For the Wolf by Hannah Whitten (freda ebook reader .txt) 📕

she loathed the softness with which he said her sister’s name, she believed him. Believed that he wouldn’t hurt her, that he’d protect her, in his own twisted way.

And Red would know if Neve was dead.

Her head hung low. Red released one more wrenching sob. Then she turned and ran toward the Wilderwood.

Chapter Thirty

R ed smacked the stolen horse’s flank, sending it running back toward the village. She doubted he’d make it all the way back to the capital— he was a fine thing, and whoever found him bridle-less and wandering could probably use him more than some drunk lord could.

The forest in her bones had guided her through the city, invisible as any urchin in her bare feet and bloody dress. Pain still splintered through her limbs, but it was manageable, and lessened as she moved northward. The horse she stole from a tavern’s hitching post, his rope carelessly tied. Riding under the deep-blue cover of sky and stars reminded her of sixteen and Neve, and she wept into his mane.

The Wilderwood was different. When she’d left— yesterday, only yesterday— it’d looked like the dead of winter, branches gnarled and bare, leaves gray on the ground. Now glimmers of autumn shone gold and ocher, seasons moving in reverse. In her chest, roots reached, stretching through the gaps in her ribs like she was water and air and sun.

It ached when Red turned toward Valleyda, pulling at the roots as they grew, but she did it anyway. She stood on the slight hill just before the forest’s edge, the crossroads of two homes that were never content to share her.

Her eyes closed, tear tracks drying on her cheeks. Maybe if she stood here long enough, right at the edge of her world, Neve might sense her. Maybe Red could will her reasoning into the earth, weave some kind of understanding into the air her twin would eventually breathe.

“I love you.” An echo of the first time she’d disappeared between these same trees. Neve’s promise that day had come true— they’d seen each other again. Red hadn’t made a promise, not out loud, but this felt like it coming true, anyway. Her place had always been the forest.

One more deep breath of outside air, then Red slipped into the Wilderwood.

Trees stretched tall, branches spread in fanfare. The moss made a carpet for her bare feet. The sentinels speared up from the ground, tall and proud with no trace of rot around their roots.

A trick of the light made it almost look like they bowed.

The forest inside her stung as it grew, as it anchored. Above her, the sky faded from lavender to plum, and Red’s breath hitched in her chest.

The Wilderwood soothed in a voice of rustling leaves. A vine grazed along the ridge of her shoulders in comfort.

“Red?”

Lyra picked through the forest deft as a fawn. “I thought you said three days?” There was something stricken in her voice, her manner.

“I got homesick,” Red whispered.

Golden leaves crunched beneath Lyra’s feet as she approached, brows drawn into a question she already knew the answer to. Tentatively, she laid her hand on Red’s arm. Static rent the air, a sharp crackle like the atmosphere before a thunderstorm, and Lyra hissed as she pulled her hand back, dark eyes wide.

“Oh,” she breathed, understanding distilled into one syllable. Red’s knees felt weak. “I figured it out.”

Everything chased her, everything catching up. Adrenaline spiked in her middle, memories of Arick and twisted sentinels, Kiri’s knife, Solmir’s face. And Neve, Neve beyond her saving. Spots swam in her vision. “Where’s Eammon?”

Lyra’s face was unreadable. “Waiting for you.” She eyed Red’s hands, one sliced and bloody, the other clearly broken. “Those need to be seen to. Come on.”

Red followed Lyra silently through the trees. It made a path for her, the Wilderwood, retracting roots and thorns. A fall of leaves fluttered to the ground.

One lighted in Lyra’s curls. She plucked it out, turned it over in her hands. “Kings,” she murmured, something awed in her voice. “It wasn’t like this before. Even with . . . with the others.”

“The others didn’t have a choice.” Red reached out with her cut hand and touched the bark of a sentinel as she passed. It was warm beneath her palm, soothing on the slices. “I did. Eammon made sure I did.”

Lyra nodded. She opened her hand. The leaf fluttered to the ground.

When they reached the gate, he was waiting. He opened it before they reached the iron, running across the forest floor, eyes wide and mouth set and arms warm as they wrapped around her, tight enough to pick her up off the ground.

Eammon’s fingers shook as he pushed her hair away from her face, traced her jaw. Red rested her forehead against his chest. Warmth bloomed, the forest in him welcoming the forest in her, a missing piece fitted into place.

“What did you do, Red?” Horror laced Eammon’s voice, and when she looked into his eyes, it lived there, too. He pressed his forehead against hers, swallowing hard. “What did you do?”

Fife brought food and wine, but didn’t linger, movements small and eyes unreadable. His voice met Lyra’s when he climbed back down the stairs, murmuring low and indistinct.

Eammon sat at the foot of the bed, features shadowed by the blazing fire behind them. Red’s hands rested gingerly on her knees, one sliced and scabbed, the other broken. After taking the roots, the pain of them had been nearly forgotten, but now it was a struggle to keep her breathing even.

“They hurt you.” Eammon looked at her injuries like he was cataloging each one, debts requiring restitution.

The forest in her chest rustled. “I’m here now. I’ll be fine.”

“You aren’t fine.” His eyes stayed on her hand, like he could intimidate it into healing, but the vehemence in his voice made it clear he was talking about more than broken bones and dagger cuts.

She touched his wrist, leaving a smear of her blood.