by Kyla Stone
Hunching slightly, terrified that her every movement would trigger Vlad into attacking, Raven shrugged off the pack and the rifle. Both fell to the ground with a thud.
Vlad roared in her face again, shaking the ground, rattling her bones.
It hadn’t worked. She’d just made him angrier. Now he would pounce. Now he would sink his four-inch claws into her belly and eviscerate her within seconds—
Out of nowhere, Shadow plunged in and bit Vlad on his flank. The tiger whirled and swiped at him, claws missing the wolf’s muzzle by a hair’s breadth.
Shadow galloped out of harm’s way. Vlad didn’t chase him, but crept a step backward, hissing, still favoring his wounded paw.
The tiger’s piercing eyes fixed on Raven. He was angry, defensive, but there was a weariness in his gaze, like his heart wasn’t in it. Or maybe that was just what she wanted to see.
“You don’t have to do this, Vlad,” she said. “I know you don’t really want to.”
Shadow and Luna growled and snarled furiously. They spread out, Shadow on Vlad’s left, Luna on his right, with Raven directly in front of him.
The wolves darted in, snapping their jaws a few feet from his hide and springing away as he spun toward them, slashing with his claws.
His ears were laid back, his tail lashing. His eyes blazed in frustration. He kept up a continual low growl that was still loud enough to vibrate right through her, shrieking alarm signals at her brain of predator proximity and imminent death.
She forced herself to keep it together, to fight the panic. She focused on lifting her foot and taking a slow step backward. Then another. And another.
The tiger snarled and swiped at Luna. She ducked and scrambled backward, growling. He could have pounced, taking her down with a single leap, but he didn’t like Shadow at his exposed back.
And he didn’t want to leave his kill undefended either, she realized. The Headhunter’s body lay a few yards behind Vlad. The tiger had remained in nearly the same position since the confrontation had started.
Raven took several more steps backward, until she reached the edge of the clearing. Vlad and the wolves were maybe thirty yards away. The tiger could still reach her in under two seconds if he wished.
But she was beginning to think, to hope, to pray that maybe, just maybe, he would let them live. He seemed more irritated than anything, batting at the wolves like flies, snarling at them to leave him be.
She slipped between a sugar maple and a dogwood tree, thorns snagging her pants as she stumbled backward, unwilling to take her eyes off Vlad for an instant. Shadow and Luna were both backing away slowly, backs arched, hackles bristling.
Vlad snarled half-heartedly. He hunkered down in front of his kill, protecting it.
The predators had come to a sort of understanding. Neither tiger nor wolves felt like a battle to the death this day.
She wanted to think it was because Vlad knew her, recognized her smell, associated her with affection and kindness, all those years of jerky treats, scratches and rubs against the chain-link fence.
But more likely, he just wasn’t hungry. Maybe it was some of both.
Raven whistled to Shadow and Luna. “Come on!” Then she turned and fled.
She ducked and weaved between trees, around branches and thorny thickets, leaping over roots and fallen logs. Breath hissing, feet pounding, heart roaring. She ran until her stomach cramped, the pain searing her side bending her double, her throat burning. She gasped, eyes stinging, and sucked in heaving mouthfuls of precious, precious air.
The damp, earthy scent of the woods filled her nostrils. Gradually, the forest sounds returned. Sparrows, finches, and swallows chirped. A red-tailed hawk soared in the patches of sky through the leafy canopy.
The trees were on fire, exploding in shades of orange and red and yellow. Squirrels chased each other across matted clumps of dirt and leaves, the ground ribbed with gnarled, twisting roots.
She was alive. Gloriously, miraculously alive.
Shadow stalked to her side. His ears were still flattened, hackles raised. He rubbed against her side as if to make sure she was okay, to reconnect.
“We did it,” she said, her throat raw, burying her hands in the thick ruff of his neck. She felt everything—the cold air chilling her skin, the wooden wing of the bird carving in her pocket digging into her thigh, the ache in her side, her chest, Shadow’s fur beneath her fingers. “We faced the king of beasts and lived.”
Shadow gave a low yip and bolted into the forest ahead of her. On her left, she glimpsed Luna slinking through the shadows, and then she, too, disappeared.
They would be back. She was certain of that now. She trusted them. They hadn’t abandoned her to Vlad. The three of them had defended themselves—together. Together, they’d escaped the jaws of death.
She knew how lucky they were.
But she’d lost her pack. There was no way she could risk going back for it. Vlad would stay with his kill for another two or three days at least. She couldn’t afford to wait for it—not with the Headhunters hunting her, not with Ryker bent on vengeance.
If she really pushed herself, she could reach the cabin in two days. Two days of heavy exertion without food or water, unless it rained. Without her tarp or tent, without her compass. Was it even possible?
It was. It had to be.
It wouldn’t be easy.
She checked her dying SmartFlex. It flickered with a sickly blue light, but it still worked. Forty-eight miles north. She could make it. With Shadow and Luna at her side, she could do this.
As she set out toward the cabin, she couldn’t help feeling buoyant, triumphant, reveling in the flush of victory, of hope.
34
Raven hadn’t hiked for more than half an hour when she heard Luna’s excited yips. She stepped off the deer trail she’d been following, which meandered close to the direction she needed to go, and pushed through a thicket of sumac and mountain laurel.
She tugged a handful of plum-purple leaves and twigs aside to peer into a clearing next to a small stream. The water splashed over the rocks. A large boulder lay next to a copse of shagbark hickory trees, their shaggy bark peeling from their trunks in great swaths like wood shavings.
Luna was standing over something lying on the ground in the shadows between two trees. She bent her head, sniffing, lips curling back from her teeth eagerly, hungrily.
A calf carcass.
Alarm shot through Raven. Something was wrong. That carcass belonged in the world of the refuge, stored in the walk-in freezer of the meat house, not out here in the woods.
She sucked in a sharp breath, opening her mouth to shout a warning.
Too late. Luna stepped close and sank her jaws into the carcass, triggering the trap. A log dropped from the tree above her; the net beneath her feet snapped up, hauling her several feet off the ground.
Luna thrashed fiercely, her legs tangling in the rope. She yelped and snarled in mingled fury and fear.
Raven shrank back, crouching low behind the cluster of bushes, fighting the desire to rush into the clearing and free Luna—she still had her whittling knife in her pocket—but instinct held her back. She crouched behind a thick bush, waiting and watching.
Across the clearing, a Headhunter appeared from behind the boulder. Then another. Oman and Ryker. Their rifles were slung across their shoulders, and they both carried long, gleaming hunting knives. Wolf pelts were strung across their shoulders like capes.
Raven’s lungs constricted. She recognized the distinctive markings: Titus’s streaks of black. Shika’s beautiful, brindled coat.
Revulsion boiled up from her gut, acid burning the back of her throat. A cold, unbearable rage seared through every part of her.
“Look what we have here!” Oman crowed. “Told you it would work.”
Luna growled ferociously.
Ryker only laughed. “Knew you were good for something. Just couldn’t figure out what it was before now.”
Behin
d Ryker, Oman scowled through his thick beard, his beady eyes darkening, but he said nothing.
“Now all we need is that girl, and we can burn this damned place to the ground.” Ryker prowled deeper into the clearing. The angles of his face sharpened in the dappled sunlight. He lifted his rifle and aimed at Luna.
Behind the bushes, Raven cringed, helpless and petrified and hating herself for it. What she wouldn’t give for her hunting rifle. She could take out the two of them in a matter of seconds.
Her empty hands curled into fists. She didn’t have a weapon worth anything. She was utterly useless.
“Not yet,” Oman said, almost apologetic. Ryker swung around and glared at him. Oman shrugged. “Cerberus wants to kill this one himself. You know how he is.”
Ryker sneered. “And how does he propose we bring her to him? On a leash?”
Oman pulled a tranq gun from his waistband. He shot Luna in the flank. She squealed and thrashed, but she was as helpless as Raven.
The wolf whimpered, twisting her beautiful, regal head. Her sharp eyes seemed to pierce straight through the underbrush. Luna fixed her amber gaze on Raven. Her eyes were full of confusion, fear, pain, and something else—something that looked a lot like recrimination, betrayal.
The same look her mother had given her the day Raven hurled I hate you at her. The day Raven had used her words like a weapon, meant to hurt, to destroy.
But she hadn’t meant to hurt Luna. She’d tried to save her. Tried—and failed.
A few tense moments later, the wolf slumped, unconscious.
“You wanna bring it back alive, you do the honors,” Ryker said, lip curling. He leaned lazily against an elm tree bare of leaves, arms crossed over his chest. “I sure as hell aren’t lifting a finger.”
He stood by and watched as Oman cut her down and tied her fore and hind paws together with rope. Oman squatted and slung the wolf’s limp body over his broad shoulders with a pained grunt.
The Headhunters crashed through the forest, heading back toward Haven. She watched them leave, the beautiful gray and brindled fur pelts on their backs rippling.
For several tortured minutes after the last sounds faded, Raven crouched there, her legs aching, her hands trembling, her pulse a roar in her ears.
They’d taken Luna. To slaughter her like a pig, to butcher her vibrant, wild beauty and reduce her to a flat, dead thing—a rug, a cape for some idiot to wear. And Raven had been forced to watch, impotent with helpless fury, utterly useless.
With the last gasp of power from her SmartFlex, she checked her GPS location. In her crippling exhaustion, the disorienting fog, and the confrontation with Vlad, she’d traveled less than four miles from Haven.
A low, despairing moan escaped her lips. She had been naive and incredibly, dangerously stupid. She had lowered her guard, letting herself believe they’d gone far enough to escape the threat of the Headhunters. Not even close.
She forced herself to stand on shaky legs.
The forest came alive with sounds—the breeze rustling the trees, the trilling of grasshoppers, birds chirping, tiny creatures creeping through dead leaves and dirt. She leaned against a pine tree to steady herself. Her hand came back sticky with sap. Blood still stained her fingernails, the creases of her palms.
She looked away.
Shadow was off scouting somewhere ahead. He didn’t know Luna had been taken. How would he react when he found out? Would he understand? What would he do? Would he hate Raven, too? Blame her?
What are you going to do?
She’d watched them kill Shika, Echo, Titus. Suki. Gizmo. Who knew how many others they’d managed to slaughter last night? Was Zephyr still alive? Kodiak and Sage? Electra?
She’d stood by and done nothing. Or so little it didn’t seem to matter at all.
Are you going to run?
She could. She should. She could still make it to the cabin in two days. She could survive there, alone. Wasn’t that what she’d wanted all along, from the beginning?
She was a loner. A nomad. Not made for anything but an isolated, solitary life, just like her father.
It was her original plan, after all, before Zachariah died. Before her father died. Before the Headhunters came and started killing. Before she’d tried to save Haven. Before Shadow and Luna had made her part of their pack.
She sank down against the pine tree, the bark scraping her back. The earth smelled dank and slightly rotten. She shifted. Mushrooms burst beneath her hands—slick, rubbery, crumbling. Like something dead and rotting.
Do what Nakamura women do best. Leave when the going gets tough.
She was only one girl.
She’d done everything she could. She’d released the animals from their cages. She’d stalked and wounded three Headhunters, driving the rest from the woods so the animals could flee.
She’d killed Jagger.
Hadn’t she already tried her best? Hadn’t she done enough?
No one will blame you for running.
No one would even know. The world was dead. Everyone she’d ever cared about was dead except maybe her mom. Did she even count?
Her mother had left. Her mother ran. When things got tough, she’d taken the easy way out.
Raven drew her legs up to her chest and wrapped her arms around herself. She lowered her head to her knee and moaned. Luna was just a wolf, just a wild animal.
But that wasn’t true, and she knew it, felt it in the deepest parts of herself.
Her mother had always claimed it was a mistake to ascribe human emotions to animals, especially wild animals. They were just genetics and instinct, her mother said. But she was wrong.
It wasn’t human emotion—it was simply emotion. And some emotions—joy, anger, fear, grief—transcended species. Animals could feel, could think, could remember. They were as much sentient beings as humans. Their lives held value, connection, beauty.
Luna’s life held value, connection, beauty.
What are you going to do?
If Raven did nothing, the Headhunters won.
The world outside was already destroyed, but it was the Headhunters who had destroyed Raven’s world. The Headhunters who stole her home, her food, who killed the animals she cared about—the animals she loved.
What are you going to do?
To go back to the lodge now…they would torture her, kill her…
Unless…
It was ludicrous to even consider it. Insane. Dangerous.
But not impossible.
If she was smart. If she was careful.
What are you going to do?
Once, she’d planned to run, to flee, to escape her problems. But that was a lifetime ago. She was someone else now. Someone better.
She wasn’t her father. She wasn’t her mother. She didn’t have to be either of them. She didn’t have to repeat her past.
The world might have shattered into a million pieces, she might be dying of the Hydra virus—but she wasn’t dead yet. She was still here.
Raven rose to her feet, steady this time.
She wasn’t leaving Luna behind.
35
It was dusk by the time Raven reached Haven again.
She skirted the perimeter of the park outside the wrought-iron fence and crouched in the underbrush near the front of the lodge, listening and waiting. Thick dark clouds roiled across the horizon. It would storm soon.
The Headhunters were moving around, loud and boisterous and angry. At least a dozen more motorcycles were parked along the drive at the entrance. The semi-truck had arrived. It was backed up to the food storage buildings, but the bikers hadn’t begun loading yet.
From what she could tell, the majority of them—twenty or so, all men—were crowded around the six picnic tables in front of the Grizzly Grill.
The men she’d wounded yesterday were hunched at one of the picnic tables, clutching bottles of bourbon they’d stolen from the restaurant’s bar. They’d also found the first aid kit. Their legs were bandaged. They�
��d probably received stim shots, too, to keep them upright for another day or two until…until when? Were there even any hospitals left?
Right now, she didn’t care. Their legs could rot off. She wished she’d had the guts to just kill them.
One picnic table was loaded with guns—mostly semi-automatic rifles, their handguns and hunting knives already holstered at their hips. They were preparing for something—a hunt.
The scent of cooking meat reached her nostrils. They were grilling. She could guess the meat.
Her stomach lurched. She forced herself to stay focused, to tamp down her rage until she could properly use it.
Raven shifted her position, creeping closer, and peeked over the top of a manicured row of bushes. She could just make out what covered the second and third tables.
More pelts, raw and stretched to dry. A bear pelt. It was facing her—she could just make out the white patch between the ears. It was—had been—Kodiak. Another wolf—she recognized Suki’s dark gray fur. Scorpio wore a collection of three fox pelts across his broad shoulders, the lush red tails rippling down his back.
Anger scorched through her, turning her veins to ash. How dare they? They didn’t have the right to steal those animals’ lives, to kill them. Zoe, Zelda, and Magnus had never hurt anyone in their lives. Kodiak and Sage were giant teddy bears. And the wolves—the wolves were primal beauty and grace in motion.
They were all beautiful—and the Headhunters had slaughtered them.
She forced herself to keep her attention on the Headhunters. She used her anger to force herself to focus. She couldn’t lose her edge, not now.
Cerberus held a chunk of grilled meat in his bare hands, ripping out chunks with his teeth. Juices dribbled down his chin. Scorpio laughed and took another swig of bourbon. Oman slumped at a picnic table, picking at his teeth with a twig.
Ryker wasn’t eating. He wasn’t smiling or laughing or swearing. He paced in a slow circle in front of the picnic tables, his movements languid and graceful.
