Hope got a hold of me and rattled me awake. We might make it. We could find a tree to sleep in. We could still get this done in time.
The sound and the sight of three wolves approaching grabbed at the hope and tore into tiny pieces right in front of me. We were dead.
Their muzzles were bloodied. Their eyes focused on the two, white-clad puffs, two Woodland girls who didn’t belong out here in the Wilderness. Careen grabbed my shoulder and squeezed. Our eyes connected and I inherited her wildness. I thought of nothing other than survival. We turned and ran.
They were so close. Their low growls rumbled in my ears and then a quick bark followed as they pursued us through the undergrowth. Branches whipped at my face as I scrambled up and over rocks. The unnatural, cool steel of wind-turbine posts suddenly creating an extra obstacle course we had to weave around. They churned the air and confused sound. I peeked back at the wolves; they shook their heads, their ears flapping against their heads. The whirring confused them too and slowed them down a fraction. Careen stayed at my back. I knew she could run faster than me and I didn’t understand why she hadn’t overtaken me yet.
I twisted my head back to look at her and realized she had stopped. She was standing legs parted, knives up, ready to throw.
I watched in slow-motion terror as she threw them both. One connected with a black wolf’s chest. The great dog skidded in the snow, smashing face first into the ground with a single yelp, and then went silent. The other knife landed in the front leg of another, but it only seemed to make it angrier and it didn’t slow its pursuit. Careen spun around, weaving her hand into mine, and ran next to me. I’m not sure who was leading. We dragged each other along.
We didn’t care how much noise we made. We were intensely focused on getting close to the wall and up a tree as fast as we could.
The handheld flashed. Two-hundred meters.
Oh my God. We might actually make it. I looked up and noticed the trees were spreading out, becoming sparser and sparser as we approached the wall. There would be nothing to climb.
My concentration lapsed for a fragment of a second and that was all it took. I put my foot down between two rocks, my boot wedged, and I fell forward, my face planted in the snow. All I could see was white. All I could hear was growling. They were right on top of us now.
A hand grabbed the back of my jacket, yanked me up, and threw me forward. A jaw snapped closed, connecting with nothing but air, teeth on teeth, just missing my calf. The wall was right there. I could see it. Grey concrete topped with white snow like a molding cake. But it was too late. We’d run out of time.
I don’t know what I was hoping for, but I sprinted at the wall for all I was worth. Maybe I thought someone might see us, rescue us, pluck us from the ground and place us back inside the walls. I didn’t want to die.
We slammed against the wall at the same time. I pounded it with my fist weakly but my mouth wouldn’t open. I realized quickly and depressingly that I would rather die than be captured and put back in there.
We planted our backs to the concrete, waiting for the wolves to spring at our throats and tear us to shreds. This would not be a quick death.
Careen took my hand and squeezed.
The two remaining wolves had slowed to a walk. They had us cornered and they knew it. They moved slowly, their tongues hanging out, the injured one limping slightly. Their eyes were wild, the bloodstains around their mouths making them look monstrous and invented. They lowered their bodies to a ready crouch. I blinked slowly.
Joseph , I’m sorry.
I concentrated on the mouth of the black wolf. Its crusty lips lifted, gums baring polished, white fangs. Pink-tinged saliva dripped from its growling jaw. My heartbeat slowed to match the viscous trickle. It slowly bulged with the extra weight of more liquid joining it and then plopped onto the fresh, powdery snow, spreading like a stain and disappearing as it melted through the ice.
The wolves pushed off and flew through the air. Their fur stood on end, sharp as needles, as their bodies created an elegant arc, paws outstretched and pointed like they were part of a dance. They were awe-inspiringly beautiful even as they were terrible.
Something cracked like lightning, and the scene transformed. Mid-flight, their fur singed black and they fell like clumps of snow from over-weighted branches to the ground, three feet in front of us. Their chests heaved in pain. The foul smell of burning flesh crept up my nostrils.
We stood like statues, afraid to move, our eyes passing over the lumps of futile fur. Careen stepped forward and swept her foot over the snow under one of the wolf’s limp legs. “Scorch spot,” she whispered breathlessly as her dusting revealed a metal curve about three-inches wide, buried in the snow. I turned to her with a withering look. She tapped it with her foot and leaned down to press her ear to it with her hands behind her back. I did the same, hearing a faint, ominous humming.
“They’re called Scorch Spots. Be careful! Don’t put your hands and feet on the ground at the same time and don’t come too close,” she warned, in between panicked breaths. I got up awkwardly, my legs starting to spasm under my weight. “Anything with four legs gets zapped as they cross the threshold. I remember them from my Guardian training. They protected us from animals on outside patrols.”
The wolves looked at us through piercing, yellow eyes. So un-human but so human was their need. Help, they pleaded. And despite the fact they tried to kill me, they were wild animals and deserved a better death than this. Careen obliged, slitting their throats neatly as her hands shook from exhaustion and sheer nervous energy. The wolves bled out in seconds.
I put my shoulder to one, trying to heave it over, but it was immense and what little strength I had was sapped.
“We can’t move them,” I said in a high, stepped-on voice. This would draw attention if it hadn’t already. Careen scooped up some snow and threw it on the black wolf’s back. It contrasted so strongly. The pure, cold white against the rough, dark fur and warm, flowing blood. I shuddered at its barbarity and its necessity. We heaped snow and broken branches on their bodies as fast as we could. When we were done, we ran around the wall until we’d put a good distance between us and them, hugging the smooth concrete.
Careen’s eyes were slightly crazed when they snapped to me. My first clarified thought was Pietre. I hoped he was ok. “We have to find somewhere to hide,” she whispered, although it sounded more like a soft shriek. Even Careen could panic.
I surveyed our surroundings. The black rocks had petered out and stood only a few feet from the ground. There were straggly pines about two-hundred meters back into the forest but they didn’t look very strong. Wind turbines shot up everywhere. The bases of the posts were big and set in each one was a small maintenance door. I pointed one out to Careen.
“What about in there? Could we kick it in?” My voice was still breathless, the high edge of terror still dominating. Careen just nodded and we lugged our exhausted bodies to the nearest one.
The door was flimsy and easy enough to jimmy. Careen, not so carefully, jammed the edge of a knife in and wrenched it until the door came loose. We crept inside the small space and pulled it closed.
Inside, the darkness was impenetrable. I could see nothing and only hear Careen’s ragged breathing and shuffling legs. Exhaustion hit me like a falling rock, splitting me open and riddling me with holes. I could move no longer, my brain emptied. We lay against the curve of the hollow post, listening to the whipping of the air above and the creaking and turning of the mechanisms within.