Page 51 of Great Falls Cadet
“Arisha—?”
“Shh.” She seems unwilling—or unable—to move a muscle, even to turn her head in my direction. Dressed in nothing but smallclothes—a white chest wrap and undershorts—with her uniform grays folded neatly on the bed, the girl seems to have been in the middle of changing for dinner when…
When what?
Dropping the books to the floor, I survey the room…and see nothing. With the smell of Arisha’s fear so thick, I can sense little else on that front as well.
“Behind you,” Arisha whispers, still not moving a muscle. Her blue eyes are wide, her chest rising with shallow rapid breaths. “Under the bed. Move very, very slowly or it will—” She gasps as a low growl fills the room. “It doesn’t like movement.”
My back tightens, my body shifting protectively between Arisha and the bed as I glance around for a weapon. “What isit?” I ask in a voice too calm to be mine.
“I don’t know.” She swallows. “But it has teeth. And yellow eyes. And…a tail. Gray.”
Eyes, teeth, tail. A feather of disbelief runs down my spine.Turning around, I narrow my eyes into the under-bed darkness.
“Grrrrr.” The darkness replies in a lupine whine I know too well.
8
Lera
My eyes widen, my heart stuttering for a beat before leaving my chest. The instinctive unbearable longing to throw my arms around Shade’s warm neck flashes through my soul, stopping short against a cold kind of terror. Arisha already thinks something is wrong with me. How do I explain a bloody wolf in our room? If she makes an accusation… If Arisha makes an accusation, it won’t be just my head in the noose. River will have the whole guard searching for Shade’s wolf. And if he keeps being this reckless, eventually they’ll find him.
Think,I order myself, drawing a covert breath.Think, think, think.
Facts race through my mind, shifting like rules in a mathematics formula. Shade is under my bed. No, Shade’swolfis under my bed. Arisha has seen the animal, and I can’t make her unsee him.
“That’s my dog,” I blurt to fill the pounding silence. “Ruffle. I didn’t think he’d follow me all the way from Osprey. I’m so sorry he scared you, Arisha.”
The girl points a trembling finger at my bed. “That thing isn’t a dog.”
“I mean, he’s tame.Likea dog.” I need to do better. How does one make a humongous wolf seem harmless? Grabbing a pitcher of water from the small hanging shelf in the room, I head for Shade’s hiding spot. “Look. I’ll show you.”
Before I can reconsider the wisdom of what I’m about to do, I swing the pitcher, emptying the cold liquid into the growling darkness.
Arisha’s high-pitched screech hurts my ears, the noise mercifully stopping a heartbeat later when a large yellow-eyed wolf belly-crawls from beneath my bed and shakes himself off, hundreds of tiny droplets flying at both me and my bedding.
Shade’s wolf tilts his head as if finding the concept of a talking girl to be fascinatingly curious, his black muzzle opening into a gentle, easy-to-please pant. Then, with great lumbering laziness, the beast arches his back down, indulging in an extended stretch.
Arisha whimpers.
“See? He’s friendly.” The words tumble from my mouth and I beg the stars to make them true. The amulet around my neck remains cool, spinning no veil to explain Shade’s appearance. A wolf belongs in the mortal world, after all. Even if he’ll be hunted. My voice turns desperate. “Please. Just let me introduce you. He won’t hurt you. Won’t hurt anyone. But I don’t know what Masters River and Sage might do if they find him.”
“Wait.” Arisha closes her eyes and draws several deep breaths, her strained breathing filling the silence. When she opens them again, her shoulders are set in a fair imitation of bravery, though her hands wring each other until they’re bone white. “Is it… Stars. I can’t.” She shakes her head. “I shouldn’t say—”
On the other side of the room, Shade is now circling in place, his wet nose chasing a slowly moving tail. When Arisha takes a step, however, the wolf snaps his teeth, and she cowers back against the wall. I swallow a curse. Shade’s wolf scents my fear and, with no one else in the room, has concluded Arisha to be its source.
“Stop that,” I snap at Shade. Turning back to Arisha, I hold out my hands placatingly. “What were you going to say?”
“Is that your f-familiar?” Arisha says quickly.
“A familiar?” I blink in bewilderment. “Like…in children’s tales about witches?”
She nods, her face reddening.
“I’m not a witch.” I clear my throat, not sure how to react. “Witches aren’t actually real. I mean, so far as I know.” In Arisha’s defense, witches figure in human tales and legends as much as fae, the difference being that the latter aren’t fiction.
“No. Of course not. I know that,” Arisha says quickly, then cringes at her own words. “I mean, I’m not gullible—I just didn’t want to assume things.”
