She spun, her red cloak whirling.
The shadows were deep enough that her eyes couldn’t penetrate them. She strained her vision into the dimness.
Nothing.
“Don’t be afraid,” said a voice.
Rosa jumped and stumbled backward.
An enormous wolf emerged out of the bushes, his gray fur so long and thick it looked like armor. His yellow eyes focused on her, calm and intelligent.
Rosa stopped her feet and straightened her spine. She was not going to be her mother.
“Hello, sir,” Rosa said to the wolf, very politely.
“Hello.” The wolf stopped a few paces from her. It was so big. Rosa’s heart thumped against her ribs. It’s not going to eat you. It—he—he’s a grundwirgen. He’s not a wild animal. He won’t attack.
Don’t be your mother.
“I’m new to these parts,” the wolf said. His voice was very deep, and with an odd overpronunciation on some words. Different mouth, Rosa supposed. A mouth so full of long, white fangs and a long, pink tongue. “I wondered if you could direct me into town.”
Rosa let out a quick breath of relief before she could stop herself. Don’t be your mother. He only wants directions. A gentleman.
“Go back that way,” Rosa instructed him, pointing back the way she had come. “When the path opens up from the forest into a meadow, go right. There’s a fence. Go down the fence…”
The more Rosa spoke, the more mixed up her directions felt—she was used to running fleet-footed through the forest, not describing which tree marked the fork in the path where you had to turn left because turning right brought you up to the top of the mountain which would take you two days to climb so you definitely didn’t want to turn right unless you wanted to spend two days climbing a mountain …
The wolf had sat down on his haunches, his large, fluffy tail lying upon the leaves, and he stared at her unblinkingly as she recited. It was unnerving. Don’t be your mother; grundwirgen interact differently, that’s all, Rosa reminded herself, but she kept getting confused, needing to backtrack, until her descriptions muddled themselves still more.
“Thank you,” the wolf said, when she faltered into silence, not sure she had been helpful at all. “You are a very kind little girl. Very kind. Where are you off to tonight?”
“My grandmother’s,” Rosa answered politely.
“Oh! Does she live around here?”
“Only a little ways in that direction,” Rosa said, pointing.
“I did not know this part of the woods housed many people.”
“Not many,” Rosa said. “We have some neighbors, but they’re not near. It’s nicer out here than in town. More space.” Town was too dirty, Rosa’s grandmother always said. Dirty and loud and full of rude people. Abuelita preferred to be able to step out onto the hunting trails and breathe in the nature of the woods. “It’s quieter here. No one to be nosy, my grandmother says.”
The wolf dipped his head. “Thank you, little girl. You’ve been most helpful.”
“You’re welcome,” Rosa said. Her chest puffed a little in pride. She was not her mother. She’d just had a perfectly polite conversation with a very nice wolf. She was a good person.
The wolf uncurled himself and turned on silent paws to pad back through the forest the way Rosa had come. She watched him disappear into the shadows. He seemed to veer off the path at the last minute, just before she lost sight of him, and Rosa’s heart twisted in anxiety that she had misdirected him. She hadn’t been very clear.
Hopefully he wouldn’t become lost again. And if he did, hopefully he would know she hadn’t done it on purpose, that she’d tried her level best to tell him the way to go, that she wasn’t like her mother …
It was dark enough now that it was becoming hard to see. Rosa shook herself and started back on the path to her grandmother’s, her feet moving a little faster. A chill wind had picked up now, and Rosa pulled the red hood of the cloak up and tugged it close, drawing the edges tight.
She was a good person. A good person. Not like her mother at all.
Rosa quickened her pace. By the time she spotted the golden windows of the cottage beckoning her in, the trees were mere black-on-black outlines around her.
The cottage door was ajar. A narrow slice of light slashed the darkness.
That was odd.
Rosa pushed at it. “Abuelita?”
“Come in, little girl,” said a voice.
The voice was pitched high and feminine like it meant to be her grandmother’s, but it was wrong, different, too far off and with an odd overpronunciation swallowing the edges of the words.
Rosa could have run. She should have run.
She burst into the cottage. “Abuelita!”
The wolf sat on the floor by the fire. He looked up at her with those yellow eyes and licked scarlet off his fangs. Then he leapt.
He was so fast. Rosa threw the basket at his face and sprinted—but not back out, she dashed sideways, toward the door to her grandmother’s bedroom. She hardly knew what she was doing. “Abuelita!” she screamed, the cry tearing out incoherent. “Abuelita!”
The wolf landed on silent paws and his haunches bunched as he leapt at her again, a growl in his throat, that gray fur rising on his back in a spiky peak.
Rosa couldn’t make it to the far wall. She skidded around against the hearth. A pot bubbled there, unwatched—the dinner her abuelita had been making. The fire tongs had fallen, dropped, halfway in the embers. Rosa grabbed the end, ignoring the searing pain in her hands, and whipped around, the red cloak blossoming around her. She brandished the tongs—the other end was cherry-hot, glowing and warping the air. “Get away from us!” she shrieked. “Get away!”
The wolf snapped at her and then lurched back, snarling, the smell of singed fur sharp in the small space. Rosa scrambled backward against the wall—the tongs were cooling, the other end dimming to a grayish orange. She groped a hand out against the wood, looking for another weapon, for anything to defend herself with.
The wall was wet with droplets of red.
Rosa’s hands stung, pain shooting up her arms as her blistered fingers slipped. The wolf paced close, his monstrous coat of fur standing up so tall on his back that it made his silhouette into a horrifying demon. His lips pulled back from a white-and-red mouth, his yellow eyes fixed on her. Near enough that her face felt the hot reek of his breath.
The tongs were almost cool.
Her grandmother’s hunting rifle. It was in the chest in the corner—if Rosa could get there. She backed toward it as fast as she dared, waving the tongs wildly before her. The wolf waited, his tail twitching from side to side, waiting for her weapon to stop being a weapon so he could finish his meal.
“Why are you doing this?” Rosa wasn’t sure why she said it. Or how. Her mouth barely managed the shape of words.
“Wild animals have to eat,” responded the grundwirgen, licking his muzzle.
“But you’re not a wild animal! You’re not—you’re not!” The grundwirgen were just like people, just like people, just like—
“How we are treated is what we become. You will learn, little girl. When you humans want me to be feral so badly, it is the easiest thing in the world to satisfy you.” The edges of his mouth drew back farther. Whether he meant it as a terrifying smile or a threat didn’t matter. His teeth were enormous, curved, and very sharp.