Christmas with Nick Klaas

Part 7: Shadow in Wolf's Clothing

After tugging her coat back on, Noelle stepped out of the tavern and looked around. To the right were cheery streets, the inn, and—farther down—the pontoon pier. To the left was the outline of a beech and pine forest illuminated just by moonlight.

Noelle went left.

She'd lied to Avery; she was still hungry. But she had become overwhelmed at all the sights, sounds, and even smells attacking her senses, furiously and all at once. She needed to clear her head, and a quick stroll alone in the crisp, winter night seemed like her best option.

Her new clothes were warm, although the sweater's collar occasionally itched against her neck. But if she just imagined asphalt instead of ice, high-rise apartments instead of Nordic chalets, traffic lights instead of flickering lanterns, and the smell of urine mixed with Chinese food instead of the ever present aroma of gingerbread spice, it was just like walking in Manhattan after a night of partying.

Once Noelle had left the muffled carol singing behind, only the sharp crunch of frozen snow under her boots broke the otherwise silent night. The cold air burned in her lungs, but the peace she found by being the only person in the immediate vicinity was priceless. Her previous fatigue was gone, having been replaced by an inexplicable urge to keep walking. Before she knew it, Noelle had passed several rows of houses and was standing at the edge of a thicket.

The trees had grown far enough apart to wander between, but close enough together where their branches—long pine needles covered in a shimmering layer of snow—touched. There was no movement around or within, and only the occasional ray of bright moonlight shone through, as if illuminating a path just for her.

Watch out for the wolves. Piet's warning popped back into her mind, but it was quickly replaced by the bar maid's insistence on the unlikeliness of such an encounter. Which should she believe? The innkeeper with the flirtatious smile who could have had an ulterior motives or a waitress who knew nothing of her and therefore no reason to lie?

Pushing aside a low-hanging branch, Noelle entered the forest.

Trudging through the underbrush reminded her of wandering around in cane fields in St. Kitts as she played hide-and-go-seek with the local kids. Except in a much colder setting, of course. Just like then, there was something freeing in exploring without limitations, in forging her own path in the pristine powder.

"Aooo." The howl came from the distance sending a chill through her, stopping Noelle dead in her tracks. Frantically looking around, she saw no movements or changes in shadows.

"Pull yourself together," she said to herself out loud while searching for her footprints in the snow to lead her back to the town.

But there were none.

That's impossible, she thought, blinking to clear her vision of perhaps a trick of light. It was no good. No matter which way she looked, all Noelle saw outside her immediate circle of distraught movements was virgin snow.

After taking a deep breath and doing her best to recall which of the nearly identical looking trees she'd passed, Noelle headed back the way she (hopefully) came.

"Aooo," another howl rang out, this time louder and closer.

Noelle increased her pace.

There are no wolves here, she mentally tried to dispel her greatest fear with logic.

"Aooo," the creature answered, as if reading her thoughts.

Dodging a fallen branch she was sure she didn't cross before, Noelle changed directions. She ran even faster now, swerving between the bare trunks of tall beeches and the spiky needles of evergreen pines. The dry or frozen vegetation grabbed at her fleeing body like the claws of a predator entrapping its prey.