Chapter 11- Slade, ten years ago

About forty miles from the Florida line, in Waycross Georgia, I pace on the side of the road, gritting my teeth, and kicking at loose gravel with my boots. Our hunter band is caught up in the traffic of a road closure and I’m losing my damn mind at being forced to be idle and stand by. Once again, the tuniculas are fucking everything up, hindering our search of the rogue and the Cross girls, and making us lose valuable time. Every second counts in this hunt. We’ve already burned enough daylight, and with three a.m. quickly closing in, another night will pass for those poor girls in the company of their depraved captor. Only the moon knows what is happening to them. And I shudder at the thought.

The law in this county as well as the Feds have created a roadblock in and out of Waycross, where Bale slaughtered eight humans only hours before. They aren’t making our job any easier as their closure has made traffic a standstill and pretty much blocked our access to the town. Not that we need to get right to the crime scene, as Grady has kept us in the loop, but if we don’t get close enough to get our noses to the ground, we can’t pick up the rogue and the girl’s scents.

 I’m growing increasingly more irritated as time passes, as Clay and Wolfe took out their frustrations by throwing rocks at soda cans on the guardrail, River is stretched out in the bed of the truck star gazing, and loud ass humans are turning the shut down into an opportunity to fraternize.  Several have gotten out of their vehicles to stretch their legs, strike up random conversations with other stranded motorists, play music too loud, breathe through their mouths at an ear deafening volume, and pass around whatever snacks and beverages they have, chewing like cows with cud. After a few hours of this, I’m done and have had enough.

I walk up to the truck window, which Father has down to enjoy the breeze, as he again combs through all the intel Grady sent him. I give out a frustrated groan and grip his window.

“I can’t stand this! My gut tells me he’s taken them into the swamp.  Beta Alder, I’m requesting permission to scout the surrounding wetlands.”

I have a feeling as to why the feral wound up in this town and it was no coincidence or random.  Waycross Georgia is the gateway to the Okefenokee Swamp, just under seven hundred miles of wetlands for a wolf to get lost in. It is a good strategy, because logistically, it is hard terrain for a human search and rescue crew to navigate through.  Stagnant, dark waters break up the patches of land, not to mention visibility, especially at night, would be a nightmare for the tuniculas. They don’t have our superior vision that allows us to see in the dark, or our enhanced sense of smell or hearing, ability to heal quicker, or moon blessed strength. They are not moon favored to lose the clumsiness of two legs and take to four, with tougher hides, made to tread and withstand the places most fear.  We were created for this.

The climate is hot and harsh, not to mention the predators that stalk these wetlands by both land and water, gators, bobcats, wild boars, black bears, and a variety of venomous snakes such as Diamondback rattlers.  It is not so much an inhospitable climate to a wolf, but for two little girls, that’s another story. The rogue is going to get the Cross girls killed out here. Even his little cub is not so resilient to survive the harsh conditions of the swamplands indefinitely, especially with the crazed rogue as their keeper.  It is all the more critical we find these girls quickly, now more than ever. It’s’ already approaching the fifth day of their captivity, and Bale is mentally unstable, prone to violent fits of rage, the longer the girls remain with him, the higher chance he’ll snap, and we will only find pieces of them left. I need to get into that swamp.

In the back of the truck, River’s ears perk up at my request, and he sits up. I know I’m not the best tracker of our hunter band, our best trackers wait quietly in the Jeep behind, but I can’t tell Father I feel a pull to the swamp. A feeling I can’t ignore, much like I had back in Crosby. I can’t describe it or maybe I’m afraid to tell him. I don’t want my cousins to overhear, to give me grief and call me crazy, like the self-professed seer of our pack named Mable. So far none of her predictions have ever come true and we call her Marbles behind her back because she’s missing quite a few of them. No one takes her or her feelings seriously anymore, and I don’t want to share that same fate.

“I also ask to accompany Slade on his scouting mission, Uncle Alder,” pipes up River.

“Permission denied. We have reports the game warden has already started some surveillance on the swamplands, looking for the wolf. For now, we sit tight and await further orders.”

Clay laughs as he sits up the cans for another round of target practice, “You couldn’t find your own asshole if it wasn’t attached to your body, Slay.”

He dodges the rock Wolfe throws at him. My burly cousin laughs like an asthmatic hyena and lobs more rocks in Clay’s direction.  I don’t usually agree with Wolfe on much but throwing rocks at Clay’s smug face seems like a good idea to me. I have yet to fully exact my revenge on the pair of them for invading my privacy. I changed my password on the way here and plotted. Clay worships his dirty blonde curls, so I’ll hit him where it hurts the most, and give him a middle of the night buzz right down the center in the near future.  I could serve Wolfe a colder dish, to wait until the next time we are home, and fuck Fauna. She likes them around my age with lots of stamina, pretty boys, and I’m prime pickings for her ferocious sexual appetite. But now, I have more important things to concern myself with, when the life of two girls hangs in the balance.

I take a few deep breaths in and out of my nose to try and calm myself. The air is heavy with smells I don’t care much for, sweaty groins, unwashed pits, cigarette smoke, cheap perfume, which only makes my frustrations worse. I have to talk my wolf down as it wants to run off into the swamp. And if my wolf is willing to disobey an order, it’s for a damn good reason. Then an even more absurd idea enters my mind to challenge my father for his rank of head beta of the hunter band. I try and shake it off, but my wolf growls at me, urging me to throw down the challenge. It’s a rather extreme reaction that I can’t fully understand the rationale behind it. It’s a fight I know I can’t win, but why does my wolf even want me to try?

I pick up a rock and throw it with all I have at the can, narrowly missing Clay, and it sends the target careening off into a field to get lost among the tall grass. I make quick work of the other two cans, caving the aluminum in with the force of my fury. I consider making Clay and Wolfe the next targets when River jumps out of the truck and clamps a hand down on my shoulder.

“Let’s take a walk, cuz,” he says, “your eyes are practically glowing.”

I don’t argue as I could use some breathing room from the most annoying of my cousins, and my anger over my father pulling rank on me. River and I mosey up the side of the rode past a young couple kissing on the hood of their car, another man asleep reclined back in the passenger seat of his SUV, with his little kid up way past his bedtime. The boy is hunched over a screen in the backseat watching what I believe to be an anime by the bad voice over.

I break my own rules by running a hand through my brown hair until its standing up every which way. River can probably feel the tension rolling off me, I know he has to smell my increased testosterone.

“I know the waiting is hard, cuz, but you must trust in Beta Alder’s judgement on this. He is head beta for a reason.”

“Are you just going to blindly follow orders for the rest of your life?” I snap. “I can’t just do nothing, on the side of the fucking road while Bale has those girls out there doing only the moon knows what to them. I know he’s taking them into the swamp, River. We could find them tonight. Put an end to all this.”

“And risk exposing the pack? I don’t like this any more than you do, Slade, but you and I both know that swamp is probably swarmed with park rangers right now at the very least. We’ll get our shot, we just have to wait until the right time. Besides, when Bale senses us on his trail, and we have a shit ton of humans standing in between him and us, how much collateral damage do you think they’ll be? He’ll use them as human shields. We must trust the wisdom of the moon and our elders.”

My throat tightens and I know he’s right, but a part of me keeps screaming that if we wait too much longer, we’ll be far too late. That Sloane Cross will die, that we won’t save her, and I can’t live with that. I know I’ve grown too close to this case and gotten too emotionally attached. I broke a cardinal rule in the hunter life and let myself be driven by my emotions. But it’s easier to put your emotions in a box, when the victims are just names and gruesome old photos, not a fresh kill scene when the bodies are barely cold, and you’ve seen the toddler’s bedroom with a string of lights wrapped around her small bed, and a preteen girl’s sketches of horror icons and explosion of tie-dye in her room. I’d never felt this type of connections to any of the other victims before.

“That’s what I’m worried about! That the human sister will become the collateral damage and then this will feel like it’s all been for nothing,” I confess, “we need to save her, River.”

“And we will. If he wanted her dead, she would already be. Bale maybe crazy, but he’s not stupid. He wants her alive and that gives us some leverage. We’ll get her back, and our cub, and turn them over to the safety of our pack. And we’ll make sure the rogue is put down once and for all. The moon will keep us in its favor.”

I wonder if perhaps the moon is at play here, for my intense feelings, for that damn thread that pulls me towards the swamp. My intuitions paid off yesterday. I think over my next decision. If I disobey a direct order from my beta for a second time, it will probably mean the end of being a pack hunter for me. Father can’t allow disobedience to stand, or bend the rules, even for his own progeny. Order must be maintained. I may also face a punishment from the council and Alpha Fennell for my actions. I doubt the infraction would be serious enough to get me banned from the pack, but there is a serious chance I would be demoted to an Omega.

 Omega’s are the lowest of the pack, and though Alpha Fennell is less tolerant of abuse of pack members than most, Omegas of the Shadow Ridge pack still feel the brunt of taunts and jeers from higher ranking wolfs and get stuck with the worst jobs no one else wants. Omega’s are the pack’s bitch. Some are driven off into lives of being a lone wolf as they leave the pack because of their poor treatment. Personally, I think the whole pack hierarchy is archaic and fucked up, though I guess someone has to be in charge. I hate the high ranking wolfs who use their power to abuse and terrorize those weaker than themselves.

Being knocked down to Omega status is a risk I’m willing to take, because in my gut, I know what the right thing to do is. I’m going to disobey my beta, my father’s orders, and possibly lose everything because of it. And I know why, because the human girl is out there and she needs me. I’m going to save her and the time for waiting around in the shadows is done. I cannot ask this of my pack, the risk of breaking our sacred laws and exposure with all those trained humans milling around in the swamplands. This is a task I must do alone.

I shove a hand into my pocket and let out a deep breath I was holding in, “I know. You’re right. I’m back in control and you’ve got nothing to worry about.”

He cocks a light brow in my direction, “You aren’t about to go off and do something stupid now are you Slade? You know Aunt Iris won’t make me anymore of her apple pies if I let you go off and get yourself killed.”

“You wouldn’t be missing much. She uses too much cinnamon and too tart of apples. But no, I have no intentions of getting myself killed.”

I don’t add or doing something stupid. Hunting without the pack is all kinds of stupid, especially with Bale as my prey. He’s taken down more than one hunter over the years. He’s strong, fast, a skilled fighter, and ruthless.  He has no honor and no pack loyalty making him all the more dangerous. But I know I need to do this. I can feel it. Sloane is running out of time and by tomorrow night, when the humans likely suspend the search for their rabid wolf, my gut tells me it will already be too late for her.

River cracks a smile, “Good, because Auntie will likely kill you herself when she hears what you said about her pie. Come on, let’s go raid our food stash, I’m famished. I haven’t eaten anything in two whole hours.”

I snort and follow my cousin back to our vehicles. I don’t tell him that Wolfe and Clay already ate all the good stuff while he dozed and there’s only slim pickings left. I also don’t tell him when his guard is down, and everyone is distracted, I’m going to make my move. I’ll go on foot until I’m far enough away from prying human eyes to merge with my wolf and take to the swamp in my fur. I’ll cover far more ground and much faster that way. I may not be the best tracker or the most stealth among us, but I’m damn fast. I can beat all my cousins in a race in whatever skin I wear. Only Hawke is my true rival in that regard.

I wait for things to cool down for about another hour or so. River isn’t happy about most of the food being devoured, including his favorite chips and all the beef jerky. He is forced to settle for the shit the others wouldn’t touch, the vegetables mostly that Hawke always brings along, and he eats a salted cucumber glumly. Father takes pity on the nephew who he helped raised and tosses a bag of deer jerky to Riv he had hidden in the glove compartment. The jerky came from home, it is a pack specialty, and no one makes it like Oak Skymane. Now that is cooking I actually miss from Shadow Ridge, as the elder beta has never made anything I didn’t like. He is one wolf I’ll miss when he’s gone, not just for his cooking, but also his stories. I remember being entranced by his tales for hours as a cub sitting at his feet beneath the trees and stars. It saddens me to know he can’t be far off from his final season.

I announce loudly I need to take a shit and make for the tall grass on the edge of the highway. Many other motorists have already made it their restroom in the hours we’ve been stranded with no way out in sight. My kind have no problems relieving ourselves in nature. It’ s as natural as breathing to us. While especially the young females stuck on the road that night, complain about it, and often travel in packs to do their business. If my mind wasn’t so occupied, I too would have found humor in their undignified shrieks, proclamations of disgust, and annoying giggles, and at the particularly loud redhead who told her friend to be careful not to wipe her ass with poison ivy.

We can’t even turn around to find another route if we wanted too. Because the road is so narrow and gridlocked and the fact another roadblock is set up ahead in the other direction. The road and the town have been essentially shut down for the investigation, no one is allowed in or out by vehicle except for emergency crews and law enforcement personnel. Some desperate motorists had abandoned their cars on the shoulder and made the three-mile trek into the heart of the town by foot to get a room for the night and some food. A man and his teenaged son had even made the journey there and back to bring provisions back to his wife and younger kids to get them through the night. I feared that Wolfe would jump them for the pizza and even Father had given the younger beta a sharp look when they passed by our way to keep him in line.

We are all sitting ducks if the rogue did decide to strike, but I know he is far more concerned with dragging his cub and human mate deep into swamp country and far away from civilization. I wonder what his long-term strategy is, because he can’t expect to keep those girls in one swamp or one place for the long run. Bale knows the humans aren’t the only ones out there looking for him, his own pack have been hunting him since he absconded after his first murder spree. There’s nowhere he could go that we couldn’t find him eventually. And life on the run with two girls is far different than a life on the run as a lone wolf. It will be impossible to make them like ghosts that only haunts the shadows.

When I reach the tall growth, it’s not to relive myself. I crouch and wait quietly and still. I know that if I don’t come back from this, the others will come looking. I need to get a good head start and to do that I need a good distraction. The edge of the swamps is filled with all kinds of creatures, so I just need to wait for the right one to come along. I use my hunter instincts to guide me, and I await my prey.  I consider snatching up a raccoon that treads too closely scavenging for food in the underbrush, but it would be hard to smuggle that animal out of here. I need something smaller but also effective and nonvenomous, perhaps a lizard or a nice big salamander, and I know exactly what I’ll do with the creature when I catch it.

The moon decides to assist me and soon I see the perfect candidate to cause my distraction. An indigo snake slithers through the grass past my boot. Eastern Indigos have a glossy black iridescent skin that shimmers with purple or blue tones in the sunlight, and a red or orange chin. Though they can be intimidating to look at, and may be mistaken for a venomous snake, but they aren’t aggressive or dangerous to humans. In fact, Eastern Indigos usually do a feigned strike when threatened, which is lash out with a closed mouth, and bites are very rare. They may shake their tails, hiss, release a foul musk from their tails, when they feel threatened to scare off prey. Every wolf is taught extensively about the wildlife we share the Earth with. The indigo is a moon send tonight as the humans will be in no real danger from the reptile.

I strike quickly grabbing the snake behind the back of the head before it has any time to react. I immobilize it’s thrashing body by trapping it beneath my arm and pinning it down my side with the hand that doesn’t hold it’s head. I’m not keen on having a snake against my bare skin, down my shirt sleeve, but anyone who sees me walking by will think I’m scratching my armpit. And regrettably, the reptile goes in defense mode and secretes it nasty slime against my skin. I now smell like rotten cabbage, but it’s a small price to pay in the grand scheme of things.

 I make for my target, the group of college aged girls in what I believe is a rental. These girls were likely headed towards Jacksonville Florida, suitcases and lounge chairs crammed full in the back. I can smell the nail polish the burnet is painting on her toes on the hood, while the blonde inexplicably sunbathes in her skimpy bikini though dawn is still a couple hours off, and the wine cooler the curvy one chugs back she dug out from a cooler with melted ice. The redhead, with the voice that could carry across the Atlantic, is passed out across the back seat. Perfect.

 I creep up next to the SUV and slip my friend down through the open window, right onto her face. The snake slithers away across the sleeping coed, and she barely moves at first. It’s the smell that gets her rather than the actual movements of the snake across her skin. The girl partook a bit too hard of the road trip alcohol it seemed. She swats at her face instinctively, still caught in the fog of sleep and booze before I can see her nostrils working in overdrive. She grimaces before hazel eyes open and out comes a blood curdling scream from her peach-colored lips. I’m already in the tall grass as a chorus of screams joins the first and it’s a sorority girl stampede. An evil smile touches my lips at the chaos I’ve caused in my wake as I make my way through the undergrowth quiet as a mouse.

But tonight, I’m the hunter and it will take a warrior to take down Bale and save those girls. I don’t know how much time I have before the swamp life will be joined by several other paws in pursuit of me, the wayward wolf who disobeyed his beta’s command. They will come for me to try and force me to submit and return to the highway. I do not like putting the pack at risk, but I trust the moon would not have sent me on this task if I wasn’t capable. I take it as a good sign I can’t yet smell evidence that humans are also prowling these woods tonight in the wee hours of the morning before dawn’s first light.

I discard my clothes and invite the change to come. It ripples over my body, making it stronger and better than before, and I let my wolf take control. I need his speed and strength tonight more than ever. In my fur, that thread is an even more visceral, living thing exiting out my chest and leading me north through the marsh. I run among the trees at full speed, my senses allowing me to dodge obstacles in my path with ease and agility to navigate the uneven terra. The native wildlife out here causes me no problems and hide from my wolf. I catch scents of foxes, deer, black bears, minks, gators in the murky waters, of peat, moss, cypress trees, evergreen oaks and longleaf pines, and that does not include the creatures I smell up among the trees. The swamp is swarming with much life the moon created and I will try and leave it as undisturbed as I found it.

By the time, I get several miles behind me, the air is perfumed with tuniculas and their canines, but their scents are far off in the distance and not in the direction the moon leads me. In my wolfskin, I have no doubts what is the cause of the pull inside me, the invisible string that guides me through the swamp though I have yet to pick up on any scents of my prey. I have faith in the moon that guides my way. So, I trust, and I run on.

Just as dawn breaks, I can hear the howl of my beta and smell the scents of my pack in the wind. I know they will catch me soon, but I can not stop. I must go on and I will face whatever consequences await me when the light fades again, but to stop me now, my beta will have to kill me. I will fight him and the whole pack if I must. I push my four legs to move faster through the muck of the black water, the soggy lands in between, not stopping to rest or drink.

By the time the morning paints the swamp in gold, I know I am surrounded by my pack. I can smell and hear them setting their trap, before I see them closing in. A circle of wolfs corrals me beneath a longleaf pine and I have nowhere else to run. My cousins flank my sides, Wolfe in his pelt of ash gray, River in his red coat, and Clay in his silver-grey fur growling and baring their teeth when I get too close, while the twins trap me from behind, fur raised and snarling. In front of my path is Hawke, the second largest of our hunter band watching me warily with ember eyes. But the scariest and most Alpha wolf of all is my father, my beta, the size of a horse, with a mane smoky gray. He blocks my path with a ferocious howl and comes at me. He is going to teach me a lesson, his amber eyes alight, his fangs nip my skin just enough to break through my pelt.

My packmates stand and await a command from their beta to join in. I yelp as my beta nips my skin again, this time piercing the hide near my neck. But I do not lie down and submit before him. I growl at him and counterattack, going for his pelt at the scruff of his neck, trying not to leave my neck open to him. I do not wish to injure my father, my own kin, but now he leaves me little choice as leaving the swamps with my tail between my legs is not an option. He is stronger and a more skilled warrior than I, years of battles have prepared him and I’m still green behind the ears. He pounces me to the Earth, pressing me down with his large paws, his teeth nip at my pelt over and over.

He does not wish to inflict a fatal injury, but he means to punish me and assert his dominance as is the way of our kind. His growls are assertive and lesser betas would have already submitted, possibly before that first bite came. But I do not yield, even as I know the fight is lost. Even as he signals the other pack mates to join in to put me in my place and show me my rank among them. They nip at my pelt from many different directions, most of the bites are shallow, River’s never breaks my skin, Wolfe’s are the worst tearing skin and fur, but the elder wolfs among us are more controlled in their attempts to cause me pain but not injuries that will hobble me. I growl and fight back, but I’m outnumbered and no match, as I’m laid out on the ground. My fangs meet hide, but it does little to save me from my current predicament.

Finally, Father calls the other wolfs off when he thinks I’ve had enough. I’m left bloodied and dazed, with missing patches of fur, though I have no life-threatening wounds. My wounds will heal quickly, and most will not even scar. I can hear the command to retreat in my beta’s growl. I may have lost the fight, but I am not down yet. I will not limp out of this swamp in shame and defeat, and I will not leave until the human, the cub, and the rogue are found. The moon is my ultimate alpha, the final authority, and it has given me a command I will not refuse.

 I shift back into my human skin so I can better explain this to the pack of wolf which still surround me, with stances ready to fight if given the command. Ready to give chase if I try to run. The dangers of being exposed out here, by a band of human hunters is even higher in the sunlight. We are nocturnal creatures by nature, and this goes against our instincts. But I will not run nor hide nor retreat.

I pull my naked, sore, and aching body to my feet. My thinner human skin is a map of blooming bruises and broken skin, highlighted in the sunshine.

“I am not going back to the highway. The moon has spoken to me and given me a command. It told me to come to the swamp and it is guiding me towards the rogue and the girls. I will not disobey the moon, its orders supersede all,” I declare, panting, “do what you must, but I will do the same. If you want me to leave this swamp, you will have to kill me first.”

I feel the intense stair of seven pairs of eyes watching me, but none as strong as my father’s. For a moment, I think he might just kill me. It would be within his right to do so, though our pack usually doesn’t take such a harsh interpretation of the law, some packs kill members who disobey orders from a superior or fight their challenges to the death rather than just to submission. I’ve never known a member of our pack to be put down for things other than breaking the sacred laws though. But there’s a first time for everything and he looks furious with me even through his wolfskin.

Then a strong breeze blows through the swamp, and I catch the smells riding it. I see my pack members putting their snouts to the wind. The moon has given us a sign. Bale’s stench sours the air, along with the sweeter smells of his captives. Furthermore, his howl cuts through the wetlands, followed by a scream. A scream that is entirely human.

I drop to all fours, my body merges with my wolf before I even hit the ground, and I am running. I can hear my pack on my heels, though I know they do not move to stop me, but rather to join me. To give aid as the terrified screams get closer and closer, as their odors grow stronger, as that thread in my chest only tightens, as the miles pass beneath our paws like the blink of an eye.

The rogue will not escape us this time. The moon is on our side and today he will face his judgment. The ground will be painted with his blood, and he will be returned to it. Today, the human girl and the cub will be safe forevermore, this I swear on the moon.