When the Mountain keeps Secrets

The Howl Beyond the Light

The square doesn’t so much empty as dissolve. One moment the fiddler’s tune has everyone spinning and stamping, the next there’s a tremor in the crowd — a ripple of glances toward the far road — and the music falters. People drift apart, pairing off, heading for doorways.

No one says anything loud enough for me to catch, but I hear mutters tucked under breath, the same word repeated in different voices. Lupi.

Lucia’s fingers tighten lightly on my arm. “Time to go.”

Matteo is already moving, cutting a straight line through the thinning crowd. Lantern-light clings to him longer than it should, like it’s reluctant to let him walk into shadow. His scarf is loose again, collar open to the cold.

I hurry to catch up. “What happened?”

He glances back once. “Don’t ask.”

Lucia’s smile is faint and humourless. “Answers have their own prices.”

We pass the baker’s stall. The bread that smelled so rich earlier is now under a cloth, and the baker himself makes the sign of the cross as we go by. A woman handing out roasted chestnuts pauses, then presses three into my palm — one for each of us — murmuring a blessing I can’t quite hear.

The cold here has changed; it’s sharper now, as if something in the air has stripped away the softness. I keep expecting to see that broad shadow again between the houses. Instead, I see shutters closing just wide enough to leave a sliver for watching.

The lane narrows as we climb. It’s all stone here — wall, path, the thin lip of steps leading to the next terrace. Our breath hovers between us in quick clouds.

Halfway to Nonna’s, the sound comes.

A howl.

Not the quick, high cry of a fox. Not the barking yip of a stray dog. This is deep, drawn-out, and heavy enough that it seems to push at the stones themselves. It starts high on the plateau and works its way down into my ribs.

Matteo stops mid-step. His head tips slightly, like he’s not just listening, but sorting something in the sound.

Lucia says something in dialect, quick and low.

“Wolves?” I ask.

Matteo’s mouth flattens. “Maybe.”

The howl comes again — closer — and I’m sure I hear a second, shorter one answering. My skin prickles.

Lucia takes my hand without looking at me. “Inside,” she says.

We pick up pace. The village is quiet now, too quiet. The only sound is our boots and the wind in the higher rocks. Then — another change.

It’s like stepping into a patch of air that isn’t the same as the rest. Still, heavy, muffled. Even the cold feels thicker here.

Footsteps follow us.

Not fast. Not human.

They’re coming from the lane we just passed, the one that snakes toward the fortress wall. Slow, deliberate, padding.

Matteo turns his head slightly. His weight shifts in a way that makes my stomach knot — like a man who knows the shape of the thing behind him and is ready for it.

Lucia moves so that she’s between me and the sound. “Winter’s Step,” she says, and this time the name lands heavier, sharper. “Now.”

The sound stops.

The silence that follows is worse than the howl.

Then — it comes again. A long, slow prowl into the mouth of the lane. I see it clearly this time: silver-pale fur under the frost-haze, eyes the colour of frozen water. A wolf, but wrong somehow — taller, heavier, the way the bear-shadow was wrong by the chapel.

Matteo takes a step toward it.

“Matteo!” I grab for him, but my fingers close on empty air — he’s already halfway down the lane. The wolf doesn’t move away. It’s watching him.

A third sound cuts through — deeper, thicker, a low chest-deep rumble. The wolf’s head jerks toward it, every muscle tight.

And then it’s gone, melting up the slope like water poured into darkness.

The deeper sound lingers, a weight in my bones, before fading back into the night.

Matteo reappears, breath coming hard. His scarf is gone entirely. “We should get you home.”

Lucia’s voice is steady. “That wasn’t just wolves.”

“No,” Matteo says. “It wasn’t.”

⸻

Nonna Maria takes one look at the three of us in the doorway — cheeks raw from the wind, lantern smoke still clinging to our clothes — and waves us inside without a word.

“Close it tight,” she says. “It’s no night to be walking back.”

Lucia hangs her cloak on the peg, dark braid dripping faint frostmelt onto the floorboards. Matteo lingers by the threshold, as if he needs permission to come further. Nonna studies him a moment longer than me or Lucia, then jerks her chin toward the hearth.

“Warm yourselves. The wind’s moving strange tonight.”

Her words are quiet, but the way she sets the bar across the door makes the air in the room seem smaller.

We eat what’s left of the stew in comfortable silence, the fire throwing a gold halo over the bowls. Outside, the wind presses itself against the shutters in long, restless sighs.

“You’ll stay,” Nonna says finally. “All of you. No one goes out after dark.”

Lucia meets Matteo’s gaze over the rim of her bowl, and something passes between them — an agreement or a warning, I can’t tell.

My room is warm from the fire downstairs. The bed is broad enough for the three of us if we keep to our own sides, though Matteo stretches himself along the edge like a guard rail. Lucia lies on her back, hands folded on her stomach as if she’s listening to something in the dark.

The wind changes, sharper now, carrying with it the faintest thread of something… animal. Matteo shifts, pushes back the blanket. “Stay here,” he says quietly. “I’ll check the latch on the shutters.”

He’s gone before I can answer.

A long minute passes, then another. The wind has teeth now, rattling the eaves. From somewhere beyond the house comes a sound too heavy for the wind alone — a thump, then a low, vibrating growl that prickles the hairs along my arms.

Lucia’s eyes are open in the dark. “Keep still,” she murmurs.

There’s movement outside — not footsteps exactly, but the slow circling of something that knows we’re here. The growl deepens, and though I can’t see it, I can feel the shape of it in my mind: the height, the weight, the patience.

Another sound joins — not a snarl, but a deep, chesty bellow that makes the windowpane tremble. Then, silence.

The latch clicks. Matteo slips back in, snowmelt shining in his hair. He doesn’t say a word, just lies down again, breathing harder than before.

We’re quiet for a while. I start to think it’s over — until something scratches once against the wall, slow and deliberate.

I hold my breath.

And just when I think it’s gone, a sliver of moonlight finds the gap in the curtain, catching on two pale eyes fixed on the bed.

They blink once, and vanish — leaving only the sound of my heartbeat and the wind pressing in.

The scratching stops. The silence that follows is so thick I can hear the pulse in my ears.

Lucia’s breathing is steady beside me, but her eyes stay open, watching the dark.

I stay still, waiting for another sound, another shift in the air. None comes.

At some point — I don’t remember when — my eyes close.

When I open them again, the wind has gentled, the moon has slipped lower, and I’m not where I started.

I’m folded into warmth, my head against a chest that rises and falls in deep, even breaths.

Matteo’s arm is around me, his hand resting light as frost on my shoulder.

I tilt my head and he’s already looking down at me. His expression is unreadable — soft and watchful all at once.

Before I can speak, he dips his head and presses the faintest kiss to my hair, so quick I almost think I dreamed it.

Then he closes his eyes again, and the house settles back into silence — as if nothing had stirred the night at all.