Walking Wolf Road (Wolf Road Chronicles Book 1) (7 page)

Blood scalded my veins, so much hotter than shifting energy it bordered on frigid. It spilled out from the dragon’s pit like a black ichor, and rage consumed me.

Fuck running. I stopped suddenly and turned to face Fen, my eyes burning with fury. I dropped low at the last minute and tripped Fen with his own momentum. My wolf seized the moment, and cast me aside reeling as he pounced on Fen with my body. My human mind couldn’t even process the melee of biting, snapping, and clawing as I fought to regain control, until something broke.

My rage spilled into the wolf, and it ignited into a bloodlust frenzy that surged off me in a billowing cloud of power.
 It blinded me to pain and poured steel strength into my muscles, as the snow around us evaporated into steam.

Somehow, Fen managed to roll on top of me and tried to pin me again, all amusement gone from his face. He looked afraid.
 I defied his dominance and opened his cheek when I lashed out with my teeth. 

The taste of blood sparked on my tongue, and the beast I’d become fought even harder.
 Darkness descended over me, and I knew only brief flashes of image and sensation, all connection to my body lost.

Fen…

Images of red gore, streaming blood…

No…

“No! Jimmy! Jimmy, wake up!”

Cold lifeless grey eyes, a mist of red… NO!

“Jimmy! Calm down; it’s over! It’s over now—LOOK AT ME!”

Something shook me, and my unseeing eyes locked onto Fen’s face. He straddled me and pinned my arms to my sides while his eyes bored into mine with sadness and—fear?
  

Something hot and wet dripped onto my face, and my gaze drifted from his worried eyes to the angry red slash on his face that bled down his jaw and dripped onto my face, the dark scent of copper lush in the air.
 I stared at the wound as madness gnawed at me.

I made that… I made that out of a hate he didn’t deserve; what have I done?

That wasn’t the wolf; it was… it was
me!
  

The images and desires that had only moments ago consumed me flashed through my mind again and the world swam.
 I twisted out of Fen’s grasp and rolled over as I dry-heaved a few times on the snowy grass. I heard the others run toward us as Fen spoke softly.

“You’ve bottled so much rage inside you…
 When the wolf moves from the deep, sometimes the doors to other things are opened as well. Monsters we couldn’t destroy, so we captured and buried them in the darkness.”

“It wasn’t the wolf. It was me…” my voice was thick and raw, “It was all me… I’m so sorry Fen…
 So sorry…”

You don’t belong here.

I crawled over to one of the huge pine trees and curled up under the sheltering boughs while I cried and choked on shame in the spiny bed of fallen needles and cones. The others caught up with Fen, and their blurry shapes moved in the veil of snow until my eyes closed

I felt so weary, tired and weary of trying to force myself to live a life I could find no worth in.
 

Your father didn’t want you, why should anyone else?

I drew back from the world, until I heard snow crunch underfoot and familiar scents filled the space under the tree.

“Are you done sulking?” Loki’s voice was soft, but there was an edge to it. I opened my eyes, and their blurry shapes came into focus silhouetted against the moonlit gray of the sky. “Get out of there, the night’s still young, and I’m in no mood for a pity party.”  

Fen and Geri grabbed me and pulled me up partway onto my feet as they dragged me out; but when they touched me, their energy poured into me and stirred the wolf. I held onto Geri’s arm and gasped as a sharp pain blossomed in my leg. My back spasmed and arched as my knees gave out and I fell to the ground while my mouth gaped in a soundless scream.

My nerves caught fire and my body twisted and turned, like it was trying to split its seams and remake itself.
 The wolf inside me fought for freedom, but his frustration turned to anger as he hit an invisible wall.

Cool soft hands touched my feverish forehead and anchored me, and I looked up into Loki’s eyes.
 “Shh, it’ll fade in a moment; you just have too much shifting energy right now, we’ll help you.” She closed her eyes and breathed out; as she did a calm current settled beneath the chaos and pushed it out. Fen and Geri touched Loki’s arms and the air around us vibrated.

Loki pulled her hands away and shook them like they were numb, while Geri bounced from foot to foot. “Holy shit, you’re powerful,” she said, “but you’ve got a lot of gunk you need to work out of your system. And we
all
have a lot to learn…” She shot Fen a dark look, and then shrugged, “So, I’m afraid you’re stuck with us whether you like it or not.”

“After everything I’ve done, you still want me?”

“More than ever,” Fen replied, “You’re Pack. Your wolf waking up had little to do with that ticking bomb inside you. As bad as you think this was, it could have been so much worse. We’re fine, this’ll heal in no time.” He waved a hand past his bloody cheek and rolled his eyes. “You have the most healing to do, you didn’t realize how deeply infected the wound was.”

“Um,” Geri started, as he pulled his sleeve back and looked at his watch. “I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but my mom wanted me home by two.”

“You’re not sleeping over? It’s his first time!” Loki whined while I asked, “But I thought we were spending the night?”

“You are…” Fen said as he and Loki chuckled.

“…But not at Geri’s.” I finished for him.

“I’ll take you over, but I can’t stay, I’m already late,” Geri muttered and looked at his watch again. “Besides, I have a raid in the morning too…”

“A raid?” I frowned.

“World of WarCrack.” Loki volunteered, “Geri’s addicted to video games”

“It looks like it’s time for us to leave anyway,” Fen muttered and pointed toward the parking lot, where red and blue lights flashed in the snow. Fen seemed to enjoy sneaking just a little too much, and none of the officers saw the four shadows that slipped past them and quietly drove away.

We sat in silence, each lost in our own thoughts while Geri’s windshield wipers squeaked a gallant losing war against the snow.

“Um, Loki? What did you do back there?”

“Oh, I just used a little vampire trick I picked up.
 You had too much energy, we had too little; I just sorta—” she made a slurping sound “Drained it outta you and shared it around. Kinda like how Fen woke up your wolf actually…”

“It wasn’t me…” Fen muttered.

“What do you mean?” Loki turned and looked at him over the back of her seat.

“I wasn’t the one who bit him, it was Lupa. She—took over my body. I thought I was dreaming, I couldn’t remember exactly what happened.”

Loki stared at him for a moment, “Has she ever done that before?”

He shook his head, looking for a moment just as confused as the rest of us. “Never.”

We fell silent; I didn’t even know where to begin to process everything that just happened. The thoughts that I was important, that I was wanted, that I was powerful; they were so foreign to me. I’d been nothing my whole life; I didn’t know how to be anything else.

Geri dropped Loki off at the mouth of a driveway that disappeared into the snow, the soft glow of her house lights beyond the curtain of snow. Then he drove us few blocks through a twisting maze of streets and let Fen and I out. His taillights disappeared into the white dark, and I followed Fen toward another irrigation ditch.
Fen walked off the edge as though it wasn’t even there.

What the hell do you think this is, Underworld?

He disappeared from sight until I reached the edge and looked down. Fen hadn’t slowed at all and already faded from sight into the snow. I hurried down after him, and slipped on a patch of leaves, which dumped me on my ass in the snow. I followed his footprints as I trotted to catch up with him.

“Do you mind telling me where we’re going?”

“It’s a surprise.” He smiled over his shoulder, and I blinked compulsively when snow landed on my eyelashes. I wiped my nose on the sleeve of my coat and watched clumps of snowflakes land in Fen’s blonde hair until his body heat melted them. I caught myself staring, so I looked down at his footprints instead.

We came to a gap in the hedge along the ditch’s rim, and without warning, Fen leapt up and disappeared through the hole. I stood and stared at it a moment in shock. The wall wasn’t as high here, but it was still a good six feet up, and while Fen seemed to be capable of ridiculous feats, I had no such confidence. I took a few steps back and then leapt up as high as I could toward the gap.

I performed an ugly parody of a swan dive and belly-flopped hard onto the cold ground. I coughed and fought to catch my breath again as I pulled my knees beneath me and crawled the rest of the way through the thick hedge into a scrubby little patch of brush and trees. The foliage overhead blocked most of the snow, but my hands chilled as they shuffled through the fallen leaves. My nose told me that cows were nearby, and—something else—something familiar…

“Hey pup.” Loki’s voice surprised me, and I followed the sound to where Fen stood next to a dark blob on the ground with her grinning face. She rested her head on her arms while the rest of her seemed to disappear into the ground. “Took you long enough.”

“But—” I stuttered, “I thought Geri took you home?”

“He did, I have to keep up appearances.”

“She just sneaks out her window whenever she wants to,” Fen muttered as he pulled off his coat.

“Yeah, my parents totally didn’t know what they were getting themselves into when they gave me a room on the first floor,” she laughed.

“But, where are we?”

“The Pack’s den,” Loki replied from her hole.

Hm, I didn’t know we had a den. “That’s useful, but where are we?”

“My back yard.” Loki crawled out and stretched her arms over her head.

I crouched and looked around. “You
live
here? Won’t your parents see us?” I hissed.

She turned and pointed out over the pasture that spilled up to the edge of the thicket. “Do you see the house over there?”

“No…” I muttered, puzzled.

“Exactly. Even if they were still awake and looked right over here, they couldn’t see us. We have privacy fence to keep the neighbors at bay, and the only other way in is the way you came,” she explained while Fen rolled up his jacket and pushed it ahead of him as he crawled down the hole, head first.

“Down the hole with you.” Loki nodded her head toward it. “You might want to take off your coat if you don’t want to get stuck halfway.”

“Oh, um, okay.” I unzipped my coat and the greedy air sucked all my body heat out within seconds. I wadded my coat up like Fen did, and yipped when a sharp pain stung my butt. I spun around reflexively, and Loki just stared at me with utter innocence.  

“What happened?” She smiled, and her emerald eyes shone in the night. I remembered the way she looked twirling in the snow, and any sharp words or acts of retribution I’d planned fell from my head. I had to look away before my blush betrayed me, and could only shake my head as I turned back toward the den.  

Bracken and twigs formed an arch just barely large enough to crawl through, the snow had settled into a thick frosting on top. I pushed my coat ahead of me, and found that the tunnel floor just a few feet in was dry. When I looked up, a framework of branches arched over the earthen part of the tunnel, and I saw patches of blue behind them, probably a tarp to keep the den dry. From the outside, it’d just looked like a mound of sticks and field discards. The tunnel curved before it opened up into a larger chamber.

I smelled Fen and heard him move, but light was pretty much nonexistent. Even the efficiency of my wolf’s sight was powerless when there simply
was no light to see with.
Helplessly disoriented, I groped my way along one of the walls of the chamber. About halfway around, my fingers encountered warm flesh; some part of Fen obviously. Which part I had
no
idea.

Too late, my mind whirled down dangerous paths. I apologized, and Fen grunted an acceptance as I scuttled away from him as quickly as the cramped space would allow until I hit the cold earth wall on the other side of the chamber.  

“Okay, so, new guy here. What do we do in here? What do we sleep on?” I asked.

“Each other,” Loki’s deadpan came from the darkness as she crawled in, and it took me a moment for it to sink in.

“What!” I yelped and my eyes bulged in the dark.

“It’s part of the exercise,” Fen a
nswered this time, annoyed.

“We depend on each other for warmth and reinforce our bonds through touch.” Loki’s tone was subdued, “You might be uncomfortable at first, but you’ll get used to it. Just try to trust your wolf, okay?”

Trust something with no real form, that shouldn’t exist, while dog-piling with two other people. Okay, sure, no problem. 

I kept my mental grumblings to myself, and gathered my coat under my head like a pillow. Exhaustion caught up to me with a vengeance, and
I almost nodded off; but woke up shivering with the frigid dirt floor dug into my skin and drank away my body heat. My sweater was a pathetic barrier against the cold. I shifted and wriggled for what seemed like hours, struggling to find a spot that was—if not comfortable—at least
less
uncomfortable.