Chapter 6

On their way back that day, they passed through a birch grove.

The northern birches were different from the southern ones. Their trunks were slimmer, and their bark was as white as paper, streaked with black horizontal lines. The wind swept through the grove, turning the leaves over to reveal their silvery-gray undersides. The entire grove shimmered in the wind like a signal.

She walked ahead, and he followed behind. She could hear his footsteps, lighter than hers and almost silent as they fell on the fallen leaves. Yet, she could pinpoint his exact position in her mind. He walked up beside her slowly.

The backs of their hands brushed against each other.

It wasn’t intentional or accidental; it was simply the inevitable result of two people walking side by side on a narrow path.

Their hands touched for less than a second.

In that moment, she felt the warmth of his hand, higher and warmer than normal.

She slipped her hand into her pocket.

He slipped his hand into his pocket, too.

They kept walking. The birch grove shimmered in the wind. Neither of them spoke.

That night, she lay awake for a long time. Not because of pain, but because of the lingering warmth on the back of her hand.

She slipped her hand out from under the covers and held it in the moonlight for a long time.

On the night of the full moon, she had no premonition.

The day had been just like any other. Erik took her to a higher pass to the north, where they could see the next fjord and the mountain ranges beyond.

The mountains lay in layers, their colors shifting from deep green to gray-blue and finally blending into the sky. She stood at the pass as the biting, cold wind swept in from the north.

He untied his scarf and handed it to her. She didn’t refuse. The scarf carried his scent—pine resin, firewood smoke, and something indescribable and wild.

She wrapped the scarf around her neck and buried the lower half of her face in it.

“Thank you.”

He nodded.

By the time they reached the bottom of the mountain, it was dark.

In August up north, night falls a little earlier than in July, but only slightly. The gray-blue twilight was deeper than in the summer, closer to true night. They parted ways outside his cabin. She said, "See you tomorrow."

He replied, "Okay."

She walked back to her own cabin. She glanced back. He was still standing in the doorway, the glow of the fire shining through the half-open door and tracing his outline into a silhouette.

She fell asleep.

She woke up suddenly in the middle of the night as if something had tapped her on the shoulder.

The moonlight was too bright.

The full moon in the north is different from the one in the south. Here, the moon hangs low over the ridges, disproportionately large and bright.

Moonlight poured in through the window, bathing the entire room in a silvery-gray glow. The moonlight on the quilt and floor was cool. She reached her hand into the light, and her fingers were illuminated until they seemed almost transparent.

She sat up. Her heart was racing, though she couldn’t explain why.

She put on her coat. She pushed open the door and walked out.

Later, when she recalled this moment, she thought to herself, What if I hadn’t gone out then? But one cannot speculate. She simply followed an indescribable intuition as she walked along the path she’d taken so many times before toward his cabin.

The forest at night was a world apart from the forest during the day.

The trunks of the pine trees were black in the moonlight, their crowns an even darker shade of black, and only the tips of their needles were outlined in silver by the moon. The moss, saturated with moonlight, glowed faintly.

Mica fragments on the rocks reflected tiny specks of light, like stars scattered across the ground. She hadn’t brought a flashlight, but she didn’t need one. The moonlight was bright enough to see every pebble and clump of wild grass along the path.

She heard her own footsteps and breathing. In the distance, she heard the sound of the fjord’s water gently lapping against the shore.

When she was about fifty meters from the cabin, she stopped.

Behind the cabin, there was a clearing where split firewood and other miscellaneous items were usually piled up. At that moment, the moonlight fell perfectly on the clearing, illuminating it as if it were daytime.

First, she heard a sound.

It was a low, rumbling vibration emanating from deep within the chest. It didn’t sound human. Nor did it sound like any animal she knew. The frequency was so low that she didn’t hear it as feel it somewhere behind her sternum, resonating in sync.

Then came the outline.

A massive, silver-gray figure emerged from behind the cabin. It stood on all fours. Its back was nearly as high as her waist.

It was a wolf.

But it wasn’t just any wolf.

It was bigger than any wolf she had ever seen in photographs or videos. Its shoulder blades rose high, and its spine flowed smoothly down to its hind legs. Its fur was silver-gray and shifted in the moonlight. It wasn't a static color, but a living one, like mercury. It was as if the moonlight itself had been woven into solid form.

It shook its fur in the moonlight. The silver-gray fur rippled out from its spine to both sides like ripples caused by a stone thrown into water. Then it raised its head.

It had golden eyes.

The gold flashed in the moonlight for an instant, shining directly into her pupils.

She should have run. But her feet were nailed to the ground.

She should have screamed. No sound came from her throat.

She just stood there, staring at the wolf.

She watched that massive, silver-gray creature tilt its head back.

She watched its silhouette begin to shift—not in any way she had imagined "shapeshifting" should look, but rather like a heat wave warping the air, and like ice melting into water and flowing into different shapes. Lines shifted, contracted, and reassembled. Its limbs lengthened, its spine straightened, and its fur receded, revealing the skin beneath.

A few seconds later Erik stood in the moonlight—human-shaped, naked. .

A faint, silvery sheen lingered on his shoulder blades as if the moonlight refused to fade from his skin. His eyes were still golden. Then he blinked. They returned to the glacial pale she knew so well.

He saw her.

She turned and ran.

Branches lashed her face, and her feet struck something sharp. She felt no pain. She only knew that she had to run, to get away, and to return to a place with walls and locks.

Behind her, she heard footsteps—fast, but not the rhythm of a hunt. Not the sound of four-legged running. They were human footsteps.

She dashed into her cabin and slammed the door shut. Her back pressed against the door and she gasped for breath.

Her lungs began to feel constricted again. The cotton turned to shards of glass. A taste of rust rose in her throat. Her legs shook from the tops of her thighs to her ankles. She pressed her hands against her knees but couldn't steady herself.

The footsteps stopped outside the door.

Silence.

Then, Eric’s voice came out: “Maya.”

She didn’t answer. Her hands and her whole body were shaking. The image of those golden eyes was etched in her mind, present whether she opened or closed her eyes. Silver-gray fur shimmered in the moonlight. His silhouette shifted with that irreversible, ancient grace.

“Open the door.”

Her back was pressed against the door. The wood was cold. She could feel each vertebra pressing against the door; every single one trembled.

"You're—" Her voice caught in her throat.

"You're Ulv."