Page 8 of Untethering Dark

-Leave an offering for Altes Geweih

But no park ranger visits. Johanna usually let her know when she’d be swinging by. It was a good thing Astrid was on her best behavior today.

Maybe Johanna was picking up someone else’s shift? That happened sometimes around Yuletide.

The plump, sturdy woman was a local, born and raised in Baden-Gottsdorf, and Astrid had known her since she was a child. They weren’t classmates—there was a twenty-year age gap—but Mutter Perchta introduced them, and Johanna had looked out for her ever since. First as an ally of the forest, then as a friend.

Johanna had an extensive university education in forestry. That, and twenty-five years of environmental activism experience including pushing for der Schwarzwald to be declared a national park, short-listed her to her current position in the fledgling park service.

For generations her family served as the unofficial stewards of der Schwarzwald. They knew all its secrets—monstrous and otherwise. It was Johanna who posted all the park service signs about leaving before dark.

In her relatively short, human lifespan, Johanna had become as much a fixture of the forest as the nonhuman things that lived amongst the trees. Devotion and dedication were in her blood.

Opening her door, Astrid waved the woman inside.

“Guten Morgen.” Johanna’s greeting lacked its usual cheery, chipper energy.Maybe she wouldn’t be on her best behavior today.Though Johanna smiled as she stomped the snow off her boots, her shoulders sagged and there was a weariness in her eyes, so dark a brown they were almost black. Either she already knew about the fresh crop of eaten hikers, or someone was causing her grief, and Astrid would be adding retribution to her to-do list.

“Smells good in here.” The forest ranger had to duck upon entering to avoid smacking her forehead against the doorframe. While Astrid was tall in her own right, the top of her head only came up to Johanna’s shoulder. A downright jolly giant of a person, at least when her job wasn’t overtaxing her. “Ah, I forgot how lovely and bright it gets in here this time of year.”

Sunlight streaked through the windows, more so in wintertime than any other season. Golden beams illuminated dust motes, wood-hewn countertops covered in Springerle, and the drying herbs that hung from the rafters. Though the days were shorter, the forest had dropped all its leaves, leaving ample gaps in the canopy for light.

“Enjoy it while it lasts. Winter comes and goes in the blink of an eye.” Gesturing to the dining table, Astrid told Johanna to make herself comfortable before going into the kitchen to ready a hot pot of Ostfriesentee, a strong black tea blend of Assam, Ceylon, and Darjeeling, and a plate of cooled cookies. She would have her over for tea every day if the park ranger’s schedule allowed. Life on the mountain could get a little too quiet sometimes.

Johanna shucked off her boots, leaving them on the doormat, before padding over to a chair in thick woolen socks—ones with chubby teddy bear faces Astrid knitted four years ago. Johanna brought calendars, and Astrid made socks.

Get a gift, give a gift. It was only polite.

Shrugging off her backpack, Johanna took up residence in her usual chair at the table.

“How are you?” Astrid asked, arranging the tea service on a silver tray, followed by sugar cubes and cream. “Hikers giving you any trouble?”

“There’s been reports of poachers up north going after wolves. Some they kill, others they sell to fur farms.” Johanna shook her head, worry and disgust twisting her features. “Not many wolves live permanently down here, but there are some. And others do migrate through. It’s possible the poachers will drop this way.”

Bred and raised for slaughter, discarded like garbage once the fur had been harvested. Such evil, and for what? Fashion? Certainly not survival. With modern conveniences, and theavailability of wool, the humans of this region hadn’t needed wolf fur to stay warm for a long time.

“Think it likely?” Astrid paused, clenching the silver tray’s edges. Her skin was like cracked ice, gray veins threading beneath snow-white flesh.

“I’d like to think not, but you know me.”

Imagine the worst scenario possible, and you can’t be taken off guard. It was one of Johanna’s guiding mantras. “I appreciate the warning.”

“That’s not the only reason why I swung by. It’s been a couple weeks since we’ve last chatted.”

And since then, at least five backpackers had been eaten.

“Not much new going on around here besides knitting and baking Springerle. How about you? Besides poacher reports, of course.”

Fingers threaded together on top her belly, Johanna sat back and groaned. “I caught a trio off-trail carving their names into a tree earlier this morning. Not all that far from here actually. Wrote a citation and chased them off. But the way they were laughing and carrying on—they’ll be back. Not the rule-respecting type.”

And they both knew how that ended.

Chomp. Chomp.

The day hikers were...mostlyfine. Tolerable. Better if they stuck to their trails like they were supposed to, rather than tromping on the undergrowth, disturbing the forest fauna, all to take a selfie. Or to deface trees. Or to squat in the dirt and not pack out.

Such blatant disrespect.

Astrid huffed, anger rising.

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