Throne of Night Read online

  Nikkan had brought some of the older male wolves with him when he came to take Grace home, but he had also brought Micco, their leader. I knew where I stood with Micco. He was like a grandfather to me. Even after their visit, I still knew that Micco supported me and always would. But he couldn’t make the other wolves change their minds if they now saw me like the outsider the tree people saw me as.

  Elder is made up of two distinct areas, the woods of the north and east and the farm fields of the south. I hadn’t tried the farming villages as a place to live, but I didn’t know if I could. It was the woods that called me home all the time. Running between the trees and watching the seasons change was part of me. I wasn’t sure I could live in a place with few trees, hills, or running water. Every noise, scent, and feeling of the woods was what I needed to survive. This was home, even if I wasn’t welcome by any of the people living nearby.

  The sun was at the midpoint in the sky by the time Grace felt well enough to stand. I could tell by her tentative steps, that she wasn’t going to make the jog back to the wolf village. It was going to be a slow walk, and, hopefully, we’d make it there by nightfall.

  “I’ll go get Nikkan,” Sera said quietly to me as we exited my house. I nodded to her as I offered an arm for Grace to hold as we started our walk.

  Grace watched as Sera took off full speed into the woods. She was almost as quiet as I was, but I was still quieter.

  “I’m still not sure this is the safest option,” Grace said as she took a few more steps, her strength slowly coming back after sleeping for so long.

  “The wolves will know what to do to keep you and everyone else safe. They’ve dealt with this before. It isn’t new to Micco,” I reminded her, and that was the truth. Micco wasn’t the leader eighteen winters ago, but he was the second in command. He knew what he was doing.

  Grace nodded as she gave me a strained smile. I took that as a sign to walk slower, and she slowed beside me.

  “And what will you be off doing while I wait to turn back into a monster?”

  I tried not to smile at her statement, but how she said monster with such disgust on her face was funny. It wasn’t like she thought she’d be scary, but that she’d be a slobbering mess instead. I suppose waking up covered in blood would do that to you, but it was still funny.

  Grace caught the smirk I was trying to keep hidden, and she hit me on the chest with her free hand.

  “Castiel,” she complained with a whine.

  I couldn’t contain my chuckle as it escaped.

  “You talk about being a monster like it’s gross,” I explained. “But turning into a wolf and running around the forest eating small cute furry animals isn’t gross?”

  Grace smiled and laughed too.

  “Okay, fine. Being a wolf any time is gross.” Grace paused a moment and then added, “So you and Sera….”

  I had no idea what she was talking about as I stared at her, waiting for her to finish. Grace huffed and then laughed at me.

  “You know she likes you, right?”

  “What? Not possible. She hates me most of the time, and the rest of the time, she acts like I’m her big brother.”

  Grace shrugged.

  “You like her too.”

  I sputtered as I tried to come up with another response.

  Grace just smiled and nodded to me as she didn’t say anything further.

  It was impossible. Grace had that one wrong. Sera and I couldn’t stand each other. This was the only time I could remember that I could consider Sera as being nice. Most of the time, she was just annoying as she tried to beat me at everything. We might be rivals, but there wasn’t anything more between us, and if Grace thought Sera liked me, she was crazy. Sera tolerated me on a good day and hated me otherwise. This whole curse thing was playing with her mind. I was sure of that.

  We continued to walk into the woods, toward the wolf village. I knew Grace loved to talk, but she was quiet too. I had a feeling she was more tired than she’d ever admit, but that was part of being a wolf: never show weakness.

  As we got further away from my place and into the woods where the chirping of the birds disappeared, Grace’s thinking face turned to a frown.

  “This isn’t going to be over soon, is it?”

  I knew that while Grace wanted to believe Sera, but she was smart enough to see the truth. The last curse that made the wolves lose control of their animals took hundreds of winters before it was beaten. It was possible it could take a long time this time around too.

  “I plan to go back to Red and find an answer. She was the one that broke it before and the one that can do it again. We just need to figure out how.”

  “And until then, we will find a way to help the wolves,” Sera put in her two cents as she came out of the forest to the path we were walking on with Nikkan beside her.

  Nikkan sheepishly looked anywhere but at Grace and me.

  “He can take her the rest of the way back,” Sera pointed at Nikkan. “He” was better than her usual nickname of mutt. “I explained it all to him, and he knows to keep her safe. Nikkan will take care of her while we search for answers.”

  I nodded and tried to catch Nikkan’s eyes, but he didn’t look up from the ground.

  Grace questioned me with her eyebrows, and I walked her over to Nikkan, transferring her arm to his arm. Her cheeks flamed red. At least, that was still normal.

  “She’s not very strong yet,” I told Nikkan, even if he wouldn’t look at me. “And she needs to take it slow.”

  “I do not,” Grace replied with a pout.

  “Yes, you do,” Sera replied for me. “The next few days, you will get part of your strength back. It should take several moons before the curse pulls at you again and forces you to change. It will come sooner if you let it, but all Red’s papers say you can fight the curse at the beginning. So fight it if you don’t want to be a monster.”

  Grace had fire in her eyes, listening to Sera’s talk, and she nodded along with her.

  “I can do that,” she said, determined but still weak.

  I tried to smile with her, but it was hard. I could tell that the animals had left this part of the woods, so she wasn’t going to have much to eat as a human or a wolf.

  “We will be back as soon as we can,” Sera said to Grace, leaning forward in our small awkward circle to hug Grace before we left.

  “Keep her fed to get her strength back,” I told Nikkan. He nodded without looking at me, still holding a grudge. I was okay with that. He could hate me all he wanted, but I knew he’d keep Grace safe.

  “We will be back,” I echoed Sera as Nikkan turned to start their walk back to the wolf village.

  12th March

  Sera and I spent the night at my place as it was getting close to dark by the time we made it back from walking Grace to the wolves. It wasn’t that either of us cared if we traveled in the dark of night, but we both agreed that we didn’t want to end up killing any wolves if they got too close. We were both worried about the safety of the wolves, which was strange because Sera never really cared for wolves before Grace. That gave me, at least, a little hope that Elder could change as Red wanted.

  I tried to watch Sera and see if Grace was telling the truth about her liking me, but all I saw was the same old Sera. The one that tolerated me and might hate me at times. Grace was just trying to fool me. And boy, had she succeeded. I did smile to myself several times as I realized I fell for her trick. When she was better, I’d have to get her back for teasing me. I was going to have to come up with something better than her.

  We were up early to go back to Azren to see Red. With our super speed-running, we would make it back in no time. I actually appreciated being able to run with Sera since she could keep up with my pace. No other human could do that. We both just took a slice of bread before we headed out. It wasn’t hard to eat bread and run. Actually, you could eat a lot while running if you tried, but I would never advise soup.

  “Anything we need to bring
?” Sera asked as I closed the door to my place.

  “Not that I can think of,” I replied. I didn’t have anything that could help us on our quest. I was hoping Red would be able to think of something.

  With our mouths full, we took off on our run. I appreciated that we were both eating, and I didn’t have to talk with Sera. It made conversation impossible, and I didn’t have to think more about what Grace said.

  It was nice that the woods were home for both of us. We could make our way through the foliage and not have to follow the paths most people took, and that would save us time too. Right now, we were working against the clock. I knew Sera said it would take moons for the curse to force Grace into her monster form, but with the lack of food in the wolf village, I wasn’t sure she had that much time. The sooner we found answers, the better for everyone of Elder, including Grace.

  Unfortunately, in our quiet run, my mind drifted back to Grace, telling me that Sera and I liked each other. Maybe it would have been easier if we were talking. It wasn’t that I didn’t like Sera; it was just we never seemed to get along. It was partially my fault as I always found I could do everything just a little better than she could, but it wasn’t like I ever rubbed it in her face. Okay, I might have once or twice, but for the most part, I couldn’t help that I could do things better than her. Life in the woods just came naturally to me, and as the seasons passed, I had grown stronger and surer this was my place. She seemed to hate me for it most of the time. Hate and like were utterly opposite feelings. I still have no idea why I fell for what Grace said.

  Grace had gotten into my head as I kept stealing glances at my running partner. What if it wasn’t a joke and she was right. Nothing seemed different, and it admittedly didn’t seem like Sera liked me. She was tolerating me just as I was tolerating her. That wasn’t a romantic feeling. When Grace saw Nikkan, her eyes lit up, and she always turned some sort of shade of red. I had never and would probably never see Sera blush.

  “What?” Sera asked between bites.

  I didn’t need quiet time to be over. We would likely just start arguing. I needed to put Grace and her rogue thoughts out of my head.

  “Did I get some on my face?”

  I shook my head no and turned back to watch where I was running. And Grace was so completely wrong. I didn’t like Sera in the least. Just because I knew more about her than anyone beside Nikkan, didn’t mean a thing. We grew up together. And knowing her favorite things would be expected. I had memorized almost everything about how Sera moved as a way to beat her when we practiced. It had nothing to do with the fact that she was nice to look at when she wasn’t mad at me. But that wasn’t entirely true either. She was entertaining when angry. But that didn’t mean I liked her. Or did it?

  I didn’t have time to contemplate what Grace had put into my mind any further as we came upon the town. Sera and I stopped at the same time, just outside of town, in the spring foliage. We both knew it was better to be cautious when entering the village than just to run in. The people were jumpy enough before the curse returned; neither one of us wanted to get shot by some nervous townsperson for coming back to town.

  Sera sucked in a breath at the sight before us. We hadn’t expected to meet anyone on the ground with fear running high, let alone a mob of yelling people. It was very good that we hadn’t just run into the village.

  “We can’t wait any longer,” a large man called Raul yelled at Red, who had her back to us. “They will just grow stronger, and more will attack us. If we head there now, we can wipe them all out before this begins again. No wolves, no curse. We won’t have to live in fear.”

  I sucked in my breath as I stared in shock at the tree people of Elder. They were talking about murder. Wiping out an entire race of people. And why? Because they were afraid? What about the wolves? They were just as scared. Maybe even more so. How could the tree people just forget that the wolves were their neighbors, their friends? How had it changed so quickly back to the world I only heard the older generations of Elder speak about? We needed answers to help Grace, but I was beginning to see that we needed answers quickly to help all of Elder.

  I moved to go in and tell the tree people to suck it up and deal with it as the wolves had just as much right to live in Elder as the tree people, but Sera reached out and stopped me from moving. Her smaller hand on my arm made me pause, and she nodded to Red.

  I tried to stop my thoughts from wandering to what Grace had told me before, but it was hard with Sera’s hand on my arm. I did my absolute best to focus on the mob of people around Red. I didn’t fear for her but for them. No one wanted to see Red mad. I knew that firsthand.

  “No one will be heading to the wolves,” Red said, standing with her arms crossed as she surveyed the crowd in front of her. She had her authority voice on, and her stare down was intimidating. People in front of her shrank back from her glare.

  It was strange that someone barely a sapling tall could make grown men cower, but she did just that. Maybe it was the magic of being Red, but I had a feeling it was only my mother. I had never once gotten away with anything growing up. She always knew, and I always was punished. That look from Red could make anyone pee their pants.

  “And why not?” someone yelled from the crowd, further back that wasn’t as afraid as the front row of people closest to Red.

  “Because the wolves are part of Elder,” Red replied.

  I had been on the receiving end of her glare and didn’t blame the guy that asked for blending back into the crowd. Red didn’t sound happy in the least. Bringing Elder together had been her goal as the Red, and it was so close. Her dreams for the kingdom were shattered. While I worried that she was against the wolves when she had told me not to spend time with them, I could see that it wasn’t Red, but the people, against the wolves. They were easily forgetting the past eighteen winters.

  “But they are hunting our children. They will come and snatch them in the night,” a woman with a bright green scarf around her head called to Red. “If they don’t kill us, they’ll change us into monsters. I don’t think anyone wants to be around for either of those.”

  “We are safe in our trees,” Red replied, downplaying the concerns. “Stay in the trees at nighttime, and they can’t hurt anyone. We’ve been through this before. We survived for hundreds of winters with the wolves cursed. This is nothing new. Stop being so irrational.” Red sounded like she had winters ago when I was a child that needed scolding.

  The wolf curse was why more than half the people of Elder lived in the trees. Red had told me once about when she was a child and how people were raised and spent their whole lives never setting foot on the ground. It wasn’t the best way to live, but no one questioned it. It kept them safe. Why were they questioning her and their way of life now after hundreds of winters?

  It was no different now, except for the guns my mother had stockpiled. I knew that most of the tree people knew about the arms, and it seemed the bolder ones now wanted to use them. Red had never intended for the guns she had bartered from other kingdoms to be used to kill off the wolves. She might have told me to stay away from the wolves, but I knew in her heart that she supported the wolves as much as she could. She saw them as part of Elder, not the enemy, as most of the tree people saw them right now. The guns were for safety only, not mass murder.

  “Safe? Safe is when we can walk around our own kingdom without being afraid,” a short, balding man towards the front replied. He stared at the ground as he talked, but that was probably the only way he had the courage.

  “Yes,” the lady from before cheered him on.

  Red looked from face to face. I could tell that while she looked strong and intimidating, she was actually sad. All her work was for nothing. One small moment and everything went back to the way it was. The tree people and the wolves hated each other again. The bridge she had spent eighteen winters building was torn down in one night. Her shoulder stooped a little as she looked around and shook her head at the people before her.
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  “We need to keep Elder safe for everyone, including the citizens that can shift into a wolf. None of you are going off hunting without direct permission from me. The armory will remain closed under lock and key that only I have access to. You can’t kill citizens of Elder without being punished, and I will punish each and every one of you that thinks they are above the law,” Red informed them.

  The people turned to their neighbors and talked. The whispers that I heard were all disagreements. Some were calling for Red to step down. It seemed that many knew that Sera was almost ready to take over. They wanted that to happen now instead of later as they thought she’d allow them to hunt the wolves. They were all upset, and anger was coursing through most of them that weren’t afraid of Red and the power she held. The only thing keeping them from outright mutiny was that they needed her. Red was their only true protection.

  “Will I be punished for hunting deer?” a young man off to the left wearing a deep yellow hat asked. I couldn’t see his face, but he had to be someone I knew. He didn’t seem much older than me.

  “That’s not a reason to be punished,” Red replied, falling for his innocent face as he asked his question.

  “Then why will I be punished for hunting a wolf?”

  Sera huffed next to me and shook her head. She’d seen that coming just as I had.

  Cheers went up around the young man. Most, if not all, of the people agreed with him. It was sad to see how much changed in just a few short days. Not even ten moons ago, the tree people of Elder were living side by side with wolves that had moved into Azren. I knew none of them were there now since Red kicked them out, but that didn’t change anything. How could someone you viewed as your neighbor now be your enemy?

  Red rubbed her head. I don’t think she expected that level of hatred from someone younger than me. She had tried to raise the new generation of Elder to love everyone that resided in the kingdom, but it didn’t seem to stick.

  “The wolf tribes in the north are humans. They may change into wolves, but we all know that they are human. Raul, didn’t Cameron help you just last moon cycle when your house burned? He got the water to put out the fire in the middle of the night and then let you live with him while you rebuilt? Now, you want to thank him by killing him and hunting his children?”