Something roiled in the pit of Alvina’s stomach as Rayth wrestled a snarling Blackwall into the stocks. It wasn’t right, not after all the werewolves had done for Falton. The townspeople would have starved over the winter if it hadn’t been for the werewolves’ ability to find game when no other hunter could. Did no one remember? The whole town was turning paranoid!
“Why punish all for the work of a few?” Brittany murmured to Alvina as Rayth smirked and gloated over the imprisoned werewolf leader.
“Exactly,” Alvina agreed. As much as she hated to admit it, some of the werewolves had almost certainly been at the livestock – the evidence was too overwhelming – but she didn’t think it was under Blackwall’s orders. He knew too well how delicate the peace in Falton was to jeopardize it by letting his people eat the livestock when everyone was hungry and paranoid.
Alvina stared at the snarling man in the stocks as the crowd began to disperse. It wasn’t right. She had fought so hard for peace after the Empress’s death, so hard for peace between the humans and the werewolves – and Blackwall had too. True, the werewolves were in the minority, and would have lost eventually, but that didn’t make the bloodshed right.
Alvina wandered over to the stocks and stood staring towards the bank, looking away from the werewolf, so no one would notice. She intended to ask Blackwall if it was true, if the werewolves truly had been eating the livestock. Why she thought he would answer honestly she didn’t know, but from her past encounters with the werewolf leader, he had seemed honest and willing to work for peace. Alvina still remembered the way he had laid down his arms to speak with Rayth under a flag of truce at the end of the last battle, willing to risk his own life to end the bloodshed and find a home and belonging for his people. A feeling Alvina knew all too well.
Alvina opened her mouth once, twice, but the words “Did the werewolves really do it?” would not come out. She glanced around. Did she dare? Everyone else was busy, or looking the other way. They would skin her alive. Was it even the right thing to do? Would she live to regret it? Alvina bit her lip. At least she would have done something. She couldn’t bear it any longer. Alvina turned so she could put her hand as casually as possible up against the stocks’ lifting mechanism. No one seemed to have noticed, so – holding her breath – she lifted the bar.
“Run for it,” she said to Blackwall.
The werewolf stared at her for a moment, as if he wasn’t sure what she meant, then he ducked his head out from under the bar and took off up the hill.
The sudden movement caught the attention of the townspeople milling around, and Alvina leaned up against the empty stocks as casually as she could, her heart pounding with the enormity of what she had just done, and what would happen if she were caught. Alvina put on a vacant expression that she hoped looked innocent. She had never been a thespian, though, and probably radiated guilt. But despite the confused mutterings and murmurings of the townspeople, no one shouted “Grab her!” or “She let the werewolf loose!” and no one tried to stop Blackwall as he sprinted up the hill and out of town.
Alvina took a few deep breaths to calm her racing heart. Either she was a better thespian than she thought, or the townspeople were less observant, or perhaps – just perhaps – hatred against the werewolves was not as strong as she had feared.
Alvina strolled casually away from the stocks, down the hill towards the Lonelee Rode Tavern. She hoped with all her heart that peace might someday return to Falton, and that everything would turn out alright.