I've been running for maybe ten minutes when the inevitable happens. I lose my footing and tumble to the ground, rolling down an incline and crashing hard at the bottom.
Although I'm not hurt, it doesn't mean I'm not about to pay for my carelessness with my life.
Then why aren't you running for your life? Why are you just lying here?
All I have to do is get up, even though I know there's no way I can outrun two alpha wolves. This isn't me acting cynical, this is truth. No submissive can ever hope to fight an alpha and win. All I can do is run and hope I either lose them in the thick Colorado forest, or I get back to Kier's cabin.
When I think of the size of his shoulders and his powerful carpenter's hands wrapped around his mug, I know he'll have no difficulty fighting one or even both of the shifters pursuing me. Five-three, slim me who's never been in a fight in her life? Not so much.
But I still don't move.
I lay there as a wave of hopelessness sweeps over me, making movement impossible. I wish I was stronger, an alpha, or even a beta. Anything but a lowly submissive because I can't do this.
All my life I've had someone fight my battles for me, someone protecting me, always. But now I have no one, and the only person I have to rely on is me against two alphas who either want to hurt or kill me.
And that's when I hear them a few feet away.
They've long since stopped howling. I know they only did it to terrify me enough that I'd panic and do something stupid, so they could catch me that much faster.
Something stupid like fall and not get back up again.
As the wolves slow, all I can hear over the sound of my pounding heart is the rain hitting the leaves in the trees high above me, loud sniffing, and the tread of their steps on twigs and brush at the top of the small hill I rolled down.
They know I'm here, somewhere close by. Probably they heard my cut-off yelp just before I silenced it as I fell.
I lie still, not knowing what to do, but guessing any movement, any attempt to run will end in death. Mine.
Time seems to stretch and slow as I lay unmoving, ignoring the bugs crawling over me, ignoring that I'm lying in a puddle of rainwater that's growing, ignoring everything except the two wolves a few feet away who I know will do me harm if they know where I am.
The minutes tick by, and somehow, they don't follow me down the ravine. I listen to them chuffing to each other before they race on, following the path I would've taken had I not fallen.
Another couple of minutes pass by, except instead of terror holding me immobile, now it's disbelief. I can't believe I was that lucky. I refuse to believe that they didn't find me, and I know that if I hadn't fallen, I'd be dead already.
When they don't come back, my heart starts to resume its normal beat. I'm still too close to danger for normality yet. I would have to be back at home for that to happen. But now I have a chance, a chance I didn't have before and one that I don't intend to waste.
Instead of climbing to my feet, I reach for my pants and slowly ease them down my legs. I stop again, waiting for any sign that the wolves have returned, but I don't hear their approach.
With my heart beating a less frantic pace, I hear the scurrying of small animals burrowing about as they seek a warmer, less waterlogged sanctuary, and the distant sounds of thunder. But thankfully, there are no howls and no larger movement in the forest that could be two wolves hunting me.
I reach for my bra and turn slightly to unsnap it and gently place it aside, leery of making even the slightest sound that will call attention to where I am and have the wolves turning back.
With a painfully slow motion, I roll over and get to my hands and knees to begin my shift.
This isn't a good idea. If the wolves return and find me mid-shift, then the possibility of my survival drastically goes down. But it's the only choice I have.
The only way I can see myself surviving this is to shift and use my nose to get back to Kier's cabin. He would help me, and right now I need all the help I can get if I'm going to get through this.
Even though it's the very last thing I want to do, I close my eyes and turn my focus inward, forcing myself to ignore the world around me, and instead reach for my wolf.
She's hiding, afraid. I can't say I blame her, not when all I want to do is find somewhere safe to hide too. She can hide inside me, but I'm not that lucky. I'm also not a particularly safe place to hide, not with two wolves hunting me.
My shifts are slow. It always is with submissives. But right now, I can't afford to take ten minutes or more to shift because it's time I don't have. Sooner rather than later, those shifters are going to double back when they realize my scent ended back here, and I can't let them find me mid-shift.
I won't be able to fight them off as a wolf, I know that with utter certainty, but I can run, and running with four legs will get me a hell of a lot further than running on two. But to do that, first I must shift.
I send reassurance to my frightened wolf that everything will be okay, that we just need to shift, and then we can return to Kier. Since my wolf doesn't respond to words, but emotions, it's the best way I have to reach her.
Only, instead of emerging, she burrows deeper inside me, and I want to cry with frustration because time is running out, and we need to run. Now.
Again and again, I send her reassurance and calm that I don't feel. Maybe that's why it doesn't work, because she knows as well as I do that what I'm sending her is false. That there is every reason to hide.
I don't know what has me opening my eyes, but something compels me to.
I raise my head, and that's when I know why my wolf refused to come out.
Halfway down the ravine is one of the wolves, his eyes locked on my face, and his back legs tensed to pounce.
The level of fear that surges through me makes it impossible to scream, to move, to do anything but stare.
He opens his mouth in a wolfy grin, one full of menace and dark anticipation. Then he launches himself at me, and I still don't move.
I'm going to die.
If I was expecting to learn the meaning of life, I'd have been disappointed because it doesn't come.
All I feel is an overwhelming sense that I've wasted my time, that I regret not kissing Marshall one more time. That I hope he isn't the one who finds my dead body in this forest, and that if he does, he's able to move on with his own life.
I close my eyes just before impact, every muscle tense. And I wait.
And wait.
A vicious snarl has me tearing my eyes open. My heart is in my throat at the sight of an ash-blond wolf fighting the black-brown wolf back.
Marshall.
For several seconds, all I can do is stare, struggling to understand how I can still be alive, and that Marshall could time his arrival so perfectly. I want to look around, to see if he came with the rest of the pack, but I can't take my eyes away from him fighting the wolf back, away from me.
As third in the pack, he's one of the best fighters, whether he's human or wolf.
He fights silently. He doesn't growl or snarl the way the other wolf is, but that doesn't mean he isn't furious. I can feel the lash of his rage as he snaps his teeth and uses all his strength, all his coiled muscles to launch his attack. Marshall doesn't hold back. In seconds he has the wolf pinned before going for his throat.
But then all I can do is widen my eyes in horror when a lighter brown wolf comes out of nowhere and barrels into Marshall, knocking him away.
Against one alpha wolf, he's a good enough fighter he might've won, especially fueled by protective rage over me, but against two? The arrival of this other wolf has just slashed the odds of his survival in half.
I have to shift. I can't fight and win against these wolves, but maybe I can slow one down enough that Marshall doesn't have to fight two at once. I can't watch him die in front of me, I just can't.
As the sharp tang of his blood in the air announces he's losing this fight, I squeeze my eyes shut and reach for my wolf in a way I never have before.
To force a fast shift is both agonizing and dangerous.
I've never attempted it, but it's a warning I and my younger packmates grew up hearing. My father and mom never mated, and once she became pregnant with me, he took off because maybe Hardin was too quiet for him, no one really knows since he left in the middle of the night.
Although I never met him, Mom never forgot him. When I was ten, she went looking for him and I never saw her again. That was when the rest of the pack stepped in to care for me.
They all had warnings for me, about everything. While the rest of my packmates had those warnings from one set of parents, I had them from twenty. So, I never forgot, and the warnings still ring in my ears even now.
But I'm about to ignore those warnings and ignore the possibility I could become stuck mid-shift, possibly forever. That's only one of the things that could go wrong. I could die from the shock of it. But Marshall needs me, so if there was ever a time to be brave, now is it. I reach for my terrified wolf, and this time, I guess with Marshall here, she's less afraid and embraces the shift a little less unwillingly.
They said it was agony to force a shift, and they were wrong.
It's worse than that. A lot worse.
My eyes stream with tears as I force my body into a fast shift that should take ten minutes or more with a wolf that is resistant to the idea of emerging in the middle of a deadly fight. It takes three minutes, but those three minutes feel like hours as fur ripples over my skin, my nails lengthen into claws, my bones break and reform, and my vision sharpens.
I collapse as my heart labors under the extreme pressure I just put it under.
Everything hurts. No, my body screams at me to lie down and never get up again. But I don't have time. My enhanced nose picks up even more blood scenting the air, and it's more Marshall's blood than these unfamiliar shifters.
He needs help and I'm the only one who can. If the rest of the pack were here, they would've done something already.
Shaking off my weakness and the need to cower and hide, I struggle to my feet and lift my head. The bottom falls out of my stomach.
Marshall is dripping blood, and he has an open wound on his neck that tells me how close one wolf came to ripping his throat out.
I whimper, and the lighter of the wolves, the one that came later, swings around to face me.
He takes a step, but then Marshall is there, clamping his powerful jaws around his shoulder and shaking him.
The wolf growls low in his throat, but it's a sound carrying echoes of pain and hurt, and when Marshall releases him, he doesn't make the mistake of turning his back on Marshall again.
I take a shaky step forward, my fear flooding through me. I'm desperate to do anything but approach these wolves, but I have to help, I can't let them hurt Marshall anymore, no matter that I'm terrified.
He saved me. He saved us. We have to help. Even though we're scared.
Marshall casts a glance in my direction, too fast for me to read his expression. But as if he knows what I intend, he fights with increasing intensity, as if wanting to put an end to this fight before I can become mired in it.
The darker wolf lashes out with a large claw-tipped paw and the scent of the blood has me moving faster. I don't see where he hit Marshall, but other than wobbling a little, Marshall doesn't react. He stays on his feet, and he turns a snarling face to the wolf, who backs up a step.
After growling at the lighter wolf, the darker wolf spins, and rushes back into the forest. A second later, and another low growl later and the lighter wolf follows.
Slowly, I approach Marshall because I know he's hurt and I don't want to see how badly, but I have to.
Before I can see where the wolf landed that last powerful blow against Marshall, he turns. I stop and for one second, I meet his eyes before he jerks his head in the opposite direction the wolves took.
Wary of their return, I shift my gaze to where they disappeared. I'm expecting this to be a trick of theirs to get us to lower our guard before they return. They were winning, they must've known that all they needed to do was wear Marshall down, and then they would've won. I was no threat, not really. But instead, they left, which doesn't make sense. Unless they have another plan. Or maybe they went to get the rest of their pack.
The thought has fear surging through me, and I twist back to face Marshall. While I was distracted, I discover he's padded closer to me and lowered his head, so we're no longer eye to eye.
I hold still for a second, just inhaling the warm scent of him that always makes me feel safe and loved. A scent that's almost buried by blood and hurt and pain, but it's still there. Briefly, he nuzzles me as I draw his scent deep into my lungs.
When he backs up and starts running in the direction he was staring, I follow.
We run for a long time, close to thirty minutes, I think. I don't know where he's taking me, but it's Marshall and I would follow him anywhere, so I don't hesitate.
I'm slower than usual because I haven't recovered from my fast shift, but I do my best to keep up because Marshall is hurt, bleeding, and we have to get somewhere safe.
I know we can't be going toward Kier's cabin because that was behind us, in the direction the two wolves took, and I know we're nowhere near the pack house so we're not going there either.
Our path carries us through the dense forest, deeper and deeper as the rain continues to fall through the gaps between the trees, soaking our already wet fur.
What's most concerning, though, and has me trying to stop is the scent of Marshall's blood in the air. He should be on his way to healing already, only he's not. If anything, I'm picking up more of his blood than less. But each time I slow, he growls at me and we continue on.
Finally, we emerge through the forest and a few feet away is an old log cabin. It's only once we step out from under the tall trees that I realize the rain must've eased, at least a little.
As I'm peering up at the gray sky, Marshall drops to the ground with a solid thump and doesn't move again.
I thought nothing would ever terrify me as much as the knowledge that two wolves were hunting me, but I was wrong. The emotions running through me now at the thought of Marshall dying is like nothing else I've ever experienced in my life.
For a single breath, I don't move, and then I rush over, whimpering, nudging his neck, licking his face, doing everything I can in my wolf shape to wake him, and failing.
At first, all I can hear is the sound of my heart pounding, but then I pick up a slower, lower beat that I know isn't mine, and that's when I know he's still alive. He isn't dead. Not yet.
He's breathing, but he's not moving. As a wolf, he's too big and too heavy for me to move which means I have to shift again. This one will have to be just as fast because I can't leave Marshall to lie in the rain like this.
I have to get him inside the cabin. I have to shift, even if it hurts so much that it feels like I'm dying.
After taking a second to prepare, I turn my attention inward and shift.
This time it doesn't take three minutes, it takes double that. The agony of it leaves me lying on the ground trembling, crying, and not knowing how I'm going to summon the strength to move an adult-size wolf because I feel as weak as a kitten.
Getting to my feet takes several minutes and I fall twice. Moving Marshall takes a couple more and I fall again, terrified I'm hurting him by dragging him, but knowing I have to get him out of the rain and behind a solid door in case those wolves come back.
With the amount Marshall was bleeding, it wouldn't take too much effort for them to track us through the forest, no matter that it's raining. If it was a few drops, I wouldn't be so worried, but as I'm dragging Marshall, I'm leaving a long smear of bright red blood behind.
By the time I shove the door of the old cabin open and get Marshall inside, my whole body is shaking with effort, trembling with cold and exhaustion. My cheeks are wet with tears because I know moving has made his injuries worse.
I slam the door shut. The second I do, all strength leaves my legs and I slump to the ground with my back braced against the door.
And that's where I stay, sobbing, my eyes on Marshall whose chest is barely rising.