Erin glanced behind her, listening for pursuit. She’d certainly heard it a few minutes ago: the rattle of rocks, the occasional sound of a feminine voice cursing softly, the slight scent of perfume on the air. She had run as fast as she could up the nearest hill and was heading down the other side when those sounds were replaced by the noises of the forest, cars on the distant highway, a small plane far overhead.
Where the hell had they gone? She’d been leading them away from the cave, just like she had planned. The Pack had to be back there somewhere, chasing after them, right? Where was everyone? She was counting on some reinforcements, or at least hoping for them. Of course, she thought as she slipped behind an outcrop, it might have helped if she had actually told someone that.
She listened very carefully for something above and beyond the wind and the birds and small animals in the woods in the valley below her. Then she thumped her head gently backward against the rock behind her. They were supposed to be following her, dammit. So where were they? She wondered if it would be worthwhile to backtrack, to stand around on a high ledge waving her arms around and screaming, “Here I am! Come get me!” and see what happened.
Some pebbles rolled down the hill, a long way below the ledge she was crouching on, and she was immediately alert. Something was attempting to move stealthily upward, and Erin grinned at the rock face in front of her. Now that was more like it. She erupted from her crouch in a tangle of limbs and scrambled upwards, moving as fast as she dared in the pale moonlight.
The moon wound its tendrils through her brain, making her feel both more wolfy and more tired. If this went on for much longer, she was either going to go hunt rabbits or go to sleep somewhere, so if they were going to follow her, they’d better get on it. The rock she was grabbing at broke off in her hand just then. Shit.
There was a strange hiss of air from behind her as she fell, then a guttural shout that sounded choked off followed by a sharp pain, almost as if…something had hit her hard from behind and they had fallen back down to the ledge where she’d been hiding seconds before. She sprawled down on the rocks face first, cursing and scrambling to get back on her feet. Something solid squirmed out from under her and knocked her back down again, this time sending the air shooting out of her lungs and leaving her limp and gasping.
“Quietttt.” Hot breath hissed against her ear and she tried not to flinch as a fang grazed her skin.
Erin took a cautious sniff. Why was Annie sitting on her back, about to drool in her ear? Let alone grabbing her for an exciting fast trip downward? She dug her fingers into the grit beneath her and heaved upward, banging her head backward into the space where she thought Annie’s snout would be.
The other woman yelped, then snarled, but pulled back enough for Erin to twist around and yank all but one leg out from under her. They stared at each other from inches away, silver eyes burning into gold ones, until finally, Erin broke the standoff with a hiss of her own. “Get off my damn leg.” She pulled hard and Annie leapt sideways on all fours.
“Now what do you want? And what’s the big idea of hitting me and making me fall down a rock face?” Erin rubbed a sore spot on her back and spat some grit out, but didn’t stop watching her assailant. She was getting more unpredictable, as far as Erin could tell.
Annie moved her snout, struggling either to form words or change back or something, Erin suspected. After a few minutes, she shook her head and brushed a circle of dirt clean of rocks and debris between them, then flattened it with a few swipes of her claws. She started to write something slowly in the dirt, but Erin resisted tilting her head or moving closer. No telling how that would go over.
After a few minutes, Annie stopped writing in the dirt and sat back, gesturing at Erin to take a look. Erin eyed her for a moment, then stood up to look cautiously over at the scrawled letters. She cursed softly as they gradually became readable. “Dammit, Annie, they have Becca? If you know where they’re hiding, take me there! Let’s go!” Timmy’s fallen down a well, you say, Lassie? popped into her head and she bit back a hysterical giggle.
Annie held up a paw and crouched, looking at Erin expectantly. Since she wasn’t moving, Erin realized that there was more that she intended to say and tried to swallow the giant lump of frustration, fear and urgency in her throat with a gulp. “Do it fast,” she snarled.
There followed some rapid scratching in the dirt, Annie’s snout scrunched in concentration while Erin watched. She wondered if their former, or maybe not so former, foe, had murdered Leroy and stuffed him in her trunk without any help from their neighbors. Of course, Lizzie told her that her fingerprints were on the body, so maybe she did that herself herself. But why? She was pretty sure that she hadn’t killed him, so was she planning on driving the corpse to town or something?
She wondered if Annie would just tell her if she asked, scratching her confession with her claw into the dirt, leaving her to take a picture of it for the Sheriff’s Department. Erin stretched her arms behind her head and wished that she trusted her present company enough to just close her eyes and meditate for a few minutes. All she wanted right now was to curl up at home with Becca and Clyde and a nice cool glass of lemonade and rest. But for that to happen, she needed to rescue Becca. And clear my name.
Annie made a weird noise and Erin made herself focus again. She squinted down in the moonlight, trying to read the irregular shapes of the letters in the dirt. The message this time was longer and there were no breaks between some of the words so it took a while to read. “What? What do you think they’ll do to Becca in the meantime?” She looked up with a glare, biting back the urge to scream and yell.
She didn’t ask the next question: “What if I can’t change you back in time to save Becca? If I can’t do it at all?” Those questions hung unspoken in the moonlit silence between them. Part of her wondered why Annie hadn’t just tried to corral Shelly into this little adventure, but then their Pack Alpha hadn’t gotten herself involved in a murder case, gotten kidnapped and gone on the run. She was much harder to find and rope into something like this.
Erin’s brain whirled. Becca was in danger but she herself would have to go all the way back to the cave with Annie before she could even find out what was going on? Let alone run to the rescue? Her brain scrambled through a bunch of desperate plans to try and change that outcome before coming up empty.
“Please…” She hesitated before letting her guard down. There were no other options, as far as she should tell. If Annie didn’t have enough basic humanity to respond to her plea, there was probably nothing more that she could do. “Can we go after Becca first? I swear to you, on anything you want, that I will go back to the cave with you and do whatever I can to help you turn back.” She closed her eyes for a moment and hoped as hard as she could.
Annie made a noise and Erin’s eyes shot open, instantly alert. Her wolf brain yelled at her to be ready for whatever came next, whatever she need to do to protect this ridiculous human skin she was wearing in front of this monster. The two halves of herself warred with each other, the human side demanding that she wait, the wolf that she change and fight.
The wolf-woman stared longingly down the slope in the direction of the cave, her face settling into an expression that let Erin see how exhausted and alone she was. It was almost, but not quite, enough to make Erin feel a little sorry for her. But there was a lot of water under that bridge and Annie had done some things that were absolutely unforgiveable. She wondered if Margaret had ever felt sorry for her, had let her guard down just before the end, in hopes of reaching her.
Annie turned and looked at her, the longing and the tired fading back into the expression she’d worn since she first came back. After a long minute, she scrambled up and began loping up the trail that led away from the Pack’s cave and up the steep hillside. Erin pulled herself together and jogged after her as well as she could, hoping that she was getting her wish.
It wasn’t long before she also wished that she’d packed along more than a water bottle and a piece of jerky, but she pulled that out of her pocket and gnawed on it as well as she could, in hopes of silencing the growling in her stomach. This was beginning to feel like a very long night and for the first time, she wondered if Annie was sure that they had Becca or was maybe taking her somewhere else for her own ends.
She had just started to wonder if she could signal the other Pack members when Annie stopped abruptly at the edge of an old lumber road. It hadn’t been used in years, judging by the overgrown vegetation and the big stony lumps that defined where equipment wheels had left their mark. Erin realized that they were now headed down the slope and closer to the woods.
Now she just had to figure out why Annie had stopped. She squinted into the trees, then down the road, letting her acute hearing and sense of smell help her vision out. Woods, the scent of distant cars and people, a wood fire some distance away and then there it was: Becca and the bear and his mate. Her upper lip twisted back with a growl and she nearly charged down the slope without thinking about it.
Annie sidled over and blocked her path with a soft noise that could have meant anything. Erin interpreted it as her reluctance to be eaten by a bear, were or otherwise, and she had to bow to the wisdom in that, at least for the moment. The wolf-woman stepped forward slowly on four legs, following a faint trail that Erin could barely see. It was plain that she was hoping to come up on their site from downwind.
Erin picked up a fist-sized rock, then shoved another one into her pocket. There wouldn’t be many of those once they got down into the trees and she had a bloodthirsty desire to use one or both of them on Jim and Kari. Not as satisfying as tearing out their throats with her wolf fangs, perhaps, but it would have to do for the moment. Maybe she could do both. Becca had better be unharmed or this would be more than a fantasy. A white-hot rage gave her an extra burst of energy, and she was on Annie’s heels when they reach the overhang above the campfire.
Becca was sitting against a tree, her hands tied in front of her. Her eyes were closed, but Erin could see her nostrils flare. She had probably caught their scent, but she didn’t given any other sign that she wasn’t just trying to sleep. Kari was on guard, a rifle balanced against her shoulder, as she walked in a circle around the fire. The werebear was nowhere in sight.
Annie went low, sinking into the ground, and Erin followed her lead. Where the hell was he? And what form was he in? She sniffed anxiously, hoping that Annie’s sense of smell was better than hers right now. The two of them might be able to handle him for a bit, but not if they were up against the rifle too. They had to split them up somehow. Erin sent up a silent prayer that the other Pack members weren’t far behind. They were going to need some help very soon.
A not very distant growl shook her to the bone and she whipped around, body strung tight, on red alert. From the corner of her eye, she saw Annie slink down and vanish into a crevice. Great, now she was being left alone to deal with what was coming. Now where the hell was he? A whiff of bear preceded a cloud of oily, heavy scent, too close, too close. Erin gave a snarl of her own, the larger of the stones in her pocket now in her hand. She’d make sure to do some damage this time, at least.
Jim emerged from around a boulder, wearing his outer bear form uncomfortably to Erin’s eye. Not that it would make her any less dead if he got ahold of her, of course, but he didn’t look right. His eyes were unfocused, his fur patchy, and he looked as if he was about to shift back into human form at any moment. He might be sick or wounded or…the memory of Becca when they found her in the ditch after Annie and her men dosed her with their cure popped into her head. Leroy’s cure.
Her grip tightened on the rock as his massive head swung in her direction and his nostrils flared. His eyes got more bearish, and Erin threw her rock right at his face with as much force as she could muster. The stone hit true and the bear yelped, the noise echoing off the stones around them.
A shot rang out and Erin ducked instinctively as Kari’s bullet hit the rock over her head with a loud ping. Dammit. A loud shriek made her jump and Jim whipped around and began galloping down the hillside toward the fire. Erin looked down, incredulously, to see Annie and Kari rolling on the ground near the fire, struggling for control of the rifle.
Becca was off to one side sawing her wrists frantically against something that Erin couldn’t see at this angle. She hurtled down the slope using the same route that the bear had used, hoping she wasn’t going to be too late. Becca yelled something at Annie, alerting her to Jim charging ever closer, and the wolf-woman snarled and yanked her arms free of Kari’s grip. She struck the woman hard up against the side of her head and she went limp.
Jim roared and galloped across the clearing toward Annie and his wife. Annie stood in a half crouch, eyes wild as she watched him come, muscles tensed for a leap to take her out of his path. Becca rubbed her bound wrists faster, her motions frantic. There wasn’t enough time, not enough time for any of it. He was going to kill them all and Erin couldn’t do anything about it.
In despair, she hurled her second rock at him, but this time, it went wide and she missed. He reared up and over Annie, giant clawed paws in a blinding swipe at her head. She leapt sideways, then darted in for a swipe of her own. He howled and kicked her away, then Erin slipped and slid the last few yards down the slope into the clearing, not seeing what happened next. There were more howls and snarls and she tried to ignore them as she struggled to get to her feet. She had to free Becca, get the rifle, stop all of this if she could.
Kari was moving again, rubbing her head and starting to look around. Erin scrambled for the rifle, lunging forward to grab it before the other woman could. Annie screamed in pain and crashed into her, blood spraying both of them. Then, just as suddenly, Becca was there, cut ropes dangling from bleeding wrists. She kicked out at Kari, the motion stiff and awkward, but threatening enough that the other woman flinched and Becca grabbed the gun.
She pointed it at Kari and said in a voice that Erin had never heard from her before, “Stop it right now or so help me, I will shoot her.” Her eyes were locked on Kari’s, but the werebear paused midlunge, shaking his giant furry head like he was being buzzed by gnats or something. He swung around to stare at Becca and roared, the sound driving Erin to cover her ears as it echoed against the rocks above them.
“I…” Becca said, very slowly and loudly, “have had about all I’m going to put up with of your nonsense. You move, she gets shot. Back away from Annie and change back if you can.”
Kari held up a hand and Erin wondered if she was waiting to be called on or something. She couldn’t see her face from this angle, so it was hard to figure out what was going on. She started to stand up but kept her movements slow and cautious as she tried to make sure that she wasn’t blocking Becca’s line of sight to the bear.
She missed the first part of what Kari was saying, but did manage to catch, “—can’t make him change back. I’m not even sure that he can do it at all now.” Her voice trembled and Erin saw Becca’s eyes narrow. She walked up to stand at her side, still keeping an eye on the bear and Annie, who was now lying on the ground with her eyes closed and her arms crossed over some vicious slices across her ribs.
“What do you mean he can’t change back? What did the two of you do?” Becca frowned, her voice sounding tight and tired.
The cure, it had to be. “Did you kill Leroy because it didn’t work? Or because it did and then you realized that you couldn’t control it? And what did you do to me to make me forget? How the hell did his corpse end up in my car?” Erin could feel her features twist into a human imitation of her wolf’s grimace and her entire body shiver with rage. They had made her think that she murdered someone, betrayed her friends, betrayed herself and…
She threw herself at Kari, her fury almost enough to make her ignore the roar of rage from the bear, Becca’s cursing and the sound of a gunshot. She found herself hurtling through the air and instinctively tried to curl up in a ball to protect her head. The air was full of noise and she hit the ground hard, lying still and stunned for what felt like a lot longer than it probably was as she tried to make herself move. Becca.
She managed to roll over and utter a small scream as her ribs touched the hard ground. It could barely be heard in the cacophony. Becca and Kari were struggling for the gun and Annie was fighting the bear again. It hardly made sense to think of him as Jim or whatever his real name was anymore; there was nothing human looking out of those eyes.
Annie, at least, appeared to have gotten her second wind. Her fangs and claws ran red with blood and Erin could see several deep wounds in the bear’s back and shoulders. She twisted painfully, the motion enough to make her bite back several more screams, as she managed to rise into a bent-over crouch. She reached for a fallen branch and using it as a cane, she limped back toward the fray.
A yell from behind her made Erin turn awkwardly, breath hissing through her teeth. The backup team had arrived at last. Molly and Carla and Shelly were charging down the slope, yelling, with Lizzie and Gladys right behind them. Becca managed to knock Kari over just as they appeared and it looked for a moment like she might be able to recapture the gun at the same time. Erin gritted her teeth, trying to move faster. There were too many things that could go wrong, too much danger. She had to help.
The clearing swirled around her and she went down on one knee, bracing her hands against the ground as she tried to stay conscious and keep moving. Inside her head, her wolf was trying to wake up, trying to take over and change this stupid human meat shell that was so vulnerable and defenseless.
A loud thud and a howl made her stop and look up to see what had happened. Molly and Carla were taking on the bear, hitting it with branches while Annie kept up her attack with claws and teeth. There was a swirl of limbs and fur and Kari screamed something. The bear shook its head, reared up as if about to strike, then dropped back down and began galloping his way downslope.
With a screeching howl, Annie ran after him, a trail of blood in her wake. Shelly caught Erin just before she fell over and eased her down to sit on a rock near the fire. Becca handed the gun to Carla and raced over. “Are you okay, hon? No, that’s a stupid question. I can see that you aren’t. Let us see how bad your ribs are.” She kissed Erin lightly on the forehead and Shelly braced Erin’s shoulders while Becca slid her shirt up.
The hiss of breath through Becca’s teeth told her how bad it was, then things spun slowly around once more and she faded into a pain-free darkness.