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“So? Why do you care?”

“What do you plan on doing when I unhook the chains?” she asked.

I shook my head in dismay, not understanding how it mattered what I did with my life once I was away from her. “I don’t know. I’ll get the hell out of here the moment you let me.”

“Can you even walk on that knee?” Nova pointed to my injured knee that was visibly swollen, even through my jeans.

“If I say no, are you gonna put me down like a sick dog?” I asked.

Her nose wrinkled in disgust. “I would never do that to a sick dog. I thought you read my sister’s journals. Didn’t she explain that I did wildlife rehab?”

“I didn’t get to read much of it before you took them away, but yeah, I do remember her mentioning something like that,” I confessed uncertainly.

“If you leave now, on that knee, you won’t survive long, and we both know it. What you don’t know is that while you’ve been quarantined down here, a big winter storm dropped nearly a foot of snow. How are you going to handle that? Best case scenario for you is that you starve or freeze to death, worst case involves wolves ripping you apart or succumbing to zabies.” Nova explained this all so matter-of-factly, discussing my imminent demise like it was nothing.

I arched my eyebrow at her. “Is this your way of offering me help?”

“I can treat your knee, tend to your wounds, and I even have a few pain relief treatments,” she continued impassively. “While you convalesce, I can make sure that you have food and water, although I will expect you to do the chores that you’re able to do while recovering.”

“That sounds… very generous of you,” I said, and I did my best to not sound as suspicious as I felt.

“Well, I am not generous, so you have misunderstood,” Nova corrected me. “Planting season is around the corner, and I already have dozens of animals under my care that I’m struggling to keep up with. I can only risk adding another mouth to feed if I am getting something in return.”

“And what do you want in return? You already have my backpack, with everything I own,” I reminded her.

“I need a pair of hands, and you look like you’d be strong when you’re healthy. Help with chores as much as you can until you recover, and then work the homestead with me for another six weeks after you’re better,” she proposed. “That will set me and my animals up for a much better position over the summer, and then you can move on anywhere you want.”

I tried to study her unreadable expression, and I finally asked, “So if I accept your help, I’m signing up to be an indentured servant?”

“For six weeks. Plus recovery time.”

“And the other option is that I hobble off your property and die?” I asked.

Nova nodded. “Basically, those are the two options, yes.”

“I suppose I would have to work longer than six weeks to pay my medical bills, you know, back when we still had bills,” I realized with a heavy sigh. “Fuck it. I’ll take the deal.”

“This probably goes without saying, but if you hurt me or any of my animals, the deal is off,” Nova said.

“Understood.” I held my hands out toward her again, and she finally came over and unlocked the cuffs.

She took my hand and helped me up onto my good leg. I still couldn’t put any weight on my injured knee, and Nova had her arm around my waist. Together, we slowly made it upstairs, and she brought me into a small country kitchen.

“Frost and Sable are outside right now, but they usually have the run of the house, and they’re not super keen on new people,” Nova said as she helped lower me down into a chair at the kitchen table.

“Are you talking about the wolves?” I asked.

“Wolfdogs, actually,” she clarified.

“What is a wolfdog?”

“They’re wolves that are bred with domestic dogs, usually to make a more pet-friendly wolf, but even with the breeding, they don’t often do well in the human’s world. Which is how they ended up here,” Nova explained. “Frost is a Samoyed mixed with a grey wolf, and Sable is a mixture of a German Shepard, Malamute, and grey wolf. I’ll introduce you when the time is right, but for now, it’s probably best if you avoid them both.”

“When I was downstairs, I’d often hear all this commotion up here.” I glanced around what I could see of the farmhouse from the kitchen table, and there were no obvious signs of a zombie horde, but the wood floors were awfully scraped up. “Was that the wolfdogs?”

She gave me a thin smile. “Probably. They love to run around. But you’re hungry and in pain. Why don’t you eat, and then I’ll get you settled in and tell you about what’s expected of you?”

“What is expected of me?” I pressed, but already my attention was turning to the scent of something savory in the air.