Archive of Our Own

The Feast Day of St John Chrysostom (January 27)

“Bless me, Father, for I intend to commit a great sin.”

Changmin jerks out of his drowsing thoughts. In the eight months he’s been priest of this parish, no one has confessed to any serious sin. Lust and covetousness rule the villagers, but this is true of any people, anywhere.

Sitting a little straighter on the seat within the confessional, Changmin gathers his concentration. His own sin, it seems, is sloth. He wishes he was still abed rather than in the draughty chill of St Jude’s church. He wishes he was still in Yunho’s warm embrace rather than listening to confession.

Not that many of the villagers have attended confession in recent weeks.

Keeping his tone light, Changmin says, “Never before has a man approached me to confess intention to sin.”

“This is a very great sin.”

Changmin leans closer, trying to see through the fretted screen separating priest from penitent, but discerns only darkness and soft, steady breathing. “There are many great sins. Which one is it that consumes your thoughts and leads you to confess?”

A small, dull noise; the sound of something placed against the screen. A gloved hand, Changmin realises as he jerks back on instinct.

“Murder,” the penitent says softly. “I intend to commit murder.”

Changmin tries not to react again, but his heartbeat is rapid and the confessional seems to shrink in on him. The dampness of the church clings, water seeping across the flagstones to stain the oak box pews and the confessional, making everything smell moist and rotten. Fear rises, cold within him. He battles it.

“Murder,” Changmin repeats when he’s mastered his emotions. There hasn’t been a violent death in the parish since Lammas Day. “What would drive you to commit such a terrible crime?”

The penitent considers for a while before answering: “Many reasons.”

“If you have grievances against someone,” Changmin says, aiming to make his voice brisk and commanding, “you should seek redress in another way. If you have legal complaint, a boundary dispute or accusation of theft, the Sheriff’s court will sit in a sennight. Or,” he continues, “if it is of a more personal nature, perhaps intercession would solve the problem. While I remain here, I am willing to offer myself as a mediator...”

Silence drags around them like chains on a corpse.

Changmin inches closer to the screen. Silently, he urges the penitent to talk again. He hadn’t recognised the man’s voice, but that’s because of the shock of what had been confessed. If he hears the penitent speak again, perhaps he’ll be able to put a face and name to the voice.

He knows all of his flock, and though some are hot-tempered, he can’t imagine any individual committing murder. Maybe it’s not one of the villagers after all. Perhaps it’s someone from another parish, or a knight passing through, or a mercenary, or... Changmin doesn’t know and can’t even begin to guess. Better for him to focus on what can be done to save a life—and to save the penitent’s soul.

He speaks simply. “The fact that you’ve come to me now suggests you want to avoid the stain of murder on your soul. Such an unspeakable act would damn you.”

The penitent is silent for a while, then says, “I am already damned.”

“Then do not add to your sins!” Changmin takes a deep breath. This man is being obstructive. It’s as if he’s enjoying this. Though Changmin has access to the mysteries of God, the penitent in this moment knows more than him, and the fact gnaws at Changmin’s innards.

He calms himself, hands clasped in his lap. “If you are set on this course and will not reconsider, at least give me the name of your intended victim so I can warn them.”

A low laugh from the other side of the screen. “You would break the seal of the confessional, Father?”

“For a crime of this severity, yes!” Agitation breaking through his false calm, Changmin moves nearer to the screen and peers into the darkness beyond. He is not accustomed to being disobeyed, and certainly not in the confessional. “For the love of God, tell me—whose life do you intend to take?”

The penitent leans against the screen. There’s a glitter of eyes, black and gold, their expression wistful and sharp.

Changmin pushes closer, fingers hooked through the fretwork. “Who?”

“You.”

The word is a whisper, spoken in a hot breath that makes Changmin go cold. Shock jolts him back and he almost tumbles from his perch, legs tangling in the skirts of his cassock. Terror beats at him. He imagines the man bursting into this side of the confessional and stabbing him, bludgeoning him. He remembers the corpse they found on Lammas Day, the remains shredded and pulped. Disgust and fear and anger overwhelm him, and Changmin crushes into the corner, heart hammering, sweat drenching his body.

The door of the penitent’s booth squeaks as it opens. The man is leaving.

No. This won’t do. He won’t get away with this!

Outrage burning inside him, Changmin gathers his courage and steps out to confront his would-be murderer.

The church is empty.

St Solange’s Day (May 10), the previous year

The first duty Changmin performs when he arrives in the parish is a funeral.

The blacksmith’s wife died almost four weeks ago. The body has been above ground all that time, laid out in its shroud on a trestle at the back of the empty tithe barn. The flesh has started to corrupt and swell with gas, and grave fluids soak and stiffen the cloth. Flies buzz and swarm, dressing the corpse in an ever-changing pattern of glinting black and blue.

Changmin’s eyes water at the stench. He swallows his nausea and takes shallow breaths through his mouth as he approaches the body.

His uncle the Bishop had given him a small silver pomander reeking of orange oil, cloves, and aniseed. “For taking away the stink of the countryside,” His Grace’s secretary had said with a thin, dry smile as he handed the gift to Changmin alongside directions to his new living. He almost wishes he’d brought it with him now. Though he despises the scent of orange oil, for it reminds him of insincerity and promises broken, those memories would be preferable to the rank stench of a decaying corpse.

A small knot of villagers have followed him into the barn. Changmin knows they’ll be looking to him for leadership and guidance. As their priest, he must set an example. He cannot be seen to shy away from a dead body. This was a good Christian woman who passed unshriven, and now he must grant her the rites of burial.

He goes closer. The flies rise in a cloud, buzzing in annoyance. The deceased was a young woman, and comely, too, from all accounts. Changmin prays over her, the soft chanted murmur of his Latin barely audible over the fury of the flies.

It seems hotter in the barn than outside. Beams of sunlight strafe through gaps in the walls. Beneath the stench of decay there’s the dry smell of dust and the wet scent of his sweat. Moisture slicks his back, making the thin linen of his undergarments cling to his skin. When he left the capital five weeks ago, there was still ice on the streams feeding the river, and the citizens went about wearing furs.

The prayer finished, Changmin casts a glance sidelong at the blacksmith. His name is Yunho, Changmin recalls from the hasty introductions that greeted his arrival. Dark and silent he stands there, looking at his wife’s corpse. He displays no grief; just blankness.

Despair, Changmin thinks. He fumbles as he tries to find the appropriate words. “I’m sorry for your loss. God giveth and God taketh away, and we must trust in His infinite care and wisdom.”

Yunho nods. He doesn’t seem to have heard what Changmin said. “It’s past the time, Father. You can bury her.”

Changmin agrees that it’s long past time that the body was buried. “It would not have been a sin to put her in the ground after she passed,” he says, as gently as possible. “Considering the circumstances, dispensation could have been made.”

“The next parish is fourteen miles from here. I sent word, but the priest refused to come.” Yunho takes his gaze from his wife’s corpse as the flies settle back onto the shroud. He looks at Changmin and there’s anger in his eyes, a burning fury that’s shuttered almost instantly. “We have been without a priest for nigh on two months, Father. Be grateful you have only one body to bury.”

Changmin nods. The priest incumbent before him had apparently fled the parish with the church’s plate. A meagre haul, so paltry that the Bishop’s secretary had chuckled over the loss, but nonetheless the sale of the silver would provide the thief with a comfortable living for the next few years.

The replacements Changmin brought with him are made of pewter. His Grace’s generosity towards this smallest and most remote of his parishes only extends so far, and Changmin knows his uncle expects him to recoup the cost from the harvest tithes. Not that this is a matter suitable for discussion at the moment.

“After None,” he says, raising his voice enough that the other villagers can hear. “The funeral mass will be held after None.”

Yunho nods. “Thank you.”

Changmin has not yet unpacked his few belongings, but since he has more pressing demands upon his time, he goes from the tithe barn to the church to prepare.

St Jude’s is a small church, stone-built, with wide columns to hold up the round arches. A tiny chantry is tucked to the north side of the aisle, and a confessional squats opposite. The walls are whitewashed and plain, but over the chancel arch is a Doom painting executed in stark colours, black and red and ochre, demons with gaping maws dragging sinners down into the flames of Hell while God sits enthroned high above in judgement.

The whole village attends the service. The richer folk pack into the box pews while the rest stand in uneven rows on the stone-flagged floor. They stare at Changmin in his white vestments and they stare at the pewter Communion plate set out on the altar. He looks back at them and sees curiosity and expectation, and in a few faces he sees mistrust. He’s not just an outsider; he’s from the capital, a place so far beyond the ken of these people that it might as well be on the dark side of the moon.

There’s no organ to provide music, no choir to offer song, nor even an altar boy to assist him. Changmin does everything himself, as calm and unhurried as he can make it, and he prays that the villagers can’t tell it’s his first time conducting a mass. They all kneel and stand as the service dictates; they cross themselves and give the responses, and soon their interest in him is lost to the familiar rhythm.

Only Yunho holds himself apart, his gaze turned inwards as he stands alone in his family’s box pew. He seems to take no consolation in the service.

At the graveside he performs his duties with an expression so cold and still he resembles the carved marble angels that populate the interior of the great cathedral in the capital.

When Changmin has finished intoning the burial rites, Yunho picks up a shovel and assists the gravediggers. Shock holds Changmin fast, but no one else protests. Perhaps this is the way things are done in the country.

The miller catches at Changmin’s elbow and tells him that the Widow Fletcher is laying on ale and honey-cakes. “Not a proper wake,” the miller says, “but more of a celebration. And a welcome for you, too, Father.”

Inclining his head, Changmin murmurs that he’ll be there shortly. The rest of the villagers make their way down the road away from the church. He remains behind, watching as the gravediggers fill in the hole. Yunho works twice as hard, the shovel striking against pebbles in the excavated soil. His hair hangs in his eyes. His breaths come fast and sharp.

Changmin can’t bear it a moment longer. He goes over to Yunho and says, “Enough.”

Yunho halts. The spadeful of dirt scatters into the grave, and then he lowers the shovel and meets Changmin’s gaze.

“Enough,” Changmin says again, and Yunho nods. He looks tired now. Beyond it is resignation, but before Changmin can say anything more, Yunho stabs the spade into the piled earth and walks out of the churchyard.

Changmin goes to the wake. The fletcher’s widow lives on one corner of the village green. Since her husband’s passing several years ago, she’s run his workshop as an unofficial tavern. In the town, taverns are licensed and subject to tax; out here, most transactions are paid for in kind. It’s just one of the things Changmin knows he’s going to have to overlook if he’s to make a success of his new living.

Numerous people come over and introduce themselves. Changmin clutches a mug of ale and tries to remember all the names hurled at him, promising that he’ll begin to call on each and every soul in his flock tomorrow after Terce.

As dusk steals through the sunset, he excuses himself from the gathering and walks around the village pond towards the path that leads to the presbytery. The blacksmith’s forge is across the green. Changmin pauses, gazing over at the orange glow of the banked furnace. There’s neither sound nor movement from within, but he has the impression that someone is in there, watching him.

Yunho hadn’t been at the wake. Perhaps he’s in his workshop. Changmin wonders if he should go over there, but then a blackbird starts trilling the liquid melody of its evening song from a nearby bush. Changmin stands for a moment listening, then exhales and continues on his way.

At the presbytery, he’s surprised to find his belongings unpacked. His books are piled on one end of the heavy wooden table in the dining room, his writing parchment and the box holding quills and ink placed beside them, and a place has been set for supper. The smell of spiced bacon and bean stew wafts through the house. Changmin follows the scent and finds the kitchen presided over by a round, cheerful woman of indeterminate age who introduces herself as his housekeeper.

“Not that I lives here,” she says before he has a chance to say he doesn’t need a housekeeper. “I lives in the cottage near the mill. Miller’s sister, I am,” and Changmin smiles, resigned to the fact that he can’t dismiss her without making an enemy of one of the village’s most powerful residents.

“You didn’t bring much with you from the capital, did you, Father? But then I always says a man of the cloth needs only the clothes on his back and a bit o’ food in his belly, and for everything else he has his faith, isn’t that right? But even so, you being from the capital and all, I was expecting cartloads of trunks.”

“No,” Changmin says. “No baggage except what came with me.”

The housekeeper nods. “It’s good you has simple tastes, Father. We was all afeared when we heard you were from the capital. He won’t stay a fortnight, we said, and here we’ve been without a priest these past two months. But I’ll tell everyone you’re a simple man and they’ll be right pleased.”

Uncertain how to respond to this, Changmin sniffs the air and comments that the stew smells divine.

“Get on with you, Father, it’s nothing special,” the housekeeper says, but she’s wreathed in smiles. “Sit you down and I’ll bring it to you directly.”

Changmin returns to the dining room with an earthenware jug of water. He pours himself a cup, nibbles at a piece of rye bread, then crosses the main hall in which he’d receive visitors and goes into his bedroom.

It’s a large space that catches the evening sun. There’s a simple wooden cross affixed to the whitewashed wall. There’s a trunk for his clothes and another for his linens. A rag-rug brings a splash of colour, and there’s a tiny hearth in one corner. His bed is long and narrow, freshly made up with sheets that smell of lavender and hyssop. In the wall above there’s a niche big enough to hold a candle, the stone around it blackened with years of accumulated smoke.

It’s a far cry from the luxury that surrounded him when he was a child, but none of that opulence had been his to touch. This house, simple though it is, belongs to him now. The thought is reassuring.

“Father,” the housekeeper calls from across the hall, “your supper is ready.”

Changmin closes the door and goes back to the dining room. He takes his place at the head of the table and, when the housekeeper seems disinclined to return to the kitchen, invites her to sit with him.

“Thank you, Father, right kind you are,” she says, plumping her ample weight onto a bench and helping herself to a piece of bread. She daubs it with a generous quantity of butter then munches on it.

It’s been years since Changmin has eaten a meal in the company of a woman. He’s not sure what to do. Fortunately he doesn’t have to make conversation, because his housekeeper is quite happy to hold forth on all manner of topics. Most of it pertains to village life, and he listens as she rails against the Widow Fletcher and says that the carpenter’s son is carrying on with the wife of the farmer at Long Acre. His attention is fixed mainly on the food, which tastes delicious, but he stops eating when the housekeeper mentions the tragedy that befell Yunho.

“But of course you’d know about that already,” she says, “seeing as how you buried his wife today.”

Changmin puts down his spoon and wipes his fingers on a napkin. “I know very little,” he admits. “How did she die?”

“A wolf.” The housekeeper shudders and crosses herself. “Out in the forest, it was. Terrible business. Terrible.”

“A wolf?” Conscious of the richness of the stew, Changmin pours more water into his cup and takes a sip. “I didn’t realise they ventured this far south.”

The housekeeper nods. “Aye. Come down from the mountains, so they do, and they make their homes in the forests hereabout for the winter. Most go back in the spring. This one stayed.”

“But to attack a human—it must’ve been desperate,” Changmin says. “It must have been starving or injured or...”

“It attacked Yunho’s cart.” Her face taut, her shoulders rigid, the housekeeper edges closer. “Gone to town, he had, him and his wife and the apprentice lad. Yunho makes swords for the noblemen, spurs for their boots and mail for their armouring, and he makes candlesticks for their tables and keys for their chatelaines, and for the children he makes toys that move. He goes to market every few months, but save for the Winter Market the Spring Fair’s the one that always brings him most coin for his wares. This time he was delayed on business and left as the gates were closing at sundown, and the nag he keeps isn’t fast or strong, and they reached the forest in full darkness.”

Changmin forgets to eat again, so caught up is he in the housekeeper’s story.

“The wolf stalked them probably from the moment they entered the woods. The horse, she knew there was danger, tossing her head and all that, but there was no point in going back. Yunho was walking in front holding a firebrand to light the way. The apprentice was driving the cart. He’s the one who saw it first, moving amongst the trees. And then...” the housekeeper lowers her voice, “then it came for them.”

She slams her hand onto the table. Changmin jumps.

“The apprentice lad was so afeared he took to his heels and ran away. Only imagine the terror, Father—pitchy black it was, the horse screaming, the lad run off gibbering, and a huge wolf lunging out of the night again and again.”

The housekeeper’s eyes gleam as she spins her tale. “For all his skill in forging blades, Yunho’s a commoner and can’t carry no sword. He had only a knife to defend hisself and his wife, but the beast was too strong. The wolf savaged her right in front of his eyes. He stabbed it and made it flee, but too late. His wife, God rest her soul, she bled out before anything could be done to save her.”

Changmin hastily crosses himself. He’s no longer hungry, but stirs his spoon through the remainder of the stew.

“Yunho brought her body home and raised the alarm,” the housekeeper continues, sitting back and taking another piece of bread now the most dramatic part of the story is told. “Us women washed her and laid her out while the menfolk went into the forest with torches and what weapons they had, and at length they found the apprentice lad hiding in a tree, out of his wits with fear. Still hasn’t recovered, poor boy. Won’t stir hisself from bed, no matter how often his ma bawls him out.”

“And Yunho?” Changmin asks. “He seems...” Unsettled is the word Changmin wants to use, but it seems wrong in this context.

“He did what all men do when something is snatched from them,” the housekeeper says. “He swore to destroy the wolf.”

Changmin thinks of Yunho, an impression of fierce dark eyes and a fury kept locked inside. “He must have loved his wife dearly.”

The housekeeper shrugs. “They rubbed along tolerable enough.” She hesitates for a moment, then leans closer. “Many’s the lass around these parts would have been glad to call him husband, but for years he showed no sign of settling down. Always there was this reason or that reason—caring for his ailing parents, building the business, journeying to fairs and tourneys selling his wares and gathering clients... All good reasons, but whenever he was asked to consider a bride, he always refused. And he never dallied with any of the village girls, either.”

“Oh.” There’s an insinuation here, or is he mistaking it? Changmin’s pulse picks up speed. He reaches for his cup again and decides to play ignorant. “He sounds like a good, moral man.”

This response makes the housekeeper cackle. She pops another piece of bread into her mouth and says around it, “Some would say his refusal to wed was because his interests lay elsewhere.”

Changmin tries not to understand what she means. He doesn’t want his own proclivities to be read from his reactions to this piece of gossip. “His affections were fixed on a lady who belonged to another? A married woman, perhaps?”

“God bless you, Father, that’s not what I meant!” The housekeeper rocks with laughter. “I’ve made you blush. Forgive me for speaking so loosely. A man like you, gently born and educated well, you probably don’t know what I’m talking about. Better you stay ignorant, Father. The things I mean are sinful deeds.”

“More sinful than...” Changmin forces himself to hold his tongue. He wants to know, and yet knowing will not help, either. Curiosity will forever be his downfall. Confused, he says simply, “I’m sure Yunho is a good man.”

“Oh, aye, he’s a good ‘un, loyal as the day is long,” the housekeeper says. “When his ma was on her deathbed she made him promise to take a wife as soon as his mourning was over, and that’s what he did. Like I say, him and his wife found one another agreeable enough. And now this. Terrible, terrible pity. We all said, if only he’d had a bairn from her. Nothing settles a man quicker than a bairn, but now he wears vengeance on his brow, and until his wife’s been cold in her grave a year, he won’t cast about for another bride.”

Changmin pulls his thoughts to himself. “I will call on him. He may be in need of spiritual comfort.”

The housekeeper sighs. “That he does, Father. He takes on too much for one man to bear, and he won’t ask for help. He’d never confide in our last priest, may God strike him down, but you’re an outsider. You’re different. Maybe you’ll have more luck.”

Over the next few days, Changmin goes around the village introducing himself to the inhabitants. He starts with the leading residents: the miller, the carpenter, the fletcher’s widow, but he delays calling on Yunho, making sure to pass the forge only when he hears the sound of a hammer against the anvil. That way he can tell himself he doesn’t wish to disturb the blacksmith at his work.

Changmin visits the farmers who reside some distance away from the village. He skirts the edge of the forest, more curious than afraid, and wonders if the wolf lies in the tall grass beneath the low-hanging branches of the oaks. He’s safe enough in broad daylight, but still he wanders closer to the quiet darkness of the forest. He stands at the corner of a field and stares through the trees, waiting. He wonders if the wolf is watching. The thought alarms and excites him.

The wolf doesn’t take up his silent challenge. Of course it doesn’t. The sun is directly overhead. All sensible animals are at rest in this heat.

Changmin continues on his way. The back of his neck prickles with sweat and his skin is tight with awareness, yet when he swings around and looks back, there’s nothing to see. Just the rustling grass and the oak trees. Just the forest, slumbering.

After Vespers, he takes supper with the labourers in the tavern. He stands them a round of ale, which makes him immediately popular, and listens to their complaints and hopes, even when they’re deep in their cups.

It’s then that he hears more tales of the wolf.

“The blacksmith’s wife might be the beast’s first human victim,” one of the labourers says, “but that there wolf has taken sheep and cattle before now. Vicious it is, vicious. Toys with ‘em, like. It don’t just kill the animal, like you’d imagine. It drags it around. Shakes it, like a cat with a mouse.”

“It’s not natural, that wolf,” the Widow Fletcher says, setting down a plate of honey-cakes on the trestle table. “It has a devil inside it. You mark my words, now it has a taste for human flesh, it’ll try again. It’ll get more daring, it will, and it’ll come a-creeping into the village one night and...”

The labourers moan in horror.

Changmin decides that, as their priest, he can’t allow any superstitious nonsense to spread. “It is just a wolf. The death of Yunho’s wife was a terrible tragedy, but it happened because the animal caught them unawares. Now you—now we—know what the wolf is capable of, we can guard ourselves against it. We can help one another by staying alert, particularly during dusk or before the dawn. If a neighbour needs assistance after dark, we should lend our help with a glad heart, for two cautious men are better than one unwary man.”

“Fine words,” sniffs the thatcher, “but Yunho wasn’t travelling home alone.”

“That apprentice of his was daft from the day he was born,” Widow Fletcher says. “Could scarcely light a fire, that lad. It’s only from the kindness of his heart that Yunho took him on. No other bugger would teach him a trade, and this is how the lad repays him. Running off into the woods, screaming like a bairn... Yunho might as well have been on his own that night for all the help the apprentice gave him!”

“Father, you’re from the capital,” another of the labourers says. “Can’t you order soldiers to come here and destroy the wolf?”

Changmin pauses, trying to think of an appropriate response.

“Not everyone from the capital has power,” the thatcher says. “If Father Shim were as grand as he talks, he wouldn’t be in this shithole. He’d be in some wealthy town parish performing miracles for the burgess’s wives.”

An embarrassed silence blankets the room, and then Widow Fletcher berates the thatcher for a drunk and a wastrel, and the rest of the labourers join in until the thatcher lurches to his feet, curses them all, and staggers off home.

Taking his own leave not long after, Changmin goes out onto the village green. The sunset is a violent wash of crimson, the brightness already muting into dusk. A gaggle of white geese splash into the pond. Across the way, a fire burns through the dark interior of the forge. The steady thump of the hammer stirs Changmin. He cannot avoid his duty any longer.

The sound of metal striking metal calls him on. Changmin follows the sound, moving to the rhythm the blacksmith sets. Suddenly the noise stops, and Changmin feels cast adrift. It reminds him of what he’d felt in the fields earlier today. The sense, like a cat-scratch, of being watched.

A foolish notion. He’s allowing superstition to colour his judgement. Shaking it from his shoulders, Changmin strides towards the forge.

It’s a long, low building with a sedge roof. The workshop is open-fronted, with a series of wooden barrels to one side. Heavy trestle tables covered with tanned hides stand in the middle of the space, and against the back wall is the furnace. Tongs, hammers, pokers, and other implements hang from hooks on the wall and from the wooden pillars holding up the roof. There are anvils of different sizes, and a stone bench and a large trough full of water.

Though candle stubs litter the forge, Yunho is working by the light of the furnace. He seems to be in a trance, his movements dictated by rote. Changmin stays in the shadows and watches him for a while.

It’s the first time Changmin has been in a forge. The heat shouldn’t be a surprise, but it is. The intensity of it, even at a distance, is enough to rob him of breath. It’s hot like fury, specific and deadly, and the fire burns a deep orange-red.

Its light licks over Yunho’s body, gleaming and uncertain. He wears only a pair of trousers and a thick leather apron to protect him from sparks; around his wrists are leather gauntlets. He looks like a pagan god. He looks like a demon; and then he turns and his face vanishes into darkness and Changmin thinks of nightmares, of crawling shadows, and then Yunho turns again and Changmin sees him as nothing more than a man.

And what a man he is.

Changmin curls his hands into fists until his fingernails dig into his palms. Temptation tugs at him. Desire is as insistent as his heartbeat. He stares at Yunho and, in his imagination, measures how many kisses it would take for him to cross that broad back, to round those shoulders, to travel down those strong arms. He drinks in the sight of Yunho dragging a length of molten iron from the embers and bending it, hammering it into shape before he plunges it into the trough of water.

The hiss of the steam masks the moan that slides from Changmin’s lips. He wonders if Hell is like this, hot and dark and thick with the smell of charcoal and fiery metal. God help him, but he hopes so. He wants to be trapped here, even if he can do no more than gaze at the handsome blacksmith. He could watch the play of firelight over Yunho’s muscles forever; he could lose himself in tracking the droplets of sweat that run down Yunho’s naked back.

Changmin ventures closer, the skirts of his cassock brushing against his legs and igniting the need to be touched and caressed. What he wants is wrong. Sinful. Sweet as honey dripped from the comb.

Yunho feeds more iron into the fire. He stands gazing at the banked heat, hands on his hips as he waits. Now would be a good time for Changmin to step forward and introduce himself properly. Now would be an ideal opportunity to make conversation. But Changmin’s mouth is dry and his thoughts are scattered, and all he wants is to press himself against Yunho’s back and lick the stripes of sweat from his skin.

Lust makes Changmin clumsy. He jolts against a pillar and knocks a pair of tongs from their hook. The implement makes a dull thud as it lands on the earthen floor. It sounds loud even against the simmer and crack of the furnace.

Changmin bends to retrieve the tongs, feeling the blood heat his face. When he straightens, the implement held out like a weapon, Yunho is looking at him.

“I... These fell.” Changmin offers the tongs, and then, when Yunho makes no move to take them, he returns them to the hook. There must be a certain way of hanging them, because when Changmin takes his hand away, the tongs fall again. He tries to catch them, awkward as he grabs and misses, and the tongs bounce off his foot and lie sprung open.

“Sorry. I’m sorry.” Picking them up a second time, Changmin tries to close the tongs. The spring resists him. He pushes harder, hands slippery with nervous humiliation, and the damn things leap from his grasp.

Yunho bends down and collects up the tongs, closes them easily, and hangs them on the hook.

A pulse beats at the base of Changmin’s throat. He swallows past it. “Master Blacksmith...”

The words catch. He stares at Yunho’s chest. Side on like this, he can see bare skin beneath the covering of the apron. The flesh is ragged and twisted. It looks—it looks like...

“You’re hurt,” Changmin says, too shocked to be diplomatic.

Yunho steps back, his left hand going up to press the leather apron close against his chest. “It’s nothing.”

“That’s not true.” Certainty and command snap through Changmin’s voice. “Let me see.”

“Why, did you study medicine along with theology?” Yunho doesn’t move, but there’s amusement in his gaze. “Some would say that’s heretical.”

Changmin makes an irritated gesture. “My mother had some skill as a healer. Let me see that.”

Yunho remains motionless for another moment, then shrugs and unfastens the apron. He takes it off and stands there half naked, kissed with sweat and gilded by firelight.

Changmin draws in a breath. He wishes he could enjoy the sight of Yunho’s body, lean and gently sculpted; he wishes he could admire the dusky nipples, the perfect indentation of his navel, the roughness of hair leading down below the waistband of his trousers. But though Changmin takes in this glorious vision, briefly and with a pang of guilt, his attention focuses on the snarled damage of flesh.

“The wolf bit me,” Yunho says into the silence.

“It went for your heart.” Changmin tries to keep his voice level.

Yunho’s mouth twists. “It wanted to disarm me.” When Changmin stares, uncomprehending, Yunho lifts his left hand. “By nature I’m sinistral. I taught myself to be right-handed so as not to disturb people, but when I’m tired, when I’m under stress, I still favour my left hand.” His smile is mocking. “I fought the wolf left-handed. It tried to snatch the knife from me. I stabbed it, and so it bit me.”

Changmin goes closer, staring at the scar tissue. It’s livid, a vicious red edged with puckered white, the shape unmistakeable. With an effort, he glances at the furnace and the iron rods glowing orange. Disbelief sharpens outrage. Changmin raises a hand as if in benediction; he halts his touch inches from Yunho’s chest. “You did this.”

“It was necessary,” Yunho says. “There was a lot of blood. I sealed the wound.”

Nausea spins through Changmin. He’s seen it done before. The patients were usually drunk and bound and given a piece of wood to bite upon. The stench of burning flesh was foul, oily and fat with despair. The thought of Yunho cauterising the wolf-bite alone in the aftermath of the attack makes Changmin want to weep.

His emotions must be plain to read, for Yunho gives him a reassuring smile. “I knew what I was doing. I’ve done the same to animals.”

Gritting his teeth, Changmin nods. Country people. Country ways. He forces his attention to the healing injury. “You did well, but the scar...”

Yunho shrugs again. “A blacksmith always carries scars.” He holds out his hands, inviting Changmin to examine his arms. He wears the flecks and curls of stray sparks and slivers of hot metal across his knuckles and along the side of his right thumb; higher up there’s a spray of scars over his left bicep. Over his right collarbone there’s a nick as if made by a blade, and on his left cheek is a scrolling of scars, flat and faint and only noticeable when he turns his head to the light.

“I am not pretty, Father.” Yunho fastens the apron back on, hiding the injury from view. “Not like you.”

It should be an insult, but it’s said gently, without any kind of heat, and Changmin stares. Pretty. He thinks I’m—

“I’m not pretty,” Changmin says, stung.

Yunho tilts a smile at him. “My mistake.”

That’s not satisfactory, either. Changmin frowns, then recollects himself and his duty. He is not here for flattery. Neither is he here to feed desires best kept hidden, although now he craves both.

“My housekeeper has been a veritable mine of information,” he says as Yunho goes back over to the furnace and checks on the rods buried beneath the embers.

“Her words run as freely as a mountain stream. Do not believe all she tells you.”

Changmin tosses his head. “Thank you for the advice, but I believe I can sort the wheat from the chaff when it comes to gossip.” He hesitates, uncertain of how to proceed. “I have met everyone in the village and tallied her opinions against my own.”

“With one exception.” With a pair of tongs, Yunho draws one of the iron bars out of the fire. It glows, and Changmin thinks of hot metal pressed to raw flesh. He takes a step backwards, shuddering.

Yunho lays the iron on the anvil and takes up the hammer. He spares a glance at Changmin. “You put off visiting me. People have commented on it. Unfavourably, I might add, although I care not what you do.”

“I wished to spare your feelings,” Changmin says, annoyed by the second-hand rebuke. “Given recent events, I thought to give you time to mourn properly.”

“This is not the capital. We have no fine feelings here.” Yunho swings the hammer. The iron bar bends with a showering of sparks. It begins to change colour as he alters the angle of the strike, flattening the metal.

Changmin presses on with his speech. “When my housekeeper spoke of you, there was... a certain insinuation.”

A pause, the hammer midway through its swing. Yunho stiffens, then brings the hammer down hard. He leaves it on top of the flattened iron and looks up. “What are you accusing me of, Father?”

“Nothing,” Changmin says quickly. “No accusations. I would never— I cannot presume to judge.”

Yunho’s gaze is hard. “That is your role as priest, is it not? To find us wanting?”

“No!” The interview is deviating from its path. Changmin sweats, suddenly feeling stifled. “I am here to support my flock and help them in any way I can.”

Amusement flashes again in Yunho’s eyes. “And you would help me, would you, Father?”

Changmin stares at Yunho’s arms, his shoulders, the inviting damp sheen of his sweat. “If you needed comfort.”

Now Yunho laughs, but it’s short and angry. “I think you should leave.”

God in Heaven, whatever possessed him to speak so bluntly, so obviously? Changmin gives an inward wince and tries to make amends for his error. “Please,” he says, raising both hands in supplication, “I meant no offence.”

“None taken.” Yunho lifts the hammer and knocks the greying piece of iron into the water trough. It goes in with a splash, then sinks.

Moving away from the anvil, he goes over to the darkest corner of the forge. He comes back a moment later with a small leather bag jingling with coin. Yunho tosses it towards Changmin. “Take this. I would have masses said for my wife’s soul.”

“How many?” The purse is heavy, but Changmin has no wish to insult Yunho by opening the bag and counting the coins.

Yunho gives him a long look. “As many as it takes.” He jerks his gaze away and looks into the trough. “You understand we married for duty, not affection. But still, I regret her passing. She was a good woman. If you would pray for her...”

“Of course.” Changmin inclines his head. He will give her the most beautiful and complex of his prayers, even if it robs him of sleep. It will be his penance for desiring the husband of a woman so recently in her grave.

Summer comes on. The heat is relentless, swarming the air. The earth begins to crack. The village pond shrinks in on itself, leaving a tide of drying mud and reeds that turn brown and rustling. Children run and bask in the sun while their parents peer into the ferocious blue of the sky and murmur to one another about the possibility of rain.

Despite the temperatures outside, St Jude’s is cool and welcoming. The musty, damp wood scent is replaced by the more pleasant aroma of strewing herbs, rosemary and meadowsweet, strong enough to overpower the thin pinches of incense Changmin uses during the formal mass.

He remains in church between Matins and Terce, the stone flags of the floor hard beneath his knees as he intones prayer after prayer for the blacksmith’s wife. When he has run through every prayer he knows, he sings. They are not always religious songs, but the melodies are beautiful and the words speak of devotion, albeit of a secular and physical kind.

Swifts arrive, white bellies flashing as they dart and turn, their cries shrill in the motionless air. They build their mud nests in the eaves of the presbytery. Changmin finds them charming. He spends long hours sitting in the grass, a psalter open across his lap, the manuscript ignored in favour of watching the birds twist and flick through the air. They catch insects on the wing and return to their nests to feed their young.

One afternoon, Yunho comes by. He’s careful to latch the gate closed behind him, though Changmin always leaves it open to encourage the villagers to call if they need help or guidance. For a while Yunho stands and studies the presbytery. Changmin remains seated, unwilling to startle his visitor. The path from the village ends here; Yunho is not merely passing by. He came for a reason.

Changmin cannot allow himself to hope, but desire coils, betraying him. In the weeks since his arrival in the village, his fancy for the blacksmith has grown, planting tendrils of yearning that stretch and curl and tickle at him at night, during mass, or while he walks through the village.

Yunho has never given any indication that these feelings are reciprocated. Of course he would not: Yunho is a good man, a widower who respects the memory of his late wife. He is an important member of the community, his skills essential to the village. He is well regarded by all. Even if by some impossible chance he did favour Changmin, he would never speak of it.

It would be best if Changmin could bury his lust. Bad enough that he’d revealed his base desires so obviously the night he’d importuned Yunho under the guise of offering spiritual comfort. Other men would have taken fright or been hostile; other men would have reviled Changmin and spread rumour about the village.

Yunho has told no one. He has been as kind, friendly, and generous to Changmin as he is to everyone else. And sometimes, just sometimes, he looks at Changmin. Thirsty looks, like a parched man stumbling across a spring of cool water. Wary looks, as if he doesn’t know whether the water will quench his thirst or poison him.

In those moments, Changmin both wishes he could pierce Yunho’s thoughts and gives thanks that he cannot.

Now he closes the psalter and lays it in the grass. He gets to his feet, shaking out the rusty black skirts of his cassock. “Master Blacksmith.”

Yunho nods to him, then resumes gazing at the presbytery.

Bemused, Changmin goes towards him. “The swifts have been busy. I have never seen so many nests. In the city, people knock them down.”

“Why?”

“Because they think the nests are ugly against painted eaves and whitewashed walls.” It’s only when the words are out that Changmin realises how brutal this sounds.

Yunho looks at him, brow furrowed. “What of the chicks?”

Changmin can’t meet his gaze. “They fall. Cats hunt them. Dogs eat them. Children—” He stops himself.

“I can imagine.” Yunho’s voice is low.

They stand in silence and watch the birds spin circles above them. Then Yunho says, “The roof needs fixing. Your housekeeper mentioned it. The tiles are loose over the kitchen, she says. When the weather breaks, it’ll be on a storm. You should have it mended by then.”

“Why didn’t she mention it to me?” Changmin frowns, shading his eyes with a hand to stare at the line of the roof.

Yunho snorts. “Did you also study with masons and builders when you were in the capital, or was your father an architect?”

A sharp retort springs to Changmin’s lips, but then he realises Yunho is teasing him. Half embarrassed, half amused, he smiles. “He is not an architect. Not of buildings, anyway.” He pauses, then adds, “I will write to the Bishop and enquire about a new roof.”

“Don’t waste your ink.” Yunho claps him on the shoulder, his grip lingering a heartbeat longer than necessary. “I’ll fix it.”

Changmin stares after him as Yunho cuts through the grass towards the back of the presbytery. The memory of his touch is warmer than the sun.

The following day, Changmin returns home after Sext to find his housekeeper standing outside the kitchen, looking up at the roof and issuing instructions. Yunho is sitting astride the ridge, shirtsleeves rolled up and the sun glinting from his hair as he unhooks each rectangular tile.

“Father Shim,” the housekeeper calls, “isn’t this a kindness? Such a good man, is our Yunho. I said to him, if the rains come, me and the Father’ll be swept right out of here on a great wave. I told your predecessor, God rot him, I said to him there was a leak in the roof but he didn’t care. Why should he bother about a hole in the roof when he was planning on taking our silver! Curse the man, I hope brigands robbed him and left him for dead in a ditch. But you, Father Shim,” she beams at him, “I knew you was a good sort. I only mentioned the roof to Yunho yesterday and today here he is, a-fixing it!”

Dazed by the flood of words, Changmin looks at Yunho, who gives him a smile.

“Ah, what am I standing about here for! You’ll be wanting your dinner, Father. And Yunho, I’ll wager you want feeding, too, now you have no wife to provide for you...” The housekeeper breaks off in horror and clamps a hand over her mouth.

Yunho’s smile is a little strained. “Thank you, but I brought some food with me.”

“One of Widow Fletcher’s pies, I’ll warrant.” Recovering her voice, the housekeeper heads for the kitchen door. “Nasty things, those. More fat than meat and meagre with the seasonings.” She vanishes indoors.

The men look at one another. Changmin feels awkward. “You’re welcome to dine with me,” he says, trying to signal that the invitation is nothing untoward.

“Maybe another time.” Yunho nods at a bundle wrapped in cloth hanging off the gable end. “It is one of Widow Fletcher’s pies. I’d better not sully your table with it.”

“You must accept some hospitality, at least,” Changmin argues gently.

An almost-smile twitches at Yunho’s lips. “A cup of water wouldn’t go amiss.”

Changmin hurries to the well-house. The presbytery has a stone cistern fed from the spring that emerges to the north of the church, which saves him and the housekeeper the trouble of carrying pails from the village well every morning and night. He thinks it tastes better, too, this water; purer and less brackish. He fills a jug and carries it back outside, then sets it in the shadow of the kitchen wall.

“Thank you.” Yunho smiles down at him, full and true and bright.

Changmin feels sun-dazzled.

Mending the roof is not a simple task. As soon as Yunho fixes the hole above the kitchen and replaces the old, cracked tiles with new ones, he tramps and climbs over the rest of the roof and checks the chimneys, the ridges, and the gables. He finds other problem areas that should have been attended to years ago, and he calls out to Changmin, sounding far too cheerful, telling him to jot down dimensions for new beams or to list how many more tiles or nails will be needed.

Changmin frets as he takes down the figures. The cost of all this work is rising far beyond his means. Even if he writes to the Bishop now, he’s unlikely to see any coin for months. Perhaps he can delay payment until the harvest tithes come in, but His Grace is expecting the profit from this parish to cover the sum of the pewter vessels Changmin had brought with him to replace the stolen church plate.

By the time Yunho slides down the ladder at the end of the day and asks for the list, Changmin has worked up the courage to admit to his penury.

“I can pay you for the work on the kitchen roof,” he says, “but I cannot afford anything else.”

Yunho scrubs a hand through his hair and looks up at the presbytery. “It needs doing, Father. I wouldn’t lie to you about something so necessary. One bad storm with the wind from the wrong quarter and those tiles will be off, and what the housekeeper worried over for the kitchen will be nothing compared to the mess you’ll be in.”

It’s worse than Changmin thought. He doesn’t know what to do. “Can you fix just a little of it? Just to keep the tiles on?”

His ignorance must be appalling. Yunho gives him a look akin to pity, then thinks for a while and says, “Perhaps I could do something. Nails—well, I make those; I can make them in my sleep. And I can barter for the tiles. As for the beams... I can take care of those, too. There’s plenty of trees around about.”

Changmin may not know anything about fixing roofs, but he knows wood needs to season before it can be used for building. He bows his head, indebted before the real work begins. “I will give you all the coin I have.”

“No.” An uncomfortable expression crosses Yunho’s face. He tangles his fingers through his hair again. “Say more masses for my wife’s soul. That will be payment enough.”

That night, Changmin wakes for Vigils. He kneels upon the rag-rug on his bedroom floor, faces the cross upon the wall, and begins his devotions. It doesn’t seem enough, so he pulls on his clothes and goes to the church, lays himself down flat in front of the altar, and whispers prayers against the cold stone.

The weight of God’s judgement presses down upon him from the apex of the Doom painting. As the dawn breaks and sunlight feels its tentative way through the narrow windows of the church, he rolls over and stares up at the images on the chancel arch.

Changmin locates the sinner who indulged in the same wicked desires that rule him. The sinner is being boiled alive in a cauldron. A devil with a leering face in its belly is twisting off the sinner’s nose with a pair of red-hot tongs. Blood sprays from the lacerations covering the sinner’s upper body.

Doom paintings are never very imaginative in the depiction of Hell. Changmin has seen several in the capital, all of them better than this, but the simplicity and starkness of the images here disturb him far more than the gruesome, lovingly detailed paintings that adorn the city churches.

He gets to his feet, head swinging with weariness, and performs Matins.

The days wear on, and temperatures continue to rise. It’s not yet July, and the villagers are concerned. The pond has become little more than a damp churning of mud, and every day the mud dries and begins to crumble to dust. The water in the well tastes darker and thicker, while the water in the presbytery’s cistern seems thin and inconsequential. Even at night it’s too hot, and Changmin takes to sleeping naked beneath a single sheet.

Yunho starts work on the roof early in the morning, when dawn paints a narrow stripe across the horizon. He stays until the heat drives him from the tiles, and then he bids Changmin good day and goes back to the forge to attend to business. Occasionally Changmin sees him outside the tavern of an evening, a mug of ale in his hand as he watches the children dig through the dirt in the pond. He studies the colour of the sunset and predicts the morrow’s weather, and he’s always right.

One morning, Changmin wakes to the sound of footsteps above his head. At first he thinks he’s still dreaming, and then he realises Yunho is up there, sure-footed over the sloped roof of the bedroom. Changmin snatches the rumpled sheet to cover his nakedness, then relaxes against the bolster and laughs at himself. Yunho cannot see through the roof. Even if he could, would it be so very terrible?

Lust hits Changmin hard. Stifling a moan, he turns onto his side and draws up his knees. He clasps his hands together. The insides of his thighs are slick with sweat. His hair falls in his face, the strands already damp where they stick to his skin. The sheet drags over his body. It’s too heavy. He pushes it off.

Yunho walks over the roof and settles himself. There’s a tapping sound. The noise is amplified through the latticework across the beams. Changmin listens to Yunho shuffle over the tiles. Sweat crawls down his back. He can smell his arousal, strong and musky. His body tightens. He craves a lover’s touch.

A series of thuds come from the roof, followed by the clattering of tiles. Yunho hums a tune as he works. It sounds familiar.

Changmin exhales and uncurls, straightening his legs. He’s going to get out of bed. He’s going to wash his face and get dressed. He’s not going to think of Yunho. He’s not.

Images pour over him. Yunho balanced on the roof, stripped to the waist, his body tanned and gleaming with sweat. Yunho gilded by firelight in the forge. Yunho’s back, the skin smooth and perfect. Yunho’s chest, the double scar of the wolf-bite and the cauterisation fading to pink. Yunho’s arms, corded with muscle as he swings the hammer and shapes the molten iron. Yunho’s smile, warm and bright; his eyes full of desire and his kisses hot and sweet as he pulls Changmin against him and—

Changmin jerks back into awareness. His hand is around his cock. He recognises the tune Yunho is humming. It’s one of the secular songs Changmin sings in church before Terce when he thinks he’s alone.

“God,” Changmin whispers, the yearning so sharp inside him it physically hurts. “Oh, God.”

What he wants is a sin, but it’s a sin he knows. He indulged throughout the duration of his studies, choosing lovers both religious and secular; but for all their wit and learning, none of them were as warm and vital and handsome as Yunho.

It’s a sin, but Changmin thinks the greater sin is his covetousness. He has never hungered so much for anything before.

His grip tightens. He gasps and presses his face into the bolster, desire beating through him. He hears Yunho moving around above him and strokes himself, pre-come easing the way only slightly. He revels in the discomfort and tugs faster, harder. Changmin closes his eyes, surrenders to heat and darkness and the bang of blood stopping his ears, thrumming his body. He wants he wants he wants.

Changmin reaches orgasm with his mouth open against the mattress, shame and pleasure shaking him apart.

When he comes to his senses, there’s silence around him and the sun is levelling brightness through the bedroom window. Changmin jolts awake. He’s late for Matins.

Cursing his weakness, exclaiming at the tacky, drying slime of seed across his belly, he throws himself out of bed. He washes and dresses, trying to ascertain from the position of the sun if the time is closer to Prime or to Terce.

Hurrying outside, he finds Yunho sitting on the edge of the kitchen roof, deep in conversation with the housekeeper. Changmin’s embarrassment at his tardiness and what he’d done to induce it fades when he gets closer and hears them talking about the wolf.

“What news?” he asks.

“Oh, Father, it’s terrible, so it is.” The housekeeper puts down her basket of vegetables and clutches at his sleeve. “Old Man Potter, he saw the monster hisself with his very own eyes! Saw it this morning, he did, its mouth all red with blood and teeth all sharp, like a Hound of Hell rather than one of God’s own creatures.”

Casting a glance up at Yunho, Changmin sees no reaction, just terrible blankness.

“Took a yearling, it did, from over Long Acre,” the housekeeper continues. “It were the animal’s piteous cries that woke Old Man Potter. Sounded like a beast being slaughtered badly, he said, and he was right. The wolf had that cow by the leg and was a-shaking it. Near tore it in half! What a fiend it must be. Unnatural and foul, a very devil come among us!”

Changmin crosses himself. “Do not speak so. This cannot be because of some dark agency.”

The housekeeper grabs at his hand, her gaze alight with an excitement wholly inappropriate for the tale she’s telling. “But it is, Father! You don’t know the half of it. Old Man Potter, he said the wolf walked. Stood on its hind legs and walked like a man!”

Horror stirs, but disbelief is stronger. Changmin dismisses the story. “Old Man Potter drinks a lot of moonshine, or so you told me. Perhaps he imbibed last night and was confused by what he saw this morning.”

“He saw the wolf!” The housekeeper looks offended that her own words have been used against her. “Huge and monstrous, he said, dark grey with a white stripe along one side. And it picked up the yearling and dragged it, and when the wolf stood up and walked on two legs, Old Man Potter saw a wound across its chest. A scar, right where Yunho stabbed the vile thing!”

Changmin looks up again, disquiet running through him.

“Let it come.” There’s rage in Yunho’s expression; such awful rage. “I’m ready for it. I’m going to kill it.”

After None, Changmin joins Yunho and a group of village men and goes in search of the wolf. The farmer from Long Acre bemoans the loss of his yearling as they follow the streaks of dried blood over crushed grass and trampled crops. Fat bluebottles buzz up from the occasional gory remnant, and the stench of violent death hangs in the air.

Changmin takes a tighter grip on his borrowed sword. When he’d arrived at the parched swathe of the village green, he’d found the men armed with knives, pitchforks, and clubs. Yunho had beckoned him into the forge, indicated one of the trestle tables, and said, “Take whatever you’re entitled to.”

Laid out on a piece of hide was a selection of blades: knives for butchery, knives for the kitchen, knives for cutting rope and scoring leather; narrow stilettos and daggers with spikes either side of the tangs; and then there were the swords, heavy and thick for knights, lighter and more flexible for a nobleman.

Changmin had taken one of the lighter swords.

Yunho had nodded. “I knew it,” he’d said, and the other men had stared, and then Changmin realised what he’d revealed about himself.

As they cross the fields of withering crops, he wants to tell the villagers that he’s not what they think he is. He’d been trained in the noble arts only because the Bishop had hired a tutor for Changmin’s cousins and they’d needed an equal number of sparring partners.

He’d learned the footwork and guards by rote, and then he’d tried to forget it all when he entered the Church. Perhaps the knowledge will come back to him now, although he cannot imagine a wolf following the permitted openings and attacks that form this noblemen’s pursuit.

The villagers walk a little distance away from him. They eye the sword in his hand when they think he’s looking elsewhere. Changmin tries to ignore their reactions. He scans the edge of the forest, his gaze drifting now and then to Yunho, who walks ahead of the group following the trail of blood and flesh.

Yunho stops.

The other men hesitate. Changmin strides forward and they hustle after him, feet stamping and snapping the dead crops.

“What is it?” Changmin asks, keeping his voice hushed.

Yunho points ahead at the boundary hedge. The thick tangle of hawthorn has been smashed, as if a great boulder had rolled through it. On the other side, in a thicket of weeds, lies what remains of the yearling.

They go forward with cautious steps, falling silent as they pass through the hedge. Though they all know the wolf can leap over fences and hedges, this is the first time it’s broken down a boundary. Changmin reads the impact of this on the faces of the village men. The wolf has not just killed one of their own, not just stolen cattle; breaking a barrier protected by law is tantamount to declaring war.

The forest looms close. Uncomfortably so; a few of the men shift on their feet and glance back towards the village. Changmin forces aside his own nervousness and walks a wide circle, sword held on guard, his gaze sharp as he searches for the slightest hint of movement from the trees.

His path takes him away from the ruin of the yearling. Behind him, the men make sounds of horror and disgust. One of them even retches. Only Yunho is silent.

Changmin blinks the sweat from his eyes. His palm is slick around the grip of the sword. He focuses on the trees in front of him, oak and pine and birch, ferns and brambles swarming around them. Swallowing the rise of nausea, he tries to banish the image of the shattered cow.

The wolf had torn the yearling in half. Its spine is snapped, its ribs crushed. The soft organs have been yanked out and half devoured. The flesh has been stripped from the bones as if removed by a butcher, not snatched at by an animal. Its tongue is missing, and its eyes. Its nose has been clawed, leaving behind deep, bloody lacerations. Its tail has been sliced off, and its hooves. The top of its skull has been smashed. Its brains pool on the ground, a mess of grey trickling with flies.

Changmin takes shallow breaths and steps further away from the group standing around the carcass. He moves closer to the forest. His pulse thuds. His chest feels tight. Whatever slaughtered the cow demonstrates both furious power and a thorough knowledge of butchery. An animal could not have cut away the meat so carefully. A man has not the strength to tear a yearling in half. And yet...

His wandering takes him beyond the patch of weeds to a stretch of bare earth. Changmin pauses. He lowers his sword arm, suddenly overcome. The point of the blade scratches through the dirt.

“Yunho,” he says, and the word dies in his throat. “Yunho!”

Yunho is at his side within moments. The other men follow. “What is it, Father?”

Changmin gestures with the tip of the sword.

Though the earth is baked hard from lack of rain, the wind has blown through and raised dust, and it’s in the dust that the prints are visible. The paw prints of a wolf, a confusion of them danced around and around, and then they lead away towards the forest and become a man’s footprints.

They stare down at this awful evidence in silence.

“Old Man Potter spoke the truth,” the farmer says at last. His anger and bravado have vanished. Sweat pearls his brow as he stares at the forest. “It’s a monster. A demon. A—a...”

“It is a wolf.” Yunho sounds harsh. His face is pale beneath his tan. “It is a wolf and I will kill it.”

“It’s no normal animal!” One of the labourers catches at Yunho’s arm. “Even in daylight, we could be in danger. Even with a priest! Can he—” a dismissive gesture in Changmin’s direction, “save us from such a foul beast?”

Yunho looks at Changmin. “Prayer can do wondrous things.”

“Can it defeat a monster?” the labourer asks, fear edging his tone. “Can it?”

“Prayer can do anything.” Yunho rips his gaze away from Changmin for a heartbeat, then looks back. His eyes are dark, their expression unreadable. “Anything at all.”

They do not find the wolf that day, and for the next two weeks the parishioners keep close within the village boundaries. Even the most laggardly of worshippers attends daily mass, and it’s not difficult to guess the direction of their prayers.

Changmin is still uncertain what to believe. The human footprints beside the animal tracks can be explained. Perhaps there’s a man living in the forest who somehow managed to tame a wolf. There are accounts of such things happening in distant times, so it’s not beyond the realms of possibility that this is the case now. And, his hypothesis continues, the man has trained the wolf to snatch livestock, and together man and beast butchered the yearling from Long Acre.

It’s a good theory. Changmin moots it one evening at the tavern. The regulars fall upon it with relief, discussing, debating, and refining the explanation until it stands as fact. It is easier to imagine a man with a trained wolf rather than to consider the possibility of a monster sent from Hell.

Old Man Potter sticks to his story. He saw the wolf stand on two legs and walk, he says, dragging the yearling’s carcass behind it.

“He drinks too much,” Widow Fletcher tells Changmin. “Your suggestion is more sensible.”

Changmin nods. Sensible it may be, but his theory can’t explain why the wolf attacked Yunho’s cart that night. He scrambles for further conjecture. Perhaps the man in the forest wanted the horse and cart. Perhaps he wanted Yunho’s wife, or the apprentice lad, or Yunho himself. Perhaps it was an act of revenge, or of greed, since Yunho was travelling home from market and had been carrying coin from selling his wares.

The wolf shows neither hide nor hair of itself during this time, and after the fortnight has passed, the villagers relax and give their attention to the pleasure of more scandalous matters. The carpenter’s son has been named the father of the babe swelling the belly of the miller’s youngest daughter, and a hasty marriage is arranged.

The first time Changmin reads the banns, the wife of the farmer at Long Acre faints in church. The farmer claims it’s due to the stifling heat. Everyone pretends agreement, but they know the swoon was brought on by a jealous rage.

“She’s devastated at losing her young lover,” the housekeeper tells Changmin as she serves up slices of a cold meat pie, a bowl of boiled eggs, some coarse rye bread, and slivers of cheese. “And she a woman in her prime, too, and the miller’s lass still a slip of a thing! Mind you, the lass has a shape on her, for all that she takes after her da in looks, and the carpenter’s son could do worse than wed into that family. But I hear the miller is in a dreadful rage. Wanted to marry the lass to the stonemason the next village over, he did. Aye, I wouldn’t be surprised if she loses the babe before the last reading of the banns, you mark my words.”

Changmin looks up from his meal, slightly nauseated by the implications of what he’s hearing. “Are you suggesting that the miller will force his daughter to get rid of the child?”

The housekeeper’s gaze skitters away. “Not suggesting anything of the sort, Father. But the lass being right young and all, and the carpenter’s son is the fickle type... Everyone knows fickle men produce fickle seed, the likes of which might not stay where it’s planted.” Her face is red as she darts a look at him. “Not that you’d know about such matters, Father. This is woman’s business, so it is. You just pay no attention to my prattling now. I’ll fetch you some honey for that bread.”

“No, thank you.” Changmin gets up from the table. “I think I’ll eat in the garden. It’s—it’s a trifle stuffy in here.”

“Right you are, Father. I’ll open the windows and let in the breeze, shall I?” The housekeeper bustles off to attend to this task.

Disquieted by the gossip, Changmin loads his plate with food and carries it outside with a jug of water.

Just beyond the dusty scratching of the vegetable patch, where the thin, feathery tops of carrots wither yellow beside the drooping spikes of onions and garlic, there’s a small orchard. Apples, mainly, although there are a couple of pear trees tucked closest to the wall at the end of the garden. Lichen crawls over the stooped trees. The leaves are pale and dry, robbed of nourishment, but they still cling to the branches and provide a pleasant shade.

He places his picnic beneath his favourite tree, the long grass at its foot crushed into a bower where he’s lain before, and then he glances up at the roof where Yunho is still working. “Master Blacksmith,” he calls, “if it would please you to share my meal...”

Yunho lays down his tools with a smile. “Thank you. A man can’t live on the nourishment of Widow Fletcher’s pies alone, especially as I’m sure she’s taken to mixing dust in with the pastry to make it go further.”

Changmin laughs, then realises that Yunho was being serious. The knowledge sobers him, spoiling his usual enjoyment in watching Yunho climb down from the roof. Turning away, Changmin busies himself rearranging the food on the plate.

“A feast,” Yunho declares happily, settling in the dried grass. The shade dapples him, sunlight picking out bright patches on his unlaced shirt and gleaming from his sweat-slicked skin. He smells warm and vital, of the smoky scent of the forge and the dry haze of the summer air.

The breath catches in Changmin’s throat. Longing knots inside him. To distract himself, he takes a piece of rye bread and a slice of cheese. “I’m concerned that feast will be followed by famine, and as Joseph advised Pharaoh, we should make preparations to gather what we can.”

“You’re not wrong.” Yunho selects a piece of pie. “The crops are scorched. It’ll be a miracle if we can bring in even a third of the harvest. If the drought continues, we’ll need to slaughter most of the livestock before summer’s out. At least we can hang and salt the meat ready for winter.”

Changmin nods. He finishes his bread and cheese and takes a drink of water from the jug. “How much grain did the village put aside from last year’s harvest?”

Yunho pauses in thought. “Not enough.” He eats his pie in stages, first the pastry lid, then the jelly, then the meat, then the rest of the crust. Only when he’s finished does he say, “Two sacks remain. With what folk already have stored at home, it should be enough to see us through to the harvest, but since there won’t be a harvest...”

They sit in silence for a moment. A grasshopper starts up its sawing nearby; cree-cree-cree. Heat shimmers around them. The whitewashed walls of the presbytery sear their brightness into Changmin’s eyes. He drops his gaze and picks up an egg. Knocking it against the plate, he begins to peel it from its shell.

“I have some coin,” he says. “The money you refused to take for the roof repairs. It should be sufficient to buy a few sacks of grain at market.”

“It should.” Yunho reaches for the jug and takes a long swig of water. He drinks from the same place as Changmin. Either he doesn’t notice or he doesn’t care that his mouth touches the same part of the rim where Changmin had laid his lips.

“I’m going to town the middle of next month,” Yunho continues, setting down the jug again. “Come with me.” He hesitates; gives Changmin a look both curious and wary. “You can wear the sword. It’s my finest piece.”

Another pause, longer this time; and then, words tumbling over themselves, he adds, “It’ll be a good advertisement. Knights, well, they know the value of a weapon when they see one just lying on a stall, they know at a glance how it’ll feel in the hand; but for higher nobility... For them it’s as much about display as use. They like to know how a sword hangs from their belts, how it’ll suit them. If they see it on you, they’ll be more inclined to make purchase.”

It’s nonsense and Changmin knows it. Hiding a smile at Yunho’s lack of subtlety, he says, “I am not fully entitled to that sword. I am only the Bishop’s nephew.”

Yunho looks at him. “Oh.”

“And,” Changmin continues, smile fading, “he has many nephews.”

From the puzzled frown on Yunho’s brow, it’s obvious he doesn’t understand the polite allusion.

“I’m his bastard.” Frustration creeps into Changmin’s voice, swiftly followed by anger. “The youngest and least important of His Grace’s whelps. He gave me this living because that’s his idea of generosity. My mother wasn’t important enough for him to consider me for any scheme that furthered his political interests. She just worked in the kitchens and was unlucky enough to—”

He stops himself from blurting out the rest of the tale. It doesn’t change anything and it only makes him resentful, and he doesn’t want to feel old, frustrated anger while he’s sitting beside Yunho.

“You have siblings, then,” Yunho says, taking another piece of pie.

“Five brothers. Two sisters.” Changmin picks at the egg he’s unpeeled, although his appetite has gone. “An embarrassment of riches to a man of the cloth, and I am the most embarrassing of them all.”

The frown is back on Yunho’s face. “He educated you. Sent you to study for the priesthood so you’d have a living. It is care of a sort.”

Changmin drops the egg onto the plate. “My eldest brother holds the rank of colonel in the King’s army. My second brother is under-secretary to the Chancellor. My eldest sister became the Chancellor’s second wife. My third brother...” He closes his eyes and shakes his head, a tight, painful gesture. “I need not go on. My uncle—my father—sent me here, to the meanest of all the parishes within his diocese, because he wished to punish me.”

Yunho looks at him directly. “It’s not just because your mother was a servant.”

“No.” Changmin meets his gaze, unflinching. “It’s because when he came to confront me about certain rumours that had reached his ears, he saw for himself that the rumours were true.”

Eyes wide, Yunho says, “He found you with a lover?”

Changmin lets out a sharp bark of laughter. “Two lovers. Both of them male.” He glances at Yunho, almost amused by his stricken expression. “One of them was the Chancellor’s son by his first wife. I think that was what upset His Grace the most.”

Silence circles, lashing them around until Changmin can’t bear it any longer. He has to know if his plain speech has disgusted Yunho the way he’s disgusted himself. “Now you know the truth, will you not condemn me the way he did?”

“No.” Yunho lifts his gaze, open and honest. “I don’t care what you did in the capital. Whether you loved the Chancellor’s son or if it was revenge against your father, you were the one hurt most by your actions. But I am glad of it, because it brought you here, and we needed you.”

His expression turns fierce, and when he continues, Yunho sounds passionate, as if he truly believes what he’s saying. “You are a good man. A good priest. You care for us all. And maybe care or the lack of it was what led you to do what you did in the capital, but that’s not who you are now.”

Shame fills Changmin, prompting him to a further truth: “I am still that man. I still lust for things I should not want and cannot have.”

Yunho draws back, his eyes shadowed with bewilderment and his lips parted. He seems to wrestle with his conscience, almost speaks, but then lapses back into silence.

Changmin feels empty. Now resentment has fled, regret creeps in.

“What would you rather have done?” Yunho asks at length. “You had no part in your decision to become a priest, but if you’d had the choice, what would you have done instead?”

The question throws Changmin. He’s spent so long railing against what he’s been given that he’s not sure what he’d have wanted. Unable to form coherent answer yet, he asks, “Does it matter?”

“Yes.” Yunho breaks a few stems of dried grass and weaves them together, his movements restless and idle. “You are what they made you, but you can still find a way to be you.”

Now it’s Changmin’s turn to frown. “What do you mean?”

“Like me.” Yunho seems embarrassed to be offering himself as comparison. He shrugs. “I’m a blacksmith because my father was a blacksmith and my grandfather before him. I wanted to be a toymaker, but living here... it’s impossible. Even if I moved to the town, it would be hard. The village needs a blacksmith, so that’s what I do. I’m good at it and I like helping people. I forge weapons because there’s a demand and I’m good at that, too. It keeps me busy for the most part, but I still make toys for the little ones where I can, and that’s what I enjoy best.”

Changmin isn’t sure how to respond. “I’ve heard about your toys,” he says, seized by awkwardness. “They move.”

“By clockwork.” Yunho smiles. He seems almost shy. “I’ll show you sometime, if you like.”

“I’d like that a lot,” Changmin says honestly.

Another silence falls, comfortable and desperate at the same time. Casting around for something to break the tension, Changmin takes up the water-jug and drinks. He makes sure his lips touch the place from which Yunho drank, and his heart races at the foolish fantasy of an indirect kiss.

By July, the crops are all dead and the fields are parched.

As the housekeeper predicted, the marriage between the carpenter’s son and the miller’s daughter is called off. The girl, pale and trembling, declares that she was mistaken, misled by her ignorance into believing herself with child. She had allowed the carpenter’s son to kiss her; that was all. Her ma had explained the facts of the matter and there was no babe, so there was no need for a marriage.

Changmin is disappointed. He’d have liked to celebrate a wedding. The village is so rutted down with the failure of the crops and the unrelenting heat that a wedding would have lifted their communal spirits. Instead the lass is bundled up on her father’s cart and taken to wed the stonemason in the next village over.

When the miller returns, he brings news that the crops have failed there, too. He managed to buy a sack of last year’s grain, but it cost him a great deal and he’ll have to raise his prices accordingly. He contrives to look sad when he makes this announcement, but there’s avarice behind his eyes.

Worried that the cost of bread will push the poorest of his flock closer towards hunger, Changmin gathers together all the coin he possesses. One morning before dawn, he hurries down to the forge in time to find Yunho loading his cart with swords and tools and other examples of his craft.

“If the invitation still stands,” Changmin says, “take me with you to market.”

The half light dusts them both with shadow. The expression in Yunho’s eyes is unreadable. “Town is almost twenty miles away. You won’t be back home until tomorrow eve. What about mass?”

Changmin lifts his chin, steadfast in his decision. “Better two days without mass than two months without bread.”

Yunho nods as if he’d expected Changmin to say that. He gestures for him to climb up onto the seat. “I’d be glad of your company.”

They don’t speak much until they’re clear of the village. As they travel through the forest, they’re both silent.

Changmin clutches the sword that Yunho had handed to him when they’d set off. His nerves stretch taut as he scans the trees and undergrowth on either side of the road. The dawn chorus sings from the treetops and the first rays of sunlight glimmer and shine, but it’ll be hours yet before the darkness retreats from the woodland. Signs of drought are visible even deep in the forest, where the ferns are shrivelled brown and the smell of dust hangs in the air and everything feels dry, like tinder.

They meet no other traffic on the road. They see no animals. Apart from the birdsong and the creak of the wheels, the forest surrounds them with silence.

Changmin glances at Yunho now and then. His face is pale, his jaw tense. He holds the reins and keeps his gaze fixed to the road. Around about the time Changmin should be performing Matins, Yunho halts the horse and cart. He jumps down and approaches a spot close by the moss-clad trunk of a fallen tree. There’s a posy of flowers on the ground, the blossoms wilted.

Yunho tosses them into the undergrowth. He takes something from inside his jacket. Not a fresh posy, because all the flowers in the village and hedgerows have withered and died. Instead it’s a little figure made of woven grass, like the corn dollies made for the harvest festival. There’s a scrap of cloth tied around it, the bright blue of forget-me-nots.

Struck by a grief not his to bear, Changmin bows his head and prays.

Yunho returns to the cart, pausing for a moment to stroke the horse’s nose and to murmur to it, and then he clambers back up onto the driver’s seat and takes the reins. They move off.

Changmin turns his head to look at the doll sitting amongst the dead bracken.

“She wanted a child,” Yunho says, voice barely audible over the steady clip-clop of the horse’s hooves and the squeak and grind of the cartwheels. “So did I.”

Changmin reaches out. “I’m sorry.”

“Maybe it’s for the best.” Yunho doesn’t shake off Changmin’s touch, but neither does he give sign that he’s even noticed it.

Uncertain of himself, Changmin sits back in his seat and studies the road ahead.

A little while later, Yunho asks, “Do you regret it? What you did in the capital with the Chancellor’s son and the other man, I mean. Do you ever wish you hadn’t made that decision?”

The question comes as a surprise. Changmin considers his reply before he says, “No. Perhaps I could have been wiser about where our congress took place, but I think I wanted my father to find us. I’d been getting more reckless with whom I took as a lover and where we engaged in bed-sport, so discovery was inevitable. But no, I don’t regret it.”

He casts Yunho a glance, curious. “Why do you ask?”

Yunho shakes his head. He’s silent for a while, and then he says, “I shouldn’t have married. I regret it, now more than ever. Before, it was easier. Before—” He stops himself.

“Before...?” Changmin prompts. He both longs for and fears the reply.

Another shake of the head. Yunho clicks his tongue at the horse and the cart rolls on, raising dust in its wake.

In town, they lodge at a tavern and bed down in a chamber filled to bursting with men, women, and children all come for the market. Guests wander back and forth, sometimes tripping over other people trying to sleep. A drunk sings on the street outside. The cramped space and the stink of unwashed bodies, the lingering odour of cooked food, and the cloying perfume of pomanders all combine to remind Changmin of the servant’s quarters in the Bishop’s palace.

An insect bites him. He slaps at it, hoping it’s not a flea. Curling his lip when the bug bites him again, Changmin shifts closer to Yunho beneath the thin woollen blanket they’re obliged to share.

Despite several muttered conversations going on around them, despite the progress of a dice game out on the stairs and despite the wailing of a babe and its mother’s attempts to hush it, Yunho is asleep. He’s curled on his side, hair tumbled over his brow, and in repose he looks softer, younger.

Changmin’s heart clenches. He wants. He wants so much, and it hurts.

Perhaps Yunho can feel the weight of Changmin’s yearning gaze. He stirs, relaxes his grip on the edge of the blanket. His hand falls to the straw mattress. His fingers flutter, reaching out.

“Changmin,” Yunho murmurs. The ghost of a smile touches his lips. “Changmin. Stay.”

Heartbeat thudding, breaths tight in his chest, Changmin inches closer. Hoping to hear Yunho say his name again, he doesn’t sleep for the rest of the night.

On the morrow, Changmin spends all his remaining coin on purchasing grain. The asking price is higher than he’d anticipated, but his cassock and his persuasive oratory—or perhaps his refusal to move until the deal is struck—brings a twenty percent discount. Five sacks of wheat are loaded onto the cart, and Changmin sits perched on the back of it for the rest of the morning, watching Yunho work the crowd.

A number of knights visit the stall and examine the swords. Yunho says nothing, obviously preferring to let the quality of his blades speak for him. The knights ask a few questions, handle the weapons, and then make purchase.

Burgesses come over to buy locks and keys and other household objects. A few of their wives make bold with their gazes as they look at Yunho; he smiles and flirts back, gently and playfully so as not to cause offence. Children cluster around the stall wanting to see the moving toys, and Yunho winds up the clockwork animals and sets a copper cat chasing a copper mouse. Amused, the burgesses hand over more coin. Their children whoop with delight as they carry away beaten metal frogs that leap, cows that low, and birds that sing and flap their wings.

By the time the bells ring for None almost all of Yunho’s wares have been sold, including the sword Changmin had carried on their journey.

“We should be on our way,” Yunho says, wrapping the last few items in sacking and storing them alongside the grain on the cart. “If we leave now, we’ll be back before the storm breaks.”

“Storm?” Changmin glances up into the cloudless blue sky.

“It’s coming.” Yunho smiles at him. “Trust me. I know.”

The journey home is more easeful. They talk and laugh, comfortable with one another and content with what they’ve achieved at market. Changmin praises the clockwork toys, and Yunho tells him of larger mechanisms powered by steam.

“In the kingdoms of the east, they have automata that run on hydraulics and steam,” Yunho says, face alight with enthusiasm. “Huge temple doors that can be opened just by pulling a lever! Fortresses that can be defended simply by stoking the furnace! A whole chorus of golden birds singing different melodies—actually playing music—as they sit in silver trees! How I wish I could see such marvels and learn from the craftsmen who made them.”

“You should travel to those distant places,” Changmin tells him, smiling.

Yunho shakes his head. “Duty keeps me here. Perhaps if I find an apprentice willing to learn, someone who’ll take on the forge for me and smith for the village in my absence...” He sighs. “I’m afraid it’s just a foolish dream.”

“Dreams are not always foolish,” Changmin says. “Sometimes we need their comfort to sustain us.” Self-conscious and aware of the huskiness in his voice, he fixes his gaze on the road, expecting a rebuttal.

When Yunho remains silent, Changmin says, “When I was younger, I wanted to be a troubadour. I liked singing and composed a few poor verses of my own. I dreamt one day I’d go travelling, learning the songs of different regions, and then I’d go to court in a land far from here and offer my songs as homage to the Queen, and the nobles would find peace in my voice.”

It’s the first time he’s ever admitted this dream to anyone. He’s never even made mention of it in his prayers, but now here he is, blurting it out to a blacksmith. No: to Yunho, who looks at him with understanding and that awful, wonderful belief that he’d shown last month in the orchard when he’d said that Changmin was a good man, a good priest. He looks at Changmin as if he believes in him, as if he cares for him, and Changmin feels lost and triumphant.

“I’ve heard you sing in church,” Yunho says, and Changmin knows he doesn’t mean the antiphons and canticles during mass. Smiling encouragement, Yunho continues, “Would you sing for me now? Not a religious song. Something else.”

It can do no harm. It’ll help pass the time. Awkward at first, Changmin closes his eyes and lets the movement of the cart dictate the rhythm, lets the beat of the horse’s hooves count time for him. He sings, low and soft, then as he gains confidence, he lets his voice soar. He sings a secular love song, bittersweet and passionate; an account of a man so deeply in love he abandons his wits.

When the song ends and Changmin opens his eyes, he finds Yunho looking at him in wonder.

“Sing another,” Yunho begs. “And then another. Sing us home.”

Changmin obliges. He runs through his repertoire, and when he reaches the more scurrilous ditties, Yunho laughs and joins in. One popular tune has different verses in the south, and Changmin makes Yunho repeat them until he’s got them memorised, and then he weaves both versions together to create a tale even more shocking than the original.

By the time they reach the forest, smudges of grey roll across the horizon in a long bank of clouds. For the first time in months, there’s moisture in the air. Changmin sits up straight. The breeze is like cold, damp hands pressed to his face, and it’s freshening all the time.

Yunho makes an amused sound. “Looks like we’ll get wet.”

Changmin inhales the scent of the coming storm. After endless weeks of dust and heat, the promise of rain tastes exquisite. He turns in his seat and looks at the bags of grain. He’d covered them with extra sacking before they left the town; even in a downpour the grain should remain dry enough.

They enter the forest. Leaves and dust skitter towards them along the road. The treetops bend and rustle in the wind. The light dims. Yunho leans forward in his seat, gaze sharp and alert.

The first few drops of rain fall, fat and explosive on the dusty ground. There’s a hush, as if the forest is holding its breath, and then the sky cracks open.

By the time they’re through the forest, they’re both drenched. Water streams across the hard-baked surface of the road. By tomorrow it’ll have sunk into the ground, turning it into a quagmire, but for now they can still pass without the cart bogging down.

The village is a dark blot through the twilight of the storm. A few dogs bark at their approach and a few faces appear in doorways as they drive around the green, but no one hails them.

Yunho halts the cart at the steps of the raised barn beside the mill. Changmin climbs up, unlatches the door, then helps Yunho carry the sacks of grain inside and stack them near what little remains of last year’s communal grain.

“You did a good thing,” Yunho tells him, eyes glinting in the half light.

“I did my duty as a priest,” Changmin corrects, but smiles nonetheless, warmed by Yunho’s words of simple praise. “And now I should return to the presbytery.”

“But first,” Yunho says, reaching into his jacket and taking out a purse fat with coin, “would you take this into the cottage while I unload the rest of the cart and see to the horse? It’d give you a chance to get dry, too. And there’s a bite to eat, if you’re hungry—just some bread and honey...”

Changmin takes the coin. His pulse starts to thud. “Of course.”

Holding the purse against his chest, his wet cassock slapping around his legs, Changmin leaves the barn and hurries across the squelching green to the cottage tucked against the far side of the forge. Thunder rumbles and the rain increases, sharp, cold spikes hurled from the heavens.

It’s a relief to get indoors again. Changmin stands on the rag-rug mat, clothes dripping. He looks around the twilit sanctuary of Yunho’s home. It’s nothing much, just two rooms, but it’s pleasant and comfortable, with little clockwork toys on the mantel.

He wonders where to put the money. Above the bed is a shelf holding a couple of candle stubs. Changmin hesitates, then goes over and sets the purse beside them. He lingers a moment, looking down at the bed with its quilt the colour of forget-me-nots, and he breathes in the familiar scent of Yunho’s body. He touches the bolster, fingertips brushing over the indentation where Yunho lays his head.

Changmin pulls away, his heartbeat frantic. His gaze falls upon the empty hearth and the pile of wood and kindling nearby. Moving with purpose, he lays the fire and lights it. He crouches before the flames to warm his hands and becomes conscious of the smell of wet wool as the heat touches his cassock. Perhaps he should take it off and hang it up to dry.

The rain hammers on the roof, unrelenting. Changmin goes over to the window and closes the shutters. The only light comes from the wavering orange and gold of the fire. There’s a snap as a branch breaks, a hiss as the wood tumbles and settles.

Changmin unfastens his belt. He takes off his cassock and folds it over a drying stand by the hearth. He stands there naked but for his wet undergarments.

The wind howls, rattling the shutters. Changmin shivers, even though he’s warm, even though he’s burning up.

He should leave. He should get back into his sodden cassock and go home. There’s no reason for him to remain here, none at all, except the memory of what Yunho had said last night in the tavern.

Stay.

But Yunho had been asleep and dreaming when he’d uttered that word. Perhaps it meant nothing. Changmin is torn, storm-tossed, his rationality deserting him.

The door opens and Yunho comes in. Water runs from his hair, down his face, soaking all through his clothes. He shoves the door closed against the brunt of the wind and slides the bolt across. He turns, smiling, saying something about the ferocity of the storm, and then the words die on his lips and his eyes widen as he takes in the sight before him.

“Changmin,” he says, and there’s whole worlds inside his voice, there’s such longing, and that’s all it takes.

Changmin crosses the room and kisses him.

The response is every bit as passionate as Changmin had dreamt. Yunho mouths at him, tongue flicking over Changmin’s top lip until Changmin opens up and lets him in. Yunho moans, lifts both hands to cradle Changmin’s face, and they kiss and kiss, desire roaring around them hotter than the fire and wilder than the storm.

“Yes,” Changmin gasps. “Touch me. Take me.”

Yunho jerks away, staggers back two steps, and stands in front of the hearth, shivering. He stares at Changmin, anguished and uncertain.

Silence deadens the room. Changmin doesn’t move.

“I prayed for a lover,” Yunho says at last. “Someone who’d understand me. I married my wife knowing what I was. I tried to be a good husband, but...” He pauses, takes a deep breath, then continues: “I wondered if the wolf attack was punishment for my sin, and then you came, and now it feels like the wolf was a blessing. A reward.”

He closes his eyes, conflict written all over his face, and then he looks up, looks at Changmin. “God help me, for I am helpless before you.”

“It is not a sin to know yourself,” Changmin says. “It is not a sin to love.”

“And if I love you?” Yunho asks on a whisper.

Changmin is trembling. “It is not a sin. The ancients didn’t think it was a sin.”

“They’re all dead.”

“And one day, we will be dead, too.”

Yunho gives a little shake of the head. “That is not an argument.”

“No,” Changmin agrees. “It is fact.” Afraid of a misstep, desperate to remove the doubt between them, he lifts a hand in beckoning and benediction. “Yunho...”

“You have lain with men before,” Yunho says, and he looks lost. “I... I have not. I don’t know what you want from me.”

The hesitation is gone. Changmin goes nearer. He lays a hand on Yunho’s chest, strokes upwards, touches Yunho’s throat, his face. Yunho makes a soft noise and presses closer. Instinct overwhelms reason.

“Let me teach you,” Changmin says, offering everything. “Let me show you.”

On Lammas Day, a dead body is found on the road outside the forest.

Changmin is summoned before he can begin Terce. None of the villagers seem to mind; they’re more interested in the identity of the corpse. They gather around the muddy pond and talk amongst themselves. Perhaps it’s their former priest, Changmin hears his housekeeper say loudly. Serves him right if the wolf got him.

But it’s not the priest, nor is it anyone else the villagers recognise.

While he drew breath, the man must have been a rough sort of fellow. He looks to be of late middle age, with a sinewy build that suggests hard living. His hair is slate grey with a stripe of white running from a dent in his forehead, the relic of an old injury.

Though the face and limbs are untouched and show no sign of defensive wounds, the body has been butchered. Long, raking claw-marks gouge from the collarbones all the way down the torso. Intestines slither through the gaps in the flesh. The man’s throat has been torn out and his genitals ripped away. The thatcher, who’d found the remains, reports that he’d seen the severed penis and scrotum nearby in a water-logged ditch.

“I didn’t want to touch them!” he says, expression comical with disgust. “Bad enough I had to put this horror on my cart without scooping up his cock and balls!”

Changmin studies the corpse. It has started to stiffen but doesn’t yet swarm with flies. By his reckoning, the kill took place sometime between Vigils and Matins—three o’clock in the morning, when night is at its deepest.

“That cursed wolf!” the Widow Fletcher says, standing on tiptoe to get a good look at the body. “Two human victims, now. Where will it end? It’ll devour us in our very beds!”

Yunho comes out of the forge. His hair is dishevelled and sweat glistens from his brow and bare shoulders. He meets Changmin’s gaze, hot and hungry, then glances at the corpse in the thatcher’s cart. There’s not even the slightest amount of curiosity in his look. Instead he gestures at the children trying to squeeze past the villagers for sight of the mutilated body.

“The young ones shouldn’t see such a thing,” he says. “Send them home and let Father Shim do his duty.”

Parents chase their offspring away. The thatcher starts to pull a piece of sacking over the remains, but Changmin stops him.

“You stare so intently,” Yunho says, coming to stand nearby. “Did you know this man?”

Changmin shakes his head. He can’t stop looking at the ruin of the chest. The lacerations seem so careful, as if they weren’t just inflicted to cause pain. Holding his breath, he leans forward for a better look. The flesh is puckered over the right pectoral. It’s white. Knotted. A scar, the kind left from the thrust of a knife.

“Father?” Yunho’s voice, curious now.

Jolted from his reverie, Changmin turns and recalls the question. “I don’t know him. But I’ve seen men like him before. His tan, the scars... I think perhaps he used to be a soldier. Maybe he turned mercenary, since he’s alone and so unkempt.”

“And now he’s dead.” Yunho looks down at the corpse, then covers it with the sacking. “We should get this into the ground as soon as possible.”

After a hasty funeral, the corpse is buried in the pauper’s plot at the far side of the graveyard. Changmin feels uneasy about it. Even when he walks the short distance between the church and the presbytery, he scans the perimeter of the graveyard and turns to look behind him several times. It’s as if he’s being watched, but he doesn’t know if his watcher wishes him good or ill.

Bored with discussions of the rain and if anything can be saved of the harvest before winter arrives, tavern regulars fall upon the topic of the dead stranger with whole-hearted glee. Changmin’s theory that the man was a mercenary is seized upon and embroidered by the gossips, and soon rumour has it that the stranger was bound for the village on a secret mission from the capital.

“They say he was sent here to kill you,” Yunho tells him one afternoon as the rain taps on the roof of the forge. “They say you’re a disinherited prince hiding from your royal father, and the mercenary was sent to bring back your head.”

“That was yesterday’s story,” Changmin says with a snort. “The most recent explanation is that the stranger was in search of a hoard of gold buried within a fairy ring in the forest.”

Yunho smiles and looks up from honing the edge of a knife blade. “Now that could be true. There’s an old legend that tells of a great treasure buried beneath one of the standing stones.”

Changmin raises his eyebrows. “Standing stones?”

“A stone circle. It’s partway into the forest to the west.” Yunho picks up a cloth and polishes the knife. “An eerie, silent place, it is. No birds sing there and the grass... it’s different, thick and lush and a green that hurts the eyes. It used to be a dare between all of us village children to go into the ring at twilight on one of the Turning Days and count the stones, starting from the King Stone. The twenty-seventh stone clockwise from the King has the treasure beneath it.”

“Did you look for it?” Changmin asks, amused by the tale.

“Of course.” Yunho’s smile fades. “But you can never count twenty-seven stones. There’s only twenty-four still standing.”

One evening, just after Vespers, Changmin notices something fluttering on top of the mounded earth of the stranger’s grave. He makes his way across the wet grass and looks down. A wreath has been placed upon the grave; a garland, knotted and twisted, of purple flowers.

Changmin knows enough of herbs to recognise it as wolfsbane, but he’s too ignorant of country customs to tell if the villagers placed it here as prevention or cure.

A breeze stirs the flowers. He thinks of the dead man and remembers Old Man Potter’s report of the wolf. The beast was grey with a white stripe in its fur. It had a wound in its chest. A scar.

Crouched at the graveside, Changmin wonders if it’s possible; if the dead man had also been the wolf. He’s read of such things in ancient texts, Pliny and Petronius and Herodotus, but he’d always dismissed them as tales for the credulous. The slaughter of the yearling and the evidence of the paw prints becoming footprints had shaken that belief, but he’d thought he’d found a rational explanation.

Until now.

Now he doesn’t know what to make of it, and so he wonders.

And because he cannot stop the direction of his thoughts, Changmin also wonders what manner of creature killed the stranger. Whatever it was, it was certainly not human—but neither was it completely animal.

He keeps careful watch over the grave for several days afterwards, but sees nothing unusual. Not that he’d expected anything to happen, but still. Superstition is rife in the village. Sometimes its power is stronger than the authority of the Church.

No one says anything to suggest a link between the dead man and the wolf that killed Yunho’s wife. Changmin wrestles with the problem, but cannot bring himself to discuss it with anyone. He doesn’t even make mention of it in his prayers, perhaps because he is afraid of being given the answer, and at length he convinces himself the subject is closed.

Late one night towards the end of August, when the candle has burned low and his eyes ache from the strain of reading, Changmin hears a wolf howling.

Despite the heavy rainfall, there’s only the most meagre of offerings come the harvest festival. Changmin weighs the Bishop’s anger against the needs of his flock and waives the tithes due to the Church. He hopes this demonstration of compassion will encourage people to draw closer and help one another as the air turns chill and the sun’s heat grows weaker, but instead the village is divided.

Autumn comes on, frost riming the village green and icing the pond. The few late crops of vegetables are dug out of the ground stunted and wizened. One of the sacks of grain that Changmin bought at market goes missing from the barn. When another is opened, black spores are found infesting the grain and the whole sack is gone to waste. A barrel of salted meat has spoiled, and the stench drives everyone from the barn.

Accusations fly. People eye their neighbours with suspicion.

By now it’s obvious the winter will be harsh. It’s equally obvious that, even with careful management, their supplies will run out long before the spring thaw.

At Samhain, an altar appears on the village green. Tied with ribbon and carved with strange markings, a dead crow is left upon it as appeasement for the old gods. Changmin casts it down, but the next day it stands righted, hung around with tiny moppets and the purple flowers of wolfsbane.

This time he hurls the altar into the pond. There’s a smattering of applause from the watching villagers. It sounds like rain.

The following morning, a dead crow is discovered outside the miller’s door.

Changmin’s housekeeper says it’s the work of the carpenter’s son, bent on revenge over his aborted babe and the ruin of his wedding plans. Widow Fletcher disagrees. She says it’s the doing of the wife of the farmer at Long Acre, who hasn’t been seen since the day she fainted in church.

“Gone mad, she has,” Widow Fletcher tells everyone in the tavern. “Turned to the dark arts, she did, and now look what’s come to pass! Haunted by a monstrous wolf and suffering drought and famine, all because of her jealousy. Whatever will become of us?”

Over the last two months, Changmin has written weekly to the Bishop begging for assistance. He lays out his arguments with all the eloquence he can muster and reports his decision not to take tithes this year. He tells his father that the parish has no money and no harvest, and pleads with His Grace to send coin or grain.

His letters are ignored.

In early November he accompanies Yunho to market. Changmin sells his most valuable books, the illuminated psalter and a rare copy of an ancient philosophical treatise. Though he has coin, the merchants have little to sell, and the cost of grain is vastly inflated. The town is full of desperate people and a simmering mood of violence.

They return home with a crate of root vegetables and a single sack of grain.

Yunho is Changmin’s only joy amidst the morass of worry that consumes him. They spend hours buried inside one another, touching and tasting and drawing out pleasure until they learn their breaking points and can go beyond, into a wildness neither of them has ever experienced before.

Most of their loving takes place in the presbytery. The mattress is narrow and they must spoon together, but it’s their only option. After that first time, Yunho has refused to allow Changmin into the wide comfort of the bed in his cottage.

“It’s my marriage bed,” Yunho explains again, patiently, when Changmin wishes aloud that they could enjoy more luxury of space.

It’s after Compline and they’re both naked, glossed with sweat as they twine around one another. Yunho brushes kisses over Changmin’s face. “My wife has not yet been in her grave a year. It would be wrong and dishonourable to her memory for us to lie there again.”

“And yet you do not find it wrong or dishonourable to sleep with your priest,” Changmin retorts.

Yunho settles Changmin closer and holds him tight. “There are greater perils to my soul than sinning with you, my love.”

Resting his head on Yunho’s shoulder, Changmin says, “It is not a sin.”

“The Church declares it so.”

“In this, the Church is wrong.” Tension rides his voice; Changmin tries to keep his tone light. “The Church is wrong in many things. Believe me: I am a Bishop’s bastard, born out of violence done to my mother, and therefore I am an authority upon this subject.”

Yunho strokes soothing patterns over his back. “You are a good man. The parish is fortunate in you.”

Changmin snorts. “I was trained in rhetoric. I don’t believe everything I say.”

“You don’t need to. What you believe in is enough.”

“Is it?” Changmin lifts his head and looks down at Yunho through the darkness. “If I were less sinful, if I gave you up, would God be merciful to the village?”

Yunho draws him back down beneath the blankets. The scent of dried strewing herbs surrounds him, and Changmin feels dizzy.

“This is not divine judgement,” Yunho says gently. “It has nothing to do with you. Years like this just happen. It is part of nature’s cycle. Not even proper offerings to the gods of the greenwoods would help.”

Changmin turns his face against Yunho’s chest and brushes his lips over the twisted scar of the wolf-bite. “In the city we laugh at country folk for being simple-minded. Now I realise it is we who are the fools. We pride ourselves on knowing everything when in fact we know very little.”

“Be a little kinder to yourself.” Yunho kisses his forehead.

Changmin lifts his head again, mouth searching for more kisses. “Be kind to me,” he pleads. “Yunho, love me.”

When Changmin wakes later, Yunho has gone. He never stays, too aware of the danger of the housekeeper catching them still abed. Changmin rues the need for discretion. Just once, he’d like to spend a full night in Yunho’s arms. Getting out of bed, he pulls on his nightshirt and wanders through the silence of the presbytery. He comes to rest in the dining room, the shutters drawn back as he looks out at the moon.

The next day, his housekeeper comes running to report a miracle. Someone has left food on the village green: a fattened sheep with its throat torn out and a sack of grain.

When he goes to see the miracle for himself, Changmin recognises the merchant’s marks upon the grain sack. It’s from a town some distance away. Returning these items to their rightful owners would be nigh on impossible. Besides, his first duty is to his flock.

At mass, Changmin leads a full congregation in giving thanks for this unexpected bounty. Beneath the safety of his prayers, he worries. He should be grateful for this miracle, but he’s not.

He’s afraid.

One night, unable to sleep, Changmin dresses and goes for a walk around the village. It’s sometime after Vigils, and the moon is still high as it waxes towards fullness. Changmin shivers in the breeze, the cold seeping through his coat and into his very bones. He picks up his pace, already regretting his decision to come outside. He’ll walk once around the village green, and then he’ll retire to his bed. He won’t scratch at Yunho’s door like a cat demanding entrance. He won’t ask his lover to return to the presbytery with him.

A wry smile curves Changmin’s lips. He’ll do both of those things and more, and he’s not ashamed of it. Yunho will warm him; Yunho will see him to rest.

As he emerges from the path and rounds the mill, Changmin spies movement ahead. He halts, ice creeping through him as he sees a wolf, a huge, monstrous wolf, come prowling into the heart of the village.

It vanishes for a moment. All is silent and still. Just as Changmin is beginning to think he imagined the whole thing, the wolf comes back.

It has something between its jaws. A dead animal.

Changmin starts to shake. The wolf is dragging a sheep onto the green. It drops the carcass, pats at it with one paw, then lopes back into the shadows. A short time later, it returns hauling a sack. Not grain this time; the shape of the contents is wrong. Vegetables, perhaps. Changmin can’t tell.

The sack is dumped next to the sheep. The wolf turns and starts to pad away.

Changmin makes a sound of disbelief.

He clamps a hand over his mouth, but it’s too late. On the other side of the green, the wolf’s ears prick forward. It stops in its tracks. Turns.

Fear roots Changmin in place. His mind screams at him to flee, but he knows with cold certainty that if he runs, the wolf will chase him. The wolf will catch him. If he remains still, so very still, if he doesn’t move at all, maybe it’ll lose interest. Maybe it won’t see him. Maybe it’ll leave him alone.

The wolf lifts its head as if sniffing the air. Changmin wonders if it can smell his terror. His legs tremble. His teeth chatter, very softly. With an effort he holds himself together, keeps himself still. He can’t banish his fear, but he can at least present the illusion of confidence.

Around the pond the wolf comes, its glittering gaze fixed on Changmin. As it comes closer, slinking into the view of the moonlight, he sees its fur, a brindled coat of black and dark red.

It’s not the same wolf as before.

Changmin holds onto that thought as it approaches. He can barely breathe. His heart beats so fast he thinks it’ll explode. Terror shrills through him, and yet behind it all, he knows he’s safe. He knows the wolf won’t hurt him.

It’s not the same wolf.

The creature stops in front of him. It looks at him. It’s huge, easily twice the size of a normal wolf. Its head is at the level of Changmin’s chest. It’s a monster, and yet it’s brought them food.

The wolf snuffles at him. Changmin doesn’t know what it wants. Involuntarily, he takes a step backwards. The wolf paces closer, and Changmin takes another step back. Now the wolf yips. It wants him to walk. No; it wants to walk with him.

Praying that he’s understood this right, Changmin takes the path leading to the presbytery. The wolf follows at his heels. He doesn’t dare turn to look at it, but he knows it’s there—the smell of it, the warmth of it, the sound of its paws against the ground and the brush of its tail against the undergrowth.

When he reaches the presbytery gate, Changmin looks back.

The wolf has gone.

News of his encounter with the wolf spreads around the village like wildfire.

“It’s a good wolf,” Changmin says, over and over. “It brings us food.”

For indeed it does, even after their chance meeting; and though the villagers stay up all night watching for the wolf to show itself again, they never see it—and yet gifts of food are left once a week upon the frost-strewn grass.

“A good wolf,” Changmin repeats, but the villagers disagree. Wolves of that size and intelligence aren’t natural, and if it’s helping them, there must be something behind it. The wolf brings food now, but soon it’ll demand something in return, and no doubt it wants the souls of every last man, woman, and child in the parish.

It isn’t long before the villagers decide that the wolf is a creature ensorcelled by magic. They latch onto this idea with fervour, and a witch-hunt begins.

They begin with Old Man Potter, since it was he who first saw the wolf walking on two legs. A group of men led by the thatcher search Old Man Potter’s house, but they find no dried toads or red thread or wax manikins. They don’t look too hard and they leave the old man alone, contenting themselves instead with drinking his moonshine.

With the courage of the liquor burning through their veins, they decide to call at Long Acre. Everyone knows the farmer’s wife is a witch. She used a spell to seduce the carpenter’s son, and when the lad fell in love with the miller’s lass, she called upon the dark arts to make the girl lose the babe. She put a dead crow outside the miller’s house and, most damning of all, she fainted in church. Only those in league with the Devil are overcome by the sanctity of mass, and the thatcher distinctly remembers that the witch swooned right when Father Shim offered her the Communion bread.

Yes, there’s no doubt at all that the farmer’s wife is the witch. She caused the drought. She made the harvest fail. She called the wolf to the forest, and now she’s bent it to her will, she bides her time and intends to use the monstrous beast to take a terrible revenge upon them all.

Drunk and baying for blood, the mob reaches Long Acre. The farmer comes out to remonstrate with his friends and neighbours. His wife has gone, he says. She left him nigh on five months ago, the morning after she fainted in church. He beat her because she’d broken her marriage vows and lain with the carpenter’s son, and so she left him.

The thatcher doesn’t believe this story. The mob crashes through the farmhouse in search of the woman, but they don’t find her. What they find instead is the stolen sack of grain, so they feel justified in taking out their frustration on the farmer.

They kick him almost to death before Yunho arrives, accompanied by Changmin, and puts a stop to it.

The horror of the drunken attack is discussed in whispers throughout the village. Though some condemn the incident, and though Changmin urges calm upon his flock and beseeches them to join together in friendship and unity as defence against the harsh winter, there’s too much bad blood, too much discontent.

“We cannot rely upon the wolf’s gifts,” Changmin tells them, but they don’t listen.

Some of the parishioners refuse to eat anything brought by the wolf, convinced that one day it’ll come stalking into the village and demand a reckoning in human flesh. Others argue that they should eat the food until the spring thaw, and then set a trap for the wolf and kill it. All agree that the situation is unnatural and the result of sorcery.

Robbed of an obvious culprit, the villagers set their sights elsewhere.

One morning, Changmin finds a dead crow outside the presbytery door.

He carries it into the village and drops it onto the ground. His parishioners sidle out of their homes and stare at him.

“This must stop,” he says. “This solves nothing. It doesn’t help any of us. For the love of God, let there be an end to this witch-hunt!”

The miller, glad to have shaken off the taint of mistrust that’s clung to him over the past few weeks, claims he looked out of his window the night Changmin encountered the wolf: “And what did I see but the beast walked at your heels, Father, the way a faithful hound follows its master!”

Startled, Changmin gathers his wits. “Do you accuse me of sorcery?”

“No,” the miller replies, chin jutting. “I just tell it like I saw it, and I did see you, Father, I saw you with that wolf. Why didn’t it attack you? A beast that size, a monster like that... it should have eaten you, Father, beggin’ your pardon but it should.”

“It did not harm me because I prayed to Our Lord and to our patron St Jude, and they delivered me,” Changmin says. He raises his voice so everyone gathered round can hear. “My faith protected me.”

“Amen,” his housekeeper says, crossing herself, but only a few others respond.

Winter is as relentless as the summer heat. The snow blocks the road, drifts around the boundary hedges, and then the cold slams in and freezes it hard. The pond is but a dip in the white blanketing the village green. Trees stand black and skeletal.

It’s a miracle none of the villagers has died yet, but surely it’s only a matter of time. The farmer at Long Acre hasn’t recovered from his beating. No doubt he’ll have gone to his grave by the New Year. Old Man Potter, too; he has a hacking cough that brings up blood, and his neighbours have the same rattle in their chests when they breathe. Just a chill, they say, but no one believes it.

St Jude’s is icy cold. Few people venture to church of a weekday now, and the congregation at Sunday mass has halved. Changmin continues with the divine offices even if he’s the only one present. His fingers turn blue and his breath hangs in the air, and when he sings his voice crackles like the splitting of ice.

On the solstice, several dead crows are left outside the presbytery. When he goes into the church for Matins, Changmin finds a dead crow upon the high altar. Its head has been smashed in with a stone.

His flock races toward destruction, and Changmin is helpless to save them.

Only Yunho stops him from falling into the same pit of despondency. When they meet, their love-making is increasingly rough and desperate, as if time is running out, as if they could consume one another with the force of their desire.

They’re careless one time. The night after the defilement of the altar, Yunho stays with him, as reluctant to leave as Changmin is to let him go. They exhaust one another, smiling and happy as they bundle beneath the blankets, and then wake to ruin when the housekeeper comes knocking at the bedroom door.

Changmin dresses hurriedly and goes out to break his fast with Yunho’s kisses still warm on his skin and Yunho’s seed smeared down the insides of his thighs. He tries to herd his housekeeper out into the kitchen so Yunho can creep away through the front door, but she hears the squeak of the hinges and bustles out into the hall, suspicious.

She says she thought it might be a thief, or maybe the evildoer who’s been leaving the dead crows lying around. Yunho smiles and says he was on his way to gather firewood from the copse beyond the churchyard when he thought he’d call in and see how the roof repairs were holding up.

The housekeeper nods, apparently accepting this excuse, but her eyes are sharp with scepticism, and when she turns her gaze on Changmin, it’s full of disgust.

Though most of the villagers attend midnight mass on Christmas Eve, they do so with a bad grace. With surly features and curled lip, they stand silent on this most joyous of occasions. Changmin tries to ignore the mistrust and anger in the eyes of his congregation. He tries not to glance at Yunho too often, but it seems the damage is done.

The wolf leaves one last gift on Christmas Day. A goose, snow white, is laid carefully at the kitchen door of the presbytery.

His housekeeper no longer calls to do her duties. Changmin roasts the bird himself. He shares his meal with Yunho, who took the precaution of walking the long way around across snow-covered fields so they could spend a precious few hours together.

The farmer at Long Acre dies two days before the New Year. Changmin leads the funeral mass in a church almost empty of worshippers. Yunho stands with a few of the more elderly villagers who either don’t know or don’t care about the rumours that Changmin is a warlock and the basest of sinners.

A few days after the funeral, the younger members of the community take to following Changmin around, silent and accusatory. At first he smiles at them—some are but children, no more than seven or eight years old—but they stare at him, and there’s menace in their eyes, menace and fear and the blank hatred of ignorance.

Changmin stops smiling. He doesn’t show his unease and tries to walk ahead of the group with his usual brisk pace. When they bar his way, he continues to be polite, hoping that simple Christian duty will prevent them from making a mistake. On those occasions, after a few minutes of stand-off, the group gives ground and lets him pass. He walks on, the skirts of his cassock whispering across the frozen snow, the heat of their stares burning into his back.

He does not turn around.

Old Man Potter succumbs to his illness, and then one of the children, skating on the pond, falls through the ice and drowns. Three deaths in a matter of weeks during a harsh winter are not unusual, but the villagers mutter that it’s sorcery; it’s revenge.

Changmin is trudging across the slush-churned green one afternoon when someone throws a stone at him.

He stops, more shocked than hurt. The stone—a piece of flint, its end knapped to a point—lies in the slush. His shoulder stings and throbs as he bends down and picks up the missile. It’s warm in his hand, retaining the heat of the palm of whoever had held it so tightly. Dismayed but not yet afraid, Changmin turns and finds most of the villagers arrayed in a half circle, facing him.

Yunho comes out of the forge, the stink of smoke wreathing him, anger upon his brow. “Who did that?” he demands, placing himself in front of Changmin. “Who dared to assault our priest? Who did that?”

No one answers. No one even moves.

Then the thatcher speaks up. “Bad luck should be driven out,” he says, “and bad luck started when he arrived.”

“That’s not true.” There’s disbelief in Yunho’s voice. “He has done only good for this village. Have you forgotten the drunken fool we had before? The priest who stole our church plate? Father Shim replaced the vessels. He knows proper liturgy. He has been kind and helpful to all. He even sold his own precious books to buy grain and vegetables for us!”

Silence holds them all motionless. A few people look shame-faced. The thatcher speaks again: “He sins. A sinful priest leads his flock to ruin.”

A quiver goes through Yunho’s body, tension winding tight. His fingers curl into fists. His guilt is as palpable as his anger.

Changmin takes a step closer. “Don’t.”

Yunho ignores the plea. “He does not sin.”

The thatcher folds his arms. “He takes his pleasure with another man. That’s a wickedness right there. Even worse, the man he seduced used to be normal. He used to be one of us. A good man, a moral man. A married man.”

A hiss of agreement ripples through the crowd.

“You cannot argue against this,” Changmin whispers. “Please, do not even try.”

Yunho swallows, chin lifting in furious defiance as he glares at the villagers. “Why will you not name this man, this poor bedazzled fool who was so ensnared?”

The thatcher scratches his head, then glances at his fellows. “Don’t think it’s necessary. The man in question will return to his senses, we reckon, just as soon as the priest is gone from here.”

Changmin exhales. He’s trembling, and now the bruise on his shoulder burns like a brand. He catches at Yunho’s shirt. “They will never forgive me, but you are too important to them.”

Yunho turns and looks at him, love and despair in his eyes. “I will not let you go.”

“If I stay, they will harm us both.” Making the only decision he can, Changmin pushes past Yunho and meets the hostile gaze of his flock. “Now the snow is thawing, the roads will be passable. I will write to the Bishop and request a new living. I will admit my failure here amongst you and ask His Grace to send a good man to replace me as soon as possible.”

“No,” Yunho says, low-voiced and anguished. “No, Changmin.”

“But until then,” Changmin raises his voice and meets the challenge of those staring at him, “until then, I will stay. Until you have another priest to tend you, I will continue in my duties. I will not abandon St Jude’s as my predecessor did!”

A few people seem relieved. Others mutter and share angry looks. The crowd loiters a moment longer, then disperses slowly to gather in small groups outside the miller’s house or beneath the eaves of the tavern.

Yunho faces him. “This is a bad idea.”

“I have nothing else.” Changmin aches, the injury like cold fire. He straightens and lifts his head, forcing a smile. “Besides, what can they do to me? For all that they consider me sinful, I am still a priest. No man wishes to bring down divine wrath for harming a priest.”

Changmin returns to the presbytery and writes a letter to his father. He knows there will be no reply. Perhaps the Bishop’s secretary will find some other hapless fool to administer to this flock, but His Grace will not concern himself overmuch with the fate of this community, just as he won’t burden himself with the effort of finding a new living for the youngest of his bastards.

Misery roars in to claim Changmin. Eight months ago he’d arrived here, uncertain and angry but willing to build a life for himself. Now everything lies in ruin, cast down by drought and famine and the wolf, by simple greed and fear and ignorance. Still worse, he’s destroyed the reputation of the man he loves. By opening Yunho’s eyes to possibility, he’s tarnished him forever.

Overwhelmed with disappointment and grief, Changmin pushes aside the clutter of quills and ink and parchment. He lays his head on the table and shudders, racked by dry, angry sobs. He gropes towards prayer, but nothing soothes him and all his words for God are vicious and spiteful and make him feel worse.

At length he sleeps, head pillowed on his arms, the smell of spilled ink a balm.

He wakes to the sound of furious hammering on the presbytery door and the curling, acrid stink of smoke. Bewildered, Changmin jolts upright. His chair falls to the floor with a crash. He takes a deep breath of over-heated air and coughs. He staggers, clutches at the table, then drops to the floor. His eyes water. He blinks, wits returning as he sucks in clearer air and begins to crawl towards the kitchen.

The hammering on the front door stops. Moments later, the kitchen door bursts open and Yunho races in, crying Changmin’s name.

Changmin reaches for him.

They stumble out into the orchard. Yunho lays Changmin in the snow beneath the trees—I thought I’d lost you, God, oh thank God, I love you, I love you—and then races to the well-house. As Changmin watches, head still thick with smoke and his every breath painful, Yunho fills pails of water and tries to douse the flames that consume one side of the presbytery.

By Prime the alarm has been raised in the village and a few people have come to help, but by then it’s too late. Though they bring the fire under control, part of the roof has collapsed. Changmin sits beneath the stunted apple tree, the snow around him melted from the ferocity of the blaze, and stares at the blackened ribs of his home.

Streaked with soot and sweat, Yunho crouches beside him. “The shutters of your bedroom window were forced and tinder and kindling thrown in. If you’d been asleep in your bed...”

Changmin shakes his head, too numb to grasp what Yunho is telling him. “They wished to frighten me.”

Yunho seizes him, shakes him. “They wished to kill you!” His fingers bite hard into Changmin’s shoulders, and then he lets go, his face almost a mask, dark with despair. “They won’t be content with this. They’ll try again.”

“I will not leave until I’m ready.” The words lack conviction, but Changmin knows he must hold onto something. “Until a new priest comes, I’ll sleep in the vestry.”

Yunho looks as if he wants to argue, but then he exhales. “And when the new priest comes, what will you do?”

Gazing past him at the smoking ruins, Changmin says, “I don’t know. Throw myself upon the tender mercies of His Grace my father, I suppose. Beg him for another meagre living.”

“You could be a troubadour,” Yunho says after a long moment.

Changmin manages a weary smile. “A stupid dream.”

Yunho looks away. “I would come with you.”

It takes a while for Changmin to understand just how great an offer has been made, and then guilt claws at him. He sits up and clutches at Yunho’s sleeve. “But this is your home,” he protests. “These are your people.”

“Not anymore. Not for a long time. You are more my home than they are.” Yunho takes Changmin’s hands. “And if they knew, they would burn us both.”

Changmin frowns. His wits are still slow from the shock of the fire. He’s missing something here, something that teeters in his memory but remains out of reach. He looks at Yunho. “If they knew what?”

“What I have become.” Yunho leans close and kisses him. “I will find a way for us to be together, my love, so we can be safe and free. Trust me. I will find a way.”

Imbolc (January 31)

Changmin lights the candles in the church as he prepares for Vespers. His hands are steady, his purpose resolute. He will celebrate this, his favourite office, and then he will retire to the vestry until Compline. Yunho has promised to bring bread this evening; it will bulk out the thin pottage they’ve been sharing over the last few days.

The soft glow of the candles only serves to emphasise the darkness creeping around the church. The confessional squats in shadows against the south wall. Changmin can’t help but shiver when he looks at it. Only four days ago, someone made a threat against his life. Someone confessed intent to kill him.

Even though one or more of the villagers had set fire to the presbytery, Changmin can’t bring himself to believe that they intended him any great harm that night. They want him gone, that much is clear; but to stoop to murder?

No. He cannot—will not—believe such a terrible thing of his flock. But as for the man who came to confession...

Changmin casts another glance into the shadows, then strides through the nave towards the high altar. The back of his neck prickles, as if an unseen gaze crawls over him. He will not turn around. He has nothing to fear in a church.

Except...

Sunset marked the beginning of Imbolc. The first day of spring in the old calendar, it’s one of the year’s four Turning Days. During this sacred time, the veil between worlds grows thin, and spirits can cross in both directions for good or ill. During the Turning Days, the Church has little power and no authority.

Changmin kneels before the altar, bows his head, then rises again. Perhaps he should have broken the seal of the confessional and told Yunho what had been said, but what could he have done? It’s bad enough that Yunho risks what’s left of his reputation in bringing food to the church. Bad enough that he sits with Changmin and breaks bread with him. And if anyone knew that, after Vigils, Yunho scratches at the vestry door and comes inside to wrap Changmin up, to lie with him in the box pews and keep him warm against the bitter cold...

Changmin shudders. Maybe someone does know.

He pushes the thought from his mind and takes his place behind the altar. He bows again, touching his lips to the cloth, and begins the first of his prayers.

He’s not even halfway through when the church doors slam open. They crash against the walls, the aged wood splintering. The force of it is so great that the bells rock in their cradles, stirring a low, deep note.

Changmin jerks his head up. In the moment before the candles snuff out, he sees it loom through the doorway. Eyes glittering, its teeth bared, the brindled wolf stands on the threshold. It growls, the sound full of menace, and then it pads into the church, gaze fixed on Changmin.

It’s come for him. The villagers were right. It saved them from starvation, but it wanted something in return—and now it’s come to collect.

Fear freezes Changmin. His heart beats and beats. His breaths come sharp and shallow, panting so fast his head starts to spin. He can’t die here. He can’t defile the altar with sinner’s blood.

He runs.

The wolf snarls and leaps after him.

Changmin races into the vestry and heaves the door closed. The wolf batters against it over and over. The hinges start to scrape free of the stone. Wood cracks. Frantic, Changmin pulls open the door leading out onto the south side of the churchyard. He slams it shut just as the wolf breaks through the inner door, and then he’s running across the graveyard, almost tripping in his haste. He vaults the boundary wall and runs for the safety of the village.

Behind him, the vestry door smashes open. When he glances behind—stupid, desperate—he sees the wolf clear the wall and land on the track. It gathers itself, eyes shining, and then it puts back its head and howls.

It sounds like agony. It sounds like joy.

Changmin sobs and runs faster, faster. The road is muddy, the surface sharp with pebbles. He falls, putting out his hands to catch himself. Heat tears through his left hand. He drags himself to his feet and runs on, glancing down at his palm to see blood glistening dark in the moonlight.

The wolf is behind him. He can hear its running feet; its low, soft growls.

He gains the village. Several parishioners are still abroad, out drinking in the tavern or gossiping by the barn. They stare at him as he runs across the green. They point at the wolf stalking him and hurry inside their houses, shutting their doors.

Changmin falls against Yunho’s door and begs to be let in. It’s locked, and there’s no response from within, no sign of life at all.

The wolf howls again. It’s closer now. Changmin turns, his back pressed to Yunho’s door, and then the wolf launches itself out of the darkness.

Changmin ducks. He feels the heat of the beast pass over him; he hears the vicious scratch of its claws against the door, and then it’s on the roof of the cottage, snarling and pawing as if it wants to get inside.

It’s an opportunity. While it’s distracted, Changmin runs. There’s nowhere for him to go except the forest. If he can haul himself up into a tree, if he can climb to the very top, if he can hold on until daylight, he’ll be safe.

There’s a crash behind him. Changmin doesn’t dare look. He runs, his breath labouring, his blood pumping hot and violent, terror lending him scatter-bursts of speed every time he slips in the mud.

The animal part of his mind takes over. He lets loose all rationality and surrenders to instinct. Run. Run. It beats at him, makes him want to scream. Sweat bathes him, hot and cold at the same time. He doesn’t know if it’s sweat or tears stinging his eyes.

Another howl, a long leash of sound that comes to an abrupt end.

Changmin throws himself into the undergrowth and runs into the forest. Branches whip at his face. The cut on his hand stings. His sleeve is wet with blood. He can’t stop running. The earth is soft and damp beneath his feet. Bushes tear at his cassock. Bracken clutches at his ankles. He pulls free, running, running.

The wolf comes at him from the left.

He swerves right, loses his balance, and rolls down an incline. Bruised and aching, heartbeat thudding in his ears, Changmin forces himself to his feet. He stares around at the moonlit forest, the light and dark blurring into confusion. He laughs, exhausted and desperate and yet somehow exhilarated.

Adrenalin pours through him, making his limbs tremble. He can smell the rank stink of fear, but underneath it there’s the musk of arousal. He’s going to die here tonight. He doesn’t care. He wants the wolf to take him.

Twigs crunch. Changmin turns. The wolf crouches a short distance away. It’s watching him.

Changmin bares his teeth at it. “Come on then,” he shouts, throwing down the challenge. “Come on.”

The wolf leaps.

Changmin darts left. He’s running, but he’s laughing, the sound bubbling out of him like madness. He runs and the wolf runs with him, sometimes veering closer, sometimes moving further away, and Changmin realises it’s herding him in a particular direction. Just as he grasps this, the forest opens up into a clearing, and he runs into a hollow in its centre.

Snow still covers the ground here. The air is crisp, almost tangible, as if it’s made of ice crystals. Changmin wades into the snow. It’s so delicate, so white, almost dazzling beneath the moonlight. A series of stones juts up, black and grey, their tops gently dusted with white.

He knows where he is. The stone circle Yunho told him about, the site of fairy treasure. Changmin runs into the centre of the ring. The moon is almost directly overhead, its light casting shadows from the stones.

A growl, soft, almost purring, and the wolf emerges from the trees. It approaches the stone circle but makes no move to come inside. Instead it paces around and around, wearing a track through the snow outside the stones. Changmin turns and turns again, watching the wolf as the wolf watches him. Perhaps, he thinks, grasping at hope, perhaps there is magic here after all. Maybe he’s safe.

When he turns again, the wolf has gone.

Heart beating fast, Changmin backs against the biggest of the stones and slumps into its cold embrace. He’s running with sweat. The cut on his hand is still bleeding. The rush of excitement and adrenalin drains away. For the first time since he’d fled the church, his mind is clear.

He tips back his head and stares up at the moon. His panting breaths return to normal. His heartbeat slows. Frost descends.

There’s no sign of the wolf.

Cold starts to creep through his feet, through his hands. Changmin shivers and pushes away from the stone. It’s taller than the rest, set aside from the others. This must be the King Stone. How did the legend go? The treasure is buried beneath the twenty-seventh stone clockwise from the King.

Changmin counts the stones. They number thirty-three.

Startled, he stumbles away from the King Stone and heads towards the twenty-seventh. He moves like an automaton, pulled like a puppet. The snow has drifted to one side. There’s a deep scrape beneath the twenty-seventh stone, like an animal’s den. It’s a tangle of black, full of shadows and roots. Something glints from the darkness. Changmin crouches down to look.

The wolf hurls itself from the space beneath the stone. Changmin falls back, lands in the snow and goes scrambling through it. He leaves a delicate trail, his blood turning pink as it sinks into the ice crystals, and then he flounders as the wolf pounces.

Solid weight lands over him. Changmin is frantic, arousal slamming into him. He’s going to die. He’s ready.

Cloth rips across his back. The wolf’s hot breath washes over his bared skin. It paws at his cassock. The cloth wrenches apart. The wolf holds him down, but not with any real force. It holds him like a lover.

Changmin struggles. He gasps after freedom, the night air cold on his naked flesh. The wolf settles over him, warm and comforting. It nuzzles at his ear, at his cheek, then it shifts backwards. Changmin grits his teeth and pushes his face into the snow as his undergarments are torn away. The wolf licks him long and slow, tongue rough and hot between his buttocks. Changmin spreads his legs. He doesn’t know if he’s moaning in pleasure or fear.

Reality slips away, his mind caught in traps. The wolf is as aroused as he is. Changmin rolls over and takes hold of the wolf’s fur. It’s thick and brindled black and red, so soft, so warm. It smells familiar. It smells like the smoke of the forge.

The air shimmers like cobwebs torn in sunlight. The wolf is gone, and in its place is Yunho. Instead of snow they’re lying in lush, fragrant grass. Instead of terror there’s desire. Yunho is holding him, talking to him, a fast babble of words that roll and tumble like a mountain stream.

“This is the only way,” Yunho says, the look in his eyes fever-bright. “In a place of old magic on a Turning Day, it’ll work. It will. It has to. I can’t lose you, Changmin, I can’t. I’ll make you a wolf like me and we can run together, we can chase the horizons far from here and make a new home. It’ll work, my love, it’ll work.”

Changmin grasps onto him, trying to understand. He listens, and beneath Yunho’s voice he hears the bark of the wolf, and when Yunho kisses him he feels his teeth, as sharp as needles.

He reaches up and wraps his arms around Yunho’s neck. “Love me.”

The veil rips. Yunho is a wolf again, huge and hot on top of him, all fangs and claws and the smother of brindled fur.

Changmin turns again and presents himself to be mounted. The wolf snarls; seizes him. There’s pain, a great overwhelming slide of it, thick and hot and with the rigidity of bone, and then the wolf—Yunho—snuffles and pushes deeper. Changmin urges back against the wolf, panting, opening up, dizziness ringing around and around his head.

They rut together, the smell of it rich and heavy. The snow crunches beneath their weight. It starts to melt from their combined heat. The pain fades, and now there’s only pleasure, as bright as fire, kindling, burning. It lifts, gathers, surges. He can’t take it. It’s impossible. He can’t—

The wolf fastens its teeth into his neck. Agony flashes through him. Ecstasy destroys it. Changmin howls. This will either kill him or turn him.