by Claire Ryann
25
"I dunno, man, you really think she made it this far?" Lowell was hesitant to keep going in their current direction, and with good reason.
Daelan stood on an overlook and stared into the east. They were at the eastern border of the pack's territory and two days out since Haley had been discovered missing.
The good news was that there wasn't any indication that the others had caught up to her either. The bad news was that the land east of their territory was notorious habitat for a variety of other animals-- both shifter and not-- that had an unfriendly history with Daelan's pack. Oh yeah, and another storm was headed their way. Winter was catching up to the Cascades with a vengeance.
"I understand if you want to go back," Daelan said to his friends.
"You're going to keep going?" Ken asked.
Daelan nodded as he continued to scan the exposed slopes of the mountains in front of him.
"Then I am too," Ken said emphatically.
"Me too," Mingan said.
Lowell nodded in unspoken agreement. If they were going so was he.
All eyes turned to Rek.
"You should know you never have to ask," he stated firmly as he returned to his wolf and began the descent down to the next river crossing.
The youngest wolf among them was already ahead, yipping from the other side of the river as a guide for his elders.
Ken shook his head in amusement, "Guess the kid is in too."
The four men left behind shared one more glance between them. Crossing the river below put them out of bounds and they knew what the penalties could be for a party of wolves caught over the line.
They waited for Daelan to take the lead but he directed them to go first. Daelan shifted last and followed the others down the mountain, aware that his closest friends still looked to him to lead.
Out here, politics did not determine who was in charge.
26
The storm had forced them to seek shelter for the rest of the night. Their wolves huddled together for warmth under a low rock overhang.
Daelan couldn't sleep. He could only watch the sky wage war on the landscape with increasing agitation.
This was the third night she was out here. He had to believe she was still alive. That she had managed to stay ahead of the hunters just as she'd managed to stay ahead of him. That she had found some place to hide and be safe from the storm.
Daelan left the pile of sleeping wolves and waited for the weather to clear.
Haley's trail had already become hard to follow after the boundary crossing at the river. This storm had hurled rain and hail on what was left of her scent. Now the fury had given way to peaceful snow fall.
Daelan knew that a new coat of snow would obscure the visible signs of her trail as well as her scent, hiding the trampled grasses, the recently turned stones, and the broken branches that would have led him to her even when her scent was washed away.
His only consolation was that it would also hide her trail from the dogs that would tear her apart if they got to her first.
When he found those traitors he was going to tear their throats out. For seeking to harm his mate first of all, and also for daring to challenge his authority as alpha.
He hadn't had to win any challenges for his position. He hadn't asked to lead the pack but he had taken it seriously. He did his best to take the pack in the directions he felt were best for all of them. Learning to embrace their humanness and survive in a world that was increasingly difficult to ignore while staying true to their wild nature and their pack's traditions.
It was a hard line to balance.
Rek's betrayal also cut deep, and although his old friend was here to support him now, he knew that when this business was settled there would be a proper challenge between them. Of all the challengers he'd expected to face, he never would have expected that he would find himself in a fight to the death against his oldest friend.
As if he'd been summoned, the dark wolf arrived at Daelan's side.
"We'll find her." Rek's voice interrupted Daelan's thoughts and shattered the calm of the night.
Daelan's wolf nodded.
Rek moved on the rocks beside Daelan, finding a more comfortable position for a man.
Daelan wanted to be left alone, he wanted to leave his wolf as it was and pretend it couldn't understand Rek's human words but he had words of his own that needed said.
"Ruelle isn't with us."
Rek nodded in unspoken understanding.
"I never thought he would stand against me."
"He's seen the worst of humans. You knew he wasn't going to allow one into the pack," Rek said.
"But this? To hunt a pack member's mate?" Daelan's voice was strained with emotion, "His Alpha's mate. My mate. I never thought I would have to protect anything of mine from him." Daelan turned and narrowed his eyes at the man beside him, "From any of you," he added bitterly.
"I can't speak for Ruelle," Rek said soberly.
"I'm not asking you to."
"We'll get to her first." Rek's voice was full of certainty.
Daelan's eyes left the man at his side and scanned the moonlit landscape, "Ruelle's a good tracker," he said, a tinge of despair in his voice, "and he doesn't respect the boundaries."
"You're better," Rek assured. "Full moon tonight," he noted, changing the subject.
"Won't help her," Daelan answered.
Rek's head turned toward Daelan, "Have you discussed that with her?"
Daelan worked his jaw tensely, "She went catatonic on me when he saw me shift. I told her a lot of things while she was out, just trying to keep talking, you know? I don't know if I mentioned that."
Daelan looked down at his hands in his lap, "Do you think that would ease the pack's resistance?"
He heard Rek sigh heavily beside him.
"How long has it been since we invited a human? Who was the last one? Myra? Jonathan?" Rek was thinking back in time.
"Robert and his wife. Victoria, I think."
They shared a sigh.
Sad memories. The couple had been hikers who had stumbled into the pack's territory inadvertently. They would have been free to go on their way if they had merely encountered a small band of wolves or a camp of drunken men celebrating their hunt but they had come into the camp just as the hunters had returned and they had watched 12 wolves turn to men.
It had been a spur of the moment decision for the hunting party's leader. They had given the couple the option to join them or take their chances with the wolves.
Daelan remembered that from his childhood, or they can take their chances with the wolves, it was the code the older generations had used for set the humans free in the woods and then hunt them down. It sounded sporting, but both sides knew who had the advantage.
Robert and Vicky had chosen to join the pack and had actually been eager to do so but Vicky hadn't taken the wolf well. She warred with the new animal inside her and tried to leash it like a pet, unable to accept its natural instincts. The wolf had taken her over a cliff in a dead run.
Of all the humans that had joined the pack in its history only Robert and Laka remained and Laka had received her wolf so long ago that she no longer remembered the name her mother had given her.
It was best to share the wolf with humans while they were young. Human brains became less adaptive as they aged, asking them to adapt to such a big change late after they reached full maturity was a gamble. Some humans embraced the wolf as if they had been born with it. Others fought it, unable to reconcile the new duality.
Most often they issued challenges to upper ranking pack members that they weren't prepared for. They refused to follow. They were unprepared to lead. They lacked the skills to survive, caught between the wolf and the human.
Victoria's case had been extreme. There had been a ban against Turning humans since.
"It's been nearly a hundred years then," Daelan said sadly.
"That's a long time to outlive a mate if you don't."
Rek w
as right but his words made Daelan's wolf charge to the surface fiercely. Daelan turned shining eyes on his companion, "It's also a long time to ask her to outlive her mate if I lose."
Rek stared at Daelan's silver eyes in surprise, "Lose what?"
Was the man joking? Had he forgotten his mutiny? Certainly he didn't think that he could usurp the Alpha position so easily?
Daelan might not have asked for the position but he sure as hell wasn't going to walk away from it without a fight. Not after all the work he'd done. And definitely not under these circumstances.
His wolf growled a warning at Rek's.
"I don't want your damn job," Rek's eyes flashed a matching silver in the moonlight, his voice acidic.
"That's not what you announced to the council just before you threw me in a fucking jail cell," Daelan hissed.
"You were losing control, Day, I need to keep you from going all Incredible Hulk in there. It was the only way I could think of to prevent a bigger mess while we got this worked out."
Daelan knew it was the truth but his wolf continued to to huff. He eyed his old friend carefully, determining where they stood.
The wolf settled, leaving Daelan with the restless exhaustion of an adrenaline crash.
"Get some sleep and then we'll head out," Rek rose to his feet and laid his hand on his Alpha's shoulder, "your mate needs you to be at your best if she's going to have a chance against Ruelle."
27
Haley's eyes fluttered open. It was dark all around her and the ground was hard under her body but for the first time in three days she wasn't dangerously cold.
Her feet were elevated, resting on something warm. She blinked a few times and waited for her eyes to adjust to the dim light.
She had no idea how long she'd been out. It was the first real sleep she'd gotten since Daelan had left the cabin. It wasn't great sleep, but it had lasted more than 10 minutes and she needed that.
Her feet were so toasty now. She remembered she was barefoot and she wondered what her feet were on. It wasn't the hard granite floor.
The wolf!
She uncurled herself from her awkward position and rubbed her eyes. She hadn't meant to put her feet on top of him. She hoped she hadn't moved his front leg and separated that gash further.
Pulling her feet back under her, she turned so that she could check on her patient.
The faint glow of silver light that faced her when she turned sent her flying backwards, nearly knocking out her breath as her back hit the wall. His eyes widened slightly at her startled grunt and the sound of her skull bouncing off the rock.
Ruelle sat with his back up against the other side of the small cave next to the opening that showed a full moon hanging in the night sky outside.
"Why did you do that?"
His voice was raspy with the sound of a man in a good deal of pain. He took a labored breath and she watched him as he used one hand to physically reposition the other, placing the limp arm in his lap where her feet had been resting a moment before.
OK. She got that they were werewolves-- shapeshifters-- whatever. That part she was getting used to, so it shouldn't freak her out that he wasn't a wolf anymore. She was pretty terrified that the injured wolf turned out to be Mr. Mean and Shovey himself. He hadn't exactly struck her as her best bet for an ally. But there was no freakin' way he should be sitting up watching her sleep like he'd merely skinned his knee.
That wolf had been damn near dead. It needed massive surgery to reconnect damaged nerves and muscle tissue. It need IV antibiotics and probably about 157 stitches to literally sew its arm back on. It needed to be kept immobilized for weeks while it got a steady drip of whatever painkiller was safe for man-wolf things.
The man that was sitting in the cave with her looked like he'd been in a fight for sure, but if he'd said the other guy looked worse, she might believe him.
Ruelle was nowhere near drawing his last breath.
At the moment, Haley was too fascinated to be scared.
She hurried over to him and began examining his wounds.
He was wearing a t-shirt that was a snug fit over his muscular frame and jeans and boots. The sleeve of his shirt was ripped pretty much off so that it looked like half a wife-beater. There was dried blood all over him, but the ragged gash that had almost torn his arm off yesterday was a deep, painful-looking cut. The skin was still torn apart, the edges jagged from being torn by claws or teeth, not the clean lines of a cut. She couldn't see into the wound well in the darkness but she could tell it was healing.
"Why?" He rolled his head toward her and watched her with patient eyes that still shined with that silver light.
She returned his stare. She honestly didn't know.
"I'm a nurse?" It was the best she had.
Ruelle laughed. One hard guffaw that shook his body. He winced as he settled back against the rock, "You're a fucking nurse," he repeated sarcastically, "ain't that sweet."
"I thought you were going to die," Haley said quietly, "there was nothing I could do for you. I just didn't want you to die out there alone."
Ruelle raised his eyes to her again with a labored sigh that rattled in his chest, "You didn't want me to...lady, you know I was looking for you to kill you, right?"
Haley gave him a short, quick nod.
"You knew that wolf wasn't Day, or Kenny, or someone who was hoping to get to you before I did so they could save you, right? You knew it was me?"
Haley nodded with every question but the last one, "No. No I didn't know it was you," she gulped, "but-- but I knew it was part of the group that was hunting me. I knew you'd have killed me if you could."
Her voice was tight and she'd pulled away from him slightly but there wasn't enough to room to escape the reach of his good arm if he decided to grab her by the throat.
"So you knew I was going to kill you and you still dragged me in here and curled up with me to sleep? Scratching my ears all night like I was a fuckin' German Shepard you took on a camping trip?"
Well she hadn't exactly thought about it like that, no, but Haley gave him a weak shrug, "kinda?"
Ruelle forced a pained laugh again and shook his head, "Shit. Thanks for making me feel like a fucking savage. Guess Mingan was right about me being an asshole." He coughed and pressed his good arm against his ribs, "I always thought he was just jealous."
Haley leaned back on the wall opposite Ruelle and stared outside. The moon was high and full in the sky and it turned everything blue. There was a blanket of fresh snow on the ground and the night was still and quiet.
"So you're not going to kill me?" She whispered without looking at him.
Another choked laughed came from him, "Seems like kind of a dick move."
"Well I don't want to change your mind about not killing me but I didn't do anything. All I did was bring you in here. I don't know how you're alive much less look like it's been 3 months since you got hurt."
"You did do something, Haley. You're name's Haley, right? I mean, yeah, maybe you're not the reason I'm still alive but you took care of me while I was out. You tried to take care of me and comfort me even though you knew I was trying to kill you. That's ballsy."
"Ballsy," Haley repeated with an absent nod. He wasn't going to kill her. That was great news! On the other hand, there was still a bunch of other werewolves out there somewhere who would kill her. Haley reminded herself not to get too excited.
Ruelle was nodding, his eyes half closed as he thought out loud, "Yeah, like real alpha female ballsy," he said to no one in particular.
They were quiet for a minute and then Haley interrupted his thoughts, "Why are you still alive?"
"Ha," Ruelle chuckled, "you wouldn't be the first woman who was disappointed about that." He opened his eyes and gave her a wink and a grin.
"Seriously, we just heal is all. If we get injured we heal. We ain't immortal, but if you're gonna kill one of us, you pretty much have to it all at once or take us out while we're already down."
&n
bsp; "So you could get shot?" Haley asked.
He nodded, "yeah," his voice sounded sad now, "that's been a big problem. That's what they did in California you know, hunted the wolves out of existence down there. Killed a lot of shifters in the process. Drove out the rest."
"Oh. I'm sorry." She pictured a scene from a movie, wolves and people all running to escape men with guns. Women and children being shot in the back. It probably hadn't been like that but it was hard not to picture it that way.
"So are there other types of shifters?" She decided to change the subject a little bit.
"Yeah," It sounded more like he wanted to say duh. "Pretty much every animal on the planet has a corresponding shape shifter. There's a bunch of old mythology about the Great Mother in the first age and how she gave an animal to each of her favorite humans as a gift. Some shifters buy into that more than others."
That sounded familiar. Haley tried to put her finger on where she'd heard it before. Oh yeah, Daelan had told her all about it while he was trying to bring her out of her shock when she'd seen him shift the first time.
"I take it you're not much of a mythology buff?" She asked.
"I guess it's as good an explanation as any other," Ruelle sounded thoughtful, "I still think there's some science to it. Gotta be, right? Some sort of mutation or uncoded DNA? But till we figure that out, I guess cursed by Ma Nature works just as well."
"I thought it was a gift?"
Ruelle shrugged with his good shoulder, "One man's gift is another man's curse. Legend has it that back in the day the people who lived around here actually thought we were gods, or superheroes, or some shit. They used to invite us over for dinner and encourage us to fuck their daughters and shit. Used to be a real party if a shifter took one of their people as a mate.
Then things changed and humans decided that we the bad guys. We weren't gods anymore, we were demons. All of a sudden nobody wanted shifter in-laws anymore. And that was before the Europeans showed up. Once they got here, everything went to hell."
"So, shifters used to mate with humans? And that was OK back then?" Haley was starting to put 2 and 2 together and it wasn't adding up to 5.