Feathers

Wolves

She worked with the hide from the doe that the Peregrines had killed until the sun went down. It seemed that every inch that it lowered, the air became colder and filled with the electricity of the coming storm, each stitch she made drawing it closer. It was rolling in from the sea, she could tell, and so would be powerful. Sorren used her knife to cut out a new shirt, a longer one than her half top, that she could wear in the coming fall and winter, but she was hardly focused on her task. She worked more to keep her hands busy than anything as she worried about Bear, lying in the corner. His breathing was shallow and ragged, awful to listen to, and he shivered constantly. He coughed a few times and it sounded watery, yellow mucus coming from both nostrils. Sorren tried to get him to eat or drink, but he was not very cooperative and after he bared his teeth at her, she gave up. She covered him with her blanket in the hopes that his shivers would go away.

The thunder was loud and booming, shaking the whole hill. Sorren was nervous that it would split in two, just like her dream, and reveal the same machine cranking loudly away inside. The lightning illuminated the world outside in purple-white flashes, highlighting the tiny holes in the hanging moss. It was getting close to midnight, but there was no way that she was going to be able to sleep.

The moss tore apart in a flash of light, a dark mass exploding into the space. Sorren cringed and jumped away with a yelp, but it was drowned away in the roar of thunder. She realized that the form was smaller than her as it righted itself on the floor and shook away the water that coated its body.

"Owl!" She sagged with relief and pulled a strand of moss from his back with shaking fingers. She was not surprised at all that he was out at night, but she wondered what he was doing out in the storm. Indeed, he looked half-drowned and quite bedraggled. It was a miracle that he had been able to fly so far with the heavy force of the wind soaking his feather.

"Sorren," he panted. "I came to warn you. I saw the wolves running by. There are so many of them, Sorren. I heard them and I heard...I think...They might have gotten Cat. They were heading this way and they will be here soon. Oh no, I think they want revenge on you and Bear! You must get away from here!"

She looked to Bear, sleeping more peacefully than he had all day. She swallowed the horrible ball of grief in her throat that Cat might have been killed and the fear that the wolves would find Bear weak and kill him, too. "Owl, he is sick, too sick to fight them even. We cannot leave."

"But they are coming!" He was clearly distressed.

She held out her arm for him to step on and lifted him up to her nest. A sense of calm washed over her and she knew what she had to do, what the only option was. "You stay here. You can't fly until you dry off. I...I will lead them away from here. Don't say anything. Just watch over him. I will be fine."

She grabbed her axe and knife and sprinted out into the rain before he could get a word out. The truth was, she knew she would not be fine. She and Bear had fought a small pack before and had barely escaped with their lives. If there were more than before, as Owl had seemed to have thought, she did not stand a chance. Her only hope would be to get to the Gagra's corpse and hope that it would hold them up and confuse them long enough for her to have a chance to escape. After that, she would have to try to spread her scent all over the forest and hide out of reach in a tree until it stopped raining and she could dry and fly back home.

As the drops pelted her like icy bullets, she streaked through the brush to the nearest deer trail. Even through the wailing of the wind in the branches and the drumming of the sheets of rain, she could hear their sharp yipping and howling. They were not far off. She could only hope they would follow her path and not go in the cave.

She didn't feel the freezing mud splashing on her legs or the leaves slicing at her arms and face. She focused solely on sprinting as fast as she possibly could and not inhaling water as it streamed over her lips and nose. Just as with the Gagra, she could hear them closing the distance between them and her with every second. Had they known Bear was ill? It had been over a year since they had been driven away, what had triggered them to return now?

Sorren ran over one hill and down another, passing the Peregine's old camp off to her right, and pushed herself on toward the quarry. She could feel her muscles burning, but she couldn't stop. They seemed to scream in protest at her relentless pace, but it was not fast enough. The familiar rock wall stretched up to her left and the fork appeared in a flash of light.

She skidded to a stop, dread and fear welling up in her throat at once. The Gagra's body was gone. It had been dead! Even if three bears and a pack of wolves had gorged themselves on the carcass, there would still be some trace behind, but it had completely vanished.

"No!" She sobbed into the rain. The wolves paused in their barking for only and second and then it was renewed with twice the frenzy. They had almost caught their prey!

She turned down the left fork and bolted into the shadows, struggling to continue to run when her lungs were aching and her wings, so heavy with water, weighed her down. Desperation kept her going, but in her mind, all was lost. She could never outrun wolves. She was not even sure that she could fly faster than they could follow her on foot. The thought of being ripped to shreds was the sole motivation that made her legs keep moving even when they felt like they were broken and insubstantial beneath her.

With a cry, she toppled into a ditch, rolling head over heels down a steep bank into a small and murky stream. Scratched and bruised, she barely had time to stand, her slippery fingers finding the lumpy skin of a stick, before a massive shape passed over her head, paws landing on the other side of the ditch, sinking in with the weight of the wolf. Hairs all over her body and her feathers stood on end. She kept her posture crouched and defensive so they could not easily knock her over. The rest of the pack flooded in around her and stood above, creating walls of snarling and snapping teeth. In the dark she could only count seven, but there were more. Dire wolves were as heavy as any Avian and their shoulders came to chest height often putting them face to face with their two-legged opponent. Their teeth were as long as fingers but were sharper than daggers. It only took one wolf to bring down a Feral.

"Where is your big bear, Feral? Not here to protect you now!" His jaws clacked together and the others scratched in the mud, waiting to pounce. She could barely hear him over all the growling and yipping. "I cannot wait to tear you apart for the sake of my mate and the others you and the bear murdered."

"We defended ourselves," she growled back, though her voice was weak with fear. She knew she was going to die. At least it would be quick. "It was us that you were trying to kill."

"Shut up, Avian! We need to get on with this. We are hungry from running so long. After you, we will find another Feral and another until Deepfell belongs to us once more. How fitting that you will be the first. Your blood will taste so hot and sweet on my tongue!"

"Not as sweet as it feels to sleep under your mate's pelt every night," she spat.

He growled viciously. "How dare-"

Sorren stuck him across the side of the head with the stick, snapping it in two and dropping it, simultaneously pulling out her axe and swinging to the side as she pivoted to intersect with the mouth that had fully opened to fit over her head. The blade screeched against the rows of teeth and hit the bone deep in the jaws, cleaving the top half of the wolf's head off as its momentum carried it on through the path of its jump. The body hit the ground with a thud, but she was whipping out her knife to slash at any muzzle that appeared. They surged forward at once, lightning flashing and turning the scene into a black and white stop motion, full of twitchy movements and confusion. With all the bodies fighting to get at her, the alpha was barely able to force his way in just as the hilt of her dagger, the blade buried deep in the neck of another, was torn from her hand. His teeth locked down on the handle of the axe, her hands on either side of its lips. She felt the sharp pain of anxious claws and teeth at her arms and legs, tearing her skin and releasing her warm blood, but would not give in to the alpha. He had to make the kill before they could strip the meat from her bones or he would never find real solace in her destruction.

In a flash of light she saw his face and his eyes seemed to go wide as the point of an arrow slid out from his mouth over the handle, dribbling blood onto her chest. All of his weight crushed down on her and she had to jerk to the side to avoid being impaled with the point as well. He slid heavily into the mud, the rest of the shaft protruding from the back of his head. The wolves were reeling back from the figures that had appeared suddenly, four giant Peregrines.