AN: 

Guys! Last night I completed part II! Oh my gosh, it's crazy not to be at the same speed as you all, but all I can say is I am extremely excited for you to learn more about the secrets I am about to uncover. Shit is about to go down in approximately two chapters. 

ALSO: 1K! Reads! How grateful am I to have you guys behind me. Thank you for the love. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. 

PS: You can follow me on Instagram @ authorjunevalentine

The downpour continued over Marjorie's words, casting a darkening gray hue over the surrounding world. It smelled like wet earth. Now, there was a stickiness in the air, which caused her red hair to itch at the roots. Marjorie lifted her foot and discovered rainwater pooling together to form thick puddles of clay mud beneath her boots.

Petyr extended his hatchet out straight, allowing fat droplets to dampen the dried blood on the blade. Then, he wiped it clean on his wet trousers. The fabric, darker because of the rain, hid new smears of red. Perhaps the cold water would wash away the blood before it stained.

"Vivian did this," Petyr accepted Marjorie's words. There was no hesitation in his deep voice. "What does that mean?"

Fenris took two long strides forward, leaving muddy footsteps in his wake. The downpour caused his hair to fall in one, wavy curtain. He looked like he belonged in a storm.

He sidled almost flush against Marjorie, until only a few inches remained between Marjorie's face and his. She wanted to drop her gaze to the ground and stare at the muddied ends of her red cape, suddenly too self-aware of the intensity of his scrutiny. She fought against the reaction, and instead, kept her eyes up to study all his strange beauty. Although his wild gaze appeared young, there was something unmistakably ancient hidden between his lashes.

"It means she isn't who she claims to be," Fenris announced bluntly, leaving no room for questions. His words pushed warm, sweet breath over her cheeks, a harsh contrast against the harsh smell of wet soil.

He thrusted his hand forward and looped it through the handle of her wicker basket, taking it away from her with one, smooth wordless motion. The Wolf tucked it between his forearm and hip, and then swiveled on his feet in the direction of Grandmother's house.

"Who is she then?" Marjorie asked. She found her fingers had slipped into the velvet folds of her cape, searching for any kind of security while Fenris took his sweet time to answer.

His mouth widened with an amused, little smile. It was not one of happiness. There was an unfamiliar, bitter edge to the smooth line of his lips.

"The forest has many enemies," Fenris confessed. He sounded old, older than Marjorie or Petyr—even, she thought, Grandmother. "But Vivian, she is not like the others. She has a broken heart, one that has looked to hatred to heal. For that, it has collapsed on itself, over and over again."

"And for what reason?" Marjorie asked, unable to stop her curiosity.

"Does it matter?" Fenris shook his head. "Who she once was is no longer what she is now. Vivian is no Wardeness, but a witch."

Petyr hissed at his words. "Wait," Petyr stopped trailing behind them, causing a ripple effect for Marjorie and Fenris. A quiet settled between them. The rain sounded harsher now, in the way it does when a storm is steadily becoming more dangerous. Branches of energy crackled through the air, like in the seconds before lightning strikes down to the earth. "Do you mean to tell me I have sent my family to die with a necromancer at the hilt?"

There was the strike.

Marjorie's ears rang at his words. Her village, although well-versed in ostracizing her, did not deserve a premature death.

They did not deserve the same fate as Blanchette.

She turned to look behind her. Blanchette's body was just an unrecognizable mound from this distance. Death was always like that—a distorted illusion until one stood before it, forced to admit the reality of this life: that everyone and everything would eventually be helpless to its whim.

"They will not die," Fenris said. "She took the villagers as a way to punish me."

"To punish you?" Petyr asked. His blue eyes widened with disbelief. "I thought..." he paused, "things like you were on the same side."

Fenris shook his head, the heavy curtain of his hair following the movement. "I have spent the last century trying to kill her," he admitted, no shame present in the confession. "I possess few weaknesses, and those that I do, she can do little about. We have played a good game of wolf and mouse. Granting your Village autonomy is a clever, but admittedly, strange way to get under my skin."

"You expect me to believe the villagers are your weakness?" Petyr asked. There was a harsh laugh at the end of his words.

Fenris's eyes shifted from Marjorie to Petyr, as he did so, his smile stretched into a tight, thin line.

"You know I kill one each year," he said. "And regardless of what you may believe, Petyr," it was the first time he spoke his name, and it dripped in poison, "it is not all in fun."

"Then why must you kill?" Marjorie asked. She moved her hand to his bicep, testing the hard surface with one, questioning squeeze.

He paused. His gaze rushed to where her palm pushed down on warm, wet skin. She wondered how long it had been since someone voluntarily pressed their fingers to him—when he last felt someone who wanted to touch him instead of simply running in the opposite direction.

"These woods need a balance," he whispered. "I am at the will of its needs."

* * *

The three of them carried in silence until they approached Sicily's treehouse. Warm, golden light swelled from within, casting a yellow glimmer through the drawn, silk curtains. The colors reflected off of the muddy ground beneath the home, morphing certain angles into tiny, disappearing rainbows.

Fenris pressed a barefoot against the painted staircase. It whined underneath his weight, causing Marjorie to snap her eyes down from the back of his neck all the way to his ankles.

He was still naked, and completely unbothered by his lack of decency.

"Wait!" Marjorie shouted. She could feel heat pooling in her cheeks. "I apologize but can you—" she shrugged off her long, red hood and thrusted it toward Fenris's hands. "—just please, cover yourself. I am sure the last time my Grandmother saw another bare body was when she last changed my swaddling cloth."

Fenris took the cape with a grateful expression and wrapped it around his broad shoulders. He tied the strings at the neck tight, until his collarbone disappeared from view, and buttoned the two wooden clasps at the abdomen to cover his bottom half.

His dark skin was a welcoming contrast against the vibrancy of the harsh red. Marjorie found herself entranced by the way the heavy fabric swayed over his lithe figure. Although it seemed impossible, he looked even more otherworldly draped in her thick, velvet hood.

"Finally," Petyr growled from where he stood at the door, waiting for them to join him. "You gave the dog a collar."

Marjorie ignored the venom. Instead, she pushed past the Woodsman and pressed her hand on the door, testing to see if it was already unlocked. It swayed underneath the pressure, until the door slowly crawled forward and revealed the den.

Like outside, it was cold. There was no fire save for the few smoldering embers left to die in the firepit. The chalky, dark pebbles released tiny trails of black smoke, but no heat came. Sicily's stew crock remained where Marjorie left it on the tabletop.

She peeked over the rim. The soup was untouched. Without the simmering bubbles, the stagnant orange liquid looked the opposite of appetizing.

Petyr pushed forward. He pressed his palms flush against the rounded walls of the dish.

"It is cold," he said.

A tightness formed in Marjorie's chest. The uncomfortable feeling propelled her forward until she ran through the curtains leading to her Grandmother's bedroom. Instant relief flushed through her at the sight of her Grandmother, sitting up in bed with a knife in her hand and a stick in the other, stripping the wood of rough bark.

"You frightened me," Marjorie rushed out. "You silly old woman."

Sicily looked up to her granddaughter, a thin smile on her pale lips. Like this, pushed against the frame of her bed and hunched inward from deep concentration, her Grandmother looked breakable.

"I don't mean to worry you," Sicily said. Her weak words were nearly inaudible. "Come, sit." She patted at the empty side of her bed.

"Of course." Marjorie cleared the distance between them in two long strides. She went knee first, gingerly sliding underneath the covers in a desperate attempt to keep her Grandmother comfortable.

"Cedar told me you brought company," Sicily said, as if her dead husband stood at the end of the bed, dutifully watching over the old woman.

The Veil is thinning, her Grandmother's words echoed in her head.

"He would be right," Marjorie said, trying to keep her voice calm, despite the chill that crawled through her body like a cold gust of wind.

"Petyr and..." Sicily hesitated. She looked up, not at the painted family tree that hung proudly above her bed, but to something that should be considered eye-level, like a man leaning over her body. "A stranger."

Marjorie nodded along. Somewhere beyond the bedroom, Petyr was stacking dry wood in the firepit and attempting to create sparks by beating two pieces of flint together. The knocking rocks echoed throughout the home, creating a harsh contrast against the raging storm outside.

"He is a new friend," Marjorie confessed. "Fenris," she called out his name, beckoning him to come forward, out from where he hid in the den with Petyr.

Her grandmother smiled at her words and reached a hand to her cheek. At her soft touch, Marjorie found that the pads of finger held no warmth, instead, the same biting coldness of a winter night.

"Grandmother, how cold you are," Marjorie said. She enveloped the woman's hand with her own and brought them to her lips, where she breathed onto the skin. It didn't matter, the temperature of Sicily's fingers never changed. It was as though she were already dead.

"You called?" Fenris appeared from behind the curtains, his sturdy shoulders hidden underneath her cloak. He held a piece of fabric to his hair, drying it with soft pats. Already, curls appeared at the drying ends.

"Grandmother, allow me to introduce you to my friend, Fenris—"

"Come closer, boy," Sicily cut Marjorie off with enough harshness present in her voice to send silence through the room.

Marjorie obeyed, unused to the sternness of her Grandmother's voice, but unwilling to speak out of turn.

Fenris's eyebrows shot up, sharing the same confusion as Marjorie, but still, the Wolf took an obedient step forward. In his right hand, he held her wicker basket, where the Devilhair remained, waiting to be mixed into Sicily's afternoon tea.

"Closer," her Grandmother pressed. She set her stick on her bedside table but kept the whittling knife tight in her grasp.

Fenris shifted his gaze to Marjorie, searching for answers in her. She simply nodded, praying that he would take a step forward.

He moved through the room as if he were crossing a floor to ask a lady for a dance. Each graceful step reminded Marjorie of flickering sprights, who only appeared with the morning fog, matching the curling white haze by swaying their bodies like wisps.

Fenris froze once he hovered over the old woman. He didn't look like he belonged here, forced to fit inside a room made of four walls. It appeared as though he was dragged inside, made to bend to the harsh contours of a home not meant for him.

His shadow swallowed the old woman whole. Marjorie realized, underneath the intensity of his gray eyes, Sicily looked like prey. And Fenris no longer looked human, instead, like a wolf.

Her Grandmother raised four brittle fingers up until they found the heavy fabric of the red cape, a vibrant color against her bruised knuckles. She didn't possess the strength to pull him down to her eye level, but he allowed her to guide him closer, until they were mere inches apart.

As she studied his face, an uncomfortable silence swallowed the room. She searched for something in Fenris.

"I know you," she whispered, so sure that Marjorie did not doubt it.

He hesitated underneath her gaze.

All signs of the wolf were gone. Like this, he resembled a rabbit, cornered in its burrow with snapping jaws blocking its only way out. He looked toward the entrance of her bedroom, as if he imagined himself flying forward and hiding from the harshness of her gaze.

"I had hoped you would forget my face," he admitted.

Sicily dropped her knife. The blade fell against the blanket, suddenly useless. She moved her fingers up, from his chest, to his neck, until finally, it rested on his cheek.

A smile lit up her face.

"You are the Wolf who brought my Marjorie home to me." 

AN:

Lookout for a new update tomorrow morning! Please vote!

Is this all still making sense? Comments and support help me so much, so please, I welcome any and all feedback in hopes of making a better story for you all to enjoy.