Five Is Enough

The fire was wrong.

Delilah saw that first.

Not the men.

Not the wagon.

Not the two bodies hanging from the dead traffic post where the old road split into three directions and went nowhere useful anymore.

The fire.

It burned too clean.

Out here, men who were cold built greedy fires. Men who were afraid built desperate ones. Men who wanted to be seen built them high and stupid, throwing sparks into the dark like invitations.

This fire sat low in a ring of broken concrete, fed in patient pieces, its light kept narrow. Enough to suggest shelter. Not enough to show how many men waited beyond it.

Bait, then.

Delilah lay flat on the ridge above the road, chin close to the stone, red hair tucked under the edge of her hood. Dust moved around her in pale lines. It did not touch the weapons.

Nothing did, if she could help it.

The bow lay beside her left hand. Flat black. No shine. No ornament. It drank the starlight instead of catching it.

The spear rested along her right side, dark shaft parallel to her body, blade wrapped in dull cloth until it was needed.

The knife rode low against her hip.

Other people had a name for that one.

Delilah did not.

Names gave things more room than they deserved.

Below, one of the men laughed.

Too loud.

There were not four men.

Delilah had counted six.

The unseen one mattered.

Lady had found him.

The dire wolf moved somewhere below and left, silent in a way that made silence seem clumsy.

Lady did not wait for orders.

She understood the shape of a hunt the way water understood downhill.

Delilah set the first arrow to string.

The bow bent without sound.

She breathed out.

This is where most stories would slow down.

The arrow left.

The man in the ditch dropped before the string finished returning.

No cry.

No warning.

One.