It has always been this way, he’d said. No matter how hungry you are, no matter what you seek, you must never enter the village.
But he was wrong. The pact was broken. Humans had started entering the forest. And now Leto was going into the village.
Before her, the road was packed with men, women, and children. So many people. Did the humans always gather like this? The children chased each other with sticks, laughing and yelping, the tree-bark coverings on their feet heavy with mud. Women pulled fabric tight around their heads to protect themselves from the frigid air, their cheeks and lips rosy as they giggled. Many of the men wore fur on their heads, making them look like strange forest creatures. The humans all had their heads turned in the same direction, as though watching and waiting for something to happen.
She sifted through the many smells, trying to find the one she knew to be Leto. At last, she caught it. He was nearby. He must have just passed this way.
Carefully Zima crept along the edge of the woods. This was different from his usual smell. Sweet, like ripe berries. It was bursting with the scent of his feelings, and he reeked with excitement.
And then he appeared. Just a few bounds away from her, half-hidden by the trees. He trotted behind a cluster of villagers. They had their backs to him, but he was close to them, too close. A human with a bow and arrow could easily shoot him, could even throw a knife where he stood. But none of the villagers seemed to notice the young wolf behind them, weaving close and then away, poking his nose about. He was searching for something.
A sharp sound—almost like the trumpet of a goose—pierced the air, three blasts. Excitement rippled through the crowd of villagers. They shivered, like something had rubbed their fur the wrong way and they were shaking themselves to set it right.
Zima crouched, aiming to grab Leto by the scruff of his neck so she could drag him away from the humans into the safety of some nearby brambles. Silent as the wind, she sprang.
Leto turned his head as Zima flew through the air toward him. They collided and she knocked him to the ground, pinning him under her. Rolling away from the humans, they tumbled down a small hill and just out of sight.
Zima, what are you doing here? Leto hissed when they stopped rolling. Grom told you to stay at the home place.
The pity in his eyes stung more than if he’d slashed at her with his claws.
Zima growled softly, low enough so the villagers wouldn’t hear. Why are you here?
I am not to tell you, Leto said.
Was this part of Grom’s plan? Zima didn’t move, keeping the much smaller Leto pinned under her. That same trumpeting sounded again in the distance, and the people exploded with chatter.
The two wolves needed to get out of there. They were dangerously exposed, and who knew when the humans would let their attention stray from whatever was going on. Every passing instant there was the risk of a human turning around and spotting them within reach of their arrows.
She pulled her paws away from Leto, letting him stand, then shoving him backward into a jumble of ferns and berry bushes.
Now hidden from the villagers’ view, Zima whirled on Leto in a panic. Father told us never to enter the village. What about the pact?
Leto bristled. Humans have been invading the forest. The pact is finished.
Zima couldn’t believe what she was hearing. So Grom sent you here into this swarm of villagers?
We did not expect so many.
>
Then we must go. You can come back here when they have gone.
Leto stood, poking his nose between the fronds to peer out again. No, I need to watch them. I want all the humans to be here—it means I can report to Grom.
Report what? Tell me what is going on!
The growl in Zima’s throat startled Leto. He turned to her, no trace of fear in his eyes, only surprise. Had she been Grom, he would have answered her question immediately. After a long moment, he sighed. Weapons. We plan to take human weapons. Arrows, traps, everything.
So this was Grom’s scheme. It would lessen the threat of humans for a while, but at what risk? Leto would get hurt before they got anywhere close to the completion of this plan.
But before she could protest, the villagers began to cheer. Zima jumped, ready to dash deeper into the woods, but Leto stayed put. He kept his head poked through the brambles, watching.
Zima pressed forward, taking in the scene. Leto’s eyes were focused on the villagers closest to them, with weapons strapped to their backs. There were quivers full of arrows. Men held roughly hewn bows in one hand. Past them, the reason for all the commotion emerged. It was a wooden box perched on wheels, pulled by a team of horses. But while the other carts in the village were of rough, splintery wood, piled high with goods to take to nearby villages, this one was enormous and elaborate. Sunlight bounced off the polished wooden beams of its roof. Below, windows were covered with thick heavy cloth, and the doors were framed by intricate carvings of two eagles, their wings outspread.
As the thing passed a gap in the crowd of villagers, Zima saw a graceful hand, so gentle that it might have floated away on the breeze, sweeping aside the fabric in one of the windows.
Then the hand’s owner, a young human woman dressed in blue, moved into view. She had a round, moonlike face that glowed with apparent happiness. Her eyes scanned the crowd, taking in each person one by one, until at last the cart rolled around a bend in the road and the woman was lost from view.
Like fog clearing, the villagers turned and began to walk in the opposite direction toward the village. Small children raced ahead and the adults followed behind chattering excitedly at what they’d just seen.
But beside her, Zima could feel the tension in Leto’s legs and tail. He’d glimpsed something.
Zima looked back, watching the crowd. There was nothing that she could detect to put Leto on guard.
Then she saw it.
One of the villagers, distracted in conversation, had leaned his bow against a tree behind him. It was too close to him. He would notice if it disappeared, but for the moment, his back was turned.
A flash of dark gray fur whipped past Zima. She tried to call to Leto to stop, but her fear of catching the villagers’ attention made her swallow her cry. Instead, she dashed after him, nipping at his tail and missing. He darted up the low slope and extended his neck to snatch the bow in his jaws. But as he turned around to smile in triumph at Zima, something made him pause. Zima followed his gaze, and her breath caught in her throat.
Behind Leto down the road was a villager boy, and his eyes were locked on them.
The chair scraped against the wooden floor of her hut as Baba Yaga pulled it away from the table. She stared at the fire until it burned her eyes. Her plans had begun to unravel. Without a wolf, she would fail, and the tsar would triumph.
The forest had whispered to her that a wolf was the answer, and she had spent days following and approaching different packs. But the wolves hated her, just as they had for hundreds of years. Up until now, she had never found this a concern. She was happy to stay sheltered within her hut and to leave the wolves to themselves. But the forest had once again begun to chant its soft song: Find the gray wolf, find the gray wolf, and Baba Yaga couldn’t help but wonder why the forest had commanded her to seek the creature least likely to assist her.
How the forest anticipated that a wolf would help, she had no idea. Would the wolf track down the tsar, hunting him as though he were its prey? Or did wolves have their own unique magic, something she had never encountered?
None of that mattered now. Not a single wolf was willing to help her. Not even the young female who had spared that little human girl with the shawl.
The forest was wrong. Baba Yaga had wasted too much time already, trying to convince a wolf to join her, when no wolf was ever going to agree. There was less than one week left until the next full moon.
But there was something else she could do. One last attempt she could make to thwart the tsar. And it was her only option now.
The human boy reached out his little hand and pointed a shaking finger at Zima and Leto. Whispered words to the adult standing next to him were lost in the jumble of rattling carts and the laughing conversations of other humans.
Her legs shaking, Zima crept away from the road with uncertain steps. The ground seemed to tip and tilt beneath her. The bow was still clenched in Leto’s mouth as he trailed Zima to duck behind a moss-covered log.
Zima poked her nose out and peered over the log. The man next to the child was now peering toward them, in the direction of the boy’s accusing finger. The man’s hands were moving toward the bow and quiver strapped to his back.
Kill them before they kill you.
But Zima’s courage dropped out of her like a downpour unleashed from a rain cloud. There were too many humans. If they attacked one, more would fight back. She and Leto couldn’t possibly defeat all of them. She wanted to call out that she wouldn’t hurt them, that she just wanted to go to her home in peace.
But it was no use. They wouldn’t understand her.
Run, she said to Leto.
Leto’s ears flattened, but he didn’t make a move.
RUN!
She turned and hurtled into the forest. Leto followed close behind.
The shouts of human voices pierced the air like the screeches of hawks. There were several voices—the hunter must have called other men from the village to his aid. Their feet thumped behind her and Leto, sloshing in mud and dislodging rocks.
And then an arrow whizzed past her ear. It hit a tree nearby, piercing the tough bark with ease.
She snapped her head back to Leto, but he was fine. The arrow hadn’t touched him. He overtook her, leading the way through the trees.
Zima darted one way and then another, hoping it would confuse the humans as she tried to navigate through the forest, always keeping Leto in her sights. She stumbled across a stream and up the slope on the other side. Pebbles dislodged by her paws tumbled down behind her.
Poisonous weeds and toxic springs blocked their path, and they wove through and about, leaping over sudden pitfalls and thundering rapids.
Another arrow pelted the branch of a tree overhead. Zima flinched and forced her legs to run as they’d never had to before.
The voices behind her grew distant. The humans must have lost sight of them.
She kept running.
Only after the human shouts died away completely did Zima slow to a walk. She forced herself to breathe calmly as they ducked between branches to enter a small clearing encircled by pine trees. The trees stood like humans shoulder to shoulder, forming a wall of branches and needles that shielded the clearing from its surroundings. Leto released the bow from his mouth and collapsed to the ground next to her, panting.
Zima rounded on him in a fury.
What a—dangerous—thoughtless—thing to do! She spit as she spoke, and the words came out in a jumbled mess of angry thoughts.
Leto sneered, baring his teeth. I did what I had to do! This is how we will keep the pack safe!
Not if you die first! Zima snapped. If this is Grom’s plan, soon we will not have a pack to protect!
Leto’s ears folded, and a look of shame washed over him. I was only supposed to tell Grom where to go. He did not instruct me to take the weapons myself, he said. But I cannot stand by doing nothing! I need to help!
His words reminded her of her own anger with Grom. How can he po
ssibly think our small pack can disarm an entire village of humans? she asked.
He hopes to gather other packs. We can band together for the safety of all of us, said Leto.
Zima snorted. That will never happen. The packs have never united, and they will not for a plan as dangerous as this one.
They will! cried Leto. You will see! Grom’s plan will protect us.
We have a choice, she said, choosing her words carefully, to disarm the humans, or to protect the pack.
Leto’s muscles tensed. What do you mean?
I think we need to leave. To go somewhere deeper in the forest where the humans cannot find us. It is the only way to protect the pack without anyone getting hurt.
You…, Leto said, his eyes narrowed in concentration. You want to run away?
But before Zima could answer, a voice, muffled by the pine trees, sounded behind them. Are you safe? The voice came as a fearful whine. I heard humans shouting.
Zima turned. Veter stepped cautiously into the clearing, his brow furrowed, every whisker tight with concern. She hadn’t even heard him approach—the cluster of surrounding trees seemed to block out all sound.
We are safe, Zima said gently. The humans followed us, but we managed to outrun them.
Relief lit Veter’s face. The human smells are everywhere. I was worried—something might have…but I am glad no harm has come to you.
Leto let out a low chuckle.
What is so funny? asked Zima.
I am standing between two wolves, said Leto, one who wants to be friendly with humans, and one who wants to run away from them.
