Crow didn’t pass as comfortable a night as his friends had. There was no roaring fire or soft blankets to warm him, nor was there another person there to offer him any comfort. Just the small fire next to him, and even it was dying out now. His night was spent much the same as the last several had been; restless and lonely, only now there wasn’t even the voices and laughter of the other men to break the still around him. Just the whistling of wind. He shivered a little as he stared up at the stars – or at least what few of them he could see through the ceiling of tree branches above him. Autumn had come and winter would follow soon, long before he was ready for it. On top of trying the impossible task of hunting down not only a Wyvern, but a very specific Wyvern, Crow had to find a way to survive here. There was a large part of him that wanted to ignore all of that and find the beast, get its head, and run before winter even started, but he knew that it wasn’t possible. He had to try everything he could do to live long enough to complete his quest and get back to Snow, even if it meant taking longer than he’d hoped.

That is, if he could do it all.

Crow had known from the beginning this was a suicide mission. A tiny, shameful, thought crept into his head and it advised him to listen to what Snow had said and just leave and never come back. No. He purged that thought from his head the moment it entered. That was never going to be an option.

He huffed a sigh. At least he couldn’t see his breath… yet. But he blinked and saw something else out in the tree line. Something worse.

He was staring into a pair of yellow eyes.

Crow flew to his feet and grabbed his axe in one fluid motion. He couldn’t tell exactly what was out there but this was the Wildlands; chances were good it wasn’t going to be friendly.

He flipped the axe over in his hand, never breaking eye contact. “Come on,” he murmured. “Let’s get this over with.”

There was no way he was going to die, not yet. Not on his first night here. But if fate decided she wasn’t done twisting him in cruel hands, determined to squeeze out what little life and joy was still in him, then at least he wouldn’t let it end without a fight.

He didn’t have to wait long. Crow barely registered the giant beast as being a wolf as it lunged out of the trees and towards him, its teeth curled in a wicked snarl. He side-stepped it and swung, hoping to use the wolf’s momentum against it but it dodged him with more grace than he’d expected. A quiet curse escaped his lips. An axe. He had to fight a wolf with an axe. He’d been so wrapped up in his own internal problems that he hadn’t even thought about the fact that the Master didn’t bother to give him any better weapons; no bow, no arrows, not even a spear. The only other weapon he had was a hunting knife, more suited for skinning than killing and certainly less helpful than the axe. If this wolf fight was nearly impossible, how would he ever kill a Wyvern?

They circled each other. Wary. Crow knew he wasn’t only disadvantaged by his weapon; the only light he had was the little fire near his bedroll and he was sure he couldn’t see near as well as the beast. But by the small amount of light it offered, he could see the wolf was not as big as he had thought. It was thin, too thin, and covered in scars. A wolf with no pack desperately hungry enough to attack some foolish human that walked into the Wildlands. Crow would’ve almost felt sorry for it if it wasn’t standing between him and survival.

They moved at the same time and as Crow ran for the fire, kicking burning embers onto the fur of the wolf, he felt claws dig through cloth and flesh and let out a growl of irritation. The wolf growled too and shook the embers from its fur. Crow cursed again. He’d hoped to catch the beast in the face with the embers but he hadn’t been fast enough. Fine. If he couldn’t be faster than it, or stronger, he’d just have to be smarter. Without taking his eyes off of the wolf, he reached for the rope that hung by his side and unwound it slightly as they continued to walk that slow circle around the small clearing Crow had chosen for his camp.

This time, Crow moved before the wolf and made first for the beast’s head, changing his direction at the last moment. He tried to ignore the sound of mighty jaws snapping together just above his head, tried to ignore the hot and foul breath on his face. He simply wrapped the rope clumsily around one of the beast’s paws and pulled as hard as he could.

It fell.

Crow was on it before it could recover, hacking repeatedly at its neck. He ignored it as it writhed frantically below him, ignored its cries of pain, ignored the warm blood seeping onto his hands and through his clothing. He just hacked and hacked until it finally let out a last whimper and stopped moving.

For several moments, he didn’t move. He just sat there on top of the wolf, breathing hard, his axe still embedded into its neck as the blood seeped into the ground all around them. At last, though, pain, shock, and exhaustion all hit him at the same time and he half-crawled half-collapsed off of the beast. He’d forgotten it had injured him. Wincing, he put his hand to his side but his hands were already so covered in wolf blood that he couldn’t tell how much he was bleeding and even with the light what was left of the fire, he couldn’t see how bad it was. Unburying his axe from the wolf, he wiped it off clumsily on his coat before shoving it into his belt and then used his hunting knife to cut a strip of cloth from his shirt and bind it around the wound. It was too dark to do anything now, and he was to tired. It would have to wait. Crow got to his feet and stumbled to his bedroll and was asleep as soon as he hit it, knife still in hand.

It was fortunate that nothing else decided to come that night. He would not have had the strength to fight again.

—------------

Crow awoke the next morning to an ache in his side. Instinctively his hand went for where he had wrapped the wound as he blinked away the fog of sleep, trying to recall all the details of what had happened the night before. The memories came back to him quickly as he turned and saw the corpse of the wolf lying not far across the clearing. The fire had gone out.

Wincing, Crow rose to his feet with a soft groan and pulled away the strip of cloth. He had to twist a little to see the claw marks but after a brief inspection he realized they weren’t as deep as he’d thought, though the gashes were long enough to stretch partly onto his back. They needed to be cleaned. Again, his gaze drifted over to the wolf. It was too emaciated to provide much in the way of meat, though he’d try, but the pelt was worth saving. It wasn’t very thick but it would provide a little extra warmth as the weather grew fouler and he’d be a fool to leave it. It could wait, though. First he wanted to clean up – an infection could be deadly out here with no medicine or healers to help him. He’d stopped to fill his canteen in a brook not far from here shortly before making camp and he’d already planned to backtrack a little and fill it again before continuing on, not sure when he’d find fresh water again. Crow scooped up his canteen and hung it from his belt before stumbling off in the direction of the water.

It wasn’t really pain that was causing him to stumble. No, he’d had much worse back at the circus. It was exhaustion and hunger and more than anything, a burning grief so deep that it numbed all his other senses. He’d never felt so alone before in all his life.

The chill of the water helped bring him back to his senses. He’d removed his boots and rolled up his pants to his knees before stepping in and at first he gasped, a little in shock at the sensation of the cold water, but allowed himself to relax. The shock was what he needed. Keeping a level head was key if he expected to come out of this alive. Scooping up some water in his canteen, Crow poured it gently over the gashes on his side and scrubbed a little at the dried blood surrounding the wound. Then he scrubbed the blood from his hands and finally, he drew out his axe and stared at it for a moment. He hadn’t cleaned it very well last night. Blood from the wolf was still smeared not only the blade, but the handle as well, and he twisted it around in his hand, staring at it thoughtfully.

Though he’d been trained in the use of various weapons, he hadn’t used this one for much more than looking threatening and keeping people in line and away from the parts of the circus that they weren’t supposed to see. More practical and more deadly weapons were used for the hunting and tracking of the creatures they’d drag back to the circus. But this axe, this small insignificant weapon, had proven itself last night.

Crow had never named a weapon. That was for warriors, generals, and kings; great and mighty men who fought great and mighty battles. But there was no one here to mock him for it and he knew he’d likely not ever see another human face again, so he might as well give it a name. It had earned it, he decided.

‘Wolfsbane,” he said out loud. The wind kept on blowing and the brook kept on rushing, bubbling its way downstream, and the few birds that were singing didn’t stop. Their sounds were neither in approval, nor disapproval, but Crow knew it was as good a reply as he was going to get to the name he chose. He knelt down and washed it in the water.

La would’ve laughed at him for taking better care to wash his weapon than his wound. Then she would’ve taken the bandages from him and wrapped it for him, teasing him all the while, and he would grunt and grumble and pretend to be annoyed. How he wished she was here to look after him now! Out of the three of them, she had the most sensible head on her shoulders – Crow was too quick to act in anger and Snow too slow, always asking a million questions about everything. Trying to understand. She’d been their balance. He hoped they were looking after each other in his absence. He remembered, too, the promise that Lars had made him to keep an eye on them and wondered if the boy would do as he’d said. Lars had seemed earnest when he spoke but Crow had learned a long time ago to be wary of everyone, no matter how sincere they seemed. Everyone, that is, but for La and Snow.

Once his axe was sufficiently cleaned, Crow dried it on his tunic and then tucked it back into his belt before leaving the water. He sat on a rock by the bank for a few minutes, afterward, letting himself dry and staring into the forest ahead of him, lost in thought. A wolf had been desperate enough to attack him on his very first night. It was more than lucky that he survived; if Crow had believed in the gods he might have even thanked him for letting him live, but if they were around then they had done little for him that was worth thanking them for. Why had they let him even get to this point? If they really did intervene to save him last night, was it only to see him battle and die at the hands or claws of a worthier foe later on? To watch him struggle and fail? Crow frowned, spitting on the ground next to him. Pah! To the depths of the earth with them. Let them suffer in that pit of lost souls; he cared not and believed not. All that mattered to him was surviving this day and the night after and repeating that as long as he could until he either found the Wyvern or died trying.

Finally, Crow put his boots back on and stood, heading back to the campsite. He needed to skin the wolf and pack up camp so he could cover enough ground before nightfall, as well as try to find a safer place to camp out before what little sun peeked through the trees disappeared and plunged him into a sea of darkness. Fortunately, no other beast had ravaged his camp while he was gone and he skinned the wolf, trying not to look too long into its eyes. Crow would do whatever had to be done but he didn’t find any joy in killing a creature who was trying to survive, just like he was. A creature who had managed to live so long in such a brutal place only to be felled by someone who didn’t even belong here.

“Life ain’t fair,” he said gruffly, examining to see what meat he could take from the thin wolf. “Get used to it.”

Naturally, there was no answer. Crow hadn’t been expecting one. He didn’t much care for the sound of his own voice but it was better than hearing no human voice at all. He continued talking to himself under his breath until at last he had finished his grim task and packed up camp, heading on his way without looking back. There was nothing behind him now; any chance he had in life lay in front of him.

—

There wasn’t much of a trail to follow. It wasn’t easy following a flying creature but he did his best; looking for broken branches high in the treetops or dead animals with massive claw and teeth marks in them. Even blood trails, as much of a stretch as that was. Anything to give him even the slightest clue where it had gone but the Wyvern had had a head start and, despite being injured, could go much farther in much less time than a human could. But Crow tried not to think about all of that. He was already teetering on the edge of despair and if he let himself fall over that precipice, all was lost.

Though this was only his second day walking, the woods already felt like they were getting much thicker. Soon he was forcing his way through thick brush, thorns, and branches and once even ran into a snake, though it was only a small one that hurried away quickly enough. By the time night fell, Crow was disgruntled and in a more foul mood than he’d been since the Master had forced him to leave. He’d made little progress through the Wildlands. He was hungry, cold, and tired. The wolf meat, which he’d wrapped rather clumsily in a handkerchief, wouldn’t keep for long so he built a small fire and began to cook it wishing all the while that he’d known which of the bushes he’d passed while traveling had had edible berries and which ones hadn’t. Unfortunately, he didn’t know the difference and it wasn’t worth the risk of trying.

‘This isn’t the sort of life you deserve.’ That little, annoying voice in his head began to whisper once more. ‘This isn’t even the sort of death you deserve. Frozen? Starved? You can go anywhere you want, so leave. Be free. You’ll never find that creature anyway.’

Obstinate as ever, Crow pointedly ignored the voice. He replaced it with the laughter of La and the sound of Snow’s voice, chattering on and on so quickly that Crow could only understand half of what he said. He replaced the voice in his head that he hated, even though he found himself wanting to listen to it, with the voices of those whom he loved. And when he thought of them, even in such a situation as this, everything seemed a little less grim. Sad, perhaps, but the memories allowed him to smile all the same.

He’d figure this out. He’d go back to them someday and free them.

He had to.