An hour after leaving the kill carcass, they found another dead elk. Scavengers were already busy at work.
Meat bees and flies buzzed around and on it. Two turkey buzzards hopped away, not taking flight until the Wolves were close enough to make them prey.
It was impossible to tell how the animal died, but there was a single set of wolf tracks leading away from it. Jael’s eyes met those of a man who looked several years younger than him and shared a family resemblance.
Brother, Rebekka thought, seeing something pass between the two of them. She turned her head and caught Aryck watching the exchange with interest, guessed, like he and his father, the Wolves communicated telepathically.
A signal from Jael resumed the hunt. They moved steadily upward, toward a ridge.
Away from the meadow the land grew increasingly dry and hot. Unlike the dense pockets of forest surrounding the Jaguar and Wolf homes, the soil beneath Rebekka’s feet was fragile, supporting the growth of scrub and manzanita and very little else.
As they crested the ridge she saw a copse of trees in the canyon below, its location indicating a spring. They climbed downward, traveling on narrow, well-worn paths.
Rebekka was fairly certain they were moving east and north. She felt sick with the knowledge that if she removed the amulet, they wouldn’t need to travel at all; the elk would come.
Guilt tried to work its way into her consciousness. She beat it back. I’m doing what I can, she told herself. Nothing good would come of revealing her secret.
Her memories circled repeatedly. From urchin visits to the encounter with her father, to the things the Wainwright witches had told her and given in payment, to what her mother had revealed. Her father might be demon, but the urchin was clearly his enemy, and an enemy to the Weres as well.
The journal in her pocket was a weight against her thigh, making her think of the Jaguar cubs, who would have died without the knowledge contained in it. Just as her father had once saved her from rape and sent her to the Were brothels, he’d been responsible for the protection offered by the amulet and the deepening of her gift because of it. He was allied with the Wainwright witches. He had to be. Was it such a stretch to believe he meant for her to be here now?
A glance at Aryck and a flutter went through Rebekka’s chest. Or was she only looking for a reason to give in to the feelings she’d experienced since the first time she truly saw him as a man?
He turned his head then, meeting her eyes. Heat came. Instantly. Flushing through her with memories of waking beneath him, of the promise in his eyes when he’d pinned her against the tree.
She dropped her gaze. His hand stroked down the length of her spine in a silent message. Later.
Prints in the mud around a spring indicated the herd had been there. No one drank.
They kept going, coming to what was little more than a watering hole. There were additional tracks, including those made by a heavy vehicle.
Aryck knelt down to study a partial human shoeprint at the edge of the water, glanced up to the spot where dirt and crushed scrub told a tale of vehicles stopping and turning around. “The humans from the encampment were here.”
“Several times,” Jael said. “They’ve explored other areas as well. This is the deepest they’ve come into our lands.”
Aryck considered his father’s suspicions when it came to the Wolves and the human interlopers. There had long been distrust between the various predatory groups. Some of it was rooted in history, and in the case of the Lions and Hyenas, by genetics, but much of the pressure came from territorial disputes.
Pure animals were held in check naturally. Their numbers rose and fell according to what the land could sustain.
They starved when there was not enough food. Females didn’t go into heat, or the offspring they gave birth to were so weak they didn’t survive into adulthood.
It was not the same for Weres, especially those belonging to the dominant groups. Having the ability to reason put them at an advantage. Being able to shift form gave them an edge. It also meant their numbers could increase radically, and often did when females got pregnant while in their animal forms.
Wolves could give birth to upward of fourteen pups. It was perhaps one reason werewolves had starred in so many human stories well before the supernaturals made their presence known.
The predatory Weres controlled the size of their packs by splitting and taking over new territory, driving away those in possession of the land they wanted or—if necessary—fighting, reducing their numbers in the way humans had always done, through warfare.
For the same reasons predatory Weres did not associate with those who became prey in their animal forms, they did not intermingle much with other predators. Doing so increased the risk of interbreeding and, with it, of family alliances being formed that would lead to divisiveness in the pack should the two groups go to war. It was easier to kill a stranger than someone you’d shared food with or seen with their children and mate. And with prey, better not to realize after the fact that you’d eaten a friend.
Aryck glanced at Rebekka. He could still feel the imprint of her body against his, could still taste the kiss they’d shared. It took only the thought of her to make his cock start to harden.
Days ago he would not have believed such a thing was possible. Days ago he’d recoiled when the Jaguar called her mate.
A question slid into his consciousness, similar to the one that had risen as he ran to intercept the trespassing Wolves. Had the ancestors revealed Rebekka’s existence and sent him to her for a greater reason than just the healing of the cubs?
The Wolves had let her pass through their lands. Such a thing would only happen if the alpha allowed it.
Their alpha might have given permission on the off chance there were old weapons on Wolf land. But considering it now, Aryck realized it was far more likely the alpha had allowed them to cross because the shaman advised it.
Without Rebekka’s presence the Wolf pack would have been eradicated. And because of her, he was here, among them, sharing a hunt with their enforcer and contemplating alliance.
Not just alliance, Aryck admitted to himself, but claiming Rebekka as his mate. He was rapidly coming to believe the ancestors favored it. Or maybe the fear of being made outcast stood no chance against his desire to couple with her.
He rose from where he was crouched at the edge of the waterhole. Coming on the heels of what had happened to the Jaguar cubs, and the way the virus acted, striking all the members of Gaetan’s family without regard to age or body mass, it was hard not to be suspicious of the humans in the encampment, who’d suddenly gone quiet after making their presence known by filling the night with the sound of gunfire.
“So far the only sick or dead have been Wolves and elk,” Aryck said. “I would have expected to find deer carcasses as well, possibly coyote and fox.”
Jael caressed the knife hilt against his thigh. “I’ve been thinking the same.”
With a minute wave of his hand, Aryck indicated the footprint at the edge of the water. “There’s no proof the humans in the encampment are behind this but it seems foolish to ignore the possibility. This incursion into Were lands might just be the beginning of their plans for our territory.
“Without knowing who is behind the foray and what kind of power they wield in the human world, all of us are at a disadvantage. Not sharing what we learn or uniting against the threat adds to our disadvantage. What we do, or don’t do, will ultimately affect all of us. One group of us attacking might well be answered by declaring open season on all of us. Yet if the humans are somehow behind this virus . . .”