The Cursed Healer

Chapter 1

Hailey

The air in the square is thick enough to swallow. It tastes of woodsmoke, damp soil, and the sour tang of fear. Elder Borin stands on the raised platform, his voice a low rumble that rolls over the silent crowd. Every family is here. Every pair of eyes is fixed on the line of girls standing beside me. All of us born in the eighteenth summer of the village’s founding. All of us eligible.

“The Blackwood demands its due,” Borin says, his hands clasped behind his back. “The pact, honored by our fathers and their fathers before them, keeps the beasts at bay. It grants us another year of peace, of harvest, of life. One of our daughters must walk the Blackwood Path.”

My fingers brush against the worn leather pouch at my hip. The familiar shapes of the tools inside, the faint, earthy scent of dried herbs clinging to the flap, are the only steady things in a world about to tilt on its axis. My grandmother’s last gift. ‘The forest provides for those who listen,’ she’d whispered, her voice thin as cobwebs. ‘It takes, too. You must be prepared for both.’

I am prepared. Just not for this.

A murmur ripples through the crowd as Joric, Borin’s son, steps forward. He is all polished leather and shining confidence. The sunlight catches the silver pin on his collar, making it gleam. The other girls in the line shift, their nervous glances turning to admiration. He has their hearts. He has the village’s respect. He has always, always had my scorn.

“My father speaks the truth,” Joric’s voice rings out, clear and strong where his father’s was gravel. “The pact must be honored. But I ask you, what is the purpose of this tradition? Is it merely to lose a daughter? Or is it to show the forest our strength? To prove that our village is worthy of survival?”

He lets the question hang in the air. He’s a showman, always has been. He paces the edge of the platform, his gaze sweeping over the crowd, making every person feel as if he speaks directly to them.

“I say we send an offering that has meaning,” he continues, his voice rising. “Not just the pull of a name from a bowl. A choice. A choice that strengthens us all. A choice that removes a weakness from our midst.”

His eyes, cold and sharp as flint, land on me. The crowd follows his gaze. A hundred pairs of eyes turn, pinning me in place. The whispers start, a rustle of dry leaves. ‘The hedge witch’s girl.’ ‘Strange one.’ ‘Always digging in the dirt.’

I keep my chin up. I meet his stare. I will not give him the satisfaction of seeing me tremble.

“Hailey,” he says my name like it’s a curse. “She lives in the shadow of this village. She speaks to weeds and mud. Her hands offer no skill in the loom, no strength in the fields. Her only trade is in bitter tinctures and poultices, remedies for the sick and the dying. A constant reminder of our frailties.”

My grip tightens on the pouch. My grandmother’s remedies saved his own sister from the lung fever two winters ago. A fact he conveniently forgets.

“What value does her life hold here?” Joric asks the crowd, his arms spread wide. “She is an outcast. A burden we have politely tolerated for too long. I say, let her life finally have purpose. Let her be the one to serve the village in a way she never could while living within its walls. Let her be the one to walk the Blackwood Path.”

Silence. A heavy, suffocating blanket of it. Not a single person speaks against him. In their eyes, I see it. Not malice, not hatred. Just a terrible, selfish relief. It isn’t their daughter. It isn’t their sister.

Joric turns to his father, a smug, triumphant tilt to his lips. “Father. It is the only sensible choice. Let her sacrifice mean something. Let her cleanse us of her strangeness.”

Elder Borin looks at me. His face is a mask of stone, but I see the flicker in his eyes. He is considering it. The logic, twisted and cruel as it is, appeals to him. A neat solution to two problems: the pact, and the quiet girl who reminds everyone of an older, wilder magic they’ve tried to forget.

“This is not how it is done,” a voice says, thin but clear. It’s Mara, the baker’s wife. Her own daughter, Lyra, is standing two places down from me in the line, her face pale as flour.

Joric rounds on her. “And why not, goodwife? Are the old ways so sacred when a better way presents itself? A way that ensures the one chosen is the one we can most afford to lose?”

His words are a slap. The other girls in the line pointedly look away from me. They can afford to lose me. I have no mother to weep, no father to rage. My grandmother is gone. I am an island, and the sea is rising.

“She is one of us,” Mara insists, though her voice wavers now.

“Is she?” Joric sneers. “Does she join the harvest songs? Does she dance at the midsummer festival? Or does she spend her days in the woods, whispering to plants and scaring children? She belongs more to the forest than to this village. Let her go home.”

The final, venomous words strike their mark. The crowd murmurs in agreement. He’s right. They’ve always seen me as something other, something untamed. My knowledge of herbs, the very thing that helps them, is also what sets me apart. They come to my door in the dead of night for a feverfew tonic or a willow bark tea, but in the daylight, they cross the square to avoid me.

Elder Borin raises a hand, and the square falls silent again. He walks to the edge of the platform and looks down at me. His gaze is heavy, judging. He is not just the elder; he is Joric’s father. The pride in his son is a blinding light.

“The boy speaks with a hard truth,” he says finally. The words are a death sentence. “The needs of the village are paramount. The choice must serve us all in the best way possible. Logic dictates the path Joric has laid out.”

Lyra gasps beside me. A few of the other girls let out shaky breaths of relief. It is done. The world has tilted.

“The choice is made,” Elder Borin declares, his voice leaving no room for argument. “Hailey will be the offering. She will walk the Blackwood Path at dusk.”

Joric smiles. It is a victor’s smile, sharp and cruel. He thinks he has broken me. He expects tears. He expects begging. He has wanted to see me brought to my knees since we were children, since I bested him in a race to the standing stones and he pushed me into a patch of stinging nettles for my trouble.

I give him none of it. I straighten my shoulders. My hand, which has been clutching my grandmother’s pouch, relaxes. I let my gaze sweep over the crowd, the elder, and finally land back on Joric. There is no fear in me now. Just a cold, quiet calm. The kind of calm that comes when the worst has happened, and you are still standing.

I take a single step forward, separating myself from the other girls. My voice is quiet, but in the ringing silence, it carries across the square.

“I accept.”

A shockwave passes through the crowd. This is not the reaction of a victim. This is the response of a volunteer. Joric’s smile falters for a fraction of a second. His father narrows his eyes.

They do not understand. They think they are sending a lamb to the slaughter. They see a weak, useless girl they can discard. They have no idea what my grandmother truly taught me. They see an outcast going to her death.

I see a girl finally being set free.

I turn without another word and walk away from the platform, toward my small cottage at the edge of the village. The crowd parts for me, a sea of faces etched with pity, relief, and a new, unsettling flicker of confusion. They don’t know what to make of my stillness. They wanted a sacrifice, a spectacle of fear and sorrow to make their own safety feel earned. I have denied them that.

Back inside my home, the familiar scents of dried lavender, chamomile, and rich soil greet me. It is the only place I have ever felt truly safe. I move through the small room with purpose. There is no time for grief. There is only time for preparation.

From a loose stone in the hearth, I retrieve a small, oilskin-wrapped bundle. Inside are three knives, their blades sharpened to a razor’s edge. One for skinning, one for carving, and a small, wickedly sharp one for protection. My grandmother believed in being prepared for more than just harvesting roots.

I open the leather pouch at my hip and check its contents. Bundles of yarrow for wounds. Nightshade berries, carefully wrapped, for poison. Dried rowan for warding, and a small flint and steel. Tools. Not just for a healer, but for a survivor.

As the sun begins to dip below the horizon, painting the sky in shades of blood and fire, there is a knock at my door. I open it to find Lyra standing there, her face tear-streaked. In her hands, she holds a small loaf of bread and a waterskin.

“I’m sorry, Hailey,” she whispers, her eyes darting nervously back toward the village. “It’s wrong. What Joric said, what they did… it’s wrong.”

“Joric is as he has always been,” I say, my voice even. “And the village is afraid. Fear makes people cruel.”

“You’re not… you’re not scared?” she asks, her voice full of disbelief.

I think of the endless days of whispers behind my back. Of the loneliness that has been my constant companion. Of the suffocating judgment of the village. I think of the Blackwood, vast and dangerous, but honest in its peril.

“I am scared of dying,” I admit softly. “But I am not scared of leaving this place.”

I take the bread and water from her. “Thank you, Lyra. You are the only one who showed me kindness today.”

She throws her arms around me in a quick, desperate hug. “May the spirits of the wood guide you,” she sobs into my shoulder.

“They will,” I say, pulling away gently. “They know me better than anyone here.”

When the elders come for me, I am ready. They bring the simple white sacrificial gown. It’s thin and useless, meant to show vulnerability. I put it on over my own practical tunic and leggings. They cannot stop me from wearing clothes beneath it. A small act of defiance. My boots are sturdy, my knives are secured to my legs, hidden by the gown’s folds. My pouch is tied firmly at my waist.

They lead me through the silent village to the edge of the Blackwood. The trees loom like giants, their branches clawing at the last of the evening light. Joric is there, standing with his arms crossed, his smug expression back in place. He is here to watch his victory.

“Your life finally has meaning, Hailey,” he says, his voice dripping with condescension. “Try not to scream too loudly. It upsets the children.”

I stop and turn to face him. I look directly into his eyes, and for the first time, I let him see the cold fire burning within me. The fire my grandmother kindled.

“And your life, Joric,” I say, my voice low and dangerous. “What meaning does it have? Hiding behind your father’s title and the fear of your people? You think the wolves are the monsters in the forest. You’re wrong. The worst monsters are the ones who wear human skin.”

His face twists in a flash of rage. I have finally struck a nerve. It’s a small victory, but it tastes sweet.

Without waiting for their dismissal, I turn my back on him, on all of them. I face the oppressive gloom of the Blackwood Forest. I take a deep breath. It does not smell of death. It smells of pine, of damp earth, of life. It smells like home.

I take my first step onto the path, leaving the village behind me. I do not look back. My fate is not to be a sacrifice. It is to survive.

Chapter 2

Hailey

The final image of Joric’s face, tight with fury, is a satisfying one. It is a small, hot coal I carry into the cold of the woods. The whispers and pity of the village fade behind me, swallowed by the rustle of leaves and the creak of ancient branches. The air changes instantly. It is cleaner here, thick with the scent of pine needles and damp soil. It smells of truth.

The thin sacrificial gown catches on a low hanging branch. I pull it free without breaking my stride. It is an absurd garment. A costume for a play where everyone but me believes their role. Beneath it, my own clothes feel like a secret skin of defiance. My boots make almost no sound on the packed earth of the path.

They expect me to follow this track, a straight line to my demise. A path for lambs. But I am not a lamb, and this is not a slaughterhouse. It is a homecoming.

I veer away from the path, stepping into the deeper gloom beneath the canopy. My eyes adjust quickly. This is where I have always been most comfortable, where the light is dappled and the world is a mosaic of greens and browns. My grandmother’s voice is a soft echo in my mind.

‘Never trust the easy path, little bird. It is made for the feet of fools and the mouths of wolves.’

I find a game trail, a faint depression in the moss that only a practiced eye would notice. This is the forest’s own road. I move with a steady pace, my senses open. A raven calls from a high branch, a sharp, interrogating sound. I see the flicker of a squirrel’s tail as it spirals up an oak. The world is alive. It is speaking.

My goal is not to hide. It is not to escape. They want to appease the wolves, to give them an offering. Fine. I will be the offering. But I will not be chased down like a frightened rabbit. I will walk to the heart of their territory and meet them. I will look my fate in the eye.

This is the only way to truly be free of the village. To die here, on my own terms, is a better end than a long, slow life of being tolerated in a place that will never be home.

An hour passes. The last of the sun’s light is gone, leaving the woods in the silver wash of a rising moon. The temperature drops. I pull the ridiculous white gown tighter, grateful for the warmth of my tunic beneath it.

And then it happens.

The birds go silent. The insect hum that has been a constant companion ceases. The silence that falls is not peaceful. It is a heavy, listening silence. The kind of silence that precedes a lightning strike.

My hand moves instinctively, my fingers brushing the worn leather of my grandmother’s pouch. A tool for every occasion. But what tool works against a creature of nightmare?

I stop. I stand perfectly still, letting my breathing slow to a near stop. I listen. Not with my ears, but with my whole body. The way my grandmother taught me. Feel the vibrations in the soil. Taste the change in the air.

There. A twig snaps. It is to my left, and far too heavy to be a deer. The sound is deliberate. A statement. I am here.

I do not turn my head. I do not give it the satisfaction of my fear. I simply acknowledge its presence and begin walking again. My pace does not quicken. My shoulders remain straight. I am not prey. I will not behave like it.

But I can feel it now. A weight on the air behind me. A pressure against my back. It is like walking through deep water. The sheer presence of the thing is immense, a physical force that makes the hairs on my arms stand up. It is stalking me, matching my pace with an unnerving grace. For something so large, it is terrifyingly quiet.

I scan the trees ahead, looking for a place. Not to hide. A place to stand.

The moonlight spills into a small, circular clearing a hundred feet ahead. It is ringed by ancient, moss covered stones, like the teeth of some long dead giant. It feels old. It feels important. That is the place.

My heart is a frantic drum against my ribs, a wild bird trapped in a cage. But my hands are steady. My feet do not falter. I walk out of the oppressive darkness of the trees and into the center of the moonlit clearing.

I stop and slowly turn, my body a pale column of white in the silver light. I face the direction from which I came. I face the hunter.

“I know you are there,” I say. My voice is quiet, but it carries in the profound stillness. It is not a plea. It is not a challenge. It is a statement of fact.

For a long moment, there is nothing. Just the cold moonlight and the silent trees. I begin to wonder if I imagined it, if the fear and the forest have conspired to create a phantom in my mind.

Then, from the absolute blackness between two massive pines, two points of light ignite. They are not a reflection. They glow with their own internal fire, a pale, eerie gold. The light is not animal. It is intelligent.

My breath catches in my throat. I cannot move. I can only watch as the creature detaches itself from the shadows and steps into the clearing.

My mind refuses to comprehend what my eyes are seeing. The stories, the whispers, the fears of the village… they were all children’s tales. Pathetic understatements. They spoke of wolves. They did not speak of this.

It is a wolf, but it is to a normal wolf what a mountain is to a stone. It is colossal. Its shoulders are higher than my head. Its fur is the color of polished jet, so black it seems to drink the moonlight, swallowing the light and leaving only a void in the shape of a monster. Muscle ripples beneath its pelt with every silent step it takes.

But it is the eyes that hold me. Those glowing, intelligent eyes. They are not fixed on my throat. They are fixed on my face. They are not looking at a meal. They are looking at me. They are reading me. A low growl rumbles from its chest, a sound that vibrates through the soles of my boots and up into my bones, a sound that promises to shatter the world.

The colossal black wolf stops at the edge of the clearing, its gaze locking with mine across the moon-drenched grass, and in that terrifying, intelligent stare, I know my fate has finally found me.

Chapter 3

Hailey

The sound is the only thing that exists. A growl so deep it feels like the world is tearing itself apart at the seams. It vibrates from the mossy ground, up through the soles of my boots, and settles in my bones. It is a promise of utter annihilation.

The colossal wolf does not lunge. It does not charge. It moves with a terrifying, liquid grace, beginning to circle the clearing. Each pawfall is silent, deliberate. A predator that has no need for stealth. Its presence is a physical weight, pressing the air from my lungs.

My hand hovers over the leather pouch at my hip. Yarrow for wounds. Nightshade for a quick end. What a foolish thought. What herb could possibly work against a creature carved from midnight and rage? My grandmother’s teachings were for the natural world. This is something else entirely.

His eyes, those two burning gold lamps, never leave mine. They are not the flat, hungry eyes of a beast. They hold a terrifying intelligence, a depth of awareness that feels ancient. He is not just looking at me. He is dissecting me, peeling back layers of skin and bone to see the soul cowering inside.

I force myself to stand still. My heart is a trapped bird, beating its wings raw against the cage of my ribs. But I will not run. I came here to meet my fate. To run from it now would be to give Joric his victory. I will die on my feet.

“Get it over with,” I whisper, the words stolen by the cold night air. I don't know if he can hear me. I don’t know if he can understand.

The growl changes. It falters, a note of something else creeping in. Confusion? Pain? He stops his circling, standing directly across from me. He lifts his massive head and tastes the air, his black nose twitching. The sound in his chest is a low, tormented rumble now. It is the sound of a war being fought within.

This is not the behavior of a simple predator. This is something far more complex, and far more terrifying.

The wolf takes a hesitant step forward. And another. He is closer now, close enough that I can see the faint silver scars that trace patterns through his jet black fur. Close enough that I can feel the heat rolling off his body.

Then he lets out a sound that is not a growl, but a guttural whine of agony. His body tenses, muscles bunching into stone. He collapses onto his forelegs, a tremor running through his enormous frame.

I take an involuntary step back. Is he sick? Wounded? Is this some trick?

An awful sound fills the clearing. The sharp, wet crack of bone breaking. It is followed by another, and another. The wolf’s body begins to contort, to twist into shapes that are unnatural and horrifying. I want to look away, to scream, but I am paralyzed, a statue of ice in the moonlight.

Fur seems to melt away, receding into skin that is pale in the moonlight. The enormous paws elongate, fingers stretching from the pads with more sickening cracks. The powerful haunches reshape themselves into human legs. The long, wolfish snout shortens, pulling back into the planes and angles of a man’s face. The transformation is not magic. It is a violent, brutal, physical tearing apart and rebuilding of a living thing.

Where the monster stood, a man now stands. He is on one knee, his head bowed, his breathing a harsh, ragged panting. He is naked. His body is a tapestry of scars, old and new, pale lines crisscrossing over a landscape of raw, masculine power. Even kneeling, he is immense.

Slowly, he pushes himself to his feet. He is towering. A giant of a man, built with the same savage grace as the wolf. His hair is as black as the wolf’s pelt, long and untamed, falling around a face that is ruggedly, intimidatingly beautiful. A sharp jaw, a straight nose, a mouth that looks like it was made for snarling.

He lifts his head, and I stop breathing. The eyes are the same. They are a man's eyes, but they burn with the same eerie, intelligent golden light. They are the eyes of the Alpha King.

My mind is a white noise of panic. This is not possible. Shifters are not real. They are tales to frighten children, warnings about the deep woods. They are not supposed to be real.

“What… what are you?” The question is a thread of sound, barely audible. My voice is not my own.

He takes a step toward me. His golden eyes are locked on mine, and the expression in them is a terrifying mix of fury, desperation, and something else. Something that looks like a man who has been starving for a century and has just found his first meal.

I should run. I should scream. But my feet are rooted to the earth. The knives strapped to my legs feel like children’s toys.

He does not speak. He just walks, closing the distance between us until he is only an arm’s length away. The heat from his skin washes over me. He smells of pine, and damp earth, and something wild and musky that is purely him.

“You,” he says. His voice is a low growl, the sound scraping from his throat as if the words are unfamiliar, painful. It is the first word he has spoken, and it sounds like an accusation.

He is fighting himself. I can see it. His hands are clenched into fists at his sides, his knuckles white. The muscles in his jaw are knotted tight. He is holding himself back with a control that seems to be costing him everything.

He closes his eyes for a moment, and when they open again, the battle is over. A raw, primal need has won.

In a movement too fast to follow, his hand shoots out and closes around my arm. His grip is iron, not meant to injure, but to possess. To hold. A brand of heat sears through the thin fabric of my gown, and my tunic, all the way to the bone. The shock of it, the sudden, violent contact, makes me gasp.

He pulls me forward, a single, effortless tug that brings me stumbling against his bare chest. I am a doll in his grasp. My head only comes to his shoulder. I am surrounded by him, by his heat, by his scent. My mind screams in terror, but my body is frozen solid.

He lowers his head, his face close to mine. His wild black hair brushes against my cheek. I can feel his breath, hot and ragged, against my skin. His golden eyes burn into me, staking a claim so absolute, so final, it terrifies me more than the wolf’s fangs ever could.

He ignores my shock. He ignores my fear. He speaks one last word, his voice a guttural command that echoes the deepest growl of the beast he was moments ago. It is not a request. It is a statement of fact. A declaration that changes my world, my fate, everything I thought I knew.

“Mine.”