Descent of Wolves

Birthdays, Blights, and Bleeding Hopes

            The end of spring used to usher in warm weather and the hum of the summer fireflies. Summers in the Empire of Sylestine had never been ordinary, they weren't humid or stuffy, no, they were like dreams made real with all the coziness of being wrapped in a blanket or a loved one's embrace.

             Summer had begun to wink out of existence the year Maloria turned eight years of age, as if it knew what was to come and it couldn't hang on any longer.

             That spring Maloria had grown to find that the woods weren't as horrifying as she'd been told they were, and neither were the wolves that inhabited them. She'd come to see the Harkharlow woods as a place of wonder, of wishes and fairytales yet to happen. The woods were her friend, and so were the wolves.

             The wolves, Maloria had come to find, all breathed the same air of magic, of impossible abilities and infinite possibilities. The woods breathed their own sense of magic as well, an ancient power song the whispered on the wind and made the woods appear as if they were alive and to Maloria, they were.

            Shade had hardly left Maloria's side since the day she'd met the wolf and Maloria had named Shade shortly after meeting him with the thought that the wolf moved as she thought shadows moved. Shade never ceased to show up for Maloria and after the disaster that had been the day that she'd turned eight years of age; she had made up her mind that Shade and the other wolves were really the only ones who would always be there.

The 21st Year of the Amara Malediction:

             Maloria sat in the dim lit kitchen as her mother baked and had the odd feeling that something was going to happen. Being eight did not feel much different from being seven, and upon telling mother that, Maloria received a small, lighthearted chuckle. Maloria's mother radiated with a warmth no one else could copy when she laughed, her light brown skin and dark brown hair seemed to glow in a way no one else's could with a mere smile and Maloria wondered in that moment if she would ever be as pretty.

             Maloria's mother smiled in her cheery way as she topped a large chocolate cake in small candles and lit each one lilting a melodious "happy birthday, my dear". Maloria's father walked in at that point and with a beaming grin added "make a wish". Maloria blew out the candles and couldn't think of anything she wanted more than what she had, so she wished that things would stay the same. That's when she heard the dreaded sound of the Et Iustus. Maloria's mother shared a worried glance with her father and told Maloria to stay put, that everything would be fine.

           Maloria watched her mother open and close the small wooden door leading out of the house, and she knew in that moment that everything would change.

           Maloria never saw her mother alive again and she decided that she was never going to make another wish for as long as she lived.

            Maloria's father locked himself away in his study, and Maloria spent the rest of that ill-fated day in tears only to be comforted later by Shade, who somehow managed to be by her side as she cried.