“Aren’t you the doubtful one. If you still think it’s an illusion, go ahead and touch it,” teased Holo, smiling, curling the giant paw in a come-hither motion.

Lawrence found himself irritated, yet still he hesitated. Besides the sheer size of the limb, it also gave off a certain ineffable sense of danger.

It was the leg of a wolf. I’ve dealt with goods called Dragon Legs, Lawrence told himself, irritated at his cowardice. And just before his hand could touch it…

“Oh—” said Holo, seeming to remember something. Lawrence snapped his hand back.

“Wha—! What is it?”

“Mm, oh, nothing. Don’t be so surprised!” said Holo, now sounding annoyed. Adding embarrassment to his fear, Lawrence became angrier and angrier at what he felt was his failure as a man. Getting hold of himself, he reached out once again.

“So, what happened?”

“Mm,” said Holo meekly, looking up at Lawrence. “Be gentle, will you?”

Lawrence couldn’t help stopping his hand short at her suddenly endearing manner.

He looked at her, and she looked back, grinning.

“You’re rather charming, aren’t you?” she said.

Lawrence said nothing as he made sure of what his hand was feeling.

He was irritated at her half-teasing manner, but there was another reason he failed to reply.

It was of course because of what he was touching.

The beast-leg that thrust from Holo’s shoulder had bone as thick and solid as a tree’s limb, wrapped in sinew that would be the envy of any soldier, and covering that, a magnificent coat of brown fur, from the base of the shoulder all the way down to the paw. Each pad of the paw was the size of an uncut loaf of bread. Past the soft pink toes was something denser—the scythes of her claws.

The leg was solid enough, but those claws were anything but illusory. In addition to the not warm, yet not cold sensation peculiar to animal claws, Lawrence felt a thrill at the sensation that these were not something that he should be touching.

He swallowed. “Are you really a god…?” he murmured.

“I’m no god. As you can tell from my forepaw, I am merely bigger than my comrades—bigger and cleverer. I am Holo the Wisewolf!”

The girl who so confidently called herself “wise” looked at Lawrence proudly.

She was every bit a mischievous young girl—but the aura that the beast-limb exuded was not something a mere animal could ever manage.

It had nothing to do with the size of the thing.

“So, what think you?”

Lawrence nodded vaguely at her question. “But…the real Holo should be in Yarei now. The wolf resides in the one who cuts the last wheat stalk, they say…”

“Heh-heh-heh. I am Holo the Wisewolf! I know well my own limitations. It is true that I live within the wheat. Without it, I cannot live. And it is also true that during this harvest I was within the last wheat to be harvested, and usually I cannot escape from there. Not while any were watching. However, there is an exception.”

Lawrence listened to her explanation, impressed with her rapid delivery.

“If there is nearby a larger sheaf of wheat than the last one to be harvested, I can move unseen to that wheat. That’s why they say it, you know, the villagers. ‘If you cut too greedily, you won’t catch the harvest god, and it will escape.’”

Lawrence glanced at his wagon bed with a sudden realization.

There was the sheaf of wheat—the wheat he’d received from the mountain village.

“So that is how it was done. I suppose one could call you my savior. If you hadn’t been there, I would never have escaped.”

Although Lawrence could not quite bring himself to believe those words, they were lent persuasion when Holo swallowed a few more wheat grains and returned her arm to normal.

However, Holo had said “savior” with a certain distaste, so Lawrence decided to get even with her.

“Perhaps I should take that wheat back to the village, then. They’ll be in a bad way without their harvest god. I’ve been friends with Yarei and others in Pasloe for a long time. I’d hate to see them suffer.”

He concocted the pretense on the spot, but the more he thought about it, the truer it seemed. If this Holo was the real Holo, then wouldn’t the village begin suffering poor harvests?

After a few moments his ruminations ended.

Holo was looking at him as if stricken.

“You…you’re jesting, surely,” she said.

Her suddenly frail mien rocked the defenseless merchant.

“Hard to say,” Lawrence said vaguely, trying to conceal his internal conflict and buy some time.

Even as his head filled with other concerns, his heart grew only more uneasy.

Lawrence agonized. If Holo was what she claimed to be, the god of the harvest, his best course of action would be to return her to the village. He had long associated with Pasloe. He did not wish them ill.

However, when he looked back at Holo, her earlier bravado was entirely gone—now she looked down, as apprehensive as any princess in an old knight tale.

Lawrence grimaced and put the question to himself: Should I return this girl to the village, even though she clearly does not want to go?

What if she is the real Holo?

He mulled the matter over in a cold sweat, the two questions battling in his mind.

Presently he became aware of someone looking at him. He followed the look to its source and saw Holo gazing at him beseechingly.

“Please, help me…won’t you?”

Unable to stand the sight of Holo so meekly bowing her head, Lawrence turned away. All he saw, day in and day out, was the backside of a horse. The life left him completely unable to resist a girl like Holo looking at him with such a face.

Agonizingly, he came to a decision.

He turned slowly back toward Holo and asked her a single question.

“I must ask you one thing.”

“…all right.”

“If you leave the village, will they still be able to raise wheat?”

He didn’t expect Holo to answer in a way that would weaken her own position, but he was a merchant. He had dealt with any number of dishonest negotiators in his time. He had confidence that if Holo attempted to lie, he would know.

Lawrence readied himself to catch the prevarication he was sure would come, but come it didn’t.

When he looked at her, she wore an expression completely different from what he had seen so far; she looked angry and near tears as she stared into the corner of the wagon bed.

“Er…what’s wrong?” Lawrence had to ask.

“The village’s abundant harvests will continue without me,” she spat, her voice surprisingly irate.

“Is that so?” asked Lawrence, overwhelmed by the piercing anger that emanated from Holo.

Holo nodded, squaring her shoulders. She gripped the furs tightly, her hands white from the effort.

“Long did I stay in that village; as many years as I have hairs on my tail. Eventually I wished to leave, but for the sake of the village’s wheat I stayed. Long ago, you see, I made a promise with a youth of the village, that I would ensure the village’s harvest. And so I kept my promise.”

Perhaps because she couldn’t stomach it, she did not so much as look at Lawrence as she spoke.

Earlier her wit and words had been quick and easy; now she stumbled uncertainly.

“I…I am the wolf that lives in the wheat. My knowledge of wheat, of things that grow in the ground, is second to none. That is why I made the village’s fields so magnificent, as I promised. But to do that, occasionally the harvest must be poor. Forcing the land to produce requires compensation. But whenever the harvest was poor, the villagers attributed it to my caprices, and it has only gotten worse in recent years. I have been wanting to leave. I can stand it no longer. I long ago fulfilled my promise.”

Lawrence understood Holo’s anger. Some years ago, Pasloe had come under the care of Count Ehrendott, and since then new farming techniques had been imported from the south, increasing yield.

Holo thus felt that her presence was no longer necessary.

Indeed, the rumor was proliferating that not even the god of the Church existed. It was not impossible that a countryside hamlet’s harvest god had gotten wrapped up in such talk.

“The village’s good harvests will continue. There will be a poor yield every few years, but that will be their own doing. And they’ll overcome it on their own. The land doesn’t need me, and the people certainly don’t need me either.”

Getting her words out all in one breath, Holo sighed deeply and fell over on the pile of furs yet again. She curled up, pulling the furs around her and burying her face in them.

He could not see her face to make certain, but it seemed not impossible that she was crying. Lawrence scratched his head, unsure of what to say.

He looked helplessly at her slender shoulders and wolf ears.

Perhaps this was how a real god acted: now full of bluster and bravado, now wielding a sharp wit, now showing a childish temper.

Lawrence was at a loss at how to treat the girl now. Nevertheless, he couldn’t very well remain silent, so he took a new approach.

“In any case, setting aside the question of whether or not that’s all true…”

“You think me a liar?” snapped Holo at his preamble. He faltered, but Holo seemed to realize that she herself was being too emotional. She stopped, abashed, and muttered a quick “Sorry,” before burying her head in the furs again.

“I understand your resentment. But where do you plan to go, having left the village?”

She did not answer immediately, but Lawrence saw her ears prick at his question, so he waited patiently. She had just delivered a significant confession, and Lawrence expected that she simply couldn’t face anyone for a moment.

At length, Holo guiltily looked into the corner of the wagon bed, confirming Lawrence’s suspicions.

“I wish to return north,” she said flatly.

“North?”

Holo nodded, turning her gaze up and off into the distance. Lawrence didn’t have to follow it to know where she was looking: true north.

“My birthplace. The forest of Yoitsu. So many years have passed that I can no longer count them.…I wish to return home.”