Clara yawned, covering her mouth with a glove-clad hand as she followed Wyatt along the snow-covered path. The skies had opened up shortly after she had returned to the tent the previous night, and the gentle pattering of snow against it had been enough to keep her already-frazzled mind awake, jolting from suspicion to suspicion with every sudden gust of wind, each one carrying the promise of a new enemy or and old fear, just waiting for her to surrender to sleep. No, Clara did not sleep that night.
Despite its proximity, they had decided to drive to Stafford and forego the odd looks that they inevitable got for walking straight out of the forest and into town. With each step, the icy breeze seemed to intensify against her cheeks and the car seemed miles further than where they had left it - or perhaps with every step they took, it was moving further away, taunting them. Yes Clara, she thought sarcastically. The car is evil too.
She knew it could be worse, though. She could be in pieces in a motel somewhere, the handiwork of a vengeful Alpha. Still, there was nothing enjoyable about trudging through the snow.
As they rounded a corner of white-dusted shrubs, the frosted car came into sight, its black hull glaring through the wintry blanket that attempted to submerge it. She breathed a sigh of relief and walked a little faster, releasing Wyatt's hand and -
Bang!
The gunshot rang clear - she felt it rush by, inches from her face, felt her heart pause in her chest as if she'd been hit and it was closing up shop. But she felt the air as it whipped through the white, and she heard it hit the tree beside her, and when she landed on her cold ass behind Wyatt, she felt no warm blood gushing out to relieve her from the winter and send her into any fiery pain, or peaceful sleep.
Her ears were still ringing from the bullet's proximity but she knew she had yelled, and she knew Wyatt was growling from the heave of his shoulders and his shaking hands. She thought he would shift - she had never seen his wolf. A part of her was curious - would his clear, kind blue eyes stare back at her, set in fur? Or would he be a stranger - just an animal, cold and unfamiliar, like the ones she used to kill? She had never considered them to be people when they had claws and teeth that could rip her apart with one false move, but she had never known any of the ones she killed in wolf form.
She scrambled to her feet, careful not to slip in the snow, but stayed low as Wyatt charged towards the treeline from which she assumed the bullet had come from.
"Oh my lord -" the voice was a crescendo as her hearing returned, and definitely not Wyatt's. She stood up straight and ran the few steps it took to reach him, just before he tackled a shotgun-wielding - and positively horrified - Henry to the ground.
The shotgun was out of his hands in seconds, landing in the snow just out of arms reach beside them. Feeling a little useless just watching, Clara grabbed the heavy weapon. She'd never fired a shotgun before, but knew how to bluff. She pointed it at Henry, fiddling with the gun as if she could use it. It wasn't too dissimilar to the ones she had owned. She doubted she would be using it, anyway.
"Oh God, oh shit, are you okay?" Henry turned his head, ignoring the low growls of Wyatt above him and staring straight at Clara, almost pointedly ignoring the shotgun in her arms.
"Why the hell did you try to shoot me?" She'd been through enough to know not to trust anyone at their word. When Henry gave a little frown, she stepped closer, pointing the gun in his face so that he couldn't ignore it anymore.
Wyatt stood, allowing the disarmed man to scramble to his feet. "I-I didn't, I swear - are you sure you're alright?" he panted, holding one hand to his heart, covered by layers of bone and skin and plaid, and another outstretched to Clara, his fingers raised as if he were trying to calm her. "I didn't think anybody would be so far out here!"
She shifted her feet, eyeing him carefully for any traces of suspicion. He had mentioned before, at the diner, that he hunted wolves - but she didn't know if he was aware that Stafford's resident wolf population were more than just that. If he did, it wouldn't be difficult to guess why two humans were walking around deep in the forest.
"Well we are, you son of a bitch!" Wyatt almost snarled the words, taking a step forward but restraining himself from lunging at the man - for the moment.
"I'm sorry! I've been tracking the wolves around here, you know? This area is crawling with prints and I saw something move and I shot and -" his fast babbling was cut off as Wyatt's short-lived self-control snapped and he knocked Henry back a few steps with a single, crunching blow. He stumbled to right himself, a trail of scarlet vivid under his nose against his pale skin. He glared at Wyatt, staggering back to avoid another hit as his apologetic expression dropped.
"I didn't hit her!" he yelled, glancing once at Clara - the distraction earned him another swift punch, one that knocked him straight into the snow. With a small sigh, she stepped forward, the shotgun lowered to the ground.
"Stop it, Wyatt." She said loudly, shivers beginning to wrack her body as the initial burst of heat from her pounding heart wore off. "Let him go."
He glanced dubiously back at her, apparently fully prepared to beat the hunter into a bloody pulp, but after another hit that would probably leave Henry bruised for weeks, he bitterly stepped away. With him groaning and staining the ivory snow, they walked back to the car. Before she got in, Clara spared a glance to the man, who sat up. She slid inside the vehicle, still holding the shotgun, just as he began to stand up, and they were already driving away when he started yelling for his gun.
She tossed it onto the backseat.
* * *
They went to the diner again.
Clara didn't doubt that it was the only place to eat in the area if they didn't want to live off junk food from the cold supermarket. They still got some odd looks as they walked in, snow in their hair and yet hardly dressed for winter. Their cheeks were tinted pink on pale skin and their lips were already darkening. Clara's eyes were bloodshot, red and sore from the sleepless night, whilst Wyatt's tension was only from their encounter with Henry. He had gripped the steering wheel so hard the entire way there that she thought he might break it off.
But he didn't, and apart from a sliding stop when they parked, the car had made it across the cold roads with all wheels - and passengers - intact.
Clara settled into the little booth seat, already slipping off her thin jacket as the radiators and space heaters that were cluttered in every available space assaulted her with warm air. She glanced around the room. There weren't many people around - perhaps just because there weren't many people in the town, or maybe because of the time, whatever that might be.
The near-silence in the air shifted her thoughts back to Maine, and the tiny town near Wyatt's house. It was barely on the map, but still a lot busier than this little black hole. Her hand itched to her pocket, where she usually kept her phone - she had to remind herself that she didn't in fact have one. Joanna's, the battery already dead, was somewhere in her car...
The grin pulled at her lips before she could help it, half hysterical.
Wyatt looked up, allowing the tension that tightened his features to subside as he titled his head slightly, his hands on the little, hand-written menu between them. To him, her smiles were infectious. "What?"
"Joanna's car," Clara laughed, leaning her forehead on her hand. She recalled how her friend had driven the thing so carefully and smiled each time she ran her hands over its shiny surface. "She's going to kill me."
Wyatt grinned back, apparently already aware of the implications. God, she was sure that the thing was smashed in or stolen from outside her old building in Boston. It was a trivial thing, but it was nice to remember the people they had so carelessly left behind. Warmth tinged her cheeks at the thought, and her slightly bitter nostalgia was replaced with shame.
"Have you called Dylan?" she asked him, and his smile dipped a little too.
"Not yet." He said, his eyes flicking back down to the menu as if she'd hurt him. God help her if she wasn't going to fight him on this. She was more grateful than she'd ever say that he had left with her, but she knew it wasn't right. Her mother would target Maddox, and probably wouldn't stop to check if they were there or not. Wyatt suddenly gave a sigh, tinged with anger. His knuckles turned white for a moment, and then the tension left his hands, and consumed his eyes. "Say it, Clara. Stop looking at me like that and say what you want to say."
She paused, placing her hands flat on the table and holding his gaze steadily. Her voice didn't waver. "You shouldn't have left the pack." She said quietly. He began to speak, and she did too. "It's not fair to -"
"What did you expect me to do? Really, Clara, did you think I'd just let you run off to be killed?" he said, half bitterly but half desperately, trying to make her understand. "Duncan will kill you if he finds you - and you might be fast, and you might have killed a few wolves before, but this is an Alpha. You couldn't win."
She almost let a wry smile take over - she remembered when she arrived in Maine to kill an Alpha. "You're right - maybe I can't. But if he's so dangerous, you should be back with the pack, protecting them. Dylan can't lead right now! If you go back and tell Duncan I'm not there with you, maybe he'll stay away. And if he doesn't, then at least you'll be there to help your own people fight back."
"Stop trying to be a damn martyr. I'm not letting you die, and I'm not letting my pack die either." He said, the passion behind the words forming it into some sort of vow. "Dylan will get in touch with Duncan before he does anything rash. He has no reason to attack the pack if you're not there."
"It's still a risk." Clara said, a little defeated. "I should have never let you come with me."
"You know what? Forget this. I don't want to listen to you complaining about me trying to protect you. It's not fair, Clara, you know I couldn't just let you go alone." Wyatt stood, grabbing his jacket from the shiny red booth and fishing through the pockets. He swiped out his phone before she could even speak and dropped it on the table between them. "Call Dylan, if you're so worried, and he'll tell you the same thing: the pack is fine." And with that, he shrugged on his jacket and left the diner, letting a last gust of white-speckled air into the room.
She sat for a few moments. She bought a coffee with what little bit of change was in her pocket. She sat for a few minutes longer. No, she would not go after Wyatt and apologise - she held firm. She understood his need to protect her, but the uneasiness at abandoning their pack remained.
After a while, she picked up the phone, grinning internally at its clear age, and found his contacts. Dylan was one of very few.
"Wyatt?" he answered, sounding a little tired.
"Try again." She said softly, smiling.
"Hey, Clara," he laughed. "How's it going?"
"Fine - although I have to say it's freezing up here." She replied. "How are you though? And the pack? Has Duncan attacked? Have you talked to him at all, I mean I know that you -"
"Whoa slow down there - I'm fine, and the pack's fine. There's been no word from Alpha Duncan, not even about his wife. It will probably be safe for you two to come back in a few days." Dylan said calmly. She remembered the days in the beginning, when she was still looking for ways to escape from him, when he had been so vibrant and cheerful, despite her ceaseless anger.
"Thanks, Dylan." She paused. "Have you heard from Joanna?"
He was silent for a moment, but covered up the break in his façade of calm with a level voice. "No. I think she's staying in Boston for a while longer. It's for the best, anyway."
"I'm sorry."
"It's not your fault. You just get yourself home safe, alright?" an ounce of teasing bled through into his tone, and she lit up. Maybe Dylan wasn't broken after all.
* * *
Clara didn't see Wyatt again that day. After her call to Dylan, she drove the truck - grateful that he hadn't taken it when he stormed off - back to where they'd parked it before, sliding a little on the ice but nevertheless managing to safely stow it near the campground. The shotgun she'd taken from Henry that morning was still in the backseat, and her own pistol was stowed somewhere in the trunk. After shutting off the engine, she sat for a moment in the fading heat of the car, biting her lip. Shotgun. She dragged it out of the backseat, surprised by its weight. With the adrenaline of the shock this morning, she hadn't noticed that it was so bulky.
She got out of the car, holding the gun loosely with both hands, ready to lift and fire. Not that she was expecting too much trouble - but she was still uneasy about the wolves in the area, and without an ally by her side she was better safe than sorry.
Instead of heading for the tent, she killed the hours until sunset, which was rather early this far north, by walking through the forest. It was making her uneasy, not knowing her surroundings, and hell, she had nothing better to do. She didn't encounter any wolves, or Wyatt, during her surveillance of the area, but couldn't shake the feeling that she was being watched, however cliché that sounded. Still, she didn't once spot a wolf, despite her knowledge that the pack, or whatever they wanted to call themselves, was very large.
Eventually, when the sun started to set and she had trampled her new path enough times to know it well, she returned to their little campground. The yellow tent was illuminated by the lamp outside, casting shadows of a figure sat down in the small space. Hesitantly, she approached, the shotgun still in her aching arms.
She spotted his boots just outside of the tent's zipped door, and then he heard her. "Clara?"
She made herself known as he unzipped the door and she kicked off her boots, stashing the shotgun under the bags they'd left outside before he could see it. When Wyatt scooted back within the tent, she slipped inside, closing the door as he spoke.
"Where have you been? I was worried about you." He said, relief and fear evident in his watchful eyes.
"I took a walk," she replied quietly, peeling off her jacket, and then her socks, and her stiff jeans until she was just in her underwear and T-shirt, which was rather large on her anyway. As Wyatt watched with concern in his eyes, she pulled the unzipped sleeping bag over herself and lay down beside him, taking a deep breath before facing him as she felt he was about to speak.
"I'm sorry." He whispered, as if they weren't alone in the small clearing. Perhaps they weren't, she mused. Maybe the wolves were still around, slinking by with movements so silent that she would never hear them coming. "I was an asshole, but I just -" he stopped, not wanting to tear open the argument again. He settled down beside her and whispered again, "I'm sorry."
She turned onto her side, facing him and reaching down slowly to grasp his hands in hers. "Me too." She unconsciously moved closer to him, revelling in the warmth that he provided after trudging through the cold for so long. "I called Dylan. You were right - everything's fine there."
"They're safe," he murmured. "And so are you. I promise."