Northern Lights

by Debra Dunbar

  “What’s your name?” I tore strips from the shirt, making sure I tucked a few into my waistband for Renee. Hopefully I wouldn’t need any for the others.

  “Ray. Hurry and get this over with before I have a panic attack and pee myself.”

  Yeah. I was really liking this guy. I gently took hold of the man’s arm and supported it as I wrapped my shirt around where the break seemed to be and tied the ends behind the man’s neck. Ray’s eyes widened as I moved the arm, then unfocused.

  “It really hurts. Wish I had some drugs.”

  “Me too.” I stood and looked around. “Stay here while I go check on the others. I’ll be right back.”

  The man put out his other hand to halt me. “Where are we? What happened?”

  Those were the questions of the day. “I don’t know. We’ll figure it out. Right now I need to see who all is here and make sure everyone is okay.”

  The man nodded, and I moved on. In the distance were two figures, another approaching them on foot. As I drew near I heard the sounds of crying. The girl’s blonde hair was stained pink with blood, and she was crying over a motionless figure on the sand.

  “Sarah? Sarah, please. Oh God, please, please, please.” The blonde woman began to rock. Hobbling closer, I squatted down to face the crying girl. “Is this your friend Sarah? Can I look at her? I know some first aid. Maybe I can help.”

  There was no helping Sarah, but I had to do something before the other girl completely lost it. Gently I turned the motionless figure over, smoothing reddish hair away from her face. The girl wasn’t breathing. Her eyes stared blankly at the horizon.

  “I landed on her. I killed her. I landed on her.”

  There was no time for this. It was hot and dry. People were injured. We needed to clean and take care of the wounded. There wasn’t time for grief and guilt.

  “I’m so sorry this happened to your friend, but we need to find shelter.” We needed to find water and food, too, but first we needed to get out of this sun and somewhere defensible. I had no idea where we were or what sort of dangers this place might have, but heatstroke was the most pressing problem we were going to face, followed by dehydration.

  “I can’t leave her. I can’t leave her.” The girl wailed. They were all going to fall apart on me. An injured elderly man, an injured woman with two children, this emotional wreck, and a dead teenager. I was an Alpha, a leader of werewolves, not a leader of hurt, frightened humans.

  “Let me help. Can I get through here? Coming through. Excuse me.”

  I turned around, then looked down. Standing in front of me was a woman who had to have been over a foot shorter than me. Her dark brown hair was escaping in wisps from a stubby ponytail at the nape of her neck. She was slight, with delicate features and the most amazing eyes. They were so dark brown that they were almost black, heavy lidded with long lashes. Bedroom eyes. The sort of sultry, sleepy eyes you wanted looking up at you the morning after an amazing night of sex. Her skin was creamy pale, but her features had a Mediterranean look, as if she were a Spanish film star or an Italian model.

  And those sexy bedroom eyes were looking at me with a commanding confidence that many werewolves couldn’t even muster. Her gaze drifted past me to the body on the sand and she caught her breath, for a brief instant allowing the mask of authority to slip. She’d seen dead before. She’d seen lots of dead before.

  Then abruptly the cool confidence was back as she turned her attention to the crying woman. “Let me see where you’re bleeding from, hon.” She blew a strand of dark hair away from her face and plopped her backpack on the ground, pulling out a flag-patterned bandana, a first-aid kit, and a bottle of water.

  “Out of my way, Muscles.” It was said with a good-natured twinkle in her dark brown eyes and an elbow to my ribs that effectively moved me to the side. She reminded me of the pack females, used to holding their own surrounded by males. She moved in front of me, blocking the crying woman’s view and giving me a chance to quickly close the dead girl’s eyes. Sarah. Sarah’s eyes. Hopefully it would make her seem peaceful, as if she were sleeping, and give her friend a bit of comfort.

  The woman knelt down and examined the blonde’s head with gentle but thorough hands. The whole time she made soothing noises, telling her it would all be okay, and that she’d help. Help with what? She could slap some antibiotic cream on the woman’s head, but nothing was going to help with her grief. It wouldn’t be okay. And I was pretty sure if they didn’t get out of this heat to some shelter, it would be far from okay.

  “We need to go,” I said. It was like I was talking to the air. No one moved or responded to my firmly worded edict. That was a first. Humans and werewolves alike jumped when I gave orders. Ahia was the only one who argued back or ignored me. This…this just didn’t happen.

  “Ooo, that’s a nasty cut. I’ll clean it best as I can now and put a butterfly bandage on it. Hand me that bottle of water, will you, Muscles?”

  I stared at the woman’s outstretched hand for a moment, then picked the bottle up off the sand and placed it in her palm. “We should conserve water. I don’t know when we’ll find more.”

  “I don’t intend on washing her hair with it, just cleaning the worst stuff out of the cut.” She moistened a corner of the bandana and dabbed it against the cut in the woman’s temple, examining the wound before capping the bottle and handing it back to me. “Can you hand me the antibiotic cream and a butterfly bandage from the kit? I don’t have anything with me to stitch it, so I’ll have to hope this holds.”

  I stared at her a moment, wondering how I’d completely lost my authority to a human with do-me eyes and a backpack. Before my ego could get too out of whack, I gave myself a mental slap. Yes, she was a human, but she clearly had more first-aid experience then I did, and she had supplies. Time to stop thumping my chest and be grateful that there was someone else with leadership skills.

  “Here.” I handed her the bandage and the cream, putting the water bottle back in her pack.

  She squeezed the cream out and applied it to the cut, smoothing the woman’s hair aside then squeezing the edges of the wound together as she put the bandage on.

  “I killed her. I fell on her and killed her,” the blonde woman told her.

  She stood and put the antibiotic cream back into the first-aid kit, stashing both it and the bandana back into her pack. “Let me take a look.”

  “We need to get going.” I repeated. Again, no one paid any attention to me.

  Bedroom-eyes knelt down beside the dead girl, examining her. “I don’t think you killed her, hon. We didn’t fall that far, and landing on her wouldn’t have caused instant death. I think she may have died in transit to wherever we are.”

  The girl looked up, her eyes and nose red and swollen. “Really?”

  “Really. We need to bury your friend. We can’t just leave her here exposed, but we need to find shelter. Can we bury her? Is there something you’d like to leave with her? Something you’d like to say?”

  The blonde girl gulped and pulled a gold chain from around her neck, and the other woman pulled a small package out of her pocket. She placed them all on Sarah’s chest, folding the girl’s arms, then scooping sand over the body. The blonde watched her for a few moments, tears still spilling from her eyes, then she knelt down and helped bury her dead friend.

  Pushing enough sand over the body to barely cover it, the woman stood and picked up her pack. “You’re right. We need to get shelter,” she said to me under her breath, glancing over at the crying girl. “Do you have any orienteering experience? I’ve got a compass in my backpack, but the iron in this sand will probably screw it up. Besides that, I don’t know the landscape around here. I’m assuming you’re a resident?”

  I helped the blonde girl get to her feet. We’d eventually have to deal with her emotional state, but for now there were other priorities. “I’m a resident of Alaska, but we’re not in Alaska anymore.” I couldn’t help an ironic smile at my words, envision
ing a yellow brick road opening up before us.

  “I didn’t think there were any deserts in Alaska, but where else could we be? Did a tornado suck us off to Oz? Did we fall through an interdimensional rift to a land of lizard people and sand monsters?”

  “I suspect the latter.” I headed off with a supportive arm around the blonde, and the woman on the other side of me.

  “Nice dry humor. Very good delivery,” she teased. “So you’ve got no idea where we are either? And you’re hurt.” The last was said with a sharp, accusatory tone, as if I’d done it on purpose.

  “It’s no big deal. I’ll be fine.”

  “You’re limping. I saw you in the tourist shop. You’re the strongest, most fit among everyone here. We need you, which means we need you not to be hurt.”

  Brutally practical. And she, as well as the others here, had no idea I was a werewolf. Local humans did, but those facts were always kept from the tourists.

  “I’m fine. I promise you I’ll be one-hundred percent in a few hours. Pinky promise.”

  She snorted. “Okay, tough guy. I better not see any limping by tomorrow, or you’re under my care.”

  Bossy. “What, you’re a doctor?”

  “Yes, I am. A trauma surgeon. I work in the ER.”

  “And you were on the cruise ship?”

  “No, I flew up for a few weeks to do some hiking and rock climbing. Doctors get to take a vacation every decade or so if we’re lucky,” she teased. “I thought this would be a fun trip.”

  “Is it living up to your expectations?” What was I doing? We were trapped, surrounded by hot sand in another country, or planet, or dimension, and I was carrying on a flirty, bantering conversation with a bossy, incredibly sexy doctor.

  “Expectations exceeded. I can’t wait to write my online review. ‘It was like an episode of Land of the Lost, only with more people.”’

  I chuckled. “I’m hoping without the dinosaurs.”

  “Me too.”

  My brief levity vanished when I saw the older man and once again realized the gravity of our situation. Ray was pale and looked as though he might be going into shock.

  “Crap.” The woman muttered, hurrying forward. She knelt down in front of the man, and I noticed her left leg seemed off, as if she was favoring it when she bent the knee.

  I doubted she’d been packing for an emergency medical situation, but for someone I assumed had been about to go on a hike, she had a good amount of survival items in her pack. The first thing she did was unfold a lightweight, metallic emergency blanket and wrap it around Ray.

  “What do you need?” I asked, taking the backpack from her outstretched hand.

  “Water. Gauze. One of those ice packs.”

  I pulled them out, and assisted as she examined his arm first. She was fast, efficient, and had a calm air about her that elicited confidence in her skill. She was also kind, speaking to Ray and smiling warmly at him as she worked. When she was done, Ray had an icepack supporting his arm that was now back in the T-shirt sling and some gauze packing in his nose.

  “Can you walk?” She asked, getting to her feet and holding out a hand for Ray.

  The older man took her arm and got up nodding. “I think so. I want to warn you that I’ve got my blood pressure meds back at the cruise ship. We were only supposed to be off the boat for a few hours, so I didn’t bring anything but my wallet and my pocket knife.”

  The woman patted his arm, but shot me a grimace. “I’ll keep an eye on you, Ray. We’ve got a bit of walking ahead of us, but we’ll go slow. Think you can make it a few miles?”

  The man paled. “I don’t have much choice, do I?”

  I saw a muscle twitch in her jaw. “We’ll go slow. And if we need to rest, I’ll stay with you. The others can go ahead.”

  I’d be darned if I left any of these people behind, but the sun was hot and we probably didn’t have any water beyond that one bottle that the doctor had in her backpack. I looked around to some mountains in the distance. It was hazy out and it was hard to tell if they were huge mountains that were fifty miles away, or smaller ones five or ten miles off. I wasn’t sure Ray would be able to make it even if they were only five miles away.

  When we joined up with Renee and the two boys, I felt a slight sense of relief. At least we were all together, and beyond Ray and Renee, none of the others were injured.

  “Doc? Can you check on Renee’s ankle?” I asked.

  The doctor muttered a curse and went over to the woman, easing herself down, then pulling supplies out of her backpack.

  I sat in the sand, willing my leg to heal faster. Ahia wasn’t here. We’d all fallen fairly close together, and she’d not been anywhere. Part of me wanted to go search for her, just to be sure I wasn’t leaving a pack member—my First, my best friend—behind, but I couldn’t abandon these people. They all looked to me with hope and expectation in their eyes. I’d need to find shelter first, then water, then food. Doc could take the medical treatment off my hands, but the rest would be up to me.

  I couldn’t smell water nearby. I couldn’t smell anything beyond heat and the metallic odor of the sand. The haze was clearing a bit, and I guessed that the small mountains in the distance — —more like big rocks — —were about three miles away. But I didn’t want to head there if water was closer elsewhere. Closing my eyes, I inhaled, willing that faint extrasensory directional ability I had to find something, anything that would point me in the right direction.

  Iron. Copper. And the cold clear smell of granite, but no water. My eyes popped open. It would have to be the mountains. There we’d at least have shelter. And there was a chance of a stream or pond, and possibly edible plants and animals that I’d be able to smell once closer.

  I stood. “Renee, can you walk?” I’d carry her if I had to, but hopefully she could walk at least some of the distance.

  “I don’t know. Can I, Doc?”

  The other woman nodded. “You’ll never get this boot on again if I take it off. I’m thinking this is just a sprain. If not, the boot will help stabilize any break until we get somewhere for the night. I might have to cut the shoe off, but…” Doc looked over at me, then back at Renee. “We’ll figure something out for footwear if I do.”

  She helped Renee to her feet, and the woman hobbled a few steps with the help of her sons. “I’ll be okay if we go slow.”

  I looked out at the endless expanse of sand toward the mountains. I had no idea how long it would take us given our injuries. Hopefully we’d make it before nightfall. Hopefully we’d make it at all.

  Chapter 23

  Ahia

  I needed to talk to Nisroc and Raphael, to figure out how I could find or replicate the rift that took Brent. But first I needed to talk to the pack. They’d just lost their Alpha — quite possibly forever. Sabrina had been the next in line, but she wasn’t ready to take over the pack. No one was. As the last person who’d seen Brent, it was my responsibility to tell them. And as the pack’s First, it was my responsibility to support them, to help Sabrina pull together the leadership, authority, and alliances she’d need going forward.

  So I’d sent Zeph to my house to fetch Raphael and tell him to bring Nisroc, then I’d driven to Brent’s place to hold what was fast turning into a press conference.

  It wasn’t just the pack that was affected. A human establishment had been destroyed. Humans had vanished — tourists. Those who lived here were well aware of the supernatural and had been working with the pack and me to take care of the monsters who came through the rifts as well as cordon the areas off to prevent further human disappearances. They all knew but what were they going to tell the cruise ship? One or two tourists running late and missing the boat wasn’t a big problem. It happened a few times per season and we just sent those people via boat or plane up to the next port-of-call to meet the ship. But seven humans? Seven humans who weren’t all on the same sightseeing bus, and were all seen shopping in the demolished store just a few blocks from the port.
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  Word had spread fast, and by the time I’d pulled down Brent’s long driveway to the huge hacienda-style house designated for the pack Alpha, it was lined with cars. Everyone had access to the Alpha’s house. It was more a pack meeting place than a real home, so I wasn’t surprised to see all the lights on and people milling about the porch as well as inside.

  I’d barely put the car in park before the sheriff was knocking on my car window, Sabrina by his side. I rolled it down and he leaned in.

  “The cruise ship officers are being very cooperative. I told them of the explosion, and that we were still sorting out who was hurt and in the hospital, who might be buried in the rubble, and who was unaccounted for. Understandably, they don’t want to alarm families without cause, so they’ve agreed to wait, but they won’t be able to give us more than a day, max. They gave me a list of those who didn’t report back to the ship, and will stall as best as they can, but they need answers and they need them now.”

  Sabrina made a choking noise, her eyes red and puffy. This wouldn’t do. Our next in line for Alpha couldn’t be falling apart like this, not when I was leaving the pack in her hands to go find Brent.

  “They’re dead, aren’t they Ahia?” she asked. “We’ve assumed all the others are dead, either killed on the other side by the monsters or unable to survive in whatever conditions are through those rifts. They’re dead. We should announce it, and start trying to pull ourselves together.”

  An image of the mummified bodies flashed through my mind and I almost started to cry myself. “We don’t’ know that. I’m able to go through the rifts. If I can somehow get this one to open again, I’m going to go through and bring them home.”

  Most likely I’d be bringing their bodies home, but I didn’t want to face that myself let alone smash whatever hopes the others might have.

  “How? How are you going to open the rifts?” Sheriff Marsh seemed to have no more hope than Sabrina.