Doubts
The juniper smoke curled into playful spirals as Fleda waved her bread crust like a tiny sword, sugary crumbs catching in her chestnut braids. At seventeen years, her giggles still carried that hiccupping pitch I knew would deepen come her next growth spurt. Dad's chuckle rumbled beside me—a sound as warm and constant as our cottage's hearthstone.
"—and then," Fleda announced, kicking her legs so vigorously her leather shoes flew off, "Miss Gisela's rooster tried to steal my flower crown! So, I told it—"
"Language, firefly," Mom interjected without looking up from darning my torn tunic. Her needles flashed, mending the elbow I'd ripped during yesterday's ill-advised tree leap. At twenty-one years, I was supposedly the "mature" one. Tell that to the sap still crusting my hair.
The supermond dominated the sky, swollen to thrice its normal size—a glowing marble some celestial child might flick across the stars. Dad's astronomy lessons floated back: Once every eighteen years, but for us… My toes curled in the dewy grass. For elves, this moon meant something grander. A first tooth lost, a braid ceremony, or in my case tonight—marking twenty-one years since Dad found me wailing beneath a lightning-struck oak.
"Your turn, grump-a-lump!" Fleda's sticky fingers poked my cheek. "Make the dumb wish already!"
"Ermenfleda Ercangaud," Mom warned, though her lips twitched. "Respect the—".
"But she's taking forever!" My sister flopped onto her back; arms splayed like a starfish. "I already wished for ten thousand cows and a castle made of cheese!"
Dad's calloused hand ruffled my silver-white hair—lighter than any elf's in Ercangaud. "No rush, moonbeam. Some wishes…" His thumb brushed the locket at my throat, its strange runics hidden beneath my collar. "…need time to simmer."
The fire popped, jolting me back to when I was twelve years old, when I'd first understood this necklace wasn't like Fleda's carved acorn charms. "You came with it," Dad had said, voice tight in a way I didn't recognize until last winter, when wolves almost took Old Man Gerran's life. Fear.
"Adele's doing the creepy eye thing again!" Fleda stage whispered.
"Am not!" I stuck out my tongue, the motion automatic. Childish? Sure. But when your sister's idea of "subtlety" involves tadpoles in your boots, maturity crumbles fast.
The loaf had shrunken to raisin size when the owl cry came—low and mournful beyond the firelight. Fleda stilled, her mischief melting into the quiet question all young elves learn: What prowls beyond the glow?
I grabbed her ankle, shaking it gently. "Race you to the well?"
Her responding grin outshone the moon. "Loser licks the honey pot clean!"
We exploded into motion, bare feet slapping dirt still warm from yesterday's sun. Behind us, Mom's sigh carried fond exasperation. "Mind the nettle patch!"
***
Haaahm…
The familiar creak of our cottage's floorboards greeted me as I stretched, joints popping like roasted hazelnuts. Morning light filtered through moth-nibbled windows, painting dust motes gold above my rumpled bedroll. I scrubbed at the crusty corners of my eyes—curse those late-night Law functions Dad had me practicing—and stumbled toward the wash basin out back.
Cold well water shocked me awake. I blinked at my reflection in the dented tin mirror: silver braids fraying like old rope, sleep creases marring cheeks still round with childhood. Twenty-one years old, and I still looked like a kid who'd lost a fight with a thornbush.
"Mom?" My voice echoed through the too-quiet kitchen. No clang of iron pots, no scent of rye porridge burning at the hearth's edge. Just yesterday's bread hardening on the cutting board, a single raven feather left beside it like some cryptic note.
I checked the root cellar first, then the chicken coop. "Dad? Fleda?" My calls grew shriller as I circled the empty goat pen. No gangly sister dangling from the apple tree. No Dad humming off-key while mending tools. Just dew-soaked grass and the distant caw of crows.
Maybe it's a surprise, I told myself, fingers worrying the cold silver locket beneath my tunic. A few birthdays ago, they'd "forgotten" my special day only to ambush me with a honeycomb stolen from Old Gerran's apiary. This is just their weird grown-up game. First thing I woke late, then shocked by the sound of their ambush.
Back inside, I traced the grooves Dad's boots had worn into the threshold. The hearth's ashes lay cold. Fleda's favorite doll—a cornhusk thing missing an eye—sat abandoned by the firepit. My stomach growled, betrayal mingling with hunger.
"Fine then," I announced to the empty rafters. "More porridge for me."
The lie tasted bitter as I portioned the last withered carrot into my bowl. Sunlight crept across the floorboards as I settled at Dad's workbench, his leather-bound grimoire still open to yesterday's lesson: Intermediate Mana Allocation: Avoiding Combustive Feedback.
By noon, I'd redrawn the Law circle eight times. Eight. And even that still failed spectacularly, with no mana can pass through it, rendering the Law circles I meticulously drawn only an artistic scribble of runes and equations put together. As a result, charcoal smudged my fingertips black. While the crows' laughter outside grew louder.
***
The last Law circle dissolved from my palm as I slumped against the well, chest heaving. Evening sunlight painted the yard in sickly orange hues, my practice sword abandoned in the dirt where sweat had made it slip from my grip. My throat burned worse than the time Fleda dared me to eat a whole chili pepper. I stumbled toward the water bucket, legs wobbling like newborn fawn's.
Crash!
The front door slammed with such force that chickens scattered squawking into the bean stalks. I froze, dipper halfway to my lips. Water trickled down my chin as another crash shook the house—the sound of Dad's iron-booted stomps rattling Mom's herb jars in their shelves.
"D-dad…?" The word came out mouse quiet.
He stormed past the wash basin without glancing my way. Even through the steam rising from my sweaty tunic, I saw it—his face wasn't right. Not the warm russet of oak bark after rain, but the mottled purple-red of overripe plums. Veins bulged at his temples like earthworms after a storm. His eyes…
Oh stars, his eyes.
They locked onto mine as he passed—pupils shrunk to pinpricks; whites webbed with red. The look he'd given the wild foxes that once ate our goat, but sharper. Hungrier.
"MOVE!"
The roar sent me scrambling backward, bare feet slipping on wet stones. My hip hit the trough as he vanished into his bedroom. Water sloshed over the edge, soaking my leggings. I didn't dare to breathe until the door slammed again.
Creeeak.
The back gate's whine snapped me alert. Through blurry eyes, I saw Mom's straw hat abandoned by the fields. Her favorite apron—the one with sunflowers Fleda had embroidered last spring—lay trampled in the mud.
"M-Mom…?"
A scream tore through the twilight.
High. Piercing. Wrong-wrong-WRONG.
Not Fleda's play-shriek when we found snakeskins. Not Mom's laughter-round-the-firepit yell. This was animal. Raw. The sound of our old ewe when the wolves got into the pen.
I ran.
Thorns ripped at my ankles as I crashed through the blackberry thicket separating yard from fields. The locket bounced against my collarbone, colder than winter creek water.
"FILTH!"
Dad's roar hit first. Then the thwack—wood on flesh. A sound I knew from threshing day, but wetter. Closer.
Mom knelt in the barley stubble; arms curled around her middle. Her braids hung in mud-clumped ropes, the yellow ribbons she'd always tied every morning now scarlet. Dad's staff rose again, tipped with iron from the smithy.
Crack.
Her whimper pierced through the air, sending a jolt of panic through me. Fleda huddled against the scarecrow post, her small frame trembling as she buried her face in her hands. The screams that had once echoed around us had dissolved into choked hiccups, the kind that came after hours of crying. Fear radiated from her, palpable and raw, as she struggled to regain her composure. I could see the terror in her wide eyes, reflecting the shadows of the looming fields around us, and it broke my heart to witness her fear.
"Stop…" The word slipped out feather soft.
Dad didn't hear. The staff fell again.
"STOP!"
I launched forward before thinking, arms wrapping his waist like that time Fleda tried stopping the runaway cart. His tunic reeked of sour ale and sweat. The staff grazed my ear as he twisted.
"Let GO, brat!"
"Please!" I choked on snot and tears. "Daddy, please—"
The world flipped. Sky. Dirt. Sky again. Pain exploded in my gut—white-hot and squelching, like stepping on a nest of fire ants. I curled around the ache, retching breakfast's rye porridge onto the broken stalks.
Something warm trickled from my nose. When I wiped it, my fingers came away red.
"A-Adele…!"
Mom's hand brushed my ankle. Her little finger bent sideways, the nail torn off. Behind her, Dad loomed like the shadow monsters in Fleda's bedtime stories.
"Worthless whelp." His boot connected with my ribs. "Just like your whore moth—"
Crack.
The last thing I saw before darkness swallowed me was Dad's face—rage melting into fear as my chest hurts terribly, almost like it broke into two pieces.
***