Chapter 18
Saoirse
I didn’t remember dropping my pack, but my fingers were already at the zipper before I’d fully registered that we’d stopped moving. The poacher’s blind around us was narrow and musty, the wood damp with age and the faint stench of mildew, but it would hold. For now.
Ajax whimpered low as I knelt beside him. Finn hovered at his side, hands clenched at his thighs, chest heaving like he couldn’t quite remember how to breathe.
Focus. Prioritize.
“Okay, sweetheart.” I shifted into the soft tone I used in surgery, in emergency calls, in any moment where panic had no business being. “Let’s see what we’ve got.”
Ajax’s flanks were rising too quickly, his sides trembling with the effort of staying still.
I murmured nonsense as I ran my hands over his ribs.
Palpated gently. The muscle on his left side twitched under my fingers, hot and wet.
Not arterial. Not spurting. But bad enough to soak into Finn’s shirt on the way here.
“Good boy.” I whispered more words of praise as I checked for signs of internal bleeding, shock, obstruction. “You did so good.”
His pulse was elevated, but not ragged. His gums were pale but not white. He was still tracking, eyes flicking toward Finn every few seconds like he needed him in view. Like he needed the tether.
I felt that, deep.
“Stay with me now.” I tried to project calm into his bones. “You’re in good hands. You’re my patient now.”
I reached for my trauma kit, tugging the roll open with a practiced snap. Gloves. Sterile gauze. Clotting powder. Local anesthetic.
The harness had to come off. I sliced it free with my pocket blade, pulling the shredded straps back to reveal the wound properly.
A deep slash—knife, definitely. Sharp, deliberate. Not a wild tear. I bit back a curse. I hadn’t seen precisely what had happened because I’d been flat on the ground, barely out of harm’s way, while these two had saved our arses.
“Missed the artery,” I muttered. “Lucky lad.”
I poured saline over the wound to flush it. Ajax flinched but didn’t pull away. God, what a dog. I dusted the clotting agent into the cut, watching the powder fizz slightly as it did its job. Pressed gauze in place and held it, counting down from twenty under my breath.
Behind me, Finn didn’t move. Not even when I asked, “Can you hand me the syringes from the red pocket?”
No response.
Ajax whined again, so I leaned closer, brushing his ear back from his face. “You’re okay. It’s almost over.”
Painkiller next. I drew it up, found the muscle, and injected smooth and clean. Then the pressure bandage. Tight, but not too tight. A clean wrap. Containment.
The worst was done. I sat back on my heels, breath catching as I pressed the back of my wrist to my brow. Sweat, blood, bark fragments—I couldn’t tell which was which anymore.
Ajax blinked at me, eyes glassy but calm now. He let out a low sigh and shifted slightly toward Finn.
“Of course you want him,” I whispered. “It’s always the stubborn ones.”
I reached down and stroked his side, slow and careful. “You’re going to be okay, sweetheart. I’ve got you.”
Then I looked up.
Finn hadn’t moved an inch.
Still kneeling, still staring at Ajax like if he blinked, the dog might vanish.
His hands were red with blood that wasn’t his. His jaw locked tight enough to crack. His expression wasn’t blank. It was far too full for that. Like if he let go for even a second, the whole thing would come apart.
Triage definitely wasn’t done.
I reached for him next.
I stayed on my knees, shifting to close the space between us. Finn didn’t flinch, didn’t look at me—only continued to stare at Ajax, as if his will alone were keeping the dog here.
“Finn.” His name was soft on my lips. Not the professional tone, not the vet’s voice. Mine.
No response.
I reached out, slowly, and laid a hand on his forearm. His skin was hot and tacky with blood—Ajax’s, not his, I was pretty sure—but he didn’t react to the touch.
“Your turn.”
That got his attention. He didn’t look at me, but his shoulders stiffened, jaw grinding.
“I’m fine.”
“Bullshit.”
That made him blink. He still didn’t look at me, though.
I let go of his arm long enough to grab the gauze again, then shifted in closer, scanning him. He had a long scratch running down his right biceps, caked with dirt and blood. Not life-threatening, but it needed cleaning.
There was blood at his temple, trickling from a shallow scrape hidden under his sweat-damp hair, and likely bruises on his knees from their fall into the blind.
“You’re a mess,” I said, gently. “Sit still.”
“Saoirse—”
“Sit. Still.” I didn’t raise my voice, but I didn’t back down either. “Let me check you.”
He exhaled through his nose. Almost a laugh, if it hadn’t sounded so damn broken.
He didn’t fight me, though.
I cleaned the worst of the blood from his temple, then cleaned and wrapped his arm quickly. Nothing needed stitches. Nothing critical.
But his hands were still shaking.
I pressed the edge of a sterile cloth into his palm, to see what he’d do. He didn’t close his fingers around it. Merely sat there. Motionless. Empty.
“Finn,” I murmured, and then did something I hadn’t done since we started this trek. I reached out and placed my hand flat against his chest.
His shirt was soaked—Ajax’s blood, sweat, dirt—but beneath it, I felt the thud of his heart, fast and irregular.
“You’re in shock,” I said.
Still, he wouldn’t look at me.
Then, so quietly I almost missed it, he murmured, “He’s all I’ve got left of Charlie.”
My throat tightened.
The words weren’t for me, not really. They were just… loose. Uncontained. The way confessions sometimes slipped free when your guard cracked enough.
Ajax shifted beside us, letting out a breath through his nose, not quite asleep but fading fast from the painkiller. Finn’s hand finally twitched—once—and settled lightly against the dog’s side.
“I swore I’d take care of him. That I’d do it right.”
Guilt radiated off him like heat.
“And you have.” I infused my voice with as much reassurance as I could muster. “You are.”
He finally met my eyes.
And God, there was so much pain in that look. Pain and self-recrimination and the barest flicker of something like hope—like maybe he wanted to believe me.
But he didn’t say anything.
I let my hand rest over his heart a beat longer. Then I shifted slightly, leaned my shoulder into his just enough to remind him he wasn’t alone.
We sat like that for a long moment, surrounded by trees and shadows and breathless silence, while Ajax slid into sleep beside us.
Finn’s breathing eventually evened out, the shake in his hands mostly stilling. Not gone. But manageable.
I gave his arm a light squeeze, then rose, knees stiff from crouching so long.
The blind was narrow, barely wide enough for the three of us and our packs, but it was better than nothing.
I nudged open a warped wooden panel—hinged with rusted nails and what looked like repurposed leather strapping—and slipped out into the dense brush while Finn stayed with Ajax.
A slow circuit confirmed what I already suspected: the old poacher’s hide was built into a shallow slope, its rough-planked walls nearly lost beneath bracken and low-hanging spruce.
The wood was grayed and cracked with age, but still held together, reinforced in places with moss-packed seams and the occasional bit of netting or tarp half-sunken into the overgrowth.
The platform floor inside had held—dry, though it creaked underfoot like something remembering its age.
The brush coverage above and around was decent.
Not impenetrable, but enough to break up our silhouette, especially in the dimming light.
I ducked back in and gave Finn the report. “It’ll do. We’ve got decent shelter above and low visibility from the ridge. No signs of recent use. Should be safe until first light.”
Finn looked down at Ajax, then back at me. “It’s not ideal.”
“No.” I settled onto the edge of the pack I’d repurposed as a seat. “But moving him tonight would be worse. He needs rest. So do you.”
He didn’t argue, but he didn’t agree either.
I could see the calculation running behind his eyes. Risk versus reward. Danger versus exhaustion. His whole body was still vibrating with the aftershocks of fight mode.
“We hold here,” he said at last. Not quite a command. A decision. “I’ll take first watch.”
I tilted my head. “You’re not doing anyone any good half-dead on your feet.”
He started to protest, but I held up a hand. “I’m not saying sleep. I’m saying sit. For five minutes. With me.”
His jaw worked like he wanted to argue, but he didn’t. With a low, exhausted exhale, he slid down beside me.
The blind creaked faintly as he leaned his head back against one of the supports, staring at the ceiling like he was trying to see through it. Ajax shifted slightly, nestled between us, his breathing slow and even beneath the gauze bandage I’d wrapped tight.
I let the quiet settle between us.
It wasn’t the same tense silence from the trail. This one was softer. Worn in. Like the hush that followed a storm.
Finn’s shoulder brushed mine.
He didn’t move away.
Neither did I.
We stayed like that for a long time.
Not hours. Not full afternoon to dusk. But long enough for the heat to fade from my skin, for my breathing to level out, for the ringing adrenaline in my ears to quiet into something like thought.
Outside, the sky lightened and shifted—not toward evening yet, but far enough that the shadows grew more directional, the air cooler where it touched my neck. Summer in the Highlands made time feel strange, like the light was elastic.
The forest didn’t settle, exactly, but it changed.
Branches creaked in ways that didn’t feel threatening, and birdsong slowly picked up again, cautious at first, then bold.
A breeze filtered through the slats in the hide’s walls, dragging the scent of moss, soil, and old bark across the air.
Somewhere farther off, I thought I caught the edge of smoke. Not strong. Not close. But real.
Inside, the space felt tighter than before. The rough wood walls trapped our breath, our silence, our shared waiting. But the structure held. Still solid beneath the bracken and lichen, with enough coverage to keep us shadowed and small.
I didn’t try to fill the silence.
He didn’t either.
And maybe that was the point.
There was nothing more to fix for now. No trail to follow or plan to make. Only the warmth of a dog between us, the ghost of fear still clinging to our backs, and this unlikely pause in the middle of nowhere.
We weren’t safe.
But we weren’t alone, either.
And for now, that was enough.