By Ella Wong

As Nicola trudged through the thick, crisp snow to the village meat stores, she fingered the knife in her pocket. It had a sharp, steel blade and a handle carved by her mother, Anya—oak, with swirls of silver painted on. At the bottom of it there was a fancy N, for Nicola.

She whispered the chant all the children in the village learned and memorised and were told, forcefully, to heed.

“White is the colour of a blizzard come to take you

Hide, take shelter, and wait for it to subdue.

Grey is the flash of a wolf with bite

Kill it if you happen to catch sight.

Black is the smoke of a fire

If you see it, run—the situation is dire.”

The village was a happy place, nestled in the snow-topped mountains underneath a sky flecked with glittering stars that sparkled like diamonds.

But it was dangerous, too.

A snowstorm or an avalanche could easily kill you, bury you under layers of tightly packed frost and ice until you suffocated, unable to breathe.

Fire spread like blood staining snow, the flames leaping from wooden house to wooden house, its mad cackles drowning the screams of those trapped within.

And wolves—those were the most dangerous. Wild, untameable beasts that bit you and ate you and never, ever let go.

That was what the knife in Nicola’s pocket was for. To kill wolves, not on purpose, but just for self-defense. Every child was taught to wield one from age three.

Nicola reached the meat stores. It was a simple wooden hut, draped in a velvet cape of snow. Icicles gleamed like crystals, hanging from its roof. Suddenly Nicola felt a shiver snake down her spine, an icy finger trailing down her back. She didn’t know why; she’d been to the meat stores loads of times. Instinctively, she drew her scarf tighter around her neck.

Just a hut, she reminded herself shakily. A hut with boxes inside, packed with ice to keep the meat fresh and red. Nothing to worry about.

Drawing a deep breath so cold it stung her lungs, she pushed open the door and nearly screamed.

A wolf snarled at her, black gaze locked on her throat, saliva dripping from its pearly teeth. Nicola couldn’t breathe for fear and awe—the wolf was beautiful, too beautiful for a killer. Dappled smoke-grey fur, artfully tousled, his belly a soft cream trailing red.

Red.

The wolf was bleeding, a ribbon of dark crimson winding its way like a river through his fur and dripping onto the floor, where it lay in splotches of glimmering molten scarlet.

What she’d mistaken for a snarl of menace was a low moan of pain. It stabbed at her heart. How could anyone tell her to harm such a creature?

She slammed the door shut—she couldn’t let anyone else see him. She sank to her knees beside the wolf. He snapped at her, but half-heartedly. As he swayed unsteadily, limping instinctively away from her, she wondered where his pack was.

And then she saw it.

The wound wasn’t jagged or sharp; the edges weren’t rough. This wasn’t something inflicted by an animal or a branch. A thin slit of blood, precise and deliberate, made almost certainly with a knife. It ran all the way from his tail up to his chest, and then broke off abruptly.

She felt anger rise in her throat, thick and sloshing. How could anyone do this? Someone had tried to skin the wolf while he was still alive, and the someone had probably scared off his pack.

Nicola fished the knife from her pocket—at the sight the wolf let out a yelp and skittered backwards, cringing—she put it down.

“I’m unarmed,” she said. “I mean you no harm.”

Slowly she advanced, the wolf backing away until he hit the wall with a soft thud and fell to the floor, whimpering in agony. He scrambled up frantically as Nicola approached, baring his teeth.

Nicola felt a pang in her heart. The wolf needed help. But he wouldn’t willingly accept it. In his eyes she saw fear and confusion clouding his mind. He didn’t know what to do or where to turn. He wouldn’t let a human near him.

If Nicola was to help him, she’d have to somehow gain his trust. She opened one of the boxes of meat and laid out three strips of elk flesh before him.

“Go on,” she said softly.

The wolf bent down and gave it a tentative sniff, then a lick, before he gobbled it down. Nicola crept beside him as he ate, emitting low growls of satisfaction as he gorged himself upon the meat.

She looked around the meat stores and saw a clump of dull green moss growing in a corner. Sphagnum moss. She broke off a piece. Unwinding her scarf slowly, she tucked the moss into its folds. Sphagnum moss could help prevent bacterial infections at a wound, and help it heal faster.

Nicola bent down and wrapped the scarf around his belly once, twice, thrice, watching him carefully, before slowly winding it round and round him, farther and farther back near his tail, and then binding the makeshift bandage in place with a knot.

He didn’t snap, just glanced at her from the corner of his eyes. Nicola tried not to think of the teeth inches from her neck. One quick twist of his head, a gurgle of blood, and she would be done for.

When she was finished the wolf was too. He glanced up at her, sated and grateful, and she noticed the markings around his golden, mist-deep eyes: swirls of dark, stormy grey.

Silently she opened the door and he slipped out.

As he left, padding through the snow, his paws breaking crackling frost, she hefted meat into her arms to carry home. Her mother would ask what had taken her so long, and she’d say she’d stopped to help someone who’d been hurt.

To quench the guilt writhing inside her, she thought to herself, over and over: it’s true. Just not the whole truth.

Every day after that for a week, Nicola left meat half-buried in the snow outside the meat stores. It was enough for a wolf to track the scent. She left it for the wolf she’d met, because she knew he probably couldn’t hunt with his wound.

When she came back the next morning, every morning, the meat was always gone.

She hoped another wolf hadn’t taken it.

One morning she found something else: her scarf, a patch of flaky brown staining the middle. She turned it over in her hands, the dried blood making it stiff. The wolf was fine now, she thought.

Just in case she laid out meat as she had before.

This time, no one took it.

—--

“I’m just going to get more wood,” she said to Anya as she stood up, beaming proudly at her handiwork.

Nicola had been working on a project for ages now; making a new chess set because her old one had lost several pawns and a rook.

She’d finished carving all sixteen pieces of the black side on her chess board. They had rough edges and uneven sides and the tar-like paint had dried while it was dripping down their sides, but Nicola was infinitely proud of it.

Now she just had to make the white side.

“Okay.” Anya said. “Just go to the log house, then. Don’t stray off the path.”

“I won’t.” Nicola promised, grabbing her jacket on her way out. She didn’t notice her knife tumble out of its pocket.

If Anya had known how wrong things were going to go, how far from the path Nicola would stray, she never would have let Nicola out. But she didn’t know, and the girl was left to her fate.

Nicola saw the flowers in the woods next to the log house—a house made of logs in which they stored all their logs. It was a very appropriate name.

The flowers were bright and colourful and a rich, sapphire blue with a piercing yellow heart in the middle.

She’d lived here all her life and yet she’d never seen them before. Curious, Nicola wandered closer and suddenly someone lunged at her from behind a tree trunk, throwing her into a sack.

Thrashing and yelling she fought to get out, but she could tell from the bouncing of the sack that they were getting farther and farther away from the village, deeper and deeper into the woods.

It was no use. Even as she struggled she knew she would never get free.

When she was let out of the sack Nicola tumbled into the snow and immediately sprang up, ready to fight. Reaching for her knife, she realised it wasn’t there.

Instead she faced her kidnapper: a man with a bushy beard, red and orange like dazzling flames.

His eyes were darkest black. Instantly Nicola knew he was danger—

Black is the smoke of a fire

If you see it, run—the situation is dire.

“Hello, little girl.” he leered. “What’s your name?”

“Not telling.” she replied, trying to channel all her courage into those two words. The man towered over her, smiling frighteningly.

“It doesn’t matter, girl. Right now my men are demanding skins and food from your village in return for your safe return. We’ll get the supplies, but unfortunately…they won’t get you back.”

“Oh? Are you so certain?” she cocked her head, wondering if she looked confident or not.

Suddenly a rumble shook the air, deep and growling, a snarl that made the earth tremble under their feet.

“What was that?” the man asked, backing away, fear etched onto his face. His eyes locked onto Nicola’s.

She swallowed. “The Spirit of the Ice,” she lied. “It’s coming to protect me.”

But she knew it wasn’t true. Dread sank into her flesh, chilling her bones as the sound came nearer and nearer. Snow swelled above them, an enormous cloud of white and blue, engulfing trees and sky and blocking out all the sunlight.

“Told you.” she said airily, standing her ground.

The man whimpered, turned, and ran down the slope.

Nicola was safe from him now. But she wasn’t safe from the avalanche barreling towards her. She turned to run but her feet were shaking, frozen in place by sheer terror, numb with the cold that hadn’t really bothered her moments before.

The avalanche gained speed, coming nearer and nearer and nearer—

Something grey pounced upon her, eyes flashing molten gold.

The wolf she’d bandaged. She recognised the swirls around his eyes.

She was struck speechless as he lifted her off her feet, threw her onto his back, and then sped down the mountain faster than she could possibly have run, the avalanche snapping at their heels.

He veered left and right, dodging the trees the snow effortlessly devoured, everything a blur to Nicola as they ran past.

Eventually she realised they weren’t alone. A whole pack of wolves ran alongside them, and with a jolt Nicola realised they were listening to the wolf-with-the-swirly-marking’s orders.

He was the leader of the pack.

She felt honoured and terrified and dazed, as if this whole thing were just a nightmare. She decided her saviour needed a name and a glance at the colour of his dark fur gave her a flash of inspiration. She would call him Storm.

“How do you know the way home?” she whooped, as her village came into view, a speck in the distance.

The rumble was quieting down. The avalanche was losing speed.

When they skidded to a stop outside Nicola’s village it had stopped altogether. But the sight that greeted them was so terrible she gasped.

Men were ransacking her village, led by the man with the red beard. He was barking orders as the intruders bustled everywhere, taking knives and meat and jackets, bundling precious firewood onto their horses. The poor horses grunted, struggling under the weight of meat and wood and jewelry that clinked and scratched against their skin, their skinny legs buckling with malnutrition.

Storm announced their arrival with a deep, dangerous snarl.

Everyone turned towards them, gasping at the sight of Nicola riding a creature they all knew to be vicious and bloodthirsty.

“Out of my village now,” she declared. “Or I’ll set the wolves upon you—and not to mention the Spirit of the Ice.”

The villagers looked at her, puzzled, but the red-bearded man turned pale.

“Retreat!” he bellowed, but as they stampeded onto their horses Nicola said, “And I’d like everything you pilfered back, please.”

The men could’t unload their horses fast enough, and soon they were smudges on the horizon, and then not even that. The setting sun erased all traces of them with its melty red glow.

As soon as they were gone Anya threw her arms around Nicola and they played chess with their neighbour’s set all night long, sipping cups of hot chocolate and watching the moon fall back under the mountains.

It was a perfect night.

The next morning there was no sign of Storm and his pack, not even pawprints in the snow. But Nicola knew they’d always be somewhere out there, even if she couldn’t see them.