Jed hesitated, considering that, and was just opening his mouth when he looked around. I heard it also.
Zar appeared from the rocks, trotting toward us. He had on a Malamute sack and looked long-suffering as he came up to me, panting. Andrew, unencumbered, bounded out of the rocks from the same direction, distracted by pursuit of something on the ground. Either a rodent or lizard darted in among the rocks and Andrew pounced too late, digging and snuffling into the gap in the stones.
Zar pressed his shoulder against me and I removed his Malamute sack.
“Time for a trade? I’ll give it to our boney friend. He hasn’t had a turn.”
Zar, a classic mottled wolf like Kage, though more tawny, less of the black highlights, and smaller, wagged his tail. He did not, however, move away. He only shook himself to be rid of the thing, then grabbed it in his teeth, tugging it from me.
“You want to change again? Are you sure? I don’t think Jed minds doing a longer shift.” No, Zar, don’t change. Leave your brother alone. We’re having a moment.
Zar hauled the sack away in his teeth to change in the stunted spruce trees. I sighed. Jed glared after him.
He stood up, shoving the human backpack at me.
“That’s fine,” I started. “You can stay in skin also and—”
“Might as well change.” He stalked away.
I blew out my cheeks. So much for our moment.
Andrew pounced, scrabbled at something, snapped, then cocked his head, listening. It must have been bad news because he turned away to bounce over to me.
“You seem well-rested,” I told him.
Andrew spun his tail like a helicopter as he dropped into a play bow before me.
“How do you do that?”
His ears pricked and he sniffed his way to me until he could lick peanut butter and honey off my hands. He wagged over his work, then climbed his forepaws onto the rock I sat on to lick my mouth as well.
I shoved him away. “There’s no peanut butter on my face.”
He tried instead to rummage snacks from my bag. I wasn’t fooled. Not with the obviously bulging stomach in the wiry frame.
“Quit it. You look like you’re pregnant. You must have eaten enough for three days.”
I was still struggling with Andrew and my backpack when Zar returned, on two feet, with the Malamute sack.
“We missed you last night, Cass. I wish you could come out with us.” He dropped the sack by me and pulled on his shirt.
“I wish I could too. Sounds like you covered a lot of ground, though. That’s what matters.”
“It’s brilliant out here. I’ll tell you about it.”
“I’d like that.” I hefted the sack. “Could you get Jed’s clothes and roll them up? And you, mister, can have a turn—”
The moment I moved the sack to lift over his shoulders, Andrew fell on his side. He rolled to his back, smiling up at me with his mouth open.
“Get up. That’s not fair. Everyone takes a turn.”
He stood and shook himself. I rested the sack on his back. He fell over.
“Andrew.”
He got up, draping his head in my lap, and rolled his eyes up, swishing his tail.
“Thank you.” I placed the sack and pulled the chest strap around.
Before I could buckle it, Andrew toppled to his back.
“Andrew!” I jumped to my feet.
Andrew scrambled up and bolted away, bounding over the rocks, into the spruce trees, then out of sight, swishing his tail as he went.
I turned to Zar coming back to me with Jed’s things and Jed standing in his fur, glaring after Andrew.
We repacked the sack and I took it over to Jed.
He stood like marble, staring straight ahead, as I buckled it around him, letting out the straps and checking the fit.
“Sorry. I’ll make sure he and Jason take their turns also.”
Jed did not respond. Even once Zar and I moved off, he remained stiffly in place. I looked around to check on him and he finally took a few robotic steps as if the Malamute sack crushed him.
He found his stride after a minute, trying to follow me on the trail. We had not seen another human being out here all morning so far, but we’d been up at an obscene hour and we must assume there would be more people today as long as we stayed on a real hiking trail.
“Sorry, Jed, but you can’t stay with us like that. Go on and roam and we’ll see you later.”
Even then, he was slow to leave.
We didn’t see Andrew again all through the middle part of the day.
Maybe Jason’s prong collar and leash could hold him still for a share of the heavy lifting? Maybe a bit of magic force? Or a bribe? A spoon of peanut butter?
Zar told me about their night in far more lively detail than Jed had conveyed, going over the maybe/maybe not shifter trace, the bears, the whole elk herd they’d chased, the way picking up new smells here was like seeing new colors he hadn’t known existed. I enjoyed listening to him, especially getting his thoughts about the possible shifter. Zar, at least, seemed sure we were going about things the right way.
All the same, I had trouble keeping my focus, thinking of predators and Jed and my own pain.
By the time we stopped for an afternoon lunch for me and break for us both, my shoulders were burning, my feet crying out, and I was disconcerted to think this was only my second trail day. I took two ibuprofen with my jerky, protean bar, apple, and more peanut butter.
I restocked water from a stream with my bottles and the water tablets, then we continued our descent now west, heading into a dry valley that was still high in the mountains—only a groove on the map.
I was already the weak link out here but, when we came to a splendid golden meadow a couple hours later I had to stop again. The ground was rolling and the visibility clear in all directions into the mountains and forests around, while here was a sunbathed oasis, far from any human trail, a glorious little refuge as if from a movie set.
No water here, and I needed to soak my feet, but I stopped anyway, too tired to worry about spiders as I sank down in the dry grasses with my sunhat over my face, head on my backpack.
“Wake me in ten minutes,” I mumbled to Zar, so relieved to have that pack off the dry earth might as well have been a feather bed.
“How about camp here?” Zar suggested, sitting beside me.
“Too early. We have three or four hours of daylight left.”
“Barely. It’s far enough. Want to come out with us tonight a little bit? See what it’s like? It’s beautiful, Cass.”
“I’d only be in the way.”
Something hot and wet touched my hand and I jumped sideways into Zar, the sunhat falling away.
Jed was standing over me. He cocked his head at my reaction.
“I didn’t hear you. Here—” I sat up to unbuckle the Malamute sack.
I thought Jed would take off. Again, though, he remained. He shook himself, rolled on the ground where the sack had mashed his fur, then pawed at it.
I opened the zippers, but couldn’t find the wool ball.
“Oh… I suppose Isaac has it. Stuff’s been getting mixed up. We should have bought two different colors to tell them apart.”
Jed stared at the sack, eyes wide. He plunged his face in, snatching things out, removing his own and Isaac’s shoes and clothes, growing more and more agitated. I stopped him, snatching the coat as he tugged that free.
“I’m telling you, I looked. But it’s fine. It’s in the other sack. I made sure everything was packed up before we started this morning. Isaac will be around soon and we’ll get it from him. In fact, we can wait here until he shows up.”
Jed pawed the bag, looked around, pawed again, sniffed every inch of it, then my backpack, then Zar’s.
He whined, turning a circle, frustrated, teeth clicking together.
“Shhh. It’s okay. I know that ball is fine. Come here.” I extracted the wire brush from my bag and sat up on my hip, dazed wit
h my own fatigue. “Why don’t you sit with me and we’ll wait for Isaac?”
Jed seemed undecided about this, starting away, then returning, his jaws still quivering, cheeks puffing out with his own anxiety.
“Shhh…” I ran the brush down his neck and chest, several slow, long strokes, and Jed sat. “It’s okay. It’s scary when we can’t find something we care about. I totally flipped out on Andrew last time he stole my phone and I didn’t know and couldn’t find it. But I do know where your ball is. All we need to do is wait and it will be here. Okay?”
He placed a paw on my knee, subsiding a bit as I brushed him.
Zar stared at us and, for some reason, I felt embarrassed, my face heating while I went on talking to Jed and brushing him—like this was totally normal.
I brushed until Jed finally lay down, head still up and ears pricked waiting for Isaac. He did relax, though, while I brushed all along his back where the bag had been.
He sat up.
It was half a minute before I saw Kage and Jason emerge from the same false trail we’d followed here.
Jed sagged back against me, glaring.
“It’s all right,” I said again. “He’ll be here soon.”
Kage and Jason trotted side by side, having a chat about something by the way they mouthed each other’s faces and kept their bodies together with hip and shoulder bumps. Like a couple of guys slapping each other on the back and yucking up a great joke as they ambled down the sidewalk.
They trotted to us when Kage spotted our resting place. Jed stiffened against me.
Kage stopped ten feet away, staring in disbelief at the brush. Jason was distracted from nibbling his jaw to stare at us as well. He cocked his head. Wait, what?
While Kage’s expression was more, You’re shitting me.
“We’re only stopping for a break and waiting for Isaac to arrive with the other Malamute sack,” I told them.
Kage also cocked his head. That’s what you’re doing, is it?
Why did they all make me feel so weird about a brush? I would brush any of them. This wasn’t some personal thing about Jed. In fact, I’d been thinking of Kage when I’d bought the thing.
Jed did not help. He took the opportunity to shift himself closer up against me, his shoulder on my hip, one forearm across my legs, giving Kage a hard stare in return. The gesture was more than possessive. There was a Make my day challenge quality about him that made me even more uncomfortable. I could see this escalating into something very ugly very fast.
A moment of dead silence and intense, golden-eyed stares.
“Kage?” I said brightly. “You know what I was just thinking about this spot?”
As all eyes besides Jed’s shifted to me, I reached for my bag again, leaving the brush on the ground. It took only a second to remove the flying disk from the front of my pack.
“I can’t throw well sitting down, but you start us off and I’ll get up.” I drew back as well as I could while Kage’s eyes lit up, then hurled the disk toward the center of the meadow.
Kage, almost involuntarily, it seemed, went tearing after it, Jason beside him.
Jed also started, nearly breaking his guard for the pursuit as well. He caught himself and leaned back into me instead.
I sighed. “This is going to cause trouble.” I waved the brush in his face.
Jed nosed my hand for more.
“Maybe later. This is for everyone—not yours personally.” This last was for Zar’s benefit as much as Jed’s. I avoided looking at the former as I extracted myself from Jed and got painfully to my feet.
Might as well get back on the trail. Only wait for Isaac first.
Kage did not bring the disk back. He gambled about the field until Jason plowed into him and grabbed it. Then Jason returned it to me, proudly swinging his tail.
Jed snarled at his approach, getting to his feet, and I walked several feet away to meet Jason so we didn’t crowd Jed.
On the second throw, a really good one this time, winging across the meadow, the red wolf burst out of the forest to join the chase, he reached it thirty feet ahead of Jason and Kage, then took off in a wild sprint of the field.
Jed scratched my shoe and I looked down to discover he’d brought the brush over, holding the rubber handle in his teeth.
I sighed, but was spared the awkward situation of either refusing or accepting the request by spotting a white figure coming from the trail where Kage and Jason had emerged.
“There you go.” I pointed.
Jed dropped the brush as he bounded toward Isaac.
Reaching the meadow and seeing Jed bearing down on him like a rhino, Isaac froze.
“He wants something in your bag,” I shouted, since it probably looked to Isaac like Jed was coming for him about an unknown grudge.
I was spared running to him on my blisters since Zar took the initiative to go after his brother.
Isaac braced himself, bristling, while Jed bounded up to him and snapped at the Malamute sack, trying to find the zipper with his teeth. Instead of any zipper, he was close to tearing the whole thing apart.
Zar swore as he ran up. I shouted at him to stop. Jed paced around Isaac as Zar got there and unclipped the plastic buckles so Isaac could get away from the bag.
While Jed sniffed the sack, Zar opened first one side, then the other, and at last extracted the compressed wool ball the size of a grapefruit. Jed snatched it from his hand, apparently hitting flesh because Zar yelled. Jed was already bounding away.
I stopped in the field to greet Isaac. “Sorry about that. We’re just taking a break.” I stroked his head and frowned at the mud on his paws. No one else had been wet when they’d reached us. “Find anything?”
Isaac looked over his shoulder, then back.
Jed came tearing over to shake the ball at me, wagging his tail.
“What’d I tell you? It’s fine.”
I went to lie down again, first throwing the disk when Andrew brought it to me. Isaac tried to stay close but Jed was already at my bag, flopping down to chew the ball—which he would do only gently, without severing the fibers.
“Want to change and tell us if you have anything?” I asked Isaac instead, distracted by Andrew returning the disk to me. “Let someone else get it sometime or they won’t want to play with you.”
Zar and Isaac watched the disk sail away, Isaac taking a few steps and halting.
“Why don’t you change and join in?” I asked Zar, sitting back with my bag. “Give me fifteen minutes with my shoes off and we’ll go on for a final stretch.”
Zar did change after all, and I did my best to throw the disk in a sitting position—much easier than throwing a ball.
Jed left the ball in my lap for safekeeping and went to retrieve the brush he’d dropped as well.
Shoes off, but afraid to remove my socks, I leaned back on both backpacks. Lying there and brushing someone was troublesome enough, but sitting up every minute for another throw was far less conducive to a meditative state.
Lumpiness in my pack reminded me of something else. I removed the brightly colored, knotted rope, thick as my wrist, to offer Isaac.
It worked. As soon as the three chasing Jason with the disk caught sight of the sparkly new rope that Isaac was chewing, they ran for him. Jason followed, disk still in his mouth. No more throwing arm required.
I shielded my face with the sunhat again, absently keeping up a slow brushing of Jed’s shoulder while he leaned into me and mouthed the wool ball. The rest tumbled about the field, fighting over the rope, getting into three-way tugging matches, and playing keep-away.
How did they have the energy? They’d traveled how far in two days and a night?
Yet they bounded like pups with a new toy. It made me smile. I loved how strong they were. I loved that they could get along—at least now and then. And I loved that they were here with me, my pack, playing a game like the family we somehow were.
Then I saw the bear.
Chapter 13
Jed sat up. I knew something was wrong because of sudden tension in his muscles as he remained against me.
The others tumbled across the field, scuffling over the rope.
I pushed back my hat, sitting up when I couldn’t see anything aside from Jed’s stiff form looming above me. He gazed to the pine forest lit in the sinking sun.
The bear stood there, watching us.
Two things instantly struck me about him: first, the size, an SUV of an animal, golden and burnt umber in the rich light; second, there were no grizzly bears in Colorado. At least, not that had been recorded or mapped lately.
I’d been scared at first as I’d grown used to seeing the wolves in fur, being around them, close enough to touch them. When I saw that bear—whose head probably weighed as much as my body—I was terrified. And how had he arrived at the edge of the forest just like that without being heard or smelled?
Oh, yes: he was a predator. He’d come at us upwind, listening and observing as he stalked in, now in sight when the pack was making enough noise to mask him.
Jed stood, very slowly, along with the fur down his spine. I wrapped my arm around his back—my shoulder not even coming up to his withers.
“Don’t do anything,” I whispered. “A bear has no reason to tangle with a whole wolf pack. He’s just looking. He’ll move on.”
Jed took two steps over me so he was covering me, forepaws to one side of my legs and hind on the other.
I held on with both arms.
“Just wait. It’s okay. He’ll move on.” While my heart hammered.
Jed stood silent, motionless, only staring at the grizzly with his head low and his hackles raised.
The bear stared back, from the tumbling five to Jed and myself with its beady black eyes, lifting its great nose to sniff, lips working and jaws opening slightly as if to taste us.
Someone yelped.
The bear looked again to the pack.
Tussling stopped. Silence other than the faintest background of forest life in the birds and buzzing insects. Then rustle of padding feet over dry ground and grass.
In a second, five wolves were in front of us, between the grizzly and myself with Jed still standing over me.
Moonlight Journey: A Reverse Harem Shifter Romance (The Witch and the Wolf Pack Book 6) Page 9