Red

by Kait Nolan

  When I slipped my pack back on, I glanced up at the shaft leading to the surface. I wouldn’t be able to climb that with paws. If I stayed down here and didn’t manage to master the shift between forms, I’d be trapped. But the alternative was to stay exposed, a veritable sitting duck for Patrick and his gun. Leading with the flashlight, I made my way into the cave.

  About a dozen feet in, I found the pony tail holder, pink with a little sparkly butterfly. Molly’s. Had to be. So close to the entrance. But she was just a little kid. Terrified of the dark. And her brother had put her down here to hide her from the monster. How long had she stayed before she’d ventured out and been found by search teams? I inhaled. Beneath the odor of rock and damp and something I really didn’t want to think about being bat droppings, I fancied I smelled her fear. But it was probably just my imagination. I knelt and picked the hair elastic up and slipped it in my pocket, a reminder that she had survived her nightmare.

  The cave extended further back than I expected, winding and twisting away into more tunnels. A spelunker I was not. I went in only so far as it took to find a semi-flat space with room for the sleeping bag. The pack fell from my shoulders with a crash that reverberated down the cave. I cringed, waiting for a flurry of startled bats. Small blessings, there were none.

  I dug out the small, battery powered lantern and set up my makeshift camp in its pitiful fluorescent glow. Mindful of Sawyer’s constant badgering to make me eat, I pulled out some jerky and protein bars, even though I had no appetite. I ate the first bar standing up, more in defiance of my fever weakened state than anything else. Restless, I moved just outside the edge of light from the entrance to the cave and listened hard while I ate my jerky and sipped a bottle of water. No signs of pursuit, just the sounds of the mountain around me.

  The part of me that had been running on high alert since last night uncoiled a little, forcing me to admit I was utterly exhausted. I went back to my little camp, tossing the other energy bar back into my bag, and collapsed onto the sleeping bag. Sawyer’s scent puffed up around me, at once comforting and nauseating. My throat closed up on a knot of tears. The dull ache of loss flared to life, a vicious, rabid thing. I fought it because I needed to fight something or go mad. But fever and exhaustion took me, and I slid into an uneasy sleep.

  Elodie, wake up.

  I shivered at the sound of my father’s voice. He sounded angry. He never used to get angry before the letter.

  Ellie, please wake up.

  Nope, I wasn’t going to be lulled by the please or the pleading tone. I hunkered down, curling tighter into the sleeping bag, face pressed to the cotton, breathing in a scent that made me sad.

  C’mon baby, you have to wake up. We have to go.

  Why did he sound so panicked? It was just a letter. Just a sign that Mom was crazy. Why should I have to change my whole life because she was crazy?

  “Elodie!” This time he shook me.

  The motion made my brain bounce around inside my skull, leaving me dizzy. Could you be dizzy in sleep? I growled in reply.

  The hand on my shoulder didn’t loosen.

  “C’mon, we’re going.”

  My world jerked and shifted, and the pain in my head threatened to drive me back under. But that was bad. There was some reason I shouldn’t give in. So instead I fought to peel my eyes open.

  I was met with a wall of gray with splotches of black. The splotches resolved themselves into a sort of shield that read Fire Rescue. I blinked and let my head fall back. An arm stopped it from falling right off my shoulders, for which I was grateful. Peering up at the blur on top of the t-shirt, my eyes turned it into a face, dimly lit in the darkness of my surroundings.

  “Dad?” Was that raw croak my voice?

  “I’m here, baby. We’re gonna get you home.”

  There was a part of me that wanted to be angry he’d come after me. But I was so glad to see a familiar face, and I felt so damn awful.

  “I don’t feel good, Dad.”

  “I’m gonna take care of you,” he said.

  Then he brought me into the light and I was blinded. I curled into him, squeezing my eyes shut against the glare.

  “Send down the rope. She’s too weak to climb.”

  Something thumped down beside us. Dad shifted me in his arms and I felt a makeshift harness being wrapped around my chest.

  “There’s something . . . ” God I was tired. And so, so cold. “Something I need to tell you.”

  “It can wait, honey. It’s all gonna be okay.”

  The absolute wrongness of that statement resonated through me with enough conviction that I tried opening my eyes again. I was at the base of the fissure, with a rope wrapped underneath my arms. Which made me realize we weren’t alone. He’d probably called out Search and Rescue. Why did that idea terrify me?

  “She’s secure. Pull on up. Easy does it,” Dad called.

  The rope went taut, digging underneath my arms.

  “Wait, Dad, you need to know—”

  “Later, Ellie.”

  I had to force my legs to engage or be scraped against the side of the fissure as whoever was up top hauled upward. My muscles were shaking with fatigue before I was even halfway up. The pain of the rope digging in under my arms and across my chest was the only thing keeping me fully conscious. When I reached the top, arms slipped beneath mine, hauling me to solid ground. Something pressed to my neck as he laid me down.

  I turned my head just in time to see Patrick pull the trigger. I felt a sharp sting against my throat.

  “Night, night, Elodie.”

  The scream died in my throat as everything faded to black.

  Chapter 14

  Elodie

  When I was ten, Dad took me on vacation to the beach. It was a rare thing, getting to play in the ocean, and I strayed out too far and got caught in a riptide. I still remembered being tossed like a ragdoll, powerless against the surging current that dragged me, while my hands scrabbled for purchase against the sandy bottom. By the time I fought my way free, I was half a mile down the beach.

  Fighting my way back to consciousness was worse than that. Every virtual inch was a struggle, and each time I came anywhere near the surface, the tranquilizers dragged me back under. It would have been an easy thing to let go and just sink into oblivion. But my father didn’t know that Patrick was a killer. Who knew what the son of a bitch was doing to Dad while I was off in a drug induced stupor.

  That thought made me stop struggling for a bit. What was I going to wake up to? More blood? More death? The body of the only other person in the world who’d ever cared about me?

  No!

  Panic was enough to boost me the rest of the way. I broke through to consciousness in silence, as though I was breaking through water and had to hold in the gasp that wanted to erupt. No need to alert Patrick I was awake yet. I listened for a while. To my left was a crackling fire. Someone poked at it. I could hear the rush of cinders as some of the logs collapsed. I couldn’t hear anybody else.

  Where was Dad?

  “Oh good, you’re awake.” Patrick sounded conversational.

  I froze, though I wasn’t aware that I had moved. What had given me away?

  “What the hell did you do?” Dad’s voice. Groggy. Patrick must have tranqed him too.

  “Sorry about that, Nate. But I couldn’t have you getting in the way, you see.”

  “In the way of what?”

  I could hear him shift somehow and tried to open my eyes, but they refused to cooperate.

  “What the hell have you done to my daughter?” Fury sharpened his voice.

  Dad was struggling against something. Ropes, I guessed. My own hands were bound behind my back, my arms numb from the weight of my body.

  “She’ll come to eventually. I may have overdosed her a bit for her size, but I couldn’t have a werewolf shifting before I could restrain her.”

  My dad went very still. “You’re the hunter.”

  Patrick said nothing, an
d I had a ridiculous notion that he’d just bowed, like an actor claiming kudos for an especially notable performance.

  “Why? What did we ever do to you?”

  “You to me? Nothing. It’s an ancient feud, really. Puts the Hatfield and McCoys to shame. It all goes back to the first she-wolf of your line. Or her line, really.” Patrick’s voice took on a lecturing tone. “Our very colorful family history has her as being the spawn of Satan, which I’ve always thought was a bit far-fetched. Something about some ancestor of mine who was a widower marrying some ancestor of hers who was pregnant by another man. My ancestor raised the girl as his own. And what thanks did he get? She grew up, turned into a wolf, and slaughtered him. His son by his first wife vowed revenge, to wipe out her and her progeny.”

  Brynne’s step-brother was the first hunter, I realized. That explained why the hunters had always been after my family and not werewolves in general.

  “And so it has gone through the centuries. My family were hunters. Her family were beasts. And nobody ever seemed to actually manage to carry out the fundamental mission: to destroy the wolf line. Until me. I was the first one who was smart about it.

  “See, I didn’t want to devote my life to this like my father and his father and his father. But, oh, it was supposed to be some sacred duty. I can’t even remember all the lies I told my wife while I was tracking down Rosalind. But I figured it out. I tracked her down. And she was already pregnant with your bastard. The next generation already started.”

  Dad loosed a growl at that.

  Patrick paid him no attention, too intent on telling his story. “But Rosalind’s father, stupid, stupid man that he was, talked her into giving up the baby. And with that I devised the perfect plan. Get everything over in one, fell swoop. My wife and I would adopt the child—”

  “You? You were the one who was supposed to take her?” asked my dad in horror.

  “Well yes. It was all very straight forward. I’d take care of Rosalind, and afterward, it would have been so easy to make Elodie’s death look like a case of SIDS. No blood, no mess. An end to all future generations. Simple. Elegant. And this ridiculous war would be over and I could get on with my life like a normal person.”

  I couldn’t repress a shudder at the casual way he talked about murdering a baby. Murdering me. Who was the real monster here?

  Patrick shifted his attention back to me. I didn’t see it, since my eyes were still refusing to open, but I could feel his gaze upon me. “But it didn’t work. Your mother—yes Elodie, I know you’re awake; your breathing changed a few minutes ago—Your mother had you secreted away and then she ran. Oh she was easy enough to track. She didn’t have your training, and she was so weak from giving birth. I tranqed her, slit her wrists. I knew your grandfather wouldn’t allow an autopsy or a tox screen. He didn’t know what they might find, and it would bring up too many questions. So her suicide was really easy to fake.”

  Dad made a sort of whooshing noise, as if he’d been punched in the stomach.

  My brain went into overdrive. My mother didn’t kill herself. She didn’t abandon me. Abandon us. This psycho, sanctimonious, son of a bitch killed her.

  “You murdered my mother.” My voice sounded faint and very distant to my ears. I still couldn’t get my eyes to open.

  “Murder implies she was human rather than beast. I put down a threat. It was a public service, really.”

  “And what about Sawyer? What do you call shooting him?” I demanded.

  “An unfortunate accident. It was his mistake choosing to be your champion, something I’m sure he’d never have done if he had known what you really were.”

  So he still didn’t know that Sawyer and his father were like me.

  “You really have been so much trouble. You’ve been the thorn in my side. The one that got away. I lost my wife. I lost most of my career. But I couldn’t fail at this like I’d failed at everything else. It took me years to find you. Who knew that when I finally did it would be because of some petty, schoolgirl vendetta on Facebook? Thank God for modern technology and social media. I might never have found you otherwise.”

  Facebook? Amber’s petty, ridiculous smear campaign is what lured this monster to my door? My brain reeled at the ludicrousness of that. But Patrick continued on, since apparently he’d been waiting for quite some time for an audience who could appreciate his villainous monologue.

  “Maybe you’re wondering why I didn’t kill you outright. Well, the thing about it is that I had to be sure. You weren’t like your mother. You weren’t like the others that were described in my records. You should’ve lost it when you found that boy amid all that blood and gore. But you didn’t. So I had to find something else, something to test you, to prove for absolute certain that you were your mother’s daughter. I’m not a murderer, you see. I couldn’t go off killing girls, half cocked on just a hunch. So then I sabotaged your car. It was a risky move. No telling when that old clunker would finally kick it. But that worked out perfectly. And you outran my truck. But just barely. I still wasn’t sure. And then I realized. You’re a late bloomer. You haven’t actually shifted yet. But judging by that display earlier, you’re not far from it. So we’re just going to sit here, if you don’t mind, until you shift. Then we’ll get this unpleasantness over with.”

  He’d killed my mother in human form. Why should he have a problem with that? Then it occurred to me. “You’ve never seen it, have you?

  “Seen what?”

  “Transition.” I managed to crack my eyes open to slits, even though my eyelids weighed a metric ton. It was just enough that I could see Patrick watching me from the other side of the fire, a gun held loosely against his thigh. “This isn’t about being sure. It’s about the science. You want to study it. To know how it works.”

  He inclined his head, his expression a mixture of approval and disappointment. “It really is a pity. You truly are a brilliant student. Yes, I’d very much like to see the whole process. It’s a pity I can’t put you in a lab. Imagine the genetic breakthroughs your DNA might hold.”

  I was way more interested in imagining my teeth in his throat, but for now it seemed wise to keep him talking while my body continued to throw off the effects of the tranquilizers. Chances were, even fully shifted, I’d never get free of the ropes in time to attack him before he could put a bullet in my brain. But if he was insisting on seeing the transition through, he might be waiting a while. I was close, but this cycle of fevers and body cramps could go on for days more before it finally happened. Maybe someone would find us by then. Search and Rescue was out there. When Dad didn’t check in, they’d know something was wrong. Someone could find us.

  I just hoped it wouldn’t be too late when they did.

  ~*~

  Sawyer

  The radio in my pocket crackled to life. I jolted and my hands fumbled to adjust the volume as Eileen’s voice seemed to boom out. “Janet and Ken have been found. They are fine. Repeat, they are a-okay.”

  Well it was nice to know that my stranding them without a map or compass hadn’t done them any lasting damage. The tools certainly hadn’t helped me any. As it happens, I’m not nearly as good at reading topographical maps as Elodie. My actual starting point and where I thought I was starting on the map were definitely not the same thing, so despite having the proper navigational tools, it took me hours to stumble across Patrick and Nate’s trail, evading two other search teams in the process.

  According to radio chatter, no one had heard from Nate or Patrick for three hours. This trail was several hours older than that. If Patrick had a vehicle stashed, they could be miles away by now. If he’d found Elodie—

  I cut the thought off. There was no reason to suppose he had found Elodie, even with Nate’s help. She was smart and resourceful. I had to believe she’d holed up somewhere to ride out transition. The best thing I could do right now was follow the trail and rescue her father. Elodie would never forgive herself if anything happened to him.

  Di
aling the volume back even more, I shoved the radio back in my pocket. No need to draw attention to myself. The sun was starting to set, shadows growing longer. I could hear Eileen giving orders for the night. They weren’t stopping like last night. Not with two of their searchers being added to the list of the missing. I knew the searchers had changed their pattern, first to try and find Janet and Ken, then to try and locate Nate and Patrick. Since I wasn’t a hundred percent sure where I was, I didn’t know if any of them was on an intersection course with me. I’d just have to keep quiet, be careful, and hope I didn’t cross any of them. The last thing we needed was more casualties in this private war.

  The wheeze disappeared by the time I reached the creek. My first attempt at a full breath sent me into a coughing fit that doubled me over until I’d hacked up the last of the blood. It left a sour, copper coating in my mouth. I spat and panted, catching my breath. And smelled smoke.

  I didn’t think the other searchers would be stopping to make campfires. But would Patrick? Wouldn’t he be monitoring the radio as I was? Surely he wouldn’t actually stop and make camp with the threat of being found. It was a stupid mistake and Patrick was not a stupid man.

  Still, I couldn’t risk not checking it out.

  It’d be faster to go as a wolf. But was it safe to try and shift? My lung had reinflated, the wound closed. I rubbed the heel of my hand over it. My chest still ached. There could still be deep tissue damage. I sighed. Two feet it was.

  The trail stayed mostly to the creek. I stuck to the high ground, following the ridge above. I couldn’t be sure, but I thought I was north of the cabin somewhere, upstream from where I’d been shot, from where I last saw Elodie. I hoped she was far away from here. Safe. But I knew better. The lingering sense of dread in my gut confirmed it. Elodie would be out for revenge. Unless she was fully incapacitated by transition, she would try to track him. I just hoped I could get there first.