Page 1 of To Ride the Wind

CHARLOTTE

Aflash of white caught Charlotte’s eye, unnaturally clean and bright among the greens and browns of the forest. She turned to face it, but it was already gone.

“Elizabeth!” A surge of unease in Charlotte’s stomach made her tongue trip over her sister’s long name. “Odelia?”

She still remembered the childhood years when they had been Bettie, Dellie, and Charli. But it had been many years now since her older sisters had turned into prim young ladies who insisted all three use their full names.

She called again, more loudly, but heard nothing in return. The silence around her was deep—too deep for a forest in mid-afternoon. She opened her mouth to call again but was silenced by a piercing scream.

Launching into motion, she sprinted toward the sound only to run headlong into her middle sister. The two girls bounced away from each other, Odelia falling while Charlotte just managed to keep her feet.

Her sister glared up at her from the forest floor.

“What is it?” Charlotte asked, too frightened to worry about Odelia’s irritation. “Why did you scream?”

Odelia stood and brushed off her dress. “That wasn’t me.” Her voice carried a note of superiority. “Elizabeth was the one who screamed.”

But Odelia couldn’t entirely hide the anxiety in her face as she glanced back the way she’d come.

Charlotte sucked in a breath. “Is she all right?”

She started in the direction of the scream, but she hadn’t made it more than three steps before her eldest sister appeared, stalking through the trees with stiff dignity.

Charlotte raced to her side, grasping her arm. “Are you hurt?” She tried to examine her sister, but Elizabeth shook her off.

“I’m fine,” she said shortly, glaring at Odelia. “I can’t believe you abandoned me! I suppose you were hoping I would be eaten first, giving you a chance to escape.”

Odelia turned pink but stuck up her chin defiantly. “Your legs work as well as mine. It’s not my fault you froze.”

“Eaten?” Charlotte asked, impatient with their bickering.

Both turned on her with a synchronized movement, glaring at the youngest. Charlotte winced. Elizabeth and Odelia might bicker at times, but they were barely a year apart and had always formed a united front when it came to her.

She sighed, but for once she was concerned enough not to back down. “Is there a dangerous creature about? I thought I saw something among the trees…” She trailed off, unable to think what predator might have been responsible for that flash of white.

“It was an enormous bear,” Elizabeth replied in a small voice, apparently subdued by the memory. “A white bear.”

“White?” Charlotte gasped. “I thought they only lived in the far mountains! What was one doing down here in our valley?”

“As for that, who knows.” Odelia looked at Charlotte with narrowed eyes. “But where were you?” She spoke as if she suspected her sister of setting the bear on them.

“I saw a flash of white earlier.” Charlotte pointed toward a place between the trees. “I couldn’t think what it might be.”

All three young women turned to stare at the place she indicated, their earlier fear overwhelming their disharmony. Elizabeth and Odelia might have been pretending to be unaffected, but they were clearly still afraid.

Something moved between the trees, mostly out of view, but none of them could miss the glimpse of pure white. Odelia screamed, and all three sprinted away from the bear toward their house.

Elizabeth and Odelia soon outstripped Charlotte. Given her petite frame, she had never been a great runner. As she fell behind, she knew she should be afraid, but she couldn’t help a surge of curiosity.

She glanced over her shoulder, scanning the trees for any glimpse of a snow-white bear. Did such a thing really exist? And, if so, what was it doing in her forest? In the five years her family had lived in the region, she had never heard tell of a brown bear in the area, let alone a white one. Could Elizabeth or Odelia have mistaken what they’d seen?

Her steps slowed even further, and she half turned. She knew she shouldn’t look behind her while moving—she was going to walk into a tree if she kept it up—but she couldn’t bring herself to blindly flee for home. It was rare for anything new or interesting to occur in this remote valley.

But her momentary courage fled the moment an enormous, white-furred shape lumbered out from between two trees. Her steps faltered and she stumbled to a halt, her mouth falling open. The creature was even larger than she’d imagined, and its fur seemed impossibly white for a wild creature. Charlotte herself never wore white, since the material didn’t stay that way for long.

The bear lifted one foot to step forward, and her eyes caught on its long black claws. Her heart took off into frantic flight, and her muscles tensed, ready for her body to join it. But just as she sprang into movement, her eyes found the bear’s.

Her breath caught. Objectively, they looked just like those of any bear, but there was something in the creature’s expression that she couldn’t dismiss.

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