Chapter 24 By My Side
~ Three weeks ago ~
Seri
The early spring sun was warm on my back, but the soil beneath my fingers felt wrong.
Worn and lifeless, like it had forgotten how to breathe.
I knelt in the middle of the vegetable garden, my hands sinking into the dirt.
It used to be so different. Papa would hum as he worked, his big, calloused hands moving with a magic that made everything grow.
He’d kneel, suspenders slipping off his bony shoulders, and sing to the seedlings until they stretched toward his voice.
The tomatoes were always plump and red, the carrots straight and sweet, and the air smelled like green things thriving.
Now, the rows were patchy. All the early spring crops I’d planted last week were struggling despite the sun and water and love I was giving them. I laid one side of my face against the furrow, listening for the heartbeat of the land Papa swore lived beneath us. Only silence answered.
“Come on,” I whispered, brushing my fingers over the leaves of a tiny kale plant. “You can do it. Just try, okay? Please?”
The kale didn’t answer, of course. It just sat there, unimpressed by my pleading. I sighed, sitting back on my heels and wiping my forehead with the back of my hand. My hair had escaped its braid, and a few stubborn curls stuck to my damp skin. I could almost hear Papa’s voice, teasing me.
“Seri, you’re fussing again. Plants don’t need fussing. They need patience.”
I wasn’t sure I had any of that left. Not when Arabesque’s shadow fell over everything, turning the homestead into something cold and unrecognizable. I didn’t know how much longer I could keep pretending everything would be okay.
That I was okay.
Reviving the garden wasn’t just about the vegetables; it was about reclaiming my home, about finding a way to escape Arabesque and her daughters.
I glanced over my shoulder at the house, its windows dark and uninviting.
They were probably inside, scheming or lounging or doing whatever it was they did when they weren’t making my life harder.
Josslyn was safe for now, tucked away in her room, the baby monitor clipped to my waistband, and Brumous was napping in the shade of the old oak tree right next to me.
At least they’re okay. That’s something.
My hands moved faster, pulling weeds and loosening the soil. I poured water from the can, watching it soak into the ground like a promise. Maybe if I tried hard enough, if I poured enough of myself into this little patch of earth, it would remember what it was meant to do.
“I’m not giving up,” I muttered, more to myself than the plants.
Brumous stirred under the tree, his blue eyes blinking open. He padded over, his paws leaving prints in the dirt. He tilted his head as if to say, Plants sad.
“Yeah,” I admitted, brushing a hand over his fur. “But we’ll fix them.”
He nuzzled my hand, his presence always a comfort. I leaned into it for a moment, letting myself breathe. A beetle scurried by, its iridescent shell catching the light before he snapped it up.
“A little extra protein, huh?” I smiled as I petted his ruff.
The garden might be struggling, but it wasn’t gone. Not yet.
And neither was I.
My gaze drifted to the empty chicken coop, its door hanging crookedly on broken hinges. The silence there hurt my heart. No clucking, no scratching, no flurry of feathers. Just emptiness.
My eyes traced over the splintered wood where claws had ripped through.
The memory of that night still clawed at me.
The guttural growls, the snapping of bones, the helpless cries of my poor hens.
I’d hidden in the pantry, clutching Brumous to my chest, his skinny body trembling against mine.
When it was over, all that remained were bloodied feathers.
Eggs had been my lifeline, a way to stretch my meager rations for both of us. Now, with the chickens gone, I didn’t know how much longer I could keep my good boy fed.
Sure enough, he was looking over at the coop, too, as if trying to figure out why we weren’t gathering ‘his’ eggs. I could almost hear him murmuring about being hungry as his ears drooped and he pawed at the ground.
“Keep the beast fed from your own allotment, or I’ll skin him for a hearth rug,” Arabesque had said when I’d begged to keep him rather than see her kill him. Shocked that she was giving in, I didn’t even hesitate to agree.
“I’ll give you all of my dinner tonight, Brummy,” I promised even as my own stomach growled.
Speaking of dinner, the slanting sunbeams told me I needed to hurry inside to clean up and begin preparing something for Arabesque and her twin horrors. With a deep breath, I stood, brushing the soil from my hands as Brumous watched me.
Seri sad, said his bright blue eyes.
I didn’t deny it. How could I?
“Come on, Brummy,” I called quietly. “Let’s go.”
He trotted to my side, pressing his warm body against my leg. He was growing taller, but no heavier, and I knew that wasn’t good. I had to find another source of food for him.
As we walked back toward the house, I stared at the back porch where Papa had once smoked his pipe as Mama watched fireflies stitch the dusk with gold. Then my eyes flicked up to Josslyn’s nursery, the curtain drawn tight. My baby half-sister hadn’t cried once since the wolves came.
Hadn’t made a sound at all as they howled in the night.
Crows circling the compost heap cawed at us, and Brumous’ tail twitched once. He’d tried to catch one last week, but had been frightened into retreat by the rest of the murder screaming at him.
Watching him now, a new plan formed in my mind. He might be too afraid to hunt, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t. Survival came before game wardens. I could set a few snares, just big enough to catch rabbits or squirrels, not werewolf paws.
I was already foraging as much as I could.
Ramps, fiddleheads, nettles, field garlic, trout lily roots, chickweed, gorse, hawthorn, meadowsweet.
Anything edible. Soon the morels would be ready, and that would be a huge improvement in my diet.
Brumous couldn’t eat mushrooms, of course, but they would feed me, which meant I could give him most of my rations.
“Would you like a tasty bun-bun for lunch tomorrow, Brummy?” I asked absently as I tried to remember where the snares were stored. “The wolves ate or scared off all the big game, but I still see lots of bunnies and squirrels around. We might get lucky!”
He gave me a little yip of excitement, and I grinned, hoping this new plan might just work.
#
The next morning, as the sun was just peeking over the treetops, I walked back to the house, following a dirt path through the woods.
My hand stung from where I’d over-tightened one of the rabbit snares and it snapped back on me, and I absently shook it out as Brumous looked up and wagged his fluffy tail.
We were halfway to the house when I heard it, a low, guttural voice that sent a shiver down my spine. It wasn’t the kind of voice you wanted to hear alone in the forest with only a skittish pup. My steps faltered, and I froze, ears straining. Brumous stopped too, his ears perked, his body tense.
There, just beyond a stand of pines, stood Arabesque. Her black hair cascaded down her back like a waterfall of ink, and her pale green eyes glinted with an unnatural light.
Beside her was a man. No, not just a man, his broad shoulders and thick arms marking him as something far more dangerous. His face was hard, all sharp angles and cold, unyielding eyes. A white line ran across his throat as if he’d survived a hanging.
“The crown will be ours soon, Claudio.” Arabesque’s voice was as smooth as a snake coiling around its prey. “But we must tread carefully. The king is not to be underestimated.”
My breath caught in my throat as I tried to piece together the fragments of their conversation. Which crown did she mean? And why was she conspiring with a rogue werewolf?
“We will handle the king,” Claudio growled, a burr of wolf bass in his voice. “You just make sure your end of the deal holds up. I’m not risking my neck for nothing.”
“Oh, Claudio, have I ever let you down?”
He didn’t answer, but the look in his eyes said enough. Obviously, trust wasn’t something either of them gave easily or at all.
“Brumous,” I leaned closer to breathe in his ear. “Go to the house and guard Josslyn, okay? Stay with her until I get there.”
Pulling back, I met his eyes, saw the struggle, and knew he didn’t want to leave me.
But he would, because I’d asked him to guard our baby.
Without a sound, he stood and took off, his furry body low to the ground as he ran for the house and the doggy entrance I’d cobbled together for him in the back door.
I crouched low behind the thick stand of evergreens, my heart pounding so loudly that I was afraid they could hear it.
Every instinct screamed at me to run, to get as far away from them as possible, but I couldn’t.
Something told me I needed to listen. Arabesque’s voice dropped lower, and I leaned forward, straining to catch every word.
“Once the crown is mine, no one will be able to stop us,” she said. “Even now, I’m eroding the foundations of the other throne. Soon, both kingdoms will fall into our hands like sheep.”
Claudio’s jaw tightened, and he nodded once, a grim determination etched into his features. Then the wind shifted. His head tilted, and my stomach turned to ice as his nostrils flared.
“Speaking of sheep, one of yours has grown too curious for her own good.”
Arabesque whirled. For a heartbeat, I prayed the pines might swallow me whole.
Then those poison-green eyes locked onto mine.
For a moment, the world stopped. The faint rustle of leaves and the distant chirp of birds all faded into nothingness.
All that remained was her gaze, cold and unyielding, and the slow, cruel curve of her lips.
I was doomed.
“Darling Serafina.” Arabesque’s smile showed too many teeth. “Enjoying yourself, I trust?”