Blood for Wolves

by Taft, Nicole

  They removed me from of the chamber. Behind me, Wolf spoke.

  “Now that I have proved my loyalty, my Mistress, would you be so kind as to remove this?”

  We traveled back through the halls before they dumped me into my cell again. I crawled up to sit on the stone ledge protruding from the wall. I buried my head in my hands and tried to stop crying. I wanted to shake him, shake him until he couldn’t see straight and scream “Why?” into his face over and over until I got an answer. I peered through my tears at the cell door. It looked more like a fence, made of wood. I let my head drop. I was still wearing Wolf’s coat. I had half a mind to take it off and throw it across the room.

  “Caroline?”

  I looked outside the cell door again. “Alex?”

  “Jesus. Thank God. It is you. Are you okay? Are you hurt?”

  “No. I’m all right.” The biggest lie in the history of mankind. My body felt like it was freezing and burning up at the same time. My heart had been split in half like a ripe peach.

  “God, I thought they were torturing you up there.”

  My screaming. “No. I was just…” I choked on a sob and tried to swallow it. “Wolf…”

  “What? Is he hurt?”

  I shook my head as though Alex could see me. “He’s a traitor.”

  “What?”

  “He led us here. He was…on their side. All along.”

  “He’s working for them?”

  Not thinking, I nodded and said nothing.

  Alex took my silence as a yes. “That son of a bitch. But…we saved his life!”

  I didn’t want to talk about it anymore. “Where’s Marianne?”

  “She’s in here with me, hiding under my coat.”

  I leaned back against the curved wall of the cell and wiped tears out of my eyes. Time to be strong. I couldn’t crack now. We had to find a way out of here.

  “Marianne?” I called. She didn’t respond. “Marianne, I’m so sorry honey. I’m not a very good Guardian, am I? I keep getting you into all these awful situations.”

  A meek voice barely made it to my ears. “It’s not your fault.”

  I almost started crying again, but managed to keep it under control. “I should have listened to you about the wolves.”

  For a long time we were silent. The only sound the crackling of fire torches and the occasional shuffle of a werewolf passing by.

  Then Marianne said, “My mama used to say to me that sometimes bad things happened because they had to. Otherwise we wouldn’t know anything. She said it’s because of the bad things that we learn.”

  I almost smiled. Wise little fairy ring girl. I stared out through the wooden slats.

  “Your mama is a smart woman,” I told her. We’re going to get out of here. I’m going to get us out of here if it’s the last thing I do. The old witch’s words echoed in my ears. “You will stop reaching for the stars and wait until the end of time and cry in the dark. Or perhaps the opposite will be true.”

  Well I certainly wasn’t going to sit and cry in the dark. No one was coming for me. Fine. I was used to being on my own as it was. Besides, I was Marianne’s Guardian, damn it, and I was going to do things right for once.

  I rummaged through the pockets in Wolf’s coat. Each one seemed to have something. His map. A length of twine. Wilted lavawort. Dried gum leaves. My matches. The bastard stole them! Pieces of jerky wrapped in an oil-stained cloth. The small pouch of iron filings.

  I gazed around the cell. It had a domed shape, made of stone aside from the door. The door itself looked old, but not old enough. I got up to rap on the wood. Sturdy. No amount of brute force would work on it. In the far corner sat a trough of murky water that had probably been there since the place was constructed. I went over the items in my mind. A crazy, half-baked plan began forming. I had no idea whether or not it would work, but figured I had no other choice but to try. I pressed my face against the wood slats. Neither Alex nor I had guards. All I needed was for the werewolves to stop patrolling or whatever it was they were doing. A passing werewolf snarled at me. I gave him the finger.

  The moment the area was clear, I pulled out the matches and lit one. I held it under the wood of the door. If I could get the whole thing on fire, they’d have to let me out. And if they didn’t, the door would burn down and I could get through. Absurd, but it was all I had.

  Except the wood refused to burn. Under the weak flame of the match, it charred but didn’t catch. I swore to myself. There had to be some way of getting this to work. I needed a stronger flame, a more sustained burn. Cloth! The dried lavawort and gum leaves!

  I started going through the coat again when a set of werewolves showed up. The lock to Alex’s door opened.

  “No!” Alex yelled. “Get away from her!”

  Marianne screamed. I plastered myself to the door.

  “What are they doing?” I shouted. “Alex? Marianne?”

  I kicked the wooden slats, but they didn’t budge. I switched tactics and heaved my shoulder against them, backing up several steps each time and slamming into them with all the force I could gather. The locks clicked again and Marianne’s crying soon faded away. I shouted angrily and crashed into the door again.

  “Caroline! Caroline, stop!” Alex yelled.

  Perhaps he was afraid I’d hurt myself, but I didn’t care. I had to get out. I had to get Marianne away from that bitch. Away from Wolf. Out of here. To safety. It was my job.

  “Care, stop! What is she going to do?”

  “There’s a woman. Wolf called her Mistress. She’s in charge of all the werewolves.” I kicked at the door fiercely one last time. “She wants to start a war between wolves and humans, and she wants all the wolves to become werewolves. She thinks it’s great being an all powerful werewolf or something.”

  “So why does she want Marianne?”

  My gaze darted around my cell. There had to be something in here I could use. “She said something about Marianne being the one to break some curse that wolves are under. She wants to put me and Marianne into some kind of magic coma so we can’t interfere, and no one like us will ever be born again.”

  I spotted my pack, lying sad and neglected under the stone bed. I guessed they’d thrown it in after finding nothing of use. Suddenly an idea struck me.

  I snatched up the pack and tore open the back to get to the aluminum stay bar. I pulled it out, a piece of shining metal curved to fit against my back and better help me carry the pack. It would bend, and if I turned it the right way, I might get my idea to work. I had no idea if it would, but I sure as hell would try. If there was one thing every camper and hiker trusted out in the woods, it was their equipment. I used the stone ledge to bend the strip of aluminum one way, then another to form a step-like shape. Then I slipped over to the edge of the door and reached through the slats with the stay, feeling around for the locks. If I could hook it just right…

  Left, left, right, up. The bar locks clanked together as I manipulated the stay, trying to slow the beating of my heart. Focus, Caroline, focus. Left, left, right, up.

  “Caroline, what are you doing?”

  I ignored Alex for the moment and kept working. Each angle, each turn was difficult to handle. I couldn’t see what I was doing. I hoped the noise wouldn’t alert anyone. I panted, pressing into the door, forcing the stay around.

  “Come on,” I breathed. “Come on…”

  The latch fell out of place and the door swung open. I waited a few minutes to see if anyone came, but the area remained silent. Then another thought hit me. I tore off Wolf’s coat long enough to pull off my t-shirt. I shouldered my pack again and rushed over to Alex’s cell.

  I lifted, turned, and pushed back the bar locks and opened Alex’s door. He gaped at me.

  “Holy hell Care, how did you get out?”

  “Never mind, we have to save Marianne and get the hell out of here.”

  “There are werewolves all over this place. How are we supposed to get out?”

&
nbsp; I held up my shirt. “I’ll throw this down a hall to confuse their senses. I might smell more like Wolf in this coat.” I shoved the stay at him. “Use this as a weapon.”

  “What about you?”

  “I have an idea. Follow me.”

  I ran down the spiral walkway to the area below, keeping my eyes peeled for any guards. I looked around. A huge cauldron of something cooked over the fire pit. The bubbling liquid smelled surprisingly good. I was making everything up as I went, but we didn’t have much choice. A wooden spoon as long as me lay on a table. I shoved the end of it into the coals until it blazed away. I gazed around for a moment at the tapestries hanging from the walls. Some were at least thirty feet long, attached to thick wood beams that stretched across the ceiling. That’ll do.

  I ran over to a tapestry and held the spoon turned torch under it.

  “Care, what are you doing?”

  “They’re all at whatever ceremony that werewoman is performing on Marianne. We need some kind of diversion to get them away from her and to keep them busy so we can get out.”

  The tapestry flared and I ran to the next one. Within minutes, the four around us were engulfed in flames. We ran up the slope again, but before I took Alex to the sorceress’s chamber, I threw my shirt as hard as I could down another hallway. Alex followed suit and flung his hat after it. We sprinted up the stairs, relying on my memory of coming down after being captured. Heat radiated up from the lower room as the fire caught on other things. Tendrils of smoke crawled up the ceiling. They should smell it soon…

  We were about twenty feet from the chamber when roars echoed down the stairs. We ducked into a side hall, scrambling down it to hide behind the curved wall. Werewolves raced down the hall we’d just stood in, snarling and swearing. I hoped they all ran into a backdraft. One at the end of the pack stopped near our hall, the others charging on without him. He inhaled long and hard. His eyes narrowed. He started to creep down our hall, sniffing amidst the smoke that now billowed up the stairwell. I suddenly shoved the fiery spoon at Alex and took the stay, reaching into a pocket to grab the pouch of lead filings. I grabbed a handful.

  The werewolf came around the corner, and I flung the lead into his eyes. Before he could make a sound, Alex smashed the heavy spoon into his muzzle. His jaw cracked loudly and went slack. A second strike to his face dropped him onto the stone.

  “Okay, let’s go,” Alex said, peering up into the empty stairway.

  I stared down at the bloodied, broken jawed creature. A nasty inclination to set him on fire crawled over me.

  “Caroline!”

  I snapped out of my fiery reverie. I darted around Alex and continued leading him up the stairs to the main chamber. This whole building was big and confusing, but I remembered well enough we’d gone through her chamber when we came in. Escape had to be that way too.

  “What is all this nonsense?” the sorceress yelled. I guessed we’d interrupted her during whatever ceremony she’d concocted for Marianne. I hoped we weren’t too late.

  We peeked around the corner into the main chamber. The Mistress stood in front of her chair as before, with Marianne opposite her on the other side of the fire. Wolf stood off to the side, hands clasped behind his back, looking stern but unperturbed. His nostrils flared, and for a second I panicked. Could he smell me? Would he look this way and attack? But he did nothing.

  “What do you mean, fire?” the Mistress snapped. Communicating through the ankle collars. “Then put it out!”

  “What do we do?” Alex whispered in my ear.

  “I don’t care how big it is!” the Mistress said.

  My mind felt like it was running a million miles a minute. I didn’t have enough magic items to make any use of them that I knew of. I gazed at the tapestries. I didn’t know what this woman could do, but she certainly wasn’t rushing down to put out a fire that was going to engulf her entire fortress. The idea tickled the back of my mind. I glanced around and found a sharp point of stone jutting from the wall.

  “Okay. I’m going to set these on fire like the other ones. Then I want you to get Marianne while I keep her busy. She said my blood was poisonous. One of the werewolves licked me and died.” I ignored Alex’s aghast look. “I’ll get as close as I can to her while you get Marianne. She can’t use any dangerous spells on someone in close proximity without damaging herself. Besides, she wants the two of us alive.” I hoped all the things I’d read in those books about magic were right.

  “What about him?” Alex said, nodding at Wolf.

  “Never mind him. Just get out. If I don’t get away, then just take Marianne back to our world. Find the pond. Get her out of here. They’re just going to keep following her. You can hide her better in our world.”

  Alex shook his head. “This is crazy.”

  I clapped him on the shoulder. “I know.”

  I edged the spoon forward. The flames were dying on it now, but they were still strong enough to do the job. I inched it behind one of the tapestries while the sorceress ranted at her werewolves and Wolf looked on, seemingly indifferent. The tapestry caught. I slammed my hand onto the fragment of stone in the wall, slicing open my palm. I ground my teeth together, trying to ignore the pain as I swept my bleeding hand over my face and the coat, and then all over Alex.

  “Go help those idiots!” Mistress finally barked at Wolf.

  Wolf inclined his head and strode toward the stairwell. The moment he reached it, I flung the burning spoon into the room, where it slid to a stop under another tapestry. The fabric was instantly alight.

  “What—” was all Wolf got out before I grabbed him by the front of his vest and hurled him down the stairs with all my might.

  Without looking back, Alex and I stormed into the room. Alex snatched up Marianne as I ran right up to the Mistress, holding out my bleeding hand to her, using the power of my blood to stop her in her tracks. The other tapestries around us caught fire. I glared at her, the blood on my face slowly drying from the heat of the fire. The dark liquid dripped onto the floor.

  “You impertinent little human! I ought to rend you until your heart falls out.”

  I flung out my hand, droplets of blood flicking out at her. She leaped back, screeching.

  “Caroline!”

  “Alex, go.” I slowly walked backward, continuously flicking blood at her.

  The Mistress snarled. “So you think I can’t use magic? Then how about this?”

  White fire suddenly erupted around the both of us. It seared through my flesh, turned my clothes and hair into nothing but cinders. The marrow in my bones cooked, my eyes melted away, I became nothing but flames and fire, white hot pain. I couldn’t even scream.

  Then it was gone. I found myself rolling over the stone floor. The tapestries fell around me into piles of flaming orange fabric. My senses returned, and someone was helping me up. Alex.

  “I told you to leave,” I gasped.

  “She wouldn’t let me go without you.”

  Marianne stood beside him. I grabbed her up into my arms. Alex bounded down the stairs in the hall that we’d first come through after our capture. I stole a look behind me. The Mistress was nowhere to be seen, but most of the room was nothing but fire and smoke by now. Then, beyond the flames, I saw Wolf. He stared back at me, his eyes golden in the firelight. He couldn’t reach me through the fire, only stood there. I turned and bolted down the stairway.

  Along the way we passed the weapons cache. Alex grabbed up another crossbow and two quivers of bolts. I shifted Marianne slightly.

  “Hang onto me, honey,” I told her, and slung a crossbow and quiver over my shoulders as well. As an afterthought, I snatched up something that looked like a rapier. We ran as fast as we could out of the fortress, into the woods. But we didn’t get far when Marianne screamed.

  Behind us loped gray shapes. Howls echoed through the woods as the werewolves came straight for us. Alex stopped where he was and started shooting. Werewolf after werewolf went down, crashing into the f
orest floor in a shower of dirt and leaves.

  “Alex!”

  He kept shooting. The werewolves spread out into a wide circle. Too many for him. I put Marianne down, taking up the crossbow and shooting at them as well. My aim wasn’t as good as his, but it slowed them down. Marianne clung to my leg, her entire body trembling.

  We were surrounded. They closed in on Alex. I ran out of bolts and brandished the rapier just as a werewolf leapt at me. I ran the sword through his middle, pushing Marianne back and ducking as the still-alive werewolf slashed at me. I jabbed at him again and again until he finally fell back, dead.

  “Alex!”

  They were too close. He planned to go down fighting.

  A werewolf leapt at him. Not enough time for him to put another bolt in his bow. I screamed.

  A huge wolf collided with the werewolf in mid-air and the two rolled over the ground, snarling and fighting.

  More wolves charged out of the forest, attacking the werewolves, and suddenly I realized who they were. The pack we’d talked with a few nights ago. The alpha had just saved Alex. Alex didn’t question it and sprinted back to me as the alpha tore out the werewolf’s throat. He looked up at me. I understood.

  I picked up Marianne, and together the three of us ran, leaving the werewolf pack and the wolf pack to battle it out.

  Chapter 18

  We ran for a long time. Sometimes we carried Marianne alternately. Sometimes she ran with us. We ran until we simply had no strength left to run anymore. Finally we dropped down on a felled log. I laid down, breathing harder than I ever had in my life. I had no idea how many miles we’d traversed. We’d zigged and zagged from time to time as well, in a weak attempt to make it harder for them to track us. Or at least buy us a little time. I coughed. Alex looked like he wanted to throw up.

  “Don’t do it,” I gasped. “You need the energy.”

  He held up a hand in a clear statement of “Shut up. I know.”