She petted his head. "We're going to leave him like this?"
"Yes," I said firmly. "He's a werewolf. It's too dangerous to try and take him out of here. Even injured, he can still survive for one night on his own. I have no doubt he can get around on three legs just fine and he'll start healing soon anyway. His instincts should guide him to his home once his attention isn't on us anymore."
I hoped.
She let out a huff of breath that fogged the cold air. "Okay."
I peeled off some more tape and wrapped his legs with it, going around them at least a dozen times. To say it didn't bother me to leave him would be a lie, but we didn't have much of a choice. Werewolves were strong. He'd most likely get out of the tape within minutes of us leaving. I had to hope he was smart enough to head back to the cabin. His truck was still parked there and if he was anything like the others of his kind, he'd have a change of clothes inside it for emergencies.
Hunter's eyes moved back and forth between us—a sure sign he was developing a resistance to the fairy dust. If he recognized us at all, he didn't show it. He was angry and in pain and wanted to lash out. We were running out of time.
"Okay, Em." I closed my bag and stood up. "Give me the fairy dust."
She handed it over. There were only a few pinches left inside.
I gave her my keys. "Run back to the jeep as fast as you can and get it started. I'm gonna hold him until you get there and then I'll follow right behind."
"But Mel…"
"Don't argue with me." I shook my head. "We both know I'm faster and have a better chance of out-running him. Now go!"
She knew I was right. I might still be a sensor and mortal, but I'd had two doses of nephilim blood earlier this year. It made me stronger and more resilient. My odds of surviving a werewolf attack were much higher than hers.
Emily reluctantly climbed to her feet, giving me one last worried look before she took off running. Good girl. She knew time was of the essence. I flung another pinch of dust in the werewolf's eyes and waited for my senses to tell me she'd reached the jeep. We weren't that far from it and only the heavy snow slowed her down.
I could feel the magic holding Hunter weakening with every second that dragged by. Already one of his front paws twitched. Shit. I had one good pinch of fairy dust left and I had to make it count. As soon as my senses—much like a radar—told me Emily had made it, I tossed the last of the dust in his eyes and ran.
Well, running might be a bit of a stretch considering the amount of snow slowing me down. I stumbled a couple of times when my feet sank down too far. A loud growl came from behind me before I could make it to the edge of the woods. The werewolf had already broken the tape and was heading in my direction.
Dammit. I trudged along even faster. Why was it that injured animals could still move abnormally quick when they set their minds to it? I should have gotten some wolfsbane, but Emily had used the last of our supply.
He was coming up behind me. No way would I leave my back open to attack. I turned around and faced the werewolf as he got closer. Only fifteen feet away.
He might be limping, but he didn't appear to be letting one bad leg slow him down. He loped over the snow far better than I could. His eyes were trained on me with a singular focus that put chills down my spine. Still, I couldn't let fear control me.
When he jumped the last few feet, going straight for my throat, I put my arm up to block him. His teeth sank into my forearm, biting down through the layers of my jacket and sweater. He pierced my skin deep. With strength I rarely used, I swung my arm as hard as I could and flung him off. He went flying into the nearest tree with a loud thud. I'd knocked him unconscious, but my senses told me he lived.
I looked down at my arm. Pain radiated where his teeth had ripped into it. The sleeve was torn and my blood was soaking through. He'd bitten me hard enough there was a good chance it could turn me. Most sensors wouldn't be able to withstand this kind of bite, but I wasn't exactly normal anymore. I was the first mortal to be allowed to ingest nephilim blood and not be immediately executed. Part of the deal was I had to keep it a secret.
Whatever happened, I needed to get away from Hunter before he woke up. I had enough other deaths on my conscious that I didn't need to add a seventeen-year-old werewolf to the list. He was only acting on instinct, but my own survival skills were kicking in and the next time I defended myself I might kill him. An older werewolf would be a greater challenge, but this one still had some growing up to do.
I trudged the rest of the way back to the jeep, holding my arm tightly. Emily sucked in a breath when she saw the damage as I climbed into the passenger seat. Driving back was going to be painful. My right arm was throbbing and I needed it to shift gears. I flexed my fingers and found they at least worked well enough that I should manage okay.
"What happened?" she asked.
I curled my hand around the shifter, trying to hide a wince, and set it to reverse. "In a match between a werewolf and duct tape, always bet on the werewolf."
"He bit you!"
"Your powers of observation are most impressive." Okay, I tended to get a little cranky when I was injured. Emily knew that, though.
She turned toward me in her seat. "Mel, is it going to turn you?"
"I don't know." I glanced at the clock and saw it was already midnight. "Tomorrow is the full moon. We'll have less than a day to find out."
"That's New Year's Eve. Nik will have the werewolves and everybody else at his house for the party." Emily was one of the few who knew about my changed status and that I had to hide it. "You know they'll try to drag you over there even if you tell them you don't want to go."
Nik was our nearest neighbor and landlord. If I went by how his party went last year, the werewolf pack would wait until after midnight to go on their run. Their instincts to turn were strong, but they could resist for a little while. Of course, it wasn't a full moon last year, but I knew they could still hold back.
"Well, if I do change, at least the werewolves will be close by."
Emily looked out the window at the moon. "I hope Lucas' blood keeps that from happening."
"That makes two of us."
***
I was burning pancakes the next morning when my cell phone rang. Emily grumbled something under her breath and took over so I could answer. She'd do a better job of cooking them anyway. I ruined about seventy-five percent of the meals I made, but that didn't stop me from trying to improve my skills.
"Hey, Derrick," I said after answering the phone. "What's going on?"
I glanced at my arm and was glad he couldn't see it. The skin around the wound was swollen and it ached like hell. I could heal from injuries faster than I used to, but apparently not this time. The only thing making it bearable was some ibuprofen.
"Melena, you haven't seen Rob Maccormac's son, Hunter, around have you?" Derrick asked. "He went missin' last night and no one's seen him since."
Derrick was already aware there was "tension" between Hunter and Emily. I wanted to tell him the truth, but if I did he'd rush over and insist on looking at my arm. Then he'd think I'd turn into a wolf tonight and I had no way of explaining if that didn't happen. The repercussions of him figuring out I'd become something more would have major consequences. Luckily, I wasn't a stranger to lying.
"He hasn't been around here." Which was true. "I'll take a drive around in a bit and see if I can't sense him. You never can tell what these teenage boys are up to." Though I had a good idea about this one and was seriously worried.
"I'd appreciate it," Derrick said. "His father's about ready to organize a search party if the kid doesn't show up soon. Hunter's been known to stay out late, but not like this."
"I'll give you a call if he turns up." Oh, we'd find him one way or another, but I couldn't tell Derrick that.
I hung up and looked at Sable, who was sleeping curled up in the middle of the floor. She was currently in the shape of a Canadian lynx with a mixture of brown and black fur—h
er usual form. Why did she always have to take a nap right where everyone walked? At least she'd be good for sniffing things out if Hunter wasn't at the cabin—or close to it.
***
Emily's shoulders slumped. "He's not here."
I let my gaze sweep around the inside of the cabin one last time—as if my senses hadn't told me enough already. The only things inside were a mattress on the floor, a wood-burning stove, and a couple of metal chairs. If there'd ever been a table, someone had probably broken it down for kindling when it got too cold. There was a lot of trash lying around too, but no injured werewolf.
"We'll take Sable over to where he was caught in the trap. She can get his scent from there and follow his trail."
Emily nodded, looking forlorn. "Maybe I should have just gotten him back the same way he got me. It would have been safer."
I indicated we should start walking. "How would you have done that?"
"I'd have put his iPod back in his locker and played…" she tapped her chin, "No Scrubs by TLC. You used to listen to that one a lot."
"Uh, right." I might have gone through a man-hating phase when she first came to stay with me, but that wasn't the point. I nudged her in the shoulder. "It would have saved you from having to kiss him."
She bowed her head and didn't say anything. Her cheeks might have reddened a little, though.
We reached the trap site. I sent Sable over to sniff out the remnants of Hunter's clothes. They were completely ripped up and stained red. I hadn't been able to see them well last night, but in the cold light of day it was clear he'd lost a lot of blood. We shouldn't have left him, but I didn't know what we could have done differently.
As soon as Sable lifted her head and met my eyes, I knew she was ready.
"If you want to change forms, do it now," I told her.
This wasn't just a cat that could shift into any species of feline. She could also understand English and obey any commands I gave her—most of the time. The fey knew how to breed their pets well.
With a tinge of wild magic pushing at my senses, I watched Sable turn into a snow leopard. It only took her a few seconds, unlike weres who needed more time. The change made her about four times larger than she'd been as a lynx and much more intimidating.
I didn't let her take this shape often because it wasn't native to Alaska and would cause major problems if any humans spotted her. She knew not to kill them, but they'd still report seeing her and I'd have to tell Nik—the supernatural leader of the area—so he could do damage control. It was a real pain covering up something like that, even with vampire compulsion at your disposal.
Still, she could get around better in this form so I let her use it now. Plus it kept the other wildlife away. She was really beautiful if you ignored the huge fangs in her mouth—even a wolf's didn't compare.
Sable stretched her newly changed body and let out a big yawn before heading in a northerly direction. We were going even farther from civilization. Emily and I followed in her footsteps so we could cover them up in case any hunters came along and wondered how in the hell such a large cat got in the area. She sniffed at the snow occasionally and adjusted her direction as we went. Almost an hour passed before her tail perked up—a silent signal telling me she'd found something.
A moment later a moose came into sight. It turned its head and glanced at us before going back to chewing on a bush. Sable growled low in her throat and positioned herself to attack.
"No, Sable. As long as the moose is minding its own business, you have to leave it alone. Derrick will have my head if you kill another one." She'd killed two of them since I'd gotten her back in early March.
She gave me the annoyed look only cats could give and moved on. We trudged another thirty minutes through snow before her tail went up again. I knew she'd found Hunter this time, but something was very off because I should have sensed him sooner. He'd only popped up on my radar in the last few minutes which was not my usual half-mile radius.
Sable led us up to the edge of a small cliff. Below was a small, frozen river with rocky banks on either side. I peered down and saw a naked male body lying at the bottom. He wasn't moving. Werewolves didn't get hypothermia easily, but their human forms were more vulnerable. Hunter would have been forced to shift back at dawn and he'd have been exposed ever since.
"Oh, my God," Emily gasped. "He's barely alive!"
She turned her rounded eyes on me.
"It's going to be okay." I squeezed her arm and hoped I spoke the truth. "Go with Sable and find a safer way down. I'm going to jump from here."
Emily's brows furrowed. "Are you sure you can do that?"
"Yeah, it's only a fifteen foot drop. I can handle it." My newly enhanced body could, anyway.
"Okay, but be careful," she said, giving me one last worried glance. Then she followed Sable as the cat led her away. Emily would be fine so long as she stuck with the shape-shifter.
I positioned myself in the best spot I could find and leaped down. My knees bent a little when I landed, but they held. The nephilim blood had definitely made me a lot sturdier. I turned toward Hunter's body and rushed over to him. He was lying twisted among the rocks.
A quick examination told me he had at least several major injuries. The wound from the bear trap still looked nasty and swollen, he'd broken his other leg, and he'd cut his head open. His skin was turning blue, too, especially around his lips. I needed to get him warm. It'd dropped to negative thirty during the night and hadn't warmed up much since.
I set my backpack down and pulled out a small fleece blanket. It wasn't much, but it was better than nothing. I'd packed it in there before leaving this morning, thinking it might come in handy. Too bad my instincts proved right. I tucked it around his body as best I could and pulled off my jacket next. He needed it far more than I did.
It took some careful maneuvering since I didn't know if he had a neck injury, but I got it underneath his back and pulled the front over his chest. He had a bigger build than me, but at least it would help.
Emily and Sable were working their way up the river when I pulled out my satellite phone. There was only one person I knew of who could save Hunter now.
"Micah, I need your help," I rushed out as soon as he answered.
"What did you get yourself into this time, Melena?" he asked.
"It's a long story and I could do without the sarcasm. I've got an injured teenage werewolf here and he's fading fast. Can you please come save him?"
He let out a martyred sigh. "Where are you?"
"In the middle of nowhere, Alaska. Hold on just a sec."
I pulled the GPS out of my bag and checked the coordinates.
"Write this down," I told him, giving him a moment before reading off the numbers.
"Is this supposed to mean something to me?" he asked when I was done.
I rubbed my face. Damn. When a man is twenty-five hundred years old, it's easy to forget he doesn't know everything. He'd gone into The Sleep for five decades and had only come out of it a little over a year ago. Grid coordinates probably weren't on his priority list of things to catch up on.
"Get one of Lucas' vamps to help you. I'm pretty sure they'll know what to do. Just work fast because this kid is hypothermic and he's got injuries to his head and legs."
"I'll be there as soon as I can." Micah hung up.
Emily and Sable ran the last fifty feet toward me. I asked Sable to lie down next to Hunter as carefully as she could. If anything could help get warmth back into his body, it would be her fur coat.
"Is he going to be okay?" Emily asked, kneeling down next to me.
I put an arm around her shoulder. "Micah's coming soon. If there's a chance Hunter can be saved, Micah can do it."
She'd never seen the man in action, but the one thing Micah did stay current on was medical treatments. He could use his well-developed powers to heal most things, but some ailments required the help of modern science. Without knowing how a disease worked, he couldn't know how to tre
at it—even with magic.
Emily and I did our best to protect Hunter's body from the chilling wind while we waited. I wished there was something more I could do, but moving him wasn't an option. At least Sable's warm breath helped bring a little color back into his face. It was a good thing he wouldn't be waking up soon, though, because a snow leopard staring at you from only a few inches away would scare the shit out of most people.
About twenty minutes passed before a flash of light appeared in the woods across the riverbank. Micah had made it. The coordinates would only get him within ten meters of us and there was an even greater margin for error since he'd never been in this area before. He'd probably had to flash around a couple times before making it this close.
Micah eventually turned and saw us. I waved at him and watched him disappear. I tried not to jump when he popped up again next to me. He immediately crouched down and started examining Hunter. His hands moved over the body and I could sense him using power to probe for injuries.
"It is as you said," he stated after a moment, still gazing down at Hunter. "The boy has a severe head injury, a broken leg, and extensive damage in the other leg. He's too weak to heal on his own, especially with the hypothermia set in. This will take time and a considerable amount of power to repair."
His golden eyes focused on me. It was hard not to look away. He had the face of the man I loved and hadn't seen for most of the year. The only physical difference between him and his brother was Micah wore his blond hair down to his shoulders and Lucas usually wore his short. Otherwise, they had the same muscular build with golden-toned skin and both stood at six and a half feet tall.
Lucas had almost sixty years left on his sentence and I didn't know how I was going to survive that long without him. People thought I was being anti-social lately, but they had no idea what was really causing my behavior—except Emily and Micah, who knew the full story.
"Just do whatever it takes."
The nephilim stared down at the kid, working his jaw. He might be a healer, but he didn't use his powers for just anybody. It took a lot out of him.
The Stroke of Midnight: A Supernatural New Year's Anthology Page 30