by Sam Witt
Al wished the pack was with him and cursed himself for letting them be poisoned. He had faith they wouldn’t die, but it was his job as their leader to keep them from dangers they couldn’t see. The fact that no other predator had touched those animals should have been clue enough for him that there was something wrong. The dogs couldn’t see past their hunger, but Al didn’t have that excuse. Just thinking about how he’d failed his pack made him sick.
A bullet almost found him while he was indulging in a moment of self-loathing instead of paying attention to the dangers around him. It whistled through the air next to his pointed ear, singing a deadly song as it tore past his head. The shot’s thunderclap report cracked the quiet night a split second later, triggering the Beast’s survival instinct. He threw himself prone and scurried into cover behind a snow-covered pine tree.
He’d been so confident he was hot on the trail, he’d walked right into a trap. The Beast didn’t think of guns or traps. It thought of the hunt and the kill.
He sniffed the air and caught traces of Rae and gunpowder on the wind, but no other scents. The witch finder might as well have been a ghost where the Beast’s nose was concerned.
He peeked around the edge of the tree and caught sight of his quarry retreating. The witch finder was wearing a heavy fur coat that covered him from his chin down to the tops of his well-worn boots. He had a high-powered rifle slung over his shoulder and held the poles of a travois in either hand. Rae was bundled up on the travois, her pale face smooth and peaceful in unconsciousness. There was a trickle of blood leaking down from her hairline above her left eye. That was the wound that allowed Al to find her.
The Beast exploded out from around the pine tree and broke into a headlong rush. Less than twenty yards separated him from his prey. Even if the witch finder turned around and took aim the instant the Beast had started running, he wouldn’t be fast enough to land a shot. The Beast was primed for the kill.
He hit the witch finder in a flying leap, claws outstretched and jaws open wide to lock around the man’s throat. Their collision was a bone-jarring impact that left the Beast dazed.
Instead of being bowled over by the powerful tackle, the witch finder held his ground as still as a statue. He grunted with the impact but seemed otherwise unaffected.
The Beast raked at him with his claws, but the tips of his razor-sharp talons slid off the man’s fur coat like water from a beaver’s back. Snarling with frustration, the Beast lunged to take a bite out of the man’s throat.
The witch finder took a hopping step back from the attack and thrust his left arm forward. Like striking serpents, bony fingers emerged from the cavernous blackness of his coat’s sleeve. The witch finder released a cloud of shimmering particles that surrounded the Beast and hung motionless in the air, despite the blowing winter wind. “Too slow, demon,” the man cackled, his voice cracking like ancient leather.
The Beast roared and rose up to his full height, drawing his claws back for an eviscerating swipe. But as his arms swung forward, the sparkling cloud bit into his body. The glitter held him in place as surely as iron manacles. The Beast howled with rage, but even that was muffled by the dazzling cloud as it clamped around his muzzle.
The witch finder cackled again and took up the poles of the travois. “It was a nice try, but it’ll take more than a nice try to finish me.”
Al watched, impotent rage boiling in his chest, as the witch finder trudged away, disappearing into the veil of falling snow.
7
The Beast writhed in the grasp of the witch finder’s trap. He twisted his arms and legs until his joints screamed, but there was no give to the sorcerous bonds. As the witch finder trudged away with Rae, the Beast hung in the glistening web, limp and exhausted from his struggles.
The falling snow coated the web with ice crystals, and soon the Beast couldn’t even see through the frosty cocoon. Worse, he could feel his strength fading, as if the occult net were draining him dry. He jerked his hands and feet back and forth, putting all of his remaining strength into the effort, but the net was too strong. Frustrated and exhausted, the Beast limped into the back of Al’s mind, leaving him once more at the forefront.
Turning his attention to the net itself, Al examined the points where it held him tightest. The motes of glittered had formed wiry silver threads that looped around his wrists and elbows. He tried to twist his head to get a look at his ankles and knees, but there was more of the crystalline net around his muzzle that held it immobile. Judging by the feeling in his legs, though, the story was the same there. There was nothing around his neck, which was his only good luck.
He watched the bonds around his left wrist as he twisted and pulled against it. The loop didn’t flex or bend, no matter how much effort he put into it, but it didn’t get any tighter, either. A quick tug on his right wrist revealed the same there. It wasn’t much, but the little bit of room he had to work with had to be enough.
The snow continued to fall, a gentle wash of white noise that gave Al a soothing focus for his attention. He let his mind drift away from his body, preparing himself for the pain to come.
Al hauled his left hand back against the silvery bonds. He pulled until the skin tore open and revealed the gleaming red muscle beneath. Pain washed over him, robbing him of his senses and cover his brain in a blazing red blanket. Al struggled against the agony, and kept pulling until the skin of his left hand had peeled away from the meat beneath like a wet glove. The pain pushed him to the point of madness and became a consuming entity all its own.
The Beast ripped its head back, as if trying to escape from the agony. But the movement only added to it wounds, as the net around its muzzle shredded the flesh there. Its bloody snout free from the trap, the Beast was able to roar in defiance of the pain, and Al let himself fall into its frenzy. He wasn't strong enough to free himself on his own, but the Beast would not allow himself to remain bound now that Al had started the process and shown it what was necessary to survive. The Beast’s struggles flensed more flesh from his arm, shredding it away from bicep to elbow.
The agony turned the Beast’s world red, but his arm was free. The loose flaps of skin clung to his arm with the uncomfortable dead weight of wet cloth, but the Beast ignored his discomfort. He would heal when he was free.
He turned his attention to his right arm. He tugged his hand back until the sorcerous bonds bit into the back of his wrist. The Beast took a deep breath to steady himself, then used the razor-sharp claw of his left index finger to slice away at his right hand. He cut the skin away with his left hand while pulling back with his right arm, and moments later his hand slipped free in a welter of steaming blood.
The Beast didn't take time to wallow in the pain. The instinct to be free at any cost drove him to claw at his own arm until it slipped through its bonds. He sagged at the waist as uncontrollable tremors racked his body. He had to finish this before his self-inflicted wounds rendered him unconscious.
With both hands unbound, the Beast had better leverage to work on his legs. He found if he concentrated his strength he was able to bend the net just enough to pull his legs through without having to deglove them as he had his arms. Free at last, the Beast receded once more, leaving Al to deal with the carnage.
Kneeling in the snow, Al was able to take stock of the damage done to his hands and arms. He smoothed what skin remained back into place across the exposed muscle and bone. Then he closed his eyes and focused his transformative power on his wounds.
The air filled with the scent of hot blood, and daggers of pain skewered Al's hands and forearms. A terrible, relentless hunger blossomed in his belly. As the wounds healed, they pulled energy and mass from the rest of his body. If he didn't eat soon, the strain of his transformation and regeneration would take him out as sure as any of the witch finder’s traps.
Al struggled back to his feet, ignoring his hunger by turning his attention to the black-hearted rage within him. He flexed his claws and raised his head into the w
ind. Rae’s scent was still there, fading, but still hanging in the air. He howled his rage and charged after it, ready to rip the witch finder limb from limb.
8
With Rae’s scent growing fainter by the moment, Al was desperate to catch up to the witch finder. If he lost the trail, she was as good as dead.
He ran full bore, following his nose from one drip of blood to the next, closing his eyes from time to time to heighten his sense of smell, opening his mouth to suck in more air, tasting the wind.
In the distance, a member of his pack let out a long, mournful howl. Al answered with a quavering wail of his own. He wanted the pack to know he was on the hunt. He needed them to know why he’d abandoned them and left them defenseless and unconscious in the snow. Al didn’t know if the pack would ever forgive him for not protecting them, but they needed to hear his urgency and understand why he wasn’t watching over them. Al didn’t care if his need to communicate with his hounds gave away his position. The Beast’s primal needs won out over more tactical concerns.
More howls answered him, but they were weak and confused. Al was grateful that his pack was alive and recovering from the poison, but from the weakness he heard in their voices, he knew he couldn’t depend on them. The battle with the witch finder would be Al’s alone.
And he looked forward to that battle. The Beast was enraged that he’d been tricked by the old man and furious with himself that he hadn’t been there to stop Rae from being kidnapped. When he caught up to witch finder this time, he’d tear the motherfucker apart.
The wind switched direction, yanking Rae’s scent away from him. For a moment, the air was dead in his nostrils, devoid of any scent save his own and the crystalline bite of falling snow. The Beast plunged ahead, following the same line he’d traced before, hoping the witch finder hadn’t changed direction, praying that the wind would turn back in his favor and reveal Rae’s scent once more.
But what if his luck didn’t hold out? Rae would die if he didn’t catch up to her. He couldn’t just rely on the wind shifting for him, he had to make his own luck.
This part of Pitchfork County was hardwired into the Beast’s brain. After months of traveling over this chunk of land, he knew its ridges and valleys so well he could see them in his mind as if he were an eagle flying overhead. He hunkered down and did just that, closing his eyes to let a vision of Pitchfork County unfurl inside his head.
The witch finder wasn’t as agile as the Beast, and he was saddled with the travois. That meant he wouldn’t be climbing either of the nearby ridges. It also eliminated the stream that carved its way down into a hollow from the east, because the witch finder would have a hell of a time dragging the travois upstream.
That left two options that Al could see: a steep-sloping climb over the hills to the west, or a descent into a valley to the south. Given the witch finder’s additional burden, the Beast guessed the man would be heading down into the valley.
Which meant he could use his greater speed to circle around and get ahead of his quarry. He sprinted along the ridgeline, dropping to all fours to increase his speed and stability on the snow-covered scree. Within a few minutes, he caught Rae’s scent again, the blood tossed on the wind as it whirled up out of the valley below. He grinned, baring his fangs, and forged ahead. He’d guessed right.
After ten minutes of running, he lost Rae’s scent again. He’d raced ahead of her captor and was now upwind of them. The blowing snow made it impossible to see into the valley below, but the Beast’s instincts told him he’d done the right thing. All he had to do now was descend into the valley and head uphill until he intercepted the witch hunter.
The pack’s howls reached out across the winter landscape once again. Their voices were gaining in strength, but they were still too weak and weary to join the hunt. Heedless of the danger it might place him in, the Beast let loose with a victorious howl that let his hounds know the end of the hunt was coming soon.
He found a notch in the ridgeline that gave way to a steep, but manageable path to the valley’s floor. Still on all fours with his claws digging into the rocky terrain, the Beast scrambled down without any difficulty and very little noise. He hid in the shadow of the ridgeline and caught his breath, working hard to remain calm as he closed in for the kill. The witch finder had caught him by surprise once; the Beast wouldn’t let it happen again.
The wind swirled up the length of the valley, kicking snow from the ground and adding it to the heavy, wet flakes falling from the sky. The chaotic white screen scrambled the Beast’s vision, forcing him to rely on his geographic memory and what little scent he could pick up from the turbulent wind. He was close, he could tell that much, but he had little else to go on.
Rae’s blood was still in the wind, even if he couldn’t pinpoint its exact location. The Beast didn’t want to wait to get a clearer fix on her position. It wanted to seek and destroy.
He lowered himself to the snow and slithered forward on his belly like a lizard, offering as small a target as possible. The wind buffeted his face and made him want to bury his face in his claws to warm his muzzle. The weather was turning brutal, and the Beast wondered how much longer the witch finder would be able to keep moving. He wondered, too, how long Rae would survive in the frigid weather.
A few minutes later, he spotted his prey hunkered down in the middle of the valley. The witch finder was bent over the travois, huddled near Rae’s still form. There were black dots in the snow around the two of them, shadowed divots the width of a man’s finger. Maybe the old man was getting ready to build camp. Maybe the weather had finally gotten the best of him.
The Beast held his breath and tensed to spring. The witch finder was distracted, and this was the perfect opportunity for his ambush. The man was fast, the Beast gave him credit for that, but he’d never see the attack coming. Without a sound, the Beast hurled himself forward.
He sailed through the air, slicing through the falling snow like a thrown dagger. He stretched his claws wide and let his jaws fall open, ready to rend and crush and devour. This man would pay for what he’d done to Rae.
The Beast locked his muscles for the impact, remembering how his last attack on the witch finder had ended. This time he’d wrap his arms and legs around the old man and bury his snout in the witch finder’s soft throat.
But there was no impact.
The Beast’s claws scythed through the man’s body with no resistance, his fangs snapped through the neck but tasted no blood.
He roared and slammed into the ground, sliding across the snowy slope. His claws dug into the earth, and he churned up clots of frozen gravel and dirt as he whipped his body around.
The witch finder had tricked him again. The illusion was still there, a shadowy form that was utterly unconvincing now that he knew it was a fake. The Beast stalked forward, his muzzle peeled back to reveal rows of jagged teeth. The illusion dissolved as he approached it, breaking apart and vanishing into the snow. He stopped at the spot it had occupied and saw a scrap of Rae’s shirt, stained with her blood, stuck to the ground with a long, rusty nail. He sniffed at it then turned his attention to the divots in the snow around him. More acorn caps.
The Beast howled his frustration and kicked snow over the acorns. He turned in a full circle, searching for a new scent, a new trail. Something to show him where the witch finder had gone. There was something to the east, a hint of old wood and—
A burning bolt of pain speared through his left shoulder. He looked down at the injury, and a wave of nausea washed over him. The tip of a wicked bolt had burst through the front of his shoulder, and he could see the rest of it protruding from his back. Blood ran from the missile’s barbed head and fell steaming onto the snow. “Fuck,” the Beast whispered and sank to his knees.
There was something wrong with him, a disconnect between his brain and his body. The Beast’s muscles felt as loose and useless as overcooked noodles, and his balance was out of whack. He tried to get back onto his feet, but his legs r
efused to respond to his commands and his efforts managed to do nothing more than dump him onto his face in the snow. Poison, he thought and cursed himself for an idiot to be caught by the old man’s venom.
A shadow fell over the Beast. He could see a little out of the corner of his eye and was not surprised when the witch finder emerged from the screen of wind-blown snow. Even up close, the man had no scent. He was a deep blot of darkness with a pale smudge for a face. The Beast saw that smudge dropping toward him like a falling star as the man knelt down just out of his reach.
“You better stop now, monster.” The witch finder’s words sounded thick and distorted. “No profit in chasing me any farther. I got what I came for, and now I’ll be leaving your shitty little corner of the world. Leave it be.”
Rage sent a surge of adrenaline coursing through the Beast’s blood, but his muscles refused to respond. All he could manage was a weak snarl.
The witch finder’s creaking laugh shattered against the Beast’s ears like falling icicles. “You’re a fighter, I’ll give you that. If I wasn’t in such a rush to be moving on, I’d skin you right here and take your hide as a trophy. But I don’t have the time, so count yourself lucky. Storm’s coming, and I don’t want to end up buried in this goddamned blizzard.”
The witch finder walked away, fading into the falling snow.
The Beast’s eyes drifted closed, and snow fell on his wounded back, burying him beneath its weight.
9
Something warm and wet dragged across Al’s forehead. The sudden interruption in the numbing sensation of winter’s cold jolted Al awake. He struggled to get to his feet, but his body betrayed him, and he collapsed back onto his chest and stomach.
The motion shoved the barbed head of the bolt back into his body, sawing at his nerves. He ground his teeth against the pain. The bolt was interfering with his supernatural healing abilities. He had to get it out of his body, or the wound would never close. He’d bleed out or freeze to death, and no one would find him until the spring thaw left him naked and rotting.