Chapter 35
Chapter Thirty-Five
An hour later, the midday sun burned bright in the sky, which revealed itself in patches between the canopy of the forest. The day had warmed considerably, into the low fifties.
Raven wore her jacket around her waist, sweating and thirsty as she followed the narrow deer trail that she’d discovered an hour ago, which meandered in the direction of the river.
The burble of the river reached her over the birdsong and breeze rustling the branches overhead. She was almost there.
A loud yip sounded from somewhere ahead of her. Shadow or Luna? Or one of the timber wolves? Pausing, she listened hard but heard nothing else over the rustling leaves.
Pushing through heavy underbrush, she moved off the deer trail and headed in the direction of the sound. She eased through a thicket of sumac and mountain laurel. The rush of the river grew louder.
Just before she stepped out of the woods onto the pebble-strewn riverbank, she paused, moving aside a branch to take a look before she revealed herself. The long winding river was thirty feet at its widest point. Rushing brown water splashed over smooth stones and slick fallen logs.
At the edge of the water, about fifty or sixty yards downstream, a car-sized boulder loomed next to a copse of shagbark hickory trees. The shaggy bark peeled from the trunks in great swaths like wood shavings.
Beneath the shagbark trees, the white wolf stood over something on the ground. Luna bent her head, sniffing at the object. Her black lips curled back from her teeth eagerly, hungrily.
Squinting, Raven took a step closer. The object on the ground took shape. It was a calf carcass, lying on the ground beneath the tree along the riverbank.
Alarm shot through her veins. Something was wrong.
The calf carcass belonged in the wildlife refuge, stored in the walk-in freezer of the meat house.
It did not belong out here in the woods.
A carpet of pine needles spread across the ground beneath the trees.
Too flat, too even. No pine trees, either.
She opened her mouth to shout a warning.
Too late. Luna sank her jaws into the carcass.
The movement triggered the trap. A roped log dropped from the tree above the wolf, a counterweight to the hidden net spread beneath the wolf’s paws.
Simultaneously, the net snapped up and closed over Luna’s body.
The net rose into the air, hauling the wolf seven feet above the ground.
Luna thrashed fiercely, her paws tangling in the netted rope. She yelped in mingled fury and fear. The net swung but held the wolf fast.
Raven shrank back. Instinctively, she crouched low behind the cluster of bushes.
Rage burned through her veins. Every fiber of her body longed to burst from the trees and rush to save Luna, to cut her down with the whittling knife in her pocket, yet she resisted the urge.
Forced herself to wait and watch, to surveil the scene first.
Her caution was warranted. A moment later, a man stepped out from behind the huge boulder downriver. One of the Headhunters. A second man soon joined the first. Cobb and Dekker. And then three more burly men she didn’t recognize emerged from the trees.
The Headhunters carried rifles. They wore wolf pelts slung across their shoulders like capes. The pelts still raw and oozing blood.
Raven’s chest constricted. Aghast, she recognized the distinctive markings on the pelts: Titus’ streaks of black and Shika’s beautiful, brindled coat.
A surge of grief burned the back of her throat. Cold rage iced her veins. How dare they mutilate such beautiful creatures for their own craven benefit. She loathed them with every part of her. She wanted the Headhunters to die horribly and painfully.
“Look what we have here,” Cobb shouted. “We bagged one! Told you it would work. Look what a beauty she is, too.”
Luna growled ferociously. She snapped and snarled, but it was no good. She was caught fast.
Dekker laughed. “Those teeth won’t do it much good, now.”
He stalked along the riverbank toward the sprung trap. The angles of his face sharpened in the dappled sunlight. He lifted his rifle and aimed at Luna. “What a pelt this one will make.”
Hidden behind the bushes, Raven reached for the tranquilizer gun, but the men were out of range, too far downriver. Helpless, she despised herself for her impotence. What she wouldn’t give for her rifle. With a gun, she would’ve had a chance to nail several of them, at least.
Her empty hands curled into fists. She didn’t have a weapon worth anything. Her whittling knife was worse than useless. Silently, she prayed that Shadow, off hunting somewhere, remained far away, hidden and safe.
“You can’t shoot it,” Cobb said, almost apologetic.
Dekker swung around and glared at him. “Like hell I can’t.”
“Vaughn wants to kill the white wolf himself.”
Dekker cursed. “You gotta be joking.”
Cobb shrugged. “You know how he is.”
“And how does he propose we bring it to him? On a leash?”
Cobb pulled a tranq gun from his waistband. He must have stolen it from the lodge, where Raven’s father kept a backup for emergencies. Cobb shot Luna in the flank. She yelped in pain.
For an agonizing minute, the animal thrashed and twisted within the net, but she was helpless. Raven watched in horror as Luna’s desperate movements slowed.
Recrimination burned in her chest. Without Raven, the wolves might be far from here. They’d remained close to Haven and the Headhunters because of Raven. This was her fault.
A minute later, the wolf stilled, unconscious.
“You gonna help me here or what?” Cobb asked.
Dekker leaned lazily against one of the hickory trees, arms crossed over his chest. “I pass. You want the glory, you do the heavy lifting, man. If you can hack it.”
Cobb grimaced but shrugged in resignation. He gestured to the other men to help him. They cut the wolf down, untangled the net, and tied her fore and hind paws together with rope.
Raven hated them all. She wanted to kill them. She wanted to run from the trees and attack them, stop them somehow.
They would kill her. She knew that. So, instead, she crouched, hiding, tears slick on her cheeks.
Cobb squatted and slung the wolf’s limp body over his broad shoulders with a pained grunt. “Damn, this thing weighs a metric ton.”
“Let’s go,” Dekker growled. “Every second we’re not hunting that damn girl, we’re just wasting time. I can’t wait to burn this place to the ground.”
Dekker headed back into the woods, along the path that led the few miles back to Haven, with Cobb at his heels and the other men following close behind. The beautiful gray and brindled fur pelts on their backs rippled in the breeze.
The Headhunters crashed through the forest. For several minutes after the last sounds faded, Raven crouched, her thighs aching, hands trembling, her pulse a roar in her ears.
They were going to kill Luna. Slaughter her like a pig. Butcher her wild beauty and reduce her to a flat, dead thing—a rug, a stupid cape for some cruel thug to wear. And Raven could do nothing to stop it.
A low, despairing moan escaped her lips. She’d needed water, but she should’ve done things differently. She shouldn’t have risked the river. Shouldn’t have believed she was far enough from Haven to take the risk.
She should have driven Shadow and Luna away from here, away from her somehow. She’d be alone, but they’d be safe—and alive.
She forced herself to stand on shaky legs.
The breeze rustled through the trees. Grasshoppers trilled. Birds chirped. Tiny creatures scurried across crackling leaves. She staggered to the riverbank, sank to her knees, and shrugged out of her pack.
Pebbles dug into her kneecaps. She barely felt the pain. Numbly, she retrieved her water bottles and filled them with automatic movements, adding the disinfectant tablets, then stuffed them back inside her backpack.
Raven stared unseeing at the rushing water.
At least they didn’t have Shadow, too. Shadow had been with Luna the last time she’d seen them, but luckily, he hadn’t been at the river, or they would’ve taken him, too.
She didn’t know where he was. Off hunting for rabbit or deer, no doubt.
He didn’t know the Headhunters had taken his mate.
How would he react when he returned to find Luna gone?
Would he smell the Headhunters' scent mingled with Luna’s beneath the cluster of hickory trees and understand what had happened? Would the wolf comprehend that this was Raven’s fault?
She’d been forced to watch helplessly as the Headhunters killed Shika, Echo, and Titus. Suki and Gizmo. How many more innocent creatures had they slaughtered last night? Was Zephyr still alive? Kodiak and Sage? Electra?
She could still run and save herself. She should run. It was the smart thing to do. She had water. She could make it to the cabin in a week or so. She could survive there, alone.
Wasn’t that what she’d wanted all along? From the beginning, hadn’t she longed to leave the world behind? Hadn’t she planned to abandon all this? The animals, the refuge, the responsibility. Everything.
She was a loner. Solitary, isolated. A recluse, just like her father.
But that was before. Before Zachariah died. Before her father died. Before the Headhunters came and started killing anything that moved. Before Shadow and Luna made her part of their pack.
She sank to her hands and knees. Her palms pressed against the smooth pebbles and mud at the water’s edge. Her fingers sank into the sludge. The mud smelled dank and sulfurous. Like something dead and rotting.
She was only one girl.
She’d done everything she could. She’d released the animals from their cages. She’d stalked and killed one Headhunter and wounded three others, driving them from the woods for a few precious hours so the surviving animals could flee.
She’d murdered Rex.
Hadn’t she tried her best? Hadn’t she done enough?
No one would even know if she ran. The world was dead. Everyone she’d ever cared about was dead. Except perhaps her mother. Did she even count?
Her mother had left. Her mother ran. Wasn’t that what Nakamura women did best? They left when the going got tough.
The frigid water numbed her hands. She yanked them from the river and drew back, wiping them on her pant legs. She drew her legs up to her chest and wrapped her arms around herself. She lowered her head to her knee and moaned.
Luna was just a wolf.
But that wasn’t true, and she knew it, felt it in the deepest parts of herself.
Her mother used to say it was a mistake to ascribe human emotions to animals. They were just genetics and instinct, her mother had claimed. But she was wrong.
It wasn’t human emotion. It was simply emotion. And some emotions—joy, anger, fear, grief—transcended species. Animals could feel, could think, could store and retrieve memories. They could show and receive affection.
They were sentient beings. Their lives held value, connection, and beauty.
Luna’s life held value, connection, and beauty.
What are you going to do?
If Raven did nothing, the Headhunters won.
The outside world was destroyed. Everything had shattered into a million pieces. She might die of the Hydra Virus. Her hand strayed to her throat, then to her forehead. Still not hot.
What was left but this? But here?
The Headhunters had destroyed Raven’s world. The Headhunters had stolen her home, her food, her safety. The Headhunters killed the animals she loved.
To go back to the lodge now… they would most certainly capture her. Torture her. Abuse her. Then kill her.
It was ludicrous to consider it. Insane. Dangerous.
But not impossible.
If she were smart. If she were careful.
What are you going to do?
Only a short while ago, she’d sat on the roof of the tiger house and planned to flee, to escape her problems, to run from the things she loved. That was a lifetime ago.
She was someone else now. Someone new. Someone better.
It was a reckless decision. Stupid, most certainly. The wrong move. It would probably get her killed.
She was going to do it anyway.
The river rushed and gurgled. Sunlight sparkled on the surface of the water. The trees swayed in vibrant colors.
Raven unfolded her legs and stood. Her feet were steady.
She turned and headed into the woods toward Haven.