Inessa will do anything to keep her life as a rogue. Her freedom is the last safe place in White Timber Forest, especially since the tensions between the four werewolf clans are threatening to erupt. However, the power-hungry clans know of her skill...
Inessa opened her eyes. There was snow on the ground. Snow and blood. She looked at her hands, dark against the snow. They were beginning to turn blue. There was ice in the wind, biting her ears and nose. It was like an animal, not a force of nature, and Inessa was the prey.
The sleepy haze hadn't left her mind. Why am I in this form? Humans were vulnerable and weak. Inessa closed her eyes, the cold and tiredness numbing her.
Then she heard the howls. She jerked up from the ground, fully awake. She looked at the blood on the snow, the cut on her arm. It was one, jagged red line from her elbow to her shoulder. It was dry. She touched the bump on her forehead. It was throbbing. That tree branch. Why was I running so fast? Then it all came back: her capture by the East clan and what the man with a spear had said to her.
The man was bald with a dark brown beard, and old enough to be her father. Because of his stature and commands, Inessa instinctively knew he was of some rank. The man introduced himself as Dhruv, a member of the Red Conclave, the former rulers of the East werewolf clan.
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"Your ability to track is unmatched," he said. "They say that on a still day, no one can come within two miles without you knowing exactly where they are."
"What makes you believe that? Not everyone should believe in tall tales." Inessa said, keeping a careful eye on the two wolves next to her. She was still in human form. Every area of her was vulnerable to being ripped apart by their exposed canines.
"Daughter of the wind, you may have only served the hunters of the clans, but their masters and rulers have heard of you. My sources tell me you don't shift quickly, do you? Neither do you run as well as you can smell."
The insult stung, but Inessa tried to keep it down. "I haven't tracked anyone in months. I refused the last hunter who came to me. I'm done, so what do you want?"
One of the wolves bared his teeth and hacked. It almost sounded like a laugh.
"Simple," Dhruv said. "At this time, we cannot have someone with your skills set against us. Especially with your tracking ability."
"I don't serve anyone."
"Nevertheless, other clans can force you. You may only be one skill among many, but in the wrong hands you can cause irreversible damage. The fix for this problem is simple: you will die."
Inessa stepped back, but the wolf to her left growled.
"Or you can marry our alpha."
"What?" This wasn't happening. The world as she knew it suddenly became small, as if the corners of the world were nothing but a cage that she'd never be able to climb out of. Inessa noticed the crooked leg on the growling wolf and smiled to herself. She turned back to Dhruv. "I value my life. I'll do as you say."
That was all a farce, of course. As soon as Dhruv turned his back and started leading them in a single-file trail with Inessa and the two guard wolves towards the back, Inessa took advantage of the night.
It almost seemed too good to be true. With a swift and sudden kick to the wolf's crooked leg, he tumbled down a steep hill, and Inessa sprinted as fast as she could. She ran without stop, even through the pain of the shift, using every trick she could to throw off her scent. She ran with the wind, up and down the tree-covered hills, and finally squeezed through tight boulders bordering the mountains. Within hours, she knew she had lost them.
She would be safe.
Until she made the worse mistake of her life, and fell asleep.
Inessa's spine stiffened. It was not from the cold. She could hear the wolves around her. They were on the mountain ridge far behind her, in the woods to her left and right. She doubted they could smell her, not in this blizzard. Yet, she was almost surrounded. They must have picked up her tracks.
"No!" She gasped. It would not happen. She would not fall prey to some clan, especially not the one who killed her mother. It was the reason she never tracked for Eastern hunters. It was the Northern, Western, and Southern hunters, sometimes rogues, that sought her services. They usually asked her to find runaway thieves and other law-breakers. Sometimes they never told her who she was tracking or why she was tracking them. They just gave her the scent and followed where she went. In exchange, Inessa got clothes, food, supplies and traveling gear. In her mind, it was almost unfair: all she did was sniff out the target, but they did all the dirty work. As soon as they locked onto their target, they left Inessa alone with her payment. It was a good life. All until the hunters started getting picky, asking for information and demanding that Inessa come back with them to their villages. It was when she decided to stop tracking for anyone but herself.
Inessa knelt and dug her hands into the snow, clenching her fists. I can't lose to the East clan. To anyone! The bones in her body began breaking, bending, and re-forming. Her muscles stretched around them: leaner and tougher than before. She yelped as the bones in her right leg snapped and shrunk. Tears brimmed her eyes.
Even after hundreds of times, the shift hurt. It always did. Which was why she never allowed anyone to see her shift. No one was allowed to see the pain on her face, just like the pain she carried inside. She was a survivor, and she was going to live as a survivor should.
My choice. My freedom.
It was something she was ready to fight for.
In a few minutes, the shift completed. A wolf, covered in grey and white fur, rose from the ground and bared its teeth, it's eyes piercing like the rays of a sunset. The circle around her had tightened. She had no choice but to break through.
