Nineteen

 

Rosa headed for the clearing where she'd laid her trap, figuring it was as good a place to start as any. If the knight had heard from the Baron's men that they'd tracked the wolf that far, then he might have had the same idea as she had.

A scream told her she was heading in the right direction. The wolf had caught something tonight, though that hadn't sounded human.

It was not yet full dark, but the shadows beneath the tree canopy hid much. She flew lower to get a closer look.

Her blood froze in her veins at the sight of not one wolf, but at least a dozen, tearing at their prey, which appeared to be a large buck. No, a horse, she realised with deepening horror.

The knight's horse.

The man could not be far away.

As if reading her thought, a tree shuddered violently to her right. Almost as if some large creature had slammed into its trunk, trying to uproot it like the wolf had her perch yesterday.

Something cracked. A moment of silence, before the tree shuddered again. Now she could see something scrambling madly up the tree. A tree with whip-thin branches, that even she would not have climbed, for it would not hold her weight.

The knight fell.

Rosa didn't pause to think whether she'd be able to reach him in time. She had to try.

Offering up a prayer to the gods of the forest that she would survive this stunt, she swooped beneath the branches.