Blood on the Mountain Wind
The sound of shovels clinking against rock and steel filled the cold mountain air. The sun was barely visible behind a canopy of low-hanging clouds as Violet Grey tightened the worn gloves on her hands and hauled another sack of gravel to the edge of the temporary construction site.
Her body ached. Her fingers throbbed from the chill, and the cheap boots she bought from a roadside stall were soaked through with morning dew. But none of that mattered. She couldn’t afford to care.
“Violet! You’re pushing yourself too hard again,” one of the older workers called out. A kind, wrinkled man named Mark who sometimes shared his lunch with her.
“I’m fine, really,” she replied with a tired smile. “Just need to finish this section before the foreman does his rounds.”
Mark shook his head but let it go. Everyone here respected Violet. She was the kind of girl who showed up early, worked hard, and never complained not even when the pay was barely enough to cover her ramen dinners.
But no one knew her truth.
No one knew that at 23, she was still a full-time university student juggling part-time jobs like spinning plates on shaky sticks. No one knew she had a mother who’d been in a coma for thirteen long years. Or that her grandmother’s bones were too brittle now to carry hospital bills, and Jennifer her mother’s best friend had already sacrificed too much to help.
Violet didn’t want to be a burden to anyone anymore.
That’s why she didn’t complain. That’s why she climbed these icy slopes to mix cement and lift gravel, even when her back screamed for rest.
It was already past six when the last truck packed up and rumbled away down the mountain road. Violet stayed behind to finish the last few tiles on the shed roof. She wanted the extra hour’s pay.
As she descended the hill, her breath fogged the air. The sun was dipping low, painting the mountain range in smears of gold and shadow. The chill had sharpened into a biting wind. She wrapped her scarf tighter around her neck.
Then she saw it.
A flash of silver and black against the dying light.
A wolf.
It lay just off the trail, half-covered in fallen leaves and dried blood. Its side heaved with shallow breaths, one leg twisted unnaturally. Violet froze. Every instinct screamed at her to run.
Wolves weren’t common here.
This wasn’t some wild pup either. It was massive its silver touched black fur gleamed even through the filth. Its body was muscled, powerful, yet broken.
Then its eyes opened.
They were blue. Not just blue ocean blue, like sunlight through the sea. For a moment, Violet forgot to breathe.
And then the memories slammed into her like a freight train.
Fifteen years ago.
The crash.
Her mother’s screams.
Blood.
Her father’s cold hand.
Being lost in the forest.
The traffickers.
The glowing eyes of the wolf that had saved her life.
She hadn’t seen it again. Not until now.
Was it possible?
Could it be ?
The wolf whined softly, its gaze locked on hers, as if it recognized her too.
Violet stumbled forward before she could even think. She shrugged off her coat and laid it over the beast. Her rational brain begged her to stop this was insane.
But something deep inside something ancient and pulsing told her this creature was no threat.
“You’re not dying here,” she whispered, voice trembling. “Not after you saved me once.”
With difficulty, she managed to wrap the wolf in an old blanket from the site’s emergency bin and, using her last bit of strength, dragged it to her battered hatchback parked down the slope. The drive home was hellish. She kept checking the rear seat, terrified the wolf might wake and maul her—or worse, not wake at all.
But they made it.
Her home was a shabby little apartment on the edge of town. Peeling wallpaper. Squeaky floors. Flickering lights. But it was home.
Violet laid the wolf down gently in the bathtub, its massive frame barely fitting. She cleaned the blood and treated what wounds she could with her meager first-aid kit. Her hands were shaking as she threaded a needle to stitch a gash near its shoulder.
"You better not die on me," she whispered, biting her lip. "I’m too broke to host funerals."
By midnight, she was falling asleep at the edge of the tub, head resting on her knees.
Then the sound of something cracking like bones shifting jolted her awake.
She looked up and screamed.
Because the wolf was gone.
In its place, covered in blood and steam and moonlight, was a man.
His body was sprawled awkwardly in the tub, limbs too long for the space, his skin pale and slick with water. A line of stitches on his chest glowed slightly, like ink under blacklight. His hair black with streaks of silver was plastered to his forehead. And his eyes those unmistakable ocean blue eyes, flickered open slowly.
Violet stumbled back, heart thundering in her chest.
This couldn’t be real.
No. No way.
He groaned, reaching a hand toward his head. “Where. am I?” His voice was deep, cracked like he hadn’t used it in years.
“You you turned into a human!” she blurted out, nearly tripping over her own feet.
He blinked. Slowly. “A human?”
“You were a wolf!” she pointed, waving frantically toward the bloodied towel. “And now you’naked and human and bleeding all over my tiles!”
He tried to sit up and promptly collapsed back with a grunt. “I I don’t remember anything.”
“What?”
He turned his head, looking straight at her. “I don’t remember who I am.”
After the initial panic and a whole lot of awkward towel-wrapping, Violet helped him out of the tub and onto the worn couch in her living room. She gave him one of her oversized university sweatshirts and a pair of shorts from her laundry basket.
He didn’t ask questions. Didn’t protest. Just sat there quietly, blue eyes roaming the room like he was seeing the world for the first time.
Violet watched him carefully.
Every instinct in her screamed that this wasn’t normal. That she should call someone. Get help.
But those eyes
She remembered them from the woods. She remembered the necklace. The stories her parents used to read her.
Maybe she was going insane. But she didn't care.
He looked so lost. So vulnerable. Like a child trapped in a man’s body.
“What should I call you?” she asked gently, kneeling in front of him.
He blinked slowly. “I don’t know.”
She bit her lip, then said softly, “Then I’ll call you Rye. Like the color of the sea. It suits your eyes.”
“Rye,” he repeated. And for the first time, he smiled faintly. “Thank you.Violet.”
She froze. “How did you know my name?”
He blinked. “I don’t know.”
