The trees no longer knew his name.
Taranis sat beneath the twisted yew roots where the earth sloped sharply into shadow. His hands, still small though scarred, trembled not from cold, but from the silence. He had not spoken since sunrise not when his father handed him the satchel, not when the last brother refused to meet his eye, not even when his mother whispered
“Run.” Her voice had broken, but not for him for the children who had not survived the sickness.
For the village, he was now a curse. A child touched by strange spirits. One who brought death and unnatural things. One who raised a bird from stillness, and soon after, watched the village rot from within.
So he ran until his breath failed, deeper into the old woods. The Wending Hollow.
He knew the stories: spirits with antlers, beasts with no eyes, witches who wore the skins of deer. He knew, too, that children were not meant to survive here. But he wasn’t a child anymore.
He was eight. Alone. Exiled.
And hungry.
By dusk, Taranis had found a shallow stream and a fallen log riddled with mushrooms. He sniffed each cap like his uncle had taught him. Then he took only the pale gilled ones that didn’t smell of metal or death.
He dug roots near the waterline — bulbous, bitter, but full of strength. Nettle leaves, stripped with care and boiled in his small clay pot over a weak ember-fire. Then made a tea that smoked green into the mist. It tasted sharp, like the sting of his mother’s goodbye.
His first exile meal was crude:
🌿 A bitter root mash warmed on a flat stone.
🌰 Wild hazelnuts cracked with care.
🍵 A handful of mushrooms, seared by flame.
🌿 Nettle tea, sipped from his cupped palms.
It filled his belly but not the hollow in his chest.
The howl came just after nightfall.
Low. Wide. As if dragged from the pit of a creature that had forgotten how to live.
Taranis froze. The fire dimmed, not from wind, but from presence.
Another howl. Closer.
Then bones not breaking, but rattling.
Like antlers knocking together.
Like something with no voice calling for company.
He rose slowly. The wind twisted his fire out.
From the trees stepped a figure that wasn’t quite wolf.
It was tall as a stag, gaunt as famine. Its limbs stretched too long and wrapped in skin the color of ash. Bone jutted from its snout and spine. Its eyes were hollow. And it carried no scent only silence.
The Bone Wolf.
Taranis stood firm, chest rising and falling. He did not cry. He did not scream. Something inside him, something older than fear, whispered:
Face it. Or be followed forever.
He reached for a stick and held it like a spear. The creature stepped closer… then paused.
Its skull tilted. It sniffed the steam of his cooked meal, then… turned.
It vanished into the dark, leaving no prints. Only breath warm, inhuman on the back of his neck.
He did not sleep that night.
But when the dawn came, the trees whispered again. Not in welcome, but in recognition.
The boy had survived Night One.
And the Bone Wolf had spared him.
Thank you for reading.
© written by ELHewitt
Further Reading
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