The Wolf's gold

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A dog barked from the other end of the village, and in a heartbeat another half-dozen canine voices were raised in protest against whatever it was that had alerted the first animal. Snug in his straw nest beneath the house, warm and dry among livestock that had long since become accustomed to the boy’s nocturnal presence, Mus smiled sleepily at the chorus of barking. Whatever it was that had set off the dogs would also have resulted in a storm of invective from the men of the surrounding houses, if his father’s usual reaction was any indication. He wormed his way a little deeper into the straw, closing his eyes in anticipation of the dogs’ protests at whatever nocturnal creature it was that had awoken them dying away into renewed silence.

With a sudden, piercing shriek that had the boy wide awake and sitting up startled in the straw, one of the dogs was silenced. It was a sound that Mus had heard once before, when their neighbour’s animal had mauled his master’s son and been rewarded with four feet of legion-issue gladius through its back. The dying animal had given out howls of agony in its death throes, struggling against the cold blade’s implacable intrusion, until its owner had been forced to rip the sword loose and behead the writhing dog to silence its heart-rending cries. In the brief moment of shocked silence that followed, Mus knew that he had just heard something horribly similar. But who would take a blade to a guard dog for doing its job?

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