Wolf Silver

The Battle of the Red Stone Mountains

Sam

We drove silently to the mountains, the sound of my heart thudded through my skull. I held the map in my hands, that shook lightly. Was I scared? I couldn't really tell. It could have been a number of things, something that I could feel from the pit of my stomach to the top of my chest.

August behind sat grinding his teeth and his knee bouncing wildly. He looked extremely on edge, but who wouldn't? Considering where we were going. Wolves walking into a nest of Hunters.

We found a park exit and took it, pulling right up to the bast of the mountains. My heart thudded faster. I could see it now, the flash of red stone as I ran past. The feel of the stone beneath my feet. "I've been here before." I whispered looking up the mountain. John gave me a sideways glance, I'm not sure what went through his mind but it was probably a million of things. My own thoughts were racing.

I stepped up to a few large, bright red stones and picked one up. My stomach dropped and the world went dark. I felt my vision daze then slowly fade away. It was a sickening feeling. I blinked a few times to find myself... transported?

Around me enormous wolves battled against straight coated humans. The coats were strange, they didn't look like something people were wearing since I had been in the company of John and the Blake pack. These coats looked tight, gold straps crossed over the chest and large golden button deckles  up the front on two sides. their pants were tucked into tall leather boots, that came to their knees. They held long guns that fired with a deafening blow, a bright flash erupted from the end of the barrel.

A voice in my mind told me that what I was seeing was the past. These events had long since gone, the patrons probably long dead. A battle for land that no one won. In a flash the scene disappeared, the guns were silenced and the world was deathly quiet. Before me the ground was littered with bodies, human and wolf strewn along the mountain base, nothing moved, everything was dead. A black moon hung in the sky laughing down at the chaos below, the death that surrounded me. A scream was built in my chest, but my throat was closed from the stench of blood. My cheeks burned as tears fell, I couldn't comprehend the mindlessness killing, the enormous loss of life. I knew that this had happened, I don't know how I knew but it did. I couldn't move my body was frozen in the wasteland the spread before me. Even the trees on the mountain had been burned, ash and smoke mixed with the blood.

The moon spoke to me then,"Blood will always spill when ignorant beings walk the Earth until all the blood has run dry." I looked up seeing a wide bloody grin flickering across the lower face of the moon. "Man will hunt man, beast will hunt beast, and monster will hunt monster. Who is who? Are you the hunter or the hunted?"

"SAM!" I blinked as the world of death faded and I was standing back at the base of the mountains on a hot sunny day, August and John stared at me concern running deep in their eyes. John, who yelled my name, lowered his voice almost to a whisper. "Are you alright? You're crying." I quickly reached to wipe the tears away.

I took slow, deep breaths to clear away the linger scent of death and bring in the warm mountain air. once composed I told them what I experienced, "I saw... Death." I described to them the smell of the mountain,  how I could feel it burning my nose. The sound of the musket fire that made my ears ring and the gleam of claws as man and wolf clashed. And finally I told them of the Moon's dark messaged that it had left with me.

Both men were quiet for a long time. Neither spoke, they gathered their things and we began hiking. Tension filled the air. It wasn't the kind of tension you get when people are fighting around you but the tension you feel in a hospital room as a loved one was grasping at the strings of life. It was hard to choke down, but you knew it was coming. So pushing through we began our climb of the mountain.