The Call (The Great North Woods Pack Book 2)

by Shawn Underhill

  “Patience,” her grandfather said at last. “All in good time.”

  ***

  Around midday they took a narrow trail—barely visible unless known of—that merged with the trail to Oak Hill. At times they had to dismount along this trail and lead the horses through rough areas dense with foliage. But the going was good and the slow pace refreshing.

  Once on that narrow trail, as the wind turned, Joseph Snow paused and stood at full attention.

  “What?” Evie said nervously.

  “Relax. I just realized where my brother has gone, that’s all. He’s on Oak Hill. It’s good and quiet there, well out of the way. That’s a good place for him now.”

  “I thought he’d leave.”

  “One never knows what he’ll do. He just might stay a while, until the commotion settles. I think too he’d like to meet you under different circumstances than last night.”

  Evie made no response as they resumed their walk. Although she’d developed an understanding and a level of sympathy for the dark giant, something about him—even the mention of him—left her with an uneasy feeling. Perhaps in time that would change, but right then she still felt too near to the battle on Moon Rock.

  Shortly before 1 P.M. the two Snows emerged from the trail by the apple trees. After caring for the horses they walked to the house, where Evie crashed onto one of the couches for a nap.

  It was strange because she never took naps. Unless she’d been deathly ill, even as a child she’d never been able to sleep during the day. Restless Brat Syndrome her mother had jokingly called it—though Evie knew now that all such jokes must have been at least partial smoke screens serving the secrecy. And Janie’s energetic tolerance and understanding was obviously rooted in the deeper strength and confidence existing below her human-seeming appearance.

  In her mind now, lying still after the long ride, she felt almost guilty for feeling so at ease. Given the horror of the prior night, to relax felt so close to being wrong that for a moment she told herself to get up again and make herself busy with something—anything.

  She was asleep within a minute of hitting the couch.

  ***

  As the two Snows had started off on horseback that morning, many miles to the south, a phone rang in a house on the coast of Massachusetts. Standing on his balcony overlooking the Atlantic, the owner lifted his phone. The screen showed no traceable number:

  * *** *** **** ***

  “Lars,” he answered.

  “Is your team sharp?” asked a distant voice.

  The mercenary laughed. “Always.”

  “We have a local target. No flying. No passports.”

  “From the morning news?”

  “The same. The Feds have passed on it. It’s yours if you want it.”

  “There’s nothing. I’ve been there before.”

  “Yes, sixteen years ago. Others have also been, but—”

  “To the east I believe is valid,” Lars interrupted. “But not Ludlow.”

  “Ludlow has been dormant, but I have before me open files. Traces of evidence have been recorded for many decades.”

  “Traces,” the mercenary said. “Either there’s nothing or they are too good to catch. Whichever is true, it’s not good for me.”

  “I’ll toss you a bone,” the distant voice said. “A three-man team was sent seventeen years ago. Two never returned. Nothing of them was ever recovered. The one that did survive turned up weeks later, seventy miles south, raving like a lunatic.”

  “Was there any truth to his ravings?”

  “Inconclusive. He was too far gone.”

  “I suppose he’s been discarded by now.”

  “A sanitarium last I knew.”

  “As I recall, I was told my objective was to explore the possibility of activity,” Lars said. “How good of you not tell me I was actually searching for bodies.”

  “This isn’t the Boy Scouts, Lars. We’ve let it go for a long time. Small but steady numbers of strange disappearances persist with zero remains found. Now we have a confirmed attack with multiple witnesses. We can’t let it slip. Do you want the job or not?”

  “It’s a fool’s errand,” the mercenary said.

  “The pay is substantial.”

  “Pay will do me little good in the grave.”

  “One million regardless. Spend two weeks. If there truly is nothing, you get paid to camp. If you succeed the pay is four. Six if you keep it perfectly quiet.”

  “We’re a four-man team.”

  “That’s the offer.”

  The mercenary laughed. “Is our nation’s progress no longer worth the price of quality services?”

  “Six million is the ceiling.”

  Silence.

  “Lars.”

  “I’m thinking.”

  “Think fast. We do have secondary contacts. And we are not without rivals. Other sponsors will likely be sending representatives.”

  Not as good as me, Lars thought, and he was absolutely right. He was no amateur, no daisy. Several rocky deployments he’d survived before taking on the higher training and pay of a mercenary headhunter. Men and trophy beasts he’d hunted successfully ever since, when the pay was good and the risk was manageable. But deep down he had a nagging, reverent apprehension for something lurking in the north of Maine.

  In his younger days, between deployments, he’d had an experience there on what was supposed to be a relaxing fishing trip. Three days into the trip, a troubling feeling set in on him. As an expert hunter and killer, he recognized the hair-raising feeling of being hunted himself. He’d taken the hint and cleared out of the area, not understanding and not wishing to clash with whatever intelligence that was stalking him. Now, after decades of experience, there were only a handful of places on the globe he would not consider returning to. Maine was one of those places.

  “You’re not getting old, are you, Lars?”

  The mercenary smiled, and with that confident smile he dispelled the last of his reluctance. Ludlow was different. He did not fully connect it with Maine in his mind. Ludlow was closer to civilization—if those northern towns and small cities could truthfully be labeled as such. Ludlow was on the northern fringes of the tourist towns, perhaps grazed on the eastern edge by whatever oddity remained hidden in Maine. He would not go east again, no. But Ludlow he could master—if indeed there was anything to master—and escape to enjoy the rewards. At the very least it was a cool quarter mil to camp and fish for two weeks.

  “Lars. Your answer?”

  “I’ve aged like a fine wine, my friend,” he said coolly. “So has my team. Make it ten and I’ll start packing the truck.”

  “Did you say ten?”

  “I didn’t stutter.”

  Silence.

  “For that you must be absolutely faultless. If you leave so much as a boot print in—”

  “We are faultless,” Lars said.

  “Good. The directions I’ll—”

  “Don’t bother,” Lars said as he ended the call. “I haven’t forgotten the way.”

  ~10~

  Nearly an hour had passed when Evie opened her eyes from the nap. On the adjacent couch she saw Erica. Her family binder lay open on her lap. She raised her eyes briefly and then lowered them again to the binder’s pages.

  “Finally,” she said under her breath.

  Everything from the night before came rushing back to Evie—the defiance, the eagerness to fight the cats, the fight with her, the slash to her shoulder. The “Narnia feeling” from the long horseback ride was long gone. Now she felt groggy and irritable, like an animal who had been woken by having its fur rubbed the wrong way. “What’s up?” Evie mumbled as she sat up.

  “Just waiting for your lazy A.”

  “What for?”

  “Here,” Erica said, and with a jerky motion she slapped the binder shut and tossed it at Evie. “Grandpa told me to give it to you. I don’t need it anymore.”

  “Don’t hand it to me or anything,” Evie
said as she awkwardly caught the binder. It took all her energy to keep her irritation from her face.

  Erica just smiled. After a short silence she said in a somewhat softer tone, “Sorry about the shoulder.”

  “Sure,” Evie breathed without looking up at her.

  “How long are you gonna stay mad?”

  “Honestly, Air, I just woke up.”

  “I just turned and you don’t see me napping.”

  Evie rose to her feet without making eye contact with her cousin. She faced the kitchen and set her mind to getting a glass of water.

  “I could be mad, too,” Erica said, still seated. “Honestly, you started it.”

  “You’re joking,” Evie said, halting and glaring hard.

  “Biting tails is a slap in the face.”

  “I was trying to help you.”

  Now Erica shot to her feet. “Yeah, well, I didn’t ask for your help.”

  “Seriously, if you don’t back off, I’ll …”

  “What?” Erica smirked, brushing her raven hair from her eye. “Is sweet Red gonna slash me back?”

  “Girls,” Evelyn said from the kitchen.

  Both slowly turned from each other toward their grandmother.

  “You’re ten seconds from a brawl. Stop right now. I’m in no mood.”

  “All I want is a cold drink,” Evie said as she started again for the kitchen.

  “Take it to the couch and get reading,” her grandmother said at her side by the sink. “Your grandfather is in his study, trying to concentrate.”

  “Where’s Mom?” Evie asked.

  “She’s gone into Cold Springs to run some errands with Ruth.” She turned to Erica, who was still standing near the couch. “And you stop spoiling for a fight. Get over here and help me. Yesterday put me behind on all my work.”

  The cousins steered wide of one another in silent passing. Evie sat cross-legged on the couch with the binder. She struggled not to smile when she heard her grandmother ask Erica if she preferred laundry or kitchen duty.

  “Actually,” Evelyn said before Erica could answer. “I’ll choose for you. Laundry. Go.”

  Erica didn’t budge. “You do the same old crap day after day, so now you’re gonna stick it on me?”

  Evie stared straight at the page she’d opened to, not reading, just listening. Oh boy. Here we go.

  “Sure,” Evelyn said. “That’s why I chose laundry detail for you. I prefer the kitchen. You state the obvious.”

  “You know what I mean, Gram,” Erica said.

  “Do I?”

  “There’s important stuff happening. You can’t expect me to be happy about washing robes and bed sheets like you all day.”

  “Girl, you’re about to push my On button,” Evelyn said. All traces of good humor had vanished from her voice. “It is my privilege to enjoy the peace and quiet your grandfather provides for us. I’ll have you know that baking relaxes me. And as far as patrolling the borders and hunting for trouble, it’s not nearly as glamorous as you believe. I trust you got a little taste for that last night. Didn’t you? I know who you were with. So does your grandfather.”

  Erica said nothing, standing still with lowered eyes. She was remembering the awful moment when Abel had ordered her to assist with the dead cat. The thought of it made her nauseous.

  Now Evelyn spoke again. “Do you remember that little pink bike you used to ride right here in my driveway? You’d chase Matthew as if your life depended on it. You just couldn’t stand to let him be ahead of you. Remember?”

  Erica nodded subtly.

  “And remember those training wheels you fought so bitterly against? You couldn’t have been more than four, but you fought and complained until your grandfather relented and removed those wheels. Then tell me what happened next.”

  Erica kept silent. Her hair had fallen over eyes with the tilt of her head. She was focused on nothing tangible.

  “Tell me,” Evelyn said.

  Stop fighting her, Evie thought from the couch. Just go before it gets worse.

  “I fell,” Erica finally whispered to the floor.

  “That’s right,” her grandmother said. “Now think about that girl from last night.”

  “No,” Erica whispered.

  “She was about the sweetest creature any of us have ever met. Not one of us would disagree. Would we?”

  Erica shook her head no.

  “For just one second she stopped thinking and followed her instinct. That’s one decision out of so many millions, one poor choice. Pride, even driven by love of family and home, is very dangerous. In this case it proved deadly.”

  Erica remained frozen in place. She felt her eyes filling up with moisture, but she told her herself she would not cry. She didn’t hope it, she ordered it. She would not give her grandmother, or Evie, the satisfaction—more pride.

  “Girl,” her grandmother continued, her voice showing a softer hint of emotion. “Let me be perfectly clear. I will not have you running wild, neither through these woods or my house. And I will not prepare for your funeral as I am hers. Even if it puts me in an early grave preventing it, I will fight you every step. Understand?”

  For a moment Erica acted as if she was going to speak. Evelyn stood staring her down, ready to counter any semblance of defiance the girl might raise.

  “Now go,” she ordered when she was certain Erica had given up. “We’re done here. You’ll be off from The Kitchen until things settle down in town, so you’ll need something other than antagonizing your cousin to occupy your time. March, young lady.”

  Erica exited the kitchen without uttering a word. Moving quickly down the hall to the waiting pile of laundry, she closed the bathroom door rather hard behind her, just shy of an outright slam. And then standing with her back to the door she felt the tears streaming down her cheeks. Her heart was pounding in her chest.

  “Easy,” she told herself softly. “Don’t lose it. Don’t let her win.”

  ***

  The truth was that Erica didn’t completely understand why she felt the way she did. She didn’t necessarily like it, and didn’t necessarily wish it to continue. It was like hunger or thirst—each time she thought she’d dealt with the problem, the mixed feelings returned again in full force, disrupting her head as a swirling tornado.

  The others would simply call her wild. But there was more to it than could be condensed into a single word.

  Evie had the Snow Gene. To look at her was to know it. The cloth she’d been cut from was that of great leaders—men of intellect and clout who had for centuries been rulers of other beasts and men. Whatever miniscule difference of code written within their respective blood showed worlds of difference in the being whose veins that blood coursed. So close, so much alike—yet so far from the same.

  Below conscience and language, with every throb of her heart Erica harkened back through the ages to an older message, an older rhythm of life. The forebearers calling forth from that younger world adhered not to standards of civilized men but of wild beasts—brutes and savages all of them. In every pack and every tribe of the world there were variances of members. Some nurtured and looked after, others hunted and made war to make surety and nurture possible; and of that latter type the rules of conduct were unspoken but undeniable—run swift or fall behind, master or be mastered, kill or be killed, dominate, subdue without compromise, prevail or die trying.

  Now those old instructors were dead and gone, dust and bone. The smaller wild cousins were banished to the farthest reaches of the wilderness—shot from distances of cowardice, poisoned, trapped, their young clubbed to death. And any similar traces of warring instincts lingering on in the tissues of humans were only granted outlet on fields of athletics—and even then there were strict rules of competition.

  But for Erica those ancient memories living on in her blood demanded to be heard. The wolf was no longer hidden deep inside her, it had broken free; she had lived within it and directed its strength. With that new strength so fres
h in mind and close at hand—just a thought away from becoming a snarling reality—the old memories were no subtle suggestions or passive impulses, they were orders to a necessary duty. Their warning was clear: to ignore was to become passive, and the passive become weak, the weak enter swiftly into extinction.

  Standing against the bathroom door in the 21st century, Erica wiped away her tears as she struggled against conflicting realities. Every fiber of her being understood that trouble was near and tensed under the warning. To beat down such reactionary instincts using the weaker side of her personality—her human conscience blunted by a lifetime of soft living—felt more than impossible: it was unjust; an eagle denied use of its wings; a bull in his prime corralled and shorn; an apex predator raised in a cage, fed scraps while on display for paying spectators who laughed from the safe side of iron barriers.

  And for aid of distraction from all that was warring inside of her, the family suggested reading and doing laundry …

  ***

  In the great room sitting silent as stone, Evie felt her grandmother’s gaze briefly resting on her after the confrontation. She kept her own eyes glued to the page before her. She barely breathed. She’d heard from friends, and possibly just from stereotypes, that grandmothers were always the easy ones, the pushovers. Not in this house.

  The early portions of the binder’s contents were now familiar to her. She skimmed over these, pausing over a section that mentioned Great Grandfather Snow and his decision to leave Europe for the New World. Other families had joined in on the promising excursion, and the North American adventure had begun.

  Impatiently she flipped forward in the binder. She stopped when she reached a section of photographs. They were grainy, black and white photos of what the town of Ludlow had looked like near the turn of the last century. The house in which she sat looked strange in black and white. The center of town itself consisted of a gravel road with a handful of houses lining it. Not that it was anything big now, but it was certainly improved.

  She flipped forward again and stopped on a page regarding Ruach, the Spirit. Long before the Snowe’s, before common men wrote, the tale had been repeated as folklore over fires, always with utmost seriousness. No one knew if the great wolf had ever taken physical form. They only knew that as far back as their particular community could recall he had been the giver of the wolf. All recounted similar experiences until it became a solid fact of life for these select few. Sadly, many could not endure his onslaught, some dying as young as twelve years old.