Rae did not know if the bandages and salve would be enough—she knew from helping Ness tend injured lambs that sometimes injuries were too deep for the body to heal. She wondered if the other wolf he’d fought had wounds this deep, or if it had escaped unscathed into the hills. She wished she could move this wolf to the shade of the woods, but pulling his great body… Rae glanced at her bandaged wrist. No. He’d tear her apart.

But sitting there beside the slumbering wolf, the churring of the meadow—the midday hum of crickets, cicadas, katydids—no longer seemed so fevered and desperate. She no longer felt the burring of their wings across her skin.

In the distance, Mop was climbing the field, waving his arms. Oh! It was time to bring the sheep in. Reluctantly, Rae stood.

“Rest, wolf,” she whispered. He did not open his eyes.

Leaving the bowl of water, Rae gathered up the pots of salve and Mop’s staff, then hurried away before Mop could come close enough to see the creature.

“Mop!” she called, running toward him. “I’m coming! Just now!”

Midway up the hillside, Mop paused, waiting for her.

“Daughter.” He caught her in his arms, his smile reshaping his whiskers. “With my staff even. And Ness’s salves. Aren’t you becoming the shepherd. But what’s this?” Taking her hand, he peered anxiously at her wrist, raising the bandages to see the wound beneath.

“Nothing.” Cheeks burning, Rae pulled her hand away, tucking it behind her back. “Nipped by a ewe is all, when I was trimming a hoof.”

He tousled her hair. “Says nothing about your qualities as a shepherd, daughter. I’ve all sorts of scars from hooves and horns… and one mouthy lamb that near took a knuckle off.” He held up a knobbed, scar-crossed finger. “But bites can be dangerous. Are you sure it’s all right?” He tried again to take her hand, but Rae folded her arms.

“I treated it.” She could not meet his eye. “Just as Ness taught me. It’s hardly anything, Mop. Promise. Just a scratch.”

“Well, show Ness later, will you?”

Rae nodded.

“Good.” He wrapped his arm about her shoulders. “Now let’s bring this unruly lot in together, shall we?” Putting his fingers to his lips, he gave a long shrill whistle. “To me!”

As they herded the sheep out of the meadow, Rae could not stop looking toward the place where she had left the wolf. How could she not tell Mop a wolf was in his field? How could she lie to her father again?

“My small shepherd,” Mop said as they walked back to the house together. “So quiet today!”

Rae tried to smile, but the weight of the lie—the weight of the wolf in the field—was too much. “Just thinking,” she said at last as Mop squeezed her hand.

XXII

NEVER MIND WORDS AND MAGIC AND MEANT TO

That evening, as the heat that had gripped the hillside finally gave way and the family sat in lantern light listening to the sound of the battering rain, Rae tried to keep her hands busy. She helped Mop rebraid an old harness; she helped Nessa strip leaves from dried herbs. Though she had managed to keep Nessa’s concerns about her wounded wrist at bay—I promise, Ness, it’s nothing, I used your salve, mostly just a bruise—she struggled to hold herself inside the house. She glanced again and again at the doorway, trying not to think of the injured wolf she had left in the fields. Finally, though, she could bear it no longer. “Have your songs—” she burst out, then stopped. She wasn’t sure she should ask.