Chapter 8 - Lara
The snow settles overnight.
I wake to the kind of soft light that I haven't seen in weeks, a diffused brightness of a room with snow against the window, and for a moment, I lie on my side under the blanket and just look at it. I’ve always loved the forest under snowfall, despite the challenges.
The cabin is silent except for the sound of the pump, and I can hear the fire is lit.
My ankle is still, but my headache has cleared, and my ribs are certainly no worse than yesterday.
I’m hungry and more alert. That’s how I know I’m getting better.
Feeling more alert makes me realize how foggy the last couple of days have been, and I know how close I came to dying.
I wouldn’t have lasted much longer. I don’t think I would have made it out of that hut, and realistically, Wilf finding me was probably better than any other shifter, given that he’s looked after me.
But he’s still a shifter, and I have no idea what he’s planning. He said I can’t leave, after all.
I think back to our conversation yesterday—it didn’t last long because I crashed out after lunch.
I don’t think he was done talking, but I went for a nap and stayed down all night.
My body wants food, but whenever I eat, it leaves me wiped out.
At some point, he’d left a tray by the side of my bed, and I didn’t even notice he’d been in the room, which makes the knife I sleep with in my hand pretty pointless.
I sit up and pick at the slightly stale bread, grateful for anything, especially the cool water.
My ankle is still protesting any kind of movement, but it’s a lot better than it was.
My head doesn’t hurt anymore, but my brain is working overtime, running a hundred scenarios with the knowledge that I’m dangerously helpless to most of the outcomes.
I push the blanket off, pull on the rolled-up sweats from yesterday, swap the huge grey t-shirt for one of the sweatshirts, and lower my feet to the floor, testing my weight before fully trusting it.
I’m about to open the door when I hear him moving through the cabin; he’s talking to someone on the phone.
I can’t make out exactly what he’s saying as it’s muffled, but I can hear he’s trying to talk quietly. He sounds caught off balance, and it’s the tone of a man who’s been caught out in a lie as he tries to bluster his way through. I gently open the door a little and listen in.
“Connor, hold on. Just…give me a second,” he says and then pauses. It’s the kind of pause a person makes when they’re deciding which way to go with an explanation. “Yes, I’m at the summer cabin. Yes, I’m here with someone. It’s the woman.”
I hold my breath as I listen, very aware of how sensitive shifters' senses are.
“Look, I found her the other night; she was in a bad way, and this just seemed best.” He falls silent, clearly listening to the other man talk before he continues.
“I know, I should’ve told you, but I’ve got my reasons.
I’ll own them. But I’m doing this to protect the pack; there’s something off with all this. ”
Another pause, longer this time. Clearly, this Connor guy on the other end of the phone is talking.
“Yeah, she’s hurt. Sprained ankle, bruised ribs, head wound. Not eaten in days, but she’s eating now and slept well. She’ll live.”
There’s another pause, and when he starts talking again, his voice is pitched even lower, and I have to strain to hear.
“She’s pretty scared of shifters. She was on the run for days from the Cheselm lot who took her, and I don’t think she was particularly fond of wolves before that. She shuts down entirely when I try to talk to her. I’d rather not lose what she knows.”
Another pause.
“Two days, maybe three. I doubt the road is passable with this snow anyway. I’ll bring her down when it opens up; hopefully, I’ll have some answers by then. If not, Luna can talk to her.”
There’s a longer pause, and I hear him exhale, full of frustration and something else I’m not sure about.
“Yeah, I know.” He says, “I should have probably told you, but this might be nothing. I’m dealing with it.”
A pause.
“Yeah, alright. I’ll keep you posted.”
There’s silence and then the sound of the phone being tossed onto the counter with a clatter. I hear his footsteps retreat toward the porch and the sound of him moving boxes. Probably the supplies he said he was going to bring in from the storage bins outside.
I keep my hand on the door, not moving, barely breathing, while I consider everything I heard.
Even through the door and without hearing the other man’s voice, I can tell the person he was talking to wasn’t very happy with him.
He obviously didn’t know that Wilf had brought me here, and now we’re trapped by the snow.
I’ve no idea if those rogues are still out there hunting, or if this cabin has wards strong enough to hide us if they are.
When he said he was ’dealing with it’, what does that mean?
Dealing with me? He knows there’s something strange about my voice, but it obviously didn’t work on him.
Why would I tell him more when he might just want to bring a witch in like the rogues?
I’m not an experiment. I just want to go home.
But he’s going to take me back to his pack, and if I don’t tell him what he wants to know, he’ll have someone else get it out of me.
By his own account, I have two or three days to either tell him what he wants, probably things I don’t even know about the rogues, because I don’t know much anyway.
I’m certainly not telling him anything about my voice, or he’ll hand me over to his pack.
That’s how long I have.
I step back and sit down on the edge of the bed.
I try to keep my breathing steady because I know it’s something that could give me away to a shifter.
My father taught me that I needed to train my way out of giving in to that kind of panic; he was very firm about it.
If you panic in your mind, that translates into panic in your legs, and then you’re useless to yourself.
I know he was right because I need a clear mind to figure this out.
I breathe in for four, hold for four, breathe out for six, and repeat. As my mind clears, I think.
He seems to be a decent man, as far as shifters go. I’ll give him that. I’m sitting here in this cabin, warm, fed, and he’s tended to my injuries with a level of decency I didn’t know shifters could deliver. He hasn’t hurt me, at least, not yet. But I don’t really know what he wants.
I know exactly what my father would say. You can’t go to a town full of them, Lar. We don’t go to the shifter towns.
There were at least twenty shifters in the camp where they had me.
I counted as many as I could, but as the days went on, it became harder to concentrate; plus, not many came near me after that first day, so I could only count through the dirty window.
It’s a miracle I was able to slip away, and miracles don’t tend to repeat.
I have no idea how many shifters live in his town, but I know where it is, and I know it’s a lot more than twenty.
He has an alpha, a Luna, and a head of security; they run patrols, and they have fancy security systems. I would have no chance of escape.
He told me that there are humans living in the town, but are they really free? Can they really leave?
I’m not going. I would rather take my chances on a healing sprained ankle and six inches of snow—both are things I’ve dealt with before.
I think he genuinely thinks he knows what's best for me, making decisions for me. I think perhaps he really doesn’t think his brand of shifters is a threat to me, but he can’t possibly know that.
Maybe he doesn’t mean any harm—or perhaps he’s just playing nice because he senses my voice could stop him, and he just wants to use it too.
I don’t know what the rogues were going to do with the witch, or what they would have done if she had arrived before I escaped, but I’m not going to sit around and wait to see if these shifters have the same plans.
I continue to weigh up my options.
I can still hear him in the other room. Every instinct is telling me to just slip out again and run, but I know I’d need to be far better prepared than that if I’m going to make it.
I get up again and cross to the chair where the bundle of clothes he gave me is still folded, and start dressing in layers.
I’ve washed and dried my underwear and jeans that actually fit, so I pull those on, then layer a knotted t-shirt and a thick sweater.
I pocket my knife again and pull on two pairs of socks.
I know my boots are clean and dry now by the back door, ready to go.
I don’t know if I’ll have a chance to escape today, but I need to be ready if an opportunity presents itself.
I stand and check my ankle, which feels more secure today thanks to the strapping and extra socks; then I walk into the front room as though I’ve just gotten up.
He’s at the kitchen counter and turns when I walk in, his gaze sweeping me in a way that makes my skin tingle, but he doesn’t say anything about the fact that I’m wearing extra layers inside.
“Morning,” he says, “you look better today.”
“Marginally,” I reply as lightly as I can.
“Coffee’s fresh,” he says, pouring a cup and putting it on the table for me, “breakfast is still warm in the pan.”