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Every word that Rogue had said kept playing in Kip’s mind for the rest of the trip. Especially when they would spot a wolf on the prowl. Once they saw five wolves and Kip had to admit, he was happy that Rogue was by his side with a gun strapped to his back.
Not that the wolves came near them, in fact, they seemed to edge further from where they were. But that would just start the whole conversation he’d had with Rogue all over again in his head. Had the man been right? Those wolves had known exactly where they were and kept their distance even as they moved towards a few mountain goats foraging for food in a denser part of the forest.
The bleats of the sheep echoed around them when the wolves were noticed, but it was too late. Kip had to cover his ears at the sound of one of those majestic creatures being taken down.
Rogue had tried to hurry him away from the scene, but it didn’t matter. Kip had known what the wolves were going to do. Witnessing it or not didn’t take away the sick feeling he had in his stomach.
“Look,” Rogue pointed toward a moose that was eating the smaller branches off a tree. “Believe it or not, more people die from a moose than a bear.”
That couldn’t be right. “But I thought moose were herbivores.”
Rogue nodded. “They are. And that might be part of the problem. Humans don’t feel threatened by them because they aren’t predators. But they also are very willing to stand their ground, especially if they have a calf. And those hooves are extremely powerful.”
When Kip took a couple of steps further back from the moose, not that they were all that close, Rogue chuckled. “You need to remember, all animals will try to defend themselves. If they need to kill, they will.”
Kip’s eyes grew wide when a brown bear came ambling out of a different area of the forest. He would have thought Rogue would have gotten them out of there, but he just watched the bear as it lumbered toward a patch of grass that was peeking through the snow.
When it started to eat, Kip was sure he was seeing things.
Rogue must have seen his reaction for he said, “Bears might be predators, but their diet consists mostly of berries, grass, flowers, and roots. As a omnivore they also eat fish and small game. They will actually eat almost anything if they can.”
Kip hadn’t known that. How did he consider himself a nature lover when he didn’t know that much about... Well, nature? He knew what was pretty, as well as quite a lot about various herbs, muds, and aromas in order to help cleanse one’s aura. When it came to the animals he claimed to want to protect, Kip knew very little.
Yet, Rogue seemed knowledgeable about everything they came across, including the vegetation. What was worse was the man was making a lot of sense. It shouldn’t have been a bad thing, necessarily, but it was hard to claim he was nothing but an animal killer.
For the rest of the hike, Rogue would point out tracks and explain what had made them. He’d taken him to areas where various animals would feed or to semi-frozen lakes they would drink from once the ice melted.
As the sun began to fade, Rogue picked up the pace. He had told Kip they had about another mile before they could set up camp and he was hoping to have their tent up before full darkness was upon them.
Kip wasn’t sure how far they’d gone, but he was certain it hadn’t been a mile, when his arm was grabbed and he was jerked behind Rogue. Before he could even register what had happened, Rogue had his gun out and aimed ahead of them.
Peering around Rogue’s body, Kip froze as a bear as big as the one that had threatened to eat him when he’d been stuck in the mud was not more than thirty feet in front of them. They’d been hiking up a rise and the bear must have been doing the same from the other side.
It was as if karma were bringing him back full circle to the lesson he still apparently hadn’t learned. That or fate was determined he was to be mauled by a bear. He really hoped that wasn’t the point of meeting another bear, who, like the previous one, was licking his chops in anticipation.
But Kip doubted it. If he had to guess, this time it was to drive home the feelings that were coursing through him. The same ones that he’d felt the last time but was too dumbstruck by the situation to comprehend the thoughts that had been going through his mind.
He’d touched on them a few times since, but even then, hadn’t paid them too much attention. He didn’t believe in killing animals after all, so he hadn’t felt those fleeting emotions had really occurred. He’d brushed them off as nothing more than his fear at the time.
In a way, they were. But what he realized as he stood there behind Rogue, his grip tight on the man’s coat as he peered out from around him to stare at the most terrifying creature he’d ever known, animal lover or no, peace lover or no, Kip didn’t want to die. Nor was he willing to lose Rogue over some his ideals.
If it meant the bear had to die, then Kip really was okay with that. He wasn’t sure if that changed how he felt about hunting, but he was beginning to understand things really weren’t as black and white as he’d always believed.
Several long tense moments went by and nothing happened. Well, except that Kip was sure he was about to have a frigging heart attack. “What are you waiting for?” he whispered fiercely. “Shoot him.”
He could feel Rogue tense beneath his fingertip. “I thought you were against killing an innocent creature,” Rogue whispered back.
Were they really about to debate the merits of killing something while face to face with what appeared to be a very hungry bear? “I was, until I’ve been forced to stare down two bears in a week,” he whispered, hoping not to startle the bear into charging them. “Now, I’m beginning to realize there are reasons to shoot an animal.”
There was a moment of change in Rogue’s body that Kip couldn’t quite describe, then the report of the gun going off. Fuck that was loud. His ears would be ringing for a week after that.
Peering around Rogue, he expected to see the bear in a pool of blood. Instead, he watched it sort of use a lumbering gallop to race away along the ridge of the hill they’d been climbing and to disappear into the trees.
Rogue took a step forward, put his rifle in the holster at his back and said, “Come on. We don’t have much time before its dark.”
Kip stood there as Rogue kept hiking at a brisk pace. What on earth had just happened? He’d given a hunter permission to kill a bear but instead he’d chased it off? Was that even possible?
“I don’t get it,” Kip said.
Even though Rogue was quite a bit of distance from him, he still heard Kip’s words. He turned. The disappointment that was etched into his features was like a stab to the gut. “You still don’t get it. Yes, I’m a hunter. Yes, I do kill animals. But that doesn’t mean I get a thrill out of doing it. There is a price for all that we do in life. I’m saddened when I snuff out one of those lives.”
That made absolutely no sense. “If you regret it, why do it?”
Defeat bowed Rogue’s shoulders. If it had been about the fact that he didn’t like being a hunter, Kip would understand, but he feared it had more to do with Kip’s inability to be open minded and accept him for who he was.
“I’m not sad because of regret,” Rogue told him. “It’s out of respect for the life that was just lost. I didn’t kill that bear because it wasn’t necessary. I don’t take the lives of animals just because I can. They serve a purpose, just as if that bear had managed to kill us, we would have provided food for him.”
Clearly, frustrated that he wasn’t getting through to Kip, Rogue started back down the path. “You might want to follow me. When it gets dark, it will be nearly impossible to see where you’re going.”
Kip quickly raced after him, but his brain was having a hard time dealing with what had just happened. He’d been told hunters were monsters who thrived on death. But so far, all the hunters he’d meet, Axom, Anook, Rogue, and many other natives in town, weren’t at all like that.
If the community he’d grown up in was wrong about that, it started him wondering what else they had gotten wrong. Kip wasn’t sure he’d ever be okay with eating meat, but he had to consider it wasn’t evil to do so.
No longer sure who or what to believe, he followed Rogue to a spot the man had deemed adequate to pitch their tent. Since he had no clue what he was doing when it came to building a campsite, he watched Rogue do it, hoping the next night he’d be able to help, but he never stopped thinking about all that had happened since he got stuck in the mud last week.
Was it possible to fall for someone who didn’t share the exact same values? Kip hadn’t thought so, but then again, he hadn’t believed he could be friends with those people either, yet he was. Not only were two of his best friends hunters, but all four of them ate meat.
Then there were those he’d become friends with in town. Other than Rogue’s mom, Harper, who only had issues with what Kip ate because it was harder for her to get it into her store, no one had made fun of him for being vegan. Well, he’d received some ribbing, but no more so than anyone else did for their foibles.
Was Kip the one who wasn’t being tolerant?
“Do you think I’m intolerant of others?” He hadn’t meant to speak the question out loud, but now that he said it, Kip truly wanted to know what Rogue thought of him.
A fire was burning in a pit Rogue had quickly made by ringing the area with stones he’d found along the ground. How he’d known which sticks and branches to use when they’d all looked like they were covered in snow, Kip wasn’t sure, but one day, assuming Rogue was still speaking to him, he’d find out.
Rogue had been pulling out a small bag, which revealed two packages of hot dogs. Kip’s eyes narrowed, for one of those looked very familiar. “Are those vegan hot dogs?”
Grabbing a long stick, Rogue handed him one, then opened the package. “My mom said you liked this every once in a while and she had just gotten in a pack, so I picked one up, figuring, sure we may not be eating the same kind of hot dog, but it would be close enough.”
Then Rogue put one of the veggie hot dogs on the end of Kip’s stick, and did the same to the other stick with the meat based hot dog. Patting a log that would seat them both comfortably, although fairly close together, Rogue stuck his stick into the ground so that the hot dog was just above the flames.
Then he brought out a foil packet and loaded two more sticks with cut up vegetables. Putting the two vegetable sticks into the ground, one near where he’d gestured for Kip to sit, the other near the meat hot dog, Rogue then sat down.
It wasn’t until Kip sat next to him, holding his own stick over the fire, that Rogue answered his original question. “Intolerant? No. I think you have your beliefs and until someone is willing to challenge your ideas, you hold firm to them. But I don’t believe you hate others just because they’re different than you.”
Kip took in his words and mulled them over. By the time they were ready to eat, he’d pretty much decided Rogue was wrong. Kip often hated others when they didn’t think like he did. He even hurt their feelings, like he had Axom with his brochures.
His heart ached to believe this about himself, but Kip wasn’t so sure he was a good person. He was also the only one who could change that about himself. He just hoped he was up for the challenge.
