6
“I wanted to watch the hunt,” I muttered.
Colt laughed bleakly. “I give you binoculars to watch birds and you use ‘em to spy on us. I guess there’s no stopping a wolf from doing what she wants if she wants it badly enough.”
He didn’t sound angry. It inspired me to smile, bolstered by his acceptance of me as a wolf like him. Because I was one. Even if the others didn’t act like it.
My smile wilted a moment later. “He took the binoculars,” I said. “But I didn’t tell him you gave them to me.”
“Thanks for that.” Colt turned around again.
I snuck a glance at my brother, watching him carefully slice chunks of meat off the elk and set them aside for me to clean up and package. Despite his lean physique, the muscles in his arms bulged as he flexed and stretched. His smile had two modes: thoughtful and mischievous, the latter pairing best with his gleaming blue eyes and sharp jawline. Behind his every calculated move was cleverness certain to sweep his future mate off her feet, whoever she may be.
It took us three hours to process the elk and clean up the butchering room. By then, it was a little past midnight; tomorrow morning, I’d have to wake up early to clean the manor, even earlier than I used to wake up for school. I graduated this past June. David wanted to keep me on an early schedule so I knew I was going to be tired, especially since I felt exhausted tonight. Colt walked me back up to my bedroom, his gloves and apron gone and now wearing jeans and his dark blue t-shirt. “Hey,” he said, grabbing my shoulder as I opened my door, “if you need anything, just give me a shout.”
I hesitated.
“Since you’re grounded,” he added.
“Oh.” I wouldn’t be able to join in on trips to the grocery store. That was probably what he meant. “Okay. Thanks.”
Colt grinned softly, taking his hand away. From the air whisked by his hand, a fresh wave of his piney smell hit my nose, rising directly off his skin. I breathed in and relished it, catching his eyes.
He tilted his head.
The desire to tell him about these newfound smells became tangled up in my throat. I didn’t want to sound stupid in case it was nothing. It was sometimes embarrassing, just looking in peoples’ eyes; so I averted my gaze and turned for my door. “Goodnight, Colt.”
“Night, Billie.”
I undressed into pajama shorts and a tank top, and once the corridor was clear, ducked into the bathroom to wash my face, brush my hair, and brush my teeth. Back in my bedroom, I crashed onto my bed and was sure I’d pass out within a few minutes.
Except I didn’t.
It was hard to sleep, no matter how heavy my eyelids felt. I tossed and turned, reliving the overwhelming stench of blood in the butchering room. No, outside. It was fresher outside. Warmer. How could I even tell the difference? I was fidgety, hungry, remembering the skinless corpse’s pattern of white fats strafing through pink muscle. The ambient sounds of the manor suddenly became too loud for me: the humming of central air, the groaning hardwood whenever Colt moved around in his room. It was too hot even after I took off my blanket. I wanted to be outside again.
I shouldn’t go. I knew I shouldn’t.
On the cusp of a dream, my feet hit the hardwood, and I walked to my door. I was only going to get a glass of water, but when I peered down the dark corridor and found it empty and still, fate tempted me to walk a little further. All I wanted was a breath of fresh air.
David’s truck wasn’t back yet. Catrina wasn’t home yet either. I slid the porch door open, wary of waking Colt, and stepped outside.
A deluge of night smells enveloped me. The dewy aftermath of a humid summer day made everything sweet and wet. It was the dirt that I could smell most strongly; fresh and damp, soil in a garden threaded with bitter notes of weeds and worms. Standing on the porch, the warm wind grazed my bare arms and fingered through my hair. My cravings magnified, pushing me into the grass so I could feel it under my feet. Smells from the dark fringe of the forest ahead lured me away. Dirt and dew, fungi and flowers, fresh animal tracks weaving around trees. I wasn’t going to be out long. I just wanted enough of the forest to sate my restlessness, then I’d be able to sleep.
I hadn’t anticipated how dark it would be out there. It was unnerving once I made it into the tree line. The forest transformed into a landscape of obscure silhouettes scarcely lit by starlight, rustling sounds I couldn’t pinpoint, cracking twigs, coyote shrieks in the distance. The lights from the manor were lost among the leaves. I didn’t know what direction I was walking.
The sensations of the forest were so intoxicating that after some minutes, going home became less of a priority; I tried not to worry about it. Instead, I savored the smells. The texture of dirt and grass under my feet. The sight of stars above me twinkling in the black expanse.
What if I kept walking and just never went back to Hexen Manor?
This freedom that gripped me invoked dozens of new possibilities. I was alone out here. I could keep walking until the sun rose and see how far I’d gone. Maybe I could get far enough away that David would never find me. I didn’t know why that was appealing; after all, he was my father, and Hexen Manor was my home. It was safe there. This wilderness was treacherous and could kill me instantly, yet… I wanted it so much more than the sequestered life I currently had.
When something moved behind me, I spun around to look, but didn’t speak. Freedom made me feel bolder. Like I didn’t need to worry—I was just imagining it. It was just the sounds of the forest. I kept walking, but there was a heaviness in the way the leaves shuddered around me. Heavy feet crackling twigs. Heavy bodies parting the bushes. And suddenly, among the forest smells, pungent miasmatic odors.
I thought of the dangerous other shifters David warned me about. They couldn’t be out here so close to Hexen Manor, in the heart of Dalesbloom territory, could they? I held my breath and stared until shadows in the forest bent, moving. Not with the natural sway of trees or bushes, but like hulking figures, striding limbs. “Who’s out there?” I ventured, fighting the shake from my voice.
Nothing answered but a low growl.
I wasn’t alone.