A Wolf Among Thorns

The Taming of Astralune

The next morning, Ava was up and running through the forest again at the c***k of dawn, only a slight stiffness in her right arm to show for the previous day’s wound. She had gotten lucky; the unicorn’s horn had slid along her arm and had not cut too deeply, but her gruesome death had haunted Ava all night long in her dreams, and frustration, coiled together with guilt, lay heavy in her gut. Thinking back on last evening’s punishment – her parents had scolded her soundly and sent her to bed without dinner for defying their instructions to not go deep into the forest by herself – Ava ran wildly, thumping her legs down harder than was necessary as she seethed against the injustice of the situation. She knew her parents were right to worry about her, but she was nearly eighteen, for heaven’s sake. By rights she was an adult, but they refused to stop treating her as a child. Gradually, however, as she ran, the tension slowly melted away from her straining muscles, and Ava found herself grateful for the creeping burn of her exertion.

The woods near her home were ancient and mysterious, yet Ava needed no map. Instinct guided her as she raced her way back to the clearing where she had fought the Blight-infected unicorn mare. She broke through the tree line, just as she knew she would, and found herself again standing at the edge of the small mud puddle tucked away in the small glade. The body of the mare was gone, and in its place, a gorgeous shrub stood, glowing softly, with leaves of pearlescent silver and flowers of a radiant white color streaked through with veins of black. Ava gaped at the shrub in shock, even as she drifted closer to it, running a finger across the velvety petals in wonder.

A quick silvery flash shot across the corner of her eye. Ava turned her head and found herself again face to face with the mare’s surviving offspring. The little foal eyed Ava distrustfully, his little ears pinned back, and stamped a hoof, but he did not dare to come any closer.

Holding her breath, Ava lowered herself deliberately to the muddy ground, heedless of the new pair of pants she was wearing. Her gray-green eyes held the foal’s gaze as she made herself as small as possible, spreading her arms to show she was no threat. She called to the colt in soft, crooning tones, and, moving slowly, pulled a few chunks of apple from her pocket, holding them out as a peace offering. The colt stopped stamping, but still watched her warily, flicking its diminutive ears back and forth uncertainly.

“I’m sorry,” Ava breathed quietly to the colt. She felt a little ridiculous speaking to an animal, but she had a sense from the intelligence in the colt’s gaze that he understood at least some of what she was telling him. “I’m sorry about yesterday,… about everything. I didn’t want to do it, you know.” She stopped, fighting back tears, and swallowed a few times before continuing. “I… It was her or me. She wasn’t herself anymore. She would have hurt a lot of people, and I didn’t know any other way to stop her…” Ava sucked in a breath. “I can sense it, you know. I can sense the Blight in people and animals. Sometimes I can beat it out of someone. But by the time their physical appearance changes, it’s too late.” The foal blew out lightly through his nostrils and shifted his weight around on his hoofs. “I don’t have any friends,” Ava confessed. “And… I’d like to be friends, if that’s okay. If you want to. I’d like to take care of you. I didn’t have a choice, I don’t know if she’d still have taken care of you anyway after a while, but… it’s still my fault that you’re alone. And I’d like to make it better, if I can.” She gently laid the apple chunks on the ground, then backed away, still facing the foal. “I’ve got to go, but I’ll see you here tomorrow. And I’ll bring you something more to eat, too.” Ava backed up a couple of steps, then turned and ran out of the clearing and away into the morning.

Every day after that, Ava found excuses to visit the little glade in the woods, even if only for short whiles. The young unicorn never strayed far from the clearing. As summer wound on, the mud slowly dried, and the shrub continued to develop even as the colt began to fill out and grow. Ava didn’t know much about horses, and she couldn’t buy hay without arousing her parents’ suspicions; but she could bring things like apples, broccoli, sugar cubes and rolled oats. She never failed to bring the colt at least a few bites to eat, and would sit and tell him about her day. In the beginning, she had been unable to come up with a fitting name for him, but finally she had taken to calling him Astralune, after the shimmering purity of his silver fur.

For many weeks, Astralune would wait to eat until long after Ava was out of sight. However, he never failed to devour her offerings. Every time she came by, he would snort and stamp at her mistrustfully for a few minutes before settling down as she began to talk. She learned to sit downwind from where he was, since a whiff of her scent was enough to make him panic and disappear for the day. But eventually he stopped snorting at her, and would occasionally turn his head away from her if something happened to catch his eye. And one day, weeks after their fateful first meeting in their little forest hideaway, Astralune dropped his head and scarfed down the food Ava had brought, not bothering to wait for her to leave. Ava could barely contain her excitement, but she forced herself to remain outwardly calm so as to avoid frightening him again. That day, Ava noticed that the black veins were beginning to melt away from the shrub that had grown up where Astralune’s mother had breathed her last.

 After that day, progress was a bit more rapid. In just a few more weeks, Astralune was accepting the food straight from Ava’s hand. He still shied a bit at her touch and would snort whenever he happened to catch her scent on the wind, but even that was slowly improving until, one day, she was able to gently place a hand on his neck and stroke him. His fur was every bit as soft as it looked, and was even beginning to glow softly, to match the shrub which now had several more blooms and showed nary a trace of black veining. Ava couldn’t help but admire the stunning creature she’d been coming to visit every day for the past three months. He had filled out and grown quite a bit from the spindly, gangly creature she’d first seen cowering behind his mother’s body. His mane was slowly beginning to lengthen, and he was starting to lose some of the coltishness he had about him. Ava had always wanted a puppy, but having Astralune’s company, she didn’t mind her parents’ refusal to allow her to buy one half so much.

It wasn’t easy for Ava to keep those visits to the clearing a secret. Already her family had remarked on how often she was disappearing into the woods now. More and more, they would saddle her with tasks that she would have to complete before the day was over, or risk further punishment. “If you have time to be gallivanting all around those woods, you have time to do your share at home,” her father reasoned. “You’re eating like a horse, too. Might as well work for your keep.” Ava bit her tongue on the sharp retort that she wanted to fling back at him, turning back to her scrubbing while her body trembled with the effort of keeping her thoughts at bay. “I say, Ava,” her sister May singsonged as she stomped through the kitchen, sketchbook and pencils in hand. “Better not complain about the housework. Least you can do is do your chores before you sneak out to see your lover in the woods.”

Ava snapped upright, her eyes blazing with fury. “At least I’m out running and keeping myself sharp instead of sitting at home daydreaming over a cartoon character with stars in his eyes,” she retorted. “Some of us have a taste for more than just being indoors our whole lives!”

“Ava!” her father spat. “Stop it! Apologize to your sister. And you better not have a lover anywhere in the woods! You’re too young for that!”

Ava rolled her eyes, trying her hardest to curb her rising irritation. “I’m almost eighteen, Father! I’ll be legal in just a few more weeks. And if May doesn’t like me telling it how it is, then she shouldn’t be trying to bait me in the first place! Don’t dish it out if you can’t handle it!” She tossed the rag she had been using to wipe down the counters into the sink and stormed out of the kitchen, slamming her bedroom door behind her as she flung herself down onto her bed. Even in the solitude of her room, she refused to let the stubborn tears fall, so they continued to burn the backs of her lids.

 Ava knew she couldn’t keep Astralune a secret forever. She had no intention of telling her family about him. She knew full well that being in the possession of a unicorn would bring them all the fame, money and prestige they could ever want, but she would never do that to Astralune. As time passed, he had begun coming to meet her every day at the edge of their clearing, and sometimes, when she was delayed more than usual, she would find him standing there waiting for her. Increasingly, however, she would find her parents scrutinizing her suspiciously. She knew they had been in her room once or twice; Ava had never been so grateful that she wasn’t a diary sort of girl. May, too, had tried to follow her once, but Ava was in much better shape and knew the forest better, and she quickly left her sister far behind. Ava knew that it wouldn’t be long before she was cornered, and her mind raced to come up with a better idea to keep Astralune safe and hidden away. 

   As the days leading up to her eighteenth birthday faded into each other and she had not yet thought of a viable solution to her problem, her sense of urgency grew. In her heart of hearts, she knew that ultimately she would have to leave home; and while she was the most self-sufficient in her family, the thought of being all alone in the world frightened her. She wasn’t entirely certain she could survive by herself in the wild. And so, caught in the throes of her anxiety on the night before her birthday, Ava slipped noiselessly from her bed and into her mother’s flower garden. Falling to her knees in the soft dirt, upturned face bathed in the ethereal glow of the full moon, she let silent sobs wrack her body as twin rivulets of tears washed shiny streaks down her face.