Chapter 1
Donice
It was another ordinary day like any other, I got up, took care of the chickens and sheep, collected some herbs to prepare a bitter tea, took the eggs and started to prepare my breakfast, but a scream from one of the sheep made me run, and I found one of them stuck in the fence.
It was Aniette, she had been born the smallest puppy in the litter.
She had caught one of her paws on the fence and apparently had cut herself, I ran to save her, her little round eyes looked at me in pleading, there I felt my heart sink, I started to worry about her health, I took her inside my hut and went to bandage the paw, and only then did I realize that it was also broken, and it could take much longer than I would like for it to heal.
I know that any other farmer would simply sacrifice a sheep for less than that, but I only raised them for their wool, and I only raised chickens for their eggs, I was incapable of killing an animal that wouldn't attack me, and they were so kind to me that I considered them my family, after all it was all I had, it was just me, the old hut and them.
Aniette had a mark on her ear from having gotten tangled up in the fence before, I saw her born, I took care of her since she was a puppy and I would continue to take care of her.
I started by making a mixture with herbs from my yard, I left the little sheep inside my old wooden hut, applied the mixture to the cut and bandaged it, but I imagined it wouldn't be enough. I left her to recover and continued with the day's tasks, I needed to keep my plantation up to date, winter was approaching and I needed to keep food stocked for myself and my animals.
But during the night, as I imagined, Aniette the little sheep had a fever, even though I took care of it all night, the broken leg made everything much more difficult, I needed to do something. I tried to take care of it during the day, but still nothing, it was time to act.
I remembered one time my father had broken his arm working, he couldn't work and I had to pick some fruit in the nearby forest so we could have something to eat. My mother used the forbidden book from inside the wooden box, the book that she repeated every day that I couldn't touch, but ironically it was precisely the only thing that was left of them, the old wooden box that resisted the flames that burned my past, and my parents.
I only took it with me because it was the only thing I still had from them: this box and the necklace I always carried on my chest.
I spent the whole day reluctant to take it, my chest tightened just thinking about it, but it was necessary, one life depended on it, and I needed to do what needed to be done.
I opened my closet and took the box at the bottom, dusty, old, with the carvings of a tree and with the words: Iunae Lumen, which I didn't know what it meant and with pain in my chest, I opened it, inside there was a book with the same tree and the same words and I opened it slowly, the yellowed pages were full of recipes, and several of them I didn't understand and had no idea what they were for, but I remember the only time I saw my mother handle it, the recipe for healing bones, the page had a blue drawing, I tried to dig deep into my memory, I tried with all my might to remember, but my brain had erased a lot from that time, I leafed through the pages until I found it, the page with a blue drawing of a blue flower, wild blue lupine, the main ingredient of the recipe, a flower that I would only find in the heart of the forest, besides that I needed silver fir bark, and the rest I found in the backyard of my house.
I gathered my strength to go out into the forest, I never do that, it was a mix of a trauma that I didn't understand directly, with a fear that the shadows of the dense forest brought to me, but now I had no choice, I needed to go.
I put on my cloak, grabbed the daggers and knives I might need, closed the gate of my house and headed into the dark forest.
With each step I took, I regretted it a little more, but I thought about the little sheep in pain to force me to move forward, I have no idea how much time has passed, but I walked a long way into the heart of the forest to be able to find to that flower. The last time I actually went into the forest I was still a boy, running away from my tragedy, and a wolf made me end up entering the house I live in today, I haven't been anywhere near here since then, but a ray of sunlight penetrated through the closed tops of the trees and the bluish glow of the wild blue lupine flower jumped before my eyes, I ran without wasting time and collected enough for two doses, and just ahead I saw the silver fir tree, I used my dagger to remove the barks and kept everything in my pockets, but when I turned around a hole in the vegetation caught my attention, I thought about ignoring it, but it could be an animal needing help, and as I approached the grayish fur almost made me jump back.
It was a wolf.
But it wasn't big enough to be a male, probably it was a female wolf, my first instinct was to run away, but I saw a red tint in the fur near its neck, and how could I leave a wounded animal behind?
I got even closer and saw a large wound very close to the neck, and the wolf completely unconscious but still alive, I sighed deeply, I didn't believe I was going to do what I was about to do.
But I did.
I carefully picked up the wolf and placed her on my shoulders, I was afraid she would wake up, but she remained off, I only knew she was alive by the breathing and the weak heartbeat that I felt in my shoulders.
The way back seemed even bigger, my house seemed to never arrive again, until I finally saw my wooden fence and the old cabin with the stone chimney, as I approached the house it was as if I finally felt safe and finally had peace, my animals who always welcomed me with shouts of joy now looked at me suspiciously, tilting their heads, and my sheep hid.
“I had no choice, she was injured,” I said towards them as I got ready to open the door, when I entered the injured little Aniette opened her eyes wide and screamed in fright when she saw me enter with a wolf. “Calm down, she’s hurt, she won’t hurt you.” I said, placing the wolf on the rug next to the sofa, and the sheep, like all my animals, always seemed to understand what I was saying.
It was at least funny that I treated a wolf and a sheep at the same time, side by side.
The recipe would probably work for the wolf too, and I wasted no time, I gathered the rest of the ingredients and first applied it to the sheep's paws, which like magic seemed to stick the bones together again, and in seconds she stood up jumping, I couldn't believe it, at least it had worked, my trip to the forest was not in vain.
Little Aniette rubbed herself against my legs as a thank you before heading out the door, probably not wanting to be in the same place as the wolf. I still had half of the recipe, I applied it to the wolf's neck, where it looked like she had been bitten, but it was worse, it looked torn, cut, I applied the recipe and at the same time I used my fingertips to see if there was something there, and to my surprise there was a sharp object that cut my fingers. At the same time that her body was trying to heal itself, it seemed that it was preventing it, I used my dagger to move it and managed to remove it, it was the tip of a dagger, and the material seemed to burn the wolf, I removed the small object and applied the rest of the recipe. I turned to place the tip of the broken dagger on the counter behind me, and I heard a groan coming from the wolf, when I turned around my eyes couldn't believe what I was seeing, I felt my heart speed up and my soul leave my body and then back, when I looked at the hitherto injured animal and found a naked woman, lying on my rug with a wound on her shoulder.
She was a werewolf.
First chapter, I present you Donice.
