by Abby Weeks
“Tomorrow’s our first day traveling through the forest. It will be a long drive from here up to Fairbanks—about four hundred miles.”
“That’s a lot of forest,” Aisha said.
“No kidding. We’re about to start crossing one of the largest areas of untapped wilderness anywhere on earth. This isn’t like a national park back on the mainland. It’s not what you’d usually think of when someone talks about a forest. This is a vast area. If Alaska were placed over the Lower Forty-Eight, it would stretch from Florida in the South, to Minnesota and the Canadian border in the north. In the west, the outlying islands would reach California.”
Aisha nodded her head.
“All I’m saying is it’s a big area. Bigger than most of the world’s countries. And it’s almost completely devoid of human settlement. Apart from a few towns—this one, Fairbanks, a few other small settlements—this country belongs to the wild. There are things out there that no one’s even seen, that people other than northern woodsmen wouldn’t even believe.”
“Shifters?” Aisha said.
Hunter looked around the restaurant. “Don’t use that word,” he said sternly.
“Sorry,” Aisha said.
Heath cleared his throat. “Aisha, this isn’t like what you’re used to. People take things very seriously around here. You have to learn.”
The waitress arrived with their food and Aisha began digging in to her chicken and fries. She was starving. One thing was certain—Heath could be pleased that she’d lost some weight on this voyage.
“Aisha, do you know how to use a rifle?” Hunter said.
She shook her head.
“You’re going to have to learn. Tonight.”
“What on earth for?”
“It’s just a precaution,” Heath said.
“There are large animals out there,” Hunter said. “Predators. I’m not expecting trouble, but I’m planning for it. If our vehicle broke down, if we had an accident, we could be out there for days. There are literally hundreds of miles between settlements, Aisha. What if a bear attacked you? What if we found ourselves in a hostile wolf pack’s territory?”
Aisha felt sick to her stomach. This journey was just becoming more and more terrifying. When would it end? They hadn’t even arrived at Heath’s new post and already she was having to learn how to use a gun. They were talking about monsters and bogeymen and shifters. Where were they taking her? Why had she agreed to come?
She sat in front of her plate and couldn’t even eat the food. Heath ended up splitting her chicken with Hunter. They picked at her fries too. She told them she wasn’t hungry.
*
Chapter 36
WHEN THEY GOT BACK TO the motel, Heath and Hunter took the rifles from the rack in the back of the cruiser. Hunter had to unlock the rack with a key.
“It’ll be open from here on out,” he said.
He took three powerful rifles, one for each of them, and a box of cartridges. The men showed Aisha how to load the rifle and aim it. She held it up to her shoulder, holding it securely the way they showed her, and took aim at a No Parking sign across the motel lot. Behind the lot was nothing but forest. There were no cars between them and the sign.
“Won’t someone be alarmed if they hear gunshots?” Aisha said.
Hunter and Heath laughed.
“How many times does the man have to tell you,” Heath said, “you’re not in Kansas anymore, Toto.”
Aisha put the O in the No Parking sign between her crosshairs and carefully held the rifle in place.
“Be aware of your breathing,” Hunter said. “When you breathe in and out, you move. You want to be between breaths when you pull the trigger.”
Aisha breathed in, held her breath, and pulled the trigger. The sound of the gunshot shocked her. The recoil of the rifle against her shoulder knocked her back a little. She’d missed the sign.
“Good,” Hunter said.
“I missed.”
“You did all right. It was your first shot. I want you to try again. This time hold it steady when it recoils.”
Aisha aimed again, holding the rifle as securely as possible. She exhaled slowly, matching the crosshairs on the O of the sign with the motion of her breathing.
The bullet shot smoothly from the rifle. The recoil wasn’t nearly as bad when she was expecting it.
“Nice shot!” Heath cried.
She lowered the rifle and squinted at the sign. Her bullet had gone clear through the sign. It hadn’t gone through the center of the letter O, in fact it was right on the edge of the sign, close to the red border.
“I missed.”
“You did not miss,” Heath said. “That’s plenty accurate for hitting a wolf or a bear. And it’s no small distance either.”
“You’ll have to practice,” Hunter said. “The hard part is keeping your calm when a wild predator is charging at you.”
She took a few more practice shots before they put the guns away. Heath hadn’t fired a rifle recently, so he took a few warm-up shots too. Each one clanged as it struck the sign.
*
Chapter 37
THAT NIGHT FELT STRANGE. Aisha showered and came out of the bathroom in cotton pajamas. Heath was lying on one of the beds watching the television. Hunter had gone out in the cruiser.
“Where’d he go?” Aisha said.
“Where do you think?”
Aisha shrugged.
“He went to see about a woman.”
Aisha nodded. “Would it have killed him to wait till we got here to get laid?”
Heath laughed. She couldn’t understand how he could keep making so light of what had happened on the boat. He sat up and clicked off the TV.
“Aisha,” he said. “I don’t want you starting out our life in Alaska with hard feelings.”
“What do you mean, hard feelings?”
“You know exactly what I mean. That thing, what happened on the boat, that’s not as unusual as you think it is.”
Aisha shook her head. “What are you even talking about?”
“Think about it. Imagine the place we’re going. Imagine the places we’re going to pass through. What do you think these northern settlements are like?”
“Little towns, muddy streets, snowy forests full of wild animals. I get it, Heath. That doesn’t make what you and Hunter did to me okay.”
“Picture this,” Heath said, “a mining outpost in the north, hundreds of miles from the closest town, fifty men stationed there, and three women.”
“What are you trying to say, Heath? Because I’m not buying it.”
“I’m not saying anything. I’m trying to justify what happened. I’m just telling you that sometimes, that’s the way things are. What do you think is going to happen to those three women on the mining outpost?”
“I think they’re going to be treated fairly, with respect, like they deserve.”
Heath rolled his eyes. “Listen, if any woman gets herself into the position of being alone with fifty men in a place like that, she’s getting exactly what she deserves.”
Aisha got under the blankets.
“Come on, honey. Don’t be like that. I’m just trying to prepare you.”
“Leave me alone,” she said.
He put his strong hands around her waist and pulled her toward him. She resisted and he tried to pull down the pants of her pajamas.
“I mean it, Heath,” she said. “Get your filthy hands off me or I’ll call the Anchorage Police. I’m sure they have a more civilized view of things than you and Hunter seem to.”
*
Chapter 38
MUCH LATER THAT NIGHT, ABOUT two or three in the morning, Hunter came stumbling into the bedroom. He knocked over a lamp and woke Heath and Aisha.
“Sorry,” he said, more loudly than was necessary.
Aisha turned over to get back to sleep. She could smell the alcohol on Hunter even across the room.
“You find her?” Heath said.
“I found
her,” Hunter slurred. “Bitch wouldn’t let me in.”
“Well,” Heath sighed, “that’s the way it goes sometimes.”
Hunter sat heavily on the other bed.
“Missy,” he said.
Aisha shut her eyes tight. He could go to hell if he thought he was getting any attentions from her. If he had women trouble, that was his problem.
“Missy,” Hunter said again, louder.
“Tell him to leave me alone,” Aisha said to Heath.
“Let her sleep,” Heath said. “We’ve got a big day tomorrow.”
“Bitch wouldn’t even talk to me,” Hunter said, mumbling to himself. “Wouldn’t even let me in the door.”
Aisha pulled the blanket up over her face.
“Come on, Heath. Send her over to me. I’ll send her right back.”
“Let her be, Hunter. She’s still sore at me for the other night.”
Hunter sighed. He slumped back on his bed, his clothes and boots still on, and started snoring loudly.
*
Chapter 39
THE FOLLOWING MORNING, AISHA WAS surprised to see that Hunter was the first one up. He’d loaded the vehicle, purchased some supplies for the journey, and checked them out of the motel. By the time Aisha got out of the shower, everything was good to go.
“About last night,” Hunter said in the car.
“Don’t worry about it,” Heath said.
Aisha rolled her eyes. These guys were acting like they were from a different century. Hunter looked at Aisha in the rearview mirror. She moved so that he wouldn’t be able to see her in it.
“You guys hungry?” he said.
Heath nodded. Hunter pulled in at a McDonalds drive-thru on the way out of the city and they ate on the road.
“Might as well get comfortable,” Hunter said. “We’ve got a solid eight hours till we get to Fairbanks.”
Aisha put her feet up on the backseat. She was glad she at least had the back to herself. She looked out the window at the passing scenery. As they made their way out of the environs of Anchorage, she saw just how remote and isolated things could get. Within half an hour there were no buildings, no power lines, nothing to show human incursion other than the thin strip of the highway. She looked at the sky and saw no jet streams. Spruce and cedar stretched as far as she could see, a heavy coating of snow on their branches.
She looked at the rifles in the rack behind her.
“Can I fire one from the vehicle?” she said.
Hunter shrugged. “Make sure no one’s coming the other way.”
So few cars had passed that she felt completely safe taking the gun from the rack and propping it up on her lap. As soon as she opened the window, freezing air filled the car.
“What are you aiming for?” Heath said.
She looked out across the field. There was a large boulder a few hundred feet away.
“That rock,” she said.
She drew a bead on the rock and fired. A moment later, a tiny cloud of chalk dust rose up from the boulder.
“Nice shot,” Heath said.
“She’s got a knack for shooting,” Hunter said.
As the hours passed, Heath and Hunter switched positions, taking turns driving. Hunter was eager to make it at least to Fairbanks by nightfall. He would have liked to make it all the way to Dead Wolf, but they didn’t get as early a start as he’d wanted, probably because he’d gotten so drunk the night before.
Aisha sat quietly in the back most of the way. When she was hungry she had some of the snacks Hunter had bought that morning. She wanted to get a feel for the terrain they were passing through so she took careful note of everything. She noticed the forest become more rugged and remote the farther they drove. She also kept an eye out for wildlife and was amply rewarded. She saw bears, wolves, all sorts of deer, eagles, falcons, even beaver and moose. The forest was teeming with wildlife. She took it as a good sign. With that many animals around, there would be a lot of work for a girl who knew her way around a veterinary clinic.
“There’s another wolf,” she said after spotting three within two minutes of driving.
“Their numbers have been increasing steadily in these parts,” Hunter said. “It’s been a cause for concern actually. In most towns they’ll give you a fifty dollar bounty for wolf pelts just to try and keep the numbers down.”
“That’s horrible.”
“Like I told you a million times, these parts are different to what you’re used to. Up here, it’s the humans that are the endangered species. Wolves outnumber humans a thousand to one in these forests.”
“We should be shooting them from the cruiser,” Heath said.
“No,” Aisha said.
“They’re aggressive too,” Hunter continued. “They’ll attack anyone. They see people as an intrusion on their territory. Especially once you get north of Fairbanks. It’s like they decided that was the dividing line. People could settle south of the town, but any farther north, and you’d do well to shoot any wolf you see on sight. They’re a real menace.”
“They don’t attack people unprovoked.”
“Yes they do, missy.”
“That doesn’t make any sense.”
“And you’re an expert?”
“I’ve worked with wolves down in Washington. I worked for an animal clinic.”
“This ain’t the world you knew. It just ain’t. The wolves up here will attack a whole team of men if they think they can get the better of them. You just wait and you’ll see.”
*
Chapter 40
IT WAS ABOUT THREE IN the afternoon when they saw the lonely sign welcoming them to Fairbanks, Alaska. The sun was already beginning to set.
“It’s getting dark,” Aisha said.
“Sun sets early this far north.”
“This is early,” she said. “Did it set this early yesterday?”
“Not quite, but we were five hundred miles farther south yesterday.”
It was just one more thing that Aisha was going to have to learn to live with if she was going to make her home up here.
“How far are we from the Arctic Circle?” she said.
“That’s still a little ways farther north,” Hunter said. “Where we’re headed, Dead Wolf, that’s almost right on the line.”
“We’re going to live in the Arctic Circle?” Aisha said.
Heath shrugged. “What difference does that make?”
Aisha didn’t know.
*
Chapter 41
THERE WAS NO QUESTION OF pushing on beyond Fairbanks. Hunter wouldn’t even consider driving farther north in the dark.
“It would be asking for trouble,” he said.
They drove into downtown Fairbanks and Aisha saw for the first time what she could expect from her new life. Where they were headed would be three or four hours north of here on a dirt road that was difficult to travel most of the year. But she still figured she’d be able to make it into this town every once in a while.
“Is that the supermarket?” she said when they passed a plain brown brick building with a red Fred Meyer’s sign over the entrance.
“That’s it,” Hunter said.
“I remember that place,” Heath said. “Brings back memories of my mother.”
Aisha knew Heath and his mother hadn’t seen eye to eye. She’d died after he moved south.
“It looks like a government building.”
“You’ll find most things are pretty practical in these parts,” Heath said.
“There’s a Walmart across town,” Hunter said, as if that made up for everything that might be missing from Fred Meyer’s.
Aisha knew she’d be roughing it from now on, so she was eager to know just how many comforts might be available.
“Is there a mall?”
Hunter laughed. “Depends what you mean by mall?” he said. “I’ll tell you what there is. There’s a Northern Ridge company supply depot. We can go there right now and get you two some more suitable cloth
ing.”
“Will it be open?” Heath said.
“Someone will be there.”
All three of them were exhausted, but the idea of getting warmer clothes was too tempting to put off till tomorrow. They drove up to the supply depot and entered a small door that led to an office.
“Harry,” Hunter called out.
There was a bell on the counter and he rang it. Harry was an older overweight man with long white hair and a long beard. He looked more like a biker than an Alaskan frontiersman.
“What have we got here?” he said.
When he saw Aisha he grinned widely. “Well, gentlemen, you didn’t tell me you were bringing company.”
“Very funny,” Hunter said. “What have you got to kit these two out? They’re fresh from Washington State. I don’t think they’re prepared for the type of weather we see around these parts.”
Harry measured them up by sight and went back to the store room. He returned with two bundles, one for Heath and one for Aisha. Aisha opened hers and looked through it. It contained fleece-lined snow boots, a down-filled arctic-rated coat that went to her knees, and a matching white hat and gloves.
“This is so great,” she said as she put on the coat. “Oh my God, thank you so much.”
Heath was pretty pleased too. While Aisha’s garments were white, his were dark gray. “This is literally a lifesaver in these parts,” he said.
“You can each choose a rifle from the rack there,” he said, pointing to a long gun rack behind him.
Heath and Aisha passed the counter and began examining the guns. They weren’t brand new, but they were quality rifles, only the best and most reliable models, and they each picked one they liked. Aisha’s seemed older, something from a few decades ago, with a hand-carved wooden handle and an older loading mechanism.
“Will this one serve me well?” she said.
“Doubt there’s a better rifle ever made in this country,” Harry said to her.
There were a few other things they could help themselves too—compasses, army knives, and canteens. They loaded up and went back out to the car.
“Score,” Heath said.
Aisha had to agree. There were advantages to living somewhere as rugged as this, it seemed. People knew what you needed to survive, and there was little choice other than to give it to you. Otherwise you’d be dead before they got any work out of you.
