one chapter

It was far too late and far too cold for Enid to have to be out here keeping an eye on her tiny flock of sheep, but it wasn't as though she really had any kind of choice in the matter.

It had been quite some time since her family had owned land of their own that was suitable for grazing livestock. Now that they were reduced to living in the small cottage on what Enid was convinced was the coldest side of the mountain, they had little more than shrubbery, trees, and straggly patches of grass to make do with. When they first had moved into the cottage, Enid's brothers had been given the task of knocking together the lean-to shed that now usually held their few animals in cold weather or at night. But then her brothers had left, one by one, seeking warmer climates where they might have a better chance of learning a trade and moving up in life, leaving their youngest sibling and little sister, Enid, behind. Shortly after her brothers had all left, the family had had to resort to selling their prized and only dairy cow, and had just enough from that sale to cover their costs and purchase two more sheep. Just enough to keep them going for a while longer.

And so, Enid spent her days caring for, guarding, and shearing sheep. Well, more of the former; her father, Murray Sinclair, did the bulk of the shearing given the size of their little flock, leaving Enid to take up shepherd duties when required.

On this particular occasion, Enid had let the fluffy little sods wander much too far earlier in the day, too busy chasing after an escaping ewe and lamb who'd decided to race halfway up the mountain, barely seconds after she'd only just corralled the flock out the door to stretch their legs and get some better grazing. Now, hours and some miles later, freezing and miserable, Enid had watched their tiny flock of 19 sheep (including the new lamb) deciding they were going to nestle down here for the night. No amount of bribery, gentle shoving, and then not-so-gentle shoving would move them.

Enid sighed, looked at the clear night sky and sent a quick thanks to the powers that be that at least it wasn't raining. And then decided to try and get a few hours sleep in between the warmth of sheep's wool; nestled in between two of the fluffier specimens at the edge of the group (where she could wriggle out fairly easily if required) so she wouldn't freeze to death overnight. She thought her father would be wondering where she was by now, though Enid doubted he would actually come looking for her himself until daylight came.

(A tiny voice in her head whispered how her mother probably neither noticed nor cared that Enid was gone.)

Thankfully, Betty and Harriet, two of her favorite ewes, were sufficiently large to cut out the slight windchill and sufficiently warm, allowing Enid's eyes to slowly, slowly droop.

Right until she startled awake thanks to the sheep all standing at once. They stood there for a moment, shivering with cold or fear, all hunching closer and closer together and letting out the tiniest little bleats she'd ever heard. Enid shook off her sleep-fogged brain and picked up the curved shepherd's crook that she normally kept for poking stubborn sheep along. With wood thicker than her arm and a length that made it solid two and a half feet taller than Enid herself when she stood the crook on end, Enid could only hope it would be sufficient for fending off what had alarmed the sheep.

Not that she suspected much. The silly things were alarmed by darting rabbits or squirrels, or if a tree dropped a few too many branches into the air on a chilly day. But it did make her feel better, to have the weight of the crook in her hand. Just in case.

The just in case turned out to be swinging it with both hands, smacking the enormous swathe of blackness that had just tried to snatch their sole lamb from under the legs of its mother, moving before Enid really understood what she was doing. In the dark she could hardly tell what she'd hit, only that it seemed the size of a bull and made of shadows. Hitting the thick sent a trembling vibration of shock up her arms, as though Enid had slammed the wooden staff right into a brick wall. She hadn't known what was trying to steal her sheep, right until it turned to snarl at her.

Bright yellow eyes and teeth almost the length of her hand. An impossibly large, extremely fluffy wolf baring its teeth at her for interrupting their meal. All the sheep were trembling and bleating, on the verge of breaking away, and if Enid didn't do something to get this wolf away they would all flee and she'd never find them and her parents would never forgive her then she could never go home again oh god .

So they stood in an impossible tableau, Enid frozen, the wolf's hackles up high, snarling with all the apparent hatred it could summon, yet never advancing. Then it moved, too fast for Enid to react, and took the ewe instead.

"Fuck!" Enid swore. No, no, no. This could not be happening , her horrified mind rambled as her arms swung the crook with all her strength to try and tag the wolf and drag it backwards. Enid heard the bleating of the other sheep, couldn't afford to turn around to see where they all were, too busy watching the angry, hungry predator in front of her, little more than a large shadow with teeth in the dark.

As Enid frantically swung and swung again, cringing as she heard the wolf snap the ewe's neck, a part of her brain caught on that the wolf was rather skinny. The fur was thick, to be sure, perhaps a winter coat; but when the wolf turned around to dodge another blow, trying to drag the sheep carcass with it, Enid saw the curve of the thing's ribs, noticing how identifiable the hip bones were. No wonder it had come for the sheep when she was there and armed. It also explained how, despite having succeeded in thwacking the thing hard enough to cause bruises or even fracture bones, the wolf refused to let go of the sheep it hauled.

Even with its burden, the wolf was wily and fast, and also considerably larger than Enid. Unable to do more than catch an ankle that rapidly slipped from her grasp or land those few successful blows on its ribs and hindquarters, Enid had been forced to give up the chase as the wolf slipped further and further out of reach. She cursed it using the worst words she knew, feeling shattered by the fact they were now one less sheep down when they really couldn't afford it.

Possibly more than one. Possibly all of them, unless Enid spends the entire night collecting the rest of them back together.

And so she does. Too furious and too frantic to notice how cold it has gotten, Enid takes until daybreak, dizzy with hunger and fatigue, to drive the remaining sheep back home.

Her father waits, his arms crossed, and Enid just can't. She just can't. She walks right past Murray Sinclair and doesn't even greet him. She knows she's going to pay for her rudeness later, but Enid has spent the night watching one of her sheep getting killed by an enormous black wolf, and she's had no sleep and no food. Her father's admonishments could wait.

Luckily, he did. He stared after Enid - she had felt the weight of his gaze on her back all the way back up the hill into the shed - until he'd come in, saying nothing while he helped get the rest of the sheep squared away. While they settled the flock down Enid began to speak, if only so she could explain why they needed to check the little lamb for any injuries.

Her father surprises her by telling Enid he'll check the lamb and that she should go inside and get something to eat and drink, and have a rest. "Don't worry," he tells her, "your mother's asleep," thus further surprising Enid. Her father normally didn't make accommodations for or even acknowledge Enid's fraught relationship with her mother, Esther Sinclair, but maybe he was taking pity on how rubbish Enid looked and felt. Nearly ready to drop asleep standing, Enid was fatigued to feel herself swaying on her feet. So she just stared back at her father, turned and left. And made it into her bedroom to crash, face first, onto the bed, falling almost instantly asleep, still fully clothed.

"I don't think that's a good idea, Enid," her father says, several days later.

Enid, having broached the subject over breakfast of her going out to hunt down the lair of the wolf that had taken one of their few sheep, had swiftly lost what little control she had. Her mother was using words like "abandoned us for a lark" and then her parents were arguing about danger.

And then, of course - of course - Esther Sinclair had launched into what was becoming an increasingly common topic for their family debates.

"Enid, I don't want you going out there. What if something horrendous happened, and you were left with scars? Or, the Lord forbid, a more disfiguring injury? We don't expect you to stay here forever, you know."

It took all of Enid's substantial willpower not to roll her eyes, raise an eyebrow and say, you don't ? She'd been getting the distinct impression her parents wanted her to stay with them forever and care for them well into old age.

Her mother, unfortunately, had caught whatever flicker of emotion had escaped Enid's attempt to suppress it. Esther's face hardened, her voice becoming firmer, sharper. "No, Enid. We don't. I would like for you to be able to start making trips into town and getting to know some of the nice young men there. You're old enough to be married now. Your brothers are very happy to make the introductions; James wrote to me just yesterday about the new friends and connections he has been making."

Enid, who had not been back into town for several weeks and usually went just to sell what little goods they had produced and buy some simple produce, wasn't the type to notice these supposed eligible bachelors. She just walked into town, did whatever she'd gone there to do, and headed home again. The only time Enid had let herself be distracted were those times when Ms. Blanche, the sweet old thing, had drawn her into a long conversation about the uses of sheep's wool. And then again, when Ms. Blanche had pressed a beautiful, rainbow-colored set of wooden knitting needles into Enid's hands and assured her it was a gift. The old woman had told her she merely wanted someone to share the joy of knitting with, and that she had no sons or grandsons left to teach, and that Enid would do nicely.

Enid hadn't had any wool to spare since then for her to try knitting with, but she treasured those needles like gold. Perhaps she would use her next trip to town to talk with Ms. Blanche some more, maybe take the old lady some tea if she could. She definitely wasn't making the trip to see some 'nice young men,' no matter how good her brother might be at talking them up.

More importantly, she was afraid the wolf was going to come back. Enid let the subject drop at breakfast that day to avoid the risk of being corralled by her mother into venturing into town for the purpose of scoping out marriage prospects.

She spent the days that followed keeping the little flock of sheep as close as she could to the cottage. For the first day and night that followed, Enid had had the spine-tingling, weighted sensation of being watched, but she couldn't see anything to explain it. No shadow in the trees, no yellow eyes, no jaw of bristling teeth. Nonetheless, Enid remained ever-vigilant, and the wolf hadn't come back. As the days turned into weeks and time went on, part of Enid might have thought she had imagined it, were it not for their tiny flock being down to 18 sheep.

And then, she'd felt it. That feeling that left all her hair standing on end. A still, calm night with the moon bright and heavy in the sky, seeming more blue than yellow at that early hour. Enid twisted and turned, trying to spot the source of her instinctive alarm. A long minute of looking across the border of distant trees and trying to look through the few shrubs that dotted the patch of grass her flock grazed on, and - there . Blended so well into the trees that she hadn't seen it at first.

It could have been a deer or something equally harmless, but Enid didn't think the wild deer ranged this far up the side of the mountain. And by the way those two points of reflected light stayed fixed on Enid's sheep as she tsked and nudged her flock away, Enid would bet all the possessions she had left that it was the same wolf that had taken their sheep.

She hurried the flock back to the cottage and raced through getting them locked into the warmth of the shred, practically throwing the feed on top of the sheep in her haste to get back out. It could have been minutes or hours later, but Enid crept into the house as though everything was normal, trying to sneak into her room to grab her cloak, warmer boots, and water, and to borrow a large hunting knife that one of her brothers had left behind.

The sound of her father walking down the few steps from his attic study caused Enid to startle and nearly fumble the belting of the sheath strap around her waist, but she got it just in time before her father spotted her and asked what she was doing. Standing in the shadow of the eaves outside the door, Enid crept away as quickly and silently as she could manage.

She could do this. She would do this. The fact that Enid had very little experience of hunting anything bigger than a rabbit with a slingshot didn't matter. She told herself that she knew how to stay quiet in the open air, how to move so the crackle of leaves and twigs scattered across the forest ground didn't give her away. And by the time she'd reached the trees of the edge of the tall pine forest she'd seen the wolf hiding within, Enid had psyched herself up enough to step under the branches and into the darkness beyond.

The smell was wonderful, fresh and almost sweet on the spring air. The bitter cold, however, was not. They were too close to the edge of winter to make it easy for Enid to tread silently through the trees. As much as she tried, every so often the frosty ground became slippery. Stepping around one tree towards a path through the trunks, Enid had nearly shouted in frustration when her feet had slipped forward on their own account. She'd made it past the patch of icey, frosted forest floor by virtue of her clenched teeth and her utter determination to find the lair of the beast that had dared hunt her tiny, precious flock.

There. Something about the ground had been compacted between those two trees told her it was an oft-used path. A thrill of satisfaction twined with rising anxiety and anticipation through Enid as she bends down to examine the ground ahead. Here and there the moonlight dapples the ground through breaks in the branches above, barely enough to allow Enid to see by, but still enough. Enough to spot confirmation in a scattering of running wolf paws imprinted into the dewy ground, clearer a little further ahead where a paw has pressed into a patch of frosted pine needles and broken the thin coating of ice.

Enid creeps forward, looking so hard for paw prints it almost feels as though her eyes are on stalks. She steps from tree to tree where she can, twisting her neck to try and see everything at once. Wishing she had better sight and hearing, or even eyes in the back of her head, lest the wolf leap from the shadows behind her. Moving a hand towards the sheath at her belt Enid stalks quietly forward, slowly unsheathing the knife as she gets deeper into the forest. Deeper down the animal path that has evidently been used by a wolf. She stops, for a moment, drawn by a niggling curiosity, to bend down and place her hand inside one of the more distinct paw prints. The outline of the print engulfed her hand. Made it look like a child's hand, and Enid was far off from being a child. Gulping down the swell of nauseating fear that bubbled up, Enid crouched for a moment, eyes fixed on the size of the wolf's paw, and wondered if she'd made a mistake.

She had to go on. Enid would not be able to bear the way her parents would likely spend the next several years telling her how they had been right. She had to go on and take down the wolf so she could show them. So she could protect her tiny flock and not have to keep worrying about shadows.

Enid stood and continued forward into the depths of the pine forest, knife now held out before her, ready and waiting. Her breath comes out in puffs of white as the altitude gets gradually higher. The climb is imperceptible enough that she hasn't really started to feel it until now. The path was getting flatter, twisting through the trees, even more distinct than before, but somehow - narrower? Were the trees closing in, or was that just Enid's mind playing tricks? She didn't know. No, wait. Perhaps it was. A handful of minutes of careful walking passes and Enid finds herself having to turn sideways in order to wriggle through the next pair of tree trunks, into a -

clearing?

A space wide enough to fit a small village in the middle of the forest. Ringed by fallen pine needles and scattered branches, the occasional gray of rocky outcrop glinting around the edges, most of the space is covered in an astoundingly beautiful variety of wildflowers and wild herbs, and yet - there. Far across the clearing Enid can see a hut. Thatch-roofed, perhaps one or two rooms, door ajar. There was the glow of a fire shining out from curtained windows and the gap in the door. How had she not seen the light before now?

The shadow smacks into Enid while she's standing there, stupefied. Hard enough to knock the breath out of her lungs. Her shoulder hits with a smack into the rocky ground beside her right as the wolf clamps its teeth down into her upper arm and she shrieks, half from surprise and pain.

They fall together in a tangle of fur and limbs until the wolf is atop her, snarling even with teeth still clamped into her bicep. Enid realizes she hasn't dropped her knife yet and swings with her free hand to drive it deep into the beast's side.

A hot gush of blood spurts out over her arm and across the thick, black fur of the wolf who whines and collapses, crushing Enid with its enormous weight, releasing Enid's arm in the process.

Enid, shaking, suffocating under the weight of the enormous wolf above her, does not let go. Does not move for fear the wolf will snap its fearsome jaws around her head or neck and twist as it dies.

The wolf whimpers, breathing hot breaths across Enid's face, until it finally rolls over, the action causing the blade to slice deeper across its pelt when Enid won't let go of the knife. Enid lays there, gasping, gulping air from her bruised lungs, blood-splattered and nearly too terrified to scream. Who would hear her, all the way out here? If she screams it will be due to the nauseating pain in her arm, knowing no one is around to save her.

Enid feels a wash of inexplicable sadness come over her as she turns her head to the side to watch the wolf die. It whines again softly, flopped against the ground, rasping breaths getting shallower and shallower. Until they seem to dissipate into silence. Its snout is turned away from Enid, looking out into the trees, so at least she does not have to see its eyes. Enid's heart has been drumming in her ears all the while, and it beats just once more before she sees the wolf ripple .

There's no other word she can think of to describe it. Enid lays there, watching the enormous black wolf as its bones crack and snap, fur shrinking in, legs twisting about and shrinking, shrinking. Muzzle folding in, body diminishing, twisting on itself.

Until there's a naked woman lying before her, her mane of black hair the same color as the wolf's fur, bleeding out into the snow.

"What the…" Enid whispers. And then it hits her that oh my god she's killed a person.

Enid leaps up, pausing momentarily for the wave of dizziness. She shrugs it off, knowing any blood loss won't heal her faster than the woman. Her knife had been in a much more vital spot.

Whatever the woman is - witch or demon or cursed shapeshifter - Enid doesn't want to be responsible for her death. One sheep does not justify Enid murdering her. She bends down and lifts the woman into her arms, marveling at whatever magic was involved in all of this. Because she's shorter than Enid and light enough for Enid to stagger towards the hut with the woman in her arms.

Thankfully it is empty. And as Enid lays the woman on the table gently, racing around to grab whatever she can - tearing strips off the curtain fabric with her knife in order to bind the wound tightly without causing more pain - she realizes the woman - well, whatever creature she is, who looks like a woman - is young. Perhaps her age. Enid touches shaking fingers to her neck and nearly sags to the floor, boneless, when she feels the incredibly slow but still distinct thud of a pulse.

She's not dead, Enid thought, the words looping around and around in her mind. It took her a long moment before her fuzzy brain caught up enough and proceeded to awkwardly bind her own wounds, searching the place for anything she could use to try and heal them both. Dragging the blankets off the bed in the corner to keep the woman warm and to give her some semblance of decency, Enid wished desperately she knew more about healing, but keeping pressure on the wounds and changing bandages was about the extent of it. After realizing how terribly thirsty she was, Enid emptied the waterskin on her belt and then eventually found a barrel just outside the hut, thankfully spouted, full of rainwater.

She used that to refill the waterskin and went back to pour little sips into the woman's mouth. Tried not to notice how incredibly pretty she was in the process. Full lips and perfect porcelain skin, with incredibly long, dark eyelashes that fluttered each time Enid tried carefully to dribble just a little water into the woman's mouth. If Enid was thirsty, she can't imagine how the unconscious woman must feel, but she didn't want her choking either.

The hours crawl by, only interspersed with Enid finding a little pile of wood on the opposite side of the hut from the rainwater barrels outside and carting them in to build up the fire, and eventually succeeding in finding a blanket and a tough roll of bread for herself to nibble on. She sat, sipping water and nibbling on the bread, in a chair beside the woman, feeling stupid for not knowing what to do. Feeling stupid for not going for help, but unable to leave the woman there alone in case she took a turn for the worse. Not that Enid could have done much to help, but at least she wouldn't have died alone.

Enid didn't want to think about that, so instead she moves on to wondering at the sort of magic allowed someone to change shape. The memory of smacking the black wolf with her shepherd's crook came to mind, and Enid found herself feeling vaguely guilty even though the behavior had been perfectly justified.

She keeps nodding off. Her head drooping onto her cocoon of a blanket, dropping down to her chest for a beat before Enid startles awake again. She's so incredibly, unbelievably tired but she desperately wants to stay awake and ensure the woman - wolf, whatever - lives. Enid couldn't bear it if she'd fallen asleep and woken to discover she'd died.

Enid nods into a fuzzy thought of half-dream before she snaps awake again, startled by the murmur and wriggling of the form on the table.

"Hey, hey. Hey, don't move. It's okay, you're fine, you're safe," Enid soothes, her one good arm tugging out from under the blankets as she stands to hover her hand in the air nearer to the woman, unsure what to do except that she wants to be ready in case the woman is about to fall off the table. She ignores the hysterical giggling in the back of her brain at her telling the woman she's safe when Enid is the one who nearly killed her and then invaded her house. Or, at least, she hopes it's her house. Hopefully no one is going to come storming in demanding why they're there.

"Um, lady?" Enid says, cringing at the way her voice trails upwards into an almost squeak. "I'm sorry about what happened. I really am. But you need to stay still. You'll fall off the table and mess up those bandages."

Those pretty lashes snap open and suddenly, Enid is being affixed with a magnetic, black-eyed gaze.

The woman sits up and groans, loudly. Enid darts forward, unable to help herself, wanting to stop the woman from doing herself any further harm. This has the unfortunate side effect of getting up close to the pretty face of the woman Enid suddenly remembers she's seen entirely naked just hours before, and she blushes fiercely. Swallows, clears her throat, and speaks.

"Please stay still. I'm sorry I stabbed you. You - well, you were …" Enid trails off, voice wobbling as she starts to shake. Because finally, finally , her body is catching up to the fact that last night the lady sitting just inches away was an enormous wolf who had nearly torn off her arm.

The impending nervous breakdown is interrupted by the realization that she can smell the scent of pine forest, ice, and roses? Enid leans a touch further forward subconsciously and yep, there's something about the naked lady on the table that smells distinctly of roses. The woman wrinkles her nose, one hand now pulling the blanket across her, sniffing in disgust.

Nope. She's actually smelling the air around Enid.

"You're bleeding," she says, eyes fixed on Enid's shoulder.

Enid sighs unconsciously, because even her voice sounds melodic. Definitely a lot of magic going on here, she thinks, before looking at her shoulder. Whoops. Yep, her shoulder is bleeding through her hasty bandage job.

Enid looks back at the woman, blushing this time because this is an impossibly awkward conversation. "Ah, yeah. You bit me."

An impossibly perfect brow arch of disbelief.

"Last night. When you were - er, in wolf form. You've, um, been eating my sheep."

The disbelief comes down, and a vague look of confusion crosses the woman's face before it clears up into a distinct expression of remembrance, disappointment and regret. "I'm sorry. I've - it's a long story. I'm so, so, so very sorry. I don't even know your name and now I've…I've cursed you with…" she trails off, looking at Enid's arm again.

Enid is feeling confused because she doesn't understand that bit about the curse, but maybe the woman is a bit loopy from the bloodloss. "Enid. Enid Sinclair. Are you feeling okay? Should I check your bandages?"

A small shake of the head, and the woman leans back, baring skin that makes Enid look away with a fierce blush, and then tentatively back again because she does need to check the bandages. She sees the woman resting her weight on one arm, gently tugging the red and gray of the patterned curtain fabric downwards. They're bloodsoaked but it's the color of long-dried blood, and Enid blinks, dumbfounded, to see the woman shove the bandages further down her waist to reveal a long, freshly pink, knotted scar surrounded by reddened, angry skin. It looks weeks old. It's entirely unreal to witness.

"W-what?" Enid stammers, looking for an explanation.

The woman ignores her for the moment, undoing and then unwinding the bandages under her breasts with an apparent complete lack of concern about Enid's being witness to her nakedness. Enid turns away reflexively before she realizes the woman doesn't care knowing Enid has seen it all before, but still. It was the polite thing. So she waits until she hears that the woman has dropped the pile of cloth on the floor and there's a rustling of the blanket being wrapped around her, the faint creak of the table.

"You can turn around again," comes the soft, amused voice behind her.

"I'm sorry. I didn't - I didn't have time to find any clothes. I was worried…" Enid trails off, face heated, feeling like there's nothing she could say that would sound reasonable.

"It's fine. I understand. If you'll help me up from here, I'll get dressed and then we can take a look at that arm of yours."

"Oh, of course," Enid stammers, and steps forward, taking one far too dainty looking hand in her own, gently grasping it's warmth as the woman leans on her for a moment, sliding of the table, holding onto Enid until she's sure her feet are steady.

There's a low doorway Enid hadn't noticed before and it looks like the woman is heading towards it, towards what she can now see is a bathroom, before turning towards a chest beside the bed.

"Wait, let me help you," Enid cries, not wanting the woman to hurt herself trying to lift the heavy chest lid in her presumed attempt to find clothes.

"Enid Sinclair, you have one good arm. I'll be fine. I'll just be a moment. I can see you've already helped yourself to my food stores," the woman said, an echo of laughter in her tone and the hint of a smirk in the curl of her full, red lips.

Enid glanced around, looking for telltale crumbs. She'd been sure she'd demolished the entirety of the bread roll and hadn't left scraps about. "How?..."

The woman tapped the side of her nose, the hint of a smirk turning into a smile of amusement now.

Oh. Of course. Well, not of course, but Enid probably could have guessed someone that turned into a wolf had a similar talent for scents.

"Don't stress yourself any further, Enid. Please, help yourself to the larder while I change."

Enid, staring after her, feeling entirely lost and confused, darted away to the cupboards in the opposite corner when she saw the woman about to drop the blanket. She listened to the rustling of clothes and the clunk of a boot, and then the other, as she looked through the cupboards. There wasn't much. A couple of rusk biscuits of the kind the sailors used, one more of the tough bread rolls. Some sort of stringy dried fruit wrapped up in a bag that Enid wasn't feeling inclined to touch. And then, at last, two shining, fresh, green apples. Enid pulled them both out and held one gingerly with her bad arm, before turning to hand the other one over to the woman.

Who was abruptly right beside her. Enid stumbled backwards before catching herself on the edge of the cupboard benches. "Oh, sorry. I didn't - you're so silent. And fast," Enid rambled, distracted by the faint scent of roses.

"You apologize too much," the woman stated bluntly, simply.

"S-so...have an apple?"

The woman took it from Enid, fingers lingering, only holding it up to examine briefly before that intense black gaze returned to Enid's face.

Enid, for her part, was beginning to feel like her face was in a permanent state of flushing. Perhaps it was an effect of the heat of the embers of the fire, or the warmth of the closed little hut.

"My name is Wednesday."

"That's a…"

The woman glared, and Enid clamped her mouth shut.

"Wednesday Addams."

"Um, nice to meet you, Wednesday Addams. And, again, I'm sorry about the…" Enid said, trailing off as she gestured with the hand holding the apple to the pink scar covering so much of the woman's side.

"There is no need to apologize, Enid. I have a debt to repay for taking your sheep. I should be the one apologizing. I owe you more of a debt than you know," she said gravely, eyes now affixed to Enid's shoulder.

Enid took a bite out of the apple with a crunch, finding it fresh, juicy and delicious. Her eyes closed in satisfaction at the flavor, and she nearly moaned at how gloriously wonderful it tasted when she'd been so very hungry. Her eyes opened to look, and the woman - Wednesday - had moved even closer, her dark eyes affixed to Enid's mouth with an expression resembling the hunger Enid had felt just moments ago. Only wrenching her eyes away when Enid nervously chewed and swallowed rapidly at the intensity of the other woman's gaze.

Enid watched her move away again. Wednesday was dressed in heeled black boots, what looked like tight black leather pants, and a long-sleeved white blouse which had little ruffles at the sleeves and collar. Wednesday went back to the chest to pull out a long black jacket, more of a blazer. How anyone could manage to make what Enid would have thought to be masculine clothing look so feminine and pretty, Enid didn't know. She distracted herself from admiring the woman by asking what had been in the back of her head all along.

"I hope you don't mind if I ask, and I'm sorry if this is really rude - but what are you, exactly?"

Wednesday slid on the jacket gingerly at first, then faster when she didn't appear to be in pain from the movements. She took a long moment to pull her hair back into a single, long plait before she let out a long, depressed-sounding sigh and walked back to where Enid stood.

"Sit," Wednesday told her, so Enid sat.

Wednesday pulled the other chair around from the other side of the table - which Enid was only now noticing was still stained with Wednesday's blood, and cringed, feeling guilty - before planting it so close to Enid their knees nearly touched when she sat back down.

Wednesday looked at her for an incredibly long, tense moment, gaze roaming all over Enid's face and down to her arm and back again. Then she sighed once more, softly this time, and said, "I'm a werewolf."

"Beg your pardon?" Enid said, just to make sure she'd heard the word correctly.

"A werewolf. A human cursed to change into wolf shape for a whole night, every full moon."

Enid blinked. She'd been preparing for witches or sorcery and temporary shape-changing or some sort of occult skin walking, but this was a little unexpected. Werewolves were myths. Yet now that she said that, it sounded stupid in her head. She'd been fine with witches and sorcery and some sort of demonic dealings, but somehow skipped right over the expectation of werewolf. She could be forgiven, though, on account of how little she knew about these magical creatures, one of whom was sitting right in front of her.

"I'm so sorry, Enid. Genuinely. You, too, are now a werewolf."

"What?"

This had to be some sort of prank. Wednesday was just messing with her. But there was something so terribly sad, so genuinely regretful, in her face and posture that told Enid she was wholly serious.

"The bite," Wednesday said, her tone flattening, nodding to Enid's arm. "If a transformed werewolf bites another during a full moon and there's an exchange of saliva or blood into the victim's bloodstream, there's guaranteed infection. And eventually, change."

"You're joking," Enid said aloud, Even though she knew Wednesday wasn't. She had to say it, trying to give herself time to absorb it.

"I should never have - I've made a terrible mistake, Enid. I overestimated my control of the wolf, and it got the better of me. And now you're cursed."

"Cursed," Enid echoed blankly, and then brightened. "Doesn't that mean…well, if it's a curse, surely there's a cure, right?"

Wednesday shook her head sadly. "There is not. I have spent years looking. My family, they… they're all traveling the earth trying to find a cure. Werewolves live a very, very long time and they know if they do not, I will outlive them all. They do not wish that for me, and so the search continues."

Enid leaned back against the chair. She realized she still had the half-eaten apple in her hand, and then put it on the table, feeling entirely shell-shocked. When she'd placed it down, Wednesday slowly and tentatively reached for her hand, and Enid let her take it.

Wednesday's hand was arm, and soft, and infinitely smaller than the enormous paws of her wolf form. Enid stared, blinking, as Wednesday intertwined their fingers, wrapping their palms together until her thumb was rubbing soothing little circles on the back of Enid's hand.

Wednesday's eyes were big and serious, and far too pretty for Enid's brain to absorb all of this. Enid's head was wandering off by itself, thinking about the impossible length of black eyelashes and whether Wednesday's lips were forever that reddish-pink color, even completely devoid of lipstick as they were.

"I'm so sorry, Enid," Wednesday said.

Enid thought about the warmth of Wednesday's skin. How she'd thought, at first, that Wednesday's skin was cool, but as the woman recovered became warmer, nearly hot. Hotter than human, she was beginning to notice. She saw now that she'd thought Wednesday's eyes were black before in the dull light of the hut. But now, this close, she knew they were the darkest brown she'd ever seen.

"I am eternally in your debt," Wednesday told her, voice colored by sincerity and sorrow. "I have cursed you, for you are now a werewolf too."

"Okay," Enid finds herself saying blankly, stupidly. "Okay," her mouth agrees, well before her brain does.

Something in Wednesday's much-too-pretty eyes brighten with her words, and Enid discovers she's pleased to have caused the change. "We'll get through this," Wednesday promises her, tone grave but shored up by confidence, the caress of her thumb sending tingles up Enid's arm all the while.

"We'll get through this," Wednesday says again. "I'm sure of it. I suspect that you and I might be able to get through anything together."