Yes, there is more. Happy reading.
Chapter Eight
There was nothing to do. The men were still in the Meeting cabin, discussing the rules and regulations of the Challenge. Harriet was off with a male she’d just decided to like, and everyone else was in their cabins. I stood in the circle of the houses, looking around and chewing my lip. I knew what I wanted to do. I also knew that I shouldn’t.
But I wouldn’t be missed. And now was the opportune time to go. I might never get another chance.
Glancing around one last time, I darted into the woods. As I ran, I tore off my T-shirt, ripped off my jeans, and kicked of my shoes. My pendant was burning against my skin, urgent and eager. I clamped my teeth to hold back a gratifying howl as my body stretched and grew into the most noble of animals.
This time there was no one to follow me, no one sniffing my trail out and forcing me to go over the mountain. I would have no feeble excuses now, if I went over the range. If I stepped foot on the other side of Mackenzie.
Of course I went.
The trees whistled past me, and the moon had risen high in the black expanse of the sky. A blissful smile curved my lips, and my feet seemed so light that they did not touch the ground. This was the life that I wanted. Free, the wind in my face, and no boundaries to put a stop to my run. No more having to circle the valley. I could go on, and on. There was no wall to rise up in front of me.
Nearing the human camp, I slowed, tongue hanging happily out of my mouth. I crouched and edged to my bush, neatly sliding under it. I lifted my eyes expectantly.
They were gone. The only sign that it had once been a camp was the remains of the fire, and the smell of them still hanging in the air.
I whined, the sound bursting from my throat before I could stop it. Did their mother relent, and take them back to the city? Would I never see them again? Disappointment, hot and heavy, filled my wide chest. I buried my snout in my paws, fighting the despair that sought to consume me.
“Get out of here, Dane!”
Jumping, I jerked my head back up. No one was around me, but I knew that snooty voice. Marie. Heart thumping and hope returning, I ran in the direction I’d heard her shout.
I emerged into a clearing. Almost immediately, I jumped back into the safety of the brush, but not before taking in everything. There was a house. Not like our cabins, but a large, two-floor house. There was the metal contraption on wheel, sitting on the road. The grass was short here, not long and wild like at home. The twin boys played with a ball, throwing it back and forth at each other. Marie was sitting on the step, talking into a small black thing. I tilted my head, examining the object. My ears could pick up the sound of someone speaking out of it, also. Interesting. It seemed that the object allowed someone not there to hear what you were saying, and vice versa.
I would have inched closer to get a better look at the thing, but just then Dane slammed out of the house. My ears pricked, and I became more alert.
“Where are you going?” Marie called after him, as he headed for the woods. I backed away cautiously, to stay out of sight.
“Nowhere,” he snapped back. Under his breath he added, “Where is there to go?”
As soon as he was out of sight of his sister he abruptly changed directions, right towards me. Conscious of my bright pendant, obvious even in the daylight, I hurriedly changed back to a girl, not quite thinking clearly.
Dane didn’t notice me. He took out something silver in his pocket, and inserted something in his ears. My sensitive hearing could hear the words blasting out of the small white things.
The things we think might be the same,
But I won’t fight for more.
It’s just not me to wear it on my sleeve,
Count on that for sure.
All I can say,
I shouldn’t say,
Can we take a ride?
Get out of this place while we still have time.
I followed him, so enraptured by the music and the expression on Dane’s dark face that I didn’t think enough to change back.
A twig snapped under my bare foot.
Tensing, I wildly scrambled behind a bush. But the music must have been too loud for the human to hear, because he didn’t turn, and continued stomping on through the grass. Sighing, I finally changed back to follow again.
“No service,” Dane muttered to himself, taking a black thing similar to Marie’s out of his jean pocket. While he played with the thing, I noted his clothing for the first time. He wore jeans, like the Pack did, and a short-sleeved blue T-shirt. I knew what all his clothes were, because when Charles went on his supply trips he brought them back for all of us. But on his feet Dane wore something I had never seen before. In the winter, the Pack wore boots, but the black and white things on Dane’s feet weren’t anything like boots. They had white tips, and lining around the whole shoe. The rest was black. They were very flat shoes.
“Ah!” Dane grinned at the object in his hand. I didn’t pay any attention to what he was holding, or even what he was saying—he had the most beautiful smile I’d ever seen.
Genny, you’re acting like a lovesick pup! I exploded at myself, disgusted when I realized that I was almost drooling out of one side of my mouth. An image of Jeff popped into my mind, and guilt instantly took hold. I shouldn’t have left. I shouldn’t have been staring at another male.
“Hey,” Dane suddenly said, yanking the white things out of his ears and holding the small black box to one. “Yeah, I know. I just found service. Yeah, we have it at the house. But Marie is there, and you know how that goes… Yeah. No. She’s fine, I think. Bitchy as usual, but she’s doing all right with you and her… So is Hannah there?”
He’d circled and was facing me again. I hurriedly changed back, because I knew the pendant was glowing through the scant leaves of the bush.
“Hey,” Dane said once more, though this time his voice had gone soft. I paid close attention to this new tone; it was more different than all the scowls and angry words I’d known from him this far.
“No. But I think we’ll be coming home soon, don’t worry. Mom will come around. I miss you too.”
My gut clenched, and I knew I had to leave. But I couldn’t, not with him standing there and able to look at me in a instant if he wanted to.
“So how is your team doing? Won any games so far this season?” Dane went on, stepping even closer to me. I froze, my hair hanging in my face but me unable to brush it away.
“I know. I’ll be back to help them out,” Dane grinned. A single, stray hair somehow lodged itself in my nose, and tickled. Gritting my teeth, I resisted the urge to reach up and take it out.
“It’s, ah, well it’s got a lot of wild life,” Dane said, looking around with boredom. “No human life, really, but plenty of trees and animals.”
That feeling that I recognized all-too well was rising up in my throat. No. No.
“The nearest town is close to thirty miles away,” Dane told Hannah.
Please, no.
“Isn’t it—”
I couldn’t stop myself. The hair was there, torturing me and tickling me. Dane was looking at my bush, still talking to the human girl. I had no choice; I couldn’t move. There was nothing I could do.
I sneezed.
Dane twitched, staring at the bush. “Hello?” He walked closer. I jerked back, and slammed into the trunk of a tree.
“Oomph!”
Dane dropped the black box. Quickly, more quickly than I realized normal humans could move, he parted the leaves of my bush. I stared at him. He stared at me.
“Holy shi—” he began to exclaim.
Abandoning all effort to hide or not be seen, I shoved past him and ran as fast as my two legs could carry me.
“Wait!” Dane shouted. But I had been running all my life, and I had four legs now. He couldn’t catch me.
