A low growl like subterranean thunder came from behind Hunter.
Really not so much a growl as a black vibration in the atmosphere — a dark rumbling inhabited by a pure and savage animal essence. They had been moving steadily, rapidly for hours, close on the beast's heels. Hunter turned his head and gazed back, watching Ghost's distended canines extend past his lower jaw. A snarl twisted the face beneath blazing black eyes.
"What is it, Ghost?"
Moving with massive, deep power, Ghost took a solid step forward. And the snarl continued to build in depth, blending growl and roar into an unusual, cavernous depth. Then a faint trembling tensed the great dark form and Hunter turned his head to search out what lay before them.
With the support team behind him and Bobbi Jo close, Hunter searched the thick stand of white poplars and evergreens that laid an almost impenetrable black wall. He was certain the creature had used this trail to travel south; it was obvious. But the tracks clearly indicated that it had not been hesitating, that it had been moving with purpose.
Holding the rifle tight, Hunter stood from a crouch and moved closer. Even though the sun was still high in the sky, the darkness was almost complete. It reminded him of the triple canopy jungles of South America where sunlight never saw the earth beneath the arboreal giants.
Shoulders humped, hackles rising along his neck and back, Ghost moved beside him. Although the wolf now made no sound, its jaws were distended, open fangs the only threat it gave before it hurtled forward. For now it was in a killing mode, and by instinct it would be silent until it struck. Bobbi Jo, turning slowly, continued to scan the flanks for an ambush.
Hunter spoke quietly. "Don't worry about the flanks right now." His eyes never left the darkness before them. "It's not going to ambush us here. It's moving fast, not even looking to the side."
She stared. "So what's got you so worried?"
"Because it doesn't do that."
"Why not?"
Hunter bent and studied the ground. He could see where an impression was deeper, almost gouging out the ground. The mark indicated clearly that the creature had made a sudden, volcanic move to the right, turning almost in midair.
Hunter stretched out a hand, feeling the age of the track as he subconsciously identified a myriad of smells: ferns, rotting vegetation, pine and mold and ferment, a faded, coarse animal pungency, and something else— something heavy and motionless and moist. It was scent he had come to know well from a life spent mostly in the harsh wild.
He looked down. "Ghost, stay here."
The great wolf stopped in midstride, but the burning black eyes never left the forest wall before it, nor did its tension fade. Slowly, Hunter turned to Bobbi Jo. "Stay with Ghost. Tell the others to hold position."
She tightened almost to a combat readiness; the barrel of the Barrett rose. "What are you going to do?"
Hunter was already moving away, angling deeply to the right. As he twisted a move between two mammoth ferns and into the bush he whispered back to her, "Something died here. I'm gonna find out what it was."
She brushed a lock from her face and looked to him again.
But he was gone.
Despite Bobbi Jo's hand signal to hold position, Takakura moved up silently to crouch beside her. Frowning, the big Japanese stared into the foliage, searching. His narrow black eyes revealed only fierce alertness when Bobbi Jo cast a slight glance. Obviously, the commander was at home in combat. His voice came to her calmly and coldly.
"What is it, Bobbi Jo?"
She shook her head. "I don't know."
Takakura gave a glance toward the wolf, but it had vanished without a sound in the space of three seconds. It had been here when he crouched and now it was gone; no sound, no sight. The Japanese's disciplined face revealed no surprise. "The wolf… he is… like…"
"A ghost?" Bobbi Jo said, and despite an appropriateness in the reply, she didn't smile.
All that she had, emotion and intellect and will, were too tightly focused on what vague darkness — what shapeless threat — hovered on the far side of that green, mossy dark wall of impenetrable fern. Then Takakura bowed his head, slightly frowning, toward the gathering dark. He took one second to monitor the support team's stillness and nodded. Obviously, their readiness was acceptable.
"What did Hunter say as he moved?" he whispered.
"He doesn't generally say anything when he moves."
A moment, and Takakura seemed to read more into it. Without effort he seemed to understand what manner of man was leading them.
"He is a hard man," he muttered. "There is something in him that moves him. But it, in itself, does not move." He paused. "How long do you think he will be gone? We are losing what little light this canopy allows."
She waited, shook her head. "With him, you can never tell. Sometimes he won't move at all for an hour. He'll just stare at the terrain. Then sometimes he moves so fast you have to be half wolf to keep up."
Takakura grunted. "This I know."
"He'll come back when he's certain," she added, turning her head with mechanical precision to stay alert. "I've learned that much about him. He doesn't ever make a mistake. He says it takes too long to double back and pick up a track if he's wrong."
"The wolf, it helps him."
"Yeah." Bobbi Jo's hands tightened on the rifle at a slight rustling sound. She waited; possibly a falling branch. "Ghost helps him. Or he helps Ghost. One or the other. Either way, they work together."
"So I have seen. How long, do you think, before we are able to target this creature?"
Her voice was softer.
"Probably sooner than we'd like, Commander."
Slashed and disemboweled, the mammoth brown-black carcass with protruding white ribs lay before Hunter in the somber gloom.
He stood motionless, measuring the great grizzly's size, judged it to be close to half a ton. Glistening black claws at the end of incredible huge forelegs lay still. Its fangs were fixed in a frozen roar. Its open eyes were glazed by the vicious impact of a sudden and unexpected death.
Circling the area, Hunter had easily discovered the creature's taloned tracks, the ones left after it had killed the grizzly. Almost immediately he had known what had happened, but had done a careful reconnaissance to make sure that the thing, whatever it was, was not lying close to the dead grizzly as a tiger would often do. All around the area he found the grizzly's tracks, half-eaten bushes, and trampled berries. Then, after he was certain that he and the team were alone, Hunter angled carefully back to examine the corpse.
Clearly, reading the overlaying tracks, Hunter could see that it had been a ferocious fight. Not long, certainly, but ferocious — clearly a confrontation of two creatures each of whom struck with horrific force. And for a moment Hunter remembered the two Siberian tigers who had fought to the death as he rolled between them. It confirmed to him that the more powerful the enemies were, the shorter the fight.
The grizzly, normally reluctant to challenge a creature of equal size, had put up a formidable defense. Its claws were caked in dried blood, confirming Hunter's suspicion gleaned from surrounding leaves that the creature he was tracking could indeed be wounded, and had been. And somehow it gave him comfort.
No, he thought to himself, it wasn't un-killable.
In a surreal silence Hunter bent and froze. Then removed his knife to examine the bear's wounds when he heard what could have been the soft nestling of a bird's wings, so close.
He followed the almost-silent approaching steps and knew what it was before he shook his head, smiling and turning. He angled his head toward the gloom and waited, but there was no more movement. Then, softly, in a voice no human being could have heard if they had been standing six inches away, he spoke into the darkness.