A Wolf's Quest

by Hannah Steenbock

  “And who is this you brought along?”

  Sylvia smiled at me. “Grandpa, meet Ben. He helped me out of a nasty scrape, and so I gave him a lift down here.”

  I gave Sylvia’s grandpa a nod, and he walked around the car, his hand extended.

  “I’m Theo. Thanks for helping Sylvie.”

  We shook hands, something I usually avoid. But in this case, I wanted to be polite.

  “I’m just glad I could, Sir.”

  He nodded at that.

  “Grandpa, Ben has no place to stay tonight, and I thought we owe him dinner, at least.”

  He smiled. “There is the sofa, as well, son.”

  It seemed there was no way out of it. Well, I could always disappear at night, I thought. “Thank you, Sir.”

  “Come in, come in. Eric is already setting the table, dinner’s in the oven, waiting for you.”

  He took Sylvia’s suitcase out of the trunk and carried it into the house, shooing us in ahead of him.

  It was a typical farmhouse, the kitchen and dinner table taking up most of the ground floor, with a sofa and two armchairs sitting in front of an old TV. It probably didn’t see much use, considering the workload on most farms. Then I reminded myself that I hadn’t seen any animals.

  The young man who must be Eric took a look at me and quickly added another plate and silverware to the table, setting it for four.

  That explained the lack of a woman’s touch, I thought, with just two men living here.

  “Hello, Cuz!” Eric went to enfold Sylvia in a hug, and now I know who he was. He gave me a nod, and I returned it, doing my best to be as friendly as possible. And decided that I’d disappear as soon as everyone was asleep. I didn’t belong in this family.

  Sylvia took off her jacket and hung it on a hook next to the door, and I copied her, doing my best to fit in.

  Eric pulled the pots with dinner out of the oven while Theo poured water into glasses and distributed cans of beer. I could smell grilled chicken, home-made fries and green beans and my mouth watered.

  “Sit, sit!” Theo waved us to the table, and we each sat at a side. I was glad I got to sit with my back to the sofa, it felt safest.

  Sylvia smiled at me with almost maternal pride, which made me laugh inside. And I still wanted to sneak away at night, even knowing it would hurt her.

  The food tasted as well as it smelled, and I stopped after a few bites in and smiled at Theo.

  “This is excellent, Sir. Thank you so much for having me.”

  “You’re welcome. Eric has become quite the cook.” He beamed at his grandson.

  When we had eaten all the food and cleared the plates, Theo refilled the water carafe, while Eric pulled ice cream out of the freezer and dished it out.

  I stuck to the water, glad that Theo was refilling my glass, and I nodded my thanks. Ice cream was a rare treat, even though it was just plain vanilla with some chocolate crumbs that Eric had strewn on top of every dish.

  Sylvia was just telling a story about her roommate at college, when my stomach cramped. I hid a groan, but just a moment later, dizziness struck me and the world started turning. I grabbed the table, just as pure terror swept through me.

  Theo’s sharp eyes settled on me and narrowed.

  “Something I ate,” I managed to mutter, feeling worse from moment to moment. I knew it wasn’t the food. It was poison.

  Sylvia stared at me. “Ben?”

  I got up, intending to grab my backpack and run, but I only made it past the chair before my knees gave out.

  Eric jumped up and grabbed me.

  “Ben!” Sylvia ran around the table, while Theo simply sat there, watching me, his eyes intense.

  He knew, I thought, although thinking got more and more difficult. He knew what I was. Horror filled me, even as Eric and Sylvia dragged me to the sofa.

  Sylvia was draping a blanket over me, making it even harder for me to escape. Did she know what she was doing?

  Her eyes were filled with worry and compassion.

  “I’m so sorry,” she said, sounding confused. She knew what we had been eating and that it was unlikely to cause me problems. “Please, sleep it off.”

  I managed a nod, doing my best to keep up the pretense, but the poison was working its way through my system, making me shiver and sweat.

  Through the haze of the poison, I watched them finish desert, watched Theo and Eric comfort Sylvia, watched them turn off the lights and walk upstairs to their bedrooms.

  With icy and stiff fingers, I clawed the blanket off me. I crawled across the floor to my backpack that was still leaning next to the front door.

  I had to get away, it was now or never.

  Shaking from head to toe, I managed to pull myself up on my feet and sling the backpack over one shoulder. The door creaked a little when I opened it, but I had to risk that.

  Once outside, I tried to pull up the wolf, to find just a little bit of strength, but the poison prevented most of it. Even so, I staggered towards the workshop, and the forest that lay behind it, inviting me, beckoning to me, promising safety.

  I had almost reached the workshop when a hard hand grabbed my shoulder and spun me around.

  “Not so fast, monster.”

  Chapter 4

  Sylvia

  I wasn’t sure what woke me, a scream or a flash of intense pain, but both assaulted my senses the moment I opened my eyes. I very quickly noticed that the pain wasn’t my own, and it faded just a moment later.

  The scream repeated.

  I pushed back the covers, pulled on jeans and a t-shirt, took another few seconds to put on my sneakers and ran out of the house.

  Another scream, from the direction of the workshop. The lights were on, as well, and now I heard a slapping sound, followed by a gasp.

  My heart beat faster. Was was going on there?

  I crept across the yard, staying in the shadows. Finally, I was able to peek around the corner, through the open door, and my heart stopped.

  Grandpa was whipping someone they had tied across the front of Eric’s old truck. While I was watching, another lash fell, and I heard another suppressed scream. Blood trickled down the man’s muscular back, staining the top of his jeans.

  Then Grandpa rammed his knee into the man’s buttocks, eliciting a pained grunt.

  I felt sick. Whoever it was they were beating up didn’t deserve what they were doing.

  A moment later, I noticed Ben’s backpack sitting in a corner, and then I understood. My heart froze.

  My family was beating up my guest. But why?

  “Talk,” Grandpa growled. “Where are they?”

  The man shook his head, and now I could see it was really Ben. I had hoped against hope that I had made a mistake.

  More lashes.

  I retreated, unable to stand watching this horror.

  They were torturing Ben, the man who had defended me from the creep, who had treated me so gently and with such care. Who had collapsed after dinner, for some mysterious reason. And they were killing him.

  I shook, leaning against the wall, biting my lip so hard that I tasted blood. What could I do?

  Another lash, a moan, then silence.

  “Damn. He’s out of it.” That was Eric’s voice.

  “Get the cat over here.” Grandpa, his voice calm, as if he were discussing a repair job. “They are tough. It takes time to make one talk.”

  I heard the chain rattle, heard a groggy moan and another grunt.

  “Get his hands on his back.” More orders from Grandpa.

  The chain rattled again, another moan.

  “Put these on his ankles.”

  I heard movement and dared to sneak up again to see what was happening.

  They had cuffed Ben’s hands behind his back and hooked them to the cat’s chain, pulling him up that way. He was barely conscious, swaying on his feet, bending over to ease the strain on his shoulders.

  As I watched, Eric slammed his knee into Ben’s stomach, and
my guest lost his footing, screaming as his shoulder took his weight.

  Grandpa lowered the cat until Ben was lying on the ground. He slowly pulled his legs closer, trying to curl up on his side, his head lolling, his eyes closed.

  Eric was fastening a rope to his ankles, while Grandpa did the same to his wrists. They ran the ropes through grommets on the wall, hooked them to the cat, and then Grandpa started the cat’s motor and pulled them up.

  The ropes tightened until Ben was stretched out on the floor, hands pulled out behind his back. He was moaning with the pain in his shoulders, and I could practically feel it.

  Eric kicked him in the stomach again, and Ben squirmed and retched helplessly.

  “Leave him for now,” Grandpa said. “Maybe his memory will return. Pain can do that to his kind.” He chuckled, a terrible sound.

  Eric laughed. “I want a beer.”

  “Sure.”

  I retreated back into the shadows and waited until they had walked across the yard and into the house. Through the open kitchen window I could hear Eric open the fridge and then pop the lid on a can of beer. The clink of ice cubes in a glass told me that Grandpa was going for whiskey.

  Shaking from head to toe, I crept into the workshop. They had left the lights blazing, and so I could see Ben’s back clearly, crisscrossed with bleeding lines.

  “Ben?” I didn’t dare more than whisper.

  A little sigh.

  I bit my lip. Having to decide between my family and Ben was a terrible choice. But I couldn’t let them torture him. And with luck, they wouldn’t suspect me if I made it back into bed in time.

  I gritted my teeth, knelt at his back and untied the rope from his wrists. I couldn’t open the handcuffs, but at least I could remove the strain on his shoulders.

  It took less time to untie the rope on his ankles, Eric had been careless, as usual.

  When I hurried to kneel close to his chest, he was already looking at me, his eyes dark, filled with pain.

  “Sylvie, don’t get involved.” His voice was hoarse, but I didn’t care.

  “I can’t let them beat you,” I hissed. “Can you get away?”

  He swallowed hard, lifting his head, trying to sit up, then his eyes cleared a little. “Maybe.”

  “I don’t have the keys to the cuffs.”

  The corners of his mouth lifted in a weak smile, just as he closed his eyes. “No problem.”

  I could see his shoulders move, saw his arms strain, and suddenly, he smiled a little more and showed me his hands. A broken chain dangled from the cuffs.

  A moment later, he had broken the chain between the cuffs on his ankles.

  “Now get back to bed, Sylvie,” he said, his eyes on me, lifting one hand to gently touch my cheek.

  “I’m so…”

  He put a finger on my lips. “Shh. Go and let me get away.”

  “You’re hurt.”

  “I’ll be all right.”

  I stood and offered him a hand to pull him to his feet, and he took it. He was heavier than I expected, and the way he swayed on his feet worried me.

  In just a moment, he would be gone, and I would never see him again. On impulse, I put both my hands on his face, avoiding the cut and bruise on his cheekbone, leaning in to kiss him, intending it to be a farewell and the apology I couldn’t voice.

  His lips met mine, and fire surged through my veins.

  Instantly, his gray-blue eyes shone with something I couldn’t quite fathom, and he put one hand behind my head and the other behind my shoulders, pressing me close to him for a few heartbeats, while his tongue caressed mine.

  Then he lifted his head, listened for a moment and touched my cheek again. I knew this was good bye, and my heart ached.

  “Be safe, Sylvie. Go now.”

  I stepped away from him, listening for the voices of Eric and Grandpa. They were still in the house, I could hear Eric’s high pitched laughter.

  “Go.” His voice barely reached my ears.

  I walked out of the workshop, slipping around its corner into the darkness, giving my eyes time to adjust to it again. I heard a twig snap, and then Ben was gone.

  Gritting my teeth, I crept around the house, ready to sneak into the back when Eric and Grandpa left to head back to the workshop. They must not know that I had freed Ben.

  As I was waiting, I heard a howl from the forest, and a shiver ran down my back. It was deeper than the coyote howls I was familiar with, and something in it spoke to me.

  Grandpa hurried out of the front door, closely followed by Eric.

  “Did you hear that?”

  The howl was repeated, and both of them rushed to the workshop. I heard them cursing as I dashed into the house and hurried up the stairs to curl up in my bed.

  I couldn’t sleep. I had so many questions, and not one of them would be answered any time soon.

  Chapter 5

  Ben

  Sylvie hadn’t betrayed me.

  It was ridiculous how much that mattered to me, even if I could hardly think after that beating and with the poison in my blood.

  Instead, she had freed me, and that mattered most. She had also bought the show I had put on, and I was glad it had worked. I didn’t want her to know how much Theo and Eric had truly hurt me, they were her family, after all, and she already felt guilty as hell.

  So I lurched through the forest, stumbling every few steps as my legs refused to work properly. I howled once, more to let her know I got away than anything else.

  That kiss had been intense and painful, mostly because my body reacted to it with shocking eagerness and it still hurt from getting slammed repeatedly into that darn grill of that ancient banger they had tied me to. It had also been more than just an idle kiss, although I had not time to sort through that right now.

  The biggest problem was that the poison was also reducing my ability to heal fast to almost nothing. At least I had been able to call up enough wolf to break those chains, although their remains were still adorning my wrists and ankles. And that little stunt had taken all strength I had left.

  I knew I needed help, especially after stumbling through the forest for hours, getting as far away as I possibly could. They would get bloodhounds first thing in the morning to track me. Yet I had told them the truth, I had no idea where a pack lair was around these parts.

  Even shifting was out of the question with that poison still running through my body, and I couldn’t leave my backpack behind anyway, not with that precious family heirloom tucked into it.

  So I did the only thing left to me. I climbed another hill, clung to another tree and howled again, praying that the right person would hear me.

  Common sense returned a little after that, and I stumbled down the hill, catching myself on trees more often than not. If help arrived, it would most likely be in a car, not on four feet.

  Halfway to the bottom, I stopped to howl again, bringing the wolf up for it, adding a tiny note of despair, before walking some more.

  There was a road down there, I realized, curving along the valley. And no house nearby, a perfect spot for picking up an injured wolf.

  If anyone had heard me.

  I had my doubts, our kind is not common anymore, and we do our best to stay below the radar. I knew there were some around here, but we never keep details of dens lying around where others can find them.

  The only good thing of our house going up in flames was the fact that literally everything burned, leaving no traces of our contacts or extended family.

  I clung to another tree and howled again, then sank to the ground, shuddering with exhaustion and lingering pain. It was as good a place to rest as any others, few people were likely to come along this deep into a forest in the middle of the night.

  I saw the lights of the car before I heard it. It came up the road and turned into a spot of gravel on the curve more or less below me.

  Maybe they were coming to help me.

  If not, I needed a plan. It was hard to think throu
gh the poison and the pain, but I lifted my head and forced some thoughts.

  There was a brook running through the meadow at the bottom of the hill. I thought I saw a few fences, as well, but water was always a good idea to shake off the hounds. And if I could have shifted and run, I’d be far away already, but that poison made it impossible. As those bastards had known only too well.

  Someone got out of the car.

  And then she opened her mouth and made the yipping sounds a wolf makes when greeting young members of the pack.

  I almost fainted with relief.

  Climbing back to my feet was a challenge, as my body had gone stiff after kneeling for so long. I stumbled out from under the bushes and practically slid down the incline to the gravel spot, barely avoiding landing at her feet. Instead, I managed to stay upright a little longer, swaying in front of her.

  “So,” she said, her voice gentle, her back straight, showing her steely side despite the white hair trying to escape from a bun. “How did you get lost in here?”

  Answering that big a question was beyond me.

  “Looking for help,” I muttered. “Hunters got me.”

  She looked me up and down, obviously noticing I never put my shirt back on. I pulled up a bit of the wolf to let her see, and she nodded, allowing her eyes to go yellow for a moment.

  Relief was so strong that my knees buckled, and I ended up in a heap at her feet, after all.

  “Carl,” she barked, and a man hurried out of the car, gently removed the backpack, threw it into the trunk and then dragged me into the backseat of the car.

  I couldn’t suppress a moan when pain erupted in my shoulders.

  He hissed when he saw my back and helped me lean my side against the back of the seat. The world had started to spin around me, and I only managed to cling to consciousness by keeping the wolf close.

  A door banged shut, and I flinched. She slipped into the back from the other side of the car, sat next to me and took one of my hands.

  “You’re safe now,” she said, as Carl started the car. “Hang on just a little longer, if you can.”

  “Who…?” I tried to ask, but only a croak came out.