by Desiree Holt
The woman interrupted his analysis by stepping forward and extending a hand. “I’m Cara.”
He smiled and held out his own. “Sam.”
They stepped slowly forward and carefully clasped hands. Neither had a strong sense of smell as humans, but they sniffed the air nonetheless. They waited as their inner animals adjusted to the new shifter, then relaxed.
“Nice to meet you,” Cara said.
“Likewise.”
* * *
Cara’s pace brought her steadily up the mountain. She wove a bit, keeping an eye out for anything that might be a good resource. She found only snow and trees.
Even though the wolf was built for similar terrain, she found the snow a bit too deep for comfort. She could feel it building up in little balls all over her legs and underbelly and was relieved when she saw cave looming in front of her.
Her nose picked up the scent of another shifter. Feline. Lion maybe? No… cheetah. She wondered how the animal did in snowy climates. Hopefully the human had survival experience to make up for it.
She trotted up to the cave and looked around in dismay. It was hardly a cave at all. A man was standing in it, shaking out a space blanket. That must have been one of the useful things Alina was talking about. With a cave this shallow, they’d certainly need it. He saw her and froze.
Cara slowly stepped into the cave and hesitated. Her inner wolf didn’t want to shift at all; she knew it would be colder as the human and she would be vulnerable with the strange shifter nearby. Cara pushed the worried voice away and focused on her human form. She let out a sigh of relief as the snowballs clinging to her fur fell away. The wolf grumbled at being shoved back into human form and Cara gave her body a moment to adjust.
And damn it was freezing.
A gust of icy wind blew at her now bare, furless back and she gasped. Even her inner wolf didn’t argue as she took her eyes off of the strange shifter to put on her clothes. It was too cold for formalities. Practice had taught her the best way to bundle up her clothes. Her sweatshirt had been the outermost part of the bundle, and she had protected it as best as she could with the hood. Even though the fabric was cold from being outside, almost everything was dry. The dampest part of her sweatshirt was the hood, which was well off of her skin, with little chance of soaking through. Cara already felt much better.
At last, she turned her gaze to the man. He had lowered the space blanket and was watching her, studying her. He was quite handsome, although he looked a lot less rugged than some of the men she had seen on the show. His brown hair was a little long; his cheeks already marked with stubble. He looked prepared at least. His pants looked like a good fabric for multiple climates and, like her, had opted for a zip-up hoodie.
While she thrived over the phone giving customer service, Cara was shy—especially for a wolf—in person. She had rehearsed the meeting over and over again, determined to give a good first impression. She squared her shoulders and marched toward him.
“I’m Cara.”
“Sam.”
He took her hand in a firm grip and locked his dark eyes onto hers. She could almost feel the feline behind the eyes studying her, watching for a flicker from the wolf within her. She felt her inner animal settle in approval.
“Nice to meet you,” she said.
Sam flashed her a smile. “Likewise.”
Cara gestured to the space blanket. “I take it that’s one of our helpful items?”
“Yeah.” As Sam pulled the other out of his pocket, Cara noticed the camera on his head and quickly fixed her own. “It’s this uh…”
“Oh! A fire-starter!” Cara cried eagerly. “This is going to be a life-saver.” She looked around the small cave. “Literally.”
Sam laughed. “Lucky we have it.”
“So then… what shall we do first?”
Chapter 3
A fire-starter. Sam could have kicked himself. He couldn’t believe he hadn’t realized what the stupid thing was. He hoped the she-wolf hadn’t noticed his hesitation. He had prepared for the possibility that he’d be the less experienced of the pair—in fact, given the conditions he was almost hoping for it—but he hadn’t wanted to make such a bad first impression either. Now that Cara had asked him his opinion on their next steps, Sam hoped that he could play-off not recognizing the fire-starter for what it was.
“Well,” he began, “I figure we need the basics: food, water, and shelter. And in this weather, certainly fire. We’ve got the start of a decent shelter, but I think we need to come up with a way to add a little more protection from the elements. As for water, there’s plenty of snow, but we’ll need to figure out how to contain it while it melts.”
“Or just eat it,” Cara suggested.
Sam looked at her in surprise. Maybe he did have more survival experience. “No no, that’s dangerous.” She still looked confused, so he added, “Eating snow dehydrates you. If we’re going to be out here for fifteen days, we need to melt it.”
“Oh…” she said, obviously embarrassed. The wolf cleared her throat. “We’ll have to go out and gather wood for the fire. I didn’t see a stream on the way up, but there must be one around. If we can’t find a way to hold the water while it melts we can drink out of that.”
Sam nodded, wondering if she was now trying to make up for her snow suggestion.
An icy wind blew through the cave, leaving a smattering of snowflakes in its wake.
“And we need to add another wall somehow,” Cara added.
“Yeah,” said Sam, brushing some flakes off of his sweatshirt. “I think branches first. Lots of them. We can use them for the wall, the fire, and bedding.”
Cara swung her arms, psyching herself up to go back out in the cold. “If we see any animals, we should hunt. Better to be full and maybe even find a way to store meat now than wish we had later.”
“Right then. Branches?”
“Branches.”
“We should try to hurry and get the fire going before the sun sets. I don’t want to try building a fire in the dark.”
“Neither do I. The temperature will drop too.”
“Let’s get going then.”
Moving as quickly as possible, Sam started to pull of his clothes. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Cara doing the same. By the time he was dropping his boxers into the pile—as far from the snow as possible—he was shivering.
Sam closed his eyes and did his best to ignore the cold, focusing instead of a well-practiced mental image of a cheetah. Spotted fur spread across his skin, tickling as it rippled. Somewhere in his mind, the cheetah growled with delight as his limbs lengthened and stretched. In a few short moments, the change was over.
Only a couple of feet away, the wolf shook herself off. She sat down and scratched vigorously at one ear. Then she stood, nodded to Sam, and trotted into the snow.
The cheetah followed, recoiling at the sharp wind that bit easily through his fur. Sam was thankful that he had been able to spend a couple of minutes in his socks, letting his feet thaw. The pads on the bottom were made for running on hot, hard earth, not snow.
It was long, exhausting work, hauling branches back up to the cave. There were enough on the ground, and even a few choice ones that Sam was able to break off the trees, but his jaws and feet were aching by the time he was done and he had never been so cold in his life. The one silver lining was the trench his frequent passage had made in the snow. It was easier to ford the snow with every trip, even as he tired.
At last, he decided that they had more than enough branches. He set off for one more look for containers or prey. He had kept an eye out while gathering branches, but had been unsuccessful.
He was starving, not to mention thirsty. Sam knew they had to have something after all of that work. Especially since they were burning extra calories to stay warm. He wanted to explore further from the trees—his inner cheetah felt oddly claustrophobic under the dense pines—but the snow in the open spaces was too deep. Just as he was ready to
admit defeat, he spotted a bird.
Sam froze and turned his mind over to the cheetah. It was hungry and it saw meat. The bird wasn’t very big, but it would do. After a moment of stalking, the cat burst out of the brush. The bird took off and would have escaped, but it didn’t know how the large plains cat hunted. It was easy for Sam to spring higher than any of the bird’s natural predators. He snagged it between his paws and dragged it down. The inner cheetah wanted to eat, but Sam clenched the bird firmly in his jaws and headed for the cave.
* * *
Cara was already there, in human form, sorting the branches by size. Her eyes lit up when she saw the cheetah returning with the bird.
“Oh fantastic, I’m starving!” she said.
Sam trotted into the small cave and set down the bird. He headed over to his clothes and braced himself for another chilly shift.
“This is going to be our first dinner,” he heard Cara say, “Courtesy of Sam.”
He tugged his shirt over his head and glanced at her in confusion. The wolf was kneeling over the bird, filming it with her personal camera. Of course, she was narrating for the show. He pulled his sweatshirt on and adjusted his own camera around his head.
“You’ve got the narration down already, I see.”
Cara laughed, embarrassed. “I talk to myself a lot,” she admitted. “This isn’t too different. Thanks for finding dinner.”
“Sure thing. I figured I’d get the feathers off it and we can split it between us.”
“Human or animal?”
Sam shrugged. “I figure we need the meat in our human forms for the night. And it’ll be nice to eat something hot if we can get the fire going.”
His partner nodded in agreement. “Let’s get the fire going, then get back to building this wall.”
Together, they gathered the smallest branches and driest pine needles. Sam let his mind wander back to all of the humans who had taught him how to make fire and his hands took over. It quickly became clear to Cara that he knew what he was doing, so she sat back to watch.
When it looked ready, she offered the fire-starter to him. Sam took it, almost without thinking, and then froze as he studied the metal pieces. Ever since his earlier impression that they were keys, he couldn’t shake the idea of having to turn them. His mind went blank and he just stared at it.
“Don’t you…” Cara began.
Sam cleared his throat awkwardly. “Um… no…”
Cara held out her hands. Blushing furiously, Sam handed her the fire-starter. He watched her curiously as she held it down near the ground. She quickly struck one piece against the other, sending sparks flying. Sam groaned at how simple it was. He felt like an idiot.
It wasn’t long at all before a few sparks caught the kindling. Sam wanted to jump in and help to redeem himself, but it seemed like his partner had things under control. Soon they were building up branches around it and had a small, but roaring, fire.
“It already feels warmer,” Cara said, holding her hands over it.
Sam nodded in agreement. He gathered some of the smaller, wetter branches and stacked them near it, close enough for the heat to dry them, but far enough they wouldn’t catch fire.
“How much survival experience do you have?” Cara asked.
“Lots,” he said quickly. “Mostly primitive. I usually make fires without the fire-starter.” Sam didn’t want to brag, but he felt like he had to make up for his embarrassment somehow. “Let’s get that wall done,” he said.
He was glad when Cara didn’t push the issue. Instead, she joined him at the side of the cave as they brainstormed how to protect the cave.
Chapter 4
The sun was nearly gone by the time they were done. Cara stood back to admire their work. They were able to build the branches a good five feet up. It was crude, but she could feel the difference in how much wind was getting in. Luckily, the cave wasn’t very high. Their wall took the cave from an L-shape to almost a deeper cave. She supposed the space between the rocky ceiling and the top of their branch wall was like a window. The mouth of the cave was much more defined now, albeit wide open. Luckily, it seemed like most of the wind was coming from the sides.
“Time for dinner?” she asked.
“Sounds good to me.”
Sam made quick work of the feathers, while Cara worked to sharpen the points of some of the sticks to spear the meat. When the feathers were removed. Sam shifted and ripped the bird into pieces. He pawed aside the parts that were ideal for human consumption and then shifted back to human form, marveling at how much warmer the cave seemed with their fire and the wall. He dressed and then gathered up the bones and organs before leaving the cave.
“Sam?” Cara called in confusion.
He came back in a moment later, brushing snow off of his hands. “Little trick I learned. That stuff will stay cold enough for us to eat the next time we shift.”
“Great. Handy trick.”
The food they ate in either form would continue to be digested after they shifted, regardless of what it was. Some shifters didn’t have a problem eating bones and other things as animals, then shifting to human. Others claimed it gave them a stomach ache. Either way, most shifters preferred to eat the ‘right’ type of food for the form they were currently in. Animals forms drew much more nourishment from the animal parts than a human could. Cara knew they could shift and eat the entrails in the morning, which could give them a boost and hold them over until they could hunt again.
She handed over her prepped sticks and she and Sam poked the bird meat onto them for cooking. They sat for a few moments in a peaceful silence. The only sounds were the crackling of the fire and the occasional gust of wind. It had stopped snowing and the bottom of their wall was thick enough that they could only feel the wind if they stood. Sitting by the fire was much cozier than Cara had expected. For all of the time she spent outdoors, she usually spent winters in warmer climates or hotels.
The firelight danced on the walls of the small cave, keeping it bright enough to cook even as the sky outside grew black. Cara took advantage of it to study her partner. So far, he seemed like a nice guy. He clearly had some idea of what he was doing, survival-wise. And they had been on the same page so far, which Cara was glad for. She wasn’t the biggest fan of confrontation and had been hoping for an easy-going partner.
Cara still couldn’t believe she had let her family talk her into doing this. She had applied, but hadn’t expected to actually be chosen for the show. She was glad she only had to worry about one person. Of course, if previous episodes were anything to go on, they were being filmed from all around.
She turned and looked out of the cave into the darkness. The starlight glinted off of the snow, enabling her to see a fair distance in the dark. All she could see were dark trees. Were they out there, right now?
“What are you looking at?” Sam asked softly.
“I’m wondering where their hidden camera crew is,” she said.
He followed her gaze out into the snow. “Good question.”
“I didn’t even see any footprints, other than ours.”
“They must have someone in the trees. A monkey maybe.”
Cara nodded.
“So, what sort of survival experience do you have?” Sam asked.
“Not much in cold weather, I’m afraid,” admitted the she-wolf. “I basically live out of a backpack and travel, so… I guess they picked me since I do have a lot of outdoors experience.”
“You just travel?” Sam was intrigued. “I wish I could do that.” She smiled and nodded. People always shared that sentiment with her, but she knew it wasn’t a life for everyone. “Around the country?”
“The world,” Cara said. “Actually.”
“Ever been to Africa?”
“Oh yes. Morocco, South Africa, Egypt, Tanzania… um… Ivory Coast, Nigeria…” Cara counted off on her fingers.
“What do you do?” Sam asked. “I mean, that has to be expensive.”
He
listened in fascination as Cara explained her job and how she went from hotel to hotel.
“Don’t you ever want to settle down?”
“Eventually, yeah. But I’m sort of hoping to… I dunno, meet someone who enjoys the road like I do.” Cara always felt a little awkward discussing her lack of love life with people. “What do you do?”
“I’m a college professor.”
By the time he was finishing talking about his experience abroad and primitive survival skills, the bird was cooked. It hadn’t been a large bird, especially after Sam finished butchering it, so they easily ate all of it.
“The sky is beautiful,” Cara said softly, breaking the silence. It wasn’t that she minded silence, in fact she loved it when she was alone, but she felt compelled to talk when another person was around.
“It is,” Sam agreed.
The snow clouds had moved off and the stars were bright and clear. The signature haze that gave the Milky Way its name seemed especially bright.
Sam always loved to see the stars overhead. They made his inner cheetah feel at peace.
“You probably see stars like this more than I do,” he said. “College towns are pretty busy.”
Cara shook her head. “Most of my travel is from city to city. There’s always too much light pollution.”
Sam nodded in understanding. The two sat silently, just watching the stars, until Sam yawned. It triggered a yawn in Cara and the two looked at each other nervously. It was time to discuss sleeping arrangements and they both knew it.
