Wolves Among Us (5 page)

Mia ducked back down.

The woman had tried to get to her front door. Why? She must have known the sheriff lived here. Clearly she needed his help. Mia bit her lip. What had she done, hiding like this? But no, she couldn’t have helped the woman. Not with that man upon her and Bjorn away on duty. She wished this woman hadn’t come here, hadn’t involved Mia in her trouble.

Mia heard a rasping sound and pushed her face back up to steal another look. The man dragged the woman by her feet, and the woman did not resist. The two passed under a strong shaft of moonlight as the man heaved the woman by the feet over a fallen log. In the moonlight, Mia saw the woman’s head flop to the side as she went over the log, dead.

Mia gasped as the whites of the dead woman’s eyes reflected the moonlight. The man dragging her stopped, his shadowed face directed at the window. Mia ducked down, forcing her fingers into her mouth for something to bite down on. Had he seen her? He might come for her next. He might kill her—Alma and Margarite, too.

She lurched across the floor to the door, pressing her back into it with all her strength, the wood making tiny scratches all over her back. She bit down onto her fingers until she could no longer taste the salt on her skin, until she tasted blood from the little thin red indentations along her fingers. She licked them clean and made a fist instead, pressing it onto her lips. Any minute Bjorn could return. Any minute they would be safe. Any minute.

Alma turned, still asleep, as was Margarite.
Please, blessed mother of Jesus,
Mia prayed silently.
Do not let them wake.
She sat, pressing with her back and then her legs, pressing until her muscles cramped. She would bar the door. Nothing she could do about the window. She was probably a fool for barring the door when he could come in through the window, but she had to try. If he came in through the window, she had her blade.

She did not know how long she sat, pushing against the door. Darkness deceived, changing the shadows all around her so that she could not fix with certainty upon a time. At last she heard church bells, twelve in all, as rain pummeled the roof and ran in through the window. Mia watched it run down her wall and across her clean floor in unpredictable rivers, stirring up mud and ruining all her work. Her clothes stuck to her body, sweat drying in patches but leaving her sticky and sour.

She heard the torrent grow harder. Rain would wash everything away before the new morning. Everyone in town would be waking in a few hours, stirring the pots, tearing off hunks of bread and cheese to set out for breakfast. Children would be fetching new wood or eggs. Only Mia would remember what had happened in the night. There would be no footsteps, no trace of the murder. What would she say to Bjorn? Bjorn would think Mia had nightmares. He would tell her to work more, that he could protect her from everything except her own imagination. But tired bodies were not prone to bad dreams, and so he would urge her to work more.

Mia saw Alma kick off the blanket, flopping over onto her stomach, her thumb in her mouth, her hair flayed in wild directions all around her head. Mia did not like it. The girl should be hidden until Bjorn came home, until they were safe.

Please,
Mia thought,
please let Bjorn come home soon.
Please let me hear his footsteps. Please. Bjorn will make us safe.

Mia jerked awake. How long had she slept? She heard Bjorn’s footfall stirring the dead, wet leaves along the path. She checked from the window’s corner to be sure. Bjorn had returned.

Mia threw open the front door, racing for him, calling his name. He caught her by the waist.

“What is it, Mia? What is it?”

“A man came. He killed a woman, right on our very own path, right in front of the door.”

“What?”

“I wanted you to come home so badly. I thought he might kill us, too.”

Bjorn pulled her in closer, one hand still around her waist, the other going to her cheek. He looked all around at the ground, wet with puddles and washed clean of any footsteps. He frowned.

“I know, Bjorn, there is no evidence. But you have to believe me.”

He softly brushed her hair out of her face. “It has been a hard winter for you. Could you have been dreaming?”

“No. No, it was no dream. The rain washed the footprints away. But they were here.”

“Why would they come here? If you think clearly, you will see that it must have been a dream. Who would come to the sheriff’s home to commit murder?”

“I don’t know. And I couldn’t understand what they said. But I did see it happen. Someone died.”

He felt her forehead. “You’re warm. Do you feel well?”

“Bjorn—”

“I do not know what you saw, Mia, but there’s no evidence here. No one in town is even stirring. I just returned from there.” He looked thoughtful. “Are you sick? Do you want me to call Father Stefan?”

“I know what I saw,” she said, pushing against him.

He took her in again. “Shhh. I will ask the innkeeper if she has hosted anyone who would cause trouble. If it happened as you said, I will arrest him and have him hanged by dusk. Does that please you?”

She nodded, knowing he would feel her nod against his chest. She did not want to speak.

He pulled her hand up to his face, looking closely at the reddened teeth marks visible across her hand, frowning.

“What did you do to yourself?”

Mia tucked her hand in the folds of her shift.

Bjorn hesitated before speaking, as if judging whether she was able to discuss his work in her condition. “The town has been buzzing with gossip since Cronwall abandoned his wife. I have been called on to settle fistfights between men who think Catarina caused it and men who think Cronwall found another woman in a faraway city. There have been wives scolding their husbands for not stopping Cronwall from leaving, and a few bawds even blame me.”

“I am sorry.”

“Please do not add to my burdens. I will find the man, if there is one. If he was real, he’s probably a trader. Already gone by now.”

“But what about the woman?”

He sighed, closing his eyes. Mia tried to soften her demand.

“There would be a body. If it happened.” Mia added the last bit out of obedience. She did not need to be right. Not if it added to his burdens. Not if her sex was prone to imaginations. “Do you want me to go back out and look?” he murmured, sounding so tired. “I will do it, if it will give you peace.”

Alma stirred inside the house. She would want to eat soon. Bjorn was surely hungry too. Mia straightened herself at once, standing back from Bjorn. She needed to do better for everyone’s sake. She had slept, and she could not prove the events had been real. It might have been imagination, the most universal of women’s sins. Father Stefan would be angry with her.

The sun would be on the horizon within the hour. It would be a beautiful spring morning.

Stefan’s fist hit the door again and again. He would go on hitting it, splintering it if he had to, until Bjorn answered. He could apologize later.

Mia appeared.

“Mia, get Bjorn. Immediately,” Stefan said. She looked terrible, as if she’d had no sleep. Stefan wished she would take better care of herself. Bjorn said other women flirted with him daily, but Bjorn always remained faithful. How long would he stay strong under such temptation? Still, Stefan could not warn Mia. The sacrament of confession could not be broken, even to aid a struggling soul.

Mia shook her head no. “Let him sleep for a few more hours, and then I will send him to you.”

“Wake him up, Mia. Now.”

“Father, please. He is exhausted. Let him sleep.”

Father Stefan stuck his foot in the door, pushing it open wider. “Forgive me, Mia, but I must get Bjorn.”

“What is it, Stefan?”

Bjorn appeared from the bedroom. His face sagged with exhaustion. Stefan pushed the door open all the way, going to Bjorn to whisper, keeping his back to Mia. Bjorn nodded then pointed at her.

“She heard an argument last night in the woods beyond our home. A trader, she thinks. No one she recognized. I thought it had been a dream.”

Mia couldn’t help it; she smiled at her husband. She had not imagined it. She had not been a poor wife to tell him.

“The merchants are going mad with speculations,” Stefan said. “The rumors will ruin them all. People will go to another village to buy.” Stefan had one hand on Bjorn’s arm, pulling him toward the door.

“Let me get my cloak,” Bjorn said, stepping back into the bedroom.

“Have you had breakfast?” Mia asked Father Stefan. He looked at her as if she spoke another language. She waved to the little table by the fire. “Breakfast?”

“No,” Stefan said. “Thank you,” he added. “Do you want to tell me what you saw?”

Bjorn stepped out, ready to go. “Keep the food warm, Mia. And don’t go into town today. Not until I know who is among us.”

“But I do not want to be alone.”

“I’ll send Erick to check on you,” Stefan said, holding the door open for Bjorn before following behind. “He will even stay with you if you feel uneasy.”

“But what should—”

They closed the door and were gone.

Mia wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, and it came away with bits of straw from the floor and mud. She pinched herself as punishment. She should have washed herself. She must have looked like a fool.

Margarite stirred. She probably needed to relieve herself before the pain returned.

Mia went back to her life.

Chapter Five

The two bodies splayed across the church steps had none of the peaceful repose Stefan was accustomed to. There was no embroidered pillow or handsome cloak. Their limbs were spread apart, splattered with mud. Stefan crossed himself, wondering again if this was a dream. Shiny fat flies buzzed around Cronwall. His face was bloated. The woman lay facedown, thrown over him as if in an embrace, her skirts exposing her slender white calves. Stefan had never seen a woman’s calves, but he cleared his throat and tugged at the edge of the skirt to cover her, looking away from her body. He saw Bjorn taking in the scene with an expression of sadness and anger. A dark resolve passed across his face.

Bjorn had no other hesitation, no signs of shock. He set to work with a pursed mouth, pulling out the pockets lining the man’s belt. They were filled with money. Using his foot, Bjorn rolled the woman’s body off the man’s, her dead eyes open to the morning sun.

Stefan shielded his eyes from the glare, craned his neck, and leaned closer in. He wanted to be mistaken. He asked God to take it back, to make it go away.

It was Catarina.

Stefan inhaled with a high-pitched, keening gasp, like a child about to burst into a wail. Bjorn gave him a withering glare. Stefan knew he shouldn’t react to death this way. He saw it every month. But he wanted to point out to Bjorn that death and murder were not equal. Death was natural, to be expected even. Murder was a stunning perversion.

“What do we do?” Stefan asked.

Bjorn held the fistful of money out to the crowd. “This was not a robbery. Did anyone see anything? Does anyone want to speak?”

No one in the growing crowd moved.

“Why would both bodies be left on my steps?” Stefan asked.

Bjorn watched the crowd. “This is a message.” He watched the crowd, his eyes moving back and forth, searching for something Stefan did not understand.

Bjorn turned back, shaking his head, and handed the money to Stefan. “Keep this.”

Erick came out of the church with a blanket, offering it to Bjorn.

“Set it there. I’ll cover them when I’m done,” Bjorn said.

Erick did what he was told. He looked as if he, too, was wandering about in a dream, lost and confused.

“Erick? Check on Mia and her home. She will worry if she hears news of this and is alone,” Stefan said. The young man nodded and disappeared into the crowd.

Bjorn turned and knelt by Catarina’s body, ran his fingers along her neck, then pushed against her cheek. Her head twisted as far as he pushed it. “Broken,” Bjorn said. The words carried to the back of the crowd with great urgency by the onlookers.